busy as a bee

A busy honeybee on a spring crocus

I’m really too busy to be posting, but I couldn’t not share this with you. I spent the day with my mom yesterday since it was her birthday, on our way into the restaurant for lunch, she pointed out these beautiful little flowers with honeybees buzzing around. I was so stinkin’ excited! This winter has seemed to last forever, even though it’s been relatively mild. I just love spring and summer and I could have just laid down in those flowers all day. It was about 60 degrees and sunny. What a lovely day.

Life is moving along at lightning pace, but I’ve gotten a better grip on a work/home life balance. I’m looking forward to the month of April when (fingers crossed) things should slow down a bit.

Baby Elam (now 7 months old) cut his first tooth on my birthday a couple weeks ago. It made me crazy. Little Ezra (3 years old) is potty trained and says the wildest things. I’m so blessed. My husband is a sweety, too. 😉

Enjoy the weekend, wherever you are and whatever you do!

the good and not so good

I talked to my younger sister last night who reminded me that I haven’t blogged much lately. Of course, my excuse was “I’m so busy!” which is true. I miss blogging terribly and thought I would MAKE time to post something, even if it’s a little quick. 🙂

32 week pregnant shadow

This is a pregnant shadow picture of me, now 32 weeks along (33 tomorrow, actually). I can’t believe I’m only about 7 weeks from baby #2 being in my arms instead of my belly. In this shot, I was huffing it up a hill with my two year old son. He insisted walking down this big, steep bank in the field. He did great walking about a half mile, then I ended up carrying him the last eighth or so to his Granny and Poppy’s house. Thirty pounds in your arms and 20 some in your belly make for a good workout!

My son insisting we go through the gate and into the field

There’s been lots of good and not so good things happening this week. Here’s my list to keep it simple…

THE GOOD

• Got my son’s twin bed from IKEA assembled last Tuesday evening in less than 2 hours. He loves it, thankfully!
  

  Forgive the blurriness, but this is my pregnant self after assembling the cool bed last week. I AM a carpenter’s daughter.

• My garden is surviving and starting to come along. I picked up some watermelon and cantaloupe plants today to add as well.
• Had a wonderful visit with my brother in law and his family the weekend before last. They came all the way from Colorado to see us!
• Mom hemmed my curtains I’d gotten from IKEA so now most of my windows are dressed. I got 2 sets of curtains & 4 valances for $20…thrifty!
  

  My living room curtains

THE NOT SO GOOD

• Woke up sick with a stomach bug last Wednesday morning and it’s hung on for almost a week! I never get sick, so this has drained me. The baby is moving a lot, so that’s good, but my exercise has slacked. I’ve done more yoga (which is GOOD), but that’s about all besides walking around the farm with my kiddo.
• Didn’t pass my BodyPump assessment video to become certified as an instructor. Thankfully, they give you another chance and they’ve extended my submission date till the end of September since I’m so pregnant. I’ll get it next time.

Well, let’s get busy again. I hope to share some more pictures from my good camera soon. I’ve gotten some good shots here lately in the beautiful Virginia springtime that I really want to share. Have a blessed day!

poppies and more

There’s a gazillion things I’d love to blog about, but you (my readers) seem to be more like me and prefer pictures. So, I’ll let you create your own story about what I’ve been up to lately…

My son pointing to something in the field

Virginia dogwoods bloomed beautifully this year

I see the moon and the moon sees me…God bless the moon and God bless me…

Playing in the woods like usual

My son insisted on playing in the rain on a cold May day

This is one of my favorite shots of my son. He loves poppies.

I love poppies too

My son and his “poppy”

Father and son going fishing

My son and one of his Colorado cousins home for a visit

The other sweet Colorado cousin

easter and earth day in photos

Thought you might enjoy some Easter and Earth Day photos I captured…they kind of went hand in hand this year.

My son fishing in the field on his way to the woods.

Our church group picked up trash on Monday – 10 bags in 1 mile.

Church community egg hunt on Saturday.

My husband and his perfected walkway. He’s worked hard!

Father and son working on the walkway.

“Happy Easter Morning!” my son would say. He got a pretend fishing pole and a hat to wear.

Me, my husband, and son (and baby to be 27 weeks).

My son and my dad playing with sticks in the field by our house.

My dad and me.

My step dad, mom, and me.

Watching his daddy approach on the 4 wheeler.

Playing at the pond Easter afternoon.

Drinking fresh spring water from the source.

Playing in the COLD water.

A spider has made its home at the pond.

Earth Day sunrise.

resurrected savior

Image courtesy of http://muncksquiver.blogspot.com/2012/11/thankful-foran-empty-tomb.html

I had set my alarm for for 5:15 am, but the cat woke me up at 4:15, so I thought I would get up and start the day. Maybe it was God that woke me up so I could read in my Sunday School lesson and not feel rushed.

Easter is this Sunday…in a way, it’s bigger than Christmas to Christians. It was great that Jesus was born, but if He never came back from the dead, then what would be our testimony? Part of this morning’s reading helped describe it really well to me:

“The establishment and spread of Christianity makes sense only on the basis of Jesus’ resurrection. Other self-proclaimed messiahs had their fledgling movements dry up with their deaths. Why did the Christian movement flourish following Jesus’ death? N.T. Wright, a scholar who has written extensively about the resurrection, contended:

If nothing happened to the body of Jesus,…I cannot see why anyone would have continued to belong to his movement and to regard him as its Messiah. There were several other Messianic or quasi-Messianic movements within a hundred years either side of Jesus. They ended with the leader’s being killed by the authorities or by a rival group. If your Messiah is killed, you conclude he was not the Messiah. Some of those movements continued to exist; where they did, they took a new leader from the same family. (But note: Nobody ever said James, the brother of Jesus, was the Messiah.) Such groups did not go around saying their Messiah had been raised from the dead.”

No one ever found the body of Jesus after He rose on the third day. What does that say?

This week, remember that “Jesus is the reason for the season” just like at Christmas. It’s just like Santa is the focus of Christmas and the Easter bunny is the focus of Easter. Focus on God, and reflect on what He did for us.

By the way, don’t be a CEO Christian…a “Christmas and Easter Only” churchgoer. I heard a preacher say something about that the other day and it was amusing to me.

spring in charlotte, nc

My husband and I spent the weekend in Charlotte, NC for a charity flag football tournament he plays in every year (for several years). It was a beautiful, hot weekend – a nice little getaway.

We traveled with my husband’s friend and his girlfriend. While the boys played golf, we girls shopped a bit. I got a clock for our new house (finally) and plan to hang it today. That night, I got to sneak away and watch “The Grand Budapest Hotel” at this small theater all by myself. I love going to the movies and used to do it a lot before our son came along. The movie was good – I won’t say great, but I’m glad I saw it. Adrian Brodey’s performance surprised me – he was the villain and I’m not used to that.

Saturday, all 4 of us got pedicures, even the boys! I honestly about got sick when the pedicurists had to break out the cheese grater things for the boys’ heels…it was disgusting. But, it felt great and my toes are a pretty teal color now. We had sushi Uptown and then headed over to watch the games. Our guys played their first of three games in Panther stadium, then the last two games were on the practice fields. It was sunny and hot, so I bummed some shade off the medic tent. I don’t mind the heat, but being 6 months preggo in the blazing sun was a little risky. They ended up winning 1 of 3, which was good but not good enough to let them move onto the finals on Sunday.

My husband’s flag football team – The Highlanders

That night, we had dinner at McCormick and Schmicks Uptown and it was very good. They were having this cool road bike race which was right up my alley…made me miss being on my bike, but hopefully I’ll get to ride this fall after baby #2 arrives and I’m recuperated.

After a short trip to Trader Joe’s yesterday morning, we headed back home and were so glad to see our son whom we’d left with the grandparents for the weekend. It’s crazy how much you miss your kids when you’re away from them. I mean, I had the one with me (and he/she’s really moving so I was reminded that I was never alone), but I missed our 2 year old. It’s nice to have a little break from chasing a toddler non-stop, but it was really nice to see his little blond head and have him chattering all afternoon. We just love him so much.

I was tickled to see the Bradford pear trees have really blossomed and the grass is starting to grow in our dirt yard. AND, my tomato seeds have all popped up now, too! I’m waiting on the eggplant seeds to sprout and I’ve asked my husband to till our garden space beside the house sometime soon. I plan to plan around May 10 after the annual cold snap.

If you’ve never visited Charlotte, NC I do recommend it. I love the Uptown part which is what I’m most familiar with. We normally stay at the Double Tree on West Trade Street and it’s my favorite hotel there. We stayed at the Omni last year and it was just too loud. The Double Tree is a little removed and they give you cookies…yummy cookies!

Well, let’s get ready for a busy, full week at work…and cooler temps this week. Spring is here, thankfully, but this weekend was spoilingly beautiful!

meal planning, cooking, and rest

I did well planning out three meals last Sunday that I could prepare this past week and I actually ended up fixing all of them! I made the veggie pasta Monday, the ratatouille Wednesday, and the black bean burritos Thursday. All of them were good, but I think the burritos were best. I ended up with left over asparagus, mushrooms, and something else that I plan to make stir fry with this evening before they go bad. I picked up some frozen shrimp (from the NC coast, to be as local as possible) and will fix those up with the veggies then serve with rice. Easy Sunday evening dinner.

This week, I found these sweet potato burritos I plan to make one night. Then, I think I’ll make plain old spaghetti one evening, too. Not sure what I will do the other nights this week, but I have no doubt I will figure it out before then. I didn’t plan too much this week because we’re not going to be home a couple nights for dinner, so we’ll eat out.

I had a blast cooking this week! My younger sister had bought us this big chopping block for Christmas, but I didn’t break it out until we moved into our new house. She brought me these pretty new knives when she visited a couple of weeks ago, so I’ve enjoyed chopping up the fresh ingredients to go in our meals. I missed cooking with a real stove and lots of room.

Speaking of more room, we DID move into our new home almost three weeks ago! I was hesitant to blog about it for a while, because of some legalities, but it’s pretty well-known now so what the heck. We are loving our new place! My son has adapted well to his new room and things have gone fairly well. I enjoy our new living room and dining room furniture and it’s been fun decorating. I still don’t have any art or photos on the wall – I’m being very strategic. I want BIG things or groups of small things to look big. We still have about 3.5 months before this second baby arrives, so I have time to rest a little here and there…but how much rest do you get when you have a two year old?!

On the topic of rest – that was our Sunday school lesson from today and it was a very good one. I have enjoyed the past 6 weeks lessons about work, money, generosity and now rest (my personal favorite). It talked about how God created the earth in 6 days and rested on the 7th and how he set an example for the rest of us to follow. A lot of times, we get so wrapped up in life and all the things we have to do that we don’t rest nearly enough, but it’s important to do so at least one day a week. Rest and reflect. So, make it a point to build that into your weekly routine, even if it’s not Sunday.

Here are some recent photos – some of the new house and some from my cooking experiences this week. Enjoy!

Our new home sweet home

Me, my son, and husband on our new couch (which I love)

Having dinner one night at our new table

My son enjoying the ottoman

A sunrise from our back deck

The veggies for my pasta dish on Monday

Father and son working in the yard on a pretty spring day

My great aunt had a dinner for my mom and step dad’s anniversary – pretty place settings

My son playing in the dirt pile at his Paw Paw’s house

spring

Thought you  might enjoy a 30 second video clip of the birds singing from my back porch one morning last week. To God be the glory!

st. patty’s day robins and corned beef

I made this great corned beef & cabbage in the slow cooker on Monday for St. Patrick’s Day. The recipe popped through on my email from allrecipes.com (I love those daily recipes). The grocery store was out of regular cabbage, so I got savoy cabbage and it was just as good. I could have eaten my weight in the stuff Monday night! I packed left overs for lunch today and probably will tomorrow, too. So yummy.

that’s one of the pictures from allrecipes.com – I didn’t get a picture of mine

We also had a swarm of robins in our yard on Monday eating all our earthworms. I bet there were 100 robins bouncing around out there. It was amazing. They are so fun to watch.

count your blessings

This week has flown by and I’ve been a silent blogger. There’s been a lot going on! I wanted to share with you the blessings I’ve been bestowed this week.

There’s a song we sing in church that goes like this:

Count your blessings name them one by one
Count your blessings see what God has done
County your blessings name them one by one
Count your many blessings see what God has done

It’s a sweet little song and it really makes you think about how blessed and loved you are. So, here are my top blessings of the week…

1. A healthy child – even though he’s had a fever, snotty nose, and sneezing since Thursday evening, he’s still a healthy kiddo in the grand scheme of things. He’s not been sick in forever and he’s such a happy boy. We went to the Great Wolf Lodge in Concord, NC last Sunday & Monday (which we loved) and there was a girl there who obviously had Down’s syndrome. She seemed to be having a great time in the water, but it just made me realize how fortunate we are to have a healthy child with no afflictions. It was interesting because later my husband pointed out the same thing to me.
   

   Our son loved the wave pool at the Great Wolf Lodge

2. A new home – we are SO close to moving in to our new home! I’ve been silent about this for a while, because it’s been hurry up and wait, but I really hope this week is our move in week. I really hope to wake up on the first day of spring (Thursday) in our new house. It has been an experience I do not wish to repeat….ever. Our new home is nothing elaborate, but sometimes I feel guilty knowing there are folks that have no place to live at all. I count it a huge blessing that we have somewhere to live that’s safe, warm, and nice.
   

   Our new house we hope to move into this week!

3. My weight loss team won! I had lead a group of 5 ladies for 6 weeks during this weight loss contest at work and they lost the most of all three teams. I’m so stinkin proud of them! One lady on my team lost 25 pounds in 6 weeks. Granted, normally we don’t want folks losing weight that fast, but she did it by healthy habits she can keep up after the contest ended.  I made some great new friends with these ladies and feel like they will continue on for years to come.
4. Helpful family – I can’t say enough about how helpful our families have been during this home building/moving process. Someone is always pitching in to help us plant grass seed, build a porch, buy some materials, or whatever it may be. My younger sister told me yesterday, “I’m sorry I’m not there to help you. You helped me paint my apartment.” That was probably 8 years ago and I don’t even remember doing it. But, she was sweet to think of helping me and I plan to put her to work next week when she’s home for a short visit. He he he
   

   My in laws came up and helped us Monday with the new house.

   

   And my dad came to build our back deck with the help of my husband and his friend.

5. Fetal movement – I’m 22 weeks along in this pregnancy and I’m feeling that baby movement on a regular basis now. Most of the time, it’s when I’m sitting still or laying down. It’s the most amazing feeling and I remember missing it after our first son was born. I think I actually started seeing some movement on the outside of my belly yesterday, but you have to look closely.
   

   Holding my son with baby #2 in the oven

6. Loving husband – I thought this home building process would really test our marriage, and there have been some tense moments over the past few months, but my husband is a trooper. He’s stepped in there and got things done as well as put up with his pregnant, sometimes demanding wife. I’ve been very particular about colors and most of the way things are going to be in the new place and he’s been very accommodating. I wish I would have had him on my weight loss team because he’s made some healthy changes and has lost about 12 pounds! I told him that his belly is getting smaller and mine just keeps getting bigger.
   

   My boys getting ready to go play in the pool at Great Wolf.

7. Spring weather – this weather has been completely crazy so far in March. One day, it will snow and be 30 degrees and the next day it will be 70 and sunny. I’ve soaked up all that warm weather I can stand and there are green things coming up now! I’ve seen little flowers popping through and my willow tree has tiny green buds on it. I feel like this winter has lasted forever for some reason, so I’m ready for the new season.
8. Another birthday – I turned 32 last Monday and was showered with lots of cards, gifts, and love. My husband got me the best card…when you open it up, it has a lit up candle that you blow on then it plays the Happy Birthday song. It was so neat. I felt very spoiled and got to buy lots of new stuff for the house, plus some maternity workout clothes, which I desperately needed. All my shirts were turning into belly shirts and no one wants to see that from their group exercise instructor or personal trainer!

Well, I think that sums it up for now. I have so many more blessings, but I could blog for days and days and days and never cover everything. My prayer for you today is that you have a place to go and worship and get in touch with God. Thank Him for what he’s done for you.