Birthdays, Travel, Flashes, & Reformation Day

Y'all are so cool. Thank you so much for celebrating with us!!! We are pumped! God has been so gracious through all of this. We got to see and hear the baby's heartbeat this past Monday. I get teary just thinking about it! I've done a bit of dry heaving, but all in all, I feel about 95% better than I did with  any of my other pregnancies. Score! And the times waves of nausea have hit and I have needed a break, God's been gracious and a break has been possible. It's been such a blessing!

I feel like I'm barely catching my breath. This has been a BUSY fall and a lot of fun. A few weekends ago my sisters and I gathered at Mama's to celebrate her birthday! It was a wonderful weekend. Mama even brought us breakfast in bed Saturday morning. (And it was her birthday!?)

We took her out for for a fancy dinner...where Mother most definitely got hit on! That would make TWO birthday dinners in a row where that has happened. 

Happy Birthday, Mama! We are all so thankful for your precious life and all the ways you've loved us!!!

Love this shot of The Engineer...

And then last week we spent in Atlanta. The Engineer had business there all week. He's heading up a big assessment and he is THE Man in Charge. I am SO proud of him! He is completely rocking it.

We stayed downtown in the Marriot Marquis. You may remember it from this post.

The kids and I walked to Imagine It Children's Museum. 

We got there around 11:30. There were a TON of little kiddos there on a field trip. My kids couldn't find a spot to play anywhere...around two they all cleared out there were just a handful of mamas and their children left and it was SO MUCH FUN!

The kids milked a cow...real liquid came out. 

There was an entire "Fairy Tale" section...

And a HUGE glass wall where the children could paint.

The museum staff rinsed and squeegeed it after the completion of each masterpiece. (I got in there and mixed primaries...my kids could have cared less...)

And there was a HUGE machine contraption thing that you could load with plastic balls and operate...it's too complicated to explain, but was super cool and occupied most of Little Man's time. And that's just naming a few...if you're in the area, it's definitely worth it! (Just make sure you aren't going in the middle of a field trip!) We shut the place down.

We spent the first half of each day in our room, schooling and eating instant grits. The last half we spent at the pool... picnic-ing on canned tuna, peanut butter sandwiches, trail mix, etc. The pool was on the third floor of the hotel and was indoor/outdoor with a glass wall dividing the two. The kids had so much fun swimming under that divider. They averaged 4-5 hours of swimming per day. 

Before we ever left town, we gave the kids options as far as what they wanted to do while we were in Atlanta. We told them we had a set amount of funds available and let them have a say in how we allocated those funds. The result: two meals a day in the room, the children and I shared an entree for dinner out each night, made one trip to a museum, ate frozen yogurt once, and there was enough left over for dinner at The Melting Pot on the last night. Once all was said and done, they were quite pleased with our use of funds! I love that!

I'm shooting a family wedding here in the next little bit and have been practicing with a new flash. I'm not a flash girl.

I like to shoot with natural light and adjust my settings to accommodate...flashes scare and intrigue me.

But a wedding in a church is a whole new ball game. A flash will be a MUST!

And the one on my camera wouldn't cut it...

So I've been practicing. The Engineer has been helping.

We're practicing working as a team.

And I'm trying to learn how to avoid hot spots like the white blur in the background of this hilarious moment! (This is SO life at our house!)

I'm learning how to communicate with the flash...

And that when shooting in certain modes, the flash responds differently.

I feel like I'm learning a whole new language.

I'm pretty excited about it. 

I'm hoping to kick things up a notch.

But I have a long way to go.

My subjects...

Agreed to pose for us in order to postpone rest time.

I try to use things like rest time to my advantage. Especially when overexposing their faces.

I'm looking forward to figuring this thing out... 

Like I said...I have a long way to go...

But the practice is fun!

And the children are adorable!

And I love working with The Engineer, especially on something that crosses art and throwing photons.

Monday night we joined our church fam for a Reformation Day party. Thanks to my sweet in-laws, Sister was "Indian Princess Wild Flower," Little Man was "Buzz Lightyear," and Little Bit was "Fancy Nancy." The Engineer wore a haz mat suite from the Nuclear Plant, his hard hat, and a Superman cape..."Super Nuclear Man." According to the children, I was a "butterfly princess." I cut butterflies in half and glued the wings all around my eyes...someone asked if I was Lady Gaga. Um. Really? NO. NO!!!! 

The kids were completely hyped up on candy. Some of us weren't quite ready to leave. In fact, one of us, I won't name names, had an all out two year old temper tantrum...kicking legs, flailing arms, cries at the top of her lungs. Sweet thing. Life is just so rough.

Ziggurats, Swings, Sand, & Tents...Life

Okay, here are the kids posing beside the ziggurat they built a for school a few weeks ago. Quite exciting! Only, I didn't have enough brown paint on hand, so I added cinnamon (the dollar store kind) to try and darken the paint...which gave the ziggurat a stomach flipping odor. Something about paint, cinnamon, grits, and dirt all together that was rather unpleasant! Regardless, it graced our table for a solid week.

Our curriculum has had us studying Mesopotamia. We've also been learning some art terms and studying ancient Mesopotamian art. 

Pulling out my college art history book and having my children pour over it's pages, fascinated, grinning, pointing, firing off questions...well, it's made me so happy!

And while there are really precious and wonderful moments - the "ah-hahs" of teaching and the tenderness of God teaching us, changing us, working in our lives, there are also hard and long days.

Little Man was with a friend for the afternoon. Little Bit was napping. I told Sister she needed to "rest" so I could have an hour without interruptions. Ha. My attitude was rotten. And then my friend ripped the scales from my eyes and said something profound..."go for the eternal. In the midst of the noodles, go for the eternal. You'll never regret it." By God's grace, I am trying. Trying to go for the eternal. Rugs come and go. Accidents happen. My daughter is eternal.

Fun times!

The Engineer and I took a little adventure a few weekends ago. We got to help chaperone the youth in our church on a white water rafting trip! The grands graciously kept the children!

We pulled out a little before six. Most of our van was asleep before we made it outside the city limits.

The Engineer was driving a 15 passenger van...it was a little surreal.

We did more than just raft...we also did a high ropes course.

Part of that course included a swing...

That was crazy high...

And required a full body harness...

And my crazy husband impressed us all by soaring through the air, arms spread wide! NO fear.

Once hooked in, a team (of around 10 kids) pulled you up...

I think I remember hearing it was 40 feet high.

Y'all, that is really high!

Once you were at the top, you had to pull your own release...

If you're me, on the way up you think, "what if these cables break? I might die. I mean, I would die if they break. And they might. And I would die."

And then you pull the release and you SCREAM with everything you have in you!

And then you remember your husband's awesome example and you think, "If I'm going to die, I might as well die having fun. Hanging on to a falling cable isn't going to save me." (Morbid, I know.)

And you throw your arms wide and you know what? It was SO. MUCH. FUN!!!

And we rafted. And that rocked. And we played lots of games requiring massive amounts of running. I cannot out run high school athletes. Period. Hopeless. And in one game I was being chased by a crazy soccer player athlete and I knew outrunning her was hopeless, so I thought I'd turn abruptly and dive past her. That was a dumb decision. I NAILED my head. I fought the tears. My head throbbed. After an hour, I gladly accepted a packet of Goodies Headache Powder. That stuff is awesome. A few minutes later...GAME ON. Bring it. I still got nailed. Again. And again. And again. I'm so not a teenager anymore.

And then we drove home. The scenery was beautiful. We had so much fun. Those kids are awesome. 

What is love? Love is when some of your closest friends, who happen to be your neighbors, call you one Saturday morning and say, "We want to do something really special for y'all. We want to give you two nights in a brand new hotel at Orange Beach. And, we want to keep your kids while you're away." 

We were speechless. And elated. Who does that? Who gives someone two nights in a brand new hotel on the beach? AND offers to keep their children? To say we were touched would be a tremendous understatement. 

The anticipation and excitement was so much fun.

We ate at some fabulous restaurants. We splurged and rented chairs down on the beach. You know, the ones where the guy comes by and offers to move your umbrella for you. (He also nailed me in the head with said umbrella while wiggling it into the sand. We laughed.)

Our room had a balcony and chairs. We sat outside both nights. The weather couldn't have been more perfect. We walked and walked and walked. We held hands. We talked. Uninterrupted. It was so good to have that time away. With nothing to do, but be. It's been several years since we've gotten away to just be. I hadn't realized how badly we need that.

Thank you, sweet friends. Words don't express our gratitude. 

This little munchkin was VERY happy to see us leave and VERY UNHAPPY to see us return. (Think screaming fit, kicking legs, reaching for the neighbors...and every time we've set foot outside since, she calls for them...)  Little Man told us they prefer our friends to us because, "They're so much nicer." Ha. Sorry kid. Life's tough.

The Engineer helped me organize and plan our homeschool week. As he flipped through the curriculum he read a suggestion to let your children sleep in a tent all week - sort of like what Abraham and Sarah would have done...sort of. I would have skipped over that. But not The Engineer.

He bought a bag of air heads, set that tent up, carried all the sleeping bags out, told the kids to load up on books, slapped on his head lamp, ran a power cord to the tent, plugged in his alarm clock, brought the dogs in the tent, zipped it up and I didn't hear from them until a little after five this morning. 

This picture cracks me up. 

This one does too. Sister is in The Engineer's lap.

I've been archiving pictures and ran across these. Sister and I went to a 50th wedding anniversary celebration and I told her to dress in her Sunday best.

I nearly died when she came down in those boots. And then I swallowed my pride and rolled with it.

I'm so glad I did. A french hand-sewn dress and camo cow-girl boots. She rocked it. 

Happy Wednesday, y'all!