Tag Archives: spring

books, health and fitness, mommyhood, random thoughts

Currently – May!

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Hello, friends! I simply cannot believe how this year has FLOWN by! The fact that it’s already May has me reeling a bit. But, I’m always glad to give a little update and link up with the fabulous Anne in Residence and a new friend, Carrie at A Stylish Fit. Comment below or link up and tell us all about what you’re up to currently!

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Celebrating || summer! I know there are still five weeks of school left (for us in NC at least), and I know it’s not that hot out there yet, but I also know that going to the pool, eating fresh tomatoes from our garden, and not having a wake up time are all GREAT things that are coming soon!

Creating || my summer to-read list. I want to actually try to stick to it, since I’ve got so many things on my TBR list. I’m hoping to finish Peace Like a River (y’all – SO GOOD), Too Much and Not in the Mood (beautiful non-fiction, but this style is just a little slower-going for me as a reader), AND Everybody Always (shout out to Bob Goff!) by the time summer ACTUALLY arrives. At that point, I’d like to read the other books in the A Wrinkle in Time series (L’year of L’engle, says Annie Downs) and The Turquoise Table (one that I heard about a year or so ago, and only just bought). I’ll probably have time for more than just those, but I haven’t locked down what I’d like to move on to after that.Snagged these at Barnes and Noble yesterday!

Wearing || Chacos every DAY! And a new hat I got for running. It’s mesh in the back (because hot, y’all), and has a nice big G on the front. Any UGA fans around?!

Sharing || my current reads… it’s been so fun to have a little journey with some online friends about what I’m reading, what I’d like to read next, and getting suggestions for my next books! (This is mostly taking place on my stories on Instagram! Follow me @onlyhsuman if you’d like to come with me!) I’ve always been an avid reader, but recently I’ve enjoyed making time for it more and more. When I was in the fog of raising actual babies (you know, the ones who don’t sleep through the night or do anything for themselves) I just didn’t have much brain power leftover for reading. But now I can even have a few minutes to read while they’re AWAKE because they understand that Mama needs some down time, too. It’s actually lovely. I don’t mind this stage!

Going || to run my next half marathon next weekend! This round of race training has been a little more low-key than the last. There’s definitely an element of “I’ve already done this, so I know I can do it again.” and I’m not pushing myself quite so hard. I also am fairly certain I set a PR last time finishing under two hours, so I’m trying to not be mad that I’m little slower this time around. I’ll finish, and that’s the goal. Prayers for one more good long run this Friday and healthy knees and ankles for the next week and a half are appreciated!

That’s about all for me right now. What are you up to currently?!

faith, home, random thoughts

It isn’t really spring.

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I was teased today by the coming of spring. It isn’t remotely spring yet, being as it’s only halfway through January. It isn’t time for brunching in the sun, or enjoy the porch in a tank top, both of which I did today. I enjoyed sun bright enough to hurt my eyes, feeling quite hot in a long sleeves and leggings, and thinking of the days ahead with pretty flowers and green leaves.

But it isn’t spring.

It’s merely a taste of what’s to come. A foreshadowing. I must remember that we went sledding earlier this week. We played in SNOW in the same week as this perfect sunny day. So instead of pack away my sweaters, I’m going to take in the vitamin D, enjoy the warm sun on my skin, and prepare for another few weeks of long, hard winter.

You know what? I want another snow this year – really I do. I love playing in it with the kids, and seeing them enjoy something they rarely see. (Here in central NC we only get one or two good snows in a year.) I love the crisp whiteness, the huge, fluffy flakes as they fall, and the silent blanket over our home and yard. But the bitter cold without any snow is just… lame.

I’ll take this cheating little spring day as a reminder that winter doesn’t last forever. I’ll take it as a token that we are headed in the direction I want to go. The days are already getting longer, the solstice behind us. The sun lingers longer than it did just a few short weeks ago. But the cold is not over. The wind and snow will likely visit us again. And I’ll be prepared to enjoy it. I’ve got one perfect, sunny day, a reminder that winter and darkness and lack of sun aren’t the way life always is. Life will have a spring. Every year. Exactly when we need it.

holidays, home, mommyhood, My Big Jesus, random thoughts

What a Bad Idea!

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This post also appeared on My Big Jesus! 

 We can all sense it… Spring is coming. Here in NC, the weather is warmer, and flowers are beginning to bloom. All over, the sun is showing itself earlier in the morning and later in the evening. Children are losing their cool indoors and begging to go out and catch the rays of sun for which they’ve been longing. But there’s just one, tiny, little, baby hiccup about the coming of spring…

Daylight Savings Time. 

Whoever came up with this idea clearly didn’t have a toddler. I used to appreciate a good “fall back” in November. But now that I’m a parent, we all know that falling back just isn’t going to happen. And springing forward? That just sounds like every morning of my life. 

Let me just walk you through what this looks like for us…

Our first year as parents, everyone said, “Oh, it’s not so bad if you ease their bedtime up by 10 minutes the week before. Then they’re pretty much on schedule.” I don’t know if this has truly worked for people, but my daughter, who was almost one at the time, basically laughed in my face. Every year after that, we just sorta started bedtime earlier the night before and hoped for the best. (Side note: It didn’t really work.)

Recently we’ve had some trouble getting our kids to sleep if it’s light, regardless of the time (i.e. nap time or bedtime). We’ve gotten sound machines to drown out daytime noises. We’ve put up black-out shades in their rooms. We’ve streamlined routines, given baths, loveys, snuggles and stories, and come to one conclusion: those kids are gonna sleep when they’re tired. Enter my next task…

Wear. Those. Crazy. Kids. Out. This is tough. On days we don’t have school, it means parks and the children’s museum. It means play dates and picnic lunches. It means that my exhaustion counts for nothing, and I have to muster up the energy to play hard, and crash hard when it’s done. Naps must be taken, because over-tiredness leads to poor nights’ sleep. If I want them to go to bed early, we play extra hard. If I want them to take good naps, I pay attention to their “sleepy” cues, and have a bed available at that moment, instead of still being at the park when the meltdown hits. 

Bottom line? Daylight Savings Time sucks. People with young children should just move to Arizona and be done with it. No one is saving anything, but everyone is losing their sanity. 

faith, home, mommyhood, random thoughts, travel

Currently – Spring Is Coming!

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I can’t believe we are already here… It’s March, it’s been -dare I say it?- warm here in NC, and Easter is more than on its way. It feels like just two weeks ago, we were playing in the snow! Oh wait. We were. Anyway, here’s this week’s edition of Currently! Since it’s a new month, I linking up with Becky at Choose Happy, as well as Jenna at Gold and Bloom and Anne in Residence. Join us!

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Wearing || my Chacos! It’s the first ring that happens when the weather wants up… Lose the close-toed shoes. My feet like to be free, y’all. I’d post a cute picture, but my toes are woefully I need of a pedicure, and my Chacos are mud-caked from working in the garden yesterday. I can’t believe it’s already gardening time!

Craving || some quiet time. I’ve tried to build it into my schedule, and it seems the more I try, the less my children sleep, and the less I’m able to actually get up and make it happen. The desire is there for quiet time with the Lord, but I’m having trouble dragging my tired self out of bed in the mornings, because D is still getting up around 4-5. And that’s a little too early for me to start my day.

Going || to DisneyWorld! Hubby and I are taking our biggest two babes to Disney for EK’s birthday in April. We’re just going for two days, but we’ve got fast passes all set up, and we’re staying in the park to save time. We cannot WAIT to introduce the magic to EK and J!!

image from disney.wikia.com
Learning || how to garden with three babes. J still likes to run around the neighborhood when unattended (ha!), D is getting used to hanging in the pack-n-play outside (or sometimes the stroller so we can move him around the yard), and EK is still her short-attention-span-gardener self. She loves to help, but only for a few minutes. We’ve had two full afternoons of gorgeous weather, productivity, and back-breaking work. Hopefully soon we will plant, and then soon after that it will yield good fruit (vegetable)! 

   
Planning || Our spring schedule. We’ve got weddings galore, fun trips planned, and still our regular lives to attend to. Can we do all the things and have fun, too? Only time will tell.

Well, that’s about it for my family. What are you up to currently?

home, mommyhood

Currently – the Blur That Was My Week

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Y’all, last week was a marathon of passing my kids around, unpacking boxes, snagging moments of peace and embracing the chaos. I leaned on my village to help get us through the crazy week. We’ve had an amazing transition into the basement (look for an update this week!) even though it’s still a work in progress.

But for now, I’m linking up with Becky at Choose Happy for another installment of Currently! Link up with us and tell us how your week/weekend has been!

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Excited about || Smooth transitions for both kids into their new rooms! They’re both napping and sleeping at night very well in their new spaces. J’s isn’t totally finished up quite yet, but it’s coming along! We are slowly bringing some toys downstairs (including their Playhut tunnel) and reorganizing clothes since it’s a season change. A work in progress, but slow and steady till we’re done!

Planting || Tomatoes and peppers and basil, oh my! We’ve got other things on the way, but we spent an afternoon with our whole selves in the dirt, planting and nurturing our summer garden!  

Thankful for || Beautiful weather! Anytime there is sunshine, I probably say I’m thankful for it, but it’s true! Weather plays a big role in my mood, so when it’s sunny, I’m happy, and rainy, I’m sleepy. I’m never that productive on a rainy day, so I love the sunshine for myself, my family and my house! I also love springtime views like these:

Working at || High Point Furniture Market this week! Saturday was my first day this season, and I worked today, and will work tomorrow. I worked one day at the fall market last year, so it was basically like a new job again this spring. I work in a showroom for a California company called Artistica. They have beautiful pieces, so get on the website and check them out!

Well, since I worked a ten-hour day today for the first time in a looooong while, I’m exhausted! Things have been crazy being away from home a lot. Off to bed for me.

What have you been up to currently? Join our link up!

home, mommyhood, women

Currently – Celebrating Easter!

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Happy Monday! I’m linking up again today with Becky at Choose Happy for her Currently series. Join us, and just let us know what’s up with you currently! It’s a great way to find fun new blogs to follow, and to find friends. I love it!

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Enjoying || a relaxing day after a super busy Easter week. Everyone slept late this morning, and we don’t have anything on our schedule. Hopefully it’ll be a day of catching up on chores and maybe taking a nap!

Thankful for || a wonderful Easter weekend. It was full of good church, wonderful family, and sweet friends. The Lord is risen, and we couldn’t be more grateful!! There were so many celebrations we could barely keep up… We were so busy we literally didn’t get a single picture of everyone in their cute outfits! Here are a few instead of an actual “Easter photo”:

Cousins on a couch!
Elsa’s Easter outfit. What Easter dress would be complete without the Ice Queen’s crown?
Bunny love.
He was getting better at caring about the eggs by the end…
I snapped this one from behind the piano right before the Good Friday service… my favorite night of the year, I think.

Looking forward to || my mom’s arrival this afternoon! She’s staying through next weekend to help us get cleaned up, organized, and set up for guest hosting and party throwing! And of course to snuggle the sweet ones.

Excited about || my college girlfriends having a slumber party at my house next weekend! We haven’t gotten all together since our super fun weekend in December, and I’m glad we will be together again! It’ll probably be full of milkshakes and laughter and not staying up as late as we used to, but it will be much-needed time to catch up, love on each other, and store up time together for the next few months till we do it again.

Decorating || the basement! Finally! Cleaning crew comes in this week to make it really move in ready, and today I got a fabulous rug for the living room down there! Just have to find a car big enough to go pick it up – ha!

Found this rug at Homegoods – for a steal, obviously.
Snazzy custom handrail, all finished up! Now to patch the wall and floor, and build a baby gate! (Please ignore the pile of laundry at the bottom of the stairs. It rarely goes away.)

Well, that’s what’s going on in my life! Thanks for reading, and I can’t wait  to hear what’s going on with you!

food, home, mommyhood, random thoughts

Currently: Happy Spring!

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Happy Monday! I’m linking up again with Becky at Choose Happy and some more awesome bloggers for this week’s Currently. I love having this link-up every week to start my week off with a fun post. Join us! We want to hear what you’re up to!

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Watching || Gilmore Girls. I know I’m late to the party, but I’m pretty excited to be catching up with Rory and Lorelei. I’m digging all the scenes with Emily; she’s hilariously infuriating.

GILMORE GIRLS (Season 3)

Listening to || worship tunes to gear up for Palm Sunday and Easter. I want to make sure they’re topically appropriate but also good ones that people will know and love. Do you have any suggestions for Easter-y worship songs?!

Loving || warmer weather! I’m pretty sure I’ve said this every week, but every week it’s just been a tease. There are a few warm days, and then we go back into the cooler temperatures. I should be glad, because soon I’ll be complaining about how hot I am all the time. Ha! For now, I’ll be loving that I can wear dresses instead of squeezing my belly into pants.

Enjoying || my Jamberry manicure I did earlier this week! It’s springy and fun – a gift from a Mystery Mama! I’m part of a Facebook group (that I found through a blogger I follow) where we all swapped names and are sending sweet notes/small gifts over the next few weeks. I’m really enjoying it, on the receiving end AND the giving end! I’d tell ya what I sent, but I don’t want to ruin my MM’s surprises!  

Eating || some gorgeous tie-dye cupcakes! I found them on Pinterest, and told my baker friend Lauren about them, and we gave them a go yesterday! We actually used a Paleo chocolate cupcake recipe we had used before (because chocolate) but the dairy-free buttercream icing was the winner of the day. Especially since the EK-approved tie-dye colors worked out as perfectly as we had hoped! We will do them again in “princess colors” for her birthday in two weeks! I am SO happy with the way they turned out! 

Looking forward to || having my whole house back! We are officially at a countdown, folks. Carpet goes in today, stairs go in this week, as well as touch-up paint, and then it’s just cleaning up and moving back in! I can’t wait to be posting pictures of a finished, furnished basement! If you’d like to help us move furniture or play with my kiddos while we move it, or eat pizza and drink beer while it happens, give me a shout!

That’s my life in a little, teeny nutshell, y’all. Thanks for joining me! Now let’s hear what you’ve been doing!

home, mommyhood, random thoughts

Currently and Bumpdate!

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Happy Monday! I’m linking up again this week with Becky at Choose Happy and several other fantastic bloggers, to share a little bit about my life currently.

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Enjoying || the gorgeous weather! I spent all afternoon outside yesterday, and we’ve had the windows open and gone on several evening walks the past week or so. What a breath of fresh air it is after a dreary winter! Spring fever has hit me big time!

Reading || Green Mansions by William Henry Hudson. I’m really struggling through it… it’s not difficult to read, or particularly bad, but it’s slow-going. I feel like there are WAY too many details he’s trying to cram in. I dunno – just not my thing. It’s for my reading challenge’s category of “author with the same initials”, so I suppose I’m going to finish it, but I might start something else to keep my mind excited while I go through the second half.

Watching || SNL. We watched the 40th anniversary episode, but otherwise we were way behind. We have had a LOT of laundry to put away today (because we can do it here at our house again! Yay!) so we’ve been watching while doing laundry. I’d say I’m okay with it.

Excited about || All of the fun events we’ve got going on this spring! Egg hunts, EK’s birthday, and just plain being outside! We have a great deck and do almost everything out there. The kids love sidewalk chalk, too, so they like doing that anywhere we are.

Counting down || Not really counting down till my due date, but since I’m officially over halfway there, I figure that it’s close enough to pretend that I am! I’ll be honest – most of the time I’m too busy with the kiddos and the renovations and life in general to even remember how far along I am half the time. But as soon as the basement is finished up, we will move EK and J to their downstairs rooms, and I’ll transition the nursery away from J’s room to be a little home for a new guy until he’s sleeping well enough (aka through the night) to move him downstairs.

It’s always great to read what everyone’s up to… so link up with us at Becky’s blog and let us know what’s going on currently with you!