Pirates of Penzance ~ it's really over.

Glory, asleep on a couch in the basement of the theater. Poor thing, she had a cut on her nose! :(

Fine Linen's spring production, The Pirates of Penzance is officially over. Everyone at our house already sorely misses the wonderful friends we have in this group! We're looking forward to the cast party when we can spend time together again!

"A pair of ducks, a pair of ducks, a most ingenious pair of ducks" (In this case, three pairs!)

Family portrait, minus 15 daughters. LtoR: Kate (Grace), Mabel (Elise), Major General (Kevin), Isabel (Me), and Edith (Jenna).

The Stanley Sisters!
I am so very blessed by the friendship of all these sweet, talented girls.

My Uncle Chris, the policeman.

It was great fun having him in the production this year! He was so thoughtful and gave each of "his" girls - Alyssa, Megan, Grace, Jenny, Sarah, and Me - two red roses after our final performance. :)

They are the Pirates Who Don't Do Anything!

The kids all did a super job, and were very fun to watch. (Plus, they were cute!)

I love this picture because it was taken at the end of our afternoon performance, and everyone was tired and ready to eat lunch. I think most people plastered smiles on their faces for the cast pictures (I know I did!). You can tell Meg and Tess are fading fast... :)

Growing to be More Like Christ

"You cannot despise becoming what you enjoy about God. Joy in the God who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for undeserving sinners cannot return evil for evil. That joy will love being merciful. 'He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.' (Micah 6:8). Joy in the God who is slow to anger cannot coexist with its own impatience. It will fight for the triumph of what it admires in God. Joy in the God who spends eternity showing 'the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness toward us.' (Eph. 2:7) delights to be generous and looks for ways to give."
~from John Piper's Don't Waste Your Life

Baseball Games

After the zoo, we met up with the Hall family to watch Andy play baseball. It turned out that we didn't actually get to see him play, but it was still fun to be at the ballpark with friends.
Isaac Hall (age 5) took some really good pictures with my camera, and I thought I'd post them so you could see for yourself what a fine cameraman he is! :)


"... God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong." (1 Cor. 1:27)
"From the lips of children and infants You have ordained praise..." (Ps. 8:2)

He even caught one of his brother, Andy!

These pictures were from our zoo trip as well, but they are of me, which is why I didn't post them before. Becky and I skipped out on the aviary (neither one of us is too crazy about the birds) and wandered along a side path while waiting for the others in our group. We came across these strange stones set up along the walkway. They had incredibly weird quotes on them which didn't really add in a positive way to the whole "zoo experience". But since we were somewhat bored, we decided to have a little photo shoot!
On my previous zoo post, I got a comment from a certain girlfriend of mine requesting that I post these pictures for all the world to see our - or rather, my - craziness. :) I love you, Becky Girl.


It's okay to laugh at me... I was being funny. So was Becky, but for some reason we didn't get any pictures of her next to the random colored orbes. ;)

I just had to put one in black and white! You know me and the whole "old-fashioned" tendency.

St. Louis Zoo

Some friends piled into a fifteen passenger van and made a trip to the zoo one fine spring day. They had a nice time, enjoying the fresh air and each others' company. The handiwork of their Heavenly Father was displayed before their eyes at every turn. These friends are so very blessed to be brothers and sisters, living to glorify the Master Creator!

The penguin house was quite... smelly.

These two were so photogenic! Don't they make a cute couple? :)

The elephants were probably my favorite!

Here we have a Nathan, being funny. I laughed... so did other people walking by on the path.

Another elephant!

I am pleased to have gotten a picture of my dear Becky, even if it is with her back turned. She doesn't like having her picture taken very much, but I don't know why, because she is a beautiful young woman - inside and out.

Flowers in spring serve as a reminder of our God's faithfulness.

"The Lord will fulfill His purpose for me; your love, O Lord, endures forever - do not abandon the works of your hands." (Ps. 138:8)

An adventurous cameraman.

Hippos! They make me think of the VBS song... :)

Mark and Zeph sneak stealthily through the tangled forest.

Special Occasion

Daddy, Josh and I went to a parent/teen formal dinner with our Landmark friends a couple weeks ago. It was really nice, and we had fun taking pictures of everyone all dressed up.

This is Josh and some of the guys he goes to school with - LtoR: Josh, Chris, Ryan, and Zach. I "stole" the picture from a friend. :)

I have more pictures, but they're not in the computer yet, and I have a crazy (fun!) busy few days ahead. So it might be a little while before they get posted.

Sad, Funny, and True

PoP ~ a peek behind the scenes

Of course, there is almost always homework being done backstage!

Abby!

It's an inside joke... they're getting into character. :)

I'm going to have to fight (I already am!) to keep the guys away from these two beauties!

Joy, looking very pretty.

They're sad because it was time to say goodbye...

... until the next day's performance when they'd see each other again for like four hours! lol

I love these two girlies.

PoP pictures ~ on stage

My lovely cousin, Alyssa Jean.

Being captured!

This is one of my favorite scenes... the stage is so full of wonderful people!

The beautiful Mabel. Elise has such an amazing voice... the Lord has really blessed her with a talent for singing!

Parasols and "spying" girls.

Me with Jeni, one of my many Stanley sisters. :)

Frederick and Ruth.

Nathan and Amanda... they are both so dedicated to their roles, and are really fun to watch!

More from John Piper

"We measure the worth of a hidden treasure by what we will gladly sell to buy it. If we will sell all, then we measure the worth as supreme. If we will not, what we have is treasured more. 'The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.' (Matt. 13:44). The extent of his sacrifice and the depth of his joy display the worth he puts on the treasure of God. Loss and suffering, joyfully accepted for the kingdom of God, show the supremacy of God's worth more clearly in the world than all worship and prayer."

"Pirates" pictures coming soon!

Kittens!

Very late on Easter night, five sweet kittens were born! Curio is (once again) a wonderful mama, and is enjoying her precious new babies. We haven't named them yet, but there are three tigers and two blacks. They are extremely small, since they were premature. Hopefully I'll have a little photo shoot tomorrow and get the announcement pictures posted soon. :)

When I told daddy I had news for him on Monday morning, he immediately asked, "Am I a grandpa again?"

Love,
ashley

from "Don't Waste Your Life" by john piper

"... it is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that with full courage now as always Christ will be honored in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain." (Phil.1:20,21)

Notice verse 20: "It is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed." Stop here just a moment. Shame is that horrible feeling of guilt or failure when you don't measure up before people whose approval you want very much. It's what the little child feels in the Christmas program when he forgets his lines, and the tears well up, and the silence seems eternal, and the other kids snicker brutally. I remember these horrible times...
What then is the opposite of shame? It's when the child remembers the lines and hears the applause... The opposite of being shamed is being honored. Yes, usually. But Paul was a very unusual person. And Christians ought to be very unusual people. For Paul, the opposite of being shamed was not his being honored, but Christ's being honored through him. "It is my eager expectation and hope that I will not be at all ashamed, but that... Christ will be honored in my body."
What you love determines what you feel shame about. If you love for men to make much of you, you will feel shame when they don't. But if you love for men to make much of Christ, then you will feel shame when He is belittled on your account. And Paul loved Christ more than anything or anyone. "Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord." (Phil.3:7-8).
Whenever something is of tremendous value to you, and you cherish its beauty or power or uniqueness, you want to draw others' attention to it and waken in them the same joy. That is why Paul's all-consuming goal in life was for Christ to be magnified. Christ was of infinite value to Paul, and so Paul longed for others to see and savor this value. That is what it means to magnify Christ - to show the magnitude of His value.

Fun Memory

This was Corrie, Me, and Becky during last year's Fine Linen production! "Prince and the Pauper" was so much fun, and we've added many new friends to the group since then. The Lord is wonderful to bless our lives with dear friends such as these!

Shopping Trip ~ enjoy!

You know the expression "shop 'til you drop"? Here's a good example.

Pouting Models...

...what happened to their arms?

Keeping track of purchases.

Her head is too big.

Stephanie Anne!!

mmhhmmm ...

wild and crazy

Our lovely mama, my most special girlfriend.