drink it in

18 Months of Rory

2012-02-11T08:26:00.000-05:00

We love our little light-giver.

It's hard to keep track of what Rory is learning and doing with each month. She mimics every word we say and loves to spin until she's dizzy and falls over. She's very shy around anyone other than her mommy and daddy. When she's with us, she's a total ham and loves to make us laugh.

And as always, she loves giving kisses.

gif creator at gickr.com

* Thanks to her Ninang Kylene for the little sister onesie!*

Rambly thoughts of an adoptive dad

2012-02-09T16:08:00.000-05:00

I love this picture of one of our girls. And not because it shows a poor orphan with no diaper on, eating with her hands, alone on the floor... I love it because it shows the beautiful little girl who (along with her twin sister) is going to be my daughter. Over the last couple of months, Sarah and I have had the blessing of seeing pictures of the twins throughout their life in the children's home. Some pictures, like this one, give a glimpse into just how different life is for them there. Other pictures show them laughing, playing on a playground, swinging, see-sawing, and crying after a fight over a ball - a pair of normal, rambunctious almost-4-year-olds.

This morning I sat in a rocking chair on our front porch, closed my eyes and prayed for my girls - all 3 of them. I pictured myself in my meeting place with Jesus - a quiet ocean beach where I talk with my Savior and Lord. I stood on the sand facing the waves with the girls, confessing to Jesus that I didn't yet feel up to the challenge of raising these girls to be women. He reassured me that he would give me the grace to get through each day, and that as I was faithful in raising them as their earthly father, they would better understand the role of God as their heavenly Father. I need that kind of a reminder every now and then.

You know the funny things that I think about? I try to mentally fit three car seats into the back of my Matrix. I wonder if I'll get to play ultimate frisbee or go rock climbing with any of my girls. I disappointedly realize that Friday morning coffee cupping field trips are a no-go when Sarah goes back to work (do they make a triple Ergo carrier??).

Though at this point I'm not seriously worrying about things. I know we'll have our fair share of challenges pretty soon, but we've chosen to trust the Lord in it. I could pull my hair out running scenario after scenario through my brain about what will happen with regard to attachment/bonding/connection issues, health problems, possible racism, supporting our family on one income, etc. But like I said, I believe God's gonna give us the grace to get through whatever comes our way. In that promise I live freely.

I wrote this in my journal, exactly 2 and 1/2 years ago: "It's a liberating feeling, putting yet another area of our lives fully into the Lord's hands." At the time I was writing about us not using birth control and fully opening up the possibility to have our first child. Here we are in another situation where the same conclusion applies: Trust God, and he'll work it all out.

So, I'm ready. Right now it's like the roller coaster is click-clicking its way up the big hill and we're anticipating what craziness lies over that initial hump. It'll be a ride. Ups and downs. Highs and Lows. Unpredictable. WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

Adoption Shop is Open for Business

2012-01-28T12:19:00.000-05:00

Check out everything we have for sale in our Facebook album here. We've got some great homemade items and ALL proceeds go toward bringing our twins home to us next month.

Thanks for your support!

Adoption T-Shirts

2012-01-19T19:59:00.001-05:00

We're selling these awesome t-shirts to raise money to bring home our twin girls from Africa!

The shirt (designed by Jonathan) is based off of the traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony. The three cups represent the three rounds of coffee that are served to guests. Participants in the ceremony usually converse and share about important life issues. The first two rounds are called "abol" (meaning "first") and "tona" (meaning "second"). It is impolite to leave before the completion of the third round. That final round is called "baraka" (meaning "blessing") and is considered to bestow a blessing on the participants. "Baraka" is what is written in Ethiopian Amharic under the third cup on the t-shirt.

By helping to support our adoption, you are being a blessing to us and to our twin girls. Thank you so much for your support and encouragement!

The design has been printed on unisex American Apparel t-shirts. The brown shirt is 100% Fine Jersey cotton, and the galaxy blue shirt is 100% Organic Fine Jersey cotton (super-soft!).

Both designs are available in S, M, and L.

How to order:

Click on the yellow "Donate" button to the right of the blog to link to PayPal, and follow directions to donate money.
In the "Note" field, indicate how many shirts you would like of each color.
Include $20 per shirt ordered. For orders that need to be mailed (I can hand-deliver to Atlanta area), please include $5 per mailing address.

17 Months of Rory

2012-01-14T10:12:00.000-05:00

It really just keeps getting better and better doesn't it?

In the last month, Rory has made the transition of exactly 11 hours of sleep a night to 12 or 13. The only bummer about that is I don't always get to see her before I leave for work in the morning. She's still taking two 1-2 hour naps a day as well.
Her language has really exploded. She mimics every word we say. She regularly requests "gaga" since we offer her agua. She also requests "kah-wee" (coffee) since she sees mom and dad drink it every day. She occasionally counts to three, but usually just crosses her fingers (like in the above picture). She also learned the word "no" around Christmas time and used it freely with her very affectionate and loving cousin.
She's definitely a little lady. She loves putting on jewelry and headbands and then grinning at and giving herself kisses in the mirror. She also loves her pink cowgirl boots almost as much as I do.
She loves doing anything we do: cleaning up, getting dressed, laundry (check out the video below), roasting coffee, playing with tools, baking, etc. She's definitely daddy's little helper.
She loves playing jokes on mommy and daddy too. In the mornings, she'll cry out when she wakes up. When we walk into her room, she's usually standing at our crib, but the moment she sees us, she throws herself down onto the mattress and pretends she's sleeping. Then she opens her eyes and giggles. She also thinks burping and tooting are hysterical. She tries to fake burps so she can laugh about them.

Homemade Yogurt Using a Crockpot - Tutorial

2012-01-05T11:36:00.003-05:00

We've been feeding Rory organic store-bought yogurt for as long as she's been eating solid food. It costs about $4 a quart, and we go through about a quart a week. So when Sarah's sister-in-law introduced us to homemade yogurt over Christmas, I had to try it out in the "More With Less" spirit. I asked for a personal lesson and later supplemented it with some quick internet research, and made my first batch last week. Doing it this way saves us about $2 a quart! Here's how you can make yogurt at home too:

Required Supplies:

1/2 gallon of milk
1/2 cup starter yogurt
crockpot
thermometer
container(s) to store finished yogurt

I started with organic whole milk from the local grocery store. From other people's stories, as long as the milk isn't ultra-pasteurized you should be good to go for making yogurt. The higher temperatures of ultra-pasteurization do something to the milk that isn't good prep for bacteria reproduction. Homogenized, pasteurized, non-organic, and 2% milk are all fine.

The starter yogurt needs to have live bacteria in it for you to be able to make more yogurt from it. I used Stonyfield organic yogurt, but you can use any brand as long as it has "live" and/or "active" somewhere on the label, telling you those good bacteria can wake back up and reproduce. This particular one says "six live active cultures". Some people say you can't use flavored yogurt as starter, but I did and it worked... maybe because this one is "naturally" flavored? Whatever you use, it will all end up as a plain yogurt batch.

1. Pour half a gallon of milk into a clean crockpot. You can measure exactly if you want to, but I just eyeballed it.

2. Cover the crockpot and turn it on high. You want the milk to warm up to 180 degrees first, prepping it for bacteria reproduction. My crockpot has a nifty temperature probe, so all I had to do was set the desired temp. A regular kitchen thermometer (for meat or milk or whatever) works just fine too. Depending on your crockpot, it could take half an hour longer to warm up to 180.

3. When the milk is at the right temperature, turn off the crockpot and let the milk cool back down to 120 degrees. The yogurt bacteria will grow when the temperature is between 110 and 120. Too hot and the bacteria will die. Too cool and they'll go into hibernation.

4. When the milk reaches 120 degrees, take about a cup of the warm milk out, mix in the 1/2 cup of yogurt, and add back to the crockpot. Stir it together. Put the crockpot lid back on and cover it all with a towel for insulation.

5. Now wait. The bacteria just need time to grow and turn that milk into creamy yogurt. If your crockpot loses heat easily (or if you're just paranoid), you can check it every hour or so and turn the warmer back on for a few minutes to get it back into the 110-120 range. Just set a timer or something so you don't forget to turn it back off - you don't want to nuke the bacteria!

6. After as few as maybe 3 hours, you'll hopefully see that the milk is turning into yogurt. Water in the batch is perfectly normal. A lot of people just start the yogurt process before they go to bed, and wake up to put away the finished yogurt in the morning. It seems like the average wait is 6-8 hours, so that's what I shoot for too. Logically, the bacteria stop reproducing when the temperature falls out of the ideal range, so it may not matter much as the hours extend. Maybe there's a scientific reason for longer waits... go Google it if you feel the need.

7. When it's all done, just stir the yogurt and transfer it to your desired container. I use two glass quart jars, which is just perfect for the 1/2 gallon of yogurt.

8. Let the yogurt chill for however long (it usually takes me a day to get through previously-made yogurt anyway) and then enjoy! I love it with some chopped fruit and a bit of honey. Don't forget that you have to save 1/2 cup of your yogurt to make the next batch!

Organizing Fabric

2012-01-03T16:49:00.002-05:00

Yes, you're reading the post byline correctly: The husband is writing a crafty blog entry. This will be the first of several (or many) of my DIY posts, written as I journey through this season of life as a stay-at-home dad.

Because of her various sewing projects, Sarah's always had a bunch of random fabric lying around in boxes and shelves. The disorganization made it hard for her to find a specific color or pattern when she would start new projects. We're in the middle of setting up her craft room in our neato finished attic loft area, so it was an opportune time to organize that pile of fabric.

First we looked at other bloggers' fabric organization systems in order to get ideas. A lot of people seem to use "The Fabric Organizer". Very functional and neat looking, but at almost $2 a board, we had to find a cheaper alternative. the little green bean used foam core board, which ends up looking the same at a fraction of the price. At the cheapest online price, each of those boards costs about $0.44 to make. However, we thought the foam core board might get bent pretty easily and eventually need replacing.

Our solution: Hardboard. We wandered the lumber aisles at Home Depot and stumbled on something that looked perfect for our project.

We used 1/8 in thick hardboard, 4 x 8 ft. The guys at the nearby cuttings station were able to cut it down to pieces 1 sq. ft. each (they weren't able to do any smaller than that). When I did a return trip to get more made, I found out they usually charge for cutting stuff for you. But the second guy did it for free also! Each hardboard sheet yielded 32 squares, so it ended up costing just $0.25 a board! And it's a material that seems like it'll last a long time.

At home, we folded and wrapped all the loose fabric around the boards. For lesser amounts, we did two pieces of fabric per board. After a little bit of color organizing, we loaded up a set of spare bookshelves and ended up with this:

Stay tuned for more posts of Sarah's craft room!

Happy New Year

2012-01-02T12:40:00.000-05:00

Sorry I never got around to posting pictures of our Christmas decorations. The house is a work in progress and we'll be giving room tours as the rooms become ready. In the meantime, we'll be busy filling up an empty bedroom for our two little girls who we hope to meet and bring home by Easter.

We are so very thankful.

16 Months of Rory

2011-12-09T22:09:00.000-05:00

Rory is 16 months today. Really, when does it stop getting more and more fun? Every month is better than the last!

Last month's Rory-isms were short, so here's a more detailed update:

Rory still loves blowing kisses, giving high fives and fist bumps.
She's still afraid of pretty much anyone who might try to pick her up.
She loves singing songs and reading books with animals so she can make the noises too. She mimics a dog, cat, duck, cow, bear, dinosaur, and a train (not an animal, I know).
She's learning more and more body parts.
Today while I was playing with her, she randomly laid on her tummy and started doing pushups. Apparently her dad does push ups with her pretty often.
Speaking of her dad, he's definitely her favorite. She will choose him over me 9/10 times. I get it though. He's her primary caregiver and has been doing even more since I broke my arm.
She's started mimicking me when I tell her no. Not my favorite thing...
She still eats like a maniac. It's exhausting trying to come up with enough food to give her.
The stairs in our new house are new for her as well. She loves crawling up them but learned the hard way that she needs help going down them. Yep, she barrel rolled down the entire flight. I'm happy to say that I wasn't home when that happened. She recovered within minutes and doesn't even have a bruise to show for it. I guess all of that chunk is good for something!
She is officially weaned from the bottle and milk altogether since she won't drink it. (Don't worry mom. She gets plenty of calcium from all of the other dairy we feed her.) I can't tell you how happy I was to get rid of that bottle cleaner!

We Are Grafted In

2011-12-05T12:28:00.002-05:00

Hey, I have a guest post up today on my favorite adoption blog, We Are Grafted In. Check it out at: http://www.wearegraftedin.com/3821/the-nitty-gritty-of-adoption/

Coming Home

2011-12-02T19:53:00.006-05:00

In my previous post, I briefly mentioned that we're trying to fundraise some of the estimated $30,000 of adoption expenses it will take to bring our twin girls home. 30k is a lot of money, we get it. But it covers a lot of things. Physicals, FBI background checks, agency fees, home study, plane tickets, visas and notary fees... just to name a few.

We are asking for help from our friends and family because we know that we cannot do this on our own. That doesn't mean simply the finances, but everything else that comes with growing our family and raising girls. It truly "takes a village", and we are so very thankful for the tremendous support that we know many of you will be our entire lives. We also know that as we serve in unity every step of the way - from helping to pay for adoption, to babysitting, to being a role model for our kids - God will be glorified all the more.

We're trying to come up with creative ways to help raise funds. Any suggestions are welcome! For now, we've got some really great offers for people who are interested in helping bring the twins home from Africa.

For ANY donation, you will receive a small thank-you gift as a reminder to pray for our family and the estimated 147 million orphans around the world.

Please check out our facebook page here for the great things you can buy. 100% of the proceeds go toward our adoption.

How can you donate? Look for the yellow "Donate" button on the right sidebar. Click that and it will take you to PayPal to facilitate the rest. Once we receive notice of your contribution, we'll email you about your thank-you gift! And if it's important to you to get a receipt for tax deduction purposes, make checks payable to "Bringing Them Home"(please do not write our names anywhere on the check), enclose a separate note that says "For Jonathan and Sarah Pascual", and send the check and note to:

Bringing Them Home
PO Box 19212
Denver, CO 80219

Thank you so much for your support! And keep checking in because we'll continue to add new fundraising opportunities.

Thankful

2011-11-24T10:00:00.001-05:00

We like to call this room in our new house "The Safari Room" for
obvious reasons, compliments of the previous homeowners.
Right now it is completely and totally empty because we
don't have enough furniture to fill up our entire house. That
should be changing within the next few months.

We specifically waited until Thanksgiving to share this post, because no other word could better describe the news we are about to share.

Since my last post about waiting for adoption, in typical Pascual style, things have changed. A few days after we had accepted the fact that it may be years before we bring our child home, we found out about a situation that required quick action. There was an urgent need and no one stepped up to fill it. So we took a week and a half to pray. In that time, a lot of things happened: we bought a house, moved into a house, Jonathan went to Guatemala, and I broke my arm and had surgery. But the biggest thing that happened is that we found our children. That's right, children. Jonathan and I are pursuing and waiting on a referral for a set of sweet, adorable, precious three-and-a-half-year-old twin girls. Yep, read it again: We're adopting twins!!!!!

We can't give a lot of information at this time, but we can say that we are are hoping to bring the girls home in the spring. However, we also realize that there are many factors out of our control and that adoptions rarely go as planned. Unplanned and unpredictable situations seem to go well for us, so we're not worried. We're excited!

Seeing as how this is moving more quickly than we thought, we've been thrown into full-on "nesting" mode. Adoption nesting is somewhat different from pregnancy nesting, in that for us to get ready, the main thing we can do is pray persistently and faithfully for our girls. No amount of healthy eating or extra ultrasounds can help us on this journey, but Christ alone will be their caregiver. Will you join us in prayer for them?

The other part of nesting is the tangible physical preparation. And for us, that means diving head-first into the fundraising portion of our adventure to bring our girls home. I'll do another post on the details of our fundraising, but until then check out the yellow button to the right that says "Donate". That will be the primary way we will be collecting the almost $30,000 we need to bring not one, but two children home to their forever family.

Thanks for sharing this journey with us. We are excited and not-so-patiently awaiting the day we get to see our girls face to face. We love them and are devoted to them in the same ways expecting parents are devoted to their unborn children. We realize this may be the hardest thing we will ever do, but the greatest challenges often produce the sweetest results. It will be worth it. Until the day when our family is all together, our hearts will be torn between two continents, but there is a new song being written and a new family being knit together even as I write this. I couldn't imagine anything sweeter.

We are so very thankful.

15 Months of Rory

2011-11-19T09:48:00.000-05:00

Rory continues to delight us with her smiles, giggles, and playful spirit.

Rory's favorite activities continue to be reading books, singing, eating, and playing outside. She mimics every single thing we do from brushing teeth to cleaning up to resting our chin on our hand. She loves to play jokes and call her mommy "Rory" and vice versa. We just adore our little light-giver!

Update

2011-11-05T09:14:00.000-04:00

Here's a blogland update. My posts have been sparse and will probably continue to be so.

1. I started a new job in mid-October. I am still working for Goodwill of North GA fulfilling their mission of putting people to work. I was honored and blessed to receive a big promotion and am now a Regional Manager (aka. the Michael Scott of Goodwill). I oversee two employment programs in two different locations. I manage the staff that works with them, trains them, puts them to work, and supports them on the job. There are definitely some new challenges, but so far, I love the job!

2. We're, God-willing, closing on a house next week! I know I said all this blah, blah, blah stuff about not buying a house. What it comes down to for us is that our mortgage for our 4br house will be significantly less/month than our rent for a 2br apartment. Plus, we're moving much closer to the international and refugee community and we're really excited to get involved there! The location is perfect for my new job as well.

I know, isn't it full of great character? The whole neighborhood is like this!

3. Our adoption has us in a LONG season of waiting. We were originally told that it would take 6-9 months for a child to be assigned to us. It's been 6 months, an it may be another year and a half (or more) before we have our child in our arms. We know that adoption is a roller coaster. We've been asked if we'll just switch countries or have another biological child instead, but it just doesn't work that way. Adoption is not our back up plan. Our child waiting for us cannot just be replaced by a biological child. Nor are we willing to abandon a child or country because it's not going as planned or on our timeline. There may come a time when the country we are adopting from shuts its doors completely, and if that is the case, we will consider other options. But for now, we will continue to pray for our child and ache for him or her on a daily basis. God is good and we trust Him.

Source: etsy.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T15:11:00.000-04:00

Little Red Riding Hood cape made out of a thrifted skirt and lined with a thrifted fleece blanket. You can't beat a $2 homemade Halloween Costume!

Things I Love

2011-10-16T05:03:00.000-04:00

If you're not on Pinterest and you need another time-sucking habit, you should join.

Here are some of my wardrobe inspirations found from there.

I love the sweetheart neckline and vintage fabric.

Source: confessionsofacallcentergal.blogspot.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Pink and red together.

Source: harpersbazaar.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Pastels.

Source: causeweareyoung.tumblr.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Short, structured skirts.

Source: zara.com via Sarah on Pinterest

A-line dresses. And Shabby Apple in general.

Source: shabbyapple.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Hearts.

Source: shop-summerland.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Easy to sew.

Source: bleubirdvintage.typepad.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Neck tie.

Source: thesimplyluxuriouslife.com via Sarah on Pinterest

Winter coat with a bow.

Source: ebay.com via Sarah on Pinterest

14 Months of Rory

2011-10-10T07:45:00.001-04:00

Rory is 14 months!!!

The highlights of this past month were:

Walking full time...unless she wants to go backwards. Then, she does a "moonwalk crawl" where she crawls forward with her knees and pushes herself back with her hands. It's ridiculous.
She can now say 3 1/2 words: more, uh-oh, Rory, and occasionally she says I love you.
She can sign for: more (3rd picture down on the right) and ask for water
She can point out her head, nose, ears, and mouth
She takes 2 or 3 walks per day with her daddy. During the walks, she picks up every acorn she sees and hands each individual one to her dad.
We read her something like 14 books a day. She loves reading--just like her Grandpa and Grandma. Her favorite books are Counting Cows and God Made Animals. She always chuckles when we make the "meow" noise for the cat.
She loves brushing her teeth every morning with mommy. She brushes them by herself at first, and then lets mommy finish for her.
She is soooooo easy. She still takes 2 naps a day and sleeps 10-11 hours at night. She only cries if she gets hurt, is hungry, or tired.

Here are a few of our favorite stories from this month:

When Rory wakes up, she throws all of her pacifiers out of her crib and then says, "Uh-oh" until we come and get her.

We were out to dinner a couple of weeks ago and Rory was in Jonathan's lap and I was next to them in a booth. She kept trying to dip her straw into Jonathan's beer, so we gave her a glass of water instead. Then, before we knew it, she had grabbed the full glass of ice water and poured it all over herself and Jonathan. They were both drenched in ice water and, according to the people across from us, made the exact same face of horror and shock at the same time. Fortunately, we keep extra clothing with us so we could change her and finish our dinner... Jonathan, on the other hand, just had to deal with looking like he peed in his pants.

This past weekend, we had friends staying with us, so Rory was sleeping in the playpen in our room. At about 2am, when she woke up and saw us, she didn't want to go back to sleep, so we brought her into bed with us thinking she'd sleep that way. Well, she got the giggles instead and started jumping up and down on the bed until she fell over, and then she'd squeal and giggle. She did this over and over again, and even though it was the middle of the night, we couldn't help but delight in her sweet spirit.

More Outfits

2011-09-24T09:34:00.000-04:00

Here are some baby outfits I've made in the last...I don't know...year and a half.

I obviously didn't take this picture. It's so awesome because Blume Photography took it. Poke around their website, and you'll probably see some pictures you recognize! Since they're full time photographers, I figured the camera assistant onesie outfit would be perfect. The camera was attached through my new favorite method: Heat 'n Bond. I also attached the skirt.

I think the rest were for little Asher Fitz. The frog with the crown is meant to go with a pair of froggy pants I made him...that I didn't take a picture of. Jonathan made a couple of them too. Can you guess which ones?

Vacation

2011-09-18T10:06:00.000-04:00

Though it may not have been the best idea for anyone else, Jonathan and I decided to take a break from using all of our vacation visiting others, so we packed up and headed to the beach for a week. We rented a house on Mexico Beach, which is in the Florida Panhandle. We had a blast with Jonathan's sister's family for the first few days as well!

Here are some of the highlights. (This is a very picture-heavy post!)

Rory loved the beach!

As you can tell, it was very stormy for our first couple of days. One day, we saw some of the fury of Tropical Storm Lee. It blew the awning off of this house and took out our power for a few hours. It also made for some 6-8 foot swells for some great body surfing though.

Once it cleared up, we enjoyed some great sand and sun on the beach.

If you look closely in the background, you can see a dolphin jumping out of the water!

I think we're going to have to make a tradition of beachy family vacations!

Summer Romper

2011-09-15T07:34:00.000-04:00

So, it's not that I haven't been sewing lots of things. It's just that I haven't made the time to put them into blog form. We love saving money on internet. However, anything involving uploading pictures or other things to the internet takes FOREVER, so its hard to get motivated.

Anyway, I made this romper last June. It's one of my favorite projects because I actually drafted the pattern myself. No tutorials or pattern pieces. Just me and lots of measuring.

The back top panel is all smocked so she can grow into it. The back of the straps snap on so they can be adjusted as well.

The front is gathered to give the fabric some texture.

The bottoms were supposed to look a bit more like shorts than they did, but I don't think I quite gathered them in the right places. There's also a snap closure on the bottom for all of those diaper changes!

I definitely enjoyed drafting my own pattern and I'm looking forward to doing more of it in the future!

13 Months of Rory

2011-09-11T11:32:00.000-04:00

Rory highlights:

Walking: She can walk across a room by herself with no problem, but still prefers to crawl.
Signing: She uses sign language to tell us she wants more and that she wants water.
First words: Her first word was "more". She says this when she's hungry for more food...which is about every 20 minutes. For the past week, I keep having flashbacks to nursing her every hour as a newborn, except this time it's food.
Reading: Rory loves being read to. She brings books to us to read all day long. Before bed, we give her a few options, and she always picks out the one or two she wants read to her. Her favorite books these days are Barnyard Dance, Peek-a-Boo I Love You, and Pat the Bunny.
We're trying to teach her the words mommy and daddy. She always mimics our pointing though, so anytime we ask her, "Who's mommy?" or "Who's daddy?", she points to herself and gives us a huge grin. I think she knows she's playing a joke on us.
She loves riding "el caballo". Jonathan takes her for horse rides a lot. She grins and squeals with delight the whole time.
Rory enjoys giving kisses (whenever we tell her "Beso!"), high fives, and waving.
Going for walks in the Ergo or her stroller.
Dancing and listening to mommy sing "This Little Light of Mine."
She thinks it's hysterical whenever she bonks her head...which happens a lot.
In 13 months, Rory has been to 10 states: Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Tennessee, Missouri, Kentucky, Illinois, Iowa, Colorado, and California

Party Invites

2011-08-17T10:55:00.000-04:00

I'm still new into the paper/design craft world, but here are some recent party invites I've designed.

The first was a going away party/baby shower for some friends who moved from Atlanta to Michigan.

The second was for Rory's dedication. (We did a non-traditional gathering at our house.)

And the third was for a friend's baby shower.

My personal favorite is Rory's, but that's because I designed it according to my likes rather than what I thought the guests of honor would enjoy. I should also say that the last two invites weren't entirely original. I took some ideas from other things I'd seen and "made them my own."

1 Year of Rory!!!!

2011-08-13T16:22:00.000-04:00

Time really does fly when you're helping a kid grow up. It's been a blast and we've been soooo blessed with a very easy kid. None of the promises of sleepless nights and total exhaustion came true.

Here are the recent Rory-isms:

She regularly takes one step, but then sits down and crawls
She can sign "more" and calls everything "dada"
She usually goes down for naps and sleeping without even crying
She loves being read to
She uses her pacifier as a manipulation tool: throwing it out of her crib and then crying for mom and dad when she wakes up from a nap, throwing it at dad if he's asleep and she wants him to wake up, and throwing it over the gate into the kitchen so we let her in.
She definitely has some stranger anxiety. It takes 15-20 minutes for her to warm up to a new environment and even then, she doesn't like people other than her parents to hold her. She's happiest at home with mommy and daddy.

And finally, we made ourselves a little slideshow chronicling the past 12 months of joy she's given us. Have a look!

Thanks for the best year yet, sweet girl!

Life as a Working Mom

2011-08-07T21:30:00.000-04:00

Our little princess and light-giver turns one on Tuesday. It doesn't feel like that big of a deal, but I guess it kind of is a big deal. The year has definitely flown by.

Seeing as how Rory is only temporarily in daddy daycare and we have another one on the way, I've been giving a lot of thought to being a mom who works away from home. I often ask myself questions like these: Should I really be working? What is best for Rory? What is best for us as a family? Can I handle getting kicked out of another church nursery because my daycared baby has another runny nose? Is staying at home the only way to raise a healthy and well-adjusted child? Will Rory need years and years of counseling and be totally neglected if I don't stay at home with her? Am I losing any kind of deep bond with her through not being with her 24/7? Does God say that all moms should stay at home with their kids? Am I a terrible parent by making the choice to work?

It's probably just pressure I put on myself, but I sure do feel like there's a lot of pressure on women who follow Christ to stay home with their kids. Friends I deeply respect strongly encourage it, and honestly, I don't have any friends who are working by choice.

And yet, I'm just going to say it: I believe that I am where I'm supposed to be. I believe that I would actually be acting out of disobedience at this point in my life if I were to quit my job and be a stay-at-home mom. So, if anyone who reads this is a working mom struggling with feelings of guilt, pressure, or inadequacy for working, I have a few thoughts to share.

It's okay to work by choice. You're probably tired of hearing this, but I love my job. I fully and completely believe in what I do. I have such a great honor of getting to help a demographic of people that is often ignored, neglected, and avoided. And I love the people I work with. I believe I'm there for a reason. Now, I know this statement is going to make some people mad, and I don't mean for it to, but it needs to be said. I believe (at this point in my life), if 60 years from now I were to look back on my life and I was just a stay-at-home mom, I wouldn't have fulfilled God's purpose or destiny for me. I am called to be a wife and a mother, but that is not my only calling. That may change, and I'm open to that changing. It could change tomorrow, or it may be required when #2 comes depending on his/her personal needs. At this point I, with a full love for my husband, daughter, and the Lord most of all, have made the choice to work.
Daycare is NOT the end of the world. After I had Rory, I wasn't sure if I would even want to go back to work or not. Things would have been tight had I elected to stay home, but we would have made it work without a big problem. But, I knew after week 3 or 4 staying home with Rory that I was going to go back to work. At that time, I didn't qualify for FMLA with my company, so I went back to work when Rory was 7 weeks. Dropping her off at daycare wasn't the hard part. Picking her up was what made me cry the first few days. It was so hard to deal with the fact that her life went on when I wasn't there: diapers were changed, bottles were given, milestones were reached. It was painful. On the other hand, Rory learned how to operate outside of the home and she had 4 great women and lots of sweet kids loving on her every day. Whenever I would drop her off at daycare, she would grin and squeal because she was with her friends and with people who love her. Sure, it's not as ideal as being one-on-one with mom or dad, but it's not going to produce a sociopath. I promise.
Your child will still know you love him/her. If I am supposed to be at my job and I believe that God has called me there, I must also believe in Him to meet my child's needs. God will care for Rory and allow her to operate in the fullness of His love and her parents' love even if she is not with one of us 24/7. Kids are intuitive. If their mother is with them 24/7 but isn't giving them quality time and life, they know it. If their mom has just a few hours with them daily, and is loving them fully, they know it. That's how they work. Rory knows I love her.
There are other women just like you out there. I'm not exactly sure who they are, but I'm one of them at least!
Set priorities and boundaries in your personal life. This is the biggest thing I've been learning recently. There are two things I know that I'm specifically called to: my family and my job. When family is a full time job, and my job is 40 hours a week, that means something's got to give. It means I have to view my job as the ministry I'm investing in. So, my non-working hours are going to look different these days. I will make family a priority. We're still open to being with people, but Rory will join us. This isn't a season where I can have much alone time with friends. We love to be with people, and they're welcome to join us during non-working hours at our house as a family doing family things. This ensures that Rory receives quality attention and time from me daily.
Celebrate the diversity and beauty of different motherhood callings. The calling and direction and passion to be a stay-at-home mom is a beautiful thing and I totally celebrate it! It's a ton of work and in no way less of an important role than other roles. I don't want anyone to feel like I'm devaluing the position of a mom staying home with her kids through my choice to work.
Nothing is written in stone. Today, I do what I'm supposed to do today. Tomorrow, I'm going to do what I'm supposed to do tomorrow. Just because I'm supposed to work today doesn't mean I'm supposed to work for the rest of my life. I completely reserve the right to change my lifestyle as I'm led without regret or shame. Everyone should have that freedom.

So, here I am. I am embracing and owning my life as a Christ-following, loving mother and wife, and Senior Case Manager. It's right and it's good.

Thoughts??? Comments???

Cake

2011-07-16T08:23:00.000-04:00

Last month, we had a non-traditional dedication for Rory and about 40 people came to our tiny little apartment to celebrate and pray for her. It was pretty great.

I ended up needing to make a cake for the event at the last minute due to some complications with my previous dessert plans. I had 1 box of yellow cake mix, 1 box of red velvet, peaches, strawberries, and cream cheese. And here's what I ended up with!

A four layer cake with cream cheese frosting and peaches and strawberries in the middle. I based the idea loosely off of something I saw here, but used cream cheese frosting instead. I also preferred the edges to remain unfrosted.

So, I know the pictures are not the best, but the cake was super, super good. It was a little bit risky because I didn't frost the cake or add the fruit until about 10 minutes before the gathering started. It turned out well though!

11 Months of Rory

2011-07-09T10:30:00.000-04:00

Wow, one month from today, our baby girl will be 1 year old!

Rory's hobbies:

blowing kisses
waving
clapping
eating anything she can put in her hand
talking, talking, talking, talking
playing peek-a-boo
squealing and giggling
going for rides in the stroller

She continues to be super good-natured and a very easy kid. We are so thankful for her!

Adoption FAQs

2011-06-27T14:52:00.001-04:00

Where are you adopting from?

Africa!!!! We're not publicly sharing the specific country, but I'd be happy to let (those of you that I know personally) know via email. Here are a few statistics about the country we're adopting from:

in a country the size of Oregon, there are between 2 and 4 million (yes, that's 6 zeros) orphans.

up to 13% of the population is orphaned

over 50% of the population is under the age of 15

over 45% of orphaned children are orphaned due to AIDS

What is the adoption process?
Every country has a different process and a different order of doing things. Here's how it works with our agency and the country we're adopting from:

Every adoption begins with a home study. A home study is basically where a social worker dissects every aspect of our lives to determine if we would be good adoptive parents. We've had to take 10 hours of adoption training, fill out a 20 page questionnaire on things like our marriage, our child-rearing philosophy, our childhoods, etc., have extensive background and financial checks, and a social worker visit our home.
The next step is to wait for a referral. A referral is when a child has been assigned to be adopted by us. Some people don't have to wait at all depending on the age and health status of the child/children they're looking to adopt.
After that, we'll send a dossier (hundreds of pages of documents) to the country set up a court date in country.
At court, we'll obtain legal guardianship of the child. Four to six weeks after that, well get the necessary papers to bring our child back to the states.
Then, after we return to the states with the child, we'll finalize our adoption in the US. We'll be required to follow up with the country and our home study agency for a couple of years after the adoption.

What is your adoption timeline?
We officially began the adoption process in April 2011. Our home study was completed in June 2011. Everything is an estimate and tentative, but we will probably be bringing a child home within the next 12-15 months. We're part of a pilot program, so they're still ironing out a few kinks in the process.

Why are you adopting?
There are lots of reasons why we've made the decision to adopt rather than have another biological child at this time. (Get ready...this answer may be somewhat controversial!) The main reason is because God tells us to take care of "the least of these". He also says that one part of pure and undefiled religion is to take care of orphans (and widows) in their distress. This means a few things to us:

There are literally millions of children without homes or families or parents or beds or proper nutrition or education in this world. They are waiting to be rescued and they are waiting to be given the chance to change their lives and change the world. We would like to provide a home, a family, and a life to at least one of those children.
We have been so blessed through Rory. We've also been extremely blessed to have a biological child, which lots of people struggle to do. We're not doing this because we have no choice but to adopt. We're doing this because we have the choice to provide a home and a life to a child that God dreamed up and has loved since before the child's conception. We get the great joy to share some of that love of God with this child in a tangible way.
Lots of Christians talk a lot about how terrible abortion is. They make political decisions based that one issue, they picket abortion clinics, and they put bumper stickers on their cars. Abortion is not an issue I've chosen to be outspoken about. However, I do believe that if Christians are going to be so outspoken against abortion, they need to take some action and start adopting children that are unwanted or unable to be cared for. This is not our main reason for adopting, but it is an important one.
Remember that time we were going to buy a house? Well, it ended up falling through. We were sort of bummed, but sort of relieved at the same time. A few weeks later we were talking about the money we had saved away for a down payment on the house. We had always struggled with the ethics behind saving a lot of money to put down on a house. It seemed very selfish to us when we thought about the impact those thousands of dollars could make in somebody's life. (This is not meant to offend the 90% of our friends who are homeowners. As always, we encourage everyone to act on their own convictions, not the convictions of others.) We'd always tossed the idea of adoption around, and had thought about it a bit more seriously when we were discussing the financial investment we were going to put into a house. Well, a couple of weeks after the house fell through, I texted Jonathan one day and basically said, "We'd never regret not buying a house and using our money for adoption. But, we would regret buying a house and not using it for adoption." The decision was basically made at that point.

Why international adoption?

We made the choice to adopt internationally rather than domestically for a couple of reasons.

Though the foster care/adoption system in the states is far from perfect, we know that most American children in it will receive an education, 3 daily meals, a bed to sleep in, etc. Orphans in many other countries won't receive that kind of care at all because of financial problems or cultural differences
Our family already represents different ethnic backgrounds. Why not invite another into it?

Are you using an agency or adopting independently?

We are using an agency. We're doing this for two main reasons:

The process of adopting is very time consuming and complicated. We don't have the skill nor the time to orchestrate an independent international adoption. We would have to find a lawyer, an orphanage to adopt from, and do all of our paperwork on our own.
Unfortunately, a lot of child trafficking is tied up in unethical adoption. Many countries have basically closed their international adoption programs because healthy children are being kidnapped from families and given to others as "orphans." There is a lot of money to be made in adoption and working with an unethical lawyer can lead to some really terrible things. The agency we're using values adopting ethically more than anything else and has put some great safety measures in place to ensure everything is happening ethically. I'm not saying every independent adoption is unethical by any means. I'm also not saying that every agency is ethical. It's just a precaution we took.

How old will your child be?
We are open to adopting a child ages 0-2 years old. It was strongly recommended we keep the kids in birth order. That may be the case, or it may not. Our adopted child and Rory will most like be very close in age. (Jonathan always wanted twins!)

What sex will your child be?
We don't know yet! We're open to a boy or a girl. Typically, there are more boys needing adoption in the country we're adopting from, so it's more likely we'll get a boy. Girls are easier to be adopted within the country. Also, their extended families seem to be more willing to adopt girls.

How much does adoption cost?
Altogether, adoption costs about $25,000. There are a lot of "little" expenses along the way that add up to that great big number. This includes things like our home study, paying the Federal Government to get permission to bring a child back to the states for adoption, our plane tickets and lodging for the 4-6 weeks we're in country, the lawyer fee, our background checks, our agency fees, sending our dossier to the other side of the world, etc. So, we've already paid a lot, and will continue to pay in pieces as the process continues.

Whoa! How are you going to pay for that?
Well, you already read that we're using the money we were going to put down on a house toward the adoption. We're also using the inheritance I received when my grandmother died in January. We will raise funds for the rest of the money. (More info on that coming soon!)

Where did you get the onesie you made the announcement with?
I made it of course! I just sewed some fabric (with zig-zag stitches so it can stretch) to the bottom of a onesie to make a skirt and I used the freezer paper method of writing the words on. Check out my tutorial here to do it on your own. Or, you can buy one from me and we'll put the money toward the adoption!

The REAL Big News

2011-06-22T14:46:00.000-04:00

No, we're not pregnant...but we are expecting.

But Mama, what does that mean? I'm confused.

It means that you're going to be a big or a little sister to a boy or girl we're going to adopt.

What????? You're adopting a baby and I get to be a big (or little) sister????

Hooray!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is even better than Cheerios!!!!!

This is so exciting! I'm gonna go and wait for him (or her) right now!!!!!!

Dear little (or big) brother (or sister), I can't wait to meet you. We're gonna have the best family ever.

More details coming soon....feel free to ask questions in the comments section that I'll do my best to answer in a later post.

10 Months of Rory

2011-06-13T20:09:00.000-04:00

Rory hit the double digits last week. And she's totally awesome. This month she:

moved into the 75th percentile for weight
jumped to the 90th percentile for length
started mimicking words and sounds
choked twice (scary, I know)
took a nosedive off the chair during the photo shoot (hence the picture on the top left)
lost and re-gained excellent sleeping habits
goes by the nicknames: Rory, Roryface, the face, stinker-face, sleepy-face...you get the idea, Rorski, Rors M'nors, Chunks (at daycare), and bunny

Parenting gets more and more fun with such a great kid. We're very blessed and thankful!

Baby Advice and Dresses

2011-06-09T07:45:00.000-04:00

I'm heading into work late today because we're making a second attempt at Rory's 9 (now 10) month checkup. I will NOT miss this one!!!!

Ever since we went to Chicago about a month ago, her sleeping schedule has gone a little wonky. We spoiled her into getting rocked to sleep every night so she's forgotten how to self soothe herself to sleep. This is only a problem at 5:30am when she wakes up and decides it's time to be awake since she can't get herself to fall back asleep. Jonathan and I are awake at that time, but we REALLY enjoy our Rory-free morning time. She was up from about 5:45 to 7am this morning, and then I just put her down again. Any advice on how to break her of this habit...without having her cry it out? (I'm all about the Babywise method, but not all about crying it out.)

While she's sleeping, I figured I'd post a quick blog of some itty bitty baby dresses I made months ago. I think these are my favorite things to make, because they come together in about 20 minutes and people are always impressed by them!

As usual, I made these with remnant or free fabric.

I can't decide which one I like better. I'm a sucker for polka-dots, but I love the green lining on the flowery one. Which do you prefer?

Summer Sunsuit

2011-06-05T14:12:00.000-04:00

When I ran across this colorful seersucker fabric in the 50% off remnants section, I knew exactly what I was going to do with it. Summer is finally here for me to show off Rory's ridiculously adorable chunky legs, and what better way to do it than through a sunsuit? I've had Made By Rae's Baby Sunsuit Tutorial on my "to make" list for quite awhile now and this was the perfect fabric for it.

It was much easier than I even thought it would be!

In the process, I learned how to smock fabric. (Smocking is where the fabric is gathered and stretchy.)

Smocking is sooooo easy too! I smocked both the top and the legs of the sunsuit.

The other thing I learned to do was installing snaps. This project had a bit of a bigger learning curve for me and I had to replace one of the snaps (hence the different colors).

The worst part was that the very first time I tried this on Rory, she scratched her foot on the broken snap and wailed and wailed. It never feels good to see your kid cry...especially if you caused it! Of course she got over it in a minute and was fine.

All I've gotta say, is I think she'll finish out the summer with a few more sunsuits. This cuteness needs to be continued.

Photo Shoot Outtakes:

Wardrobe Restyle

2011-05-28T10:47:00.001-04:00

I stumbled upon the most beautiful 90s era dress in a thrift store. I wasn't exactly sure how to make it work, but I couldn't live without it.

Here's the dress before I did anything to it.

Those tie pockets bring back some memories, don't they? The skirt went to about mid calf on me as well. Ewwww.

So, I did a bit of snipping, seam ripping, and hemming and about 25 minutes later ended up with a shorter, pocket-free dress. And I LOVE it!!!!

(I know, the picture above is totally weird.

I'm still learning how to do these types of photos.)

The first time I wore it out, this really cool girl with tattoos all over asked me where I got it because she wanted one too. That is the jackpot of awesomeness.

Fuego Clips

2011-05-27T11:14:00.001-04:00

Rory is a fuego (pacifier) girl. What can I say? We all sleep better when she's got one. I bought a pacifier clip at Target a few months back and (surprise, surprise) it's already broken. So instead, I adapted this tutorial from Made, and created a couple of my own out of ribbons and suspender clips.

When I was almost finished with the first one, I realized I didn't have any velcro, so I just sewed it. I know that's not good for cleaning, but I was impatient. For the second ribbon, I just used a snap.

High Chair

2011-05-25T19:02:00.001-04:00

Rory is a ~~chunky~~ healthy baby and we were almost to the point of having to grease up her thighs to get her out of the bumbo seat, so we finally decided to invest in a high chair.

I wanted a vintagey one, but wasn't able to find one I liked on Craigslist. A few days later, we went to our Tita (aunt) Ruthie's house, and I saw the exact kind of chair I was looking for. I (totally innocently, of course) asked her about it and she actually gave it to me to use while Rory's using a high chair. Awesome!

The only problem is that the straps to hold her in were non-existent. So, I got resourceful and cut the strap off this (free) bag I wasn't going to use and cut the clips off of a different part.

I spent about 10 minutes sewing it together, and here you have it.

A brand new, vintage, totally operational and relatively safe high chair.

Here we have a happy baby with okra and brown rice all over her face enjoying her chair. (Oh, and there is actually a tray too. It's just not there so you could see the straps.)

Rory at 9 months

2011-05-23T08:09:00.000-04:00

Rory missed her 9 month doctor's appointment due to a car seat debacle, so I have no idea what her stats are. Probably big since she's been in 12-18 month clothes for 2 months now.

This month was definitely full of firsts. She started crawling, started pulling herself up, and started growing 2 teeth. I think she got her dad's laid back personality, because she doesn't seem to even notice the teething pain. She's really a blast, but definitely a lot more work now that she's mobile.

She also got to experience her 3rd(!!!) round trip plane flight, her 8th state, and her second funeral. During the funeral, her great grandfather had Jonathan bring her up to the front to show her off. It's so sweet how babies can bring smiles and joy to any situation.

Here are her pictures from 1 week to 8 months.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 30 (finally!!!!)

2011-05-20T08:00:00.003-04:00

A Picture of Someone You Miss

Well, this list could go on and on and on and on. For now, here are some pictures of my two grandmothers--both whom have passed away this year. I'm thankful for the sweet memories I have of them.

And I'm thankful that this 30 days is finally over!!!!!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 29

2011-05-19T08:00:00.009-04:00

A Picture that Can Always Make You Smile

This was our dog, Ali. He was ridiculous and you can read some previous blog posts to figure out how ridiculous he was. He's now in the care of a good friend...and probably much better off. Jonathan definitely misses him more than I do.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 28

2011-05-18T08:00:00.005-04:00

A Picture of Something You're Afraid Of: Selling Out

30 Days of Pictures: Day 27

2011-05-17T08:00:00.007-04:00

A Picture of Yourself and A Family Member

30 Days of Pictures: Day 26

2011-05-16T08:00:00.000-04:00

A Picture of Something That Means a Lot To You

My wedding and engagement rings.

When Jonathan proposed, he did it with empty hands, which I was expecting since we had a conversation a few days before about how he had no money. (We both feel strongly against debt, and would rather not have something than go into debt over it.) He mentioned it to me again, and I reminded him that it didn’t matter to me (which it didn’t, but I did have to talk myself through it a bit, because what girl doesn’t want an engagement ring?). He sat down next to me and began telling the story of his grandmother’s engagement.

Fifty-nine years ago in the Philippines, Jonathan's maternal grandfather had just finished medical school and his grandmother was still in university. Jonathan's grandfather came to her and said something like, “I’ve loved you since the first day I met you and you don’t know how deep that goes. I want you to marry me, but I don’t have much money so all I have for you is this simple ring. But, I promise you that on our 20th wedding anniversary I will exchange it for a diamond you deserve.” They married of course, but one month after their 19th wedding anniversary, he passed away, so his grandmother never received the promised ring. She treasured her rings greatly.

Jonathan then brought up a conversation we had had a couple of weeks before when he had told me the greatest gift he’d ever received was his guitar, and he said, “Sarah, when I told you that, I lied to you. In reality, the best gift I have ever received was the engagement ring my grandfather gave to my grandmother. She gave it to me and now I’m giving it to you.” Then, he put it on my finger and it fit perfectly! I was speechless and overwhelmed and stunned. This ring was more spectacular than anything I could have ever imagined in my entire life! I’ve never been more honored with anything in my life!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 25

2011-05-15T10:29:00.000-04:00

A Picture of Your Day

Every day is different, so here are a few highlights from the day we spent in Chicago last week.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 23

2011-05-06T08:00:00.000-04:00

A Picture of Your Favorite Book

I'm not the biggest reader ever, but the book I read on a daily basis is the Bible.

It's defined my character and who I am more than any other book in the world. And, it's lots of fun to read because it really does come alive when I read it. I'm so thankful that I live in a place where I have unlimited access to the Bible and that I have the education to actually read it.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 22

2011-05-05T08:00:00.002-04:00

A picture of something you were better at: Cleaning

I can clean, and hate living in a messy house. It's just a matter of time management and priorities. I guess it's that way for everyone though. It's just that there are a few people I know (my mom included) who are really, really good at things being clean all the time. That would be awesome. In both Egypt and Thailand, we had a maid because it was the cultural norm. That was even more awesome.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 21

2011-05-04T08:00:00.002-04:00

A Picture of Something You Wish You Could Forget

Really??? I'm supposed to remember and have photographically documented something I want to forget?

Well, in desperation to come with something, I guess it would have to be this movie:

It still gives me nightmares. I'd watch most horror movies over this one. The worst part is that we had to watch it for a class in college. Now that I think about it, we also watched The Exorcist for one of my college classes. Awesome.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 20

2011-05-03T08:00:00.010-04:00

A Picture of Somewhere You Want to Travel

Ummm...that's pretty much everwhere. So instead, I'll do somewhere I don't want to travel.

Okay, yes, Mt. Everest is crazy beautiful. But...it's freezing, and bitter cold, and really really cold, and snowy, and wintry. Plus, you have to hike to the top and use oxygen and almost die in like 29 different ways. So, I'll just settle for pictures.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 19

2011-05-02T08:00:00.009-04:00

A Picture of You When You Were Little

How awesome is this? My awesome mom made matching dresses for my dolls and me. I'm SO doing this for Rory!

Hmmm...that haircut looks very similar to the one I have now. Speaking of little kid style, when I was at my favorite thrift store earlier this week I picked out this adorable dress and was totally excited to get it for $1, but was afraid it was too big for me since it was a size 14. When I went to try it on, it was super small. Then it hit me that it was a girls 14. It's kind of embarrassing that I want to wear the same clothes as little girls.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 18

2011-05-01T08:00:00.020-04:00

A Picture of Your Biggest Insecurity: My Big Mouth

No, not that my face often looks like claymation when I smile. It's that I say a lot of gutsy stuff. And I don't always say it as nicely as I'd like to. I'm also afraid my lifestyle isn't going to match the opinions I verbalize. It's tough, but I'm really trying.

Jonathan told me a few days ago that whenever I feel vulnerable or become insecure, I do the classic psychological thing and cross my arms in front of me. So, if you see me doing that, you can bet that whatever I'm doing is another insecurity of mine too.

But you know what? It's taken like 9 weeks, but I really do love my haircut.

And...I feel totally vain for posting pictures of me online like this. But I'm gonna do it anyway.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 17

2011-04-30T08:00:00.019-04:00

A Picture of Something that Has Impacted Your Life Recently

Wow, should I do another picture of Rory? I feel like I should be a bit more creative. So, I'm going to have to say my sewing machine.

It's set me free creatively and has really impacted my life in the past few years. I love sewing things and expressing myself though fabric and patterns and new ideas. Thanks, mom, for surprising me with it almost 10 years ago!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 16

2011-04-29T08:00:00.015-04:00

A Picture of Someone Who Inspires You

Wow, this list could go on and on and on and on just with friends I know. So, in order to be fair to all the amazing people in my life, I'll pick one of my favorite authors: Elisabeth Elliot.

This woman is AMAZING. She spent over a year with her toddler daughter living among the tribe of people that murdered her husband (and 3 other missionaries). She was widowed twice. And she's a no nonsense, committed, pure, passionate woman after God's heart. In most ways, I'm nothing like her. But I really wish I was.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 15

2011-04-28T08:00:00.001-04:00

A Picture of Something You Want to Do Before You Die

See one of these...in the wild!

A little background to this story: Some friends and I went to the Cairo Zoo with some Egyptian friends. I guess Egyptians aren't as big into animal ethics as Americans are so lots of what we saw was horrifying. When we saw the lions, some zoo keepers grabbed us and pulled us into this back room where a big lion was in a tiny cage and they kept poking it with sticks until it roared. It was pretty terrible.

Oh, and don't forget...

30 Days of Pictures: Day 14

2011-04-27T08:00:00.002-04:00

A Picture of Someone You Can't Imagine Life Without

He's pretty darn irresistible. I had no idea marriage would be so much fun!!!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 13

2011-04-26T08:00:00.003-04:00

A Picture of Your Favorite Band or Artist: Enter the Worship Circle

Apparently they don't have any pictures of themselves. I guess they're more of a Record Label than a band. But, they put out CD's that are amazing!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 12

2011-04-25T08:00:00.001-04:00

A Picture of Something You Love: The Ocean

Ensenada, Mexico.

Jaco, Costa Rica

Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica

Geiranger, Norway

Is it bad that I forgot where we took our Honeymoon? Mexico

Trinidad, West Indies

Can't remember where, Turkey

30 Days of Pictures: Day 11

2011-04-24T08:00:00.002-04:00

A Picture of Something You Hate

That more than 3 billion people don't even have the opportunity to hear about Jesus Christ.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 10

2011-04-23T08:00:00.006-04:00

A Picture of the Person You Do the Most With

I really do a lot with Jonathan, but I think I actually may spend more time with Rory these days. And plus, who doesn't want to see more adorable pictures of her?

Just for fun, let's add a couple more. :)

30 Days of Pictures: Day 9

2011-04-22T08:00:00.002-04:00

A Picture of the Person Who Has Gotten You Through the Most

I'm totally wild about Jesus. I can't imagine life without Him.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 8

2011-04-21T08:00:00.003-04:00

A Picture that Makes You Laugh

I have no idea what this means, but it was outside one of the malls near our house in Turkey. There were probably 4 or 5 that were all different colors and filled with different things. It may have been around Christmas, but I can't even remember when I took the picture!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 7

2011-04-20T08:00:00.003-04:00

A Picture of Your Most Treasured Item

They fill my heart with such joy and silliness!!!!

30 Days of Pictures: Day 6

2011-04-19T08:00:00.005-04:00

A Picture of a Person You'd Love to Trade Places with for A Day

Lourdes Garcia Navarro

I bet you don't even recognize her. I didn't before I created this post either. But, I listen to her voice daily. She's NPR's Middle Eastern correspondent. Her life must be so exciting! One day her camera men were being assaulted on the streets of Cairo and the next day she was sneaking out of a hotel in Tripoli, Libya. Epic.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 5

2011-04-18T08:00:00.002-04:00

A Picture of Your Favorite Memory

It's really a toss up between our wedding

And our trip to Norway.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 4

2011-04-17T08:00:00.018-04:00

A Picture of Your Night

Usually my nights consist of lots of dishes and cribbage, but here's a glimpse of a different kind of evening. On Friday night we got a crazy spring storm. There were buckets of hail, tornado sirens, and no power for about an hour and a half. The river area of our apartment community actually had uprooted trees and other trees that just snapped in half. There was debris everywhere!!!

This picture was our best attempt of capturing the hail.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 3

2011-04-16T08:00:00.000-04:00

A picture from the cast of your favorite show.

Who else could it be? They are so creative and lively. It makes me want to go to fashion school.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 2

2011-04-15T08:00:00.003-04:00

A picture of you and the person you've been closest with the longest.

This would have to be my mom of course. We've had our moments, but she's amazing and I adore her.

Good thing she's pretty because everyone says we look exactly alike.

30 Days of Pictures: Day 1

2011-04-14T08:00:00.002-04:00

Okay, so I've got this new fun idea that I stole from facebook where I'm going to post a picture every day relating to the category given to me. (Does this make up for my lack of posts over the last month?)

A Picture Of Yourself With 10 Facts:

1. I have a fantastic life and am really, really happy. I mean, really, I don't think it could get much better than this.
2. I love change and unpredictability. Unless it's a movie. I'll enjoy the movie more if I know what happens at the end. It's the same with books. I made friends tell me how the Twilight series ends before I got into the books.
3. I'm married to the most amazing guy in the world. I can count on one hand the times I've been mad at him...and that's pretty awesome.
4. We also have a really great kid. She looks absolutely nothing like me which is kind of fun because people say lots of strange things to me like, "Is her daddy dark?" or "Your baby has a great tan." or "Is she Chinese?" Sometimes people fish for explanations, but I don't give them answers in hopes that they'll say something strange.
5. I don't recycle, but I do use cloth diapers and make my own laundry detergent and deodorant.
6. We decided last week that we don't want to raise our kids in America. We also think it would be great to adopt an African baby.
7. I hate following rules. I follow them if I have to (i.e. my job), but will even break rules I make for myself because I hate rules that much. I haven't figured out how to trick myself into following my own rules yet.
8. I have spoken or can presently speak (some) Spanish, English, Arabic, and American Sign Language. (Notice I didn't say Turkish. I don't even think I could count to 10 when we left. Jonathan was my translator which is totally weak sauce.)
9. I have one of the most rewarding jobs ever. And, I absolutely adore all the people I work with.
10. I really hope that every single thing I do is based on love for God and love for others. It's not always, but I always want to move in that direction. Jonathan is a great help at that because he's so full of love and grace.

Rory at 8 Months

2011-04-13T10:23:00.000-04:00

Our little girl turned 8 months this past weekend. She still loves to eat and sleep which makes her really, really, really awesome. Waking up in the night (even for her pacifier) is an exception rather than the norm these days. I love 8 and 9 hours of uninterrupted sleep! She's rolling over like crazy and occasionally scoots backwards, but is the most content in her mom and dad's arms. She does wiggle a lot more when being held now. And, it's time to celebrate: Rory hasn't been sick in 3 weeks. I'm pretty sure that's a record since she started daycare.

In these pictures make sure you check out:

1. Her wiggly eyebrows on the top right.

2. Her first time ever pulling herself up. Yeah, that's right. You just witnessed a milestone.

3. I bet you can guess what happened .5 seconds after the picture with her head hanging off the chair was taken. Good thing we tag teamed and Jonathan took the pictures while I caught her diving off the chair.

4. And I hope her adorable scrunchy smile never disappears.

Here are her previous pictures. It's neat to watch the process of her changing from looking like an alien to looking somewhat human.

Thankful

2011-04-06T10:10:00.000-04:00

I've been toying around with ideas of how to put the word thankful up in our house. I spent hours on this website messing around, but ended up deciding against that project.

So, at a random moment of inspiration, I got together a bunch of vintage fabric and made this banner. (I know, I know. The lighting is terrible.)

About once a year, a certain word or phrase stands out to me and becomes my (for lack of a better word) mantra. This year, it's the word "thankful." I hope I can live by it and be reminded of it on a daily basis.

Here's one of my new favorite quotes by Graham Cooke:

"There are no good days and bad days; only days of grace. Some days, God gives us the grace to enjoy. Other days we are given the grace to endure."

I made it with Heat 'n Bond, my new favorite thing ad it took me about 30 minutes. Fast projects are the best kind of projects!

Oh, and as usual, all the awesome fabric I used was given to me.

Knit Vest

2011-03-22T06:26:00.000-04:00

In the beginning of December, my mom asked for a knit vest. I mailed it to her last week. Yep, it took me 3 months and the entire winter season to make it for her. And it even knit up quickly. Hopefully she'll get to enjoy it at least for a month or so as Colorado hangs onto winter.

Oh, and did you notice the stripe in it? Definitely not intentional but I got confused and ended up purling rather than knitting on the outside.

I got this pattern specifically because it had reviews of knitting up really fast. It did..but I had to do it with 17 gauge needles...which slowed me down because they're so big and bulky. I don't think I'll do that again.

It's a Ravelry pattern. It's called the Super Bulky Outer Vest.

***And yes, I realize I haven't posted a More with Less Monday in a couple of weeks. Don't worry, it'll be back eventually. I guess I don't like to give myself more responsibility and obligation outside of what I already have!***

Soft Book

2011-03-18T06:00:00.002-04:00

Baby girls are really easy to sew for. Boys, on the other hand, can be more complicated. (For me, at least!)

So, here's what I came up with. Thanks to Thimbly Things for the great idea and tutorial!

I used the legs of some old jeans that I had laying around for the book cover. Baby Adams doesn't have a first name yet, so I went with the first initial of his last name instead.

This puppy is a very vague picture of their sweet dog, Lulu. (See, it's a girl dog!) And the house they wish they lived in!

And, I fortuitously found TONS of colored polar fleece for $1.99 that I had purchased the day before I decided on the project. Perfect, eh?

I discovered Heat 'n Bond through this project. It's my new favorite thing!!!

Here's to an easy delivery and a sweet baby boy Stacee and Normer! We love you guys!

7 Months

2011-03-15T06:20:00.001-04:00

Rory turned 7 months last week, and she put on a great face for the pictures, seeing as how she had a runny nose and a cough. (I know, big surprise, right?) That aside, aren't her rolls irresistible?

She's forgotten how to roll over, but can hold herself up standing. She also loves to talk. A couple of weeks ago she entered into a separation anxiety phase. She really doesn't like it when others hold her. Sometimes she'll tolerate it, but usually cries until she's in her parents' arms again. Honestly, though it can be inconvenient at times, it's also sweet so I don't mind it that much. Fortunately, the women at her daycare are like family so she always grins and squeals when she sees them.

Project Restyle: Project 1

2011-03-09T06:40:00.000-05:00

So, remember how I said I was going to participate in that great thing called Project Restyle where you restyle something different every week? Yeah, this is my first one.

But, it's pretty cool. I started out with a set of $1 thrifted napkins, added a little remnant fabric, and ended up with this:

Can you guess which skyline it is?

Extra points to the first person who knows where the quote is from. (It's one of my favs!) And extra extra points to Jonathan for doing the hand sewing...as usual.

And, I bet you couldn't even tell the pillow isn't even sewn closed on the bottom. It's amazing how long I'll procrastinate 30 second projects!

More With Less Monday: TV

2011-03-07T06:00:00.001-05:00

(source)

Let's be honest, not much good comes from TV. And yet...I'm totally addicted. Anytime there's a TV around, I become a zombie and forget anything exists outside of TV.

And that my friends, is why we don't have a TV.

Nope. Not even for movies. We've been offered at least 3 or 4 by friends who have taken pity on us, but we turned them down. We don't want a TV in our home. Of course we still watch shows on Hulu (for free!), but we even try to limit that.

Here's how I see it:
At the end of every day, Jonathan and I say the best part of our day, the worst part of our day, and where we saw God. The best part of my day has NEVER been a certain show I watched on TV. And I usually regret those days I waste just catching up on my Hulu queue.

I thought TV was a good thing to address this week, because Jonathan and I have decided that we're going to give up TV shows altogether for the season of lent. We've tried to restrict our viewing in different ways over the past couple of months, but can't seem to follow the guidelines we set up for ourselves. So, we're giving it up cold turkey. This doesn't mean forever, but for 40 days at least.

(source)

Everyone is different and has different limits of what they can watch, but I guess I'm just extra sensitive because there are so many shows on TV that I can't even handle watching (or shouldn't be watching) because they are so offensive to me. They normalize and condone so many things that I fight to not have in my life. Before I know it, I'm completely desensitized to things I feel so firmly against. I'm not going to get into details because there are two sides to every story, but it's worth thinking about.

Are the shows you're watching building you up, tearing you down, or neutral? What do you think about when you're finished watching your favorite shows? How do you feel when they end?

I hope to live in a way that brings life and hope and freedom to everything I do. Unfortunately (for my zombie tendencies), the TV shows I watch usually don't live into that dream.

When I Grow Up

2011-03-04T08:00:00.000-05:00

It's funny how when you're a kid, you think grown ups are actually different than children. You imagine there's no more fighting or silly disagreements, or (God forbid) fun. But, it seems to me--at the OLD age of 28--that adults still often act like children. But it's not for lack of maturity; it's because we're living out of our brokenness and wounds inflicted on us in our lives. Can you blame someone who has had so many difficult things happen to them when they aren't as kind to you as you'd like?

Anyway, what I'm getting to is that there is a big lesson I have been learning over the past couple of years. It's the lesson of the gentle and quiet spirit. The passage from 1 Peter 3:3-4 has always been a difficult one for me to grasp.

Your adornment must not be merely external--braiding the hair , and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; but let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God."

(image source)

I'm pretty sure that no one I know would describe me as gentle and/or quiet. So, for quite awhile, I thought I had two options:
1. To deny who I am and force myself into the stereotypical woman I viewed as gentle and quiet...and be miserable along the way.
2. To just ignore that verse and continue on with my loud opinions and controversial statements.

But, a little over a year ago, I realized there is a third option. Awesome, right? It came after I read yet another book about what a woman of God should be like and I completely melted down and cried to Jonathan that if this is who I was supposed to be, I was going to fail miserably. Jonathan, in his amazing love and wisdom, hugged me and told me who he saw and wanted me to be. He also reminded me of who God calls me to be and who God says I am. As we talked about it and suddenly it hit me:

a gentle and quiet spirit is an internal state of being, not an external way of living life.

And in a matter of seconds, a great peace and freedom washed over me. I learned that the pursuit of a gentle and quiet spirit doesn't mean that I have to sit in the back corner quietly only using a really soft voice when I talk, wearing loose flowy clothing and having really long hair, cooking dinner every night--over an open flame in the back yard, knitting and sewing in all my free time (hold on a second...), and having and homeschooling lots of kids. (Before anyone gets mad, I'm not against any of these things and I don't think any of them are wrong. In fact, they're totally awesome. They're just not all me. Well, they're not me today, at least.)

To me, a gentle and quiet spirit means FREEDOM. Freedom from having to be anyone other than who God says I am and freedom from having to justify or prove to others why what I do is okay.

This has come up a lot since motherhood. I've talked before about the pressures to conform to certain motherhood "standards". (And sometimes the Christian culture is the worst at putting those pressures on others!) I do conform to lots of those ideals, but I also don't follow all of them. Some people are supportive of the ways we do life differently and others aren't. That doesn't matter. The cool thing about living with a gentle and quiet spirit is that God tells me who I am and I don't need to make sure other people understand or agree with that. It's actually okay to disagree...and not even tell someone you disagree with them. And it's actually really fun to love and celebrate differences in lifestyles rather than be all grouchy about how people don't do everything like I do.

I can be free and content and comfortable and gulit-free if I am constantly bringing things to the Lord and my husband.

I realize this is an active pursuit, especially recently. There are a number of things that have come up in the past week or so that could cause me to become bitter towards a situation or other individuals. But, in pursuing a quiet and gentle spirit, I'm seeking to be free to love and let the offenses go, remembering that it is the Lord I answer to and not the opinions of others. And, if I do get offended about certain things, it probably means I'm insecure about things I shouldn't be insecure about anyway!

Now, I know this post can be construed as me deciding I can do whatever I want without wisdom and an I-hate-everyone-else mentality. But, don't take it that way. It comes out of trying to figure out how to deal with insecurity more than what's right and wrong.

So, to finish off this post, here is a diverse list of my (published) gentle and quiet spirit heroines and my favorite books by them:
Elisabeth Elliot- Let Me Be a Woman (and every other book she's written!)
Jan Meyers- The Allure of Hope (This book actually led to spend 1 1/2 years going by the name Eve)
Amy Carmichael- If
St. Therese of Lisieux- The Story of a Soul
Methchild of Magdeburg- Meditations
Sharon Hersh- Bravehearts
Hannah Hurnard- Hinds Feet in High Places
Eilzabeth Prentiss- Stepping Heavenward

More With Less Monday: Internet

2011-02-28T07:00:00.001-05:00

This one is pretty easy.

We just buy the cheapest internet there is. (Duh!)

Seeing as how it's the cheapest, it's also the slowest internet out there as well. It was very painful our first few weeks of having it and others hate using the internet at our house because they're not used to how slow it is. But, after awhile, we got used to it and just make plans around the time it takes to load pictures or videos or whatever else we're watching/doing. We can still do everything you can do on your internet (including watch TV, talk on Skype, and whatever else is out there to do). And...it only costs us $19.99 a month. We don't have a home phone line or cable TV to go along with it, but it is wireless and it works great.

There may be something even more affordable out there now, but we haven't been looking. So, if any readers have more affordable recommendations, I'd love them.

Cheers!

More Pants

2011-02-26T15:24:00.001-05:00

As I said before, I love babies in jeans. But, I can't get jeans to fit over Rory's cloth diapers. So, I finally made it to the store for some denim fabric, and threw these together in an evening.

I added the ruffle in hopes that it will help to distinguish her as a girl. I also used pink thread.

She's really into a scrunchy-face smile these days. It's pretty irresistible.

I also made her some khaki pants with little pockets and ruffled bottoms for good measure.

You can't tell from the picture, but I shortened them just above the ruffles so they can be lengthened as she gets longer.

Kudos to my amazing husband for hand sewing on the heart buttons.

Thanks to Mady By Rae's pattern for these awesome pants!

It's a lovely day today. I think a walk is in order!

Have a great weekend!

Birthday Cake

2011-02-23T06:38:00.001-05:00

I'm not really a baker or cook but offered to make a cake for a dear friend's birthday anyway. I did that before I thought about my crazy weekend schedule too. Awesome.

The party was at a British themed pub, so what better to make than a Union Jack flag?

I wanted to try fondant (because it's all the cake rage these days), but didn't have time to make my own, so I bought the [gross] stuff. Let's just get it out there that if you're buying it from the shelf of Michael's, it probably shouldn't be eaten. We tasted it and decided it would only be used for decoration and not eating. Because of that I didn't want to cover the whole cake in fondant.

Jonathan and I teamed up on this one as well. I baked and frosted the cake, he rolled out and measured the fondant (because he's good at the math-y kind of stuff), and I painted the fondant red.

And here's what we ended up with. Definitely amateur, but not terrible, eh?

Painting the fondant is much easier than I thought. I painted brandy on first to try to create a barrier between the fondant and the water-based food coloring. And then I painted. Ta da!

Next time I do something like this, I'm definitely doing homemade fondant though.

On another note, I picked up some sweet chairs (sweet=cheap and sturdy) for our kitchen at Revive yesterday and can't wait to paint (possibly) and recover (definitely) them!

More With Less Monday: Cell Phones Part 2

2011-02-21T09:16:00.000-05:00

Do you know what I want more than anything? More than a sewing machine, more than an SLR camera, more than a house, even more than chairs to go around our kitchen table?
An iPhone.

It's bright and colorful, you can check email, make plans, get directions, talk on Skype, make phone calls (duh), and waste HOURS and HOURS of time playing games and checking Facebook. It's the best alternate reality ever and I want one!

But...

Do I need one? The answer is no. In fact, I would go so far as to say that lots of people who think they need iPhones don't actually need them. (Come on, just own up to the fact that it's awesome and that's why you have one! Some people actually use paper calendars and MapQuest for directions and only check their email a couple of times a day.)

We have Verizon so when looking into the extra costs, it looks like their promotion is to have you pay for your original minutes and then pay another $29.99/month on top of that. (What!?! We don't even pay that much for internet at home!)

So...though we have the money to pay for iPhones (or Droids, or Blackberrys, or whatever), we cannot justify spending $30/month ($720 for both of us for a year...not including the minutes plan itself). Do you remember my Inspiration post? Just pause for 30 seconds and think of what that $30/month could help to do in the rest of the world...

Clean water. Education. Clothing. Medical care. Freedom from the sex trade. Bibles in native languages. Freedom from sweatshops and human slavery. A home. What else can you think of?

Now I'm not saying that we're always giving away that extra $30/month. But, to me, I feel better knowing that we can. When a need is presented we can give freely and joyfully with even more finances at our disposal.

I'm also not saying I'm never going to own an iPhone. (I'm strongly considering saving up all of my birthday and Christmas money every year to put toward the cost of a phone and the extra monthly payments.) Maybe it's hypocritical...or maybe it's not.

When it comes down to it, the point of this post isn't to make anyone feel bad about having an iPhone. But, it is to encourage you to consider every decision you make and evaluate your goals in it. Is it to make life easier for yourself, to indulge in something awesome, to love others better, to be simple, to achieve your 10 year plan, to be more like Jesus, or something else? None of those reasons are bad in themselves...it's a matter of the heart. As I said before, I want my life to be characterized by LOVE and LOVE ALONE. I try (but often fail) to hold every decision I make, big and small, up to Love and Jesus. If it fits into that, I go for it. If it doesn't, I (often sadly) don't do it.

So...if you're reading this and like most, have a smart phone, this is not meant to offend you and I promise that I am not writing this for anyone specific. And, believe it or not, I don't really care what kind of phone you have and I don't hate you or judge you if you don't agree with my views about these things. I'm just sharing my perspective. (Isn't that what blogs are for, anyway? An easy way to say offensive things without the confrontation?) So...please don't feel judged by me or afraid to pull out your [totally awesome] phone next time you're around me. The most you'll get from me is envy.

Rory at 6 Months

2011-02-16T08:32:00.000-05:00

I can't believe she's already six months old!

And last week we finally introduced her to food. Her first meal was an avocado and (surprise, surprise) she ate it like a champ. Rory doesn't mess around when it comes to eating. Just ask anyone who has watched her down 8oz of milk in 2.5 minutes. So far, she's also really into sweet potatoes and bananas.

Rory's hobbies are eating, grabbing things, eating, sitting up, eating, squealing, eating, sleeping, and eating.

More With Less Monday: Cell Phones Part 1

2011-02-14T01:49:00.001-05:00

We love our family. In fact, this post is about family. And along with an awesome family comes...you guessed it, family plans!

(Yes that's me using my cell phone at the Sphinx.

Doesn't something just seem off about that?)

Jonathan and I spent the last year on our own plan. We had the least amount of phone minutes (700 combined) and unlimited text messaging. Every month our bill averaged around $112. Yes, I know. Ridiculous!!!!

So, about a month ago we were discussing ways to cut down on our bill and it hit us. We needed to take advantage of the $10 per extra line in family plans. We immediately picked up the phone and called Jonathan's sister and brother in-law (from the amazing Blume Photography) to discuss options with them. Turns out they were looking for ways to save as well. So, an hour later, the 4 of us were on one plan and paying $30-$40 less a month for our phone plans. Plus, we didn't have to renew our contracts (we were both in the middle of our contracts) or pay a change fee or anything.

Awesome? I think so!!!

Coming up next week: To iPhone or not to iPhone. Very controversial.

More With Less Monday: Breast vs Bottle

2011-02-07T07:43:00.007-05:00

To quote a good friend of mine, "Having a baby is like being back in high school again where the cool kids make you feel like a loser."

I can't even begin to tell you how much pressure there is to do the "right" thing as a parent. Doing the right thing involves things like: eating organic when you're pregnant and nursing, NOT getting an epidural, nursing for at least a year (2-3 years if you're from Boulder), rejecting traditional immunization schedules, being a stay-at-home mom, making your own baby food, following the Babywise method, and probably a lot more that I haven't thought of.

Now I'm not saying I disagree with any of these peer pressures (and I actually follow a lot of them), but I do think it's a little much to make new moms feel like losers and terrible parents if they don't do all of these things. Learning to be a mom is hard enough in itself!

Anyway, one of the ways we've found to save the most money with a new kid is through, you guessed it, breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is also about the worst thing EVER (to me...but not to most). My first 12 weeks of nursing I cried every time I nursed and kept waiting for Jonathan to tell me that it would be okay if we just weaned her...but he never offered up that option, so I never asked for it. Rory was tongue tied and couldn't latch on for her first week until the doctor clipped her tongue. (I didn't watch.) I went through two bouts of mastitis and Rory and I both got thrush. Awesome. Then, at 3 1/2 months, after Rory had been in daycare for about 6 weeks, she decided she preferred the bottle over the boob. So, guess what? She refused to nurse. And where does that leave me? Pumping exclusively.

So, she'll be 6 months next week and I've spent the last 2 1/2 months pumping exclusively. I fight with keeping up my milk supply, waking up early and staying up late to pump, and finding time in the midst of a crazy work day to sit in the cold, concrete storage closet to pump. (Sometimes I get the I.T. room to pump.)

Why do I do it? Well, if I was really, really awesome, I'd say it was because the breast is better. But, let's be honest, it's because I'm cheap. I don't want to spend $100 (or whatever) on formula a week. Plus, lots of the formula companies are super corrupt and do horrible things to African mothers.

I will say I've pushed through some major discouragement with nursing to offset some of my guilt for having Rory in daycare. She gets sick enough when still receiving all of the antibodies in breast milk. I can't imagine what it would be like for her to not be receiving them.

So, what's the breakdown? Target's generic formula would cost us about $1/bottle conservatively. Rory drinks 4 bottles a day. That's $28/week and $112/month which equals almost $1500 spent on formula in a year!

What do I spend? I own two electric pumps and I bought them both used (one from a friend and the other from Craigslist.). One was $30 and the other was $75. I also bought some pumping supplies which equals around $40. And that's about it.

Hmmm...$150 vs $1500.

It seems to me that breastfeeding (or pumping if you're me) is the quickest (but definitely NOT the easiest) way to live more with less with a baby.

Egypt

2011-02-04T07:32:00.001-05:00

Egypt has been on my mind a lot recently. So, instead of making a long commentary on what is happening and what I think should happen, I thought I'd post some of my favorite pictures and Egyptian blog posts.

What do spiders taste like? Find out here.

How Egyptians like their coffee here. (P.S. The coffee was compliments of Jonathan when he was trying to win my heart.)

In case you're wondering what people do with their old cassette tapes, find out here!

What's for dinner?

Find out about becoming momma to the ugliest cat ever here.

Egypt doesn't have yellow pages or 911.

Check out things that never crossed my mind until I moved to Egypt here.

I can't believe I actually survived all those times of getting lost in Cairo!

What it's like to fall in love in Egypt.

How I got wrangled into performing in an Egyptian wedding at the biggest church in Cairo.

There is no where in the world like Egypt. And I'm pretty sure it has my heart.

More with Less Monday: Inspiration

2011-01-31T07:10:00.000-05:00

I came across a quote by Mother Theresa in my third year of college as I was preparing a persuasive speech for my public speaking class. I was trying to convince people to give at least some of their money. I probably didn't convince anyone of anything, but the quote I stumbled upon through it has never left me.

"It is a poverty that a child should die so you can live as you want."

Wow. I hope to make every decision in light of that perspective. I rarely do, but it's always an inspiration.

Before you read on in this post, go to this link and have your wealth really put into perspective. The Global Rich list will tell you how you fit into the world's economy. We are in the top .95% of the world.

Think about what you could do what your money:

It costs $38/month to support a child through Compassion.
You can support a national missionary for $30/month through Gospel for Asia.
And you can give up even less or more for any number of causes that matter. Places like Samaritan's Purse, Blood:Water Mission, International Justice Mission, and many, many more organizations are changing the world through providing clean water, safe medical care, freedom from slavery, and the hope of Christ.

Think about how much you spend on your cell phone*, internet*, TV*, groceries/eating out, Starbucks, new shoes, decorating your house, your gym membership.

Where else could that money go? Is it worth it to you? Does anyone else have ideas of how to give sacrificially?

*These will all be their own posts eventually!

More With Less Monday: Cloth Diapers

2011-01-24T06:42:00.005-05:00

*Whoops! This was scheduled to post on Monday, but didn't!*

If you've talked to us at all about babies, you know we ADORE using cloth diapers.   They're cute, colorful, don't smell like disposable diapers, don't fill up landfills, cheaper than disposable diapers, and all around awesome.

Honestly, I can't really remember our exact motivation for deciding to use cloth diapers. I guess it was mostly the idea of filling up landfills and spending money on things we would throw away after 2 hours.

So anyway, here's the breakdown of what we do and how we do it. (If you're not remotely interested in babies or cloth diapers, I'd go ahead and just stop reading now...cause it's going to bore you to tears.)

The Specs:
Altogether we have around 20ish diapers, 10ish Fuzzibunz One Size Pocket Diapers and 8ish Flip One Size Diapers (with extra inserts). We also have about 35 8x8in pieces of flannel that we store in a wipe warmer for wipes.

Waste: Nada.
    Pascuals: 1
    Landfills: 0

Pre-wash Cleaning: None!!!! I just drop them in a trashbin with a lid and wait to stick them in the washer.
    Pascuals:2
    Grossness: 0

Washing: Every other day or so. It would be less, but I need to make sure we have enough Fuzzibunz diapers for Rory's daycare, because they're easier to use. (Let me stop you there. Did you hear me say that I send cloth diapers to daycare with Rory? I do! I had to call around and get permission ahead of time, but it's totally doable!) I soak them in cold water without detergent. Then, I wash them in hot water for the longest cycle with 1/2 of the recommended amount of All: Free and Clear. (I can't use my homemade detergent for these because lots of laundry soaps ruin the diaper's absorbency.) The wipes are washed along with the diapers.
    Pascuals:3
    Stains on diapers: 0

Drying: On a drying rack of course! I wash them at night and let them air dry overnight. When I forget to wash them, they dry in under an hour in the dryer.
   Pascuals:4
   Energy Bill: 0

Time Spent: Not nearly as much time as it takes to find and print some coupons to make the diapers more affordable, get in my car, drive to the store, walk a mile from the parking lot to the store, find the best deal, stand in line and pay for the diapers, walk a mile back through the parking lot to my car, drive home, put the diapers away.
   Pascuals: 5
   Time Wasted: 0

***Already bored? Let's take a break and consider all the ridiculous brand names of cloth diapers. My personal favorites are: Fuzzibunz, BumGenius, Econobum, Happy Heinys, Kissaluvs, Knickernappies, Thirsties, and Rumparooz. Really people?

Ease of the Diapers: Rory has never not leaked out of a disposable diaper. Her daycare says her diaper needs changing way less than the kids with disposable diapers because hers are so absorbent. They're not the original prefold and safety pin diapers. Take a look. They're an engineering miracle! I have a hunch that the same people who designed these diapers are also the ones who build spaceships and develop alternative forms of fuel.

Is anyone else drooling over the awesomeness of these yet?
   Awesomeness: 1
   Leaks and lots of changes: 0

Cost of the Diapers: On first look, these diapers are expensive. Quality cloth diapers cost anywhere from $15-$25 per diaper. BUT, these diapers (because they expand as she grows) will fit her until she's potty trained. That means we only had an upfront expense. And, everyone likes buying people things for babies before they're born, so we didn't even have to buy any diapers. Still don't believe me? Check out this cost calculator. Go ahead, plug in what you'd want. According to what we estimated, we'll break even after 8 months. (Remember, we didn't even buy the diapers.) Then, we'll just be saving money. And it's not even taking into consideration the cost for buying disposable diapers for a second or third child!
   Pascuals: 6
   Money in the garbage: 0

So, in case I didn't make it clear. Cloth diapers are awesome. I'm so passionate about cloth diapering that I am even willing to add extra periods to tell you how. much. I. love. cloth. diapers.

And there you have it.

More with Less Monday

2011-01-17T10:22:00.001-05:00

This upcoming Wednesday marks our 3 year wedding anniversary.

Don't you love everything about this picture? We both look a little bonkers because we're so giddy!

Marriage is the best. Marriage is different for everyone, but for the record, it doesn't have to be hard. They say the first 7 years are the hardest. (They=a psychology professor in college). And if our first 3 are some of the hardest, we're good to go! I couldn't have dreamed up a more spectacular man to spend my life with. Really, I mean it.

Anyway, I can (and probably will) write another post devoted to my habibi at a later date. Here's how we celebrated our anniversary More With Less (ish) Style.

Dinner: Chilis! We love Chilis and they had a meal deal too. Unfortunately we don't have "smart phones" so we weren't able to cash in on the free chips and salsa deal. We talked about going to a nicer restaurant, but we're not really foodies so we figured we'd be just as happy spending $50 less on our meal.
Pre-movie activity: We didn't plan the time between the dinner/move very well, so in effort to find something to do, we spent an hour wandering around Target. We each got $15 and had to buy each other a surprise gift by the end of our wandering. It was a random idea and super fun! Oddly enough, we both bought each other an item of clothing, a deck of cards, and candy for the movie.
Movie: Only the greatest and cheapest theater around! The Picture Show was no more than $1.75 per ticket.
Babysitter: Rory's Lola (Grandma).

Confessions and/or 11 Quick Takes

2011-01-13T08:13:00.000-05:00

I'm following the blog trend and stealing this idea from Loving Dangerously and Making Home. Ooh, where to start. Here are 11 things you probably didn't know about me.

1. My guilty pleasure TV show is America's Next Top Model. I've seen every season. All 15 of them.

2. I am not an animal person. Nor am I kid person. Now hear me out. I'm not saying I don't like kids or that I'm building a gingerbread house to lure little children into. I'm just saying I'm not a kid person. I didn't grow up around kids or babysitting and honestly, I just feel really uncomfortable around anyone under the age of 12. It's really nothing personal. I actually cried the last time I worked in the nursery at church because I was so uncomfortable. And of course, it's not your kids that make me feel uncomfortable. Just everyone else's.

3. To pass the time during Tuesday's snow day, Jonathan and I took turns pretending we were dead bodies needing to be moved to different places. I absolutely ADORE my husband.

4. My favorite foods are coffee, ice cream, and Mongolian chicken.

5. I tell everyone I grew up in Boulder, but I really only lived there for 9 1/2 years. The rest of my childhood was spent in Iowa, North Carolina, and Florida.

6. I eat Kraft Mac and Cheese at least once a week. I can't get enough of it. I also remember places and vacations by the food I ate.

7. I'm kind of a pacifist. I'm also sort of vegetarian, slightly environmentally conscious, somewhat democratic, and a little bit minimalistic. It's hard for me to really stand for a cause because I'm pretty non-committal with all of my ideals. Really, it's because I want to stand for love and love alone. If certain ideals fall into loving others better, I'll stand for it, but in the name of love. Not in the name of that specific cause.

8. It really bugs me when people use lots. of. periods. in. a. sentence. It takes me forever to read those sentences. Plus, I'm not entirely convinced they know that it's not grammatically correct. Same goes for the use of the word literally. Oh, and I HATE it when people say things are retarded or gay.

9. I tell everyone I ran a half-marathon, but I didn't really. I trained for it, but ended up having a schedule conflict and didn't run the actual race.

10. Have I talked about how much I love my job? I LOVE my job. I may change my mind tomorrow, but at this point, I don't want to be a stay-at-home mom. Lots of people aren't okay with that decision, but I am. I am so glad that I get to spend my days loving anywhere from 20-30 people who need support and encouragement so badly. Of course I feel guilty that Rory spends 1/2 of her week in daycare, but she knows she's loved by her parents no matter what. Some of my participants have received less love in their entire lifetime than Rory has experienced in 5 months. I'm doing a good thing.

11. I have lots of opinions about things. Surprise, I know. But, when I share my opinions I don't expect you to conform to them. I'm not trying to convince you of anything. So, after reading all of my confessions, don't think I have different views of you if we don't see eye to eye on these things. I really like YOU and I hope our differences in opinions will help us to become more full of love and understanding for each other.

5 Months

2011-01-12T10:02:00.000-05:00

I do believe that Rory in the bottom left corner is very interested in top right corner's Rory's jazz hands. You can also tell that Rory is really into drooling these days. It's all the rage.

I also find it strange that 3 month old Rory looks much, much bigger than 4 month old Rory. I guess its because the picture is closer.

More With Less...Tuesday: December Spending

2011-01-11T09:12:00.001-05:00

Can I blame the Atlanta blizzard for my failure to post yesterday? I mean, it's not like I was stuck at home with nothing to do except for surf the internet or anything...

December Spending

Food: $249.68
       Groceries: $211.32
       Eating Out: $38.36

Not too bad, considering I made lots of goodies for the holidays and we had my family in visiting.

Clothing: $2.12*
      Recycled: $2.12
      New: $0

*I do think I bought a couple of other recycled items, but I did it with cash, so I haven't kept track of    it.

Christmas Ornaments

2011-01-04T07:07:00.001-05:00

My big problem with making things for people is that I'm a procrastinator. This means, I have the idea of what I want to do about 45 minutes before I need to complete the project. I don't want to make birthday gifts or shower gifts or anything until I'm inspired. And I don't think about inspirations until I don't have enough time to make it. The same goes for Christmas. At about 8pm on the 23rd, I decided the sweet ladies at Rory's daycare needed something. So, with the help of my lovely friend Jess. Here's what I ended up with.

How to make the easiest ornaments ever:
1. Draw a bird pattern and trace it on 2 pieces of fabric and quilt batting.
2. Sew along the line you traced.
3. Cut it out with pinking shears.
4. Get a friend to sew on the eyes.

Oh and sorry for the not-so-awesome pictures. Another result of doing things last-minute means pictures at 11pm.

More with Less Monday

2011-01-03T07:00:00.000-05:00

I've only been doing More with Less Monday for a couple of months. This morning, as I was thinking about what to write, I got stuck. I have ideas of more ways to live simply and things that Jonathan and I specifically choose to give up or commit to in order to pursue simplicity. But, when I think about writing them, it seems ...I don't know...arrogant. Something doesn't feel right about me announcing to the blogging world the things we do that aren't the norm. We don't do them to get attention and we especially don't want others to feel guilty if their lifestyle choices are different than ours.

What do you think? Are you enjoying More with Less Monday or should I come up with some other weekly idea to write about and throw in More with Less ideas every once in awhile?

Rory's 4 Month Pictures

2011-01-02T06:43:00.002-05:00

Yes, I know. We're about 8 days away from Rory's 5 month picture due date. So...I fell a little behind. But, nevertheless, here you are!

I'll be taking Rory's picture every month for her first two years. Here are the previous pics.

Jonathan's 11 in 11.

2011-01-01T10:38:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year! So there's nothing special about today except for the date, right? But I guess I agree with it being a great excuse for some personal goals for the upcoming year. So here are my own 11 new year's resolutions for 2011:

1. Read Scripture every day.
2. Memorize 5 books of the Bible: 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, Philippians, Colossians.
3. Run at least one road race.
4. Surprise Sarah with something sweet at least once a week.
5. Start another coffee shop.
6. Start speaking to Rory in Spanish.
7. Pray with Sarah every night before going to sleep.
8. Call Dad in Afghanistan every other week.
9. Journal somewhat regularly.
10. Go on a family walk once a week.
11. Drive more safely (come to complete stops, go no more than 10 mph over speed limit, always check blind spots).

11 in 11.

2011-01-01T07:25:00.001-05:00

Here's my list of 11 things I'm going to do in 2011:
1. Floss daily.
2. Nurse Rory for a year. Never buy formula. (Controversial, I know. Of course I like the antibodies, but it's mostly because I'm cheap. Plus, if I wean her, I'll actually have to work at losing weight. Win, win, win.)
3. Participate in Project ReStyle. I won't do 52 weeks of it, but I'll definitely do some.
4. Get pregnant with #2.
5. Buy a house.
6. Help plant Resonate.
7. Get a [super] short haircut.
8. Continue only buying recycled clothing or new things for less than $5.
9. Start playing the piano again.
10. Memorize John 14-17.
11. Surprise Jonathan with something sweet at least once a week.

What do you think? Doable???

Christmas Songs

2010-12-22T18:47:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd share the lyrics to my FAVORITE Christmas song. It's not very famous, but it's beautiful!

1. Let all mortal flesh keep silence, 
 and with fear and trembling stand;
 ponder nothing earthly-minded, 
 for with blessing in his hand, 
 Christ our God to earth descendeth, 
 our full homage to demand. 

2. King of kings, yet born of Mary, 
 as of old on earth he stood, 
 Lord of lords, in human vesture, 
 in the body and the blood; 
 he will give to all the faithful 
 his own self for heavenly food. 

3. Rank on rank the host of heaven 
 spreads its vanguard on the way, 
 as the Light of light descendeth 
 from the realms of endless day, 
 that the powers of hell may vanish 
 as the darkness clears away. 

4. At his feet the six-winged seraph, 
 cherubim, with sleepless eye, 
 veil their faces to the presence, 
 as with ceaseless voice they cry: 
 Alleluia, Alleluia, 
 Alleluia, Lord Most High!

Merry Christmas!

Jonathan's Tats

2010-12-20T20:24:00.007-05:00

Okay, so I know I've only written maybe 7 posts in the history of this blog, but I guess it's never too late to attempt to be a regular blogger. And since Sarah did a tattoo blog pretty recently, I thought I'd do a complementary explanation of my adventures in ink.

I got all three of my tattoos from Arte Sagrado down in Lima, Peru. They did a great job with all of them, and it was mondo inexpensive too!

Tattoo #1:

The inspiration for this one was the time I spent down in South America with a group of guys and girls dedicated to sharing Jesus with indigenous people in fairly remote regions of the Andes Mountains and the Amazon Jungle. I designed this tattoo for me and two other guys who were my traveling partners. It's a cross (for Jesus reasons) made of bamboo (connection to the jungle) and tilted to also be an "X" (because our team was called the "Xtreme Team").

Tattoo #2:

As Sarah hinted at in her post, I had no idea we would eventually get together when I stole her idea for a wrist tattoo of scripture. My take on it: Two verses in New Testament Greek. It's 1 Thessalonians 5:16-17. "Be joyful always. Pray continually." It's a great reminder for me of what my faith walk should look like on a daily basis.

Tattoo #3:

So this is actually my family crest. You can ask my dad about all the history and genealogy of our family, but the relevant stuff is that "Pascual" basically means Easter and has very Christian roots. Two of the quadrants of the coat of arms has the "agnus dei" symbol ("lamb of God"), and around the border in Latin it reads "from under whose feet the living waters flow", which is a line from a book of vespers from a pope or something like that.

As far as I know, no one in the world (except my two buddies) shares any of my exact tattoos. I like that they're unique and meaningful, as tattoos should be. I'd love to get something else done, maybe a bit bigger. I'll let you know when that happens...

More with Less Monday

2010-12-20T06:34:00.000-05:00

Families work best when at least one person likes to cook. That way, you know you'll always get good food. Unfortunately, neither of us love to cook. We'll do it and it'll be fine, but there's no thrill in preparing and sitting down to a meal.

I tossed around the idea of writing down what we eat for a week, but then I realized how humiliating it would be confessing to the blog world that we eat both Burger King and Kraft Mac n' Cheese once a week.

But, we are both much better cooks when living in other countries. Fast and processed food is much more difficult to come by in other places. In Egypt, my fast meal was a ful and musaka (I have no idea how to write those words in English) sandwich. In Turkey, it was chicken doner (most people know it is shwarma). Both of those snacks get old pretty quickly.

So, I figured I'd spotlight my favorite cookbook in the world. The More With Less Cookbook. This is absolutely the best cookbook for:
1. Living simply on a small budget
2. Living in a country where complicated ingredients are hard to come by.
3. Leaving a smaller carbon footprint on the world.

This cookbook was written by the Mennonite Church years and years ago with the tag line, "Suggestions by the Mennonites on how to eat better and consume less of the world's limited food resources."

Doesn't even the thought of eating better and being more wise with the resources you consume make you feel great?

I haven't made everything in the cookbook, but my favorite things in it are the Basic Lentil Soup, Tomato Soup, Lentil Burgers, and Pancakes. (Did you even know that you can make pancakes without a store bought mix?). I also ADORE the homemade Indian chai tea from the More with Less: Extending the Table Cookbook.

So, I highly recommend this book. If I only had one cookbook to live by, it would be this one.

Rory's Winter Hat

2010-12-16T07:14:00.000-05:00

This knit up in about an hour (after I read the instructions correctly).
I knit a bow to attach the bottom parts of the hat together.

I also knitted mittens to go along with it, but we had lost one within Rory's first 45 seconds wearing them. So, we're sticking with socks on her hands instead.

Isn't the cutest kid ever??? I can't get enough of her chubby cheeks!

More with Less Monday: November Spending

2010-12-13T06:48:00.000-05:00

November felt good. For the first time since January, we weren't dishing out money to pay up front for Rory's birth (which is in the process of being paid back in full thanks to the AMAZING Christian Healthcare Ministries). So, all of our other months have looked like we were living OVER our means. Even though we knew we weren't, it wasn't fun to look at the negative on our FinanceWorks budget planner.

Anyway, on to the good stuff.

Food spending: $310
Groceries-$228
*We were actually EXACTLY on budget ($220) with groceries and eating out combined a few days before the end of the month. But then, we made a date mistake and made a trip to the grocery store on 11/30 rather than 12/1.
Eating out-$82
*The worst part about the eating out section is that only 2 items in the list of things are over $10. The rest of the expenses are $3-$4. I can get coffee for free in 3 different places. I shouldn't need to buy it. Ever.

Shopping: $21
New-$0
Recycled-$21
*Hooray!!! A month where I only bought used!

I'm guessing that December is probably going to be over our food budget. We've got lots of parties where we're making yummy treats. My family is also coming for a few days and my Boulderite younger brother only eats organic.

On another note, we're in the process of buying a house...and it's pretty much the scariest thing we've ever done. WAY scarier than having a baby. We're still in the offer/counter-offer process so nothing is guaranteed. I know the house-buying journey can be controversial. Some consider renting throwing your money away. Others say it's the most affordable way to go because you don't have to pay any upkeep. (According to my brother, when you rent, you're paying for freedom.) The mortgage rates are great these days (apparently), but living in the city is expensive no matter what.

Any advice for new home buyers?

Christmas

2010-12-10T07:53:00.000-05:00

Tattoos

2010-12-08T08:16:00.002-05:00

I like tattoos. Actually, most people in my generation probably like tattoos.

I got my first tattoo when I was 8 years ago...back in the day before it was popular to get wrist tattoos. Jonathan and I met later that year and he thought my wrist tattoo was cool too. Back then, we had no idea we'd fall in love and get married so he got a similar tattoo. Now we're the cheesy couple with matching tattoos.

(If this picture looks bad, it's because it's a picture of a picture. The actual photograph by Blume Photography is great.)

My wrist tattoo is two verses that remind me that I no longer live and it's Christ in me.
Philippians 1:21-For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Galatians 2:20-I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me.
And now, on the [near] year anniversary of my second tattoo, I decided it was time to share it with the blogging world. (Actually, I just needed to make sure my parents saw it first.)

So...here is my year-old tattoo that I dreamed up, Jonathan designed, and Tanner executed. Yes, it was in Turkey...and no mom, I don't have HIV or Hepatitis. The needle and ink were clean.

When you think of tattoo parlors, what kind of music do you imagine playing? Maybe some screaming, angry music? Well, we listened to the best of late 80s soft rock. My favorite song we listened to was "Right Here Waiting" by Richard Marx circa 1989. Awesome.

Even though I like tattoos, I'm not a big fan of the pain. To keep my mind off of it I was telling Jonathan a story, but I was talking so quickly the tattoo artist stopped and asked me if I was rapping.

I really like the location of my tattoo...except the one problem is that I rarely see it.

Here's the only post-healed picture I have of it. Thanks again to the incredible Blume Photography.

What does this tattoo mean, you ask?

The tattoo starts with a wave in the middle of it. God has always spoken to me through being around water. It's refreshing and life-giving. One time, while praying, I asked God, "Who do you want to be to me?" He replied, "I am your fountain." Psalm 36:9 says, "For with You is the fountain of life, in Your light do we see life."

The next picture is a bird. There are two separate meanings to this one. The bird itself is symbolic of a nightingale [even though it doesn't look like one]. Nightingales are famous for being loud and singing in the nighttime. When they are in cities and loud places, they sing even louder. My hope is that I can be a nightingale--one who sings loudly of hope and peace and love and eternity. I want to sing in the darkest of nights and the most desolate of places. The heart is a reminder that I sing because He gave me a new heart. Ezekiel 36:26 says, "And I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you."

The olive branches are reminders of the fruit that will be produced through me if I remain in Christ. "I am the vine and you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he is it that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing." (John 15:5)

Jonathan has 3 tattoos, and plans for more. His are awesome as well. Maybe I can get him to post about his tattoos in the future.

What tattoos do you have? What tattoos do you dream of getting?

More with Less Monday: Holidays Part 2

2010-12-06T07:18:00.001-05:00

We caved and bought a Christmas tree this year. It's small and overpriced... and I love it!

We had a good conversation about gifts last night with Jonathan's family and it made me think. We don't like having a lot of stuff. In fact, I am known for compulsively getting rid of stuff and then wishing I would have saved it. (Are there support groups for anti-pack rats?)

As I said before, Jonathan and I are not gift givers. In fact, we've never given each other Christmas gifts. But, with a kid in the picture it will become more difficult in the future. Our plan/policy is this:

Jesus received three gifts: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Therefore we will only give 3 gifts to our kids within our immediate family. That will keep it simple and [hopefully] help them to understand that life is about more than stuff.

It's important to us that our kids grow up in a simple household where they don't get carried away with materialism. I am so thankful for the ways my parents taught us to be responsible with our money. We grew up in a very wealthy city and though we always had what we needed, it wasn't at the standard the Boulderite culture demanded. I drove a 1984 Toyota Camry through high school when the cars around me were 2000 Jeeps and Audis. When we ate out, we ordered from the kids menu and only drank water. I learned how to live on less than those around me were living. I will admit that it was tough for me at the time and I felt very deprived. (I still can't turn down soda when it's offered to me because we were only allowed 1 a week growing up. It's probably the middle child in me feeling deprived.) But, just like the YEARS AND YEARS of piano lessons I was forced into by my mom, I'm thankful for it now.

So far, we've done well on more with less in Rory's 4 months of life outside the womb. We were given tons of stuff [which we are so thankful for!] but have managed to stay away from anything that's battery operated and takes up lots of space. Our splurges [all gifts!] were an infant holder, a baby bathtub, and a bumbo seat. I'm not going to say I don't appreciate electronic things though. Rory can fall asleep in a swinging chair in no time and it's nice turning on a mobile and walking away rather than running in and re-swinging it when she starts to fuss. I also realize and acknowledge that this is a very personal conviction and lifestyle choice and am in no way criticizing others who do differently.

For those of you with kids, what do you do when Christmas and birthdays come around? What's one thing you're going to change about holidays this year?

Diaper Bag

2010-11-24T09:12:00.000-05:00

Sewing is my catharsis. There's pretty much nothing that relaxes me more than creating something out of fabric.

That said, this bag idea came on a much needed day where my crazy post-pregnancy, presently-nursing hormones went even more out of whack than normal. I think Jonathan would tell you he was happy he had plans on Saturday.

So, I took all of my angst and after a 6 hours, 4 feedings, 3 chick flicks, and a VERY messy apartment, I ended up with this:

I found the free tutorial here. The only change I made was to add a little pocket on the back (which I forgot to take a picture of), and I sewed the pockets on differently than directed due to some measuring mistakes. Oh yeah, and I didn't interface the bag. Only the straps.

I can't remember where I found the pattern for the flower I made.

You can't see this, but I even designed one of the pockets to hold her bottles upright so I don't end up with a milky mess on the way to daycare.

All in all, I can actually say that this is the best sewing job I've ever done. I would actually feel comfortable selling this bag it's so well done. And...I sewed with a comfort level of actually knowing how to do stuff rather than guessing my way through it. Awesome!!!