Already another birthday

It's shocking to me how quickly time flies. June and July are big birthday months in my house. June 24th is sweet baby Cassidy who is now the big 1. July 13th is mine. it was 26 this year and man am I feeling the years now.

But today we celebrate Amelie. My rambunctious, spunky, joyful, emotional, lovely, crazy little girl. Born in the midst of much chaos she can still bring me the feelings of peace and joy or of stress and headache that where at the center of her entrance to the world.

She taught me to trust in my body and in all that I was created for. She has been key in my learning to trust myself, in my personal growth, in my growing collection of gray hairs. I would never change a thing about her. Her obsession with cutting her hair, her sweet smile, her beautiful hazel eyes that perfectly match her Daddy's, her whiny squeal, the just so way that she says things.

I love her so much even when she is pulling things off the shelves and making messes. Or pouring sprinkles in a bowl at someone elses house and trying to suck them through a straw.

Life just keeps moving on

So day to day life has a tendency of overwhelming me. I easily get bogged down in the mundane, distracted by pointless, obsessed with the inconsequential. It must be my ADHD. I flit from thought to thought. Then I find one that sticks and it just won't let go till it has run its course.

That is what has been happening. I have all these things I have been doing, seeing, watching, enjoying that I have been wanting to share here. But I have been so wrapped up in the doing that I haven't gotten to the actual blogging of the events. I am sure that part of it has to do with the recent changes in my free time. With Dave being home I am much less drawn to the computer. He was gone so long I want to enjoy as much time with him now as I can. As I type he is sitting behind me playing guitar. Yeah he really is that sexy.

So a quick update of the things that I have been up to since my studdly guitar playing sailor arrived home.

-A few days before he got back my lovely mother in love, came to suprise Dave. She stayed a few days after he got back and we all had a really good time bonding. It was beautiful.

- We had a nice two weeks of getting reaquantied as a family. Parks, libary visits, the usual things. We spent a signifacant amount off money. We bought a new tv, Blueray DVD player, and a Wii. Along with several other sundry items.

-Then we left to spend Dave's two weeks of leave visiting his family. We drove to Pittsburgh stayed overnight, then headed to Ann Arbor for the bulk of the trip and the back to Pittsburgh for a day to visit more and go to the zoo.

-When we got back I was ready to dive head first into a big room switching adventure. Which is still not fully completed. But I am getting there.

So the plan is to be blogging out all this awesome stuff over the next few weeks as well as staying on top of all the great joys of late spring. Summer is coming quick. I am not sure I am really ready for it to be here yet.


Sorry for the lack of pictures. There are lots of awesome pictures I just don't know whats up with the laptop the picture files are set up diffrently than they are on my computer. So there will be pictures on the posts to come dont you worry your pertty little head about that.

Random Tuesday Thought and its a guest post!!!!

Ok so dave has been talking about starting his own blog but I told him to start by guesting on mine. Well because I love him, He is hot, also smart, funny and totally awesome. So here we go Welcome Dave to the world of blog with love.

Okay, so here's my Random Tuesday Thought. It's more like something random I saw today. I'm not sure if they do this where you're from, but around here, the shopping carts at the grocery stores are fitted with a "boot" on the back wheels to prevent people from taking them out of the parking lot. So anyway, while we were at a stoplight, we saw this poor, confused old lady desperately trying to push a cart full of her groceries out of the parking lot of Kroger and wondering why it wasn't moving. She was putting quite a bit of exertion into it and looked rather frustrated. I wanted to roll down the window and say "HEY LADY! YOU CAN'T TAKE THAT CART WITH YOU!!"

Poor lady probably lived just down the street and walked to the store for her groceries. But, if so, she probably would have had this problem before. Maybe she's new in town. How much would that suck. So here's to you confused old lady leaving Kroger. May your future shopping trips be less eventful!

Other random thoughts...

Last Monday Amelie was half asleep while Amy, my mom and I were talking and she was responding to some stuff we said. Among her babblings were:
"I'm not a drunk dude!" and "I'm a girl! Not a boy!"

Today, I attempted to play Wii Boxing with the girls. Amelie actually did better than Audrey.

I've had too much to drink at this point...so I'm done.



And that's my thought for the day, as Mort Crim would say. But unless you're from the Detroit area, you probably don't know who that is...

My heart is whole again!

He is home. Safe and sound. His mom left this evening. He is at the ship for the evening. Duty days are no fun. Man how I missed him. Now the real journey begins. Its so nice to be held again. I missed that.



We took him lunch on the ship it was nice to get to hang out. I wish I could have taken him home right away, but duty called. (lol, he had duty and had to stand watch on the ship.)



Always a gentleman he held my stuff on the ship and he bought me roses.


the girls and I made this awesome sign and hung it on the porch. I plan on using it for lots of stuff. Because we really do love our daddy around here. He rocks!!!
Waiting for him at the pier was really exciting. It was a little chilly since it was still early but it was really nice.

Savories on Sunday

Ok so I have figured out part of the picture problem. I now know that it is the new memory cards. I'll fiddle around with that later but for now enjoy the taste sensation I just cooked up.

I am calling this Tropically Tasty Curry

1 14 oz can Trader Joe's light coconut milk
1 28.2 oz can bionaturae organic crushed tomatoes
1 20 oz can crushed pineapple, drain as much liquid as possible
1 15.5 oz can organic great northern beans, drained and rinsed (I added these at the end for a little protein, but they added something special)
cumin seeds
turmeric I just eyeball the seasonings whatever looks right to me.
ground coriander
curry powder

1 good sized onion, sliced up (I didn't worry at all about the pieces being the same size)
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
4 yukon gold potatoes, cut into little sticks (you can cut the potatoes in whatever small shape you like)
A few good sized hand fulls of fresh green beans, cut in to bite size pieces
1 head of cauliflower, cut into bite size pieces
3 small yellow squash, sliced into rounds
oil, i used safflower

Put some oil in the bottom of the pan over low to medium heat, depending on if you are still cutting veggies or not. Add the onion, let it get translucent. THen add the cauliflower and potatoes, cook a few minutes. Add squash, garlic and beans. Add spices. Stir well. Add all the canned ingredients. Simmer until the veggies are to your desired texture i like mine to still have some crunch left in them. I plann on serving this with rice or quiona. I made it today to serve later in the week. Most of it will get frozen for later.

Enjoy!!!

My song of the day

I just wanted to share this song with you all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oX98DqGd2f'

So my my new memory card doesn't seem to want to let the pictures off. So all these cute pictures I am taking are not getting on the blog as soon as I had hoped. Well I have my tech people on it. We shall get back to picture posting soon.

oh thank heaven

I bought a new camera today so lets see how the pics look on the blog.

its coming

The day is soon approaching when our family will all be home again. It's less than a month away now. THere are lots of things to be done so I am going to post my list here. In hopes that it will make me feel a little pressure to get these things done. So here's the list:

-Make Welcome Home banner for the porch
-Deep clean and organize the office/tv/play room because it looks like this

Actually its worse now if that's even possible.

-Get daves clothes out of cold storage in the back of the closet. So that they are ready when he gets home. This also involves finding a home for them in the bed room since we are lacking in storage.
-Make the girls outfits for homecoming
-Decide what I want to wear for homecoming
-Work on front flower beds so that they don't look like big mud pits
-Bake for freezer. Extra muffins and cookies so they are ready for him.

There is more I'll keep adding to the list.

Hiatus

Just came to apologize for the bloggy hiatus. I'll be back soon. Tha camera broke and there are things to be done.

Picnicking and a recipe

So as of late we have been picnicking quite a bit. I'll pack up some fruit, sandwiches, a salad, and various other yummy things before we leave the house. With the intention of stopping and eating at the park, rather than getting drive-thru junk. One of my favorite salads is a play on something one of my doulas from Cassidy's birth made me once.

Some you take an avaccodo and mash it up. I add a little olive oil to thin it out but you could use water if you are worried about fat content. A little bit of vinegar. I have been using Bragg Apple Cider Vinegar. A little all purpose seasoning or seasoning salt to taste. Maybe a little ground pepper. Some lettuce I have been using a baby romaine mix or an italian salad mix, but any good, quality salad greens will do. Add veggies, fruit and toppings of choice. I like carrots, apples, dried cranberries, sunflower seeds, cucumbers, really whatever is in the house at the time. This is sooo yummmy!!!! Try it and ENJOY!!!

A song for Saturday

Ok my Four year old LOVES Jazz. So this makes her mother very happy!!! I am going to share one of the songs we have been listening to. I love this album and has been our jazz of choice in the van the last two weeks or so.



Ok I hope you enjoyed that. As much as we did. The plan for tommorrow is to post pics of their art. Audy wants to be an artist when she grows up. That or a chef. I hope both. But I want to give her a little show on the blog.

From Snow day to Hiking day in just 4 days!!!

We went hiking today at the Arboretum. Man I love this place. It has to be one of my favorite in the area. The beach being number 1 of course. We walked a lot today it ended up just being the girls and I. We invited friends but no could make it. I think that was meant to be. I really enjoyed just spending time with them in nature. It was great. Audy thought the woods were "creepy". I thought they were resplendent. It was beautiful. So we walked I have no clue how far. Then we went to the little homestead area and had a picnic lunch. We learned that PB and J is great with shredded coconut in the middle. Very yummy we will be doing this a lot I think. As well as more hiking. The girls were pretty good at sticking with me. Ok so you want to see pictures of this outing I am sure so here ya go.

Does it get any cuter than two sisters sitting on a bench. I think not.
The trail passed by the back of some apartments.
You would not believe how many times I tried to get this picture there are several of my armpit.

The girls at the trailhead when we started out on our journey.

We will not be going into the two visits to the park that ended in us having to leave because Amelie wet her pants and only once successfully park streaked and the time with other children present. I was distracted enough to not pay much attention to guy who was yelling at his son to apologize for some minor park mishap. But it was cool that the second trip my friend Anna Facebook stalked me and came to the park too. That was awesome.

Wordless Wenesday

Randomness!!!

Ok so yesterday we had a snow day so of course we played in the snow.
Amelie was making a snow angel. Oh the zipper on her coat is broken that is why its open.


Then we made snowflake cookies. They are all gone now. Polished off this morning. Man they were yummy. I made good Old Fashioned Royal Icing. RAW EGG in all its glory. We are not sick. Just so you know.Now for some baby cuteness. Ok so the other evening I was doing dishes and Cassidy was in her Bumbo beside me. I look down and this is what I find.

No she is not dead. She fell asleep like this. I left her there to cause I didn't want to wake her up. She has done this a few times. It cracks me up every time.

And now for the cuteness to end all cuteness.

Come on how cute is that. The sweetest little thing ever. Those rosy little cheeks in a Momma made tomato hat. Doesn't get cuter than that. And the look on her face is priceless.

Favorite Music Friday

Ok My Best Friend Megan Posted MXPX today and so am I because coping my friends is how I roll. Now if you could only hear the extra verse Dave wrote for this song when we were dating that would be flippin' awesome. I hope you enjoy the funny video. I have no clue who made that but it was better then the other ones.




edited to add link to Megan's blog. I am a bonehead and just realized I forgot it.

Shoes!!!!!

Ok so Friday Morning my wonderful friend watched Amelie and Cassie for me while Audy was at school so that I could get a little break. I got some coffe at 7-11 and went to my favorite thrift store to see what I could find. I am always looking for cute shoes. I have a hard time finding heels that I like anyway new or used. Well it was my lucky day check these out. Super sexy gray heels my size for $6. I am so happy and too top it off they are actually really comfy.

Wordless Wenesday

The joy of morning

This is what I get to wake up to every morning. What a joy! I love them so much. Oh yeah the girls regularly sleep in what they wore the day before. Who cares about jammies when you are tired. I sincerely hope that you are all enjoying your President's Day. We woke up this morning like any other Monday and got ready for Audy to go to school. Got in the car and started driving. We drive by an elementary school on our way to Audy's Lutheran Preschool. The light wasn't flashing. No grumpy looking crossing guard. The sign said NO SCHOOL 2/16. Hmmm I didn't hear anything at school Friday guess we still have school. We get to Audy's school and not a single car in the parking lot. I drive on by and try to tell Audy that she has day off. But there is no way she can hear me over here screaming. Oh well I guess I am taking all three kids to the Commissary. All I here the whole time we are in the store is a chorus of I want this I want that. I persevere. When we get to the van with the bagger i realize all I have is a $20 to tip the guy. I feel like being generous so I give it to him. So all in all it wasn't a bad morning and I did a good deed.

Hope Your Day Is Enjoyable!!!

Am I Really reading again?

Yes I do believe that I am. So I finished the entire Twilight Saga in two weeks. Which is crazy. I pretty much just let my house fall apart. But it is looking pretty good now that I finished just in time for bedtime on Thursday. Now we have started reading The Harry Potter series at bedtime. I was hoping to get through a chapter a night but we get through like 3 or 4 pages before Audy is driving me nuts with the wiggling. Amelie is usually out by the second page. Why did I not think about reading at bedtime a long time ago. I mean I know lots of people do this But man if I knew it would work this well for mine I would have done it a long time ago.

I have a stack of library books to go through this week. Lets see what I get through.

Let me leave you with a song that I have been loving this week. This is Such Great Heights originally by The Postal Service covered here by Iron and Wine. This is the version I have been listening to. The video is not what I would want but it was better than the title through the whole song. Garden State is a really good movie too.

Friday Five

Five things in my bag

Ummm... ADDICTED!!!!!!

Hello my name is Amy and I am addicted to Twilight!

Yes I can truthfully say that now seeing as I Have spent the last few days in a daze. It is not really even funny anymore. I have devoured Midnight Sun (Twilight from Edwards POV). There are only like 11 chapters that she posted on her website. And now I am in love with Edward. Dave I hope you get home soon. I may need to be sent to the nut house when you get back if I don't get this under control soon. I feel a little wacky but I am slowly coming down. Must keep breathing. Keep mental focus an real life not creepy vampire fantasy world. Ok I will be fine. Over and out!

The cult of Twilight

I have officially joined. I hated the first chapter. Her writing style leaves something to be desired. But I have to give her props for telling an amazing story. It has infected my mind. Yesterday after church I came home and pretty much did nothing but read THAT book. I read it until i finished it. I started the day in Chapter six. I went to bed having started the first chapter of New Moon. I spent the whole night dreaming of plot lines and stuff for Bella and Edward to do. It was kinda insane. I can't wait to get my hands on a copy of New Moon. I borrowed Twilight from one of the sixth grades girls from the small group I lead on Wednesday evening at church.

I now fully understand the TwilightMania. This book gets stuck in your head. I didn't watch a second of the Super Bowl, check my email or really cook. I made baked potatoes and drowned them in butter, I put sliced mushrooms on mine. What a day I think I will call it my Super Bowl of reading.

I do have to say that I did not fall in love with Edward and was really annoyed at how much Bella droned on about how gorgeous Edward was. It got quite old and she used the same descriptions to many times. "his marble arms" AGHHHHHH!!! It was a little over the top to me. But I guess in some ways true to a 17 year old girl. I reallyt want to give girls more credit than that though.

wordless wenesday

Laziness

La-zy- adjective: 1. adverse or disinclined to work, activity, or exertion; indolent
2. slow-moving; sluggish: a lazy stream

So I am in an extreme state of Lazy these days. It is a chronic problem for me but it has hit a peak it has never quite reached before. It is most obvious in the current state of my house. I swear if someone broke in to rob my house they would turn around and walk out thinking that the place had already been robbed. I am doing better at keeping up with the dishes but that's about the only thing that is getting done in the house these days. I am not exaggerating in anyway. I will post pictures if people really don't believe me. You can't walk through the house without tripping on, stepping on or being jabbed in the foot by any number of toys, silverware (clean that the kids have deieced belong on the floor), clothes, towels, blankets, pillows, empty boxes, bits of trash.

Ok so I say all this not just to whine. I seriously want to change. I hate living this way this is in no way what I want for my children, myself, or my home. I know it is more than just the season, which totally plays a part for me. I am starting to think I have Seasonal Affective Disorder. I am just so overwhelmed by everything. I really want to be motivated to get up an take care of this. This playing out in more than just the housekeeping, though that is the most obvious. I am not taking very good care of myself. Most of the time we don't eat breakfast or at least noting of any substance. I am not getting any exercise at all. I am not making any effort to do fun things with the kids. I can't remember the last time we sat and did a craft.

I want to get off the couch, well futon, and be outside playing with my kids. I want to really be excited about planning and starting our garden. I want to have the desire to keep my house in order and not just crisis clean when I want to have people over. I want to have a good routine with the girls. I want to engage them in activities that we will all enjoy. I want to be myself again.

Maybe it's Dave being gone that has exacerbated this. I feel like half of me is missing. We have been in contact as much. Its hard not having my best friend, my sounding board, my counselor, my love.

It is more than that though there is a piece of me that feels like it's dying. It's a tiny ember deep in side me that just wants to be stocked in to a roaring bonfire. I just can't find the fuel. What is the fuel that will ignite the blaze?

A song for my honey.

You have to know that story But I know Dave does and that's all that matters.

Dashboard Confessional- Saints and Sailors

Sunday Songs

Anberlin- Godspeed




Anberlin- Unwinding Cable Car

I am back!!!!

Ok I just took a not so little blog break. I have had a lot going on in my mind but no real motivation to write it out. So ya know.

But I am a growing person. I sometimes need to focus my attention other places. Now I focus a nit more back over here.

I am a slacker!!!!!

I have been home since late Saturday evening and have yet to post or unpack our suitcases. I guess two weeks of leaving out of suitcases wasn't enough for me. I am some kinda crazy. But I already knew that and I am sure several of you realized that as well. I have worked on a few projects that I have been waning to work on. Such as putting the dining room back together. It was kind of a mess when i left town. Well I have officially lost interest in this post so I am just going to stop now before I bore you to death with nonsense.