Flashback Friday

it's a grey friday morning

i'm leaving for a girls weekend getaway in less than 8 hours

and instead of picking away at my packing

or cleaning my disastrous kitchen 

or heading out to the grocery store to stock up for the hubby,

who, bless his soul, will be wrangling our wild children all on his own while i'm gone

i've decided to take a moment...

...to sip on my americano

...to listen to a random youtube indie-folk playlist

....to look through these pictures from exactly one year ago

because as much as i've loved the seemingly endless summer we've been enjoying

grey days and slow mornings have a nice kind of feel to them too

also, these pictures were taken
exactly where i'm heading this afternoon, 

exactly one year ago today

and i had this conversation with my girlies this morning:

Me: My babies aren't babies anymore...frown emoticon
A: You're silly mama, babies have to grow up!
Me: But my babies were supposed to stay teeny tiny forever.
A: No mama, that's not how babies work.
I: Don't worry mama, we'll always be your babies.

true story.

apparently, my babies have to grow up - it's how babies work, after all

you know, you get a lot of advice when you decide you want to have babies, 

but they never tell you about that struggle in your heart

the one where you want to watch your babies grow up into who they were intended to be,

while simultaneously keeping them as your babies forever and ever

oh wait, they do

but words can't convey what a mama's heart feels

so sometimes you just need to look through old pictures, 

and gush over your babies

then look up and watch them grow up right before your very eyes

and realize how blessed you are to have the past memories and the here-and-now moments

Christmas in July

because it's July 25th

and i still haven't sorted through most of my pictures from Christmas

here are a few from our Christmas morning

when my babies were such...babies!!!

ah...these are sweet, sweet memories

i feel so blessed to have them frozen in time

this mama's heart = warmed & melted through and through!

saturday bloggin' aka photo vomit

i don't normally blog on saturdays

but yesterday we got together with friends

and made tie dye shirts

then we had to wait 24 hours to unveil the final product

and i went a little camera happy

because tie dye

and toddlers

let's just say, i think this will be the first of many tie dye adventures

now on to the photo vomit part...

p.s. if this has inspired you to do some tie dying with your littles, 

here are some "resources" / what we used:

* how to & inspiration courtesy of sheena's first and second tie dye extravaganzas

* this tulip brand tie dye kit 

(except i hit up my local michaels store and used a 40% coupon so it only cost me $10ish)

* $3 t-shirts from good ol' walmart

* dollar store tablecloths left over from the girlies' birthday party:  

...one to do all the dyeing on, so that once we were all done, we could wrap up all the bits and pieces in it and chuck it

...and one more to lay our (still pretty wet) shirts on when we unwrapped them, once again so that we could contain the mess then wrap up and get rid of it easily

the girls still haven't tried them on yet (you have to wash them before you wear them), 

but they're pretty stoked about them, and it was a super fun process!

realizations + catching up

soooo....

it's been almost 3 months since i've updated this little blog of mine

and i can't really say it was accidental this time

although i didn't exactly plan on it being such a long break

and i don't promise it's quite over yet

you see, right around the beginning of april

i realized something

i was overbooked, overwhelmed, and overtired

all

the

time

so i thought about what i could take off my plate

like maybe just pare down to only doing things i absolutely love doing

and i realized that all of the things i'd piled into my life 

were good things

and i was quite thankful for that

but then i had another realization

sometimes you have to cut out the good things to focus on the best things

so, i went on an instagram-vacation,

a blog-vacation,

and majorly cut back on facebook

in order to focus on my real life going on around me

to sit on the floor and read book after book with my kiddos

(who seem to be growing up at mega-speed!!!)

to pick away at some personal photography projects

to travel

to sit at my kitchen table late at night,

chatting about kids and life and Jesus

to more regularly spend time with Jesus

to go to bed at a reasonable hour

to wake up with the sun, like i've always loved doing

(i know, i'm crazy)

and it was good

i plan on eventually adding some of the things i cut out back into my life

but not quite yet

i still have a few projects to wrap up

but i do miss blogging and instagramming and connecting via social media

and let's be honest, the creative outlet is a bonus

but until then, i'll try to check in now and again

hopefully more regularly than once every three months!

it may just be to throw up a bunch of pictures without many words

but hey, it's better than nothing, right? 

that being said, let's get that trend started with some pictures from my birthday

(already over two weeks ago...whoops!)

i spent the day enjoying Daniel's family in NC

taking the kids tubing in the lake for the first time

fishing off the dock

and getting some sweet cards their "Glammie" (read: grandma) helped them make for me

Glammie also took the kiddos for us so that we could enjoy a date night out

(for the second time in two weeks - that's gotta be a record since the kids were born!)

i chose the Harvest Moon Grille for my birthday dinner; 

this cute little cafe style restaurant

that serves local, seasonal food (all from within 100 miles of their doors!)

and boy was it good

(for the record, we both ordered their pulled pork sandwich, 

and they accommodated my gluten intolerance without skipping a beat

by offering to sub out my bun for an in-house-made corn tortilla.

then, when they found out it was my birthday 

they brought me the most amazing smore for dessert,

complete with freshly made ginger cookies, dark chocolate and an in-house-made marshmallow)

seriously, if you're in the area make sure you visit this place

not only was the food outstanding, the service was wonderful

and as it turned out, the restaurant is located in the cutest little town

seriously.

check. it. out.

after we got home and put the kiddies to bed, we slipped out onto the dock to snap a few photos

(since i was silly enough to leave my camera at home for our date), 

catch a couple more fish

watch a magical lightning bug show,

and call it a night

an excerpt from my devotional this morning

i recently started going through a short devotional series

that i found out about through Pursuit31

a community that i am a part of,

designed for Christian women who are also creative entrepreneurs 

we meet our local group about once a month to discuss different issues

and support one another

plus we get access to awesome resources like the Seek Devotional

i was reading one of the entries in said devotional this morning 

and i wanted to share an excerpt from it

that really resonated with me

***

"When we surrender our lives to Him, we have to be willing to surrender the things in it to Him as well.  Your health, your plans for the future — it all has to be held out to him as an offering.  It takes trust that He is who He says He is to unclench our fists and offer up what we have in exchange for what he as for us…

Every morning, with every breath we breathe, we have to choose Him.  His way.  His will.  His good.  It won’t always be what we want.  It won’t always be an easy decision or a smooth path.  But He has written each of our days long before we lived even one of them (Psalm 139:16) and He works all things together for good…

If these days that were formed for us before we took our first breath in this world will be an outpouring of glory and praise to our Lord, is it not worth the surrender of our desires, our dreams, our plans and our possessions?  Doesn’t knowing that He holds and maintains us with a love that never falters, with a heart that wants good for us, lessen the ache of loss, of the struggle in circumstances beyond our control, of those moments we would never choose for ourselves to live through?"

- Kristin Ungerecht; Seek Devotional, Day 15

***

such a great reminder to kick off the week!

i hope it encourages you as much as it did me  :)