Happy Fourth!

Well, it’s been a while since last I posted, but life doesn’t just stop for us when the posts do; it’s been an active few weeks. This post brings us to our family’s Fourth of July celebrations!

Fourth of July is a big deal here in Nebraska!  Not only can you go and buy fireworks to your heart’s content at any NUMEROUS fireworks tents (my 2-year-old calls them “the circus”) and stands, but people start shooting them off a full week in advance!  And I am consistently amazed that it’s not just about celebrating on the 4th, but how normal it is for everyone to celebrate on the 3rd, too!  Whole blocks shut down and barricade the streets off to allow for unhindered, widespread neighborhood explosive-partaking.  It’s really quite fun and quite the experience if you live in a state (like California) where you are not really “suppose to” shoot them off on your own.  If you’ve not had this experience, COME TO NEBRASKA!

Well, for our family, since moving here, we have started a tradition of starting our celebrating, like many other Nebraskans, on the 3rd.  This was our third annual 3rd of July celebration at my DH’s parents’ house with family and friends.  It’s always a great time of food, family, friends, fun, and of course…FIREWORKS!

And of course, we celebrated on the 4th, as well. We had a great time with our fellowship group at the country home of some friends’, which also included food, friends, fun, fireworks, AND disc golf, smores, and a Roman candle war! This year was also my first time to visit a fireworks tent.

Here are some pictures of our time.

Good Food

My Family

My Girls

with Papa and Gamma

The DH and I

Boom!

Sparkler Writing

Sparkler Writing

Happy Birthday!

June 18, 2010

Today is my youngest’s first birthday!!!

 I can’t believe a year has gone already!  It has been such a fun time to watch as Zoey has    grown, matured, learned new things, experienced some of her “firsts”.  It is also a bit bittersweet, as another one of my babies is no longer a baby.

June 2011

She’s now becoming more inde- pendent, with a definite mind of her own, her own preferences, like and dislikes, and way to do things.  Any day now she’ll be walking completely on her own.  As it is, I can’t put her down in one place anymore, and expect her to be there when I get back.  Along with stature, personality, and abilities, her appetite has grown, as well!  This girl can PACK IT AWAY!!!  Her Daddy notes her sudden explosion of talking and her extreme “stranger danger” reactions to EVERYONE except her Momma and Daddy being much less now.  All these changes and more in the first year of life!

The Lord has been gracious to us in His gift of our little Zoey and I look forward to how she will continue to grow and change in this next year of life!

Happy 1st Birthday, Zoey!

Anniversaries…

Hello again!  This post is officially a new record for me, two posts on my blog!! Yeah!!

Our Wedding Day!

So, as I noted earlier at the end of my first post, today is my fifth wedding anniversary!  These past five years have brought laughter, tears, more furniture, another chinchilla, lots of great recipes, a few not-so-great recipes, four moves, and a ton of memories!  It has been a blessing to see how the Lord has not only grown my DH and I closer together.  Also, it has been wonderful to look back and see how the Lord has taken such great care of us, blessing us in even the smallest, simplest ways.  Two of the bigger blessings in our five years of marriage are our two little girls, 2 and a 1/2 & almost 1!  I am so thankful for these gifts the Lord has bestowed.  And, I am thankful to and for my DH for all he does and is for me.

Now, I wanted to share the more amusing side for me of celebrating five years of marriage.  You see, it seems like every anniversary, the Lord has sent some event or happening to make that anniversary all that more memorable.

For our first anniversary, I had planned on taking my DH out for a day on the town.  I get excited celebrating for other people and love making plans.  Since we lived in California at the time, I had planned on taking him to Knott’s Berry Farm and then to Medieval Times for dinner and a show.  As we we were leaving that morning for our busy drive and day, we were about 3 blocks from home when we were rear ended…by a non-insured and non-licensed driver, non-the-less.  Thankfully, all were safe from injury and our car was covered to be fixed, but it definitely made that anniversary more memorable!

For our second anniversary, we found out we were unexpectedly expecting our first!  It was quite exciting and to-say-the-least, surprising!  Shortly there after we moved out of California to a more cost-efficient, family-friendly state…Nebraska!

Our 5th Anniversary!!

For our third anniversary, we spent the day at the hospital…getting my gall bladder out!   My first surgery (besides my wisdom teeth).  4 months later, it was my appendix.

Last year, for our fourth anniversary, I was about to deliver our second daughter.  She was due on the 13th of June.  I ended up being induced on the 17th and delivering on the 18th. I must say though, she made a great Father’s Day gift!

That brings us to this year.  The DH had plans for us tonight, but wasn’t letting me in on them.  As the morning progressed, my two and half year old started to really not feel well and developed a high fever with no other symptoms.  However, with some rest, liquids, and some tylenol, her fever went down and she seemed well enough for us to go out.  We had a low-key evening with dinner and then Paint-Yourself-Silly.  It was nice to nice to have the time to relax a bit and talk while enjoying each others’ company.  It’s not very often that the DH and I get to go out on our own without feeling rushed so tonight ended up being a treat (and just as memorable as our other anniversaries).

Through all of these crazy happenings throughout the year and from year to year, my DH has been QUITE a trooper and I am so thankful to be able to look back and remember these adventures with him!  I look forward to many more years and what surprises might come our way as we celebrate each)!

Do any of you have any amusing & memorable anniversary celebrations?

Out of Cinnamon…

Do you ever have a funny story to share from your day?  Some little “oops” or goof or tale to tell that made you laugh?  Maybe its something you can’t appreciate right when it happens even, but maybe down the line?  They happen ALL the time to me, funny things my little girls do or say, objects I run into in the oddest ways, silly things I forget (like how to write a “3″), cooking accidents, housecleaning “oh-no’s”, etc., all those many different daily experiences that make up my adventures as a housewife!

Well, this evening I was telling my DH (dear husband) about one I had today.

My DH has a Wednesday night class that he has been teaching at our church that I enjoy making yummy treats for.  Today I was making oh-so-yummy carrot cake cupcakes (NO NUTS!!!) with homemade cream cheese frosting. Now my recipe calls for 3 teaspoons of ground cinnamon, and that’s a normal staple in my spice pantry, but, lo-and-behold, when I went to add the cinnamon, I had not enough for even a 1/4 teaspoon!  When I’ve run into the problem of running out of something in the past, I try to just make do and substitute something else (vinegar and milk for buttermilk, applesauce for oil in baked goods, white toothpaste for wall spackling, etc.), and most of the time it works, but LEAVING THE CINNAMON OUT OF THE CARROT CAKE CUPCAKES!!!! It’s a crying shame!!!  I might add that I had already mixed most of the other ingredients and couldn’t just run to the store, since my two little ones were down for naps.  So, I did the next best thing…I went to our next door neighbor, who I happen to know through church.  She wasn’t at home.  So, I went to our other neighbor, a few doors down, who I also know through church.  She wasn’t home, either!!  So, I tried one more “next door” neighbor, who I ALSO know through church.  Third time’s a charm, right?  Wrong. She wasn’t home either.  By the way, for those of you wondering about all these next door neighbors who go to the same church, we all live in a fourplex complex and duplex complex that are next to each other and those complexes are right across the street from our church. Anyway, getting back to the story…so, I went back home and thunk some more.  Then it came to me!  I happened to have one whole cinnamon stick left from a craft project I’d done recently.  I also happen to have a cheese grater with a fine-grate.  So, I did what any desperate housewife would do, I spent about half an hour grinding this little tiny stick of cinnamon down to get my 3 (almost) teaspoons.  Did you know that cinnamon sticks are rather hard to grind in that fashion?  I do now!   But, I must say, the cupcakes turned out wonderfully! Moral of the story…make sure you have a really fine cheese grater on hand!

So, after telling this to my husband this evening, and, of course, after laughing at me, as he usually does, he suggested that I start a blog where I would document these constant funnies. I thought,”That’s a great idea!” I find myself forgetting more and more lately; what a great way to keep up with those memories AND with friends and family.  Truth be told, I actually tried starting a blog about three years ago and a few times since then, but, like all of those daily and weekly “to-do’s” around the house that I’m always trying to catch up and maintain, it seemed a bit daunting to try to catch up everyone all at once on what’s happened in our lives in the last few years (which happens to be A LOT).  So, I hope to just start fresh here, not try to catch up, but rather, take off from this point on.  Hopefully this first post will be the start of many more.  And hopefully you’ll be able to laugh with me (and maybe at me, sometimes) and relate to some of these stories from an absent-minded housewife!

By the by, looking at the time, it is officially June 16th, 2011 where I live, which means I have been married to my DH for exactly 5 years!  Happy Anniversary, buddy!!!