Creative anniversary ideas?

Scuba diving on our awesome honeymoon in St. Lucia! Despite that big smile, I didn't have a very good experience with the scuba diving itself...for the next three days, I woke up gasping for breath with nightmares about being dragged into the depths of the ocean by shadowy masked figures...

I'm looking for some inexpensive ideas for celebrating our three-year anniversary this August 8. Instead of doing gifts, we decided last year to start taking an anniversary trip. This year, we'll be less than four weeks away from our official due date for Baby Girl, so traveling or doing tons of walking or outdoor activities won't be much of an option for us.

There's a possibility we could do something on one of the last two weekends in July, but that's subject to a couple of factors we are still working out schedule-wise. Michael works every Saturday now, so we are looking at a Saturday evening through Sunday during the day outing most likely. One night and full or partial day away--just the two of us--would be fantastic. A bed and breakfast somewhere near Houston would be lovely I think.

We had a great 'staycation' last year here in Houston, and we're definitely open to doing that again.

We have a low budget for our anniversary this year, but we're both ready and excited to be creative!

Any ideas? 

The Power of Positivity

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus." -Philipians 4:6

This is a familiar verse for me. And yet (as Scripture tends to do), some of the truths in this verse have taught me practical new lessons for my life lately. The most powerful of these lessons has been about being positive in my everyday life.

One part of this lesson that I've been living out lately is the "with thanksgiving part." More and more I've been trying to be thankful first and foremost in prayer, even when I have an urgent or specific intention. And I've found that this practice really helps me get back in perspective, as well as often "save" a day.

Very rarely will you hear me say anymore, "it's been a bad day." Life is too short--and God has too much important work for us to do--to give up on a single day like that. I will concede that I can certainly have a rough morning, or evening, or night, but if we label an entire day as "bad" for reasons other than devastating medical test results, someone losing a job, or a terrible accident (you get the idea), I think that in most cases, within reason, we're getting too wrapped up in the small stuff.

And perhaps we're forgetting to be thankful for the small stuff.

Since I've been home full time for a couple of weeks now, I've started attending daily mass a couple of times a week with my 18-month-old son, Gabriel. Like almost any toddler, he's an active little boy, and it's been a struggle for many months now to find and maintain effective discipline in mass. While I am happy to report that he is behaving better and better in mass these days, especially in daily masses, I've noticed that my internal stress level about attending mass with him has calmed considerably since I started changing my prayer during my time in mass. Where I used to lift up constant prayers for Gabriel to "please, please behave today!",  I've started adding my special thanks to God for each moment of peace and good behavior that I do get during mass.

When I make an effort to add the "with thanksgiving" part to my prayers, I find that I tend to notice the little gifts and blessings in the situation.

For example, in morning mass this past week, I realized that Gabriel had been quiet and well-behaved through almost the entire Liturgy of the Word. He slammed his head into the pew during the Gospel when picking up his copy of The Very Hungry Caterpillar off the floor. But that day I had been struck by the relevance and power of the Responsorial Psalm to a particular situation in my life, and I had actually gotten to pray through that part of the mass (for once) before having to take Gabriel to the back to cry off the bump on his head. I realized that and was given great peace by that as I sent up a quick prayer while scooping up my wailing son. Just a small gift, but a gift all the same. And just a small peace, but a peace that really did "guard my heart and mind" from getting angry or frustrated.

Being positive and looking for blessings in the midst of petition has also been helpful in other areas of my life. My husband and I just started a small business, and I recently quit my job to be home full-time. I'm also nearly seven months pregnant. We have a lot going on in our life right now! Good things, but new things. I've absolutely seen how being positive, trusting in God, and maintaining my peace (at least, mostly:) has really helped my husband and family make these transitions. Especially as a wife and mother, I've seen how being more positive has helped me, as the "heart of the home" to maintain a (mostly) peaceful home.

Yet again, God has led me away from myself in my search for peace. It's not about tuning out the hard stuff, but looking for the little reminders of God's interest and presence in our lives that shower us during the day. It's having just enough wipes left in the pack to take care of the horrific Stinky (number 5 of the day!) you're trying to dispose of. It's having your husband get home in time for dinner, even though you burned the bread and over-boiled the broccoli because you had to nurse your impatient, hungry little two-month-old.

It's this kind of small stuff that provides us with just enough grace to take our next step.

Mothers have a Get Your Hands Dirty kind of job. Our job isn't glamorous. It's not always fun. But God created marriage and families for a reason: He decided they were the best way to teach us about Himself. Keeping that in mind helps us lift up the mundane parts of our lives and give them meaning, purpose, and nobility.

I've only been a mom for 18 months now, but already I cling to the knowledge that everything I do for my children and family is truly aimed toward the divine in its own created way.

A Really Big Pool, Dynamic Soccer, Father's Day Memories and a Big Boy Haircut

We had a fun weekend! 

On Friday, my sister Shannon and her boyfriend Myles came to visit us for the weekend. Before they arrived, though, our summer roommate Katie took Gabriel and I on a special tour of the NASA Neutral Buoyancy Lab (NBL). Even though I've been a "NASA wife" for a few years now, I had never been to the NBL before, and I loved it! 

The NBL is an enormous indoor pool with mockups of the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle. The astronauts train at the NBL for each mission. The finals of the ROVER International Robotics Competition were held over the weekend, and Katie was a volunteer and got to bring guests in for tours during the competition. 

On Saturday night, Shannon and Myles treated us to a Houston Dynamo game. I loved it! I played soccer through about 8th grade, and all of my brothers and sisters played soccer through high school (with my brother on soccer scholarship in college) so it was nice to actually know what was going on in the game! 

Unfortunately, the Columbus Crew stole the show from the Dynamo this weekend, but the Dynamo really did play hard, and I'd definitely go see another game! My dad is actually a big soccer fan, so Michael and I started preliminary scheming to lure him to Houston for a visit by taking him to a game sometime.

For Father's Day on Sunday, we ended up having a much more busy day than we planned! We went to 9am mass, then to the mall to pick out Michael's birthday gift, and then to have lunch with our good friends the Perrymans. After a long nap for the entire family that afternoon, we went over to our friend Lucy's house for the evening. We made homemade grilled pizzas and Italian sausage for dinner, and the little boys (six in all under 4!) played in a kiddie pool and then played their sweaty little boy hearts out all evening. It was a joy to see them all toddling around together. Lucy and I ended up throwing her two oldest and Gabriel in the bathtub together, where we managed to knock off at least the first layer of mud, grass and sweat from them. Rub-a-dub-dub, three boys in the tub...it's called a circus! 

Here are some adorable home videos from that afternoon...

We ended up just letting him run around in a diaper for the rest of the evening after dinner. He didn't mind. :)

Gabriel mowed the lawn and followed 3 1/2 year-old John-Matthew around for 40 minutes while Katie and I cleaned up inside and Michael weeded the driveway for Lucy. 

In other news...I gave Gabriel his first clipper haircut today. I've been trimming his hair with scissors every once in a while, but this was his first official Little Boy Haircut. Lucy let me borrow a DVD on cutting hair, and I watched it and then I took Gabriel outside, got Michael's clipper set, and went at it! I don't have any photos yet, but here's some video from this afternoon with the new 'do. :)

Embracing the mess of the fray

I wanted to re-post this blog from Fallible Blogma, a great Catholic blog written by a fellow Houstonian named Matthew Warner. It's a great message for parents, but especially for all of the hardworking dads out there as Father's Day approaches.

I've been trying my heart out lately to step up into my new roles of Stay-at-Home Mom and Wife of a Man Who Just Started a Business. The Wife of a Man Who Just Started a Business role is the tougher of the two so far! Michael is working as hard or harder than I've ever seen him. He has, hands down, the strongest work ethic I've ever seen, but he even his seemingly boundless energy is really being taxed lately by the demands of our new business (on top of maintaining his 40-hour work weeks). A new baby coming soon as well as the loss of the income from our old job certainly may make things a little more intense for him!

I love the part in this article about finding peace in the "sweat" of the journey. So perfect in the 100+ degree heat we are having here in Houston...

I pray for Michael, speak encouraging words and Scripture to him, take care of Gabriel, make him healthy meals and give him a clean and peaceful house to come home to. And these are valuable things for sure. But sometimes when he's out late working, and still gets up faithfully and uncomplaining at the crack of dawn each day, I desperately want to be able to pick up a shovel, or a weed-eater, and physically help him.

I'm so thankful for this opportunity and challenge God has given us, because I know He is working on both of our souls.

And you know what? Talk about God's timing: He absolutely has seemed to orchestrate the starting of our business with my quitting my job and entering my third trimester, so that I would have the time and energy to do all of the things I am able to do for Michael to support him. And I'm awed and thankful for that.

[From Matthew's June 15 blog, "Embracing the Mess of the Fray"]

“When we find ourselves grousing about having so little time for ourselves, for being asked to do so much, let’s try to remind ourselves that that’s the way it’s supposed to be. God gave us our families to serve. We are being asked to give everything for our families. Indeed, we are being called to be modern heroes in our families and in our society.” – Stephen Gabriel, To Be A Father

Sometimes we look for peace and relief in all the wrong places. For many things, we just have to accept the fray of the world we live in. We have to find comfort in the mess and joy in the day-to-day struggle. Otherwise, we’ll be endlessly dissatisfied and stressed.

It’s like buying your own house and then only looking forward to the day when there are just no more things to fix or chores to do around it. That day just doesn’t come. We have to find some comfort in the unfinished work. This earthly life is a journey, not a destination or vacation. Yet we make the mistake of trying to turn it into one.

Find peace in the sweat of the journey. Only in such peace do we discover the presence of mind to really embrace the adventure and gift of the life before us.

We need to stop racing toward some hypothetical end all the time where we’re finally “all caught up”…only to realize at the end that we’ve missed the point entirely. All of the things we grumble about are most often precisely the things we should be doing. They are precisely the things we need for the journey. Don’t waste them. Embrace them.

Beach babes and babies

We spent last week in gorgeous Pensacola, Florida with 15 or so members of my family. It was a great trip! Gabriel wasn't too excited about the beach this year though. The sand and water combination didn't quite agree with him!

I had lots of help with Gabriel this week, so much that I took many naps and also read three books! Going on trips with a baby can be hard work, especially when you're 27 weeks pregnant, but my sweet family made sure that Michael and I got to have some quality "vacation" time on this trip. Thanks, guys :)

Gabriel and my brother, Ryan

The entire family :) Gabriel was only happy when cocooned away from the scary waves by a sand fort. With balls and a bucket inside.

Me and my sister, Rivers

Balls and a bucket...

Gabriel's face most of the time we were on the beach

Airplane! (We went to the Naval Air Museum one day)

Gabriel sat on this missile for a few pictures and said "Pa-tow, pa-tow, pa-tow!" the entire time. It was cute but also kind of unnerving in a back-of-your-mind kind of way

My uncle, aunt and Mom

Sitting in the Ejection Chair at the Naval Air Museum

Doesn't he look cute in his little sunglasses?  

What you don't see is Gabriel's hugely pregnant mother snoozing on a towel right next to him, but looking and feeling more like a beached manatee than this cute little picture :)

Family photo shoot! 

My parents and siblings

My brother and his sweet girlfriend, Meghan

My gorgeous mom. She's going to make me take this photo off my blog as soon as she sees this, so enjoy while you can. I hope I look this glamorous and beautiful when I'm her age :)

 

My cousin Liz and her husband, Chris

What's not to love about this little boy? I'm such a goner for my son. Oh. My. Goodness. 

Case in point...

My favorite :)

Laughter, defend us in battle

"I love people who make me laugh. I honestly think it's the thing I like most, to laugh. It cures a multitude of ills." 
— Audrey Hepburn


I ran across this quote after a particularly stressful morning last week. We were packing up to leave at lunchtime for our much-anticipated vacation, a road trip to the beach. And my 18-month-old, Gabriel, was having a rough morning. 


A really rough morning. 


Everyone has rough days every once in a while. I've already come to the conclusion that this rule of thumb applies to babies as well. It's just that toddlers, in particular, seem to hurt themselves a lot when they're having a bad day. 


I know they can't help it, at their age. They simply charge headlong off the Precipice of Self-pity and don't look back.  


My recent rough morning is a case in point: 


Gabriel follows me around the house, whining constantly, his normally steady little walk deteriorating until he starts tripping, falling and hitting his head on normally benign household objects like doorways, tennis shoes, and the water bottles he's pulled off the bottom shelf of the pantry.  


After tripping over the water bottles, he starts sobbing (even though he didn't really hurt himself) and rolls dramatically over onto his back, right into a puddle of bright red Koolaid I spilled on the floor when I heard him trip over the water bottles. 


I pick him up, cooing and humming a rendition of "Hail Mary" that does double duty as a lullaby and a prayer for sanity. I'm doing this at the same time that I'm stripping off the new white polo he's wearing and  furiously looking for my last bottle of stain remover in the laundry room (which I ultimately can't find because I used it up a couple of days ago). 


When I've changed his clothes and calmed him down, I put him down next to me while I finish packing (I'm trying to pack for our trip, remember?) After a couple of minutes of cheerfully tracing the designs on our living room rug, he suddenly starts whining, runs toward me, and flings himself at my head, knocking off my glasses and simultaneously obliterating my carefully folded and separated underwear and teeshirt piles.


Once I pry him off my leg, refold my underwear and teeshirt piles, successfully set him up playing with his favorite airplane toy, and turn my attention from him for 10 seconds, I turn around to see he has been so kind to unpack the carry-on bag I just finished putting together. When I finish packing the carry-on again, I realize he's walked off with the right shoe from the bag, so I spend the next 10 minutes looking for it, finally finding it under my husband's dresser. Next to my wallet, which has been emptied unceremoniously partially inside the shoe.


By the time Michael arrives home from work at lunchtime, I'm frazzled and quickly reaching Shut Down Mode, but everything is actually packed. A tiny miracle.  


With Gabriel fussing the entire time, we manage to load up the van. As I'm on my way back into the house after my very last trip to take luggage out to the van, I spot Gabriel out of the corner of my eye, toddling matter-of-factly down the driveway by himself toward the street. I realize he had opened the back door by himself to make this escape, a "first" he chose to present to us today of all days.


And as I scoop him up in my arms, all of a sudden I laugh. Because the morning and the situation is so absurd, so completely beyond description at this point. And because it's either laugh or start crying. I make my choice.


I think that laughter can be a secret weapon in motherhood. At least for me, in this season of parenthood. Even if it doesn't quite "cure" a stressful Toddler-Having-a-Rough-Day situation, it certainly helps me regain my cool. 


The St. Michael prayer is a daily one in our home, and I've recently been appreciating it more. 


Saint Michael the Archangel,
defend us in battle.
Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil.
May God rebuke him, we humbly pray;
and do Thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host -
by the Divine Power of God -
cast into hell, satan and all the evil spirits,
who roam throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls.

Amen. 


The "snares of the devil" are all-too-often disguised as the rough mornings in our daily lives. With one toddler and a little one on the way, I'm still a young mom, but I can already see where the challenges of domestic life can be a real battleground for those evil spirits "seeking the ruin of souls."


I feel like I've started to learn that abandoning my will and emotions to God, keeping my cool, and--sometimes most importantly--making sure I have the last laugh on those rough mornings can make all the difference. 

My first day on the job

I love this picture. This mom reminds me of myself: sleeves rolled up because she's been scrubbing a baby poop stain out of her carpet, hair a mess pulled back into a scarf (well, it's a clip or ponytail for me), with just a bit of mascara anyway.

My first day on the job was nice. I got to take a nap. And I got a lot done--and maybe that's an understatement.
- Doctor's appointment (with G-man in tow)
- Deposited our very first CrossCutt payments at the bank :)
- Took out cash for our June budget, then separated all the cash and organized our budget for the month and for vacation
- Surprised Michael by bringing him a smoothie at work
- Organized, folded and put away an enormous bag of beautiful baby girl clothes one of his coworkers gave us
- Organized the chest of drawers in Gabriel's room to hold both Gabriel's and Baby's Girl's clothes.
- Organized MY chest of drawers, refolded everything based on size, what I fit into right now, and type of clothing
- Cut coupons
- Ate lunch with Gabriel in the backyard
- Went to Walmart and Kroger (and saved lots of money with coupons!:)
- Cooked a nutritious and delicious dinner (feta chicken bake with peas and pasta salad)
- Went for a bike ride with Gabriel and Katie
- Played with Gabriel in the backyard and swung on the swing with him for a while
- Watered our plants in the backyard
- Helped a stranger push his car back to his house (well, I went and got Michael to help him at least)
- Took a shower
- Took a 45-minute nap
- Blogged
- Made two phone calls I've been needing to make
- Moved forward with two emails/projects I've been needing to attend to for a couple of days
- Bathed Gabriel, read to him, and put him to bed all happy and content
- Got into bed with a clean kitchen and house to wake up to (including Michael's and Katie's lunches already packed in tupperware for tomorrow)

GEEZ.

So before I absolutely crash with exhaustion after realizing how much I did today and how late it is right now...some thoughts.

I'm totally, self-consciously, good-humoredly and knowingly in the "I Have to Get a LOT of Things Done Now That I'm Home All Day" phase.

I've been told this phase will settle down soon enough :)

I sure hope so. It's hard work being in the Newbie Phase....