A Little Bit Of Vague And Haphazard

Summer vacation is here, with it's slow mornings and long evenings. We've had a lot of rain in Ohio and not so many summer-ish days. We haven't even made it to the lake yet this year, which is unusual for us.

Last week we put 40 quarts of strawberries away... in jam, small lunch containers in the freezer, and our stomachs. It's amazing how quickly a job like that goes these days!

We celebrated Chris's birthday...

And our 18th Anniversary...

Then and now!

Chris took the day off  Saturday and we had a most lovely day wandering around together. He's such a good sport when it comes to shopping, even if thrift stores are a hazard for too many cassette tapes and random books. 

He patiently waits 

while I browse though fabric

And good naturedly buys the Amish dresses at thrift stores that I suddenly realized would make cheap fabric for making dresses for my 9 and 11 year old girls. You can't beat $3.50 for a whole dress compared to $6 and $7 a yard fabric!

We did nothing fancy or extravagant; hit up Dairy Queen for lunch and played a round of miniature golf and talked and laughed and enjoyed each other's company. 

Came home to a messy house and a table full playing Monopoly and food that needed to be made for fellowship dinner the next day. Real life is always there waiting but out of the ordinary days sure help to give us fresh courage for the journey. 

In other news? In other news life is very ordinary. I do mounds of laundry that re-appear every time I turn around and cook piles of food that disappear just as quickly. I try to make myself put people to work and often end up letting them play too much. I putter around in my wet, little garden and work on my challenge to keep up with memorizing my girl's quiz passage. I'll tell you this, mom doing memory work does wonders for motivating a 9 year old! 

Underneath and in between it all, God keeps working away at our hearts; stretching us to places we never dreamed of and re-arranging our hearts in ways we never expected. I alternate between kicking and screaming at the process and marveling over the amazing ways He chooses to bring about His plan. One thing is for sure, God is creative beyond belief and as I read through Proverbs (our church is currently reading through the chronological Bible), I realize anew how wise it is live by His principles and direction.

I feel like I should apologize for the vague and haphazard post. But vague and haphazard seems to be the story of my life right now, so what can I say?

Off to take care of laundry and scrounge some lunch around.... and then I should make someone restock the fresh cookies and think ahead toward supper.......

Happy weekend!