February iPhone Pictures

Here are some snippets from our life in February...it was full of running, gardening, injuries, baking and several fun celebrations! 

Eli took a box from one of our latest Amazon Prime deliveries and made a costume for himself. 

Now I had my very own Box Troll!

I grew Brussels sprouts this year and these were from my first harvest. 

I probably won't grow them again simply because no one in the family is crazy about them. 

They were fun to try though!

While training for the New Orleans Rock and Roll Half Marathon, I accidentally injured myself. 

I wasn't paying attention and tripped on an uneven part of the sidewalk. The part that really stunk was that I was about a mile from my house so I still had to run back AND it ripped my new workout pants my mom gave me for Christmas! Oh well, now I have a battle scar to talk about. 

Eli and I visited our favorite yogurt place after school one afternoon. What a great Friday treat!

When we were in town after Eli's arm injury (the first visit) he and Tinsley found some cool shades at Target. 

We spent a nice quiet afternoon at the library and Eli even got his own library card!

He was so excited to put it in his wallet!

Bread day always makes me happy :)

I spent a rainy Saturday afternoon making Valentine treat suckers for Eli's first grade class. 

I found these treats at The Idea Room several years ago and finally made them!

Lego look-a-like erasers from Target added the perfect touch to Eli's Valentine cards this year. 

Running down by the river is one of my favorite things. 

Sunsets from our backyard are also one of my favorite things. 

On February 20th, we celebrated Reve and Brian's wedding. 

Josh set them up a few years ago and the rest is history. We had so much fun at their wedding! 

I am so happy that this sweet girl found love again :)

The end of February brought bad news for me. The Monday before my half-marathon I started feeling badly at work one morning. I barely made it through the rest of the day and when I got home from school I had already started running fever. I immediately quarantined myself in our bedroom and wouldn't let Eli or Josh in to check on me. I ran fever all through the night and the next day as well so I had to call in a substitute teacher for my classes. After two visits to the doctor I found out I had the FLU! The doctor told me no school for the rest of the week and definitely no race on Sunday. All that training and no reward! Talk about MAJOR BUMMER! I spent the rest of the week in bed sleeping, taking Tamiflu, and binge watching the final season of Parenthood. It took a full week for me to feel normal again and I hope that's the last time I get the flu. I'm so thankful that Eli and Josh didn't get it. That would have been even worse! It wasn't the way I wanted the end of February to go, but I'm thankful it didn't last long! 

Winter Garden

What started as a hobby has now become a passion. Josh and I LOVE gardening and we are now those people that always have something planted. I can't tell you the last time I bought any kind of vegetable from the store and I'm so proud of that. I love that every time we eat supper two or three of the items on our plates are from our garden. Plus, gardening is therapeutic. I love checking on my plants everyday and watching them grow. This year for our winter garden we tried some new things. We planted broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, brussels sprouts, cabbage, and mustard greens. Everything did really well and I loved having fresh veggies throughout the winter. 

One day before going to Josh's grandmother's for dinner I went out into the garden and harvested some cauliflower, carrots, and broccoli. I was so excited to see my beautiful bounty that I immediately took a picture of it and posted it to Instagram. 

Then I washed, chopped, and diced and turned my beautiful veggies into a veggie tray! How fun!! This is why gardening and growing your own food ROCK! Now get out in your yard and plant something! You won't be disappointed!

September iPhone Pictures

I'm finding myself taking more and more pictures with my phone on a daily basis than with my real camera. Here are some of our daily highlights from September. They capture sweet moments of our family and our life. I'm thankful for the portability of my phone because it makes remembering these moments so easy. 

Tinsley and Eli checking on Caleb's lizard thingys. 

Eli was chosen as the Super Student the first week in September. 

He loved being the line leader every day for his class. 

This was the poster we decorated to go in the hall. 

Seeing the dentist for his six-month check-up. He LOVES our dentist!

Eli wrote me a note for my lunchbox.

It made my heart so happy :)

Picture of the bridges on one of my early morning long runs. 

The last harvest of the bell peppers. We had them coming out of our ears!

"Shaving" like Daddy in the bathtub one night. 

Eli and I went by the co-op one morning for gardening supplies.

We were in the right place at the right time and got to see a HUGE alligator that had just been caught.

It was HUGE!

Eli loved getting to see an alligator up close!

Bike ride down to the river later on that evening with Daddy. 

We celebrated Mom's 54th birthday.

Dinner at Zue-Zue's house

My sweet boy and me after school one day. 

The fall burlap banner I made for our house with the velvet pumpkins 

I picked up at Hobby Lobby last year for 75% off. Score!

When we were visiting my Mom and Dad Josh called to let me know late one night that he was in the ER because he sliced his finger to the bone trying to take down a pop-up tent at a festival in town. Thankfully, Reve, his secretary and our soon-to-be cousin, was able to take him to the ER. 

I hated not being there to take care of him! Multiple stitches later he was better.

Eli's journal from school the Monday after Josh hurt his finger. 

It made me smile and it was definitely a keeper!

Summer Fun Week Seven-Building Projects

When the first week of July rolled around we'd already made a lot of progress on our Summer Fun List, but we still had a lot of stuff left to do. One of those items was "Build Something Fun". This was the week we started that. Eli had a project and so did I :)

Sanding his "Build Something Fun" project. He loved using the power tools!

Staining

Standing next to his completed project...outdoor Jenga! 

It's a lot of fun!

My project was to build a planter that I could have on my patio for my herbs. I looked on Pinterest for some inspiration but in the end Josh and I built one that suited our needs. I was so pleased with how it turned out! The smartest decision we made was putting wheels on the bottom of it so I can move it around if I need to. So far the the herbs are doing great. I have basil, parsley, rosemary, and oregano in there. We also bought a small jalapeño plant and a small sweet pepper plant and put those in there as well. I left the mint in a container on its own because I read that they're very invasive. Hopefully, my herbs will make it through our Louisiana summer! 

Those were the two major things we worked on this week, but here are some pictures of what we were up to when we finished our projects :)

Our garden is making so many bell peppers that Josh and I decided to make our own seasoning blend. 

I'm growing onions but they're not ready yet so I bought some onions and celery at the grocery store and we got to chopping and dicing. It was a lot of work, but I shouldn't have to buy seasoning blend at all this winter!

Pool time with Barkley

We went to the Farmer's Market and they had Italian ice there for the kids.

Silly glasses for a silly kid!

Candyland with this cutie. 

Time for a haircut! My shaggy headed little boy needed a trim.

So handsome!

At the end of the week, we left to go back to Grammy and Pop's house because Jameson's birthday party was Saturday :) His first year went by so fast and we couldn't wait to celebrate him turning one! Friday night we needed to do some last minute shopping for Jameson so we went to Jason's Deli first for some supper and dessert. The next day was going to be lots of fun!