Denim Daisies

 Hello, I have grown to absolutely love Survivor and my kids are really into it as well which makes for a very fun time snuggling, cheering on the different teams, and listening to Jamie ask questions about Mr. Jeff. Survivor 48 premiered last night and I’m really excited and motivated by this season. Spoilers ahead… Players who stood out to me are: Joe: I am so excited by Joe as a contestant and completely cheering for him as my number one choice. I know the nature of the game probably means that he’ll get voted out relatively early or I will end up being disappointed because he’ll have to sacrifice an honest game to win. However, I’m really hoping that he doesn’t and he somehow makes it to the end playing an honest game. That would be so motivating and, until proven otherwise, I’m on his side! Eva: oh my goodness, how much good can I say about Eva! She seems to be an authentic person, a hard worker, and her story is changing my heart! She is a person with autism who is voluntaril...

 Hello, Thank you to Shay from  Mix and Match Mama  and Schaefer from  Schaefer Told Me To  for hosting a link party celebrating real and authentic life.  Here is a little of clothes, food, entertainment, and aspirations for this month. I was in the hospital last week for a major health event which will reflect a lot in what I’m writing, but I don’t intend to go into details here. If you’re curious you can read about it from  friday’s  post that I’ve updated a little as I’ve started to process everything. What I’m wearing… Lol… (I honestly do love this dark green color for a loose sweatshirt though) Currently I’m living in loose sweats, I’d probably be doing this regardless of circumstances as it’s been pretty chilly in the Midwest. Typically my attire for work is cargo pants and warm quarter zips and then I change after work into workout attire to play with the boys and build some muscle. I also highly recommend Thinx reusable period underwear if...

 Hello, I am going to keep on focusing on the positive because it’s best for me and I’ll deal with the fear, anger, sadness, everything else with someone I trust one to one. So here are some things that are making me happy: 1. Bird songs I don’t normally sleep this much, definitely not this late, but laying in bed watching the sunrise and listening to the birds chattering away is very peaceful. 2. Flowers I really love the beauty and colors of flowers and so we’ve got quite a few at the moment from gifts to just our plants starting to sprout that are making me smile. 3. Knitting My brain seems to be working slower than usual right now and so knitting while listening to a podcast has become a truly happy and relaxing activity. Jamie has already claimed the scarf I’m making. 🥰 4. Cat snores Both of our fur babies have been attached to me like Velcro since I got home and our cat Belle, in particular, has the cutest little snores while she’s snuggled up against me. 5. Hand holding and...

 Hello, This is probably going to be a bit deeper than I usually write. I use this blog as essentially an online journal because I want to look back years from now and remember. Sunday’s I post about something that I’m grateful for from the week and I have a few:  My gratitude this week is for Jesus who is watching over my five Angel Babies until we can meet one day.  My gratitude is for having two beautiful boys on Earth who give the best hugs. My gratitude is for my amazing husband who managed everything with care and love. My gratitude is my best friend who stayed with me so I had a hand to hold as my heart broke again. My gratitude is for the hospital team who listened and ensured that I could come home to my boys. My gratitude is for all the family and friends who are currently helping us while we’re having to navigate the complicated logistics while I’m not really mobile. My gratitude is for all the people praying for us and for God’s strength and courage to get thr...

 Hello! This has been quite the week, but there is so much to be grateful for. It’s going to get a bit deep and frankly I need to not process a lot for a little while and just focus on gratitude so that I can deal with the grief in my own way and time. Thank you to Andrea from  Momfessionals  and Erika from  A Little Bit of Everything  for hosting this sweet link party every Friday! 💛 This has really helped me on my gratitude goal and also on taking pictures of all these wonderful things to remember and love! Here are my favorites from this week (in timeline order because that is how I can process right now): 1. Guerrera documentary  Some of the ladies that I trained with for our respective combat deployments participated in a documentary that came out last Saturday. They did an amazing job and I can speak from experience that this was a very accurate depiction for us. (Most of the ladies interviewing were from CST 5. I trained with them but ended up deplo...

 Hello, It’s been an eventful week for sure and so a short post today just asking for prayers for my family. I had to have an emergency surgery this week and am going to be in recovery for a while. I’ll be fine, but I am worried about my kids stress levels in all of this as they’re old enough to understand that Mom is sick, but young enough that they won’t fully get it and we want to keep their anxiety to a minimum. Thank you for your prayers!!! I feel beyond grateful to have so many wonderful friends and family to support us!!! Literally my husband and parents are doing so much to keep life stable for the kids and my best friend stopped what she was doing yesterday to be in the hospital with me during the surgery and recovery. I could cry writing how much she means to me for being there when I needed her with so much love.  Wishing you a day of love and light! 💛Jess

 Hello, I was not feeling great Monday and so my parents decided to step in and take the kids for the day. It’s the first time that they’ve taken both kids for a day at the same time since Leo was an infant and it was VERY much appreciated!!! 🥰🥰🥰 Here’s a little photo journal of their day! Fun was had by all and I am very grateful! 💛Jess

 Hello, So this weekend took an unexpected turn and I was DOWN for the count. I’m not sure that I’ve been that sick since I was pregnant with the boys and my goodness was it a rough weekend. I’m so grateful that I’ve grown and matured enough to know when to accept help and Grant and my parents took the lead so I could battle whatever in the world was going on with my body.  In honor of this and the fact that it sounds like everyone is sick right now I’ve got my top five comfort foods/drinks when sick! 🥰 5. Herbal tea I down this like it’s my job, especially chamomile. 4. Toast Especially with a little Nutella or avocado for flavor. Tastes good and part of the BRAT diet to help the tummy. 3. Fresh berries  Not 100% of the time, but when I’m sick more often than not I am down for fresh berries or an açaí bowl. 2. Applesauce Again part of the BRAT diet, not my favorite texture but it works so well. 1. Ramen I don’t know what it is about that cheap top ramen, but one packet ...

  Hello, This week I want to remember the gratitude that I have for my wonderful friends. There was a big event on Saturday that will definitely go into my Friday favorites this coming week, but it also meant a lot of emotions about a really interesting season of our lives. I am so proud of my friends and so grateful that I was able to text support to these beautiful, strong, and amazing women after not having talked for years and we picked up immediately. I know we have all scattered across the world literally, but it was so inspiring to know that we’re still connected and there is only love and support. 🥰 I love you ladies!!! 💛💛💛 Jess

 Hello! Happy Valentine’s Day!!! We had a very sweet morning with the boys and they are off to school and ready to celebrate our favorite friendship love today! 🥰 Thank you to Andrea from  Momfessionals  and Erika from  A Little Bit of Everything  for hosting this sweet link party every Friday! 💛 This has really helped me on my gratitude goal and also on taking pictures of all these wonderful things to remember and love! Here are some favorites from the week: 1.  This morning the boys were so excited for their valentines from Mom and Dad, but I think I was even more excited! 😉😂 These were such a cute Walmart find and we have been looking for easy-to-wash water bottles for a bit now, so these with the lunch boxes and puzzles, we’re perfect! 2. Jamie is an early bird and usually gets up around 4-5am but Leo likes to take his time. This morning while I was slowly getting Leo up, I walked away for a moment, and came back to Jamie reading to him in bed. 🥰🥰...

 Hello, It feels like a lot of people are particularly stressed this week, I don’t know if it is because of the news, the weather, or just something in the air. I’m using this post to codify the things that are bringing me peace right now: 1. Drinking tea instead of coffee I love coffee, but I was not feeling great for a while after drinking it so I decided to switch to tea and it is making a world of difference. I put a little creamer in still to get that same thicker and less watery feel and I feel so much better. 2. Reading my Bible every day I am so grateful for these moments of peace, even though many mornings I have Jamie adding commentary, it is so helpful to spend the first part of my day learning about God and trusting Him more every day. I’m especially encouraged that God uses the bad for His GOOD plans.  3. Hans Rosling’s Factfulness I read this book a couple of years ago and it just helps me to remember that overall the world is getting better. That things is the n...

 Hello, I’m joining the party again this month, a big thank you to Shay from Mix and Match Mama  and Erika from A Little Bit of Everything  for setting this up and inviting us to share as well! 🥰 Grant and I are in a season of life that usually has our two little guys along for the ride. That means that we don’t have regular dinner dates or weekends away, but we find time that works in our schedule and season. 💛 1. Wednesday and Thursday Work Commute We are a one car family as we live in a city where parking isn’t always the easiest and we love the fact that it reduces our carbon impact and has the added bonus of allowing us to spend more time together. Grant takes public transportation to work Monday, Tuesday, and Friday, but on Wednesday and Thursday he works from a different location that doesn’t have an obvious route so I drive him between the kids drop off and heading over to the zoo. This time together is just us, we’re not on our phones, there’s no distractions o...

 Hello, Normally I’d do a little overview of the weekend adventures but it was a relatively calm solo weekend while Grant was gone for some Army training and, frankly, I didn’t take many pictures. Instead here’s five ways I’m trying to live in my season. For reference this season is the cold winter between holidays where we are pushing pretty hard with Grant’s work and the boys are still young enough to need a lot of attention and supervision but learning some independence. (I.e. helping with chores or learning to self entertain more though I love playing with them too!) 1. Including the boys in chores. I’m more of a “get it done quick and efficient the first time” person. That doesn’t really work well with preschool and young elementary age children so I’m trying to learn to put that aside and just have them help. It’s a fair chance that things won’t be done exactly as I like them, and it will DEFINITELY take five times as long, but it’s worth it for them to learn some additional ...

 Hey! So I don’t have a meat free Monday idea today as my biggest idea is my 4 year old’s favorite…avocado toast with Tajin.  Instead let’s talk about stains. Our cat has been getting sick lately, she doesn’t like the changes in weather and it seems to stress her out. That being said, we’ve had to clean up a lot of stains and I’m just gonna put it out there, dish detergent, especially the dawn power wash, is AMAZING!!! Seriously next time you have an issue, try it! If it can clean organic matter clean enough to eat off of a plate, it can definitely handle a little rug stain, and we all have it, or a version, in our homes already! 🥰 That’s all for today. The boys are off school and we’re going to get their classroom valentines today! 💛💛💛 💛Jess

 Hello, Today’s post is a little later in the day as it was a bit of a busy solo weekend and so when I had the chance to get an extra 30 minutes of sleep this morning it was an easy decision. This week I’m grateful for hand holding. My boys are BUSY and typically I have to hold onto their wrists in a mom death grip when we’re in a parking lot or near a road to avoid any accidents. In the past couple of weeks though they’ve started holding my hands in return for more than a couple of seconds. It’s the most lovely thing in the world to have your two boys holding each of your hands walking through the park after school. I love it and I will savor this forever. 💛Jess

 Hello, It felt like this week was sprinting and I blinked and it’s already Friday. It’s going to be a really fun day with a Valentine’s Day dance for the boys at lunch today and I get to be one of the chaperones! My kids are little so I think we’re still in the stage of wanting mom around and I probably won’t do this when they get older so I’m going to soak in all the delighted hugs and excitement while we’re in this phase of parenting. 🥰 Here are some other favorites from this week though. Thank you to Andrea and Erika from  Momfessionals and Alittlebitofeverythingblog  for creating this “link party” 🥰 1. This pill device! If you have a child who has to take medicine regularly, finding a travel device that can store, cut, and crush pills is a game changer and I LOVE this  one.  I’ve bought it twice now so I carry one with me so we don’t miss a dose for him and I left one at the school as it’s the best all-in-one that I’ve found. 10/10 best gadget of the yea...

 Hello, So a quick check in today on goals as this is the time that most people drop off and I most definitely have in the past. 1. Writing a card to a friend once a month. I wrote the card, addressed and stamped it, put it in my bag and have yet to put it in the mail box so I’m 90% of the way there. 2. Family Bible Time. We’ve kept this up with the help of Trader Joe’s mini ice cream cones and it’s going really well. It’s also nice to have this time as a family talking and learning together, focusing on how God can use imperfect people to make a perfect plan. I’ve been disappointed, frustrated, and downright livid this week but I know that God will use this to make his perfect plan a reality and I trust him. I want my kids to have this knowledge and trust much sooner than I did so we are keeping this up! 3. No spend weeks. Our first one was last week and it went pretty well! It’s a lot easier than I thought to just put something on a list or a save for later or even use things as ...

 Hello, We are a game family. We love board games, we love sports, we love team video games, we love cheering… just all of it. These are five of our favorites right now that work for our 4 and 6 year old.  We LOVE this game. It’s simple, it’s wildlife themed, and it is fun while not taking too long so it doesn’t require a long attention span. It essentially a matching game about Australian animals and it’s just very sweet. Our current favorite, I’m looking forward to seeing if this helps the boys identify scat on our future hikes! 😂 I think we got this one from the school as one of the preschool hand outs a couple of years ago but it has been a good entry level game for the boys and a great speech tool for comprehension and learning positional adjectives! We love this game and the fact that the dance mode card ensures that we get up and dance throughout! We’ve played Dino dig so much the box fell apart and so I have the pieces and board in a large gallon sized bag. It’s reall...

 Hello, I mentioned last week that we went on a little weekend trip to Columbus as Grant had an army obligation there but it worked out for myself and the boys to go too! Jamie has been obsessed with the idea of a hotel for a while now so this was the perfect opportunity for that treat. 🙂 We went up Friday night and then stayed in the hotel and had a fun pool/snack and relax day on Saturday. Both boys love swimming so after thoroughly enjoying the hotel’s hot breakfast we headed up to change and go to the indoor pool for the morning.  The boys both LOVE swimming and so this was definitely a highlight as they got to play swim school, mermaids vs sharks, and dive rings.  Day two began with breakfast again but then my dad decided to drive up and join us for the day and we took the boys to legoland discovery center in Columbus. They had a blast (Grandpa included) building, playing, and going on the different rides. It was so sweet to watch them all together. After that it wa...