"Bless the LORD oh my soul"

"Praise ye the LORD. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise Him in the firmament of his power." ~Psalm 150:1

“Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless His Holy Name! Bless the Lord, O my 

soul, and forget not all His benefits: who forgives all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases, 

who redeems your life from destruction, who crowns you with loving kindness and tender 

mercies, who satisfies your mouth with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the 

eagle’s.” ~Psalm 103:1-5

“The word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even 

to the division of soul and spirit” ~ Hebrews 4:12

I felt like sharing these few verses with y'all today. *smiles* Hopefully they will bless you as much as they have blessed me.

~Melinda

A sort of Japanese experience

Life continues as busy as ever in the Sanford home. Lots has happened these past few days and I will try to fill you in as best I can. :) Sometime last week the girls decided to make a new dessert that the family had never tried. They searched the recipe books and came up with these cookies:

These are mint-chocolate cookies and they were absolutely delicious!! I think they are going to be a family favorite from now on cause they were that yummy. Good job, girls!
As some of you know Josh and Jen are up from Oklahoma for a visit. Initially we were planning on taking them to Liberty Day but our weekend was totally changed due to my soon-to-be-niece, Jael's insistence that we all were not giving her enough attention. *grin* I'll fill you in on that^^ in a second though... In the mean time here is what the guys have enjoyed doing while the weather was good.

My amazing daddy's 50th birthday is coming up soon (April 4th) and for his celebration he didn't want anything too special. Instead he wanted to do something completely random. So this past Wednesday he took us all out to a Japanese restaurant where they make and serve the food right in front of you. It was a neat experience and we all had a really good time together. Here are all of us girls right before we left...

The guy who fixed our food was a hilarious goofball. He had us all laughing pretty much the whole time with his cute accent and funny show. He started out with making lots of fire just to get our attention. ;)

What'd ya know it was dinner and a show!

At one point he tried to throw a piece of broccoli into each of our mouths. Elaina is the only one who caught it on the first try.

Here he is getting our meats onto the stove so he can start fixing them.

We all watched with awe as he cooked... lol

Later on that evening a friend of mine who loves mushrooms dared me to eat one for a dollar... here is my reaction to it... *small smile*

*laughs* I cannot believe that I am posting this picture... *hides* But it just shows how nasty mushrooms are. *nods with an angelic smile*

We all had a lovely time that night and we will always remember Daddy's 50th birthday party. <3

Now back to what's going on with Josh and Jen's baby, on Thursday morning Mom and Josh had to take Jen to the hospital because her contractions were becoming a little harder and more regular. She is 35 weeks along and so the doctors tried to stop the contractions. So far so good but now the Doctors are saying she has to stay in the hospital until she has the baby because she is still dilated and they want to keep an eye on her. It's very frustrating for Josh and Jen because they wanted a home-birth with their baby anyway. And now all this added stress of hospital life is wearing on them a little. Please keep them in your prayers!! I know they will appreciate it very much. But with all that said, Josh and Jen are doing great with trusting in the Lord and they are totally leaning on Him and in his power. They are willing to do whatever God needs them to do so in the end everything is okay. Sorry if that went in a total circle. ;) 

Hasta la próxima vez!

~Melinda

Hanging out with friends

This past Saturday some good friends of ours had us over for dinner with some of the McDonald family as well. We had such a great time hanging out while playing ping-pong and "4 on a Couch" and eating some delicious sloppy Joe's that we didn't even take any pictures. Oops. But I think that's a good thing. ;) Anyway, at the end of the night right before our family left we remembered we hadn't taken any pictures yet so we hurriedly grabbed the camera and snapped a few of us kids. Unfortunately the McDonald family had already left so we were not able to get any pictures with them. *sad face* Here are the ones we managed to get though...  

You've got to love the bright redness of Rebecca's shirt in this shot. 

Jesi and I are so similar sometimes it's scary but we manage to have a blast talking about *cough* a certain actor. *cough/grin* I love this girl! <3

Adrianna really didn't want to leave without at least getting a few pictures! This is her whiny face saying, "We can't leave yet!!" Love ya, Adi. ;)

Aren't we all such sweet and happy people?

Insides jokes run rampant at our church... We have soo many between friends that it is hard to remember them all. But the ones we made that night will definitely last awhile. ;)

These next few pictures show just how much fun we really are. *grins*

                 ~~"Hold a true friend with both your hands."~~

Ashly, my fellow third-born friend whom I love! <3 We share a secret bond of having two annoying older siblings that we love very much but find completely crazy. ;)

And that ends a wonderful night with friends. *happy sigh* We will have to do that again SOON! :D

Next up Josh and Jen are coming for a visit and our whole family is headed to Liberty Day on Friday. We cannot wait to dress in costume while listening to all the speakers share about our American history. This will be our fourth year attending and we still cannot wait to go! :)

Hasta la próxima vez!
~Meli

JUMP!

Our family is so happy about Spring coming that we decided to get a few "happy" pictures on the Trampoline. If you have captions for these pictures please feel free to share cause I can think of none. :)  

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The boys are so totally not posed in this shot. Peter actually does sing into rakes all the time, Zach and Nathan also yell into their hands on a regular bases. *cough* Just thought I'd let y'all know that. :D

Well today is Saturday so I wish y'all the most wonderful of weekends!! Enjoy this beautiful sunshine that the Lord has blessed us with! And remember to thank Him for everything good or not so good that comes your way today. He is in control of it all and has your best interests in mind.  May God bless all y'all!!

Amigos adios!
~Meli

Psalm 117
"O praise the LORD, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people. For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the LORD endureth for ever. Praise ye the LORD."

Spring pictures of the family

Yesterday while the sun was shining Mom wanted me to get some pictures of the kids so we can change the ones on Mom and Dad's bedroom wall-of-shame. ;) So I grabbed our trusty camera and went out to obey her command. These first three pictures were from times past since Josh and Jen aren't coming up till next week I couldn't wait to get a picture of them and this one is just too cute! 

Garrison is in Afghanistan so that wasn't going to work either... but this picture (besides being a bit fuzzy) is a great picture of our brother.

 I didn't feel like getting yet another picture of myself so I also used an older one. :)

Derick smiling.

Peter looking ever so nice.

Zach's growing up so fast! *sniffs*

Adrianna being as gorgeous as ever.

Nathan is also growing up too fast! *sniffs and wipes a tear*

Victoria looking cute with her new hair cut.

Rebecca smiling with her gorgeous fluff-ay hair.

And last but not least we have the baby of the family who isn't such a baby anymore. Elaina loves her new bangs and looks beautiful with them.

And those are our families Spring photos. Next time you are at our house you will see them hanging up on our wall-of-shame. ;)

Until next time! Amigos Adios!

~Melinda

*shy smile* Okay yeah it's been forever... Buut instead of trying to give reasons for not posting for 7 months I'm just going to pretend it never happened and move on. *smiles*

So my whole entire family is super duper excited that Spring is on it's way!! We cannot wait for the long hours spent outside playing volleyball, jumping on the trampoline, and goofing together. Being cooped up in the house all Winter long has gotten to us so as you can imagine. So when a sunny beautiful day like today came along we all rushed outside to enjoy the sunshine! And while we were out there we just happened to take a few pictures. :) Enjoy!

The first fruits of Spring. *happy sigh*

God's creation is so beautiful even in the early stages.

Me and my gang. *love*

Dude... I am totally related to a bunch of hunks. :)

Thanks for reading and hopefully I will get around to posting more often. But until then, amigos adios!

~Melinda