Medieval Times

Please forgive me for being a bad blogger, but it’s been a hectic week. We have packed up 75% of our house this week, but I still feel like we have a ton more to do. Bear with me as the next week or so will be quiet on my blog also.
I did want to tell you about our date we went on last night though. (We got a babysitter and everything!) We went to Medieval Times. You go for dinner and a show, and there’s jousting and all kinds of fun stuff (think “Cable Guy.”) Anyway, you walk in and you are assigned to a section, and each section out of the 6 total cheers for a certain knight. So when they perform, you get to cheer them on. Well it’s been a while since I’ve been out without Hunter so I went crazy with the cheering. Greg thought I was a nerdo at first, but after a little while he joined in on the fun. :) The knights came around a few times and would throw flowers out to the ladies, and I was getting “upset” that I wasn’t getting one, so finally the last time he came around, I stood up and waved my arms around and yelled as loud as I could. I got a flower along with a laughing knight, LOL. I felt like I was at Mardi Gras (minus the whole lifting-my-shirt thing.) Being a Marine, Greg wasn’t happy that our knight was the first to get “killed,” but he didn’t let it ruin his night (no pun intended, haha.) ;)
Anyway, here are some pictures of the show to give you an idea of what they do.
So all in all, it was SUCH a fun date. It was nice to have a relaxing evening amidst a crazy week. I think it did more for our relationship during our move than we know (does that make sense?) Seriously though, there’s only a handful of Medieval Times in the country, but if you ever get the chance, GO!

Friday My Town Shoot Out - Reflections

Ok, so this week's post took a total different direction than originally planned when I first heard the topic. With us moving soon and me spending most of my time packing, I only got one picture this week, and stumbled upon it accidentally. While packing, I looked over and saw the reflection that the sun was making on my exercise ball, so I grabbed my camera! I think it's pretty cool!

Bottomless Pit

I'm talking about my son. I swear I canNOT believe how much this child eats. You'd think I would have taken his birth weight and the fact that from the time he was born he wanted to nurse every 1.5-2 hours as a warning. If we're eating something he likes, he'll eat as much as I do. The portion sizes I give him always surprise my family, but it's because he'll actually eat all of it!

I also can't believe how big he's getting with eating. I came downstairs on Saturday morning and Greg had fed him breakfast and he was just sitting in his highchair eating a bowl of cereal with milk and everything! He can also eat a banana out of the peel! And I'm getting to the point now where I can give him most foods without having to break it up into bite size pieces. Doing so may not be mess-free yet, but we're getting there. We had grilled cheese on Saturday, and he ate it like a big boy.

We also decided to go out to dinner on Saturday, and becasue of how much this child eats, we FINALLY caved and decided to buy him his own kid's meal. He got mac and cheese and a side of fries. Aside from a little help with the fries because mom and dad were hungry waiting on our meals, the child ate the whole thing by himself! He's not even two yet and he needs his own kid's meal. He'll be ordering off of the adult menu by the time he's six, and I don't even want to THINK about my grocery bill when he's 16...

Money

So I mentioned not long ago that the Lord gave me a wonderful night at work, money-wise.

Lately though, He just keeps blessing us financially to be able to make our ends meet. I had another good night at work on Monday, we got a check for over payment from our student loans for Greg's school. Granted, we will eventually have to pay those back, but we need the money more now, and are fine with paying them back in the future. We desperately needed new tires on our Jetta, especially since we'll be driving cross country next month, and Greg found an AWESOME deal for tires online, AND there was a mail-in rebate! I found a $60 math error in my check register in our favor. Now, granted, it was my mistake in the first place, but I honestly believe that God had me find the error at the perfect time. I have gotten awesome deals in my last couple crocery shopping trips here in IL. I got an amazing deal on Quilted Northern toilet paper at Aldi on Tuesday that seriously made my whole day! We needed diapers, and got a $3 off coupon in the mail the day before I needed to buy them. It's so relieving to see Him constantly showing Himself taking care of our finances like this.

Amazing things happen when you obey the Lord. He is so awesome, I just had to share.

Christopher Daniel

My friends that I helped throw the shower for a few weeks back had their baby on Wednesday! He is a beautiful baby boy, named Christopher Daniel. He is SO tiny at 6 lbs, 6 oz! Praise God that Maria had a quick, easy labor. She went in to the hospital at midnight and had him at 5am with little trouble.

I was so blessed to be able to visit them yesterday. The new daddy, Ronn, stayed in the lobby with Hunter so I could go up and see them. It's so weird to hold such a tiny baby, since Hunter was never that small, being born at 10lbs 8 oz!

Mommy is doing well, however, yesterday they discovered a hole in little Christopher's heart. They are going to wait a few days because there is a possibility it could heal itself, but if not, he'll need surgery. They heard a murmur, and decided to do an ultrasound, and that's when they found the hole. And the murmur they heard wasn't even the hole. So, praise the Lord that they did the ultrasound to find it. They are keeping him in the hospital a few more days to monitor him. I know Ronn and Maria would really appreciate it if you could please keep little Christopher in your prayers.

My Town Friday Shoot Out - Yard Objects

A staple in our yard are our American Flag and Marine Corps Flag. They fly proudly from sun up to sun down.

And what's any American yard without a barbeque?? :)
I LOVE summer!

The Weekend

This weekend was another good one. Praise God for the beautiful weather we had!

As our IL time is nearing an end, I've been watching, recalculating, and really obsessing over our financial budget. The move is going to cost us SO much so I'm just making sure we have enough to at least make it through paying our bills up until the move. Anyway, I know that God has provided for us every single month of our marriage and I am so thankful for that. And I Friday, He blessed us by me having an awesome night at work. We have been so slow lately, and I hope to make half of what I made each night compared to last year this time. But Friday, I made the most I have ever made in a single night in the 3.5 years of serving. I was so grateful, because, now, not only can we pay our bills, but we can also fill our bellies AND our gas tanks! PRAISE GOD! :)

Yesterday, there was a car show right by my work that I heard about, so we went there to check it out. I thoguht it would be fun for Greg, and anything that's free is fun for me! We have an AMC AMX sitting in my uncle's garage right now waiting for us to have the money to fix it up (It's also waiting for us to have room to store it at our house too.) It was my dad's car in high school, and so we acquired it from my parents. It was fun to go to the car show because Greg could point out certain things to me that he's thinking of doing to the AMX. My only request for the car is that it has pink on it. Really, I wanted the whole thing pink, but Greg vetoed that idea, unfortunately. There was a really cool truck there that I got lots of pictures of. The details this guy put into his truck were amazing. He had license plates EVERYWHERE, and even had a tuna can as a tail light. It was pretty cool. He also had this fish he made out of silverware that I took a picture of for you guys. He said it took 340 spoons to make it. He also had a fish on the tip of his hood that would squirt water at people when he pressed a button. It was pretty funny.

After the car show, I had to run 10 miles. And believe it or not, I DID IT! I didn't think I was going to make it a few miles in, but I kept at it, and two hours later, I arrived home. I ran a 12 minute mile, which is pretty slow, but I don't care. I still ran 10 miles! I was in a LOT of pain when I got home, so I took the advice of my marathon-running friend and did an ice bath from the waist down when I got home. I think those 10 minutes in the bath were (almost) as painful as the 10 miles! But, wow, it made a huge difference today. I have sore quads, but that's it! I'm definitely doing another ice bath the day of the half marathon since the next day is the day we pack up our house. I can't be down for the count that day! Three more weeks to the half marathon. I can't believe it! I'm very excited. Especially since I did the 10 miles. I know I'll finish the half. Now I just want it to be here!

Friday My Town Shoot Out - Textures

Ok, today marks my official start in the Friday My Town Shoot out gang! I had the awesome opportunity to shoot pictures in Oak Park, IL, where Frank Lloyd Wright designed many homes in the early 20th century. (I feel like I'm writing a school essay, ha!)
Anyway, I happened to go there this week, and used it as an opportunity to capture some awesome pictures. I didn't have the chance to perfect some of the poses because it was raining, and I had my father's camera instead of my own, but I am still happy with my first shot at it. (No pun intended!)

Anyway, enjoy the pictures, and comments are welcomed!

This next one was taken by my father, but I just love it so much, I had to include it! The idea of this next one is my favorite, although, because the rain was falling on me and the camera, I couldn't execute it as best as I would have liked.

Fourth of July

It's been a busy few days around here.

My parents were here for the weekend, so it was a pretty full household. It was an enjoyable visit though.

Friday was spent lounging and relaxing.

Saturday started out with coffee and Beignets. If you ever get the opportunity to have a Beignet, go for it. They are amazing...or at least the mix my mom had that was from a Beignet shop in New Orleans was. They are basically just fried donuts smothered in powdered sugar. I didn't think to get a picture before we attacked the plate of them, but I did manage to get one before the last one was inhaled. Seriously, delicious. (Just don't ask how many calories they have.)

After breakfast, my parents, Hunter and I went to Oak Park, IL, where Frank Lloyd Wright designed some houses from about 1890-1910ish. It rained the whole time, but it wasn't unbearable. And as you can see in the picture, Hunter stayed dry. :) While walking the neighborhood and looking at the houses, I took lots of pictures of different aspects of the houses and neighborhood. I found a blog called Friday "My Town" Shoot Out *thanks to Ellisa, again!* Every week, they post an "assignment" to take pictures. The assignment is a category (for lack of a better word) and you snap pictures that you feel fit in that category, and then post them every Friday. So, starting this friday, I will be posting pictures for the Shoot Out. Hope you enjoy them! I'm very excited about it, and I haven't even been a part of it for a full week yet!

Anyway, after Oak Park, we BBQed a wonderful dinner! I felt like it was Thanksgiving with all the food we had. We made Wehrman Turkey Burgers (except with beef), corn on the cob (what's 4th of July without it?), potato fries (I will post a recipe soon), and baked beans. I guess it really doesn't seem like that much when I type it out, but we had mass quatities of everything, so maybe that made it seem like more. We had 16 ears of corn and 3 pounds of meat...it was a lot of food! Then for dessert, we opted for more Beignets. :) YES, THEY'RE THAT DELICIOUS!

Our little city of Streamwood has their own fireworks, and they display them only a mile from our house, so we walked there to watch those. They were pretty good, especially for the size city we are. Even Hunter enjoyed them, just relaxing in daddy's lap the whole time. During the fireworks, I got a childlike feeling of what the 4th of July is about. Shooting of fireworks, to me, has always been a celebration of our freedom we have in this country. Having been a military wife and knowing first hand how much our freedom costs, I still get choked up when I think about how blessed we are to have the freedom we do. We are a very blessed country, and I'm thankful that I live here. I was reminded of that during the display last night.

Even though Sunday is supposed to be my long-run day, I woke up with bothered ankles this morning. So, I decided to blow off my 9 mile run, and instead cashed in my Mother's Day gift and had a day at the spa. It was absolutely wonderful and so relaxing. The massage was really good for me too, especially from all the running I've been doing. The rest of the day was spent in the same relaxation manner...I didn't even cook dinner! (Thank you, Pizza Hut!)

Tomorrow starts another work week...but Greg and I are definitely counting down until we move. I can't believe we have less than a month left! 4 more full weeks left, and we'll be on to another chapter...

Momma's Silly Boy

I have another video of my boy. He was being totally silly with daddy so I captured some of it on tape. Enjoy!

And I apologize for how randomly placed my pictures and videos are within my blog entries...I'm still trying to learn how to get it all pretty!