Grace for All the Busy

This one's for all of you fellow stay-at-home mommies out there.  Or working mommies.  If you are a mommy, just read this.  My sweet friend Kyna sent me the link, and am I ever glad she did. 

I think I'll keep it bookmarked and re-read it on the days that wear my patience to a thread.  Trust me, I've been where the author is many, many times, and confessing and asking forgiveness from the "tinies" is the only way I've found things can truly be turned around. 

http://www.emergingmummy.com/2011/11/in-which-i-find-grace-to-be-dry-land.html

Hello Zebra

My fantastic hubby let me buy these chairs last weekend, and I am in love.  I was out looking for neutral chairs, but I wanted an 'interesting' neutral.  I saw these puppies and knew I had to have them.  Thankfully Jason thought they were great, too! 

Now I'm in the process of negotiating pricing with a seamstress on Etsy for two orange lumbar-type pillows to put in the chairs.  I would make my own, but the problem is that the normal insert sizes are too big for what I'm wanting.  And I definitely want the look of an insert versus poly-fil or whatever that stuff is.  I have to say I almost threw up in my mouth when I had to type "burnt orange" in my email to her.  In NO WAY am I endorsing the University of Texas by placing that particular color in my living room. 

I'm not sure if I ever blogged about the other throw pillows on the couches, so here they are.  The blue ones I found at Gordman's, and the patterned ones were also found on an Etsy site.  Oh that Etsy... it's a dangerous place.   

Next up on our living room to-do list is getting rid of our big entertainment center and TV and replacing them with a cream-colored, waist-high, furniture-type console (wow, that was a lot of hypens) and either a free-standing or wall-mounted flat screen (again, more hyphens... it's like my fingers won't stop).  It may be a few months away, but eventually we'll have this room completed!

We love fall leaves

I distinctly remember pulling up to our house for the first time when we were house hunting.  The big tree in the front yard caught my eye because of its flaming reddish orange color.  Since we had only lived in new construction, I'd never had a tree in my front yard before.  And let me just tell you, I'm a big tree kind of girl.  The more the merrier, the bigger the better.  If I could build a tree house in the middle of a forest, I think I would. 

Needless to say, the changing of the leaves has brought me great joy this fall.  Here's our beauty in the front yard.

And guess who else has experienced great joy as a result of the leaves?  You guessed it... the two amigos.  We went outside two different times this weekend so they could romp and play in the foliage.

Goodness, sometimes I just can't wait until the littlest squirt is out there, running right alongside her brother and sis. 

Happy Fall!

Okay, now this is getting ridiculous

We just experienced another earthquake.  This one lasted about 20 seconds, and the entire house shook.  It felt like a huge train was going by on a track in our backyard.  AM radio is saying the early reports are showing it was a little above a 5 on the richter scale.  Totally unsettling!

Earthquake!

Oklahoma experienced a 4.7 magnitude earthquake last night around 2 a.m., and we felt it.  The epicenter was a couple of hours west of us, between Tulsa and Oklahoma City.  Jason and I both woke up to the sound of what we thought was Jax falling out of bed.  Jason quickly ran upstairs and didn't find anything out of the ordinary.  When he came back to bed, I told him it must've been a wind gust.  He looked out the window and reported that it was completely calm outside.  I think we were too tired to try and investigate any further.  I found out it was an earthquake this morning while at an 8 a.m. garage sale (which turned out to be a goldmine of fabulous kids' clothing for $1 each... yessssss). 

So now I can say I've experienced an earthquake.  Sounds quite dramatic, doesn't it?

Hayden is 9 months!

My sweet girl is growing too quickly!  What fun she is right now... belly laughing at her siblings, trying so hard to pull up on furniture, getting dangerously close to crawling, saying 'da-da' and squealing at the top of her lungs.  Her sixth tooth is just about to poke through... praise the LORD when it finally does.  I was almost certain Dr. B would tell me she had another ear infection based on the amount of fussing she's been doing.  She's infection free, thank goodness.  I took her for her 9-month checkup this morning while the other two were at preschool, and she's 19.5 pounds and 27" long.  Smaller than the other two at this age... Em was 20 pounds and 28.5" and Jax was 22.5 pounds and 28." 

Speaking of belly laughing, I took this video a few weeks ago.  Emerson makes her laugh like no one else can.  I can't wait until those two are sharing a room.  I have such special memories of laughter and fun during all the years growing up that my sister and I shared a room.