Tag #1

My friend Juli tagged me a while ago and I forgot until recently when Crystal tagged Tessa.

Here's how this "Tag" works. List 3 joys, 3 fears, 3 goals, 3 current obsessions/collections, 3 surprising facts about yourself. Then tag 5 people at the end of your post.

3 joys:

1. When my house is clean. (I try to be joyful in between those rare moments as well).

2. When our family is together doing something fun. The other day we were on this four-way see-saw at the park and I remember thinking at that moment that my joy was at its peak thus far in my life.

3. Feeling close to the Lord.

3 fears:

1. I'll just get this one out of the way, SPIDERS!!! I've been held hostage for quite a bit of time by quite a few in my life. If I see one and watch it go under something I have to find and kill it before I can even think of going on with my life. When I was little I had to shine a flashlight down under my blankets to check for spiders before I would get in bed. Now I'm so blessed to have Darrin around for the majority of the spider sightings.

2. Losing a child. I'm sorry to go from something so trivial to this. This really would be the hardest most unbelievably painful trial to go through in this life.

3. I really fear the thought of my parents getting old. Dementia is a frightening disease to me and one that I hope I never have to experience. But, the fear of #2 and #3 is so greatly aleviated by the knowledge of the resurrection. For that I am grateful.

3 goals:

1. Grow a tomato to its juciest, redest (is that a word?) state.

2. Go to Hawaii with Darrin someday...he really needs to experience this, and I need to experience it again, this time with a special boy to walk hand in hand down the beach. :)

3. To learn digital scrapbooking...anyone into this who wants to teach me??

3 current obsessions/collections:

1. The song Welcome Home by Radical Face.

2. I'm collecting lots of food and toothbrushes with the couponing I'm getting into. It's super fun.

3. I'm kind of obsessed with reading other people's blogs and admit to being a total blog slacker myself.

3 surprising facts about myself:

1. I lived in Russia once in 1998 and again in 1999 teaching English. I have some of the fondest memories of my life in those two semesters.

2. I like hospitals. I enjoy being a patient and would love to be a nurse someday...the human body amazes me to no end. You can find me many times not being able to sleep, watching Discovery Health. The human body is A-mazing.

3. I never went to the same Elementary for more than one year in a row. But, my mom promised I would go to the same junior high and high school and she kept her promise (although I still moved 3 times during that time---it was still within the boundaries). Thanks mom. :)

Kay, now I tag Crystal, Lisa, Christy, Laura, and Ashley if you guys want, I'd love to read em.

Mason Jennings' youngest fans...

My girls belt it out to this song (Sacred Place) and Fighter Girl whenever we play them in the car. It makes me happy.

Aaahhh this is the life...

Said Malia the other day while swinging on her grandparent's new patio swing. Where does she learn this stuff??? But, I'm now saying the same sentence as I sit here eating my seedless watermellon in my basement, cooling off after a late evening walk around the local high school track with the family. It was really fun. Malia and Tessa loved to "race us" (we started with a stroller, but they wanted in on this exercise business as well, and who am I to stop their ambition). I don't know why we hadn't walked at the track before. It's nice not to have to worry about the kids running into the street and other sources of stress, such as having strange people honking at you and the like. I think we'll do it again soon.

So, what really got me in the mood for documenting my life today was taking a close look at my tomato plants---I have a row of 9 of them. I would surely upload a picture if I could find my camera cord, which, well, don't get me started on the lack of organization currently taking hold on my sanity. But, imagine in your mind me stooping down looking closely at the yellow petals, one by one, assessing every square inch of them...when "aaaahhhh Malia!! come here!!!! There's little green round things growing on them!!" She ran over, we hugged, we literally jumped up and down holding onto each other. I really hope no one was watching, as there are quite a few windows that can see into my yard. If they were I hope they got the laugh they needed for the day and that they've moved on. The girls have been helping me water them and shovel a scoop of manure on them now and again. This is our first garden and we only have tomatoes this year. But I can't wait to have a whole plot of salsa growing some day with some pumpkin, zucchini, etc. thrown in as well. Aaaaahhhh life is good.

Pictures to come. Also, please pray that I didn't just jinx my poor little plants.