bsmiles and sunny days

Have I mentioned that my sister made a surprise appearance? It was so funny... I had no idea she was coming until we were driving down the strip in Santa Barbara and she called. Dale played it off, but I had talked to her that morning and couldn't figure out why she kept talking to Dale. So I asked if we were picking her up; there's a train station in Santa Barbara. He fessed up and in five minutes we were loading her bags into our truck. Right as we pulled off to the side of the road, I said, "Hey kids! Who's that lady?" All of them stared but no one said a word! It was so adorable. Once we had her loaded into the car, they talked and squealed all the way home. It was pretty thrilling. Being that it was Friday, we dragged her to the Farmer's Market where I purchased these lovely flowers for four dollars. Yep, four dollars. Aren't they pretty? I read a book a few years ago about how to live a beautiful life and one of the suggestions was to budget in fresh

Meet Max, Maximus, Maximillion, Maxter, our new Boxer, our little gift from heaven. This little guy came to us, after much searching and researching and wishing and hoping, literally by surprise. Dale works with a guy who is family to a breeder. He had mentioned how much he's always wanted a boxer and low and behold, he brought one to work in a kennel for us. SURPRISE! Poor thing was in desperate need of some tender-loving care, which we immediately obliged times seven. He apparently had rarely been held, had scratches and bumps all over his neck and belly, and was super skinny. I'll tell you the truth; I was looking for a reason to send him packing from the moment he came into the house, but after I saw how much he needed us, I couldn't turn him away. This is the sweetest little dog! Scooder, all the sudden, is old and grouchy and looking very fat, but we're trying to dole out the love in equal shares. It's funny how God cares about our needs and then gives us what

Looking for Property in the area? Thought you might find this interesting. This lovely cottage with a white picket fence has recently been extensively remodeled and is move-in ready. This cozy 2 bedroom home offers an additional room t hat could be a dining room or office. The despacious lot offeres lots of pootential for outdoror living activities or possible future exansion. And you can get all this for the price of a condo! Why wait? Make thsi Soutside charmer your new home today! And you can have all of this for the mere price of $299,000!!! Welcome to California, baby!

I'm stealing away for a moment from the fast pace of our new life here because I can't bear to be away too long. The days race past and a walk feebly by the computer, gritting my teeth with resolution not to sit and write because there are other things pressing. I'm baking bread these days. Last week I baked a my first loaf of French bread and it was spectacular. I contemplated taking a picture of it; it was so lovely and delectable, but I decided to do it too late, after it have been torn into. My idea is, in an effort to save money, bake all the bread and freeze the milk. I have to go to the store every other day for milk or bread. Seriously, we go through so much of both that I can't go two days without going to the store. And I've realized that I spend about $50 everytime I go to the store. Now that's not always, but generally speaking, it's true. I have not disciplined myself to stick to the list yet and here's why. I get there, see fifteen

Here's a blast from the past... Princess Leila on the front porch of our 2nd Street Mansion. She is still royalty around here. We're trying desperately to break her reign, but she's so dang sweet! She rules us all. Tre and Micah in their Zelda costumes at the kitchen table- which they have almost outgrown already. Sorry Mom, the sunshine and saltwater works like miraclegrow on my kids! They got these on a Monday and I peeled them off of them the following Monday insisting that they be washed. The last rainy day that the kids were in Nebraska, I was feeling especially nostalgic and decided to let them play in the mud. This is the end of our driveway where they bathed and splashed and screamed for a long, long time. Hahaha. They were so excited. Mr. Fantastic; discovering that he is a real boy with belches and toxic emmissions from the nether-regions. He is still breakdancing and doing life-threatening flips onto his head, no matter how much we discourage them. Crazy kid. Ev

John Mayer wrote this song that goes... Stop this train I wanna get off and go home again I can't take the speed it's movin in... I'm sure he wrote it at that crossroad, the first time you realize how fast life is going and you think, "Man, I wish I could just go home." This song always blasts me back to mornings when I was in grade school and I'd wake up before the sun. My mom would already be fully dressed making breakfast and slinging sandwiches into sandwich bags. I loved that time in my life, it was so predictable. Needless to say the train is picking up speed. We were talking about Dale's friend at work being 45 years old and expecting his second child soon. I said, "You know, I can see us being in our thirties, it wasn't difficult for me. But I cannot imagine us being forty-five. *which makes Kennedy 20*" I know, it's a long way off, but it's coming. When do you get to an age that feels right? Maybe you grow each age a

My reading is slow and it doesn't produce a lot of sharing opportunities. When I was working nights and had four hours to read at a time, usually more than that, I could really digest a lot of information quickly and formulate a nicely rounded opinion or theory from what I had read. Now reading one chapter a day, it's like the thinking happens in spurts after I've gathered enough information to make a collective thought throughout the week. Everyday I sit in this room and type various items that may be of interest and I'm surrounded by books. Chuck, my personal carpenter at one time, built me these fantastic seven-foot shelves that require several burly young men to lift, and we've managed to fill every shelf including the very top that really isn't a shelf at all, with books of all genres and themes and generations. I really toil over whether my simplistic writing is of enough value to sacrifice the time when I could be reading. And indeed, I believe it is

Thank you, my friends, for being so honest. Sometimes I live under the heavy blanket of guilt over all the things I should be doing and am not doing... the person I should be by now and still am not. It's difficult. But a longtime friend revealed this crucial err in my thinking and reminded me that in Christ we are no longer condemned to live life like that. It was a perspective that had somehow escaped me for a long time, that has now given me a little freedom. Knowing your thoughts and struggles are so similar to mine gives me some relief, like I can keep going because we're all in the same boat. These were taken in Solvang, the Dutch community that I raved about early on in our adventure. It's about twenty miles from here; along that road is an ostrich farm which you can see from the road. We stopped to get a closer look and in order to go to the viewing area, you have a pay per person. We laughed about that, at how we could stand at the pay counter and watch then for fr

Let me ask you a question, and I really want a response because, honestly, I don't have anyone to talk to right now. There is something about the phone that inhibits conversation with everyone I talk to. It's so strange that distance automatically changes things. And so when I think about things I don't have anyone to bounce them off of. I miss my sister and I miss my friends. I'm not necessarily lonely, it's not something that I fret over most of the time, but when I'm sitting in church and these thoughts tumble through my mind, I want to hash them out with someone over a grilled cheese sandwich in my kitchen after the kids have gone out to play. I really just want to be apart of something and have someone that I can be myself with. I know it takes time, it just makes me miss home. WOOHOO!!! On a sidenote, I have just successfully loaded the FIRST EVER blog photo of our family since we moved to California! And here it is! We drove out to Pismo beach *all the c