Theme Thursday: Black & White

I love making pictures black and white and playing with the contrast.  I'm sure there is all sorts of technique behind purposefully taking a black and white picture, and maybe someday I'll learn some of it.  But for now I'll just enjoy the ease of editing in Picasa, and marvel at all the amazing photographers converging on Clan Donaldson.

First: old picture--taken on a retreat in college; if I remember correctly, I was using my sister's camera and it actually had a b&w setting (along with sepia and something blue)

New picture: self portrait, because I always love those (when they turn out; they are sometimes hilarious and sometimes boring when they don't) and because Alex and I don't have nearly enough recent pictures of the two of us; taken with the outdoors (landscape?) setting on my Fujifilm Finepix and magicked in Picasa

A little encouragement...

Alex and I were discussing the news of the day and feeling more than a little bit discouraged, when he reminded me "Rome wasn't converted in a day."  We are by nature a persecuted Church, and we can't expect the world to just leave us alone--or even to understand.

If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.  If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.  Remember the word that I said to you, "A servant is not greater than his master."  If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also.  But all this they will do to you on my account..."  (John 15:18-21a)

Clever, wise husband.  I am so blessed.

I hope you are encouraged as well.  Feel free to share!  (artwork found here)

House update (prayers please!)

So, a quick update on the house situation.

We had our inspection, and it was pretty much as we expected--the house is 35 years old and needs some TLC, but nothing too scary.  The owner, just to be consistent, ignored our attempts to negotiate a somewhat lower price based on the results of the inspection.  We weren't in much of a position to press her--if we officially stated we would only buy it at a lower price and she refused (or ignored) our request to negotiate then we would end up out of contract (again), and we weren't willing to risk that.  It would have been nice for her to acknowledge the work it needed and knock a few thousand off, but we weren't willing to let the house go over that.

So one major milestone has come and gone.  The next milestone is a scary one, because we have no control over it.  The house is in pre-foreclosure, being foreclosed on at the end of the week.  The bank had already scheduled an auction for July 3rd to auction off the house unless the owner sold it before then.  Because the seller has a buyer (us) but hasn't closed yet the bank is being asked to postpone the auction to give us time to close on the house.  But they might say no.  And we probably won't know until July 3rd whether they are going to auction off the house anyway or whether they are going to let us buy it.  If it goes to auction then it's out of our reach because we can't pay cash for it.

We don't have a particularly high opinion of banks as involved in the home buying/selling process, but we really feel like this house is God's will for us.  So for the next week we're just trying to trust and pray and not FREAK OUT ABOUT IT.  Sorry.  Like I said: trying.  Alex is doing a better job with the not-freaking-out bit than I am, but that's fairly typical.

Please pray for us that the bank would let us have our house!!!

and once we move in you can come over and I'll bake you
thank you cookies!

Summer fun

We are thoroughly enjoying our summer vacation.  Here's some evidence (unfortunately not in time for last Thursday's theme of water... rats!):

Liam is not quite convinced he really wanted to wake up from his nap

handsome man

enjoying the pool together

Liam was very tolerant of Michael splashing and yelling

one and a half smiles on demand out of three... not too bad

nomming the seal

summer lovin'

Theme Thursday: Water

Okay, full disclosure: I am going to be a Cheater McCheater Face.  This week's theme is water, which is a lovely theme, and I can't wait to look at all the other pictures of water hosted over at Clan Donaldson.

But.  This is Colorado (yes, we are finally home from our amazing three week Lincoln visit).  And we are a little short on water at the moment.  :*(

But when I was musing on my trip to Vietnam in college for this week's Mystery Ingredient Monday I got to go back through all the pictures from that trip, and Vietnam has some spectacular water.  Since I didn't manage to get a picture of the 1,000,000% humidity we enjoyed while we were there, I leave you with one of my favorite pictures from the entire trip: sunset over the water in Hoi An, Vietnam.

Go see Cari and the gang for more!!!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Sunday was my birthday.  I got to spend the day with five of my favorite people in the whole wide world: my  amazing husband, my two beautiful boys, and my wonderful parents.  It was glorious.

picture stolen shamelessly from my dad's blog

On Sunday Alex and I also went under contract for a house.  THE house.  The house of our dreams; the house of our prayers.

This morning we had our inspection.  The house needs some work, and we're excited to make it our own and give it the TLC it needs.  We were thrilled that there was nothing too drastic; there is some mold in the attic which needs to be addressed before we move in, but nothing that can't be taken care of.  If all goes as planned (please oh please keep praying for us!) we'll be homeowners in early August.

And you guys... this house is on a corner.

God is good.

Mystery Ingredient Monday--Mint

Yes, it is Tuesday.  Be nice.

Alex and I are kind of Iron Chef and Chopped junkies, so you can imagine how excited I was when I learned about the Mystery Ingredient Monday link-up being hosted by A Clan's Tale, Housewifespice, and The Bazin Chronicles.

This week's mystery ingredient was mint.  I love mint.  I was tempted to head to the store to buy some mint chocolate chip ice cream (and maybe even splurge on Haagen-Dazs because it was my birthday week) and call it good, but I figured I should probably do something that required more than popping off a lid and grabbing a spoon.  My next thought was mojitos, because if anything is better than mint + chocolate it is mint + rum.  But I was feeling like a bit of an over achiever and decided I needed to step out of my comfort zone and find a savory mint dish (and I'm so glad I did, because Tasha's mojitos look way better than mine would have been).

7 Quick Takes (vol. 30)

--- 1 ---

My new mantra is "at least it's not diphtheria."  I kept telling myself this after L's last round of vaccinations, and it sort of helped.  Sort of.  And it has been an ALIND kind of week.  Allow me to explain.

--- 2 ---

My allergies have hit hard here in Lincoln.  They're pretty manageable in CO (although the dryness bothers my sinuses year round), but something here in NE (I'm assuming all the cottonwoods) drives me absolutely crazy.  As in, I feel like my head is going explode, major sinus headaches, can't breathe out of my nose, and my nose does an impressive imitation of a leaky faucet.  All. The. Time.  You're welcome for the details.

But at least it's not diphtheria.

--- 3 ---

And thanks to all of my sneezing and overly-congested-nose-blowing, I gave myself a subconjunctival hemorrhage (not as bad as the pictures on Wikipedia; but even so I'll spare you a picture of mine).  It's mostly under my lower lid, but could apparently take 1-2 weeks, or possibly even longer, to go away.  Lovely.

Michael hasn't noticed it yet, but as soon as he does he will be asking me 27 times per day: "What's dat?! What happen, Mama? Otay, Mama?  Mama owie?"  At least he is considerate...

And at least it's not diphtheria.

--- 4 ---

And to top it all off, yesterday morning M woke up running a fever and coughing a bit.  Ever since his awful bout of croup right before his 1st birthday (which landed us in the ER for a night of observation after not clearing up with 3 vapor treatments at the pediatrician's clinic) I have been super sensitive to even the slightest hint of a cough.  It was moderately barky yesterday morning, but his breathing was fine.

Then he woke up from his nap wheezing and barking like a seal with emphysema.  I called our pediatrician back home on the off chance that he would call in a prescription for a steroid to a pharmacy out here and we could nip what I was sure was croup (but in June? seriously?) in the bud before we all had a wretched night and possibly another trip to the ER.

Well, our pediatrician wasn't in the office and certainly no one else was going to prescribe anything over the phone based on a (probably hysterical) mother's diagnosis (not the nurse's words--she was very nice and understanding about it).  So we packed up some supplies (Thomas books, juice and snacks--it was dinner time, of course) and headed to an urgent care clinic.  The wait wasn't nearly as long as we feared, and in fairly short order we had a confirmed fever of 102.6, a positive strep test, and a prescription for amoxicillin.  

Strep.  Lovely.  But you guessed it--ALIND.  And we are blessed with a little boy who is pretty darn happy and perky even when he's sick.

--- 5 ---

Liam hasn't shown any signs of strep, although he seems to share my aversion to cottonwoods (or whatever it is)--he's been a little more snuffly and growly than usual.  But he's still pretty much the happiest baby ever.

God willing, we'll be able to keep the toddler from his new found love of sharing and we'll limit ourselves to a strict quota of only one case of strep in this family.

--- 6 ---

What are you doing this October?  We are hoping to be spending a weekend in Bismarck, ND for the THIRST Conference.  There will be all sorts of incredible speakers, including Cardinal Dolan, Scott Hahn,  and the Augustine Institute's own Dr. Edward Sri (my thesis advisor!) and Chris Stefanick... along with... Jennifer Fulwiler!!!

Major fangirl points for talking about this in a Quick Takes?  Yes, I think so!

One of my FOCUS disciplers/Bible study leaders from UNL is now working as the Coordinator of the Year of Faith for the Diocese of Bismarck, ND and helping to organize this conference.  It's pretty exciting.

--- 7 ---

Thank you to everyone who has been so generously praying for our house situation.  We found out this afternoon that the house is available again and we quickly (thanks to our amazing realtor) submitted a new offer (because, typical of this situation, the seller never signed the back up offer she said she would accept; if she had we would be under contract now).  A zillion things could still go wrong (like, the seller could simply not accept or refuse or counter our offer... again...).  St. Joseph, pray for us!

Go see Jen and the rest for more Quick Takes!  
Happy Friday :)

According to Alex on a Theme Thursday

After a long absence I'm back to remembering that Thursday is THEME Thursday before waking up on Friday morning.  Woohoo!  Excited to once again be joining Cari and gang.

This week's theme is Fathers--and I don't know if there is anything I love taking a picture of more than my boys with their amazing father.  Pictures of my boys with their amazing grandfathers and great-grandfathers come in a close second.

This is one of my favorite pictures of all time: a 6 month old Michael with Alex, Alex's dad, and Alex's grandpa Charles.  Talk about a perfect picture for the theme of "fathers."

Be sure to check out the rest of the father pictures at Clan Donaldson!

And in honor of the father of my children, here are some recent gems.

"He sounds like a Chinese lounge singer!"  Upon observing his first born singing along to "Old McDonald Had a Farm."

When I admitted that eating chocolate chips by the handful(s) probably wasn't helping me lose the last of the baby weight: "You should put them in cookies.  Eggs, wheat, nutrition!"  (Yes, definite fans of Mr. Cosby in this household.)

With calm resignation as I was trying to relate something great I had read recently (a common occurrence): "I will never be able to keep your blogosphere community straight."  (I think it was his way of saying "You read way too many blogs and it's kind of ridiculous, but I love you anyway.")

"This is my pity face."  With an absolutely pitiless expression when I was complaining about something (something perfectly valid, of course).

Michael (from the other room): Mama? Help? Pease? A nammit (napkin)?
Me (while nursing Liam, to Alex): He's asking very nicely.  Would you please get him a napkin?
Alex: He's asking you.
Me: Oh, would you like to nurse the infant while I get the toddler a napkin?
Alex: Would you like to see me try?

Best Daddy ever!

Five Favorites (vol. 1)

After being a long-time lurker, I'm finally linking up with Hallie for Five Favorites!  Are you excited?  I am!

1.

HoMedics Sound SPA Relaxation Sound Machine
[source]

When Michael was born I was adamant that we did not need any special noise-making devices.  For the life of me I cannot remember why... I just felt like creating white noise with fans should be sufficient.  Should.  Ha.  This attitude persisted for the first several months of Liam's life as well.  He was in our room, and if we had the bathroom fan turned on all night that seemed to work just fine.  Then we moved him out of our room at 6 months, and for a while I tried to make do with radio static.  Not so great... it was kind of harsh but it worked, except when reception suddenly improved in the middle of the night and I'm sitting there nursing Liam, half asleep, and I realize I'm hearing voices.  Radio voices, not in-my-head-voices, although it took a minute to figure out.  So I finally gave in and ordered a sound machine and I LOVE IT (yes, it is worthy of shouting).

The ocean setting is so incredibly soothing.  I have a tendency to fall asleep when I'm nursing Liam at night (and sometimes at naptime) anyway, and with this it is almost impossible for me to not doze off.  Which is sometimes nice and sometimes a pain--literally, a pain in my neck when I realize I've been sleeping in an awkward sitting position for two hours.  But I love this sound machine as much as--probably even more than--Liam does.

sweet dreams

2.

[source]

The last several times I've tried to paint my nails I've been horribly disappointed in the result.  I've never become particularly skilled at it, but recently it seemed like no matter what I did they did not turn out even remotely smooth.  Then it dawned on me that pretty much all of my nail polish is 8-14 years old.  Hmmm... maybe just because there is some left in the bottle doesn't necessarily mean it is still usable?  So I treated myself to some new nail polish, and I opted for a quick dry type because even when my nails do turn out semi-okay I ruin them almost right away because someone (or sometwo, for that matter) demands my attention before they are completely dry.  I'm pretty darn pleased with the result--it went on smoothly and dried quickly (such high standards, I know).  It seems to chip fairly easily, but for how quickly it dried I can afford to redo them.

Side-note: I was checking the bottle looking for the name of the color before writing this post, and all it said was "24k."  Great, some stupid code/numbering system isn't particularly descriptive.  How can it not have a name?  I distinctly remember there being names for the colors on the display at the store...  So how would I describe it?  Faintly shimmery, kind of a gold tone.  Gold... 24k... okay, I get it.  Obviously I need some more quality time with those ocean waves.

3.

[source]

Impulse buy yesterday while shopping for above nail polish: Mike the Knight DVD for $5.  The show itself is cute (um, a knight, named Mike? obviously Michael needed this--and it is not available on Netflix. lame.) but not spectacular enough to make it into the top 5 by itself.  What is truly my favorite is how excited M got about it.  He carried the DVD carefully for the rest of our shopping/browsing trip, relinquished it reluctantly in the check-out line, and sat absolutely enthralled for the entire thing when we got home.  Then for the rest of the day he told everyone that he watched "Mite the Knight"!  And then told us again!  And again!

The evolution (devolution?) of my thoughts on children's shows is a topic for another post.  Suffice it to say that I'm thankful for a little variety in our life.  I can only watch so much Thomas before my boilers bust...

4.

[source]

Don't judge.

5.

These boys.  Always my favorite.  Cheating?  Maybe.  But one of them (*cough*littleone*cough*) woke me up at 6 this morning and I have been trying to finish this post ever since.  It has been a cheating sort of day.

The end!

Still houseless, but never homeless...

The short version is: we still don't have a house, and I'm mad, sad, and trying to let myself be comforted.

The long version... well, the long version is going to be quite long.  And even longer if you want some of the background here.

For the last two months or so we had been keeping our eye on a house.  A fairly large house, with a nice size  yard, in our dream neighborhood.  It was out of our price range, but not hopelessly so.  And there was a decent chance it would be well within our range by the end of the summer (if it stayed on the market around long enough).

Before we came out to Lincoln we decided we should try to see it, just in case we needed to/were in a position to make a move while we were on vacation.  After a few scheduling snafus (chrome says that is spelled correctly, but it looks awfully strange) we were able to see it late Tuesday afternoon right before driving out to Lincoln.  We even delayed our departure time by several hours to fit it in (which is probably what threw Liam for such a crazy loop sleep-wise, but that's neither here nor there).

And it was perfect.  Not perfect as in "too good to be true" perfect, but perfect as in "we can absolutely see ourselves living here and making this our own and being thoroughly happy and comfortable here" perfect.  After we replaced the pinkish tile and magenta carpet in the master suite, of course.

Something old and something new, something borrowed and...

... a whole lot of blue.

No, this has nothing to do with weddings.  But I'm only a few sips into my first cup of coffee, and even though the littlest one only woke up once last night (not counting the brief waking at 9:30 when I finally remembered to move my laundry to the dryer and, of course, woke him up when I started the dryer) he also woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed shortly before 6:30.  Which wouldn't have been a problem if I had gone to bed right after switching my laundry... I think there's just something in the air in Lincoln that makes it impossible to get to bed before 11.

ANYwhoo.  New blog design! (In case you didn't notice).  The background is a photo of Sandhill Cranes courtesy of my dad and Picasa.  I spent what seemed like all day Friday (Alex and the boys would probably agree) trying to optimize the positioning and shading to get the effect I wanted without compromising readability.  What do you think?  Does it work?

And of course I can't get Blogger's mobile template to do anything I want, and somehow I got rid of the background completely and can't get it back.  That's a battle for another day... maybe later today... after more coffee.

Right, so, same old blog, borrowed and blue picture, and ... new Facebook page!  Maybe not as exciting as I think it is, but if you'd like to see links to new posts and miscellaneous updates (and whatever other distractions from changing diapers and playing Thomas I can sneak in there) you can now follow the Corner on Facebook.

7 Quick Takes (vol. 29)

--- 1 ---

We are enjoying a beautiful start to our summer.  This is probably the longest and most relaxed visit to Lincoln we've ever had.  Unfortunately it's relaxing without being particular restful... while Mr. Michael is sleeping like a champ in a real bed (and the transition certainly seems to have marked an epoch in his life), Mr. Liam has reverted to a Mr. Not-Sleeping-McNeedy-Pants at night.  Our two glorious weeks of mostly sleeping through the night--or waking up only once when we did wake up--seem like a distant dream.  A distant day dream, because to be a real dream I would have to be asleep so I could dream, and that's exactly the point.

--- 2 ---

But sleeplessness aside, we are having a lovely visit.  We are enjoying the unseasonably cool weather (!!!) with lots of soccer in the yard and trips to the park, farmers' market, and zoo.

brilliant farmers' market find... just the tiniest bit too big

four hours of running around the zoo = M falling asleep in public for the 3rd time. ever.

--- 3 ---

Soooo, our whole family (both sides) uses Verizon, and I have to say that this whole thing makes me feel kind of like this:

Yep, that's me.  In college I worked for the university performing arts center, and one year I got to participate in a live surveillance exhibit to go along with a performance of 1984.  It was pretty fun at the time... kinda creepy now.

--- 4 ---

Speaking of phone conversations, I had kind of an obnoxious one yesterday.  I called my OB clinic with a question about a potential medical concern (which, of course, completely resolved itself shortly thereafter because I had bothered to call) and the nurse's first question was "What kind of birth control are you using?"  Not "Are you using birth control?"  Not "Are you trying to get pregnant/are you concerned about becoming pregnant?"  Just quite simply WHAT birth control am I using?  And when I explained that I'm not using any birth control but I practice natural family planning the nurse (who I'm sure is a very nice person and quite competent at her job) felt it necessary to remind me that they strongly recommend using birth control unless I'm trying to get pregnant.  I wanted to ask her "Really? From a purely medical, scientific point of view, is that really what you recommend as the healthiest thing for my body?  Seriously?"  But I didn't.  

Yes, I know that I can still get pregnant while I'm breastfeeding.  No, I don't want birth control.  Thanks anyway.

--- 5 ---

And speaking of pregnancy, would you please be so kind as to storm Heaven with prayers for Dwija and her unborn baby, and the rest of her family as well?

--- 6 ---

I'm so thankful for the blogging community I've discovered over the last year or so.  And while some may scoff at applying the term "community" to a bunch of people who just read stuff other people throw out into the interwebs, I prefer Jen's description of the internet as the modern village well.  It's a blessing to read the stories of other moms (and dads), receive encouragement, and share prayers.  And it's just the teensiest bit more meaningful than the "friends" I met in high school through a Star Wars discussion forum (um, what? did I just admit that?)

And it's totally worth it even if too much time spent perusing mommy blogs results in dreams about running into one's favorite blogger or two at Costco... hypothetically, you know.

--- 7 ---

One more prayer request--some acquaintances from college lost their little baby boy on Tuesday.  Please take a minute to say a prayer for Mitch and Erica.  St. James Aloysius, pray for us!

Go see Jen and the rest for more, better, timelier Quick Takes!  
Happy Friday/Saturday :)

Why?

And so it begins.

I knew this was coming, but despite an impressive vocabulary, great communication skills, and a healthy dose of curiosity, Michael just hadn't been asking "Why?"  In fact, I think he maybe asked that particular question twice.  Ever.

Until last week.  And it wasn't a gradual development either.  One day he wasn't asking "why?" and the next he was.  All. The. Time.

I think maybe it was triggered by getting to sleep in a big boy bed while we're here at Grandma & Grandpa's house.  He woke up after his first night here and voila!  Why?

Well good morning Michael!
When did you grow up so big?!

Summer Flavors

Once upon a time I told myself "It's okay if you don't blog for a while... summer vacation is almost here and then you'll have all sorts of time to blog."  And then summer vacation got here and I used that time to drive to Nebraska.  And sleep.  And go for walks.  And visit friends.  And sleep some more.  And go to the zoo.  Etc.

BUT!  It is finally summer, hooray hooray!  And so yes, in theory (and hopefully in practice hereafter), I will be a little more consistent about blogging.

Also once upon a time, some people that I love very much wrote about the flavors of their past week.  I've been meaning to write this post for over a week and I have all the cute pictures to back it up, so thanks Dad and Dene' for loving me anyway even though I never blog with you on time ;)

What flavor has your week been?  Our past week weeks have tasted like SUMMER!  Oh I love summer.  Well, I love the idea of summer.  And I love early summer, when you get the occasional blazing day but there's still some cool weather to be had--and I don't feel like I'm going to die of heatstroke because I went for a walk later than 6:30am.  And how convenient--that's exactly the kind of summer we're having right now!

My summer flavors have been brauts and long island ice teas set to the back drop of bright flowers and little boys enjoying fresh air and sunshine and the sand box.

Liam's summer tastes like steak.  Literally.  His first experience with meat was definitely a hit (much more so than sweet potatoes or bananas... but I'm not at all surprised to have another little carnivore on my hands).

Michael's summer tastes like "lemon juice," but in a good way.  That's what he calls lemonade, and in typical Michael fashion he refuses to budge.  It probably also tastes like sunscreen and sand, but in toddler-land that might be a good thing too.

not pictured: trusty lemon juice

Alex's summer tastes like freedom and cookies.  Freedom from any cares and worries concerning grad school, and the cookies I baked to celebrate.

photo credit: Cici

A note on the cookies... chocolate chip were Alex's request (and my mom's amazing recipe, called Cowboy Cookies for some unknown reason--still unknown, because I keep forgetting to ask her) and the chocolate chocolate cookies were my latest cookie experiment: Nutella chocolate chip cookies, which I discovered on Ana's blog.  If you check out the recipe you may notice that my cookies look a little different than the promised finished product.  Okay, a lot different.  I'm blaming it on the altitude.  But they still tasted pretty amazing, so I'm calling the experiment a culinary, if not visual, success.

We are all thoroughly enjoying the many tastes of summer!!!