Category: food

Three…

Published on by Mae @ Rainydayinmay3 Comments
Me– 
– again, I’d like to read two personal (non- work assignment) books. {I’ll take this moment to point out that I’ve had the same goal every month. In January I read two, and in February I read 5. FIVE. I didn’t read 5 books for me in all of 2011. This is huge, folks!} 

– I really want to celebrate my birthday right. This is a big one. Every year my birthday month is such a struggle and I lose myself in the planning of Genny’s birthday festivities. This month is different. And this birthday HAS to be different because it’s a big deal. One I feared I’d never see… 

– more handwritten letters. I keep saying it… 

Capture– 

– my pet, on a walk
– my workout
– young
– old
– something suessical
– spring
– irish
– birthday toes, x’s 2
– kites
– cake

Us– 
– birthdays. Specifically mine and Gen’s. Doing something really special for Genny’s birthday, but I’ll wait to blog details until it comes closer. 

– We’re going to see West Side Story and I am really, really, really excited! 

Heart– 
– for the season of Lent I’ve given up television and senseless spending. I am really excited about both sacrifices- and am moderately embarrassed to admit that both of them ARE sacrifices. It shouldn’t be like that. 

– I need to be better about shaving out quiet time to center myself… 

– I missed journaling in February due to everything being out of whack. i’ve really missed it. I want to get back to it, everyday this month. 

Home– 
– we’re reducing… We emptied out a storage shed and are purging. I love that. 

– together we are building a cool project that i can’t wait to show you… When it’s done. 

– spring cleaning is underway. It started after the Oscar party. 

Health–
– My immune system is out of control. It is ridiculous what 5 months of pneumonia can do to a girl. I want to learn how to repair it so that i stop catching EVERYTHING… 

– I am going to increase the level of difficulty in my water classes. 

– My goal is to lose another 5 lbs this month. 

– I’m also going to start hooping. Chw is going to make me one and I am really nervous/excited. 

– Also, curious about trying green smoothies. (It takes me awhile to warm up to stuff…)

– yoga, at least weekly. 

Love– 
– catch up on our weekly reading together. We’re a bit behind. 

– Sneaking away on mini-dates. I love them, maybe more than full dates… 

– working on projects together. I love that. 

– holding hands and walking. happiness. 
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Journal {week 3}…

Published on by Mae @ Rainydayinmay3 Comments
IN MY LIFE THIS WEEK… 
School aside, there is a significant decrease in the tension and drama around the house. That’s a very good thing as it’s been growing increasingly more suffocating for a long time now. It’s amazing to sleep a full night and wake up feeling peace. 
A lot of the sleep and the peace though come from just letting go and realizing that we are powerless. 
I’m a slow learner. 
IN OUR HOMESCHOOL THIS WEEK… 
Oh man… ROUGH, ROUGH week. 60% blatant defiance and 40% pure exhaustion. 
Not much got accomplished, and certainly nothing extraordinary. 
We did do a bit of studying on career paths, talents, strengths and abilities. 
We also spotlighted poetry for literature. That part was really lovely actually. We gave it the chunk of an afternoon and I wished it wouldn’t have ended… 
I AM INSPIRED BY… 
the stories you read/see of people who true difficulties that they overcome with amazing success- all because they try and work heard to do it and don’t play the victim card. (People with no legs, playing sports; a mom with no arms being a stay at home, homemaker with her baby; etc…)
PLACES WE’RE GOING, PEOPLE WE’RE SEEING… 
Swimming, basketball practice, basketball games, field trips, movies and dinner with friends, life group, youth group, super bowl get together… I kind of feel like all we’re doing is going. Tonight i get to have craft club. we’re a small group but I think even if it was just me- i’d love it… 
MY FAVORITE THING THIS WEEK WAS… 
My monday night phone call with my BFF. It really centered me in a way i’d been needing. 
Second to that would be that I started doing the Writer’s Book of Days in a journal and it feels really great! 
THINGS I AM WORKING ON…
being more patient. 
making my way to my manuscript. (When???) 
finding the magic solution that will make our school days so much less traumatic. 
I’M READING… 
The death and life of charlie st. cloud by Ben Sherwood
Poetry
SHE’S READING… 
Poetry
I’M COOKING… 
cookies; roast with root vegetables; an awesome mushroom and sun-dried tomato pasta; tortellini and spinach soup; fresh bread; berry loaded muffins… 
I’M GRATEFUL FOR…
My rock of a husband. My small handful of dearest friends. They are my sounding boards, my cheerleaders, my sources of courage and strength. SERIOUSLY grateful… Two arms that work, two legs that work, a neck and back that work. 
I’M PRAYING FOR… 
My friends who have found themselves unemployed for far too long now. 
A PHOTO, LINK, VIDEO OR QUOTE… 

my nephew… he’s way funny. 
He makes me smile. :) 
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Two…

Published on by Mae @ Rainydayinmay1 Comment
Me– 
– new schedule. Making sure I survive my days by making my life NOT all Genny centric. it’s tough… 
– Read two books for me. i did it January, but January also had 2 extra days AND didn’t have any visits from Lucas… Maybe i’ll choose 2 short books. :) 
– Friendships. i need to work on this. My three closest friends live nowhere near here… I miss them. I need to focus on building closer friendships. 
– Small Academy awards get together… I’m excited. 
– personal writing… this has got to improve. since it’s a matter of days before Lucas arrives, i figure i’m going to exhibit grace on myself for this… I once heard that if you truly want to be writing, you will be. While I believe it, i also know i TRULY want/need to be- and I’m not. 
– smash book… 
– start working through the Writer’s Book of Days again… I need the diving board. 
Capture– 
-Valentines
– Sweet
– Date Night Dinner
– hello
– See You Later
– Focus Tree
– Roses
– wine (glass or bottle) 
– footballish
– love
Us– 
– Lucas is coming home for leave. CAN NOT WAIT… 
– GREAT movies coming out this month. {!!!}
– good conversations, with friends… good conversations with our family… 
– celebrating the twelfth birthday of my beautiful niece. 
– board games. Our lives need more board games. 
– Electronicless evenings. 
– cell phone less dinners. 
Heart– 
– I’ve found I am getting easily frustrated with my mom and my sister. i really need to work on that without tearing down the vitally constructed boundaries that are there for my sanity. 
– Getting more involved in our church. 
– continuing to volunteer in our community. 
– patience… it’s good for my heart, I hear. And though my physical heart is fine, my soul-heart needs more patience… and a slower acceleration rate to anger. 
Home– 
– there is a bad sort of stressful, hurtful unrest that settled down over our home. For a few reasons the past week has seen a release in that but i am going to work towards making sure that this pattern continues. 
– we have a cool entry way project that i’m hoping we’ll get done this month. SUPER excited about it! 
– entertain once or twice. 
Health–
– our quest to eat whole has been a good one. It’s amazing how much better we feel, in various ways. Less headaches, more consistent energy. The one thing that is really interesting is that we hungry a lot more… I’m guessing that’s a good thing. 
– water. loving water being a part of our time together. Swimming, play… It’s been great. 
– more tea. 
– yoga. Not just talking about yoga. 
– dancing… the Ellen kind. Whenever possible. 
– speaking of dancing- learn the shuffle… 
Love– 
– we don’t do the romantic Valentines thing. i think it’s ridiculous actually. But, we will have a date night in February and i’m excited for that. 
– we’re currently reading through the Sacred Marriage devotional, and I love it. 
– In January life circumstances led us to a lot of quality conversations… I’m grateful to see this pattern continuing. 
– truly kiss, daily. 
– continue finding ways to respect him. 
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à l’examen…

Published on by Mae @ Rainydayinmay4 Comments
Can you believe it’s the last day of January? it blows my mind how quickly time moves when you are into your adulthood… 
Today is a good day! 
Today is the birthday of someone who is, and will forever be, very dear to me. Not a year passes that i don’t think of this person and the amazing gifts they have- and send them good thoughts and love when this day comes… 
Today is also the birthday of one of the MOST INCREDIBLE women i’ve ever know… Her name is Joan and she truly is the most amazing woman on the planet… 
Last, but not least, today is the day that my Lucas is en route to the US, from Germany, for his pre-deployment leave! WOO HOO! Even having him on US soil will do my heart ridiculously good! 
In review of my January goal list, i didn’t do awful. I didn’t drink “no soda”, but it was a rare thing. {Very rare} so I’m not too upset about it…

And, I had to change a few things up in my photo challenge, for the month. Like, the fact that there were NO icicles, and that there was no bundling of children because the one day it was frigid enough for such fun, we were trapped at home… 

 Pajamas… 
first meal… {sort of…} 
 Something new… Chw shaved his Goatee of 15 years and poor Genny was NOT pleased.
 Cup of tea and books to read… 
 Winter reading… 
 first snow of the year. {that’s as good as it got, folks…}
 our Tree… January. 
 Cup of steaming soup… 
 Baking… 
 Happy Birthday, Kaileigh… 
And a bonus… :) 

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journaling {week two}

Published on by Mae @ Rainydayinmay5 Comments
IN MY LIFE THIS WEEK… 
It was a good week, over all. Monday started rocky but we got some good news, (major answer to prayers) and so that was a good thing. 
I also got a few fun freelance opportunities. 
We celebrated the second birthday of my amazingly beautiful miracle niece, Kaileigh, which was great… And then there was lots of chaos and going…  
IN OUR HOMESCHOOL THIS WEEK… 
I decided to go easy on myself and get over the self imposed guilt and pressure… and though still a big rough- there was definite improvement! 
We studied time management and I think keeping a time journal was a good way for Genny to see how incredibly long she takes on things. A typical day would have her moving through school at a defiant, turtle pace and then getting angry at me because she finishes so late and I give her too much. The journal motivated her to get through things well, with no “corrections” and she found she could be done by lunch, or soon there-after… 
I AM INSPIRED BY… 
I have some really lovely people in my life. I have a friend whose mother is fighting breast cancer and both mother and my friend have been incredible sources of inspiration for me. 
We found out, for certain, about our daughter Amanda’s ship out date for boot camp. Her eagerness and excitement inspires me, as well as scares me. With Lucas preparing to deploy this spring it is all a lot of overwhelming fear junk for my heart, but still, when I am honest with myself I realize that both of them just BLOW ME AWAY… 
They make me take notice of the present in a powerful way. 
PLACES WE’RE GOING, PEOPLE WE’RE SEEING… 
We have a field trip to the aquarium today, which we are looking forward to. We had went to a local coffee place for chai and no bakes while we read our literature book and wrote letters. It was amazing. We went swimming, Genny had two basketball practices and a game tomorrow. Looking forward to family date night tonight. Going to pizza and to see a movie. 
MY FAVORITE THING THIS WEEK WAS… 
It’s a tie…
1}On Tuesday night Genny’s basketball team had team photos. Since she’s part of a community sports league this meant that there were literally hundreds of kids, (of all ages) conglomerating in groups of their team t-shirts, awaiting their turn. It was a long, tedious evening. As Chw and I had nothing to do but sit at a table and send stupid text messages back and forth. We discussed philosophical things such as frozen yogurt and displayed our mad-skillz making many emoticon faces. At one point he says to me, “we’re so lame.” 
2} Roughly a half an hour later we are home, and he (wearing contacts) picks up the pair of eye glasses on his  nightstand and says “I really need to order new glasses. These are all scratched up, I mean-” He then puts them on his face to further point out their flaws when he jumps back AT LEAST a foot and shouts “WOAH! WHAT THE HECK?!?!?” I immediately start laughing. Wearing your contacts? His slight “oh, yeah.” reassured him nothing catastrophic had happened to his vision. 
Lucky for me, i’m a little less lame. :)
THINGS I AM WORKING ON…
A few freelance projects coming on. Looking for inspiration for my Smash Book, so I can get it started. Planning a couple of small parties… Nothing too major. 
I’M READING… 
Trying to read (still) Lost by Greggory Maguire. I don’t know if it’s that my last book was so real life/sad that this tale is losing me, or what the deal is really… Hopefully by next week it will be a DIFFERENT tale! 
SHE’S READING… 
Treasure Island. :) 
I’M COOKING… 
Macaroni and Cheese; Fish Tacos; Fresh Baked bread… Nurture, nurture, nurture… 
I’M GRATEFUL FOR…
So, so much. Healthy husband. Healthy kids. Heat and roof over my head. A passion for writing. A handful of amazing friends. My camera. 
I’M PRAYING FOR… 
My kids… Lucas is getting ready to come home on leave and Amanda is getting ready to leave for basic. Genny is really struggling and I feel like i don’t have it in me quite often… 
My sister’s health is a gigantic mess. I miss her so much, I feel in so many ways like I’ve lost one of my best friends. She just isn’t able to be there for me anymore and though I totally understand- i miss her something awful. 
A PHOTO, LINK, VIDEO OR QUOTE… 
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