white sands

A few weeks ago our small group went out to White Sands for the full moon night. This one was pretty cloudy, but we had a blast with the group and it was fun just being out and about. We're usually concerned about bedtimes and such; it's fun to blow that off once in awhile. Lots of silliness, snacks and good conversation while we shivered and waited for the moon to rise. It's been so good being part of a small group again; it's both stretching and comforting, and where a lot of "church" happens.

Anyway, my friend Crystal took some fun pictures and I thought I'd share:

and here's one I took of the sunset. What a gorgeous place.

morning walk

It was beautiful and breezy this morning, so after we dropped Nicky off at school Silas and I went for a walk. I'm trying to incorporate exercise into life more lately, which is pretty cool since I haven't felt the need to do anything exercise-related in months (it's been a seriously lazy winter).

Fresh air is good for the soul, and I'm brimming with gratefulness for several things today. First, I heard from my mother a few days ago that the hip replacement surgery we thought was inevitable doesn't have to happen. It's pretty amazing--she's had a broken hip for months, and the way it was broken typically disrupts circulation, but it's healing properly on it's own. I'm so glad. She just has to walk a lot and build up her bones, but she gets to keep her own bones! What a relief.

And secondly I just feel so grateful to have all this space in my life, to breathe deep and be creative and spend non-stressful time with my littles. What a gift that is. Of course there are the cyclical things like housework and laundry and my incessant battle with dog hair, but seriously, right now I'm sitting with an iced coffee, blogging, while my toddler explores and plays around me, and I get to watch him discover the little things. I get the joy of putting him down for a nap, and getting him up from a nap. I have time to make things, to enjoy the fruits of my labor. It just seems like the little things--feeling the breeze on my face, preparing food, smelling bath-clean hair, reading a new book with a dog on my feet, laughing over verses in Ecclesiastes with Ricky, filling moments with music and silliness, looking forward to a square of dark chocolate with sea salt after the boys are asleep--those are gifts and I get to unwrap them everyday.

I get to inject excitement into my children's lives, to teach them gratefulness as well. There are things that are hard, like Nicky taking an hour to do one worksheet last night and consequently having no free time to play (and having to stick to my guns even though I so wanted to let him stay up later), or when Silas overturns a full basket of clean, folded laundry (happening as I write this) and the moments where I'm just wanting to accomplish something or think a full thought but I'm needed for something else--but wow, life is so sweet. And I just have to laugh as he runs around the house with my pajama pants on his head, declaring loudly in toddler-speak. I want to always remember this feeling, this windows-open, seeing the beauty, giving thanks moment. Thank you.

busy, noisy, dirt, etc.

The internet provides so many little chuckles. The other day I saw a cute sign or something on Pinterest that said boy: n. a noise with dirt on it. Oh, so true. They pretty much always smell like dirt unless they are fresh out of the bath. I tried to catch a few pics of Silas and me a few days ago but had very few opportune moments, except when he was of course trying to eat my face or pausing for a quick drink. That kid is rarely still (thus the blurriness).

 

 

Yesterday we tried again; he paused long enough to show me where my mouth is. 

Nicky's a little easier to capture on camera, as long as silly faces are involved. Here we are hanging out before his piano lesson (he learned the C major scale). He smelled like little kid + dirt + recess.

 Ah, boys.

Camera embraced.

embrace the camera: thursday morning

Sleepy eyes and silly faces (I need to go to bed earlier)....

We eat oatmeal and tame our manes and take Nicky to school.

We hang around town for a few hours until it's time to help with centers in Nicky's class, and find a birthday present for my niece. Silas scarfs down a cinnamon pretzel.

 Silas is the cutest little distraction ever while the kids practice rolling dice and putting the numbers in order. They all stop what they are doing to pick up things he drops on the floor. He sits in the student-of-the-day chair proudly. Nicky's teacher says, "oh, he always does so good!" which is good because I was wondering if we did more distracting than helping. I will miss those kiddos next year. Nicky laughs at the joke in his lunch (what is a pirate's favorite subject? Arrrrrt). We head home and Silas takes a long nap. And that is Thursday morning.

embrace the camera: post-nap

Here's a fun Thursday thing: embrace the camera! I discovered a fun new blog that makes me smile and inspires me to boot. Linking up :) I'm definitely one of those people who's much more comfortable behind the camera than if front of it, even though I've been known to whine that I'm not in many of our family pictures. So, at least once a week I'm going to be in a picture. I'm going to have to figure out how to distract certain children a bit more though. Most of these were super blurry because Silas was running to attack the camera and I was attempting to keep him in the shot with hey I'm clapping! hey look at the book! This was after a nap and I must say I am enjoying his much better moods lately after all the sickness last week.

Anyway. It was work, but camera has been embraced. Happy Thursday!