A glimpse to the future?

When we were in San Diego this summer, Bekah asked if I would take a few shots of her and Chris at the beach (with Mr. Cash still cooking in her belly). When we were about finished the kids had started to gather round and I couldn't help but snap a shot of the motley crew!

Maybe it's a glimpse into their future.......though I think the look on Chris' face says it all.

The perpetual smile.

That's Ryder, the boy with the constant smile.  I love it.  He can make me smile....even when I don't feel like it.  It's so bright, so inviting, so cheerful, so blissful.  How can it not make your day?

The redo.

There is this slight tendency I have to bite off more than I can chew, so I've been told anyway. Well, here is a project that I started and actually finished within days....rare, I know.

This hutch was gifted to us when we first moved to Kansas from Randy's Fire Chief. He and his wife knew we didn't own much furniture at the time and offered the hutch to us since they were buying a new set. That hutch has served us faithfully all these years and I always wanted to paint it, but with each move, pregnancy, baby, etc, it just didn't make it to the top of the "to-do list". Finally, with the chance at having my dining room actually utilized as such, I put it on the list and have now crossed it off. Yay!

Here it was before (I had started to sand it when I remember to take a pic of it):

And after:

(Pardon the shadows at the bottom, I would have had to clear out the dining room table & chairs otherwise)

This was my first attempt at making a piece look vintage and it was super fun! Alchemy Fine Living has awesome tutorials on You Tube that gave me the confidence to complete the project. I've even finished another piece since, woohoo!

My silly little girl.

The kids were playing out back the other day and Addie decided to ham it up for the camera. How do you like her "throwback" pink jammies and snow boots?

Such a bundle of energy......maybe I could borrow some......

Dreams do come true.

Remember this post from a while back?  Well, the kids were able to maintain there memorization of the Lord's Prayer from The City Harmonic's song, "Manifesto", and we talked about how cool it would be if we could see them in concert one day.

That day happened in September.  Yep, they came to our city.  And even crazier, the event was at our church!  The kids were soooo excited to see these guys "in real life" and the live version of Manifesto was nothing short of electrifying!

After the show, the kids were able to get the autograph of each band member and meet them personally.  Here they are (totally forgot my camera, so my apologies for the fuzzy shot!):

To add to night was an artist we had not heard before named AJ Cheek.  We all enjoyed his acoustic set and were able to buy his album after the show.  Ashlynn and I play it constantly around the house and in the car now.  Check him out on itunes, the album is titled "The Art of Letting Go", it's inexpensive and you will love it!  What really stood out to us about him, was his intentional, authentic spirit.  You could tell his heart was truly in his music and it was all for the glory of God.


Good show, great artists, awesome time!

A moment.

Yesterday at church, before we took communion, our Pastor encouraged us to jot down five things we were thankful for.  Quickly, I rifled through my purse to snag a pen and began writing.  When you live in a free country with the abundance we have, there are always more than five items to list, but we only had a few moments and the suggestion of five was a realistic goal. One thought that came to mind was "moments".  In life, all through the day, the hours, the minutes, the seconds, there are those times when we want to freeze everything and let it be etch into our memory.  It may be the smallest detail or the biggest deal ever, but we grab it and try to seal it in.  That's why I love my camera.  Ofcourse, not every moment can be captured in a photograph, a giggle, a mispronounced word, someone saying "I love you", those are cherished in the heart and mind.  But for many, I grab my camera, aim and hope it will help me remember "the moment":

It's not much really, but when I woke up the other morning, came downstairs and looked out my front door (something I do every single morning!) I couldn't help but be captivated by the way the light was shining through the trees.  It just caught my attention, it was just a moment.

The joyful smiles of vacation!

 

What really happens.

So last week, I had a stretch of blogging almost daily...wow! But, what I need to share today is what really happens around here when mommy blogs more often:






Addie and Gage raided the coat closet and with Addie in her new swimsuit, proceeded to dress in their winter attire. All this while I blogged....

As you can see, all of the photos of Addie were taken "on the run" and it was a bit like pulling teeth getting them to put it all away when they were done!

Only Gage and Addie.

The first harvest!

Yesterday I noticed the radishes were poking their little red bodies from the dirt. The kids came running to see and proceeded to pick our "first harvest" from the garden!

Here they are:

These guys went a bit rogue:

Our lettuces are coming along well too!

Here is the red chard:

I must admit....I have no idea what this is....:

The romaine, my favorite lettuce:

The broken bits you see with the lettuce are egg shells. I read a tip that they can stop certain creepy crawlies from eating/getting to your tender greens. It supposedly slices them right up......let's hope it works!

@ the Dinosaur: and how does that make you feel?

The kids were happily digging in the sandbox for hours the other day. The weather was perfect, a light breeze with beautiful sunshine and they dug away.

Finally, they came inside to show the me the dinosaur bones and teeth they had found. "Look mom! We are being psychologists out there. Look what we discovered!"

Trying to hide my grin, I said, "Oh, you're being archeologists, how fun!"

"Yeah mom, archeologists. It's so fun, we want to do this forever!"

Here are some of the psychologists, I mean, archeologists finds:

I found myself imagining them out there talking to the old bones; asking about their childhood, what their friends were like and how all of that made them feel.....



*Check out mom's bag HERE!

What did you have for lunch?

A bit of brown rice, black-eyed peas, corn, salsa, green onion, romaine, spinach, avocado, carrot.......

Check out mama's Easter dress HERE.

Ashlynn and China.

For the last few weeks, in Ashlynn's curriculum, we have been studying Asia. Last week, we went more in depth with China and it's culture. I told her about the dress I had that messy-guy-Grandpa bought me while on business in the Orient when I was exactly her age. She begged to see it and had to try it on. Once she had the dress on she asked if I would take a picture of her in it. Little did I know what she had in mind!

See, she's been playing with photo shop for the last month or so and is apparently having way too much fun! Here is her "finished" product:




Oh, and check out the bag I made HERE.

We love Spring!

It keeps tempting us, now please, please stay!

*All photos courtesy of Miss Ashlynnie

Where's the sprinkles?

While talking to my sister, Bekah, Saturday afternoon, we exchanged "stories" about what cool thing we were working on. She was excitedly getting ready to steam mop her floors, "Aren't you jealous, Lizzie? I mean, I know that's how you want to be spending your Saturday!"

Um, yeah, that's what I wish I was doing...

"Well, I think I might be cooler Beks. I'm trading out the kids clothes. You know, fall and winter to spring and summer."

Silence.

A bit of snickering.

"Yeah Lizzie, cuz we have seasons and all here in San Diego, I know just what you mean..."

So Beks, just for you, you know, so you can see what you're missing out on living in a season-less city:

Ashlynn helping to lighten the mood of the lovely job:

When Addie and Gage heard what was going on they were super excited. I had announced that we were getting out the spring clothes and they couldn't wait to get started, even offering to help with what they could...

Until the bins started coming up from the basement and getting opened.

Where's the sprinkles? You said we were getting the sprinkles!

The concert.

Here are a few images from last week's Chris Tomlin concert.









It was an amazing night of praise and worship with a fantastic message from Louie Giglio. One of the best surprises for me was seeing Christy Nockels up on stage singing with Chris Tomlin(even leading a couple of the songs). She has always been one of my favorite singers/songwriters and I'm pretty sure I own every Watermark album ever made. Randy really enjoyed the opening band, Rend Collective. They're fun, they're folksy, they're Irish, and they play really cool instruments (ukulele, anyone?).....check them out on itunes.

Thanks again for the AWESOME tickets Paula!!!

Do I look cool now?

With Paula off to Oz, *sniff, sniff*, we decided to scrape the ceiling in her room and repaint before the girls move in. Our house has that lovely 70's popcorn on the ceilings that we wish we would have scraped off before we moved in. But, when you are living with you in-laws, expecting your third child and basically living out of a suitcase, you make do and move in. Fast forward five years and we are finally scraping the ceilings one room at a time as we shift things around.

Here is how cool I looked working, try not to be jealous:

I decided I needed to breakdown my look and see what your own input would be:

If only it ended with scraping and painting the ceilings. This post is to be continued.....

What did you have for dinner?

We had a couple of amazingly, warm days last week and I just had to break out the grill. We are so looking forward to Spring staying put for a while!

The case of the conjoined fruits and veggies.

Gage has been addicted to carrots lately and asks for one nearly every hour. When we reached the end of the bag the other day, this is what we pulled out:

Seems we had a case of conjoined carrots!

Then yesterday, we were eating strawberries and found yet another conjoined food in our kitchen:





Ofcourse, the kids found all of this quite entertaining and I, ofcourse, was there with camera in hand to share with you all! Had any funny looking fruits or veggies lately?