My blog is moving

Sooooo.... we have a new website and THIS BLOG has MOVED to that website.  From now on I will be updating my blog on:

http://tjandlily.com/blog/

Penny 3 months

Just to be clear... I am wearing a dress! 

not sure what she thinks about this

Sister Love!

The faces of Penny: (missing the poop face ;)

Penny was 3 months on the first of June, she is incredible... I am so in love with her!  She has rolled over once, but no more since that one time, she coos and laughs at us now, it's not a full belly laugh, but getting oh so close!  I am told she looks like me which is also fun.  She has such a sweet personality, I am looking forward to see how it unfolds as she gets older.
Ava is being potty trained at the moment, we have been doing poopoo on the potty but not much else, so today is the first day of true potty training so I'll let you know how it goes.  So far today she pooped on the toilet, which I didn't expect, but we haven't had any peepee accidents yet... I AM expecting them  :/

Birthdays and Life!

isn't Penny supposed to be sucking on that?  :)

Love

kind of scary, but she really loves her sister

Our friend Esther

sweet babies!

made chocolate bagels, now I know what to do when craving
Uncle Harry's chocolate chocolate chip bagels.... sooo good!

someone's flexible!

Pretty girl!

my "sweet" baby  ;)

TJ caught a fish and we ate it  :)

Our curious girl!

my surprise Birthday Party on TJ's Birthday

cousins... friends

This is the "Do I want to listen to you?" Look

Happy Birthday TJ!

Happy Birthday Me!

Our Sweet Penny!

TJ and my birthday's are two days apart, his May 27^th, mine the 29th... it makes for an interesting dynamic. This year was my 25^th birthday, and TJ decided to throw me a surprise party. We were attending another party Sunday afternoon, while during TJ informed me that his brother Kyle's truck broke down and we needed to go help him, and he just wanted me to go with him, so I just went with it, he called Kyle on the way there (or pretended to) and said he was in a park, so we pulled off and while I'm looking out for Kyle, it seems weird that his truck would be broke down in a park, but whatever so we pull up, and I see all these people with stuff for a picnic or something, and I say to TJ “Kyle lied to you, Look... their throwing you a party! ;)” And as I get out of the car and walk closer, they all say Surprise Lily! I was a little confused seeing how this all happened ON TJ's birthday... crazy guy, he got me! I'm hard to surprise because I'm too inquisitive... I ask too many questions if you know what I mean. I like to know what's going on, and I'm good at figuring things out, I guess he knows me pretty well, because I was thoroughly surprised. On my actual birthday, TJ had to work, which was fine, we had a long weekend together, so I had a normal day, and for dinner we went to my sister and brother in law's house, Kyle and Cherie, she made us a hibachi style dinner with yum yum sauce (yum yum! HA!), it was absolutely delicious, then blackberry cobbler for dessert, that was absolutely divine! Quite the delicious homemade birthday dinner, I felt honored and loved. One of my favorite things to do is cook for people, so it meant a lot to me, them cooking me a delicious meal.

On another note, I have been enjoying my girls so much lately, they bring me such joy! Ava LOVES Penny, I tried to put a few pictures in here to portray that. Penny is just the cutest thing to me, I can't stop squeezing her! She is getting chunkier which is course adds to the cuteness, and she just started laughing which is so fun, so of course TJ and I are now always trying to get her to laugh. Ava is amazing me with her memory and words, she is saying so many different words, and also perfecting pronunciation on words she has already learned, it's so fun to see her grow and learn.

Embarrassing Stories

I have stories!
Ava has never embarrassed me in this way before, so I figure this is the time to document it.  We went to Costco on Saturday as a family, they are only located in Orlando which is a 50 min drive for us, so we took a family trip to do a couple things including going to Costco.  After we got a large cart of goodies, we are standing in the checkout line, meanwhile Ava is walking and right next to us is a larger lady wearing shorts, Ava just sort of touched her legs with her hands.  I felt bad that Ava accidentally touched this lady's legs, but then Ava took a step towards her once again and gently grabbed the fat on her legs... OH MY WORD!  I realize Ava thinks the fat on her legs looks kind of interesting and so she is investigating to see what this stuff really is, as I lean down to pick Ava up I start laughing, and quickly stop myself, and as I pick her up she is still looking down staring at the lady's legs while I tell Ava to "say hi to the nice lady" and "sorry about that :/"  I quickly walk away while TJ finishes up.
  I wish I could say it was over, but as we were on our way out with our very heavy car we are approaching  the very long line of people and their carts getting their receipts checked before they leave the store... Ava is very tired, and giving TJ a hard time, and I'm dealing with Penny because I just took her out of my wrap, as I look up I see that our cart is rolling towards this woman's large booty (no condemnation here, it's just the facts), I yell "TJaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!"  but it was too late, the cart had run right into her bum, we both wanted to die right there, we felt really bad, TJ said "sorry... Kids!"  I don't know if that was the right thing to say, but she definitely scowled at us, and quickly moved to the other line, I suppose I would probably do the same thing...maybe.
That's all folks

Family Progress

As for how we are doing now... I would say things are going well, God has been faithful (is that really a surprise? ;) Penny is getting bigger... and cuter! She pretty much sleeps through the night now which is great, but for some reason I still have a hard time getting enough sleep, especially with Ava waking up at about 6:15 every morning. Penny can hold up her head pretty good, and we found that she loves to sit in the jumperoo, it gives her something to do, she likes to be up and moving around a little more than Ava did at this age. Ava is pouring out the words out right now, it is really fun to finally have Ava talking, she has also been going poopoo on the toilet almost every day, she doesn't like to do all her #1's on the potty, but I'm grateful for the poop in the potty right now, we will work on the rest as she desires to go on the potty more.

I have been letting you know what's going on with our church... well there are some new things to be known.    We have a new interim Pastor until we get a Pastor of our own, and we are so thankful for him coming to us to help out our church in a time of need.  TJ has still been leading worship, and I've been singing with him, which I actually really enjoy :).  

Also, our church is still behind us and what we're doing, and are A ok with us going to school this fall. TJ also feels like this is what God has for us right now, and hasn't heard any different from Him, so we're just following God's leading. We are still saving money and are not to our goal yet, I have estimated that we need about $35,000 (for all our needs & school costs), and we are about $11,000 short of what we need for 2 years at the the New Tribes Missionary Training Center .  If you are interested in supporting us right now (while we're in school) here is the information:

~Check:  Made out to New Tribes Mission

                                1000 E. First St.

                                Sanford, FL 32771-1487

              with a note saying it is to go to us (TJ and Lily Shropshire - students at MTC)

~Credit card:  set up by calling NTM headquarters at            1-866-547-2460       or            1-407-323-3430      

~Electronic transfer - set up by calling NTM headquarters at             1-866-547-2460       or            1-407-323-3430      

Until we are NTM missionaries these donations will not be tax deductible.

Thank you for being interested in who we are and what we're doing, and would love for you to be a part of it!

In the beginning of June we will be having a yard sale at a friend's house and people in the church are donating things to be sold there, and this money will go to supporting us while we are at school, we are really thankful for the effort people are putting in, and support from our church.  We are also in the process of getting our new website up, and prayer cards made.