10 Years!

Happy Anniversary to my husband Scott today!

We've reached the 10 year milestone, but I think there are good odds that we would both probably call this past year, the craziest of all of them thus far.  Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought a year ago at this time that our family would double in size in just one year...family of 3 to a family of 6 (coming this August!)

One year ago, I was starting to believe that we would probably never have a foster care placement and even if we did, we were only certified for one child at that time.  How quickly things can change in just a matter of days.  One year ago today, I was feeling disappointed by these thoughts because I KNEW pregnancy was not an option for us as far as building our family.

Sometimes, I really get the feeling that God is looking down on me laughing and saying, "Oh, my dear child, you have NO IDEA the things I have in store for you! hehe"

That is the magic of one year I suppose :)

So, in honor of our 10 years, here is a little list I've made to share with all of you...

1:  Sweet & challenging boy we get to call our son
2:  Sweet & sassy girls whom we've been blessed to share our lives with for the past year
3:  Couches we have gone through thus far (in our defense the first two were already several years old when they came into our possession)
4:  Years of infertility that haunted us in the beginning of our marriage
5:  Semesters of college courses and late night homework
6:  Years of parenthood-we had no idea what I wild ride it would be either
7:  Months of pregnancy now under our belt
8:  Cats & kittens (at the moment anyway) with whom the kids love to play
9:  Equals the combined ages of all of our kids at this point in time (I had to stretch to come up with something for this one ;)
10:  Years of marriage and (hopefully) many more to come!

Thanks for sticking with us through all of the crazy! :)

An "F" for creativity...

is what grade this post would receive :)

The summer grind begins with my last class officially starting today.  I shall do my best to check in here as often as I can and to even post something worthwhile maybe ;)

Creativity can be hard to come by with five research article reviews plus a research paper to write over the next 3-4 weeks (along with a few other assignments)...a little creativity would make those research articles so much nicer to read too.  Alas, that is not meant to be!

I will do my best to suck some creativity from life to share with you here over the next few weeks.  I will try not to sink to the level of posting research information just for the sake of "having something to post" :)  If creativity eludes me, then I will try to at least come up with a few nice rants to share along the way...even better, I know! ;)

So, even if this post would fail miserably, at least I feel confident in the fact that my research reviews and paper will probably fair much better if past performance can be counted on as an indicator of future performance...even though they are terrible suckers of creativity!

We Be Jammin'

On Memorial Day Monday, Luke and I went strawberry picking.  Keep in mind that this was something I despised doing as a kid.  Early morning, picking and sweating, bugs, then coming home to clean and prepare them.  A common argument heard in our house was "We don't even like strawberries!  Why do we have to help with this?"  Mom would always respond with (keep in mind too that she knew that we knew that she also did not like strawberries) "Your dad likes them and he has to work.  Sometimes when you're an adult you do things you don't like for someone else."  or "You'll understand when you grow up."  Another often heard expression was, "Sometimes when you're an adult, your tastes change and you like things that you did not like as a kid."

At the time, all of these logics seemed quite illogical, but DANG-I hope I'm the mom that was always right someday! ;)

I honestly admit that I had yet to go strawberry picking as an adult until Monday.  I obviously did not know what I was doing at first either...

*We got all the way to our row with our metal trays and the guy says..."You're going to need baskets to put the berries in..."  I obviously misunderstood the people at the front-I thought it was either one or the other, not both the basket and the metal tray.

*As we get settled back into our row with BOTH items, the lady at the front starts yelling..."WE NEED THE PERSON IN THE BLUE VAN TO MOVE IT!  YOU CAN'T PARK IT HERE!" Repeat (5 dozen times-well, maybe it was only 4 or 5 times, but geez...she didn't give anyone much of a chance to claim it!)

Finally, after moving my car and walking back to our row, we got the chance to actually pick some strawberries.  Luke stuck with it fairly well for about 1/2 a tray and then he got tired so he chose to keep the conversation going while I finished the picking.  I wondered quite often if everyone gets to have such a diverse coversation when picking strawberries.  Some of our topics included:  people in Mexico speaking Spanish; people in France speaking French; people in both countries probably also speaking English; dolphins; orcas aka "killer whales;  traveling for a family wedding next summer; hotels; and why there was straw in the strawberry patch.

I worked up the strawberries a couple nights later.  The following day Luke and Big Sis helped me to make our first ever batch of strawberry freezer jam.  They were wonderful helpers and the jam has turned out quite well.  I'm looking forward to the upcoming blueberry and peach seasons to try our hands at some other jams, but I think I may have to study up before I take Luke fruit picking again!  I barely survived being able to answer all of his strawberry picking questions! :)

She Will Survive...

but maybe not when left to her own devices :)

She just turned 21 months and loves to try new things...foods & non-foods that is.

Many things go to Little Sis's mouth throughout the course of a typical day, but today the list also included the following outside items:

*cat food
*dandelions
*a random "daisy like" weed flower (that was immediately taken away because I had no idea if it was "safe" or not-I need a reference books for which weeds are okay to eat and which ones are not I think ;)
*a stick
*attempt to drink from the cat bowl

It's definitely going to be a tiring summer trying to keep my eyes on all three of them, especially with the next one wearing me out from the inside too :)

I wouldn't have it any other way though...unless maybe I could chase them around on a Hoveround with my feet propped up along the way! ;)