Visiting the M Family: June Edition

We just spent a wonderful weekend visiting with the M family at our house, so I thought it was about time I finally finished the draft on our trip to their house earlier this summer. Not only did we have a blast hanging out with them, but Dave and Christine made sure to plan in some special adventures that made it feel like a real summer get-away. 

We arrived the Friday before Caleb's 2nd birthday party. It was Caleb's first long distance ride alone in the back seat. He was a champ all 3 hours and didn't need mommy to go back even once! Dave and Christine welcomed us with an amazing grilled salmon and shrimp dinner. Yum!

Saturday morning, Caleb decided to wake at 5:15am. It was every bit as painful as it sounds. It made me thankful that we're all old parents now and had gone to bed around 10p the night before. Despite the early wake up call, we still didn't get everyone ready to leave for strawberry picking until around 8:45. That's toddler time for you : )

Caleb wants Elias to open his belated birthday present, but decides he needs a little help. Elias does not amused by this intrusion.

The farm where we went picking grew several different types of strawberries. After taste-testing, the "Early Glow" variety were the clear winners. Their season was almost over so we did a lot of picking through rotted ones to find the ripe ones, but it was worth it. Caleb was even able to help!

So. Grown. Up.

Daddy's helper

Elias getting a taste of a very fresh strawberry.

Our final adventure at the farm, bee extraction. Great teamwork guys!

We brought the boys back for naps and they were both snoozing by 11. After they awoke, Dave and Christine took us to an Italian deli/grocery to pick up subs (which were incredible!). We ate picnic-style at a nearby park and the boys wore themselves out.

What's a family photo without a dinosaur in the mix?

Elias looking too cool in his shades.

We came back to the boarding school where Dave and Christine live (yes, they live in a school, how awesome is that???) and let the boys cool off in the pool. Needless to say, they went to bed early, completely exhausted. We didn't waste those evening hours of course. David and Dave bonded by beating Super Mario Brothers together and Christine taught me how to do a perl stitch in knitting.

Splashing in the pool.

Another great way too cool down. Some of the strawberries we picked may have ended up in Dave and Christine's ice cream maker.

Sunday morning, Caleb slept in slightly more, and woke at 5:45. David got up, while I finished sleeping. I woke up around 7:30 and remembered it was Father's Day (face palm moment...). I gave David his card and promised I'd make it up to him next weekend (which I did). Being the amazing husband and father he is, he wasn't upset at all and told me he was only "doing what you do everyday". *Swoon*

We all headed to protestant service a little bit later. Afterward, David, Caleb and I explored some neat looking shops in the area. We took Caleb into one of those hands-on kids' places. Apparently little ones under 2 get in free! Caleb had a blast playing in a firetruck, riding in a toy helicopter (which he wanted to go "up, up!") and splashing his hands in a rubber-ducky lazy river. On the way back to the car, we found a neat coffee shop and bought a bag of beans as a souvenir.

After Dave and Christine got home from Mass, we put the boys down for naps and ate lunch (which involved Sonny's Sweet Sauce, so you know it was amazing). Our little guys didn't sleep long so we took them over to a pond on the school's campus and let them throw rocks in the water, which they were infinitely amused by.

After a little more visiting time, we packed up the car and headed home. Caleb was so worn out from his fun weekend, he slept most of the way. We made a lot of wonderful summer memories. Thanks Dave and Christine!

A Golden Friendship...and the story of how I met my husband

At the end of summer camp each year we used to sing a song, "Make new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other gold." Since moving to Pennsylvania, God has blessed us with so many wonderful friends through our church, David's coworkers and our neighbors. Yet, there is always something so precious about spending time with those who've known us for years.

This weekend we were finally able to make it over to Philly to visit our friends Dave and Christine. The role they've played in our lives is a story worth telling. Dave M. and my David met when they were matched up as random room mates during their first year of gradschool at FSU. Dave M. and Christine were dating, but Christine still lived in Pennsylvania. After a year of doing the long-distance thing, she moved down to Florida so they could determine if God was moving them towards marriage.

I met Christine and Dave when they started attending the same church as me for their protestant service (Dave is Catholic, so they went to Mass also). Apparently, after the first time I met Dave and Christine, Dave went back to the apartment and informed David, his room mate who was 27 and had never had a girlfriend, that he needed to come to church to meet the woman he (David) was going to marry. David responded by rolling his eyes.

After a month of hearing Dave insist that this girl had a neon sign above her head that read "David's girl" on it, David finally caved in and came to church with them. He was in a bad mood since he already had a church home of his own across town and thought meeting a girl was a terrible reason to switch churches for a morning. I had no idea any of this was going on, but after being introduced to Dave's room mate, trying to start a conversation and receiving mono-syllabic answers...well, let's just say it wasn't love at first sight.

Dave convinced David that he needed to get to know me through the Weds night Bible study where he could actually have a conversation with me that went beyond, "What's your major?". Since David's church didn't have a Weds night service, he agreed.

David and I share a love of reading and discussing the Bible and it didn't take many Wednesday nights for us to become friends. We also shared similar tastes in movies and books and jokingly said we should combine our libraries. I admired David's singleness, as, at the time, I was pretty certain I was going to devote the next 5-10 years to teaching before settling down as wife and mother, if indeed that was something God had planned for me at all.

Dave M., however, had other plans. As the four of us became better friends he was there to, not so subtly, make sure David and I got to spend lots and lots of time together. Dave made sure that no matter how awkward or inconvenient it might be that wherever we went, David was the one sitting next to me, opening my car door and driving me home. Never mind that Christine and I were leaving at the exact same time and my apartment was on her way home, Dave was quick to volunteer that "David could drop you off." David was ready to murder him sometimes, I would just turn red and nod...yet somehow neither of us could be heard to complain...

When David finally worked up the courage to ask me to date him, Dave's advice was "Just kiss her!" Advice that was, thankfully, ignored. I'm grinning as I reflect on all these things. Although David was ready to kill Dave for his pushyness at times, I think we both needed a bit of a shove in the right direction!

Since those days, life has been busy for all of us. Dave and Christine married in 2008, David and I followed the next year. 2010 brought Caleb, and 2011 brought their son Elias. Both couples have moved at least twice and now here we are, all back in Pennsylvania together.

It would have been impossible for me to imagine, playing cranium and talking theology until 2 in the morning at the guys apartment in Florida, that in 5 years we'd all be hanging out again, this time in Pennsylvania. We're still talking theology...but not past 10:30 because we all have to be ready to greet our energetic toddlers in the morning. Now, I can't imagine it any other way.

We feel so blessed for this friendship that has survived distance, moves, and life changes. We're thankful for friends who remind us of those days when we were first falling in love, who challenge us, who are willing to be transparent about how difficult marriage and parenting can be, and who know what it's like to survive colic and a baby who doesn't sleep.

Of course, it's not all theology and serious discussions. The guys went climbing Saturday morning, despite the fact that this was the view outside the window.

Christine is expecting a very special delivery in 6 months, so she and I stayed home and played with the kiddos

Once the guys got back home there was even more fun. Dave and Elias chasing Caleb.

Daddy is base!

A Valentine Tradition

I love traditions. Some families have more, some have less, and sometimes the traditions we build taper off as years pass and circumstances change. One of my favorite traditions growing up was baking Christmas cookies with my mom. As far back as I can remember, I was perched on top of a little, plastic, yellow chair pouring, mixing, rolling and baking.

As the years passed, one cookie often found itself not getting made in time for Christmas, the Sugar Cookie. Due to needing to roll out the dough, cut the shapes and add sprinkles, it was much more time consuming than it's drop cookie cousins. Most people aren't big sugar cookie fans, and I can understand why. But this isn't any sugar cookie. It's my Grandma Betty's Sour Cream Sugar Cookie. Not only does it taste like happy Christmas memories to me, but I think it's objectively the best sugar cookie I've ever eaten in both taste and texture.

After Christmas passed I'd usually keep asking for this cookie, and my mom would assure me we'd make it for Valentine's Day instead. And we did (by we, I of course mean my mom did 95% of the work and I added sprinkles). The recipe makes enough to share with an entire classroom (or 3) and red sprinkle hearts are just as yummy as green sprinkle trees.

I made these cookies by myself for the first time when David and I were engaged. My friend Stacey and I had driven up to PA to visit him while we were on our winter break. We spent our week baking and enjoying the snow before driving back to Florida to visit family.

The first Christmas we were married, I had terrible morning sickness and wasn't feeling up to baking much of anything. The next Christmas we were living in an apartment in Florida temporarily for David's job and I was finally getting to sleep in 2-3 hour stretches for the first time since our 5-month-old was born. Again, no cookies.

This Christmas, I had every intention of finally baking at least 5 types of cookies, including sour-cream sugar cookies. I ended up baking 3 types of cookies and learning what my mother and grandmother before me already knew- baking is fun, but it takes a lot of time! So I took another page out of their play-book and have now, officially, decided Sour Cream Sugar Cookies are going to be a Valentine (not Christmas) tradition.

Although Caleb often helps me with my baking projects, I did this one solo, after his bed time.

Rolled and Cut hearts

Extracting X's and O's from the dough was a challenge

Finally ready for the oven. No wonder my mom says it used to make her want to cry to see me feed these to the dogs because I wanted to "share" : )

Finished Product! Kudos to my husband for capturing this cool shot.

Caleb enjoying the fruits of my labor at play date today. Happy Valentine's Day Buddy!

I wasn't the only one who was thinking dessert today. We had an unplanned mini-Valentine's party.

The boys had a blast as usual

Why I'm Pretty Sure We Have the Nicest Friends Ever

It's nothing personal, I'm sure your friends are very nice too. In fact, until yesterday I might not have been willing to make the claim that we, in fact, have the nicest friends out there, but where I was already pretty certain, I am now sure.

See, being our friend can be a bit risky. Our nearest family is at least 10 hours away so unless the inevitable crisis's of life happen to fall on one of the 4 weeks each year when we have family in town, one of our friends is probably going to get a phone call.

For instance, if I wake up in the middle of the night with the stomach flu when my husband is away for a week, you might get a phone call that goes something like this:

Me: "Can you keep your phone by your bed, that way, in case I'm too sick to care for my child I can call you, potentially expose you (and your whole family) to this bug and let you care for my child while I go to the doctor? Thanks." Friendship with us = risk. And if I really like you, you might get this call more than once (lucky you Lindsay!)

Other help our friends have heaped on us have included: A couple (Vince and Trudi!) who raked every leaf from our gigantic maple tree while we were in FL for six months (that's about 30 mega lawn bags full, btw), a neighbor (Jay!) who plowed our driveway that entire time (even if it was just an inch of snow because he wanted the house to look "lived in"), friends who rocked my colicky baby so I could get a break (Both Jen's and Lindsay again!), neighbors who loan their truck every time we need to haul something home from lowes, and men from church who helped us get our home ready (in a way that involved carpentry skills!) for a now-mobile baby when we returned from FL.

I'm sure I am missing some big things and that list doesn't even include all the random acts of kindness like bringing in our mail for us or taking our garbage cans up the driveway just in case we weren't home or handing us a hunk of salmon from a fishing recent fishing trip.

Many of these people volunteered to do these things, not because they are close friends, but because they want to be Christ's hands and feet in this world and over the past two years, our family has needed a lot of helping hands and people willing to step out. We could not be more thankful.

Yesterday though, I was once again overwhelmed by the willingness of others to give. Imagine this (if you can).

Friends of ours had offered to give us a load of manure from their farm to fill our recently built garden bed. We could even transport it in their farm truck, we just needed to load it, haul it and unload it. With my pain issues, I knew I wasn't going to be much help, but it was a big job and I felt like my husband could really use a helping hand. He couldn't bring himself to ask for help shoveling manure though, but was fine with me doing so : )

So I decided to call our friends Chris and Maureen. Chris will probably forever regret telling us he grew up on a farm. Here's a synopsis of the day:

Me: "Hey Maureen, so I know you and I have been wanting to catch up, so I was wondering if you were free this afternoon and *cough* couldChrishelpDavidshovelmanure *cough* while we hang out?
Maureen: "Sure we'll be right over."
Me: "Really? Wow, thank you, thank you, thank you."
Chris (to David, as they were on their way): "We were just trying to figure out what to do with our afternoon when you called! It's such a nice day, I wanted to spend some time outside."
David: "This is your idea of how to spend a nice day outdoors?"
Chris (after all the manure was shoveled): That was great, I feel so productive!"
Me: "Have a warm brownie...after you wash your hands..."

You read that correctly, not only did our friends come over, on short notice, to help up move poop, they got a brownie in return. Nicest. Friends. Ever. However, if you think you can beat that story, I'd love to hear it : )