Thinking Lately

So...didn't really get moving til a little later than I thought I would this morning. Nothing bad...just the 3 of us being lazy and playing and reading. So...didn't have time to get out anywhere. We went out to the front yard about 10:30. I planned on being out there 30-45 min, but the kids were riding bikes so I started raking up the pine needles/cones. (If you remember our "harvest" from last winter/spring, I feel I should try to keep up better!!!) Soon the kids wanted out the tee and balls, the chalk, then the bubbles, so I just kept raking. When we finally came in it was after 12!!! :) I'm taking a break from going out and finishing while I make SURE they are both asleep for good!

So...I've been thinking lately...

* I have been really, really thinking about wanting to 're-enter' some mission work. In fact, I have even been having dreams and extensive thoughts of moving to work in an established mission setting, or even an unestablished one, at that.

This is definitely not something that we're packing up to do this week or anything, but when I told Jon he got really excited. We have been on 2 mission trips together before, and both of us have been on several before there was 'us.' We both have a desire to do mission work, and before we were married we even talked about spending a couple years somewhere.

I know there are pros and cons to actually moving to do mission work. I know there are PLENTY of mission opps here, right in our city. I know there are lots of worthy causes to support. But I also feel there is such a stretch of faith to actually GIVE your whole life to a mission effort. There is a sense of sacrifice that just might not happen in a comfy city like Hsv. Like, when I'm done doing my "mission work," I could run through the drive-thru and get a cold Coke, or I could go shopping and get some new shoes that are more comfortable...or whatever.

Anyways...I'm rambling, I know. I wasn't even planning on posting this, really, but well, it's just coming out.

Back in high school and college I took A LOT of Spanish classes. In fact, It was my college major. I really enjoyed learning it, and it took on a whole new, deeper meaning when I started going on trips and actually meeting people. People with whom, without my new language, I would never have been able to have conversations or relationships with. Until Jon and I were dating, i even worshipped at the local Spanish-language fellowship many Sundays and every Wednesday.

I have been to Venezuela 3 times, and Mexico once. I've also been to Oregon and Mississippi. Every time, my Spanish has been a gift that has allowed me to reach someone--to help someone.

It has been so long since I've actually used Spanish. Sure, a sentence here and there, every now and then. But not actually used it. I used to know the words to probably more than a hundred and fifty songs. I used to talk to people on the phone, on the internet, in letters. I used to listen to sermons, read books, take classes--completely in Spanish. Now, though, I feel like it's slipping away. I want to start studying again; better yet, I want to use it.

I really admire the friends and people I know who have made a full-time commitment to missions. I know it has ups and downs, but I also am sure (in my own mind, at least) that God works in those people harder than in anyone else. I really feel He blesses those who step out, stretch their faith, depend on Him for everyday needs...I feel that he also causes them to grow, in Him, in a way that they couldn't in a suburban little home.

Lately, I feel like I could use some more faith. I could use some more dependence on Him. And, I could SURELY use some more growth. This makes me wonder if I am really hearing a call?

Anyways...Just something I've been thinking about a lot lately.

Confusion

(Before I explain this situation, I am grateful for my drawers.
Now. Proceed.)

I am in a very confused state! After almost 2 years of living in this house with 7 of my 9 kitchen drawers in the shed to be refinished, I am now only missing one. This is great news, for my spoons. They have finally been moved to the drawer I truly believed they belonged in all along.

However, not so great news for my knees! Today, today alone, I have headed to the wrong drawer about 8 times!!!! I think that I am going to tear my ACL, just because I want to stir the stinkin' beans!

Surely, please, it won't take 2 more years to get used to this???

Friends, Swimming, Harding and a Photoshoot!!

Here's a picture update...

Tuesday the kids and I went swimming with our friends Shelby and Lynn. Both of my kids started out pretty nervous and uninterested...mind you--even in our little pool, Lawson will hardly touch a floatie b/c he's afraid I'm going to make him get into it to learn to swim. He's terrified. I've also told you about how Jordan has absolutely nothing to do with our pool and cries if I make her get in it. I was hoping after the fountains down town they'd both like it better. Lawson started out on the steps, then holding on to the bricks with a floatie on, then letting me swirl him around the pool in the floatie. Then him and Jordan spent time jumping off the side to me and they both loved that! Jordan also did a great job using Lawson's floatie! She's quite a kicker, and I pretty much had to just make sure she didn't flip face first into the water! :) I was in the pool almost the whole time, so I only got a few pics...

I wish I had gotten some muscle floaties so they could have done even more by themselves!
BTW...I had set out Jordan's suit on the arm of the couch to take with me, but because I believe that I'm mildly mentally retarded something sidetracked me and I TOTALLY forgot it! She had to swim just in a swimmer diaper! OOPS, MOMMY! :)


After swimming I dried the kids off and they wanted to lay on the chairs, like Shelby. Well, Lawson got on his chair, then pulled the top of his towel over his face, just like Shelby. It was very cute! I think in this pic he was just getting back up. Not much of a sunbather yet!

The kids have been sporting their Harding shirts a couple more times before they get too small! I got them this past winter when I went for Lynnette's shower.

I love this picture of Lawson! I think he looks like such a big boy!


The best one I could get of Jordan...man, she looks so goofy! :)

Thursday we went to hang out at our friend Alisha's house. We had a lot of fun playing, talking, eating lunch then watching Nemo!

Abbie spent a good bit of time pushing Jordan around on this block holder/lawn mower looking thing. Jordan just loved it! :)

Yesterday I found Jordan had climbed up and gotten down her hairbow box. She told me she was picking a pretty hairbow, then she proceeded to hold each one up and call it the wrong color. Hmmm...we're still working on that! To her, everything's blue!

Another kind of swimming..

Yesterday, Lawson spent a lot of time pretending to be a lot of animals. He loves animals lately, the most common being a tiger. He came up to me after a while of playing and asked me, "Mommy, how can I pretend to be a whale swimming in the ocean?" I thought about it for a minute, then told him I had an idea and to come with me. We went and got a big blue fluffy winter blanket and laid it out in the playroom. I am telling you...he spent probably 45 minutes being a whale, then a shark, then asking me to be one with him. Such an imagination! :)

After a while he asked me to come "swim" with him. Good thing there wasn't someone here to take a picture of all 3 of us...it would probably be called this... "Two cute sharks and a beached whale!"
Finally....

I spent some time trying to get a cute picture of Jordan for the invitations to her birthday party. I looked for a good one in the computer, but most of our at home ones find her with a dirty face or bed-head! I think I got some really cute ones...We were being silly to make her laugh, and she was cracking me up!

I think this looks like a model shoot! It makes me laugh how she looked back over her shoulder and flashed a smile!

In this one she had started waving her hands back and forth...

My latest treat...

Let me just tell you...I made brownies the other day and I may be the last one to ever try this or not...just in case there's one last person who needs this wonderful news I will post it!!!

The best-ever way to eat a brownie:
*Warm it up for 25 sec
***SMEAR A LITTLE PEANUT BUTTER ON IT!!!
*Put some ice cream on it
*If you're feeling extra daring put some caramel or chocolate syrup on top!

The PB makes it so yummy!!! Like a warm, cold, mushy, gushy, ice cream-covered peanut butter cup!!

YUM!

Not much to say....

I don't really have a lot to say these days... I keep coming up to the computer thinking I need to post, then don't know what to post about.

A couple Fridays ago our friend Jeff called and said they needed another girl to play on his work's coed softball team. He asked if I wanted to play and I decided it might be fun. Well, IT WAS! I really enjoyed the casual environment--competetive but not crazy! It was only me and one other girl on the team. I had 3 singles, plus I made a catch at 2nd to get the batter out! So fun! It was a nice change to be the one playing, too, and not the one watching the kids on the sidelines. By the time I was done and came over to see the fam, I almost couldn't find the kids b/c they were so covered in red dirt that they were camouflaged!!! :) After their bathwater drained, there was a layer of red dirt in the tub! YUCK!

We are still keeping busy. We really enjoyed visiting with Kenny and Jamey last week--I wish we could visit more often! Lawson and Avery had a really great time playing together! Jordan had a lot of fun bringing Braden baby toys. A couple times I looked over and she had nearly buried him!! Jamey took more pictures than I did, so maybe one day she'll put some up! Made me wish for Thanksgiving even more--can't wait to come see you guys!

Yesterday we went to swim with our friends Lynn and Shelby in their neighborhood pool. Sunny, Amy and I had talked about a zoo trip, but when the forecast was 102 we decided not to!!! Shelby called and asked if we wanted to swim, and we were all about that! The kids were skiddish at first, but after a while warmed right up to it and were swimming in their floaties and jumping off the side to me! Then Lynn took us all to Subway for lunch. Yummo!! Thanks for a great morning!

This morning I went to do my Wednesday morning papers and afterwards went looking for a new park. I drove to Providence school and found that they have a really small-kid friendly park there! It's an elementary school, so I guess it should! There are 2 playscapes with small slides, ladders, tubes, monkey bars, etc. There are also swings, but no baby swings. If your little one loves to climb, slide and run around try this park out! It's in the back of Providence subdivision, and there was no one there but a few construction workers over at the school building the new wing.

Lately I've been doing Facebook a lot more. I got a Facebook last year to keep up with our Seniors at church--to see what they were doing and keep up with the youth activities. That's all I used it for. Now that I've found so many people I used to know, though, I've been spending so much time surfing from one person's profile and pictures to another's. I love looking for new Flair, and catching up on what my old high school and college friends are doing these days.

Our swingset construction has come to a halt! Between the softball, company, and, ahem, Jon's Saturday and Sunday naps, we may never get to swing in our backyard!!! :) HOPEFULLY, some day soon I can post pictures...we'll see!!

When Kenny and Jamey were here last week, we had some people over to grill out. I always use company as an excuse to make recipes that I like but Jon doesn't. At least there's a chance of someone else liking it and helping me finish it! This time I made a Pineapple Cheeseball--I've had this recipe since 2000. While it was a favorite of mine at Linda Lawson's house years ago, I had never made it! Well....I think it was a hit! I got several compliments on it, so I posted the recipe at MichiganCutie Cooks.

If you know about my foot pain problems, then the wonderful resolution, then my foot pain problems again, then my second shot...well...my foot HURTS AGAIN! I almost can hardly walk! I think I need to just cut it off, but the doctor will probably not resort to that so soon! Please pray that heel spurs and tendonitis, in general, would stop hurting!

Oh yeah, the other night while brushing and flossing the kids teeth I noticed that Jordan had cut a molar! Here we go again! She has either been waking up very early, or running a low fever and sleeping very late! There have also been several (now-explainable) fussy moments as well as some full-out meltdowns. Add on top of all that 2-4 daily dirty diapers that are in addition to hear regular daily 1-3 dirty diapers! Geesh...I hope these 4 puppies come all the way through very quickly!

Well, I guess I had more to say than I thought! I must say that I have come back and added several things that I remembered after posting...since I was doing a post about having nothing to say! Now it's time to get a nap before those kids upstairs wake up!!! Hope everyone has a great rest-of-the-week!

Lawson--Here I am to Worship

Sorry about the excessive amount of "kid-posting" that's been happening lately, but if this blog's for our family and my memories, I need to post this stuff!!!
This is one of Lawson's songs...he's been singing it for a while and I taped him this afternoon...he was about to take his nap and had already gone down to his skibbies-sorry!

Another "Lawson Prayer"

Dear God,
Thank you for Hercules the movie, and thank you for Daddy building my swingset-that is so nice and you are so nice to me and to Jon and to Stacy and to Jordan Page and to Lawson James. And help me to listen to my Mommy and Daddy. And please help my nose to feel better, and please help Jordan to not scream in our house because that's a no-no and you get spankin's and smacks, but help us to scream outside. And thank you for all our blessings and you are so nice to Jon and Stacy and Jordan Page and Lawson James. And in Jesus' name, Amen.

Importance

The following is an excerpt from the book "All I Really Need To Know I Learned In Kindergarten", by Robert Fulghum. I had typed this up and put it in one of my notebooks back in high school, and found it recently when going through some of my old things. It's a good little read--I hope you enjoy it!...I also hope you realize how important you are to the people in your life and how your example can be a shining light when you don't even know someone's looking!

Hair grows at the rate of about half an inch a month. I don't know where he got his facts, but Mr. Washington came up with that one when we were comparing barbers. That means that about eight feet of hair had been cut of my head and face in the last sixteen years by my barber.

I hadn't thought much about it until I called to make my usual appointment and found out that my barber had left to go into building maintenance. What?? How could he do this? My barber. It felt like a death in the family. There was so much more to our relationship than sartorial statistics.

We started out as categories to each other: "barber" and "customer." Then we became "redneck ignorant barber" and "pinko egghead minister." Once a month we reviewed the world and our lives and explored our positions. We sparred over civil rights and Vietnam and a lot of elections. We became mirrors, confidants, confessors, therapists, and companions in an odd sort of way. We went through being thirty years and then forty. We discussed and argued and joked, but always with a certain thoughtful deference. After all, I was his customer. And he was standing there with a razor in his hand.

I found out that his dad was a country policeman, that he grew up poor in a tiny town and had prejudices about Indians. He found out that I had the same small town roots and grew up with prejudices about Blacks. Our kids were the same ages, and we suffered through the same stages of parenthood together. We shared wife stories and children stories and car troubles and lawn problems. I found out he gave his day off to giving free haircuts to old men in nursing homes. He found out a few good things about me too, I suppose.

I never saw him outside the barber shop, never met his wife or children, never sat in his home, or ate a meal with him. Yet he became a terribly important fixture in my life. Perhaps a lot more important than if we had been next-door neighbors. The quality of our relationship was partly covered by a peculiar distance. There's a real sense of loss in his leaving. I feel like not having my hair cut anymore, though the
thought of eight feet of hair seems strange.

Without realizing it, we fill important places in each others' lives. It's that way with a minister and a congregation. Or with the guy at the corner grocery, the mechanic at the local garage, the family doctor, teachers, neighbors, co-workers. Good people, who are always "there," who can be relied upon in small, important ways. People who teach us, bless us, encourage us, support us, uplift us in the dailiness of life. We never tell them. I don't know why, but we don't.

And, of course, we fill that role ourselves. There are those who depend on us, watch us, learn from us, take from us. And we may never know. Don't sell yourself short. You may never have proof of your importance, but you are more important than you think.

Tumbling Jordan

I had to grab the camera tonight to catch Jordan's latest thing. She has been doing this all day...climbing up the chair them flipping over the side and down into the seat onto her head!! She usually hops up laughing then runs around to do it all over again. As I type, it's an hour after this video and she's still flipping!! Crazy weird little girl! :)

P.S. Sorry about the focusing snafu...i don't know why the camera kept re-adjusting the fucus.

Hodge Podge

It's been busy around here...Let me offer a whirlwind review of 3 weeks or so...

A couple of weeks ago the kids and I ran to Walmart for an errand. There was a big fire engine sitting out front, so I asked Lawson if he wanted to walk over and look at it. Well, a fire fighter was standing there waiting for the others to come back out of the store, and asked Lawson if he really wanted to see a fire truck. He gave him the grand tour, showing him so much neat stuff!

Here he is standing where all the fire fighters sit. The coats, hats and boots are in this area.

When the fire fighter asked Lawson what he wanted to see, Lawson said "the hoses". So...here is the grand supply of hoses!

Here is Lawson getting to hold the, um, spout?? of the hose. I think it was as heavy as he was!

The kids went to VBS this year at Jordan Park Church of Christ. Mayfair's VBS doesn't start til age 4, so my kids didn't make the cut. My sweet friend Lisa invited the kids and they loved it! I did realize that I am spoiled by being able to take Jordan to the nursery during services at Mayfair, because she couldn't hardly sit still for even the 15 minutes of singing at the end! Wednesday-Friday I ended up taking M&Ms to bribe her and string her along!!

Here is a picture of the kids the day after they talked about Esther. Jordan was not happy I made her put on her crown again!

This is Jordan walking back from class.

We also finished up the tee ball season and celebrated with a pizza party! The kids had a great time, and here is Lawson showing off his trophy!

Lawson and his Daddy

My efforts at patriotism via wardrobe!

We spent almost 2 whole weeks in a "Projects around the House Boot Camp"...that's what I named it! Holy smokes...we did A LOT in a short time with the kids around and a lot of other things going on too...when we get it all wrapped up I am going to make a post just about that...but I loved this pic of my boys with their drills...

notice Lawson has the real one and Jon has the toy one!!!

Last Tuesday, the 1st of July, Jon's parents, sister and niece came to visit. Wednesday morning we decided to take the big kids to the free movie and out to lunch b/c Jon's mom offered to watch Jordan and then keep them again so I could do my papers during naptime.

We saw "Open Season" and the kids liked it. Here is a picture of Lawson at the concession stand to get popcorn and a Diet Coke. (Think he drinks too much of what I order??? :)

Jon's parents and the 3 grandkids Wednesday night before church. This was after a yummy dinner at Little Rosies!

Jon and his dad spent a lot of their time working on building our new swingset!!! It's still not completely done (again, a full post, once complete) but we did get a new wheelbarrow. It's really for mixing concrete...but also doubles as a "kid kart!" Here is a pic of each kid getting their turn around the yard!

After yummy bbq'ed burgers on the 4th, we all went over to Bridge Street to watch to fireworks. We actually parked in an office building's parking lot, which was actually closer to the show I think! The kids had fun running around the field while waiting, and then warmed up to the loudness pretty well. The funniest thing of the night happened about 10 minutes before the show ended...We heard a pssssssssstttttttttttt....and all of a sudden we were getting squirted by the sprinklers that came on!!!! It was SOOOO funny, b/c we were all trying to get up with the kid we were holding and run farther back. We could not stop laughing about it the rest of the night!

My family

Jennifer and Maddison

A spectacular show!

Yesterday I decided to get out b/c it was a beautiful but hot day. I took the kids to the water fountains downtown and they had so much fun! Lawson got right in, but Jordan wouldn't get wet for the first hour! I finally got her wet, traumatized her, then forced her to get used to it and run through...holding MY hand...which means I got soaked too!!! By then she loved it, we stayed another hour or so, and we all had so much fun!




Hope everyone is still having a great summer and spending a lot of quality time with the ones you love! Enjoy it now...I am noticing the days getting shorter minute by minute in the mornings!!!! Fall and (Brrr) Winter will be here BEFORE YOU KNOW IT!!! :)

Ragged Old Flag

For all the complaining we tend to do, we are blessed to be citizens of our great country. Many people have given the ultimate sacrifice so that we can live and walk in freedom and safety. Take some time today to be thankful for all of your blessings on this Independence Day.