Strawberry Fields Forever

A few weeks ago my mom and her husband were visiting from Colorado and since our backyard strawberry patch had absolutely NO strawberries, we decided to go to the pros!  Ever since we moved to our area, I had always heard of Getting's Garden but had no idea what it entailed and was a little nervous about going by myself...especially with two boys in tow now.

IT WAS AWESOME!!!  We went on a Friday morning so it wasn't super busy and the overcast day helped it to be a bit cooler.  When we pulled in, we parked the car and were immediately escorted out to the rows by a gator-type vehicle.  To this day, if you ask Ben what his favorite part was he would say riding on the gator where the bar comes down. . . pretty sure we could find something like that around here but oh well.

Embracing the Camera with my boys!

We were then handed flats that we could fill up as full as we wanted from the rows they assigned to us.  Ben knew exactly which strawberries were okay to pick and Cooper jumped right into the task at hand.

As we were finishing up, it started sprinkling very lightly so we decided it was time to taking our pickings and head back (on the gator of course!) to the Getting's cafe where we enjoyed strawberry donut holes and the boys helped me finish off a freshly-made strawberry shake!

This may just turn into a new tradition. . . especially when the raspberries are ripe for picking in August!



Favorite new "recipe"

There are few times when I follow any actual recipes from some of the blogs that I read but one that I read the other day is a definite keeper for me!  I like eggs...but my husband hates them and Ben is allergic.  Needless to say, I don't make myself scrambled eggs very often.  Thankfully my when father-in-law comes to visit he is happy to eat some with me and I don't mind making a mess to make them. 

But now...my breakfast world is changed forever!!!  I went to high school with this girl who now keeps a blog (hilarious by the way and always Christian-based!) and she posted the other day about she does a scrambled-type egg in just one minute!!!  Tried it this morning and LOVED it...and I only had to dirty one coffee mug and a fork to make it.  I even almost ran out of time to eat it at home so I could have taken it in the car on the way to church.

Anyway, I now have a new way to make a healthier breakfast and if Cooper turns out to keep liking it, he and I can share!  You can check out her post (and see pics) about it HERE or read the simple steps below:

1. Get a coffee mug and 1-2 eggs

2. Break the egg(s) into the mug and scramble around with a fork

3. Add any ingredients you might want...diced ham, cheese, peppers, salsa, etc... and mix

4. Microwave for 1 minute (2 minutes for two eggs)...yep, that's it!

Told you it was easy!!! I did mine with just 1 egg and some shredded cheese because I wanted to make sure I did it right before using any more expensive ingredients.  Tomorrow's egg will have some ham in it...yummy! Enjoy!

Climbing through the jungle

Last week, Ben and I went with some friends from our playgroup to the Omaha Zoo.  Cooper had to stay behind (which was nice for both big brother and Mommy!) so we made it into a "date day."  We left early in the morning, explored the zoo, had lunch and walked around a lot more!  It was an absolutely gorgeous day and I realized how important it is to spend some one-on-one time with each of my boys.  Now if I can just get Cooper to take me to some cool concert!

Embracing the camera with my big boy



Father's Day

What can I say about this awesome Daddy?!  He LOVES his boys!  He works so hard so we can stay home, sleep in, watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, clean/do laundry whenever the mood hits, cook/bake all day long, take naps in our own comfy beds and take trips to the zoo in the middle of the week...all while he has his arm up a cow! (too much info? - try listening to some of the conversations he has!)  He gets little sleep this time of the year but still has the energy to put our boys to bed when he's home and mommy just can't take one more minute.  On weekends, he does little (and sometimes big) projects around the house that I'm not able to do myself and is so handy sometimes I can't believe how lucky we are!  He serves our church, community and family selflessly and never complains when I make a shopping trip to Sioux City that maybe wasn't quite needed :) He's been known to say "whatever you want" or "I just want to you to be happy" even when I'm being irrational difficult about something.  He's the man I chose to spend my life with and make a family with...how lucky are we?!  We love you Daddy!

Father's Day 2012

Oh yeah, we also just had our 7th wedding anniversary and even though he was stressed with work and working hard to leave for a road trip on time, he made a trip home in the middle of the morning to bring me some flowers so him being gone all week wouldn't be so hard!  What a guy!

I love Mondays!!!

Monday is commonly the most hated day of the week for most people.  The weekend is over, it's back to work and a whole week before the next weekend looms ahead.  Around here though, we LOVE Mondays!  After having a busy weekend, it's the day we get to cuddle in bed whenever we choose to wake up, and then we stay in our PJs and watch something fun on TV together.  Does this make us lazy? Perhaps.  Does is help that I'm doing loads of laundry and cleaning off and on throughout the morning? Hope so!  But are we making memories that my boys will remember - staying in our PJs until lunchtime (or sometimes through naptime)? Absolutely!!! We usually have other things going on throughout the week that make it inappropriate impossible to stay in our pajamas all day so you better bet we're going to take advantage when we can :)

And...we're back!

After a crazy week last week, things are settling down quite a bit more this week!  We had VBS last week and though I was only scheduled to volunteer one day in the kitchen, I ended up working all week so Ben could attend all the fun activities that VBS had to offer him.  Thursday evening was the program and the preschoolers got to stand up on stage at church to sing two songs with all the older kids.  Ben did a pretty good job although we're pretty sure he didn't sing one word of any song. . . at least he wasn't the kid jumping in front of everyone else as their parent's tried to take their picture (awkard!!!)  He smiled like he was supposed to and looked handsome as always.  He just chose to be a "presence" on the stage instead of singing!

Ben and his friends at VBS



1st Real Church Program



Last day of VBS singing time

Sharing a treat with little bro after the program

He had a great time and it was hard to explain come Saturday morning why we weren't headed to church. At least he'll look forward to next year!

We did it!

We (the boys and I) just got back from only our second completely solo trip to Kansas City and back.  And last August doesn't really count because Cooper was sleeping a lot back then and slept probably 3/4 of the way that time!

This time was not so easy.  The trip down was pretty uneventful and I was able to make it by only stopping once for gas and some quick snacks only an hour from my dad's.  What about the trip back you ask?!  Well...let's just say it was not quite as easy but we still only stopped once...more to get home quickly than anything!  But all in all, I'm so glad we went and now that I know we can do it and survive with (most) our sanity, we'll probably do it again later this summer!

We had such a great time visiting with my dad and brother and their wondeful wives!  We also got to spend the night at my brother and Charlotte's new house - so cute!  I was also fortunate enough to visit with two old friends; one I've known since high school and the other since my first year of middle school.  We've been in each other's weddings and are now getting together with our KIDS!!! Of course, we could not get a good picture of the three boys together so we took a girl's picture instead.

The last two days of our trip, we got to spend with my brother and his wife who live in Lee's Summit, Missouri.  We explored the downtown area one morning, took AWESOME naps in the afternoon (after a late night) then made supper for my dad and Lori to celebrate their anniversary.  Unfortunately, our Black Forest Torte did not look as good as the one online :) We still ate it with no problem!

Even looking at these memories now it almost made the not-so-fun car ride home worth it!