A Late Night at the Drive-In

This is how things look when we stay for all three movies at the drive-in!

Berry Picking

A couple of weeks ago, my friend Dawn and I took our kids to pick blackberries!

(For the last few years I have been meaning to track down an orchard to go to, but apparently that simple step was just too much for me!)

Fortunately, Dawn did all the leg work and said she'd already set up an appointment for us to go if we we wanted to join them.  

She's great like that!!

Before we started picking, everyone got to try one blackberry so that we could see how delicious they were.

Luke about died!  

The thought of putting a fruit anywhere near his mouth is just too much for him to handle!  After a little coaxing I finally just enjoyed his for him.  Will he ever come around?

Picking berries was so much fun!  I kept thinking about all the delicious things I would make with my little black gems!

Unfortunately, we got a little overexcited and picked way more than we needed.

In the end, we had 10 nearly full buckets.  Ten buckets at an average of two pounds each is A LOT of berries!!

They are so delicious, though!  I love having a freezer stocked with them!

I'm excited to go again!  I'm going to shoot for at least once a year, but I would love to get to pick something else this year!

  

Twelve

Nov 2010

Yesterday was our 12th Anniversary!

It kind of snuck up on us this year. 

I realized it was coming up a couple of days ago.  Ben didn't until late Sat night!

I meant to remind him about it.....I swear!

*     *     *     *     *

With that being said, I absolutely love where we are with our marriage.

We've definitely gone through various stages in our relationship, but we seem to have settled nicely into the "comfortable phase".

I think this phase gets a bad rap as boring, but really it's fabulous!  It might not have quite the excitement as the early years, but it's great in it's own way!

The baby phase was probably our toughest.  We were so sleep deprived and grouchy.   We were in a bit of a survival mode.  Parenting came before everything else.  I did love those years, but looking back, I'm glad we are on the other side of them!

About the time Ollie hit 3 or 3 1/2, though, the fog of babies seemed to lift.

It was like, "Oh!  Hello!  Nice to see you again!"

I don't think either one of us realized how much we had lost each other until that point.

Now our lives have calmed down, and we've gained back a little chunk of ourselves.

It feels like we go out on dates less often than we use to, but we're okay with that.  We use to need dates to save our sanity, now they're just a bonus!  We've always been pretty good at making our own little dates out of nothing, anyway!

Plus, Luke's old enough to watch his brothers if we want to run a quick errand together--without kids!--and sometimes that 15 minutes is worth more than an entire night out alone!! 

Really, though, it's just so lovely being settled.  Settled is what I strive for! 

Starting out, I would have never guessed that this would be one of my favorite anniversaries, but really it is!

I love where we're at with our little family!  

And I'm still completely crazy about the tallest boy!!

Camping

Henry and I went on a two night Cub Scout camp out at the end of last week.

I was unbelievably nervous about it.

I've never truly camped out--certainly not on my own--and the first day was going to have a heat index of 110.

There was a huge potential of it being a total disaster.

I went in with a brave face and an open mind and I totally LOVED IT!!!

(It helped that I got a shower every night!)

Ben told me it's a good thing because next year all three boys will probably be going to camp so I'll have no choice but to go at least once!