From my Flu/DeathBed

I so wanted to squeeze in another post before the month ended, but instead I am nursing the flu this entire week.  Josh got so sick so fast on Sunday and I went down right behind him that night.  It's what I get for complaining that I never get to be sick and taken care of, for biting my nails without washing my hands, and for skipping the flu shot year after year.  Turns out, you are not insulated from the devil-germ just because your family is. :S

Anyway, the couch has my body permanently imprinted in its cushions after this week.  And the ottoman has been my faithful nurse when Josh has had to return to work.

As sick as I am, I have been so encouraged by the overflow of help offered and forced on me at times - from 3 different kinds of soups/meals delivered to my doorstep, to childcare, to covering my consignment sale shifts, to shopping for me via fb at presales, to magazines, to sympathy galore online.  :)  Josh, who still isn't 100% after his Bronchitis this week, has managed me and the kids, done sweet, selfless things like run out to get me a shake for my raw throat one night and fresh strawberries and OJ another night, and gotten me a million things I needed when I was too weak to get it myself.  Here, he was reading with Anna in the cave they made together.

So thankful for our friends, neighbors, and my hubby.  Receiving such kindnesses has really challenged me to step up to that plate more myself when others are down and discouraged as well.  A simple need met is a HUGE encouragement! Love you and thankful for you especially Cindy, Susie, Kelli, Buffie, Vivian, and Melissa! I can't even count all the other offers of help that I have had to politely decline because nothing else was needed. So blessed.  And even more blessed to be able to recognize it.

Thankfully, Noah is healthy and at school each day and Anna is a patient angel doing what she can to amuse herself while I am out of commission.

Today she has created her very own bunny costume.  She used a headband and scarves to make "bunny ears" and she tucked an Easter egg into the back of her tutu for a "bunny tail" and she put socks on her hands to simulate "paws."  On one of my many many bathroom runs (I am attempting to drown myself in fluids, you know), she sidelined me to the playroom, signed me in on her clipboard, and honored me with a showing of her new Bunny Hop Dance. She was inspired by a basket and bunny and plastic eggs our neighbors dropped by last night and then a Peter Rabbit episode she saw this morning.  You can only imagine all the TV watching going down around here. :}

Anyway, the fever seems to have relented for the most part and I think I will be back to life this weekend.  I haven't gotten a flu shot since my classroom teaching days, but I can assure you that risky habit stops now!

Didn't See All This Coming

I crossed a line today; I stepped another inch closer to granola.  I made my first ever batch of homemade laundry detergent!

And speaking of things I never thought would be my thing, here is a list of stuff I didn't see myself doing back when I knew it all as a young adult. :}

Having babies.

Being a stay-at-home mom.

Blogging.

Couponing.
Facebook.

Menu Planning and Bargain Shopping.

Gardening.

Knitting.
Going to a chiropractor.
Putting a child of mine through regular allergy shots.

HOME SCHOOLING!
Planning to be a foster parent.

And now, Making Homemade Laundry Detergent.
{Sigh} and {Grin}

I just know 21 yr old me would have laughed at the idea of who 33 yr old me has become.  But you know what else, 33 yr old me is laughing right back at that proud, foolish, selfish, naive 21 year old me, too.  So there!

Proof They're Still Little

I know you will probably roll your eyes at me for saying so, but lately I feel like the sweet, sweet years of my kids' childhoods are slipping through my fingers.  It's going too fast. The innocence, the sweetness, the precious small child moments.  I adore them and I miss them already even though I know there are still a few to savor before they run out.  I feel like I am grasping at straws trying to appreciate them and not waste a moment of gratitude from the gifts that are my babies' little years.  It's another reason I am so grateful for the option of home schooling.  It allows me to reclaim so many more of these moments that would continue to be otherwise frittered away away from home.

Some recent "little kid" moments that I took mental snapshots of because they prove to me that not all the sweet, innocent, little years are behind us:

• This morning when the kids were up before me.  They played like angels while I layed awake a little longer in my bed. Noah speaking kindly and compromising with Anna.  Anna with her squeaky, yet animated voice following her brother's lead... mostly. They crept upstairs together to retrieve a giant cardboard box that Josh made a fort of in Anna's room.  They tried to be quiet as they moved it down the stairs, but it made such a racket. But they whispered through all the bumping and racket, so they THOUGHT they were still so quiet.  I grinned in my heart at their effort - to be quiet, and to work together moving a box bigger than the both of them. 
• Then when I finally did get up, as soon as my feet hit the floor in my bedroom above them, I heard them squeal from the living room, "Mommy's coming, hurry!" as they stumbled and scrambled to get to hiding places.  Always, always, they like to hide when they hear Mommy/Daddy come down the stairs in the morning.  They have done this for years.  The hiding places are always so predictable, but in their sweet innocence, they believe they are well hidden - under a pillow, behind the curtain, under the ottoman, beneath a blanket on the couch.  This morning, the sweetness struck me when Noah whispered to Anna as I landed downstairs, "She'll never find us."  There was a giant box in the middle of my living room floor and the lid kept bumping with their tiny, quiet movements inside it.  And still they thought I would never find them. :}  So entirely sweet.
• Noah's speech is improving in terms of s's and l's, but he still has his r's and th's to work on.  So I slurp up the sound of his sweet baby mispronunciations - frow for throw, fink for think,  fot for thought, firty for thirty, etc.
• I love how they play pretend together.  Pretend doctor, pretend mommy/daddy, pretend restaurant, pretend star wars, pretend robots, pretend tea party, pretend monsters, pretend bad guy chase, pretend horseback rides, pretend castles and armies.
• The fact that they still have stuffed animal loveys is more proof to me that their sweet baby years are not entirely long gone.  Noah still has Calvin that he sleeps on every night.  Anna has piggie and bunny and a few others.  Truthfully, she has an entourage of stuffed animals she sleeps with.   
• That they still like to watch Max and Ruby and Caillou is proof that they are still little, right?
• Anna keeps calling Jesus' crown of thorns his "pokey hat."  And she says it with such wide eyes. So innocent.
• Noah still says duper (ie- duper fast, duper hard, duper smart).  We love it and use it all the time when he is not even around.  :}  We will keep saying it forever and grinning smitten grins at the cuteness of this phrase and the downright adorable boy our Noah was and is.   

Yesterday, I watched my littles playing in the sunshine, cooperating and interacting and peacefully passing the time together without a care in the world or awareness of my spying.  It was another of many moments where I just wonder how anything in life is better. I got choked up at the love I continue to experience over those two.  They worked on their "web", they climbed the tree, the chatted randomly, they twisted and swung on the swing, they chased down the slide and back again.  Just drifting through the afternoon ... together.

I posted something sappy to this effect on FB.  "I don't mean to sound mushy, and maybe it's just the sunshine and Diet Dr. Pepper talking, but I am so in love with these two. Always. And especially when they play so well together. I stand out of sight and just watch them and hold happy tears back, they bring me such joy. It also grips me to know how special their relationship is ... because they will be in each other's lives longer than I will. What a gift they are to me." 

Anna Builds-a-Bear

Anna has been pining after a decent Build-a-Bear experience. She sold some toys she was willing to sacrifice in order to raise the money and she also did some serious playroom cleanups on more than once occasion.  She saved some precious dollars her Memaw sent at Valentines Day and she emptied her piggy bank as well. Girlie meant business!  I tend to think $40 is entirely too much money for a stuffed animal, but I guess it was the experience she paid for mostly. She enjoyed ...

Picking the animal on her own and pressing the pedal to stuff it.

Making a wish on the heart she got to place inside it.

Brushing and blowing her new puppy's fur clean.

Selecting a dress and shoes and accessories for her new love.

And getting to carry her finished product home in a big Build-a-Bear box.

 

Puppy Love has been named Vanna since this morning.  And she's been to see Vet Anna as well as visited the dress up box for more accessories. :} 

Hope it was all worth it, baby girl. 

Welcome to the family, Vanna!

New Kitchen Table

I have wanted a decent kitchen table for years.  I mean, YEARS.  Like, since Noah was a baby.  Our kitchen table situation in AL and here in TN has been a long, long story of changes and just 'good enough' fixes to buy us a little more time.  Now that I think about it, before kids we had a pretty worn out table my aunt sold us, too, that wasn't much to look at, but it didn't matter all that much to me then. Anyway, with the boost of sales I have done getting rid of furniture from the guest bedroom, we finally had some cash to put down on a perfect little set once and for all.  Hooray!

And so, without further ado, allow me to introduce you to our new kitchen table set!

Nothing flashy, but nothing crafty or mismatched or crappy looking either.  Plus, it'll do for a long while without any griping out of me, which is probably Josh's favorite feature. :}

BUSY Weekend!

I always enjoy Fridays.  I make a run to Hville with my girl for her gym class and also take care of a few errands while in the area.  And the timing is just right that I am not in a hurry to get back for pickup after school.  This past Friday, we even got to share another Steak 'N Shake lunch with some friends, Amber and PerryLove...

 and their kiddos, Landon and EmmaLove.

On this particular Friday, EmmaLove got to come home and play with Anna for a bit while her momma got some errands done, as well.  It was princess and make-up play all the way!  On the ride to pick up Noah and Claire, I was the coachman for Princess Sofia (anna) and Princess Amber (emmalove).  I grinned at the packed car.  What sweet treats to get to spend time with, no?

Friday night, I made my way to Bunco with a bunch of other girls, but somehow managed to not even THINK of getting a picture of the night.  :S  I came home to find a lovely Valentine bouquet and cards for me and the kids on the table from Josh ... which I also forgot to take a picture of. :(

Saturday we went kitchen table shopping and finally found something at our 6th furniture stop along the way. I don't know which was the best part ... finding something we liked or surviving the outing with the kids in tow. That night was Anna and Josh's big event for Valentines Day - the Daddy Daughter Dance.  Noah and I stayed home and took care of a little holiday business, too - Angry Birds valentines for his classmates.

Sunday, after church, we gave away our trampoline to some friends (which turned into quite a fiasco in the rain) and we also sold our kitchen table.  That, as always, was a wonderful purging of stuff. :)  Not to mention I also dropped off what kids' clothes I had left to sell at a consignment sale over the weekend, too.

I also got to attend a Momentum women's conference Sunday afternoon/evening at Long Hollow with 1000 other women.  I went with several good friends - Melissa, Cindy, and Susie.

I especially loved hearing from the guest speaker, Angie Smith!  Had some really great takeaways from what she shared - my favorite being  when she pointed out in the Abraham/Isaac story the significance of the difference between the promised lamb and the actual ram found for the sacrifice.  How have I never noticed that before?  Actually, I think I did notice it, just didn't realize the significance.  So interesting ... and comforting!

I got back late last night and then had to wind down for an hour or so, so I didn't get to bed til almost midnight and was up again by 6 and have been go, go, going around the house all morning - laundry, dinner, blogging, playing, selling more gear.  Anna and I are about to head over to Noah's school to surprise him for lunch.  And I even finished up an inpromptu craft at my girl's request.  A tutu for her baby doll.  Not too shabby!

Daddy Daughter Dance 2013

Anna has been looking forward to her date with Daddy since last year's Daddy Daughter Dance. It finally, finally came and she got dressed ("Mommy, there is a lovely lady coming down the stairs to see you!") and was just waiting for us to say Go.

I snapped some quick snapshots...

And sent them off into the night.  Their first stop was dinner.  

I am in LOVE with the big grin on her face!  Those are few and far between in Anna's smile vocabulary.

And Anna again dined on dessert bigger than her head.

Then they were off to the dance where they boogied on down.  This was the only picture Josh got of the action.  But in his defense, he took several precious videos of our little dancing queen.

Here's some footage of Anna at the ball...

Before the dance, Anna practiced with Josh the way she wanted to dance with him "like a ballet" and she wanted him to twirl her as well.  But when she hit the dance floor, she apparently didn't look back at her Daddy for any dance assistance. :}

Truth is, the dance didn't START until 7 which is her usual bedtime, so she tired out quickly. And ever-a-daughter-of-mine, she was overwhelmed a bit by the loud speakers.  She enjoyed several free dances and a couple group dances like The Hokey Pokey and If You're Happy and You Know It, but other group dances she didn't know left her to stall out and get sleepy.  Poor baby.  It wasn't long before she struggled to keep up with some dances and Josh says she got discouraged by that. 

Here you can see the glassy stare in her eyes.  It wasn't much longer after this that Anna asked to go home.  Big night for a little girl.  I think in the end, she was tired before she got to the dance portion of the evening ... so great was her anticipation of the event.

Still, she had a lovely time and is already looking forward to next year's Daddy Daughter Dance again.  Such a special night.  Such sweet memories.  :) 

Eucharisteo

I recently finished a devotional written by Ann Voskamp from her popular book called One Thousand Gifts.  It's written so beautifully - sometimes too beautifully, if that's possible, but it is written in all honesty and it led me to praise the Lord more from start to finish.  I read this book on my tablet though and it's cramped my style for blogging the keeper quotes since I never have my tablet near me when I am at the computer!  Today, finally, I did and so I'll get this posted once and for all.  Some thinkers and amen moments from One Thousand Gifts Devotional I read in December, with my faves in bold.

• God, cause me to know it afresh today; the life that counts blessings discovers its yielding much more than it seems.
• What is the root sin, the molten core of wickedness and godlessness?  Isn't that what we have to figure out?  It's right there in Romans 1.  It's not the sinfulness you'd think it'd be; It's the thanklessness - that we do.  It's our thanklessness that first stirs the full wrath of God. ...  Our fall is always first a failure to give thanks. The pride of thanklessness...
• And there it is:  If all the dismembering wickedness in the world begins with an act of forgetting - then the act of literally counting blessings literally re-members us to God.
• And I wonder if this is why thanks is the highest form of thought - because this is always the right order of things;  Us laid low.  Before God on High.
• Our world reels unless we rejoice.  A song of thanks steadies everything.  The answer to anxiety is the adoration of Christ.  The answer to anxiety is always to exalt Christ.
• Anxiety has been my natural posture; stiffness, my default.  The way I curl up my toes, tight retreat.  How I angle my jaw, braced, chisel the brow with the lines of distrust.  How I don't fold my hands in prayer, how I weld them into tight fists of control.  Always control - psuedopower from the pit. How I refuse to relinquish worry, like a babe a mother won't forsake, an identity.
• Are stress and worry evidences of a soul too lazy, too undisciplined, to keep gaze fixed on God? To stay in love?
• Life is so urgent it necessitates living slow.
• Lord God, there will be walls I run into today, walls that seem to box me in, walls that have writing on them that I long to decode.  When I rightly read Your word, I can rightly read the world; the graffiti of this world is grace in Your hands.
• What insanity compels me to shrivel up when there is joy's water to be had here?  In this wilderness, I keep circling back to this: I'm blind to joy's well every time I really don't want it. The well is always there.  And I choose not to see it.  Don't I really want joy? Don't I really want the fullest life?  For all my yearning for joy, longing for joy, begging for joy - is the bald truth that I prefer the empty dark?  Why do I lunge for control instead of joy?  Is it somehow more perversely satisfying to flex control's muscle? Ah - power - like Satan.
• Today, let me do hard things; live the hard discipline to give thanks in hard things. Today I want to lean hard on You - who softens my heart.
• Giving thanks to God is what ushers one into the very presence of God.  And this is why he asks us to always give thanks.
• As G.K. Chesterton wrote, 'How much larger your life would be if your self could become smaller in it.'
• "Expectations kill relationships."  And I've known expectations as a disease, like a silent killer heaping her burdens on the shoulders of a relationship until the soul bursts a pulmonary and dies.  Expectations kill relationships - especially with God. ... Lord, I repent of it all: the expectations that kill relationships and the entitlement that steals joy.  Please, Lord, today, make me small and surprised by staggering grace!  Make me remember that humility comes before happiness.
• Lord, what would happen today if I saw all the not-enough, too-little in my life to be but a seed?  All the hardly-things could be holy-things - small somethings You are growing into more glory for You.  Cause me to believe again:  All feasts began as seeds.
• Lord God, today, make me giddy with gratitude for Your covenanted gifts - all joy, all acceptance, all completeness, all in Christ.  Never let my heart grow so cold that I get over this.  Wed me to worship and woo me to praise and wake me to the Word-God who deserves my all.
• For years, I tried medication, blade, work, escape, all attempts to drown out that incessant, reverberating drum of self-rejection. All futility, acidic emptiness.  But here, I hear it well:  The only thing to rip out the tape echoing self-rejection is the song of His serenade.  One thousand gifts tuned me to the beat.  It really is like CS Lewis argued - the the most fundamental thing is not how we think of God but rather what God thinks of us; "How God thinks of us is not only more important, but infinitely more important.'"  Years of Christian discipleship, Bible study, churchgoing had been about me thinking about God; practicing eucharisteo was the very first I had really considered at length what God thought of me - this ridiculous and relentlessly pursuing love, so bold.  Everywhere, everything, Love!
• Bless the Lord, O my soul - because this is what blesses the soul.
• Unless we make it a habit to give thanks, we habitually give our family grief.  Unless we consistently speak praise, we consistently speak poison.  Unless we are intentional about giving God glory throughout the day, our days unintentionally give way to grumbling.
• All fear is but the notion that God's love ends.
• Murmuring thanks doesn't deny that an event is a tragedy and neither does it deny that there's a cracking fissure straight across the heart.  Giving thanks is only this:  making a canyon of pain into a microphone to proclaim the ultimate goodness of God.  Our thanks to God is our witness to the goodness of God when Satan and all the world would sneer at us to recant.
• There is nothing I refuse to thank You for - because I am convinced there is nothing You won't redeem.
• YHWH - sounds like our breathing - aspirated consonants.  God Himself names Himself - and the name he chooses is the sound of our own breathing.
• To read His message in all the moments, in the waiting moments, the dark moments, the moments before the blooming, I'll need to read His passion on the page; wear the lens of the Word, to read His writing in the world.  Only the Word is the answer to rightly reading the world.
• Bless the Lord, oh my soul, bless the very Maker of my soul.
• "Honk if you're happy" is really "to be happy, honk."  And "give thanks if you are joy-filled" is really "to be joy-filled, give thanks."

Makin' ♥alentines

I Do So Love Adoption

Last April, a friend mine with whom I used to teach in GA, Krissie, asked if I would mind helping out a friend of hers who was looking to adopt domestically - share our story, tips, advice, resources, etc. In true Kimmie fashion, I eagerly said sure because I do so love adoption. :)  I probably overwhelmed the poor girl with all the gabbing I did and the length of my responses to her questions.  I do know that she used the agency in GA that I recommended because they were so helpful to us when we adopted Noah.  Over the next nine months, Krissie's friend and I dialogued intermittently via email.  And sure enough, I was thrilled to hear in December that their adoption journey was meeting its wonderful, long-awaited end when this family was on their way across the country to be there when their precious girl was being born.  Then, last month I got this email from the new mom herself and it made my day.  Felt like keeping it here on the blog, too, because it makes me grin so. 

I wanted to let you know we adopted our daughter, Lily Rae, in December.  She was born in Utah on 12/12/12.  We received a phone call on Thursday, we flew out on Tuesday and she was born on Wednesday.  She is amazing and she has brought joy to so many people.  Thanks for your support and allowing us access to your blog!

Tickled pink to have been any help at all!  And a wee bit jealous we aren't adopting again already. :}  Anna is requesting a sister.  And a brother for Noah.  :} 

Girls vs. Boys

Anna:  Kaitlyn wants to come over tomorrow.  So, it's good that Noah will be at school tomorrow because she doesn't wanna see any gross boys.

Me:  But Noah's not a gross boy!  Is he?

Anna:  Well, sort of.  Cuz he waffs at his toots. 

Samples from School

Just some samples of Noah's work from school lately.  While I cringe at how behind his handwriting is, I grin to read a glimpse into his thoughts.

I love how well he structured and wrote his answer on that last one for a test.  Capital letters, complete sentences, punctuation and all.  But the drawings are the ones I need a second opinion on:  Should I be concerned that he still draws people with heads connected to legs and then arms coming out of the legs?  Trying to tell myself it's not a big deal, but this habit/skill has been concerning me for awhile. :(

Just Enough Snow

The last time we had a real, REAL snow was two years ago in January.  Things were very different for us then.  Anna was only 2, Josh was still with Pearson and, as usual, was gone on a trip.  We have hoped and hoped for snow ever since so that Daddy could get out in it and play hard with the kids because you know Mommy wasn't/isn't the type for getting cold and wet and  messy and all.  I mostly took pictures of Noah and his buds in the last snowfall and a few of Anna standing at her tub of snow with a spoon (or six) in hand because she was too unsteady on her feet to actually get out and play in it all.

I worry these little years the kids are in are gonna pass us by without another heavy snowfall.  That makes me sad a little.  Anna wants so badly to experience some snow play; she doesn't even remember that last time.  Which is why when big, fat flakes started falling and just barely accumulating this morning, Josh and the kids were all bundled up and outside in no time.  There were out there before I was even out of bed!

It didn't stick much and it certainly didn't last long, but it was just enough to make my lovies grin.  

It was just enough to get me out of bed to capture the moment before it passed/melted away.

It was just enough snow to grab and hold in your hand, which counts for something around here!

It was just enough to warrant
hats and gloves and snow boots and Daddy!

I bet this snow was the best we'll get this year, but Josh holds out hope that February will bring us more. I hope he's right!  We have two sleds that are two yrs old that have yet to get a single use!

C'mon, winter! Show us what you got before you go!

From Beard to Bare

This morning: all bearded.

This evening: all bare, haircut included!

Daddy-Daughter Dance ready!