I’ve been a mother for over six years now.

In all my years of motherhood, I have to say the biggest impression have left on me about being a mom is how FUN it is. No, I haven’t developed sudden Mommy Amnesia, forgetting about the lack of sleep, the diapers, and the sibling fights (probably because they all still exist in my life). But the overarching theme in my motherhood experience right now is fun.

It is so fun to watch Fuller learn new things. I enjoy watching him build lego creations, listening to him read books to his brother, and just hearing him talk about what is churning in his imagination.

Tebow never fails to make me smile. He loves to cuddle with me and it is fun to see him settle into his own person who enjoys playing with cars, looking at books, and help unload the dishwasher (who cares if the dishes are still dirty?).

This is my mom, my sisters, and me. Can you tell who is who? I’m older than Fuller in this picture, I think Austina is Fuller’s age. And Sarah-Ginny is probably a little older than Tebow. But it makes me wonder… can you tell if my mom is having fun? Because it certainly looks like it too me. I when I think back on being a kid, I remember a lot of fun. No, I haven’t developed Adult Daughter amnesia and forgotten about the misunderstandings of childhood, the angst of being a teenager, or the desperate desire of fleeing the nest, but I’m certainly at a point where I remember the fun I had as a kid with my mom.

She took me on trips, encouraged my creativity, and put me on a path out of the nest filled with light and a hand outstretched that I could always go back and hold if I needed more help.

There was this one time, on a trip back to Atlanta when we lived in Arizona, when my mom and her best childhood friend took us kids on a tour of Mom’s old homes. These were houses her dad had built, the places where she was a girl and went through her own childhood misunderstandings, navigated the teenage angst, and flew the nest on a path leading her to Daddy… and in my memory it was horrible. My poor mom and Aunt Jean were so excited to drive us to Atlanta neighborhoods but they were driving a van filled with tired kids who just wanted to eat or get out of the car or something other than look at old houses. How fun was that?

Well at the time, it really wasn’t. But now that I look back, I know it was fun. And you know how I know? I want to do the same thing to my kids!

Motherhood is fun!

[tags]motherhood, fun[/tags]

This book contains nine images I submitted to Lark after they saw my letter projects on Flickr and approached me. (Sidenote: While some of our flickr photostream is organized, it could be better, I know!) I submitted them at the eleventh hour during the haze of getting our house on the market. I wasn’t even sure if they would pick any of the pictures, let alone nine of them! I have pictures from Chattanooga, Wichita Falls, and Asheville in the book.

I think this is my favorite submission.

The book brings you through the entire alphabet (they didn’t leave out a single letter!) as seen through the lenses of 115 photographers from 26 different countries. It is a kind of coffee table book, or as I like to think of it, a gallery of 250 photographs bound in a handy carry-around size.

If you are so inclined to order the book you can check out Focus: Letters on Amazon or Focus: Letters on Barnes and Noble. (Family members, please contact me before you order.)

I’m a little giddy over this… please share in my giddiness too!

[tags]published, Lark Books, Letters, Digital Photography[/tags]

Being in our new house this spring is so exciting because our backyard is just full of wildness, buds, and possibilities of fun. Damon has been working the soil, planting grass seed and prepping for our new fence (to keep the dogs in). Every evening he comes home the boys head outside to just be in his presence. Then they require baths before bed.

I sit on the back porch watching and just enjoying the feeling of the moment.

This afternoon I was reminded of this gem and really, it sums up exactly how I feel about Spring every year. (It helps that some of the kids in our church are in the video. And the band started at the college I graduated from.)

I Am A Stone from Third Lobby on Vimeo.

One of the fun parts of the trip is the SEC Fanfare, a place to go and have sponsors give you free stuff under the guise of playing games and subliminal advertising. It works really well on 6 year olds like my son.

The AT&T booth had these foam “hoop hats” that Fuller really wanted. The problem was to get one you had to shoot a basket from a certain point on their court, in a certain way. If you made the basket, you then had to shoot from half court (or the foul line if you are a girl) The method and location were determined by a wheel you got to spin, after signing a waiver.

Knowing Fuller wouldn’t make any baskets, Damon became his proxy, trying to win Fuller the hat. Unfortunately, it was difficult to do. On Saturday he tried again, but fell a shot short. I got in line, to try and up the odds. I didn’t really think I would make it.

I was so happy to give Fuller that hoop hat. And it was such a boost to my ego.

On the last day of 2010, I was filled with retrospective thoughts of just how blessed we have been. While it wasn’t all sunshine and roses, we were able to muddle our way to a fully refinished house, sell it, find a new house and move into it. It took us from January to May to find ourselves gathering mail at our new address, everyday since has been a reminder of how blessed we are to be here. A day doesn’t go by that we don’t exclaim how great our new house is and how much better our lives are.

With that said, 2011 has a lot to live up to.

I’m kind of going into the year blind, with no sizable list of goals or resolutions. Not that I need them, but I like to make them. So, with that in mind, I think the motto on the mug above (a gift from my parents… and I received a similar small print of it from my sister) is a good way to move in on 2011.

Keep calm and carry on.

Today I made the Ninjabread Men for Damon’s office party. I also made some regular gingerbread men, but the Ninjabread Men were a bit cooler to make.

However, I will note that making Ninja shaped cookies didn’t really put me in the Christmas spirit, as it would most of the time. Instead, I couldn’t get a Barenaked Ladies song out of my head:

The Ninjas are deadly and silent
They’re also unspeakably violent
They speak Japanese, they do whatever they please
And sometimes they vacation in Ireland.

The Ninjas are deadly and silent
They’re also unspeakably violent
They speak Japanese, they do whatever they please
And if you tear off their masks, they’ll be smiling.

At least these ninjas aren’t unspeakably violent. They just taste really good.

[tags]December Photo Project, Ninjabread Men, gingerbread men, barenaked ladies[/tags]

First, this morning’s sunrise was breathtaking and immediately had me running for the camera.

The rest of our day was spent in errands and then coming home to clean and cook for a special visitor, Mr. Bob. Bob usually meets with Damon on Wednesdays. They hike, talk, and pray together. Since Bob’s wife is out of town for a little while, we invited him over for a home cooked meal.

I’m a little proud of myself because I attempted two new things: riced cauliflower and stuffed mushrooms. Both were hits, so I’m sure they will make it back to the table again. I meant to take a picture of the mushrooms but they all were eaten too quickly.

Bob visited for a while, including listening to our Advent verse and praying with us.

While it was a busy day, it was a great day.

It’s that time of year again! I signed up for the December Photo Project again, in an effort to remember to not just capture the moments of the season but to reflect on them as well.

Thanks to Rebecca for hosting again. I’ve been looking forward to it for about a month.

Deck the halls.

I have to admit, I almost didn’t Respect the Turkey and thought several times about fast forwarding from Halloween to Advent/ Christmas because this year I am so excited to be in a new house that I really do not mind decorating for the season.

Our old house, while it had its charms and delights, was not a place I ever felt compelled to deck the halls. It was difficult to put up garland, lights, and bobbles in the midst of all the extension cords, the air compressor, and piles of clutter. I had other excuses, like travel, to keep me from getting my Martha on and allowing the Christmas spirit to shine through our home. Sure, we had our Christmas corners and maybe a wreath or two, but I just didn’t put any effort into it.

The silly thing is, in our previous home we had boxes of Christmas decorations in the attic waiting to be used.

And now… well, as I mentioned already, I am so excited to be in this house and decking our halls. Those decorations are finally being used. The wreaths in my picture above are from my little sister’s wedding, re-purposed for our Christmas spirit. We have topiaries my mother-in-law made 11+ years ago for use in our wedding that are now glowing from the strands of Christmas lights.

We are traveling this Christmas, so I (and Damon) hurried to put up decorations to enjoy as much as possible before our trip. And now, I plan on enjoying it.

[tags]December Photo Project, decoration, wreaths, Christmas wreath[/tags]

I painted stripes in my new bedroom. I really thought it would lend an elegance to the room, especially since they are only on one wall, the wall I see when I wake up in the morning.

I’m not a professional designer or painter, but I like them. I like them a lot.

Our old house was a project house, a place constantly under some sort of chaos disguised as renovation. The end result was pretty awesome, but we spaced out each project in an order that put our master bedroom last on the list. So I never had a “finished” bedroom until about a month (maybe two) before we moved. And since I was picking out carpet and paint colors for our bedroom knowing it was more for the sale of the house and not really for my enjoyment, I didn’t really get into enjoying the finished product.

Now, I’m putting stripes on the wall and getting ready to buy new bedding (once we get a bigger bed). I’m going to find that elegance for our master bedroom and enjoy the finished product.

Within hours of its return, the laptop was sitting on the dining room table and I was turned into a work-at-home(-except-its-really-your-in-law’s-house)-mother.

On the day my laptop turned into a brick and I had made my peace with losing the things I actually hadn’t lost, I secured some freelance work that I suddenly couldn’t do. And on the day I got my laptop back, I started working 4, 5, and a few times 8 hours a day trying to get a fast turn around on the project because I wanted to finish before returning to Chattanooga. Which turned out really well because we didn’t go back for a week after I sent the invoice to the client.

Yeah, that’s where the story goes… laptop dead, laptop raised from dead, start working hard, and then get an extra week of lakeside living which was really hard to enjoy knowing my husband was back at home working his butt off to get the house ready for our return.

In the end, we were away from our house and fourth family member for a month. If I had spent my time blogging every day the blog posts would have looked like this:

I love the lake but I wanna go hoooooooooome. I missssss my husband. I want to curl up next to him and help him with this last big project. I was made to be a helper and suddenly I can’t heeeeeelp. Wah. Wah. Wah.

And even though I think the first post like that would have been ok, the internet probably would have gotten sick of the homesick theme after the third post. Heck, I was sick of it before I posted anything.

But the story doesn’t end there. We returned home on Valentine’s Day (kind of romantic, kind of not) and I actually got my wish to be a helper in this project called home renovation. I’ve been taking stuff to storage, I’ve been painting trim (and have a hand cramp to prove it), and there have been more trips to Target and Wal-Mart than I am proud of (and I need to go back to Target to return something. Again).

I haven’t been sharing my story with the internet because I have been busy in a way that doesn’t spin itself into blog posts but exhaustion. And since we currently are sans TV (that’s another story), I have been trying to keep ahead of the exhaustion by going to bed at early to bed times.

And yet the story doesn’t end there because the story is still going… today I have to conquer clutter and possibly take another trip to storage. I have to roomba, steam mop, and whatever else in order to feel ready to meet with a Realtor tomorrow.

See, the story doesn’t end… it just takes a dramatic twist. And I think I just felt my first chest pain.