That Stranger

Hi. Remember me? I write on this blog, supposedly. But lack of posting over the past several months may make you wonder.

We have not been up to a lot, yet have been fairly busy, if that makes any sense. We haven't done a lot to tell about, yet life is full of work and fun.

Stephen and his dad and some of his brothers re plumbed our house a few months ago. It is so neat. I can turn on any faucet in my house, and be reasonably sure that I will have running water when I do so! What a novelty!

After a record breaking hot summer (WAAAY over the previous record of number of days in a  year over 100*) so far it looks like September may bring some relief. I don't even mind missing out on some dove hunting if we'll get some rain!

The kiddoes are doing well. Tyrel has sort of started 'school'. He knows most of his colors now and can count a little. He knows that a T is the first letter of his name. And he can quote Psalms 1:1-3. We are working on memorizing all of Psalm 1. I am amazed at how fast he can memorize each verse. I just have to work with him on not saying it so fast that he skips words, or where no one can understand him.
He has really taken an interest in dinosaurs lately. So we got some books from the library on dinosaurs. Most of them I can't even read to him really, because I can't edit that much as I read. They are so full of evolutionary gobbledy gook. I was SO glad to find one called "Dinosaurs by Design". I don't even have to try to edit it, because they know God created everything!

Kimber is talking up a storm here lately. She doesn't speak everything real clearly, but I can usually guess what she means. She calls Tyrel "Dy-da" but most other names she says fairly clear. I don't know if it is because she can't say Tyrel or if it's because Daddy call's him Cowboy, but a few days ago, Kimber started just calling him Cowboy.
Yesterday we started potty training Kimber. She has been showing interest in learning, and we are almost out of diapers, so it seemed like a good time to start. She always wants to sit on the potty, but doesn't necessarily USE it. We had quite a few accidents yesterday. I'm not sure if I'll wait to really get her started, or just keep it up since we did start.

Baby is growing and moving and doing well. Only two more months to go! I am getting a little apprehensive of labor. It is so worth it for a sweet little baby, but I don't look forward to labor itself. Right now (as of when I previously saw my midwife) the baby is 'posterior'. Meaning that he/she is head down, but back to back with me. So pray that changes, because that makes for extra painful labor.

Well I can't think of a whole lot else going on here right now. I can't get my computer to upload any pictures, so I won't be posting any til I can get that fixed.

A Blue Jean Quilt.

I have been wanting to make some blue jean quilts for the kids since about....well before they were born. :)



The stack of cut out blue jean squares. I thought I had all I needed cut out, I laid them out on the floor and needed 1 more! So I cut out a pocket square.

  I couple of weeks ago I decided to go ahead and start one, or I'd never really get around to it. I am trying to get rid of a lot of 'stuff'in our house, and couldn't rationalize keeping tubs of old blue jeans if I was never going to actually make the quilts.


Kimber's bed before I started sewing the quilt. The one on there is one my mom got at a garage sale.

I decided to start with a small one that would fit on Kimber's toddler bed. That way I would be more likely to finish the task without getting discouraged that it was taking too long, and never finish.

all laid out and ready to gather back up and start sewing. You can actually feel the difference in the Wrangler or Rustler material. Even though they are made by the same company, Wrangler definitely has better denim.

  I didn't get any pictures of me actually working on the quilt. I started it about 9 in the morning with cutting out all the pieces. I was finished with it before bedtime. Which isn't bad considering I had to stop to take care of children and feed them and myself, etc.



I used a flannel sheet that I cut up for the backing.

I was wondering what I should use for the batting. Because I didn't want to wait til I went to town to buy some batting to put in it. I know me. If I quit working on it, it could literally be years before I started working on it again. So Stephen suggested using some of the blankets I had put in the living room to give away. It worked great! As I was sewing it all together though, I was thinking to myself. "If I am getting rid of all these other blankets because we have too many, WHY am I making a new one?" :)

Here is her bed all made up with the new quilt. She sleeps on top of it and under the other one for now, as it is too hot to sleep under it right now. And yes, she sleeps with her Annie doll every night. I keep meaning to take a picture of her cuddling it in her sleep to show Sarah. :)

My MIL had the string for me to use to tie it together. So I got it all finished from cutting to making the bed in one day!  I plan on making two twin sized blue jean quilts for the bunk beds Stephen is going to make before the baby is big enough to take over Kimber's bed. (Stephen and my brother Tommy made the toddler bed you see here. :)

6 Years



Stephen checking to see why my brother Ben is back there looking suspicious.





Cake cutting time! My Grandma Rose made the cakes, and Grandma Kathy made my dress!

 



Stephen doesn't like this picture because he's making a goofy face, but I like it. :)

  So on May 28th Stephen and I celebrated 6 years of marriage. It has been a wonderful, fun, love filled 6 years too! We're pretty much still like newlyweds, in fact I consider 6 years still newly wed... I mean really, 6 years isn't THAT long, it has gone by in a flash. We were but wee babes at a mere 18 and 19 years old. Now here we are 6 years older with 2.4 children and just as in love as ever. I love you Stephen and look forward to the next 6 years and beyond!

God's Grace and Mother's Day

A little after midnight I believe it was, so a little after mother's day, my brother Tommy fell asleep at the wheel a half a mile from WalMart where he works the night shift and rolled his pickup. He called Stephen to see if it was okay to leave his pickup at the office in town, and then he went to stay the night with a friend in town. I am SO glad that he is okay.

 As far as I know other than being sore he was not hurt at all, Praise God!

 I just saw his pickup for the first time today, when I went into town. I almost cried when I saw it. His pickup was much prayed and saved and waited for. Tommy always said that God gave him a purple pickup, so he would be clothed in purple. :)


Aren't you glad he didn't have a passenger?

  He also used to sing a song I've heard on K-Love before TO his pickup. Something along the lines of. "God gave me you for the ups and downs, God gave me you for the days of doubt" So when I saw it, that was all I thought of.

 So yeah, his pickup is now totalled, but I am SO thankful that he is fine, and nobody else was even involved in the wreck. My brothers all have a saying they always say to each other which is "Do a barrel roll", just because they do I guess. Tommy now says he has DONE a barrel roll and it's not all it's cracked up to be.

In the picture below, I noticed that the cups are still in the cupholder, which I thought was kinda neat.

 On a completely different note, today my SIL and I went and had a pedicure for Mother's Day. I had never done anything like that before. It was fun. Thanks Crystal!

Happenings

We have the first fruits of our labors! After THREE years of trying to grow a garden, and one thing or another killing it. Be it cows, peacocks, chickens, etc... anyways, this year, a few days ago, we got our first food from our garden! Three cherry tomatoes. Stephen and the kids said they were good. (Shh, I don't like tomatoes....I like many things you can make with tomatoes, but I don't like to just eat them plain.) But so far our tomato plants, corn and onions are all coming along fine! I still need to plant okra, green beans, watermelon and cantaloupe. I hope to grow some greens when it cools off in the fall. It gets too hot for them to do well here in the summer.

Lets see what else. Oh yes. A few weeks ago a friend of ours gave Tyrel a 6 months old miniature donkey. An albino miniature donkey no less. He was rather stand offish at first, but in the past few days he has warmed up to us. You can often find Tyrel hanging off his back out in the yard. Yesterday Tyrel asked if he could ride Ice (he named him himself!) I told him that he might get bucked off and he was okay with that. I set him on Ice's back and Ice just stood there for about 2 minutes. I went to get a handful of feed and he started to follow. He took one step, went hop hop, and Tyrel went splat! He got the wind knocked out of him, but he was fine. He cried a little, but mostly he was proud of being 'bucked off' and that he is a REAL cowboy now because of it. :)

Kimber has been going to the potty a few times a day. I am not even really potty training yet, but if she's interested then hey, go for it! She has also started saying quite a few words. DADDY being her favorite. She will sometimes say Mama. She says apple, happy, please, hi, bye, donkey, cow, goat, up. water bottle, chickies, drink and NO. Most things she says, she says with great enthusiasm. NO! DONKEY! APPLE! BYE! Oh and she calls the swing in our tree a "wheee" because that's what you say when you swing right?



shhhhhhh



I have been feeling a lot better most days. I still get kinda sickish or tired some days, but mostly a lot better. My first prenatal appt. is on the 21st. I accidentally said I was at the beginning of my third trimester in my last post. I meant the beginning of the second! I am due early Novemberish.

Tyrel's picture of Kimber and I.



So.....

I know. It IS possible to post without pictures. Or I could take the time to actually get to where I CAN post pictures. But really I just have not been online a lot lately. After having two blissful, pretty much nothing even uncomfortable pregnancies (okay, so as I think about it there WERE times of discomfort in the previous ones, but not much at all), this one has caught me by surprise. It is really not bad at all compared to people I have heard about, but it's not overly pleasant so far. Don't get me wrong, I would put up with MUCH worse for my sweet baby, and am quite thankful that I do not have to endure more, but this isn't what I'm used to! Sleepy. VERY sleepy. Pretty much all day. I avoid going to town as much as possible, because I always want to nap while in town, or maybe while driving. We usually don't go to town more than once every week at the most, and right now about twice a month if I have to. I pretty much wake up tired, about 30 minutes later the on and off all day queasies start. The smell of my house has come really close to making me puke. (We live in an old trailer house, and it stinks horribly of mildew or something anymore.) I don't feel like eating most of the day, but if I DON'T eat, then I feel worse. Plus I need to feed baby. Not wanting to eat has never been a problem for me before. :) I like food. Sweets are my weakness. Which they seem to be what I most have to avoid.



Hey look, a picture! Maybe I fixed it. :)

 So yeah, I don't like whining on my blog, I'm just kinda letting ya'll know how things are going, and why I haven't been posting much. Since I finally got smart enough to find a due date guesstimator today, I found out that today should be the first day of my second trimester! So hopefully things will take a swing for the better!

Ho Hum

I was sitting here waiting for pictures to upload onto Shutterfly to make my Ma happy, having caught up on reading blogs after not being online for weeks, thinking..."Well now what? I would post on my blog, but all my recent pictures are on Stephen's computer at work. Then I remembered. I have something to blog about that doesn't need pictures. :)

Wanna guess?

Yep, Jones Baby #3 is on the way! Due in about November I am thinking. 11-11-11 would be really cool.

I didn't post right away when I found out because I was wanting to tell my brother Chris first. (after Stephen and kiddos) But I can only reach him by snail mail. So by the time I had decided he might have got the letter, told friends and family here, I had forgot to post about it. So now you know oh world of bloggyness.