A Very Good Day

Before bed last night Kyle and I were talking, and we decided that we had just had a very good day. Well, a pretty good weekend, really. Friday night, instead of going out to eat, we had leftovers. Since we ate kind of light and didn't spend any money, we treated ourselves to ColdStone!! That right there would be enough to make the weekend great for me. (And don't get too excited, because while it does get a little better, it's still pretty ordinary...)

Saturday morning, since we went to bed at 10:30, we were up and at 'em around 6:30. We (I) have decided that sleeping more that eight hours a night is just a waste of time, especially on the weekend. We made a good breakfast, straightned up the house a little, then went outside to work in the yard. This part was surely not very exciting for Kyle, because he HATES yardwork, but I think that when he saw how good it looked (relatively speaking) he was glad we got it done. Besides, he knows how excited I get about things looking good around the house. It had been several weeks since our last yardwork day, so it took most of the day. The two hour lunch to hang out with our friend Ed set us back a little, but that's ok. I think Ed was procrastinating...he's supposed to be studying for an exam. We didn't mind.

I have been trying to decide how to landscape the side of our house for about 6 months now. For some reason, I have the desire to be creative. Unfortunatey, I'm not. I've been riding around the Garden District for months to try to come up with a landscaping design, but the only thing I'm sure of at this point is that I want some Crepe Myrtles. So, when we finished the yard, we loaded up Luke and went to Dothan Nurseries. Before we left, Kyle says, "We're just going to run in and buy a couple of trees, right." Oh, yeah, shouldn't take long. That place is like a botanical garden. We were only there for about an hour, but it would have been longer if we weren't supposed to meet someone for dinner. Which brings me to the next great part of our weekend.

John Riddle is the minister (is that what you call him?) who married Kyle and me five years ago. He has his own discipleship ministry and Kyle's family first met him when they worked at the Big Oak Ranch many years ago(right?). He has counseled Kyle and his family a lot over the years and me a little. I think he has God's cell phone number. Such a neat guy. He came through Dothan Saturday night on his way home from St. George Island where he has been working on writing a book this summer. We met him at the Old Mill Restaurant where he bought our dinner. (We will have to physically restrain him so we can pay next time.) He always has encouragement and advice for us and this time we wanted to talk about all of the craziness going on in our great nation these days. He, of course, knew just what to tell us to get us on the right track. I'll just say here that what he said made perfect sense, so I can continue telling you about our weekend. I'll give you his advice in another post...

After dinner on Saturday, we came home to put Luke to bed. We kept him up late the night before, so we were sure he'd be exhausted when we got home. Not so much. Lots of screaming when we put him down. I'd like to think it is because he has had an ear infection this week, but I think it was just because he wanted to play:






He has really gotten the hang of that walker! Loves to crash into things and is already rolling up to the cabinets and trying to open them. Oh, boy. I'm going to have my hands full! At sometime after 9, I finally gave him an extra bottle and had to hold him down and rock him to sleep.

Oh, yeah! Forgot to say that before dinner we got in a Crossfit workout. I finally got the hang of Kipping pull-ups and I did 45 in nine minutes!!

On Sunday morning, we took Luke to the nursery for Sunday School and big church. It was the first time for both. He was fussing when we came to pick him up, but they said he did great. Since we started going to First Baptist, we have been going to Dr. Ken Clark's class. He is such a great teacher and we love the group. I recently did a study of "The Power of a Praying Wife" with my friend Denise and some girls from her class. We decided to visit that one this week and it was really great, too! So now I think we have decided to join First Baptist, but we're not sure which Sunday School class to join. There are more couples who have just started having babies like us in the new group we visited. Maybe we should stay with those guys for now and move up to Dr. Clark's class together later...

One thing about Sunday that made it so great was the food we ate. For lunch, we used leftover rotissere chicken and made it into wraps with tomato, turkey bacon, lettuce, avacado, feta cheese, bruschetta (got it at Sam's, it is SO good) and greek dressing. Oh my gosh! We decided that we need to open a little Italian Bistro one day. It was that good! Our dinner could be on the menu, too. We just took everything in the refrigerator and pantry that could be considered Italian and mixed it with some whole wheat noodles. We had artichoke, kalamata olives, roasted red peppers, bruschetta, italian seasoning, garlic and chicken strips in there. YUM!

After lunch, Kyle was so sweet to plant my new Crepe Myrtles. Just as soon as we got started, though, we noticed a huge dark cloud coming our way. Wouldn't you know that the only rain shower all weekend was while he was planting those trees. And it stopped just as soon as he was wrapping it up. The rain didn't slow him down though. Here was my and Luke's view:



When that was all done we took Luke for a run at Westgate. I've been running a little lately, so this time was much easier than the last. I think I'm ready to do a 5K! Barry was at our house waiting for us to do Crossfit when we got back. Five rounds of 7 muscle-ups and 21 Burpees. Needless to say, after running 3 miles, I decided to sit that one out!

By then it was dinner time and we got Luke to bed a little easier. That's when we decided that it had been a very good day and that we needed to start assessing every day at the end. We only have so many! That may sound a little depressing, but as Mr. Riddle put it, our time here is just "a parenthesis in eternity." What a great parenthesis it can be, though. Every stage of Luke's life so far has been so much fun. Trying at times, but fun. And I feel like every stage will be. Lots of coloring and drawing, reading, doing math, playing sports, college years, getting married, then start it all over with grandkids! So much to look forward to. Even on the short-term. Our friend Josh Parrish is the offensive coordinator at Northview, so when we go to his games we can get a little preview of what highschool will be like. Also, my parents are coming to visit this week and we plan to go see Kyle's parents in September to see their new place in Mentone. We hope to get to see the Roden's and Warren's in Albertville next month, too!

Speaking of stages, we lowered Luke's mattress last night. He just didn't realize that he could have climbed out for a while now!