Alone Time

My parents offered to take Ms. Cutie-pie today so I could have some free-time before summer break hits. I have so far been enjoying gardening, catching up on e-mails and making coffee. I keep feeling like I'm forgetting something though. I'm off to shoe shop (not for me though, boo!), get lunch, and maybe a pedicure or a nap. :) Time is running out quickly though so I'm off.

Photography of late

I've been trying to advance my skills as a photographer, learning about light and aperture and white balance and shutter speed and focal point. It's fun and just when I think I've figured something out, I realize I still have so much to learn.
Here are some favorites from the last few weeks in a variety of lighting, actions, and settings.

Recovering

After the eye injury, other parts of my body decided to stop functioning as well and I ended up with mastitis. So not fun. Antibiotics are helping an I'm finally feeling like a productive person again. Thank goodness for my amazing husband who cared for the kidlets, cooked, cleaned, etc. all while trying to maintain his job, write and preach a sermon, etc. Oh, and he did it all joyously. He rocks. 

I'm pretty much fully functional today but its been a week. So I couldn't resist joining M for part if her nap today. Who needs clean underwear? Oh wait, we all do. Seriously, it's amazing the way things pile up when one us is down and the other is in maintenance mode. The mail, school papers, cups, laundry, trash. Ugh. I'm happy to do it though after feeling so rough the past week. 

We've entered swim season around here 

That's our girl at the bottom of the lane, their coach noticed her (she's new to this team) yesterday and said "I've got to get my hands on that girl, she's strong, she's a strong swimmer." And she really is, she's beautiful to watch in the water. But we took a year off and her body has changed and she needs her skills sharpened. Swim team is going to be so good for her. H is loving it too and he looks so cute in his speedo shorts.

Good ol' one eye

Toddle-britches, that's her new name, injured my eye. A scratch on my cornea from her fingernail. I thought it would heal up a few hours later but it got worse so I had my mom come and take me to the urgent care because my vision was so blurry. After lots of tortuous drops and washings, plus a freaking expensive antibiotic/steroid drop prescription, it's much better, but still blurry and swollen feeling. I should not be writing this, I'm basically typing with one eye. I can't read or drive or really even watch tv. Last night I had to watch the office season finale with a blanket over my bad eye so I could keep it open but the light didn't bother it. First world problems, huh? It did force me to finally figure out how to download audiobooks from the library so I'm listening to my newest find, Outlander. I know this is actually quite old, but I'm finally jumping on the bandwagon and really enjoying it. 

Ok I'd better go before I injure my other eye from using it took much. Here's my favorite little leaguer who got the game ball last week. His team played amazing and he had great fielding, 3 for 3 hits, 1 run and 2 RBIs! When coach asked the team who should get the game ball, they all yelled his name! So awesome! And a moment we will never forget!

BORING!

This blog has been so boring lately, I mean who writes this thing?! My kids say boring like a curse word. They aren't allowed to say stupid or other "bad" words so they say things are "boring". I have no words to describe why I've been so slack except having a toddler is busy (and the opposite of boring). She demands my attention, how crazy is that?! If I turn my back for too long she's on top of the dining room table, or spilling the glass of milk one of the big kids left sitting on her level, or playing in the toilet, or dumping an entire costco sized box of granola bars and squeezing them all into odd shapes. This is just a sampling of what I've found her doing every time I try to sit at the computer thinking she'll give me a few minutes to write in the past couple of weeks. So I kind of gave up trying to write. I'd read snippets of my favorite blogs and catch up on facebook, but never seemed to have much time to form a cohesive thought. Everything I tried to write seemed trite and, well boring. But then I found this new genre of bloggers, not sure what to call it but these bloggers sure can write. They have a spiritual/Christian slant, but they're thinkers and share openly about life and family and God and struggles. So I got inspired again, and here I am.
We've been consumed lately with baseball. H has been playing on a machine pitch little league team for 6-9 year olds. He's the 2nd youngest and it has been such a fun time for all of us. He has really improved and we all just love watching the games. Even baby girl. In fact, I think she may be the biggest fan of the whole family.

Swim team is our next big thing, both kids are swimming this year which finally made it worth it to join a neighborhood pool (oddly expensive) and commit to practicing 5 days a week. Sounds kinda crazy, but I'm hoping it will be fun too. It'll give some structure to our summer, at least for the first month of it, and the kids will be such amazing swimmers. The coach's son is a gold medal Olympic swimmer and I am hoping it will be of the caliber of the Sewanee swim team A was on when she was 4 and 5. She learned the proper way to do strokes and became such a strong swimmer because of it.

Well, that's it for now, the only reason I can write this much is because today is J's day off. Hopefully I'll be more consistent from now on. It's good to be back.