From May's Parents Magazine:

1 3/4 cup all-purpose baking mix (like Bisquick)
1/2 cup quick oats
1/2 cup plus 1 Tbsp. sugar, divided
3/4 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
1 cup blueberries
 
Heat oven to 375.  Line 12 muffin cups with muffin liners.  In a large bowl, combine baking mix, oats and 1/2 cup sugar.  In a medium bowl, beat together the milk, egg and vegetable oil.  Stir milk mixture into dry mixture.  Add blueberries.  Place batter in muffin cups.  Sprinkle tops with remaining sugar.  Bake for 17 minutes.

I am NOT a morning person.  But God saw fit to give me a little girl who is up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 6:00 a.m. sharp every day, no matter what time she went to bed the night before.  She has been like this since birth, and it has taken me her whole three years to just get over it and start getting up right at 6:00.  I have tried adjusting nap times, taking away naps, adjusting bed times, but it doesn't matter... she is going to get up 6:00 no matter what.

All that said... I am not a breakfast person either, but getting up at 6:00 every day pretty much requires that you eat something.  So, this little recipe has become a hit in my house.  It is quick, easy, fun and gets our morning moving.  Ainsley loves to help.
 

TIIIMBERRR....

Ok, so let's praise God for the good things:
No one got hurt.
It didn't fall the other way and hit my house.
It did not damage any of my neighbor's property. (Besides a few branches from a tree.)

More pictures of what my lawn looks like...

So, now here's the story...
We needed to take down three trees in our yard.  Two were smaller and rotting... the other was quite large, but part of it was dead and each time we had any amount of good wind a large piece came off.  My husband, being resourceful and not wanting to waste one precious dollar of our money, wanted to take them down himself.  (To his credit, his father convinced him this was a good idea.  What possesses these men sometimes???)  Should I mention that before this my husband had never once operated a chainsaw?  Anyway, the first two trees came down just fine.  I was very nervous about the third tree.  Josh and his dad had one other man helping them.  I was inside with the girls, my mother-in-law and the dogs.  My mother-in-law and I were like two nervous ninnies pacing around the house.  She tried to keep the girls busy and I tried to keep busy getting dinner ready.  But it was like watching a train wreck, you don't want to look, but you don't want to look away either.  The guys had a great plan to pull the tree the only way it could fall without damaging anything.  They had a very sturdy rope all ready, but I guess it just wasn't enough, the tree started falling the wrong way, the rope broke and down went the fence.  Thankfully, both my husband and Kevin got out of the way in time.

So, now we are cleaning up... and it will take awhile.  A long while...

One other thing to be thankful for... we have enough firewood to take us into the next century.

Are they not the cutest little girls you ever did see? 

I finally got Ainsley's three year pictures and Lorelei's six month pictures taken today.  Lorelei will be seven months tomorrow, so I guess they still count as her six month pictures, right??? Every time I scheduled them something bad would happen, so I decided to not schedule them in advance and just go... that worked out just fine.

Ainsley is such a ham.  I had the hardest time picking out poses of her.  I went with these two.

Lorelei wasn't in the mood to smile her big toothless grins, but we got a few good smiles anyway...

And one precious little pouty lip.

I love my girls!

Our Ainsley...

She's the reason my husband says it's just fine with him if we never have a boy.

And she's the reason I buy Spray & Wash in bulk. 

I should have known the load of mulch we had delivered this past weekend would be too much of a temptation.  Oh well.  Praise God for that Spray & Wash. 

Hope deferred maketh the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is the tree of life. Proverbs 13:12

Nothing is more grievous than the disappointment of a raised expectation, though not in the thing itself by a denial, yet in the time of it by a delay: Hope deferred makes the heart sick and languishing, fretful and peevish; but hope quite dashed kills the heart, and the more high the expectation was raised the more cutting is the frustration of it. It is therefore our wisdom not to promise ourselves any great matters from the creature, not to feed ourselves with any vain hopes from this world, lest we lay up matter for our own vexation; and what we do hope for let us prepare to be disappointed in, that, if it should prove so, it may prove the easier; and let us not be hasty.   Nothing is more grateful than to enjoy that, at last, which we have long wished and waited for: When the desire does come it puts men into a sort of paradise, a garden of pleasure, for it is a tree of life. It will aggravate the eternal misery of the wicked that their hopes will be frustrated; and it will make the happiness of heaven the more welcome to the saints that it is what they have earnestly longed for as the crown of their hopes.

~Matthew Henry

This is our hope tree.  Planted about this time last year... on the day our baby in heaven was to be born.  Yes, my hope has been deferred, but in God's timing, my desire will be fulfilled.  I have the hope that one day I will see my God, my Savior and the baby I never got to hold in my arms.  I am so happy that each spring this tree will bloom with the promise of that hope.

A little sunshine on a rainy day...

At least it's raining in our little part of the world today.  These pictures were taken a few days ago... when it was still sunny and warm outside.  Our forsythia is finally blooming.  I love it when that bush (tree?) blooms each spring.  I wish the flowers would last a little longer.  I had Ainsley help me pick out branches to cut off and take inside, so we could have a little piece of sunshine inside as well.  Every time I cut one and handed it to her, she would say, "I so love it."  It was SO precious.

From the end of the earth will I cry unto Thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.  Psalm 61:2

It's been a pretty normal, but kind of busy week around here.  The biggest change... my husband started working on his Master's degree this week.  Yup, that's right.  He's back in school, eight years after finishing his Bachelor's degree.  Do you remember that feeling on your first day of a college class when you were handed your syllabus, looked at it and took a big fat gulp?  It looked so overwhelming.  That's how Josh is feeling right now.  Hence the above verse.  I think we will be clinging to that in the coming months.  He is working on his Master's of Managment degree.  He is fortunate that he works for a company that pays for further education.  He will only have to pay the taxes on classes that are deemed "not work related."  We'll see how many they end up saying we have to pay the taxes on.  This first one that he's taking is not being taxed.  When he's finished with the degree, he gets $10,000 in company stock.  WOOHOO!  If that's not incentive to get the job done, I don't know what is!   The best part (to me, the selfish wife ) is that he's taking all of these classes online, so he does not have to leave the house one or two nights a week for school. 

For my friends and family who read this, but do not have a xanga site, so do not post comments, xanga has opened it up so people who do not have a site can still comment.  So that means, mom, grandma, Anel, everyone else... I better start seeing comments soon.  No more lurking for you!

Thank you all so very much for your kind comments to my last post.  I am feeling much better.  We have had a very busy rest of last week and beginning of this one.  But before I go into the comings and goings I want to share our praise.

By the grace of God my husband arrived home last Thursday evening.  His car promptly "died" in our driveway.  It was smoking, making a loud noise and had lost its power steering and other things that make the car a little more driveable.  We thought for sure his old Bronco had bit the dust and we were going to have to do some digging deep into our pockets to figure out what to do next.  However, once the smoke had cleared, it looked as though the fan belt had broken and the thingy that makes the fan belt go broke as well.  (Now doesn't that sound like I really know what I'm talking about?)  Josh's brother who is a car guy came over to take a look and thought he could fix it, so with about $30 in parts and a half an hour of work this afternoon, it is up and running again.  Praise the Lord!! 

So that's our praise and here's a little sunshine...
 
Little Miss Lorelei is such a delight.  I just love her to pieces. 

We have been having the best time as a family in this wonderfully beautiful weather.  I was thankful to not have a car on Friday and today because it made us stay home, take walks and enjoy the weather.  On Friday, Ainsley and I worked out in the yard most of the morning.  She is becoming quite the helper.  When Josh got home we were off on a new adventure... we went to Six Flags New England.  We live about 20 minutes away from the park, so my friend Amanda and I decided we wanted to get season tickets for both of our families and spend a lot of summer there with our girls (she has two girls as well). Last week was the first week it was open and Friday was the first day it was nice enough to go, so we were off.  However, Amanda's little one was sick, so their family stayed home.   It was just us four, and we had a grand time.  Really, Ainsley had a grand time.  She rode every ride she was tall enough to ride... and that was a lot... more than I had expected.  That child has absolutely no fear.  She was begging to go on the big roller coasters.  We had to keep telling her that she wasn't quite big enough for that yet.

On Saturday we went to a nearby park that has both a playground and a barn with farm animals.  We love going there.  We had a picnic and enjoyed the beautiful weather.  I just love spending time with our little family.  We spent the rest of the day out in the backyard, grilling and eating dinner outside, too.

Sunday was another blessed Lord's Day... filled with church and rest.  It was also another beautifully sunny day.  Ainsley and I have been checking the growth of different plants and flowers around our house each day.  It's amazing how much they can change in just 24 hours.

And then there was today... another gorgeous summery day.  It was more than 80 degrees today... In New England... in April!  We walked all over town today.  I am fortunate that I live within walking distance of nearly everything I could possibly need... even without a car.  We walked to the bank, CVS, the library, the hardware store, the grocery store and then the park this morning.  After naps this afternoon, it was back to the park and playing in the back yard.  It was starting to look like a toy factory back there, so we had to spend the after-dinner time picking up the yard.

So God has lifted my spirits with a huge answered prayer, a little sunshine and some wonderful family time.  I enjoyed every minute of it.  But very little was captured on film.  I kept forgetting to bring my camera...

 So I've been in a funk all week.  I'm just grumpy.  I live in the Northeast so the weather has been awful.  Ainsley is going stir crazy after being stuck inside for two weeks straight.  I'm feeling the urge to go back to work or at least do something that isn't housework. (This is the first time since I was 16 years old that I really, truly am not making any money at all.)  And I look in the mirror and all I see is "frumpy mommy."

I could go on, but I need to stop complaining.  The sun is finally shining.  God loves me.  I have a husband who has a job so I can stay at home.  I have two healthy children.  I have the promise of heaven.  Why do I do this to myself?  Because I am not joying and rejoicing in the truth... what God has given me, what He is doing for me and what He will continue to do for me.

So with that I have new life...

Ainsley and I planted some vegetable seeds (and one row of watermelon) last Friday, and today this is what they look like. (For some reason my pepper seeds have done nothing at all.)  She has had the best time checking on their growth and watering them. 

Today I joy and rejoice that God loves and takes care of everything from these tiny, tender plants to grumpy ol' me.

He waters the mountains from His upper chambers;  the earth is satisfied with the fruit of His works.

He causes the grasses to grow for the cattle, and the vegetation for the labor of man, so that he may bring forth food from the earth.

~Psalm 104:13,14 NASB

I used to live near Virginia Tech.  I went to high school just miles away.  I have been on its campus.  I have attended sports games there.  Many of my and my brother's high school classmates went to Virginia Tech after graduating.  For those reasons, I feel a bit of a connection to the tragedy that happened there yesterday.  I can not imagine how terrifying it must have been for those students or how heart-wrenching it must be to be the parent of one of the students killed.  It's one of those times when you must find solace in the fact that our God's ways are perfect and that He is in control.