July goings on - and Grandpa's passing

 Little lady made herself a place to be cozy and watch tv from around the corner

Grew enough green beans for a family dinner's worth!

I got the soap in the background, but it smelled bad. And I'm all like "life is too short for bad smelling soap!" .... but then I'm yet too cheap to throw it out... :P

My cousin got married, so we did a quick weekend in Chicago. Got to see the Bean!

Speaking of beans...

One day I had a beautiful lush green flowering bean plant starting to climb up the trellis enterance into my garden, and then next morning...

Noooooo!!!!! I don't know if it was deer, almost every leaf was delicately devoured. I was so sad.

Last night Doug set up a "fence" of fishing line. The idea is the deer bump into the line, but since they can't see anything, they get nervous and go away. It has worked in the past. 

But this morning...

Several Zinnia heads and leaves were gone. Like 20 plants. So maybe still deer, or maybe rabbits. Who knows. But I was very very sad. 

Nothing has made it into my garden actually, but I had these flowers all around the perimeter for beauty and to attract pollinators, so it has been very frustrating to see all your hard work just chewed away overnight. 

The by far biggest sadness was the passing of my Grandpa Ken. He was my last Grandparent. I had the opportunity to live with him (and Grandma Marie) on/off/on about a decade while I was going to the University near their home. I had a busy social life at the time, and I'm sure part of it was just me being selfish, and I have a regret of not using more of my time to invest in actually spending quality time with them during that period. 

Over this last decade of being married and having kids we were able to spend time with him, probably every year, after he moved up North (after my Grandma's fall, and worsening dementia took them to live with my doctor uncle). And these photos and video clips are of that time. 

My grandpa was 103, my grandma has been gone for 6 years now, and I know he was feeling ready to go to heaven for a long time. Sometimes he would joke "your uncle won't let me die!" We are so blessed, as a family, to have had him around so long. It has been amazing to see the sacrificial love from my uncle and his wife for caring for them/him  for so long, And I am thankful he passed peacefully, knowing he was going "on his journey" to heaven, and at his last breath his son was there reading the passage where Mary Magdalene came to find the tomb empty. Who could ask for a better passing. I am thankful. But he was very loved, and will be very missed. 

I had the chance to facetime call him when I was at work last week. He couldn't hear me, but my uncle said "it's your granddaughter Anne Marie saying she loves you" and he answered out "and I love her!" and again I'm just so thankful that his last years have been happy and full of love and, for the most part, peace. When we were kids it seemed we were always in his way and he seemed grumpy, so it's been really wonderful to enjoy this other side of him as the lasting memory. 

Oh the peace that comes from knowing that someday I will see him again. 

Until then, Grandpa I love you.

so much to catch up on

 It feels like it's been a very busy season of life. No way to catch up on 2 months, so here's a bit of what's been going on:

MAY:

$6k for a new septic field. Pro- I now finally understand what a septic field is. Con- still planting grass seed and dealing with that mess

mother's day kisses!

August's first pet! A little caterpiller he named Frankie. (RIP Frankie)

Doug took down my old falling apart garden boxes and made me new ones from cedar

This boy finished 1st grade

Rollar skating end of the year party, so fun

Beautiful girl

My sis and I went on a women's exercise/Christian wife/mother retreat in NC. It was SOOO good to spend time together and fellowship with other women believers

Here we are with the woman who helped me get back into shape after pregnancy with her GlowbodyPT workouts. (we were totally fangirling!)

Had a date with this guy.

JUNE:

Grow garden grow!

Father's day

My brother and family was in town and we all went to Wisconsin for a family reunion. They sold the family (my grandparents 100 acre) farm last year so we all went one last time to say goodbye. It was bittersweet, so many memories in that barn. I miss my grandparents. 

We had a lot of fun with cousins at the waterpark resort we stayed at

Bummed my brother lives so far away, but always so fun to get together again

It was my first time at the Wisconsin Dells, this was a view from the Upper Dells boat tour

Later we hiked at Devil's Lake state park

this was after we hiked up to Balanced Rock (we got soaking wet with rain on the way down, but no one fell or was struck by lightening- WIN!)

Pretty girls by the flowers at our airbnb

We also went on a Wisconsin Duck boat tour, fun!

And toured a lavender farm

Then we went on to Minnesota to visit 2 other cousins (and get a picture for our US family travel map!)

It's been a busy couple months, but enjoying the summer.

Happy Easter

We did a lot to celebrate Easter this year. 

A fun egg dyeing party and egg hunt at a friend's house. 

This girl was a MACHINE picking up eggs, she got the most of anyone. 

The Easter art I made a few years ago finally has a nice place to be displayed.

My neighbor made these and gave me one, I was so impressed!

We also dyed some eggs at our house too.

This morning's Easter family basket. Some chocolates, a new movie, and a couple family games. 

HE IS RISEN!!!

August woke with a fever so just the girls and I went up to my parents' church.

He was feeling better, so they came up for the dinner together.

Happy Easter!

We love our church. But for Easter and Christmas I find myself wanting a more traditional service. I guess you can take the pipe organ building/organist's daughter out of the Lutheran church but you can't take the... I'm not sure how that goes... but on those services especially I find myself just craving those hymns. We sang this beautiful one for the closing service and it just had me in tears. 

Alleluia! Jesus Is Risen!

Song by Lutheran Hymn Project

Alleluia! Jesus is risen!
Trumpets resounding in glorious light!
Splendor, the Lamb, heaven forever!
Oh, what a miracle God has in sight!

Jesus is risen and we shall arise
Give God the glory! Alleluia!

Walking the way, Christ in the center
Telling the story to open our eyes
Breaking our bread, giving us glory
Jesus our blessing, our constant surprise

Jesus is risen and we shall arise
Give God the glory! Alleluia!

Jesus the vine, we are the branches
Life in the Spirit the fruit of the tree
Heaven to earth, Christ to the people
Gift of the future now flowing to me

Jesus is risen and we shall arise
Give God the glory! Alleluia!

Weeping, be gone; sorrow, be silent
Death put asunder, and Easter is bright
Cherubim sing: O grave, be open!
Clothe us in wonder, adorn us in light

Jesus is risen and we shall arise
Give God the glory! Alleluia!

City of God, Easter forever
Golden Jerusalem, Jesus the Lamb
River of life, saints and archangels
Sing with creation to God the I AM!

Jesus is risen and we shall arise
Give God the glory! Alleluia!

 Amen!!

Daylight Savings Time

This is SOOO me right now. 

Hard to crawl out of bed. 

But I am enjoying the slow creep towards spring. The sunshine coming in the windows. I am ordering seeds and itching to start seedlings. This year I am going to try to do it from seeds and not spend so much money on seedlings. But I do need to get started now. Every year I get excited to garden, and every year my garden is a big fail. *But maybe this year*. 

Doug made me 2 planter boxes prob 8 years ago and they have slowly disintegrated, and the fence flops over.. so we are thinking if we should reinforce the raised beds, or just take out the wood and have just the garden bed area. One con to just having a dirt rectangle surrounded by fence is the neighborhood groundhog hasn't seemed to be able to dig under the fence and come up through the raised bed- but would have no problem just digging and coming right up into the garden. So not sure what to do about that. 

Anyway, every year Doug gets me a handful of free seed packets from the library, and I bought some of the heirloom and specialty seeds on Amazon. It still was like $25 for seeds- but I spend prob closer to $75 each year on seedlings and then just have such a sad garden experience it's never evened out. We shall see, live and learn! The one pro to both my neighbors cutting down all their beautiful privacy giving trees between our homes, will be that I should get more sun! But believe me, that is the only pro. I now look out my back window and see, I am not lying, 9 sheds in all the backyards of my neighborhood. 😢

But I digress, I am trying to be thankful for all we have living here in this house, with lovely neighbors, a quiet street, great location. And hopefully this year a wonderful garden! 🤞

 

2 trips to the Urgent Care

Last week my boy was complaining of ear pain. We had missed the prior week of school due to an on and off fever, he went to school on Tuesday, and then Thursday this ear pain. So off we went to Urgent Care.

Here's when I knew he was really not feeling good. 

After 7 years, his first ear infection. Picked up the antibiotics and home to sleep most of the rest of the day on the couch. Thankfully just the next day he was feeling better. 

I was really relating to that song "and mom and dad can hardly wait for school to start again!" as he had nearly a 3 week break already for Christmas and then he was off another week for the fever and then another day for the ear. He only goes 2x a week to school and we do the rest of the work at home, so I felt a lot of pressure with him missing so much. But oh well, he has recovered and we got all our work done at home too so it is fine.

Then today we were planning on meeting some friends at an outdoor iceskating rink and doing that as a family for the first time. We were getting lunch ready when we heard, "thump! waaaaaaahhhh!!" Lucy had been sitting on the toy cabinet with Jeanie and she reached for a toy, fell off, and must have hit her chin on some hard toy on the ground, and she had a nice slice under her chin. 

The bleeding stopped after a couple minutes, but it looked deep, I could see some adipose tissue. So off we went to spend 3 hours at the Urgent Care 😔

(The happy minutes before the fall:)

Running around without a care in the world at the Urgent Care

Guess I didn't take a pic of the injury, but a 1/2 inch cut under her chin. He didn't stitch it, but did glue it shut, so I think it was worth going. 

How crazy to have 2 trips to the Urgent Care in 1 month, hopefully we are good now! :)

2024 Goals

 New Year, new goals!!!

I love setting goals. This year I wrote them on a piece of paper with kind of a checklist aspect. I am VERY motivated by checking things off. And I plan to keep this in sight this year, instead of just forgetting about the goals until the end of the year.... 😖

Marriage Goals:

- Complete the Love & Respect workbook with Doug. Read 15 of 52 chapters so far. 

- Date nights 1x a month (and weekly "date nights/connection time" at home also.

- Attend a marriage conference. 

- Do The Husband Project. 

- Pray consistently for Doug and our marriage. 

Mothering Goals:

- Complete the Parenting from Surviving to Thriving workbook together. Did 2 of 12 lessons so far. 

- Continue "Monday Momming" prayer check-ins with Liz. 

- * remember people matter more than a clean house!!! * 

(these motherhood thoughts get me every time!)

Faith Goals:

- Finish BSF. 

- Use the "snooze button" time to read my Bible instead. 

Work Goals:

- Write 2 flashcards per shift: 1 drug and 1 disease/condition to study up on. 

Personal Goals:

- Use the harp lessons from my 40th bday. 

- Read (some?) of my book pile: 

(I also plan to keep a list of books I read, so I can remember that too.)

Fitness Goals: 

- Complete the 10 minute plan.

- Complete the Firm 30 series.   

- I'll add myself to the millions of people who want to lose 10 lbs as a resolution! I've slowly and steadily gained weight since quitting breastfeeding last spring. My body is actually at what I would say the weight it likes to be at, but I like to be about 5-10 lbs lighter. Even that little makes a difference in the looseness of the pants, the effort to run up a flight of stairs, the difference in my face in photos, etc. Just obviously hard to do, especially when one already exercises and eats pretty healthfully, and is now over 40... 😩

Not resolutions, but hopes: 

- More photos in our photo travel map (flights already booked for a mid-winter break trip!)

- We'd love to get a 2nd rental property, we'll see what happens with the economy this year. 

- We're also looking to move, although I'm not going to move unless it's "the one". I do need to pray that Doug and I will be in unity about a decision- we ended up having some good conversations from what happened with the house we lost out on, but it was hard. We need to have a team approach going forward. 

- Doug has been wanting to do something volunteer wise with the kids, so we've been thinking about what we could do while still having little ones. 

Excited for this new year!!