Posts from — May 2007

Scene from our dock…..so relaxing!

At the “beach”. Remember, we’re from the coast, so we’re not used to lake beaches. I have to admit, though, not feeling sticky from the salt and sand is pretty nice.

View from Ha Ha Tonka State Park

And this added a nice little twist to our trip. State Park lawnmower and a rock were the culprits. Thankfully, we were able to have it fixed quickly.

Three of my 5 favorite guys (Gage and Papa Lee not pictured) at the MOBOT Chidren’s Garden. Highly recommend this place!

Gage has such a fun Granny!

So, now that I successfully put these pictures here, I will from now on be using photobucket. That’s my next project…….to organize ALL of our pictures and put photobucket onto my blog. Enjoy!

We started off this break (from school and work) with a trip to Montelle Winery with some great friends. Minus the kids. I was pretty excited about this!

I don’t know what was said here, but it was pretty funny, for sure. This was after the winery, and you can see that Shea was ready to have his Mommy back.

Do we look like we’re enjoying being kidless for the afternoon?

We also went to the Magic House, here in St. Louis. Check out Shea’s hair!

After all this fun, it was off to the yurt in Lake of the Ozarks! We went without the phone and internet for 4 days and it was awesome. I’ve always known that these things are a distraction, but you don’t fully realize how much time is spent wasted on these things until you don’t have them.

A bathroom with shower, kitchen sink, microwave, mini-fridge,and grill. This little yurt had all we needed.

We are big proponents of yurts now. You feel at one with nature, with all the comforts of home. Camping is just such a hassle, in my opinion. At night, it’s awesome because you can hear all of the sounds outside, just as if you are in a tent. And, my favorite thing about the yurt was the tall, dome shaped ceiling. I have a thing for tall ceilings.

So, while on this trip to Lake of the Ozarks we hiked, swam, fished, hung out by the campfire, and just enjoyed the nature around us. We saw an owl, deer, huge fish (carp), turtle, a dead skunk on the road, as well as an armadillo (also dead on the road). I took so many pictures and I want to post them, but for some reason I’m having trouble. I think it’s because I post too many pics on here. The computer told me I had exceeded my bandwidth, whatever that means. Jared knows and was shocked when I told him what it was saying. I’m a picture person, what can I say?! So, it looks like I need to add a flicker link on my blog so that I can put all my pics there for all of you fellow picture people to see.

Okay, I’m really ticked now. I am very hard-headed and just spent the past 45 minutes posting pics in this area right here and writing captions. And, guess what, GONE! Don’t know what happened, but I really do give up now. I’ll try again later. Be looking for an album on here soon!

So, we had a great trip to the yurt and then we returned home just in time for a visit from my parents. We had so much fun with them, although I think we probably wore them out! We enjoyed some time with them on Saturday by ourselves at a winery (yes, we spent 2 Saturdays in a row at a winery….please don’t worry!) and then out to eat. A friend came to babysit, and that was wonderful! Then, on Sunday, we took them to church with us and we were so happy for them to meet our new church family and hear an awesome sermon delivered by our pastor and friend, Sean. After church, we headed over to Grant’s Farm and had a great time visiting all of the animals. (the guys liked the free beer, too!) Anheuser Busch offers some great attractions to folks here in St. Louis! On Monday, we spent the day at Missouri Botanical Gardens and it was beautiful. My favorite was the fountain area where the floating glass by Chihuly is displayed.

Okay, I’m done now! Enjoy!

Okay, I’ve really blown it this year remembering birthdays. These 3 girls have been with me for the past 20+ years (that number just shocked me!), and I have forgotten each of their birthdays this year. Ughhhh! What really stinks is that they always remember mine. So, I’m very sorry, girls. You know I love you! And, Carla, I feel especially bad b/c I’ve been in touch with you these past few days and still forgot! All 3 of you are such precious friends and I thank God for you. Wish I had some pictures to post! Be watching for some late e-cards!

I have to confess that I spend a lot of my day thinking of things to write about on this blog. You’d never know it by the content, because most of the great things (or at least in my mind they’re great) I think of never make it here. They get lost in this brain of mine along with the gazillion other thoughts I’ve had throughout the day. There are times that I’m driving, thinking about a great topic to write about. I plan it out in my head, and then by the time I get home, it slips from my mind as I am consumed with just keeping my daily life from falling into shambles. It’s hard work being a stay at home mom and a blogger! I’m amazed at you girls out there that seem to do it so well! Maybe I spend too much time thinking about it. Maybe I just need to sit down and write, without letting myself feel pressured by the fact that strangers may be reading this. Or, even worse……I may offend someone! I’m finding that I usually write about the easy stuff. I’ve been shying away from talking about the things that I’ve been wrestling with. I guess it’s safer that way.

Today Gage said, “Mom, have you been reading to Shea for 15 minutes every day?” I asked him why he would ask me that and he said, “Because it inspires kids to dream big.” I think PBS Kids has been on in our house a little too much lately!

Click here:

http://www.mywonderfulwife.net/

And this one is from Gage:

And, Shea “made” something for me at church (my first mother’s day gift from him), but I left it in the car. Oops! Oh, yeah, and my friend, Emily, who has really become like a sister to me, and she even acts like my sister (and has her name!) gave me some yellow mums. Thanks, Em! I’ve had a great day today! We went to church, came home, and I haven’t done anything beyond what is a necessity when you have kids. I even watched a movie, “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” while the kids napped. And, the best part of it all is that I was able to enjoy all of this in a CLEAN house, since I accomplished my mission of actually cleaning this weekend. I don’t do that very often, unfortunately. Hope all of you had a great Mother’s Day!

Wish we could be there with you this year!  Enjoy your strawberry cake.  I had better plans for what pics  I was going to post, but after fighting with the computer over an hour, I decided to just go with this one.  Maybe next year it’ll work out how I want it to.  We love you, love you, love you, very much.  Oh, and happy  mother’s day, too.  Cayla is blessed to have you for a mom.  And, I’m blessed to have you as a sister.  I can’t imagine it any other way!  Wish I was there to give you a big smack on the butt.  I’m saving it up for when I see you next, and that better be soon!

This is Jared with his Mom, at his college graduation in 1998. I never met Jared’s mom, Brenda, because she died in May of 2000, before I met Jared. However, I wear her engagement ring proudly and love her as if I’ve know her my whole life. We miss her very much and there are many things I find myself wishing I could ask her. There are times that I’m thinking about my Mom and think about how hard it would be to lose her and it’s as if I’m suddenly punched in the stomach as I realize once again that this is something Jared deals with daily. Such a hard, hard loss. Jared wrote a book, “Dance of Freedom”, about his Mom’s life and death. I read the book the first few months after I met Jared. I sobbed as I read through the book and knew by the end of it that I loved him. But, I not only knew that I loved Jared. I loved his Mom. And, I still do! One day I’ll get to ask her all of these questions that keep coming up! Thank you, Lord, that this life is only the beginning of what you have in store for us.

I could not ask for a better Mom. It really is a blessing to have a Mom who is also my best friend. You are more precious to me than I will ever be able to explain. I love you!

Okay, so I’m sure you’re wondering what “yurt” means. This is what we are going to be staying in when we go for our little family get-away. I know, we’re taking a big risk, not having ever stayed in one of these. But, the name alone makes us just have to do it. We both like adventures, so we’re going for it. How bad can it be? There’s a bathroom with a shower, a kitchen, A/C, and a TV. We’re going to take our chances for $50/night. We’ll let you know how it goes. I don’t know if any of you have ever read the Berenstain Bears book about their family vacation. If so, you’ll know why I’m really hoping it doesn’t turn out that way. I keep remembering that book and can’t help but laugh when I think that we very well could end up having a “Berenstain Bears” family vacation.

“The family getaway is a disaster: the cabin’s roof leaks, the lake is muddy, and the mosquitoes are ravenous. But when the bears return home and develop their snapshots, they laugh and laugh, fully enjoying the worst vacation they’ve ever had!”