Blessings...

On March 27, 2008 at 5:40 p.m. Miss Madison Carrell was born at the Mt. Carmel Hospital in Dublin, Ireland. Although this was my sixth baby, I have never been so nervous before! I was induced in the morning and the day before- I was a wreck! After I got to the hospital- everything was fine. Maybe I just knew exactly what was waiting for me- I don't know! But- I am so very thankful that Madison is here and she is healthy. I often call her my little heaven. There is nothing more precious than a new little baby. They smell good, they snuggle nicely and they love their mom. How blessed we are. We have 6 healthy children. They are each unique and fun. The five big kids have been such great helpers this week. Madison and I got home from the hospital right before church on Sunday. You should have seen them after church- they each took turns holding the baby for hours! It was very sweet. Just a little while ago, I was holding Madison, who was very much asleep. I looked down at her and she was smiling, then she started to giggle. What was she thinking about? I wish I knew...

Count your many blessings.

The Beginning of our Blog

Since we are living in Ireland and actually doing some fun things- we thought we would try this whole blogging thing. We were able to go to Zermatt, Switzerland in January and it was fabulous! We rented an apartment in Zermatt for the time we were there. What a surprise it was to open the curtains (after arriving in the dark the following evening) and see the Matterhorn looming over us. (Claire thought that the Matterhorn looked like Mt. Crumpet from the Grinch...) For the few days there- the sky was blue and the weather was beautiful! Danny and the kids (Kailey, Jake and Shelby) went skiing a couple of times and had a great time. It was the kids' first time on the slopes and they enjoyed it and did well. Claire, Emery and I enjoyed our mornings lounging around and exploring a bit. (Which means that we went out and I forgot the map- so we wandered around and missed the town completely.) We spent the afternoons exploring the town of Zermatt and that was fun. We found that buying food at the local supermarket was better than the "family friendly" restaurant that we tried. (It was less than kid friendly- but maybe we just picked the wrong one!) Our friends, the Buckners spent the last two days with us and the apartment felt a bit smaller- but still sufficient for our needs. All of us went tobogganing together. It took a good 10-15 minutes to go on the whole trail. It was more of a ski run than a sledding trail. It was amazing! The sleds had no brakes- you had to use your feet to slow and stop. It was so much fun. After going down the sled run- we would take the train to the next stop in order to do it again. We had to do it several times. There were a few serious wipeouts, but those just make the stories more fun to tell.

We enjoyed the train ride back to Zurich (as it got dark too fast on the way to Zermatt- we couldn't see much) and loved seeing the beautiful Swiss countryside. Switzerland is God's country.