Loving Life

When Aaron and I first got married, I relieved him of the responsibility of making a big deal about Valentine's Day in our marriage. I don't want him to get me something because he "has" to do it. He does a great job of surprising me with little things throughout the year, just because so I feel quite loved by him throughout the year. So I was quite surprised when he came home from the city two days before Valentine's Day with these lovely roses for me. It was super sweet of him. They are gracing my dining room table and make me smile when I pass them by. I grew up with this tradition and have carried it on in my kids. Every Valentine's morning we would wake up to a hand cut out heart from our Mom with a note on the inside of it letting us know how much she loved us. I usually remember to do it very last minute. This year was no exception. Keilah woke up at 5:15 to nurse that morning and it was then that I realized I hadn't gotten my hearts done yet. ...

I know I haven't posted for a little while. Christmas was busy, but fun, and we made it through in one piece! Here are a couple of highlights from Christmas week. Keilah got to wear her cute reindeer hat for Christmas. She's obviously thrilled to pieces by it. Abby got this "fake American Girl doll" as she likes to call it. She got it from my mom and told her that it's the best present she has ever received. She takes it with her all over the place. On Sunday, she tried her best to match her doll with her clothes and hair.  I think the doll's name is Rosalind according to Abby.  Ana's gift this year had to do with sewing.  My mom got her a sewing basket (my mom struck gold this year with the girls as they both told her that it was the best gift they'd ever received). I got her a bunch of cloth and sewing supplies, along with some free downloaded patterns to make doll clothes.  She was quite delighted with that gift. David got a 1000 p...

I had a great, productive weekend.  Here are some of the things that got done. The first is little candy sleighs for our seminar kids.  Aaron and I are seminar parents at our local high school. I made these cute little things for our kids (they are all juniors this year).  I think they turned out very nicely. And before you get all impressed with my amazing creativity, don't. That's what the internet is for. And google. We'll be making more of these for the girls' teachers at school.  The next family project was putting up our Christmas tree.  I kind of dread it, but love it at the same time.  I only dread it because our tree is so huge and takes up so much of our living room space. It really didn't look like such a big tree in the store when I bought it. :) We blasted Christmas music while we all worked to put it up. It was a lot of fun. David is helping Abby put the top of the tree on. It's nice to have such a big, t...

What, your husband doesn't lounge around in his courderoy vest, tie, and pocket watch on Saturday morning preparing for his Sunday sermon? And your daughters don't inhale half of a watermelon in 15 minutes? And your son doesn't wander around the house randomly quacking and mooing? Yeah, my family doesn't do that either.

Welcome back to part two of our vacation! Once the kids had sufficiently dried out to just being damp, we allowed them back in the van where we went back to the hotel to shower and properly dry off from the big lake adventure.  We nibbled on some snacks on our way down to Kenosha, WI where we toured the Jelly Belly factory.  They have free tours available.  They didn't take you to see any of the actual production, but you got to ride on a little train and watch various clips about how they make Jelly Bellys.  It was pretty interesting.  We each got a free small bag of jelly belly's to take home with us too.  And of course you also had the option of spending your life savings on Jelly Belly's in their store once the tour was over.  We each had a dollar to spend, and found several small bags of candy on sale that we bought.  After that tour, we ended up at a Civil War Museum - this was mainly for Aaron's enjoyment, but the rest of us enjoyed it as ...

Did you miss me? We were on vacation last week! We had an awesome time together, but it sure is always good to come back home.  We spent the week exploring parts of Wisconsin.  Originally, we were planning on camping out for most of it as we usually do.  However, the weekend before we left, I came down with a nasty kidney infection - definitely not fun and was pretty scary as I was having what felt like fairly regular contractions.  Ended up going into the OB unit to figure out what was going on with me.  Baby was doing just fine and they gave me a jump start on antibiotics with a shot in each hip.  Saturday and Sunday were supposed to be my big preparation days for getting ready for vacation, but the kidney infection completely wiped out any energy I had.  I spent most of the day sleeping and lying down.  This would not bode well for camping preparations.  On our way to the hospital Friday night, we called a friend to be praying for us ...

Seems like it's been awhile since I posted anything.  We've had a very busy last few weeks.  First my family all came out to help my Grandpa celebrate his 90th birthday.  It was fun to be able to see everyone again and hang out.  One day we took our family and my brother's family up to a nearby lake and let them all have fun swimming around.  Everyone enjoyed it.  I didn't swim though as I need the temperature to be about 95 outside to be hot enough to feel like swimming is a good idea.  I'm cold enough most other times of the year that I'd rather not be cold when I'm supposed to be hot!  Here are my kids during a snack break (don't mind David's puffed out cheeks) - they were all cold from coming out of the water, so the girls huddled up to David to pretend they were penguins and get warmed up. Earlier this year, my MIL and I worked on making a border for my flower bed.  I'm still looking for fuss free perrenials to fill in the gaps, but I'm...

On Friday, my grandpa turned 90.  We held a big family celebration in his honor yesterday. We were missing two of my cousins from Texas, but everyone else was able to make it out. What a treat to come together as a family and honor this man who made most of our lives possible.  He and Grandma have poured so much of their lives into their family and have given so much of themselves.  It's been a harder transition for both of them to start to finally accept help from the family now as they deal with declining health.  They are still living independently and enjoy having family come around and visit them as much as possible. I deeply love my grandparents and cherish my many memories that I have with them.  I'm also delighted that my own children have been able to get to know them and have them be a part of their lives as well.

Since today is Father's Day, I thought I would write a little bit about my dad for you to enjoy. Here he is in one of my all time favorite pictures of him - he's holding Abby on her 1st birthday. Top 10 Things I Learned From My Dad - in no particular order: 1. How to work hard - My dad is one of the hardest workers I know.  He taught me the value of working hard and taking pride in a job well done. 2.  How to do a job well - I think I inherited my perfectionistic tendencies from Dad.  If he is in charge of a job, then you know it will be done to the highest possible standard - even if it's just doing something "mundane" like cleaning out the garage.  You know that it has never been that clean "since the last time he cleaned it out". 3.  How to laugh hard - My dad has the greatest laugh in the world - it's quite contagious when he gets going.  I love to be stupid around him and make him laugh. 4.  How to laugh at yourself - My dad has a n...

I spent the day at my parents house for Thanksgiving and my mother reminded me that it had been awhile since my last update.  I agreed.  Rather than overwhelm you with the various tidbits of my life since I last blogged, I'll try to keep it short.  I have included two pictures of various writings that occurred this past week.  The first is from Abby.  She has inherited my small mouth (as did Ana), and had to have two teeth pulled this past week to make room for her two grown up teeth that were trying to squeeze in.  There was considerable anxiety about the whole procedure going in to it.  That evening, she dictated a note to Ana to write to the tooth fairy. It reads: (and I'll use the correct spelling - as Ana still spells pretty phonetically) "Dear Tooth Fairy (which ever one you are), Can you please give me a little extra money because I was scared at the dentist office?  Abby."  Those are her two teeth laying there on the note, ...

... but didn't take any pictures.  Last week, the kids and I took a little trip out to visit friends and family in Indiana.  I had a great time.  Here are things I could have taken pictures of, but failed to do so: visiting Aaron's grandma visits with Grandma Kay & Grandpa Tom (Aaron's folks) and their cute little apartment 1st birthday party of my only niece on Aaron's side very delicious family meals staying with Aaron's aunt visiting with several good friends eating ice cream making noodles for the first time fun vehicle trips to and from Indiana I decided if I ever need a retreat time, I will go to Indiana now that Aaron's folks are out there.  I arrived and dropped my kids off for several days.  I popped in and out for meals and to say good morning and good night to the kids.  There is enough family out there now for the kids to be spoken for most days.  We did one day of school while "on vacation".  I hung out with friends I ha...

So perhaps you were thinking I had died or something since I haven't posted in awhile.  I want to assure you that I am alive and well.  Life got pretty busy this past little while, so blogging took a back seat for the time.  One of the biggest (and most fun) things that happened just this last weekend was getting to be at my lovely sister's wedding.  Here is the beautiful couple (my sister definitely got the beauty genes in the family!) Here is their family with five beautiful girls! My brother's wife was able to fly out from VA and be the wedding photographer.  She does AMAZING pictures.  If you are ever in the market for pictures that make you look like you should be in a magazine check out Keesha at RubySky Photography ! (plus when you check out her website, you'll hear one my favorite bands ever, but more on that later!).  Here is Keesha working her magic. The wedding was outdoors at their house.  They had rented a big tent canopy for ...