Can you guess?

Can you guess


where we spent

a BIG chunk of this cold Saturday

bundled up,

eating McDonald's Chicken Mcnuggets,

drooling down straws,

saying "hi",

watching big sister,

and warming mommy's heart?

My little adventurer

Little boys are born with curiosity, determination and a drive to seek and conquer.

At least my little boy was... he was climbing out of his crib at age 1, talking incredibly well at age 2 and now at barely 3 years of age has been outlawing the wearing of diapers completely for weeks now and is becoming quite the independent learner!

Any and every situation he is confronted with turns into a game, a hunt, an opportunity to discover something new and ineviablty you will hear a "I can do it, I can do it by myself!"! He de-shells his own hardboiled eggs, and loves to peel his tangerines! He's memorized his favorite book and after I read it to him before bed, wants to read it to me, too!

Right now he is in a "Why" stage and will often look at me (or any

one who is being nice to him at the moment) and say, "I like you". He loves his green blankie and still sucks his thumb. He will play with his wooden blocks for hours just lining them up on the coffee table in no obvious order. He's definately a thinker and his smile melts my heart.

He's a sensitive one and will most often say thank you without being prompted. Which always makes me smile!
On the particular day that I snapped these pictures, he had come to me in need a flashlight, which I found for him and right away he disappeared. A few minutes later I found him checking out the very dark furnace room through a vent hole in the wall! I had to smile because it was definitely an act that is consistent with his personality.

My little adventurer,
I love you.

"It is in the compelling zest of high adventure and of victory, and in creative action that man finds his supreme joys." -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Grilled Salmon with Lentil Tabouli

Okay, does that not look Delicious?

My husband has been getting the Runner's Magazine in the mail for about 5 months now and I don't think he is the only one enjoying it.

A friend and I had been co-babysitting each other's kids as we worked through the 'Couch to 5k' program together. We recently (just last week!) finished it and are now training for an 8k! We have had a blast and a half getting together, getting into shape and getting to know each other a little better... again. (only my dear Friend would know what I mean here) But then again, ALOT of us know what it's like to know each other in high school, then get married, move away, have kids and kind of drift apart for awhile... thankfully the Lord has brought us back together again so we can lean on, learn from and help each other out any and every way we can!

Aren't true friends awesome? They know you, know your faults, have seen you at your worst, yet still love you. That's what God calls us to! I am blessed to have friends like this, and blessed to return that friendship! Friendship is SO much more than good feelings, fun and what you can get out of it... it also requires sacrifice.

Anyways, SO... I read the Runner's magazine. I find brilliant recipes, good tips, dieting articles and overall it's a wonderful grouping of pages filled with recipes, articles and stories to overall improve your lifestyle choices. Here on page three of this article is some good insight into the dos, don'ts and myths of weight loss. Most importantly though, it had the recipe for THIS:

Yeah. I know. Beautiful. If you get a chance, try it. It's deliciously tangy.

Confession

Popcorn is excruciatingly yummy. I crave it's soft crispy texture, oily salty flavor and warming aroma! We eat it probably a tad too often... maybe make that everyday too often. I look at it as over-all slightly healthy, though. It's natural fiber covered in pure organic coconut oil... better than ALOT of other snackyish foods I could crave, right?


We love it enough to have an entire mega drawer devoted to it.

Hey, after all, we do have a family of seven!

An epiphany

--Bear with me here... I'm just a little excited about this one! ! !

To all of you creative, do-it-yourselfer, recycle lover, organic eating, thrifty mothers out there, I just found a wonderful new way of freezing and storing your pre-homemade baby food "for crawlers" and I'm so excited to share it with you!

Us picky-about-what-our-baby-eats baby food chefs have ALL done the freeze the baby food in ice cube trays, and then loosened and dumped them into freezer bags, only to later find yourself using at least 6 cubes per feeding for those growing little dears. Well, let me just let you in on something fabulous, the greatest idea, that just came to me today.

If you happen to buy some 'to go' packages of diced pears, diced peaches or apple sauces, go ahead and save the little plastic cups when finished eating the fruit, don't throw them away! Besides using them for baby food, they work great for snack cups, whether for nuts, raisins, crackers, cereal, jello etc. OR for little ones who need something to play with while mommy cooks. Back to the topic at hand, though... For use with baby food, place all of your preferably washed(but it is your house, your baby, so you decide, Ha) plastic containers into a glass 9x13 pan. I LOVE my Pyrex one, because it has a handy dandy green (love!) plastic lid that fits over the top. It will fit approx. 10 of them inside. Pour the baby food into each container and then place the plastic lid on top and freeze until hardened! Take them out the pan and throw, yes THROW, them into large freezer bags. If you are one who likes to think ahead throw one or two in the fridge in the evening for lunch and dinner the next day... or in a pinch, run warm water on the bottom of the container for a few seconds and the food will pop right out and you can microwave until thawed!

To all of you Mothers out there, my friends, my family, my strangers (is that a strange way to refer to you?) <*wink*wink*> Bravo! Keep up the great work! You have one of the hardest jobs on earth.

Loves!

I have found the one my heart loves

I'm overwhelmingly blessed to know that my husband is well loved by his fellow teammates, that he is wanted, and looked up to and though, yes, it may be partially because my main man is a pretty darn good soccer player, too, to hear his team has scrounged up a pool of money for his soccer registration this season... Wow!! I'm so proud of him. And when he decided to go ahead and join the team because of their 'persuasion'... I LOVE the fact that his first thought was one of outreach, of ministry, to one of the neat guys he will be playing with! What a guy!