Summer update - part 2

We decided to give camping a try. This was a family first! In fact, it'd been almost 11 years since Aaron & I had been camping. To be honest, we don't really fancy ourselves outdoorsmen. We don't hunt or fish & don't aspire to. But, we decided to give camping a try!

The whole idea got started months ago while out to coffee with a few girlfriends. We thought it would be so fun to go camping together, as families. Let the kids play and be dirty and swim and love every second of it. What a fun & relatively cheap experience!

And guess what? It really was! We don't own anything hardly, so we were really thankful for my in laws who happened to have a ton of camping stuff & let us borrow it. We faked our way through the rest.

We made a ton of memories & had a ball!

I had a few marshmallow games planned for the kids. They LOVED them, which was awesome! Ya gotta love the classics like chubby bunnies. :)

I was having all of these fun memories - of kids camps & family camps from what feels like a million years ago. I love that we got to give our kids great memories of their own with family camping, etc!

They stayed up late, roasting marshmallows and playing spy games with flashlights. We even went on 2 hikes! The second of which was 5 miles and 6000 feet in elevation! We almost quit a few times, but we pushed through & we made it! That's saying something with a 4, 5 and 8 year old. :)

We all left thoroughly dirty and tired, but in such a great way! We made a lot of notes on what we'd do different next time & what worked well for us. So, I think that it will go even better the next time we venture out into the woods. :)


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Summer update - part 1

This summer has flown by faster than ANY other thus far! We have been on the go non-stop. We have either been gone, getting ready to go, or just recovering from being gone all summer, I swear it! We have made some awesome memories and had some incredible experiences!! I am so grateful!!

I started things off with a concert at The Gorge. It's a gorgeous outdoor amphitheater. The concert I went to was Lilith Fair and it was a blast! I went with a group of girlfriends. :)










It really was such a blast!!

Two days later we headed to my mom's wedding in Iowa. I packed up our car and drove me & my kids half way across the country. That's 2 days of driving and about 1500 miles. The way out was mostly fun and uneventful. I say mostly, because when we were 40 miles away from my mom's house my SUV went ape-shit crazy and ultimately died on me. So, i had to call my mom, brother & a tow truck to come & rescue me.

My battery was SO dead that my hazard lights didn't even work. It was getting dark, and I was really wanting to panic. I knew that I needed to stay calm though, for my kids to stay calm (or as calm as possible). Semi trucks flying past us (at 70 mph) with no hazard lights to warn them that we are on the side of the road is not super comforting, however. Thankfully I remembered that we had some flares in the back. I bought them years ago in an 'always be prepared' inspiration. I could have kissed myself in that moment, because they were EXACTLY what we needed! It took a few minutes, but I finally figured out how to work them. They lasted for a good half hour, and my mom & brother showed up within about 5 minutes after they went out. Thank you JESUS! We were saved!

I got my kids into my mom's SUV and shlepped all of our stuff into her car too. My brother checked things out while waited for the tow truck. Thankfully, my family has connections in their small town and the tow truck was willing to come a bit further than usual. That way my SUV was able to be brought to their town rather than the closest random shop that it would have otherwise been.

I am VERY grateful that we broke down so close to my mom's place, instead of in the middle of no where with no cell coverage & 3 kids by myself. I really do consider that a miracle in itself! Thankfully, our SUV got fixed & we were able to move forward.

Onto the wedding!

My hubby, Aaron, had to fly in for the weekend of the actual wedding (someone's gotta make money around here). So, I got to drive 2 hours to the airport to pick him up. It was worth it though!! He was an awesome emotional support to me and it meant a lot that he was there to be a part of things.

The wedding & reception were on a boat, which was really fun!











I will post more pics from the wedding when I get them. Unfortunately, it may be a while.

The wedding was great! It was a bit crazy at times since I ended up being the wedding coordinator with zero warning. But at the end of the day, my mom got married to a nice man & they are both very happy. That's all that matters.

We got to have some play time back at the farm after the wedding too. Did I mention that the guy my mom married is a farmer? Well, his name is Dave & he is a farmer. :)

One of the most fun things we did at the farm was ride 4-wheelers.



In fact, Aaron even went mudding. He's the one on the left. :)


It was loads of fun!

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Random goings on...

Our computer died a couple of weeks ago. It's a bit depressing, because we really cannot afford to replace it right now. I am trying to focus on the positives. I had JUST uploaded 2 years worth of pictures to Costco.com and ordered hardcopies of them for our photo albums. Phew! Also, we both have iPhones. Honest to god, we would be SO screwed without them!

However, my lack of a computer is throwing a cog in the wheel of this blog. So far I haven't figured out how to get pictures on the blog (from my phone). And, it's just a little more complicated to post in general. But, what are ya gonna do?

In other news, I started using whole wheat flour instead of white flour. So, I'm feeling like it's a good, healthier step for me & my family. And, it's been a success in most things...meaning we actually LIKED the end result. The only thing I made that ended up a little too heavy was blueberry scones. I think it's because they are already more dense, the whole wheat flour was a bit excessive. I may try it again, with half white & half whole wheat. But other baked goods have been pretty tasty. The other thing I have been using is splenda instead of sugar. Whether you agree if it's healthier or not, it IS a LOT less calories, so that's really good for me! So between the whole wheat flour & the splenda, I am feeling way better about my cravings for baked goods. ;)

One thing

that is hard for me, is not being able to help/fix/change anything for my friends & family when things are hard for them. I'm talking about when there are big problems - like big financial trouble, marital trouble, deep struggles in faith, etc. I HATE that!

I mean, when you love someone, doesn't it just suck to feel so helpless?!

So, I pray. I ruminate. And I hope for change (for the better).

Interesting article on Marriage ...

I just read this interesting article in The New York Times titled "Is Marriage Good for Your Health?"

In the article it talks about the link between your physical health & your relationship status. It started with a study that was done in 1858 about married people being more physically healthy than single people, and single people being more healthy than widows/widowers. Obviously, our society today is a bit more complicated than those 3 categories of old. We have divorce, homosexual relationships, lots of people choosing to just live together rather than ever marry at all, etc.

So, there have been tons of studies since then that are more relevant to TODAY. The part that is STILL very proven, is that our physical health is absolutely linked to our emotional health (which our relationships are an intricate part of).

"The results showed that the women in unhappy relationships and the women who remained emotionally hung up on their ex-husbands had decidedly weaker immune responses than the women who were in happier relationships (or were happily out of them)."

Research shows that some level of relationship stress is inevitable in even the happiest marriages. The solution isn’t to stop fighting. It’s to fight more thoughtfully. “Difficulties in marriage seem to be nearly universal,” he said. “Just try not to let fights be any nastier than they need to be.”

Also noted is the importance of taking time off together and making sure their disagreements don’t degenerate into personal attacks. Use those moments of stress as an opportunity to repair the relationship rather than to damage it. “It can be so uncomfortable, even in the best marriages, to have an ongoing disagreement,” she said. “When your marital relationship is the key relationship in your life, a disagreement is really a signal to try to fix something.”

So, in the end I found this article really encouraging. There are real health benefits to being stubborn enough to keep dealing with problems until they are actually solved! ;-) I can't count how many fights (*ahem* discussions) we had in our first years of marriage that went on for hours and after the few minutes of being upset, really went deep into what was really going on, and truly dealt with our issues at the time. And now, we actually have far fewer of those. Once in a while we will still have (& need) a discussion into the wee hours of the night - hashing things out. It's not easy, but in the end it's always been so good for us. I'm so grateful that we have that pattern established...I'm sure we will utilize it for the rest of our lives.

We have always told people "We are passionate people. We fight passionately, but we make up passionately too!" So there you have it!

**I DO have to say also, that I think it really makes a case for the times that it IS healthier to get out of a bad relationship rather than just stay in it, for the sake of staying. It definitely takes two people (and a lot of work from both of them) to have a healthy happy relationship.

here's the link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/18/magazine/18marriage-t.html?scp=1&sq=is%20marriage%20good%20for%20your%20health?&st=cse

The truth about THIS Stay at Home Mom

1. Nap time is mostly for my benefit. When they were babies, it was for both of us, and my kids will still occasionally have super crabby days where they NEED a nap, but for the most part - it's for my benefit now. Of course, nap time is usually just a quiet time now. Call it what you want - it's really for my sake.

2. I wear some version of sweat pants or lounge pants almost every day. I know that I shouldn't, but I do.

3. I will wait to pick up my house(with the exception of small tidying) until just before my husband comes home. Oh sure, it will seem like it took me all day, but most often I only spent 15 or 20 minutes on it.

4. I have the luxury of working out when my kids are at preschool. Let me restate this in a more accurate fashion: I force myself to workout when they are at preschool. Yep, I've become that mom. Now, don't get me wrong...I'm not some pampered pooch with perfect nails, bod, hair & makeup (as you all know). I'm just the red faced mom in sweats picking up her kids from preschool. Most of the time I want to say "I was just working out. I DO own other clothes, people. I swear! And I do my hair sometimes too..." Ugh! So much for caring what other people think, right?!

5. There are more, but I'm drawing a blank...maybe next time...

Viva La Coffee!

It's only the 19th of the month & I'm almost out of coffee. My Costco membership needs to be renewed & we can't afford to renew until Aaron gets paid again...grrr! I may try to get my MIL to snag some for me & I can pay her for it. I HATE buying coffee anywhere other than Costco now, because it's such a rip off! I can buy a huge 2 lb bag at Costco for $10 vs. the 1/2 lb bags for $8 anywhere else...not really a tough choice, is it?!

I feel like that dog on the commercial for beggin' strips (I think) 'bacon, bacon, bacon, bacon, BACON!' Except mine is 'Coffee, coffee, coffee, coffee, COFFEE!!'

Yeah, I'm addicted, and I'm okay with it. :-D

Happy Monday!!