Last Week in Pictures

 Using stickers to make a Pirate Lookout.  Ahoy!

 Gardening and playing in mud puddles

 Playing catch inside because of so much rain.  At least his arm is improving :)

Every southern woman plants crape myrtles...  This one has been shooting up mighty fine.

Why are these two so daggum perfect?

This summer has been so weird for North Texas.  Typically July is spent in sweltering heat of 110*.  That doesn't even include the heat index.  And rain?  Well North Texans typically don't remember what rain is until about October.  But God has blessed us mightily this summer with a low 90s summer and an amazing blessing of rain.  Lord knows we still need more to get our lakes and rivers back up, but He is Providing.  Hallelujah!

Incidentally, you may notice my blog changing.  There for awhile, I considered growing my blog, and I kinda did start to.  And then I realized something- I hate blogging for that.  Don't get me wrong there are a handful of people I am beyond blessed to be 'friends' with now.  I love those people.  But the incessant need to keep up with this link up and that link up and make sure I comment on X number of blogs so said blogger and I can continue to build a 'friendship' got to be overwhelming.  With a few exceptions, I just began to wonder why am I concerned more about online stuff than people I know in real life.  Silly.  

So now I blog when I want.  And I write what I want.  And if there happens to be a link up I already know about, I might do it.  But if not, no big deal.  I say that because if I am not really keeping up with sharing my button with you or yours with me, it's nothing personal.  I just don't feel the need to blog all the time.  Or if I don't comment as much as I once did, it's because I want to focus on real life.  I appreciate all of you who have kept up with me.  I'm still going to be blogging, and if you follow me, you will see it.  But if you don't, thats ok too.  I'm excited for all you who have found your niche with blogging.  It's been pretty wild to see some of you grow so fast!  And that's awesome.  I just wanted those of you to know that I am still reading, but not as closely as before.  Or at least not commenting as much.  But in my heart I do adore you all :)  May God use your blog in amazing ways!

Summertime

Now that I am officially moved out of my classroom, have helped with interviews for possible Lee teachers, and have turned in my classroom keys, summer has begun.  My garage is full of books upon children's books and files upon teacher files.  I hope you weren't planning on coming to visit me this summer, because my guest room is basically full of 'guests' from my classroom.

Summer is my time to be productive.  I'm not much of a 'relaxer'.  I have a hard time just sitting.  Not that I am a social butterfly, because I definitely am not.  I just like to work.  Today I literally had the best day.  I intentionally woke myself up at 6:30, got Jude and I up, dressed, fed, and out the door by 7:30.  I was the very first oil change of the day at good ole Wal- Mart.  I accomplished some of my leftover grocery shopping from yesterday (I never remember everything I need).  We were home by 8:45.  I unpacked the groceries, and dug up all the hedge grass on the side of my house as seen in the above photo.  By 10:15, I had finished that project and then had gotten Jude and I to our neighborhood pool :)

After a couple hours at the pool, we came home.  He ate lunch, took his nap.  I cleaned up a few things, did my quiet time, and took a nap.  He woke up and we went to the library.  He picked out 2 train books and a dragon book.  Of course.  And I found the book I believe my teacher book club group will be reading for June.  Score!  (although I am also reading a book of my own choosing.  Anyone else out there read multiple books at a time?)

When we got home, coffee was necessary.  I brewed a pot and did some laundry, got Jude dinner, got my dinner ready.

If you saw my IG post yesterday, I mentioned that I drink tea on the regular.  Today I brewed a wee pot of pomegranate black tea, which incidentally is probably my very most favorite.  Unsweetened, of course.

After dinner, I got back to work on my garden.  I watered my plants that I have in pots, as well as my hydrangea I bought this weekend.  I should have taken a pic of it, as I am ridiculously excited about it.  I love them, but it's so hot here.  I think I found the perfect place to plant them though.  It's pretty shady and the soil there stays fairly wet.  If it continues to thrive, I will be buying a few more!

Jude and also planted some ivy and flowers along the side as seen above.  Not pictured will be the lattice I will need to buy in order for the ivy to have something to climb.  Jude loves to help with gardening, although I mostly just let him fill up his watering can.  It will be fun as he grows to teach him to care for things.

On the right side of the picture above you can see all the random plants I have.  I found a packet of wildflower seeds in my garage back in March and decided to just plant them and see what happens.  It's a big of a mess, and I have no idea what to do about it.  Some of them are pretty like these.  Some of them just look like the weeds they are.  I'm not really sure what I want to do with it, and I'm not one to act quickly, so who knows what I will do with it.

What I do know is that I am enjoying gardening.  I like working and cultivating things and seeing how they turn out.  I like pruning and trimming rose bushes (although I have a lot to learn...).   And I can't help but think that this is a bit of a worshipful experience since our first job was to cultivate the earth.  In fact, gardening was our job before the fall even happened.  Heck, our first home was right in the midst of a garden.  It's interesting to think about.  Like it's where we belong.  It's also interesting how fulfilling a good day's work really is.  It's a good reminder that we aren't created to just take take take all the time.  We were created to do something, whatever that something is.

Whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord ~ Colossians 3:23

Hello World, Remember Me?

Jude and I on Mother's Day

I think it's pretty safe to say I'm in a blogging rut.  Not because I don't have things to say, but I don't have the time to do it.  Or there are other things I want to do more.  Specifically gardening.  I have really been getting into this lately.  And thankfully with this cooler spring and now cool start of summer, it's been easy to do that.  I am beyond enjoying seeing all the new growth on my rose bushes.  This weekend I discovered morning glories growing wild so my head is full of how to try to capture and tame those.

My garden helper

For Mother's Day, Jimmy and I went plant shopping.  It's been amazing to have plants on my porch to look at and relax around.  So thankful for him and his willingness (and knowledge) to garden with me.  He is beyond amazing in countless ways.  Patient with my questions.  He loves on my child in ways that blow my mind.  And he serves me in the most humble ways, including planting flowers into pots with and for me.  He is the best man I know.

So much about this picture I love

My actual Mother's Day was spent relaxing in cool weather with some poetry on my front porch.  It was blissful and beautiful and peaceful.  Jude spent the time in what I have christened 'his digging spot'.  Because I'm pretty sure every boy needs one.  That evening Jimmy took us to dinner and because he is the kindest hearted human, he patiently played games with Jude while we waited.  I tried to get a pic of it, but none of them came out :(

Flash forward to last weekend (everything in between is a blur anyway...) and Jude and I joined my family in Annapolis Maryland where my brother graduated from the Naval Academy.  So much patriotism wells up in me when it comes to the military.  I am not the biggest believer in politics, but I love the general American ideals.  Flags, uniforms, gun salutes, etc just seem to foster that for me.  The commissioning ceremony was rather torturous as it was raining with a strong wind chill of 45*.  If it weren't for the fact that Obama was speaking and my love for my brother, I would have left.  The rest of the time was spent trying to stay warm, enjoying crab foods of all kinds, front porch sitting, and getting to know my brother's beautiful girlfriend (who happens to have been an Alpha Chi Omega at the University of Georgia.  I was one at Baylor.  My sis was one at Texas Tech.  There was secret handshaking.  And a possible night out with this...)

LITB

Some other pics from the weekend:

amazing

Future midshipman?

This is the porch I dream about.  My mansion in heaven will have this porch.

This weekend was spent celebrating that Jimmy and I have been dating for a year.  Technically a little longer, but we consider our first real date to be the beginning of June.  Last year on June 1st or 2nd (not actually sure of the date) we went to an Avett Brothers concert.  It was amazing musically.  Plus Dirk Novitski (sp?) happens to be an Avett fan and he showed up.  I was pretty nervous because this was the first date I'd been excited about since Michael.  I had no idea what I was doing.  Jimmy was nervous.  It  was the slowest start to a relationship considering I was somewhat freaked out to be dating anyone at the time.  I had no idea if I could trust myself to pick out a good one this time.  I took each day at a time and proceeded with caution.  As only God could know, Jimmy is just a naturally easy paced person, and my need for time suited him fine.  We spent 4-5 months 'figuring it out' and it wasn't until that long in until labels were attached.  And probably 8+ months in before we both were ready to acknowledge this was in any way serious.  Thinking back over this past year, (besides just making me cry right now- what the heck...) its just crazy.  Doesn't seem that long.  And yet Jimmy is by far one of the best things to happen to my life.  And in every way, one of the most patient, humble, servant hearted men I've ever met.  In fact if I had to pick a single word to describe him, servant would be it.  And having a character like that, well it's just impossible to not trust and respect him, which my heart so desperately needed to be able to do.  I love him so very much.

We celebrated last night by going to the KXT summer fest, which headlined, guess who- the Avett Brothers.  Same concert.  A year to the day of our first date.  It was a blissful evening to sit on a quilt in our warm, breezy June weather.  (until it poured that night haha :)  

So anyway, life is good.  In 5 days it will be summer.  I will get to spend my time with Jude who tells me every day after work that he 'misseded' me.  And I will continue to enjoy the ease of loving someone who loves me so selflessly for exactly who I am.