It is SO worth it...

This was on my heart so I linked up at the "On Your Heart" linky party found HERE

*Disclaimer:  This post is sappy.  But it's true and it's on my mind.

I was talking to a dear friend last night about having babies.  She does not have any babies yet, although when she is ready, she will be the most loving and wonderful mom you know.  She was expressing how she was nervous about a future (no not yet) pregnancy and childbirth.  She was stating all of the things that I used to be nervous about too, things that I think every single "not yet" mom thinks about.  I think you know what I'm talking about....

Anyway, I purposely DON'T give a lot of details about birthing experiences (especially my first one) to nervous future moms because they can be scary.  My birthing story with my second was hilarious and embarrassing from start to finish, partially why I've never shared it online.  Typical me, with no filter, the queen of awkward, was telling that story and I think I freaked her out more.  So I got to thinking about it.

Having a baby is beautiful, natural, and wonderful.  But it can also be scary, leaky, and sometimes embarrassing.  What I want to exaggerate today is why it is so worth it to go through a short amount of weird.

Dear sweet friend, and any other future moms who are worried out there, I'm not going to tell you that it's not hard, but I am going to tell you that is more than worth it.  When that part is over, you get this:

My first picture with my new guy (after he was wiped down)

If you're like me (and I can't be the only one) You may not have a darn clue what you are doing, but it's okay.  You really do figure it out.  It still hurts a little (or maybe a lot).  You're sensitive emotionally and physically.  No, nothing will ever be the same again.  While it seems slow, your brand new sweet baby very (very, very, very) quickly develops into a wonderful personality.  You're cracking up:

And it doesn't matter what you do because you can't stop it.  You can't slow it down either.  In fact, as much as you want to freeze it, you also can't wait to see what's next.  You can't wait to see who they become and love them more and more every single day.

Oh and this:

Oh man.  This gets to a whole new level of love.  You're in this together and it is the hardest, but sweetest journey that you'll be on.  When you see them together.  Forget it.  You melted into butter before you could do anything else.

If you're like me, and it's what you want, you then get blessed to do it all over again.  It's similar, but it's totally different.  After all, you have another completely different person.  It's leaky and embarrassing again.  But very soon, you have this:

This picture apparently became a tradition.

Who also develops a wonderful personality all too quickly:

Only this time, you get this along with it:

Those moments grow into these:

Even when they do the most basic things, you think it's the greatest thing ever.

It's not always easy.  They leak:

They're very messy:

But you love them.  You love them so much.  By now, you don't care WHAT you did in that labor room.

You're tired, but you're strong and so in love.  The next thing you know, you have these wonderful little people who take over your everything and you love it.  Memories of a birthing area are there, but they're fond, even when they're embarrassing or yes, sometimes traumatic.

That's because they're yours.

Those memories and those times; those belong to you and they are unique to you, just like my experiences here are all unique to me.  They are the moments that start it all.  And from my experience, they are SO worth it.

Happy Valentine's Day

 "We love because he first loved us."  (322)

1 John 4:19 

Photo Cred for a personal fave

Happy Valentine's Day to you!

Love,

Us

Thank you for taking this journey with us.  You are loved! (323)

Exactly What I Want

Over a month ago (pre-minivan, post T's ER trip) Lukas and I had the honor of watching our friend debut as a St. Pete debutante.  We got all dressed up and had so much fun.  I'm not going to lie, we looked pretty snazzy. (293)

When our babysitter arrived we tried to find an area of the house to take our "formal" picture.  We stood here and took this shot.  Meanwhile, I was thinking to myself that I would have to crop the "house" out of the picture later.

Then I saw the picture.  Immediately, I knew that I didn't want to change anything about this shot whatsoever (except maybe that it was taken on my phone and could be slightly more clear. 294)

This is what our life looks like right now. No matter how dressed up we get.  Toys are strewn about, sippy cups are always in weird places, our furniture is either over-sized or miniature.  And I love it.  I love it all. (295)

Balls are SO fun, don't get me wrong.  We had a blast (and took other pictures too).  But I am so grateful for the ball that I get to have here at home. (296)

Now hopefully I can remember that feeling the next time I step on a puzzle piece.

Floridian Snow Day

Our school's PTA is pretty awesome (290)! One could say that they're cool haha, I'm punny. Anyway, our school had an Olympic Snow Day and it was Awesome (with an intentional capital A). Once the kids at the school all had their turn, I brought our guys back for the fun and fun we had! (291)

I melt!

Cheese!

Happy Birthday Lukas!

Today is Lukas' birthday.  Happy Birthday Lukas!  Last year, I gave him a list of 30 reasons that I love him.  This year, I could easily give 31 more.

This year, I think I'll get him a Dyson vacuum.  It is what he asked for.

Isn't it funny how birthdays are all so different?  This year, I love Lukas even more than last year because I've had a year to get to know him even more.  He has so much of my heart.

I am so happy that Lukas was born.  I am even happier with the amazing husband and dad (and teacher and professor and leader and runner and everything else) he is.

Thank you for choosing us every day.

The Professor

*287 can be found on the Ten000Reasons Facebook page (link here or checkout the sidebar)

I really am so proud of Lukas.

Last week, he began a new adventure.  An adventure that is the direction of his career goals.

Last week, he officially became Professor Hefty (288).

He is teaching 30 or so future educators how to teach math.  Getting to work together, I have seen his professional development in action and he is so good at it.  I really feel like he can impact math education in a big way.  It's really fun to learn from and be inspired by your husband at work.

So here's to my main squeeze.  Watching you grow has been a blast, and I can't wait to continue our adventure!

I get to kiss the professor (289).  :)

So Professorial (yep, I just made up that word)

So, I Own a Minivan

Last Sunday it was raining hard.  Our first rain in really long time.  I hear that makes the roads more slick.  I was taking a nap and Lukas was at a meeting about being a professor.

I woke up and felt really off.  Like gloom and doom feelings.  Just weird.  So I just started to pray that Lukas was safe and would come home safely.  True story.  

A long(ish) time went by and it was getting to the point that I was like, sheesh, this meeting is taking a while.  Then my phone rang.  Lukas sounded a little distant and said that he had been in a car accident but that he was totally okay.  I remember not being surprised, but really grateful for the news that he was okay (279).

Our car, on the other hand, not so much.  

The back end looks pretty similar

I'm okay with that though.  It's a car.  Neither of my children were in it and my husband completely walked away from the accident (280).  In the scheme of things, it was a car.  But that did mean that we needed a new one.  

I received the Escape (pronounced ES-COP-AY) in January of 2004 when I was about to graduate High School.  I "got away" from our wedding in this car, brought both of our babies home in this car, traveled a lot, and all of the good stuff.  It was a good car that I am grateful for (281).  BUT It was a car that I would trade every single time if it meant that my family members were safe.  

So we went shopping.  When we came home, we were the owners of a new Minivan (282).  Yep, a minivan, and you know what?!  I. LOVE. IT.  Really, I do.  This is laughable to me considering that fewer than 3 years ago I vowed to never own one!  I wouldn't even consider it before 30, but here I am in my twenties still (for a few more years anyway) and I have one!  

I don't know what the big deal was.  This thing is gorgeous.  We have leather seats, I can open all of the doors from my clicker, it has a stinking DVD player.  My kids love it.  They are excited about it.  They each get their own chair and they look so great back there.  It has so many awesome features that things that make my driving life easier and I love it.

Lukas brought up a good point, when I was feeling nostalgic (but again, ready to part with) the Escape, but not saying anything, he mentioned that this would be the car our kids grew up in.  Yep, I will be that mom going to the soccer games in my van and I can't wait!  I am so ready for the adventures ahead!

Merry Christmas to All!

For

Unto

you is

born this

day in the 

city of David

a savior which

is Christ the Lord

Luke

2:11

472

Merry Christmas to you!  

Thank you for another year of sharing joy and listening to my heart sing!  (473)

From my family to yours!

(Hopefully) Feeling Accomplished

As I am writing this, it is Sunday December 1st, so I am writing for future me.  Lukas and I have challenged each other (and therefore, for the most part, our children) to 7 days of real food eating.

We have done some research (mostly on www.100daysofrealfood.com) and come up with a plan.  From Monday December 2-Monday December 9 we will only be eating real food.  We have a 3 meal (+ snacks) a day plan and we have already gone grocery shopping.  

This MTV Cribs moment, brought to you by me. 

While it is all important for me to accomplish, here is what is most important for me to accomplish this week:

1.  No soda.  Oh, who am I kidding?  I don't drink soda, Coca Cola.  My biggest challenge.

2.  No buying more food.  We have already bought all of our food for the week.  I am not going to stop anywhere and pick anything up.  We also didn't schedule even one meal out.  This serves 2 purposes:  health and money.

3.  A major cut down on sugar.  It's about time I give my pancreas a break!

The link to our rules that we are following is here

As we push our way through this challenge, I plan to document it here, so consider this week to be the Hefty 7 Days of Real Food Challenge re-cap.  I promise to even let you know if/where/how I/we cheat.  Make sure you check in each day to see how it went!

Today we shopped, mostly at Publix, with a few extra items from Earth's Origins.  I also prepared banana whole wheat pancakes that are freezing for us to have for breakfast as long as they last.

Okay, so this picture is really weird.  I promise that those are pancakes and not bags of meat.  I realize that this is reminiscent of Martha Stewart's food Instagram posts but I am simply and poorly trying to show you that these are pre-prepped frozen pancakes.  I'll post better pictures tomorrow (maybe), haha!

Clark Griswold Day

Boy, I feel like I have so much to share this week!  Isn't it funny how that works out?

Anyway, December 1st in our house is known as Clark Griswold day. (460) It's the day that we bust out the ladder (I really think that this is the only reason we even have a ladder) and the lights and hang them up.

It's Lukas' favorite tradition (haha).  He usually ends up doing all of the work while I "coach" and take pictures.  Meanwhile, the guys "help" too.

Really though, Cameron was such a helper.  The only thing we worried about with him was that he would step on a bulb and break it but he was so cautious and didn't step on even one.  He was very involved and a lot of fun.  Oh, I quite like this age! (461)

The highlight of the evening was definitely the ladder.  

And this year, Lukas got to have 2 little helpers.  (462)

We don't go crazy.  I like to think of it as minimalist lighting, the only thing that's not minimal about it is that we use colors and not white lights.  We do one row across the house.  Though it is simple, I absolutely adore it every year! (463)

Lukas even said that this year was the smoothest of all light hanging years. (464)  We put the lights in the right direction, we had matching, working sets that spanned across our house, we have lights with hooks attached and even hooks for the cord at the end of the house.  This is the first year that we didn't have to buy anything to accomplish this goal!  Yay!

30 Reasons I Love My Husband

 Today (ahem, last Sunday January 27th)  marks the 30th Birthday of my main squeeze.  If you want to hear more about our story as us, you can read about it in the "About Me" section of our blog.  This post is all about him.

For today, I want to share 30 reasons that this man makes my heart sing. One for each year of Lukas.  (227-256)

1. He loves Jesus.  Everything in the list to me is a branch off of this reason here.
2.  He loves his wife.  Really.  He understands that he was uniquely made for me and works at being the husband that was uniquely made for me.
3.  He loves his children.  To the core.  He plays with them, sings to them, hugs and kisses them, changes their diapers, wipes their snot, packs their baby bags, and doesn't complain about it.  Ever.  Maybe the smell, but not the task.

4.  He chose us.  He knew that he wanted a family and that he wanted his time to be spent with that family.  He picked a career that he could be challenged at and good at, but that would allow him time to be with his family.
5.  At the same time, he is amazing at his job.  He spent the last 7 years in the classroom teaching children and was highly effective in that department.  Now he works at educating students, parents, and staff at the same school and watching him at his place of work is really inspiring.
6.  He loves his Mom.  Now, this is a really easy thing to do.  Everybody loves Lukas' mom.  Watching him talk to and about his Mom over the years was a big indicator of how he was going to talk to us.
7.  He is calm.  He is totally known for this too.  It's amazing how much his calmness can change an entire room or situation.  His voice, mannerisms, and presence are all completely calm and calming.
8.  But, he's competitive.  He always has been.  The man's first word was ball.  If I were making a recipe for Lukas, competitive would be an ingredient every time.
9.  He's learned to really channel his competitive drive well.  Now, I'm not saying he won't still get worked up over Monopoly, but he's taken his competitive nature and accepted challenges in all areas of his life to overcome.  He's really grown from it.
10.  He's confident.  I think confidence is one of the most attractive characteristics to have.  He walks tall and speaks well.  He doesn't need to justify himself because he knows who he is.
11.  But, he's open to feedback.  If there's room for improvement and an appropriate suggestion, he goes with it.
12.  He's athletic.  He enjoys working out and playing sports.  This would also be an ingredient.  He runs with me and challenges me.

13.  He's intelligent.  His math skills alone make me just stand in awe.  It's not just his ability to do math, but I've asked him to share his thinking with me and the way that he approaches problems is always such a unique perspective to me.  This obviously carries over into non-math problems too.
14.  He's involved.  He goes grocery shopping, does laundry, cooks dinner, raises children.  It's a real team effort.
15.  He's neat.  I don't clean up after him.  In fact, it's probably the opposite.
16.  He has a nice singing voice.  People who sit near us in church (the only place that he'd be singing where people can hear him) constantly compliment him on it.  It's smooth and well pitched.
17.  He can juggle.  He taught himself in a college Psychology class.  I probably would have just written the paper instead.  This impresses me every time.
18.  He does nice things for people.

Being a groomsman at his bestie's wedding.  Later that day, he dressed as a native american and danced the YMCA

19.  He tolerates Downton Abbey while I obsess over it.  Add that to the other items on my list of interests that he tolerates and you have one tolerant guy.
20.  He takes care of me when I am deathly ill.
21.  He encourages me to do hard things.
22.  He looks like our babies.  This is probably backwards, but it works for me!
23.  Let's face it, he looks nice in general.  He's a handsome guy!
24.  I'm particularly fond of his smile :)
25.  He lets me pick the music in the car.  Actually, lately C has been picking, but up until now, it's been mostly me.
26.  He was voted "Best Dressed" at our school.  In a place of mostly females, I think that this is a really hard accomplishment.  But really, he dresses nicer than I do, again, not saying much, but still.
27.  He listens well.  If you know us, then you understand why this would be an important attribute in our relationship.
28.  But, he's witty.  Lukas is quick.  Keeps you on your toes.  Oh, and don't get caught sitting next to him in a meeting where you are supposed to be quiet, because you will be the one getting dirty looks for laughing at what is apparently nothing, but actually Lukas making some kind of remark.
29.  He makes a very specific face when writing anything (with a pen or pencil) or concentrating really hard.  He bites his lip and furrows (sp?) his eyebrows.  It's one of my favorites.
30.  He gives me cause to write 30 things that I love about him.  Even after all this time.

Happy Birthday to my wonderful Husband!