Happy Day

When we first moved in, this is all we had for patio furniture:

Poor, forlorn, tiny little chair.

Now we are the proud owners of a table!  And chairs!  And ottomans!

Hallelujah for garage sale finds.  One of the chairs is a little beaten up because it went over the previous owners' house in tornado-like winds.  You know, pretty much a regular occurrence in Iowa.  The covers are sun-bleached and a little bit worse for wear, but I am excited to get new ones at the end-of-season-clearance-sections in the fall. 

For Mother's Day, Christian will grill our dinner, and we will eat outside.  That night, and probably every night all summer long.  I love having less mess in the house to clean up!

Happy weekend, everybody!

Tornado Warning

I forced my heavy eyelids open when I heard Christian's voice.  "Come on, hon.  Let's go."  It took a moment for me to register that he was already out of bed.  I made the unfortunate decision to go to bed at 11:45 last night, because I was enjoying the quiet of the night (and I had blog reading and Facebook updates to catch up on).  I sat up and realized that he was holding Kaitlyn, and at the same time I realized the tornado siren was blaring.  I wondered what time it was as I slipped my pajama pants on.  The boys came out of their rooms the same time I did, and we all went down to the basement to wait out the tornado warning.  The boys were overly excited despite it being two o'clock in the morning.  They wouldn't stop talking, and kept interrupting each other to tell stories (about school, about the Skylanders video game).  I was too tired and worried to really pay attention, but I knew they had this need to talk, so I let them.  Christian had his cell phone and was checking the weather, and he was really quiet.  He gets really quiet and really focused in stressful situations.

I realized I didn't have my glasses on, and everything was fuzzy around me.  Aidan was in his underwear and nothing else, since it was so warm when he went to bed last night.  I knew we had our 72 hour kits in the furnace room in the basement, and we had blankets if we needed them.  But I realized we didn't have shoes, and I haven't put diapers for Kaitlyn in the 72 hour kit, and all of these thoughts were swirling around in my head as the siren continued to wail.  The lights flickered at one point, and I knew we didn't have any flashlights in the basement (besides the crank radio/flashlight in the 72 hour kit.) The siren didn't stop for ten full minutes, and the tornado warning was lifted shortly afterward.  We waited in the basement for a few more minutes, but when the radar on the weather app on Christian's phone showed us that the large red-colored cell had passed us, we felt safe enough to go back upstairs. 

I rocked Kaitlyn in the rocking chair in her room while I sang lullabies to her.  Within minutes, her head was bobbing on my arm.  I put her in her crib and went back to bed, where I Facebooked about our "adventure."  Aidan promptly fell asleep, but Ethan came back into our room after a little while because the wind was still pretty loud.  I let him slide into bed with me, and he finally calmed down enough to fall asleep.

Part of me wondered whether this is something that happens semi-frequently, like every time the weather is severe they turn on the tornado siren as a precaution.  But I learned that in the ten years since our neighbors moved here, this is only the second time this has happened.  And we also learned that the wind has to be confirmed at 70 mph or higher, and that they saw "hooks" on the forecast that easily could have turned into tornados.

This morning at 9:20 AM, the siren went off again for 30 seconds.  Even though the weather is nice right now, it scared me.  I'm not sure whether it was a glitch, or whether the county does that the morning afterward to make sure everything is working properly.  But hello - trigger alert!  I went back down to the basement anyway, clutching Kaitlyn, and shook slightly as I called Christian at work to help calm and center me.

Next, I'm off to the store to update our 72 hour kits, and I will be filling the five gallon water jug I have had for a year that has been sitting empty in the basement.  All is well, everyone is fine.  I'm glad we had this experience, and that nothing bad came of it, so that I can recognize what I need to do to feel more prepared if there is a "next time."

Telling the Truth

Wow, it's been so long since I have blogged that I momentarily forgot how to access my blog.  And, when I finally remembered, it asked me for my password (Blogger has always remembered my password before). That's a long time!

Anyway.

Character flaw confession time - I have a difficult time being honest.  I always have.  In my defense, it's in the "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all" category.  But I really consider it a flaw.  If that color looks terrible on you, don't ask for my opinion because I'll tell you it looks nice, even if it is hideous.  My inclination has always been that I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings (or said in another way, I hate confrontation/want to keep the peace) so I concur with the other person, or more importantly, not let them know the real truth, because that's being kind.  Right?

WRONG.

For years my husband has been telling me that he wants the truth.  I say it's potentially cruel and belittling to say something that doesn't need to be said, but he insists (at least with him in particular, maybe with others?) that not telling the truth is doing more damage than the potential hurt caused by being honest. 

And for years, I've been ignoring him.

A couple of discussions he and I have had over the last couple of weeks have renewed this topic again, and I have been practicing being more honest with him.  And it's really difficult!  But he keeps saying things like, "Who ARE you??" when I say something that he would never expect to come out of my mouth (like swear words or teasing or flirting, which I don't usually do).  Then Saturday night, he challenged me again to be completely honest with him for 24 hours, or all day yesterday. 

I recognized five or six instances throughout the day where I would have kept quiet, lied, or not said something that I instead forced myself to choke out (some times were easier than others) (stupid but true, letting him hear the songs on my iTunes playlist is one of the things that made me feel uncomfortable) (I know, I have issues).  But I did it.  And I'm proud of myself.

Last night, he asked, "Can we do this again tomorrow?  Because the more I get to know you, the more I love you."

Now let me tell you the truth - the more I get to know myself, the more I love myself too.

(P.S. After writing this post, while I was proofreading it, Christian called me to talk about car loans, APR's, and budget stuff.  This is generally high-stress stuff that causes me to go into placating mode, but instead, I practiced being honest and saying how I really felt.  Go me!)

We have lived in our small town now for about 11 weeks.  I had never noticed this sign driving in to town before - Christian pointed it out to me.

Let's look at it a little closer.

It's a snowmobile speed limit!  This is on our main road leading into town.  I really do live in a small town!  I can't wait until we have lots of snow and I can see snowmobiles dragging main.

Beauty

Over the weekend, I went outside to my new-to-me yard and started weeding and cleaning out the dirt beds.  I have never done this before, and I feel very inept thanks to my black thumb (i.e. my ability to kill plants without really trying).  I was pulling old leaves and sticks away from the beds, and I realized that underneath this matted, old layer there were brand new shoots of plants.  As I carefully filtered out the old stuff, I continued to discover healthy, new green shoots.  I have no idea what these shoots will become, but I look forward to watching them grow throughout the spring and summer.

Watching our yard come into bloom over the last couple of weeks has been a breath of fresh air.  The lawn is so green.  One tree has beautiful white blossoms.  Others are growing greenery.  I also noticed we have three times as many raspberry plants as I originally thought.

And the birds!  The birds here are amazing!  The owners of this house obviously did things to encourage birds to stop by - numerous bird houses, and there was a bird bath in the corner of the yard.  We have seen chickadees, doves, and blue jays in our yard. We purchased bird seed, and we have our bird identifying book and our binoculars close by.

As I marvel at the beauty of where we live, I feel reverence for God's creations.  And I feel thrilled that my children will be raised in this beautiful place.

Anyone want to come eat raspberries with us in a few months?

(I am linking up to Heather's Just Write.)

Full Circle

I was realizing a couple of days ago that my blog has come full circle.  Four and a half years ago, we lived in Iowa, and my first blog post was about the Iowa State Fair.  I didn't really know yet what the "flavor" of my blog was going to be, and it started out as a family blog.  I had two friends leave comments. 

I looked back to see which blog posts garnered the most comments on my blog, and the winner was a picture of a stick I peed on.  Gross, you guys.  No, really, if you had been following my blog for any amount of time back in 2009, you knew that we wanted another baby but that I hadn't been able to get pregnant right away.  So, when I showed you a pea-sized ultrasound picture of what was to become Kaitlyn, along with the two-pink-lines pee stick, 78 of you left a comment to congratulate me.  (For the record, 77 of you left a comment on my natural vs. epidural post, and if you were still reading my blog by the time I had Kaitlyn, you know that I delivered her without drugs.  And it was wonderful.

Now, 4 1/2 years later, we are back in Iowa, the comments on my posts are back to single digits, and I am happy.  I kind of feel like it's time for a rebirth on this blog.  Back to the basics. 

Hi, my name is Erin.  I go to the grocery store looking for thin spaghetti, and when I go to cook it a week later, I realize I purchased thick spaghetti.  I obsess over how delicious certain foods are going to taste, and then when I actually taste them, I am often slightly disappointed.  I hate being in the sun, because I feel like I am burning after only a few minutes - even with sun block on.  I mostly prefer reading non-fictional memoirs and trashy novels, but I only review on Goodreads the ones that seem socially acceptable to me.  I have a couple of best friends, and one of them I met thanks to this little blog (and Twitter).  My family means everything to me.  I live for food (especially of the dessert variety).  I love making connections through blogs and the online world.

Thanks for stopping by!

Spring is Here

I can't believe the weather here in Iowa!  Twelve days ago, on Saturday, it snowed here.  Like, thanks to the wind, our driveway had nearly five inches of snow on it (we are, unfortunately, northwest facing, and most of the wind comes from that direction, so we get the brunt of all storms; our neighbors across the street didn't even have to shovel their driveways because there was so little snow).  Two days later, it was nearly 70 degrees, and it has been mid to upper 70s ever since.  Bill-paying little ol' me LOVES not having to use the heater or air conditioner!  (Facebook friends from Utah have been talking about snow and cold weather.  All I can say is neener neener neener. Come and visit me before the humidity becomes overbearing.)

The last three days it has rained on and off all day, every day, so the lawn is greening up, and buds are coming out.  I have never, ever been an outside person, and it is really bizarre for me to recognize how excited I feel about getting into the yard, planting things in our garden, and enjoying sitting under the pergola while Christian barbeques.

I sound like a snob. A happy, contented snob.  Oh, and I can't actually sit under the pergola until we get a patio set.  Details, details.

Here's our garden.  Half of it is covered with the beginnings of strawberry bushes (and old, dried up leaves.  As soon as it stops raining for half of a second I will make my children get them out of there). The big thing on the front left corner is rhubarb.  I hate rhubarb.  I don't know whether Christian will want to keep the rhubarb plant or not, but I hope to dig it up and plant corn, green beans, zucchini, and whatever else finds its way into my basket at the nursery.

 Look, tulips!  I think tulips.  I've never had tulips in my yard before.  It will be a happy surprise to see what color they are, and what other greenery pops up in our yard.

 Four days ago, this tree/bush thingy was completely bare.  (Also, four days ago the grass was yellow and dormant.  Look at it now!  We're on the hunt for a lawn mower on Craigslist - we will be needing one within the next week or so.)

Have I mentioned a few (dozen) times that I love it here?  Cuz I love it here.