thanksgiving

happy thanksgiving!

we spent last weekend on a retreat with our youth group. it was full of laughter, junk food, the outdoors, songs, games, and fun. it was also very cold. and speaking of junk food...despite my best efforts and a stash of healthy food that i brought along, for dinner one night our daughter ate cheetos, twizzlers, gummy worms, and cookies. probably her worst dinner ever. but one night's not going to kill her, and that's what we get for spending the weekend with teenagers.

my belly popped this weekend, and now it feels like all my insides are being squished upwards, because...well... they are.

we are headed out for thanksgiving this afternoon. it is sunny and cold here today, a good day for traveling.

this past year of our lives has been very difficult and often full of sorrow as we each lost a young parent to cancer within less than six months of each other. jeremy's family will be missing his mom at their thanksgiving table, and my family will be missing my dad. it was actually one year ago today that my dad passed away.

despite our loss, we have much to be thankful for.
- jeremy's mom and my dad are healed and are in the presence of jesus.
- we have hope of eternal life.
- we have a beautiful little girl who brightens our life every day and is healthy, smart, and joyful.
- we have another child who is growing inside of me.
- we love each other and love living life together.
- we have family and friends who love us.
- our needs are provided for.
- and the list could go on for a while actually...

have a happy thanksgiving celebration!

leaves, candles, and the little beat

we've been quite busy these days.

we planned and organized a progressive dinner murder mystery party for our youth group last saturday evening. it ended up being a lot, a lot of work, but the evening was a smashing success, so it was totally worth all of the work.

a recent evening power outage forced us to realize how unprepared we were for such events. we had two small flashlights (at least both had batteries), but only a few candles. jeremy had homework to do, so he used the laptop (thankfully the battery was charged to begin with), and i sat and read with a flashlight. it was a nice change of pace for the evening. thankfully, the power came back on just as i was getting tired of reading by flashlight. and now i know to stock up on emergency candles.

our little one is starting to show an interest in the potty. in fact, she has pooped on the potty twice in the past week. we give her a lot of praise after she goes, and she is very proud of herself...but she really seems most excited about the fact that daddy has to clean it up - and she specifies that daddy has to clean it up. i'm just glad that i'm not the parent she has chosen for that task.

i had an appointment with the midwife today and we got to hear the baby's tiny little heart beating for the first time. amazing.

the leaves have almost all fallen. about a week ago, we spent a lot of time outside raking and doing yard work. of course, now that it's a week later, more leaves have fallen and it looks like we haven't done any yard work at all. our girl was thrilled when the neighbor's cat come over for a visit while we were raking. she loves all animals - especially ones that she can hold. the cat was very patient and let itself be carried around for a little while. our girl was beaming! thanks cat.

first snow

little one is napping. i am sitting with my feet up and a blanket on my lap. i am missing a mug of tea, but will soon have one in hand as i visit with a friend who is coming over in a bit. the best part about this scene is the SNOW that is coming down outside.

i always get excited about the first snow. when i woke up this morning, just knowing that it *might* snow today made me want to make special pancakes for breakfast, so i did. and they were good. the little one thought they were good too - she ate four of them, twice as many as i did! no wonder she wasn't really hungry when lunch came around...

we drove out to the farm this morning to pick up our milk, always something i look forward to doing. i marvel at the changing seasons as we drive...we watched the leaves grow, the corn get taller, and now the leaves have mostly fallen and the corn stalks are gone. we listened to mozart along the way, which made the drive even better.

and now i feel like listening to christmas music and putting up christmas decorations, but i will try to hold off for a bit yet. thanksgiving comes before christmas, and i love thanksgiving just as much as christmas, if not more.

some exciting news!

as you've probably noticed, it's been a bit quiet on the blog front these days. there's a good reason, and our little one wants to tell you why...

that's right - she's going to be a big sister!

i'm almost thirteen weeks along and am due right around mother's day. we found out that i was pregnant on jeremy's birthday, which made it even more special.

i have been feeling really, really exhausted (hence the lack of blogging and craft projects), but i've been feeling more energetic the past week or so, so i think i will soon be enjoying the energy of the second trimester. we're so excited!