Happy 40th Anniversary, Mamaw & Papaw! June 19, 2008

This past weekend, we headed back to our hometown to join T’s sister and brother-in-law and numerous other friends and family members in surprising T’s parents with a 40th anniversary party.  T’s sister has been planning this since last year, and I’m thrilled to report that Mamaw and Papaw were definitely surprised. 

The plan was for them to think that they were only going out for a celebratory lunch with T’s sister and brother-in-law and niece.  The first surprise was that they would be taken to lunch in a limo!  The second surprise was that T, The Bean, and I were waiting for them in the limo when the door was opened.  Since we live a 7 hour drive away, our visits back home aren’t run of the mill, and the fact that we were there was a treat for us and for them. 

Here’s a picture of them when the door was opened to reveal The Bean sitting in her car seat.

I couldn’t get around fast enough to get a clear shot of Mamaw’s face since we nearly forgot to have the camera out to catch their expressions until it was too late!  But if you look through the window, you can kind of see her face too.  T’s mom said her first thought upon seeing The Bean was “that baby looks just like The Bean!”  She quickly peeked in the car to see if we were in there too to confirm to herself that it really was The Bean in person!

Here they are in the limo on the way to Red Lobster for lunch.

After lunch, we all used the “girls-need-to-lie-down-for-a-nap-just-ride-around-in-the-limo-for-a-little-while” excuse to keep them occupied until the driver would drop them off at the surprise reception T’s sister had planned a little later.  The girls did get naps, but we also used the time to finish setting up before T’s parent’s arrival.

They were surprised again to see so many friends and family waiting for them when they were dropped off at the reception site.

 

Here’s the whole immediate family at the reception. 

It was a lot of fun, and we were so happy to honor such a special anniversary milestone. 

If you look closely at the table decorations, you’ll notice a small, metal, heart-shaped basket on the table.  The baskets were filled with red hots which The Bean discovered are quite tasty.  Every time I looked up, she was scoping out which table had a chair positioned close enough for her to reach the red hot basket on each table.  She ate so many that she threw up when we got back to the house a couple of hours later.  We’ll see if she still wants them the next time she has a chance to have them again!

Hats off to T’s sister, K, for spear heading the whole thing and doing so much work to make it happen.  Other family members definitely contributed as well to make it a special day! 

Congratulations, Mamaw and Papaw on 40 years of marriage.  Thanks for being such a blessing and a wonderful example!

Beautiful! June 19, 2008

I’m moved to tears every time I watch this.  What a reminder of the power of our God!

Swinging And Splashing May 26, 2008

Since T and I both had the day off, we headed over to the park this morning to enjoy some time with The Bean.  She had a blast.  See for yourself.

Okay, I had to include this one.  I can’t help but hear “a boot to the head” over and over in my brain.  Anyone know where that’s from?

Into the rabbit hole.

And she’s off!

Would you believe that after all that, she STILL didn’t take a nap this afternoon.  I’ve about decided that naps at home are pretty much a thing of the past.  She did have a blast though! 

Fifteen Years May 26, 2008

T and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary about a week and a half ago.  It unfortunately fell during the week we had our annual survey at my facility.  I was not thrilled about spending my anniversary with state surveyors, but it is what it is.  We celebrated that weekend with a nice dinner and seeing the Prince Caspian movie.  It was a nice date. 

We were young when we got married.  I had just turned 20, and T was 22.  Except for a year that we were apart, we had dated since I was 16 and he was 18.  I was lucky to find him early in life.  He is such a blessing to me, and so much more wonderful than I can ever deserve.  He is decent and hard-working.  He honors my feelings and shows me consideration.  He does little things to make me feel special.  He is an amazing father to The Bean.  We have had our share of struggles, and I’m sure there are more to come.  But I know we will walk through them together, and knowing that gives me such peace.  God blesses my relationship with T and uses it to minister to me daily. 

Thank you, T, for your love and your prescence.  I love you.  You are always, My Love.

In honor of our 15 years of marriage, I decided to post some of our wedding photos. 

We were blessed to have my uncle officiate our wedding. 

Here we are as husband and wife!

A lady in our church made the cake.  I thought it was beautiful!

Here we are cutting the cake.  The greenery in the background was ivy from my parent’s backyard growing on the banks of the bayou.  We had little vials of water attached to the back of the screen so it would stay fresh throughout the afternoon.

Our going away photo.  We went to Hot Springs for our honeymoon.  We’d love to go back one day and stay at the same place for a future anniversary. 

An End Of The Year Program For The Bean May 26, 2008

This is the first trickle in a virtual flood of blog posts after the drought around here for the past couple of weeks.  This post is one that I wanted to post a week or two ago.  But better late than never!

T and I were excited to attend The Bean’s first end of the year program at daycare.  We arrived just as the kids were starting into their first song.  It wasn’t long before The Bean spotted us and was waving and saying, “Hi, Mommy!” instead of singing.  She had a blast singing and doing her dances.  She also flashed everyone between numbers when she pulled her dress up.  Ahhhh memories!

Here she is on stage getting her certificate.  She was so proud.  Afterwards, she told us, “I practiced for two weeks!”

Happy Mother’s Day May 11, 2008

Here’s the sweet Mother’s Day card The Bean made for me at daycare. 

The flowers are actually made from a tracing of her hands.  So cute!  I am so blessed to be her mother. 

Thank you to my mom and my mother-in-law for the blessings that they bring to my life.  There isn’t space enough here or time enough to say how much I appreciate the women and the mothers that they are.  Thank you for helping me be a good mother to The Bean.  I love you both.

Pondering Motherhood April 30, 2008

Susan and Janice over at Five Minutes for Mom are hosting a wonderful contest that is also a way to share a photo that makes you think about motherhood.  Quite good timing since Mother’s Day will be shortly arriving.  I had a difficult time choosing a photo, so I’ve got several to share.

Here’s my mom with my brother and me.  (My sister came later.)  My brother and I are “Irish twins” so to speak since we’re only 10 months and 8 days apart.  When I was old enough to realize what kind of toll that had to have been physically, I remember exclaiming to her, “Mom, you were pretty much pregnant for a year and a half!”  I think her exact reply was, “Don’t remind me.”  As difficult a time that was for her, literally having one baby right after another, I remember that she took the time to do things with us.  I think in this photo, we’re playing with our Sesame Street Colorforms set. 

Ah, yes.  This photo is famous in my family.  Here I am with my brother again after an afternoon’s play.  Mom said she looked out of the window to check on us while we played in the backyard one day to see that we were wallowing in the mudpatch that had been our garden earlier in the year.  Instead of getting upset, Mom said she remembers thinking to herself, “Well, they’re already messy.  I might as well let them have fun.”  Did we ever!  We slid around that huge mud puddle on our rear-ends and had a blast picking up huge handfuls of mud and glopping it onto each other’s head.  I love the fact that she allowed us to have fun and be kids and just kind of took it in stride.  She could have stormed out of the house and yelled at us for getting messy.  Instead, she let us have fun and just hosed us off afterwards.  Thanks, Mom.

 

This photo is me holding my daughter in the NICU when she was almost a month old.  I love that she’s holding my hand in it.  Although, we still had a ways to go in her preemie journey (and may still have twists and turns ahead of us), it was about the point that this photo was taken that I was feeling fairly confident that she would be okay.  I spent many hours praying to God that she would be fine, but also asking for the grace to make it through if she died.  She taught me more about God’s love and about being a parent right from the beginning and teaches me more every moment of her sweet, Beanish life. 

I Need A New Crockpot AKA How I Nearly Caught My Apartment On Fire April 22, 2008

Have you ever walked into your kitchen and thought you smelled something hot…something scorched….an odor in the air just strong enough in the air to make you pause and look around.  Yeah, we’ve probably all been there once or twice. 

That was what greeted me when I got home this evening.  I checked the oven and the stovetop and everything was off.  Since we live in an apartment, I figured the upstairs or next-door neighbors were cooking and something got away from them.  The odor wasn’t strong, just enough to notice.  So I chalked it up to nothing more than an overly done grilled cheese from one of the neighbors. 

When T got home a little bit later, he walked into the kitchen, stopped, and asked me if something was burning.  Still stumped by the mysterious smell, I told him that I had noticed the same thing when I got home but hadn’t been able to find anything amiss.  Still assuming it was a neighbor’s cooking, we went about our nightly activities. 

A couple of hours later, T headed into the kitchen for a drink and calls out, “Hey, I found what was burning!” 

Here’s a couple of photos of what he found. 

Notice if you will, the pieces of ziploc baggie stuck to the side and rim of the crockpot.  See that red lid on top?  It’s not resting on the other lids.  Oh, no.  It’s fused to the side of the crockpot itself.  Yeah, I’ll be throwing the whole shebang out.  The addition of melted plastic to my crockpot just doesn’t seem to conducive to efficient or safe crockpotting.  While I could probably pull all of the lids off and scrape off most of the baggie, I just don’t feel it would be safe to cook in.  The fact that it’s a very inexpensive crockpot makes that an easier decision, but I’d probably say the same thing even if it cost me a lot more. 

Now that we’ve examined the evidence, how did this happen you ask!  Please, let me explain.  Since I have a very small kitchen, I try to maximize storage space.  One of the ways I do that is to store the lids and containers for my mini-blender in a ziploc bag in the crockpot when it’s not being used.  Since I cooked with it this past weekend, the stoneware portion of the pot is in the sink awaiting a good scrub down and the baggie with it’s contents was sitting straight the metal, heating portion of the crockpot. 

Apparently, when I shoved it back into it’s corner on the counter yesterday, the switch bumped against the other items on the counter and flipped on to the low setting.  The plastic bag full of lids and whatnot has been slowly melting over the past 24 hours!  I usually unplug my crockpot when it’s not in use, but for some reason, I forgot to do that yesterday.  Accckkkk!

The Lord definitely protected us from me accidentally starting a fire.  I am so grateful for His protection.  Reminds me of one Sunday when I was I guess about 12.  I saw Mom slip out of the choir loft during the service never to reappear.  When I headed home after church, she was at home and said she had remembered mid-service that she left some water boiling on the stove before we left for church that morning.  She went home and caught it before it caught fire.  Luckily, we lived right across the street from our church at the time.  She got there just in time.  The pot was completely dry and starting to smoke from the heat!  God definitely protects. 

As Psalm 4:8 says, “In peace I will both lie down and sleep, for you alone, O’ Lord, make me to dwell in safety.”  Thank you, Father! 

A Beanish Birthday! April 4, 2008

Today, is an auspicious day.  Three years ago today, T and I waited in the hospital for The Bean to enter this world so much earlier than she should have. 

She changed us from the moment we began yearning for her, from our first knowledge of her, from that first breath that she drew, from the first time we held her.  Every day that she’s here, she changes us with her smile and her laugh and her spirit.  

We’ve learned more about who we are in the three years she’s been here than the lifetime before her arrival.  Kids do that to you, you know.

But I wouldn’t have it any other way.  Apparently, neither would she.

We walked into her room singing Happy Birthday this morning.  She smiled her beautiful smile and answered, “I’m very, very excited.” 

Then she looked at me and said, “Happy Birthday, Mommy.” 

How did she know that, in a way, on this momentus day three years ago, she gave birth to me too.  

She transformed me into a mother. 

Happy Birthday, My Sweet Bean.

My Southern Roots March 2, 2008

I was born and raised in the Deep South.  I currently live in Texas, but spent most of my childhood moving back and forth between one town in Arkansas and another in Louisiana.  Although, I spent just as much time growing up in Arkansas as in Louisiana and have lived for over a decade in Texas, I consider myself a Louisiana native since that is where I was born and where nearly all of my extended family still live. 

I love living in Texas and feel at home here, but there’s a lot that I still miss about living in Louisiana.  I miss misty mornings on the bayou.  I miss the easy pace of life there.  I love the history and mystery and mood suggested by trees full of Spanish moss.  I love the heart and sincereity of the people there.  I love that there’s no other place on earth like it. 

PS. In case you’re wondering, the photos are of the bayou behind my parent’s home.