I've dealt with it for too long.  I'm tired of my custom header being hidden behind the windows live spaces header.  Quoting one of the best movies of all time, "Nobody puts Baby in a corner."  I'm moving over to blogspot.  It's been fun here at windows live spaces, but I feel called to move on.  You can find me here:

 

 

...between me and ezra

 

mama: what's your favorite thing about daddy?

ezra:  he plays baseball with me

 

mama:  who's your favorite friend?

ezra:  isaac

 

mama:  what's your favorite thing to do?

ezra:  skunk

 

mama:  what do you want to be when you grow up?

ezra:  a youth 'mister' and a golfer

 

...and then he promptly picked a booger and tried to put it on my face.

 

 

 

     

 

     

...zucchini bread

...Simon's smile

...swimming after dark

...daddy coming in the door at the end of the day

...music playing in the kitchen

...Grammie helping with the laundry

...Starbucks from Nicole

...Ezra's wardrobe

...good friends

...homemade ice cream

...a magazine and a few minutes to read it

...Isaac's helpfulness

...my Bible and a cup of coffee in the morning

...checking things off of my list

...having a dishwasher

Watching that video we made for Tim's birthday was shocking to me.  Somehow, I could not see that messy desk in real life, but putting it out in cyberspace for everyone to see opened my eyes to the mess formerly known as my desk.  So, I went right to work, organizing and straightening.  It looks so much better now. 

 

     

 

I guess now I need to video the six loads of laundry on my dining room table so that I will feel compelled to put them away...

Happy Birthday to our hero, their movie-watching buddy, our provider, my lover, my best friend, their soccer coach, our pastor, our comforter, our encourager, our teacher, their baseball-playing buddy, their daddy, my sweet love...

 

I remain...the luckiest!!

 

 

 

For something different, I thought I'd find the oldest picture in my files and write about it.  In my picasa files, this picture was in a folder of scanned photos from Tim's Grandma, or GG, as we call her.  The photo is of Tim's parents, and I'm guessing they're in California based on the other pictures in the folder. 

 

They were so young.  As I looked at them, I couldn't help but wonder--did they even imagine how their lives would turn out?  Did they guess that he would die before all three of their children were married?  Did he know he would only live to see one of his (so far) seven grandchildren be born?  Did she know she would one day go on without him? 

 

If they had known, would they have done anything differently?  Would they have spent their time or their money or their energy on different things?  Would knowing have changed anything for them or was life lived to the fullest even without the knowing?

 

I have a deep longing to jump into this picture and warn them--don't forget to kiss each other good night every single night, lavish each other with encouragement and love, play baseball with the boys every chance you get, smile knowingly at each other every time your little girl is pretending to be a princess, don't sweat the small stuff....

 

...and yet I can't warn them.  I can, however, consider myself warned.  I can't possibly know what's coming, so I choose to live each day with the warning in the back of my mind.  I'll kiss Tim goodnight even on those nights I'm going to bed irritated.  I'll play baseball when they ask and even sometimes when they don't.  The princess thing?? None of that happening here, but I WILL PLAY BASEBALL!!  I'll choose not to sweat the small stuff...

 

...because my guess is they did not even imagine it.

Our family has been laughing so hard at this that we have all almost peed our pants!!  Enjoy...

 

 

Each of my "boys" enjoyed it in his own way...

 

     

 

 

     

 

I'd like to share with you my evening's activities, and I do mean the WHOLE evening (just kidding--sort of!!).  Just call me the Pioneer Woman, with my before and after Photoshop Creation...

 

 

If you're going to hide something in your heart, I would highly suggest scripture.  However, a silly little poem worked for me today.  When I was younger, I went to B and Bubba's house every day after school.  They had an embroidered poem on the nursery wall which read:

So, today, during the second round of playing Cootie with Ezra (I LOATHE Cootie!!!!!), which was following two games of Lucky Ducks, this very poem kept going through my head.  I really didn't even know I had memorized it, but, as I wondered where in the recesses of my brain it was coming from, I remembered reading it over and over as I waited for B and Bubba to wake up each afternoon.  Thank you, little poem, for keeping me in the game when I might have otherwise gotten up to finish folding the laundry.

My mama has five brothers and sisters, as well as a half sister and a half brother who were older and out of the house before the rest of the crew was born.  My mama's oldest brother, John, died this spring, and my dad died 15 years ago.  Other than that, all of the siblings are still alive and still married to their orignial spouses.  I think that is incredible.  I love the example of commitment and love that they have all set for me.  I have heard the stories of the difficult years including poverty, sickness, and extreme sorrow.  I have also heard the stories from the years of plenty and joy.  I love knowing that all of their marriages made it through both kinds of circumstances.  This weekend, we had a "Sellers Family Reunion" which was also a surprise celebration of my Aunt Kathie and Uncle Mickey's 40th Anniversary and my Uncle Tom and Aunt Betty's 50th Anniversary.  That's them in the picture coming in and being surprised.  My Aunt Kathie and Aunt Betty are cutting the cake--I'm not sure how Uncle Mickey and Uncle Tom got out of it, but I guess after 40 and 50 years, they've learned to let their wives do the fancy jobs. :) 

 

      

 

Simon was worn out from all the kisses and hugs!!

 

 

Aunt Mary, Aunt Kathie, my mama, and Aunt Irene

 

 

During the Mexican Train Domino game, Ezra kept score in his own way!

Well, actually, Mark is my cousin, and Lori is married to Mark.  I hardly remember a time when there wasn't a Lori, though, so, at this point, let's just call her my cousin.  Just today, I was telling Tim that I remember going to Mark and Lori's wedding.  It seemed to take forever to get there, and I remember that I had a new dress on and I felt as pretty as a princess.  The whole way there, I imagined that the flower girl (who I think was maybe Lori's little sister??) would somehow not be able to do her job and I would be asked to step in and save the day with my new dress and princess-like aura.  I don't know if I thought I was going to take out the flower girl with my amazing kung-fu moves or food poison her in the dressing room--I just remember being sure they would come rushing to our row and whisk me away to join the bridal party.  Isn't it funny the things we remember? 

 

We had a big family shindig today, and I found out that Lori actually checks this blog EVERY SINGLE DAY to see if I've written anything new.  If you've read this blog for any time at all, you know that she is often disappointed.  So, I resolve, for Lori's sake, to write more often because I truly feel sorry for someone who has nothing more exciting in her life than to see if I've written about bears licking pullups or my big belly, crunchy ham, and Easter baskets all in the same post.  I'm just kidding, Lori!!!!!

 

Really, though, I am going to do more blogging--'cause it's fun and 'cause it's good for me to process this life of ours and 'cause I JUST LOVE MY COUSIN LORI!!!!

 

We're at church camp this week.  Tim is the dean of a junior high week, and I am normally in a dorm room with girls.  This year, however, since Simon is still little, I'm staying in the Joshua Lodge, a fairly new dorm for deans' families.  The Joshua Lodge is basically the old chapel (with all the garage doors, for you Camp Illiana alumni) made into a really nice lodge.  Ezra and Simon are staying with me, and Isaac who pretty much thinks he's 13, is staying in the dorm with dad.

 

Last night, as I was just about to drift off to sleep, it hit me that I was literally lying in the exact spot where, 17 years ago, I felt like the biggest loser in the world.  Of course, I've had other moments in my life when I've felt like a loser, but this one stands out to me.  I had come to high school camp alone.  My youth minister brought me and was staying the week, but I didn't know any other kids.  I was already homesick after about an hour, and I really didn't want to be here.  I got put in a family group, and our group was sitting in exactly the spot where my bed is this week.  One of the questions we had to answer was, "when was your first kiss?".  Well, I hadn't ever been kissed (and, little did I know, I wouldn't be kissed until the night Tim proposed to me), so I had to say, "I've never been kissed."  One of the girls in the group looked at me like I was an alien and said, "Are you serious?", and the rest of the group looked at me in a way that made me feel so unloved, unwanted, stupid.   I wanted to fall in a hole or die.  I know they didn't mean it, but, in that moment, I felt as if no one would ever choose me or see me as beautiful.

 

Now, here I am, married to the hot guy in charge of the week and sleeping in the very spot where I felt such pain.  He really does...He takes our "ugly" and makes it beautiful.  I love Him...I sooooo love Him.

Ezra is potty training.  It's a blast.  Tonight he told me that his pull-up was not net wet because he peed in it, but, rather, because a bear licked it.  Ok.  I would be concerned about this if I didn't know that many of the things that come out of Ezra's mouth are things he makes up!  Earlier this week, we were going swimming and we were out of swim diapers.  Tim put a thick pair of training underpants on Ezra and told him, "you can wear these underneath your swim trunks."  A couple of days later, we were going swimming again and I said, "oh, shoot, I forgot to get swim diapers."  Ezra quickly replied, "That's ok.  I can wear my neath.  Daddy told me that swimmers wear a neath."  After a few minutes of confusion, I figured out that the training underpants which Tim described as going "underneath the swim trunks" now have a new name--a neath!!!

 

Meanwhile, Isaac is spending his summer working through his "learn to draw" book and begging to swim every day.  He leaves for an overnighter at church camp bright and early tomorrow morning.  He's totally excited about it, but mom and dad can't believe he's old enough to go.  One of Tim's college classmates is the dean of the overnighter which is really fun.  Isaac and Daddy sang the song "Watching You" (look it up on You Tube if you've never heard it!) on Sunday for Father's Day.  They did a super job, and Isaac wasn't even nervous!!

 

Simon is happy to just eat, sleep, and poop. 

 

 

 

I've had "blog paralysis" because, really, how do you sum up with typed words the birth of a child??  I've been looking for just the right picture, searching for just the right words to document Simon's arrival into the world.  I've determined there are no pictures and no words that do it justice.  So, what will I do?  I'll just skip it.  He was born.  His name is Simon.  That's all I'm telling you!!!! HA!  Moving on...

 

Here we are on Mother's Day.  I am absolutely in love with being the mama of three boys.  However, we're already struggling with keeping enough cereal and milk in the house.  I'm guessing this will only get worse!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I saw this fun little meme and decided to do it today.  I won't tag anyone specifically, but, if it looks fun to you, consider yourself tagged to put the same thing on your blog--well, not the same exact thing, please don't steal my memories!!!! HA!!!

 

Ten years ago...I was planning a wedding, buying a house, living with an 80 year old woman, and in the first week of my first real job--can you say "stress points"???  My mama and Tim dropped me off in Richton Park, IL, on Easter Sunday (that sounds so harsh...they actually stayed a few days, but Easter Sunday was the day they left and I bawled like a baby!!).  I was starting my first real job as a children's minister at Deer Creek Christian Church in University Park, IL.  The next day, Jeff and Linda Noel came to help me house hunt, and I bought a house a couple of weeks later for me and Tim--yikes!!  I lived with Mary Burton, a widow in the church who had just become a Christian a few years before.  I had so much fun with her and her neighbor Claire--they were more crazy than my college friends, I think.  We got married in May and Tim started working at Deer Creek, also.  The first week back from our honeymoon, we lived with Dave and Carrie Moore and their two daughters because we couldn't close on our house yet.  The next weekend we drove to Tennessee, packed up the moving van (my stuff was still there), stopped in Kentucky and loaded some things from Tim's house, then stopped in Marshall and loaded up stuff from my mama's.  We arrived in Chicago just in time to sign the papers, then we moved in that night.  The Bulls were playing a big game that night, so our new coworkers (who were helping us move in) were a little distraught that we didn't actually own a tv.  I've always felt bad about that, but, hey, what can you do when you're newlyweds and have no clue how to be grown-ups!?!  Wow.  I'm worn out just typing this--we must have been younger then--I couldn't handle all of that stress now. :)

 

Twenty years ago...I was finishing up 8th grade.  I didn't have a date to the 8th grade dance, so I got my picture taken with my dad (my parents were chaperones).  I'm thinking this should have been embarassing to me, but I don't remember whether it was or not.  HA!  I had baby pink high heeled shoes to wear with my dress and giant pink rectangle earrings--I thought I was it!!!  I was looking forward to high school, as I remember.  I'd say my junior high years were not the best years of my life.  In fact, you couldn't pay me to go back.  I loved the movie Dirty Dancing, although my mama was very mad that I had watched it at a friend's house.  I dreamed of my own Patrick Swayze coming along to tell my dad that "nobody puts Jennifer in a corner".  Now, twenty years later, here I am married to my own hot hunk of a sweaty man.    If you have any questions about what my life was like, simply rent the movie "Thirteen Going on Thirty".  The year Jenna was 13 was the same year I was 13.  I had many of the same clothes, belts, and hair barrettes that she wore in the movie!!

 

Thirty years ago...I was three years old.  Truthfully, I don't remember much about that year.  I think we went on a trip to West Virginia to visit my aunt and uncle and cousins.  The only thing I remember from that trip (and I can't believe I even remember anything!!) is that their trailer was on the edge of a cliff that dropped about 15 feet to a creek and I was constantly scared that we were all going to fall in, trailer and all.  I think I might have started dancing lessons that year, too, and I probably thought I would grow up to be a balerina.  Oh well,  some dreams are meant to die.

 

Oh, the memories..these are just a few.  Come on...don't be shy.  Let us hear your memories!!

 

Jennifer