7 Quick Takes Friday: 3-2-1 and some!

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3 Things I Am Thankful For

::I'm thankful for my husband planning a date night to celebrate our engagement anniversary (yup, we do this, and it's great!). I get to have the steak and margarita I was wanting in this post! Woohoo! And, as excited I am about eating out with the hubster, I am most excited to spend some QT with him! EXCITED!!

::Seeing how Bigfoot isn't old enough to hold down the fort, we are so very thankful for our friends who will be watching Bigfoot and Linus! We're hoping to squeeze in a dessert too, but we'll see how Linus does. Our friends, God-sends, I tell you! They seriously have no idea how they are blessing us!!

::Lastly, I'm thankful that things are starting to come together! The past few weeks-month, I have been an absolute hot mess! But things are calming down a little. I'm getting a little more sleep and feeling slightly more normal on the day-to-day. Wahoo! Mama feeling slightly more normal ForTheWin!

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2 of My Favorite Sounds

::Love, LoVe, LOVE hearing my boys laugh. It's the best sound EVER!

::My next favorite sound would be the sound of quiet stillness. It's a good sound. I do miss it. Whether it be the quiet stillness of outside, in a home, at a retreat, or in front of the blessed sacrament, all very nourishing.

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1 of My Favorite Smells

::Breastfed baby's breath!!!

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Now that I'm done with my 3-2-1, let's see what I can fill these quick takes with. As I mentioned in QT#1, things have been hectic, changing, busy, exhausting, and rejuvenating. Lots has happened and lots more is to come. I'll probably be sharing all of it in more detail in the next few months, but since things are still in the works, all I'll do now is ask for your prayers.

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Can I just say, I love my husband. He is pretty amazing. When things were terribly rough for me, I was absolutely miserable to live with (as much as he assured me I was not). He was working late and overtime, which meant I was doing so as well. And, if you know anything about me, I am not an OT type person. While I was working in mental health and as an interpreter, I would put in my hours and that was that. I treasured my time. I guarded my life outside of work. Anytime I put in extra hours, it weighed on me. It exhausted me instantly. I know my limits and OT is one that I would try not to cross in me pre-baby life.

Now, trying to explain to my boys about how I am not an OT person hasn't worked out as well as it did with my previous bosses/co-workers. They kind of just look at me funny and start running/rolling around like crazy.. or crying.. or they decide to make a poopy ..or {insert anything and everything under the sun that would make me get my job as a mama ON}. It's how things are right now. It's our season. With God's grace and LOTS and LOTS of prayer, I hope I can approach mama overtime with grace and love.

Feel free to pray for me in this area too. I'll milk all the prayers I can get!

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Funny thought: I think my days are starting to be defined by what link-up there is on said day. Most days my brain is scrambling to recognize what day of the week we are participating in. But, no worries! Blogging community to the rescue! I go to nurse sweet Linus, pull up my feedly, and VOILA! I know what day it is! It's pretty awesome. And, very reliable. So, thank you all you wonderful bloggers who keep me in the know!

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Speaking of you wonderful bloggers, you all are seriously so wonderful! I have so much to say about this little gem of a community that I have stumbled across. I'm still pretty new, but my goodness! Such a blessing!


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Ok, that's all I got for today. And, I need to pack these boys up so we can get to Mass on time before our dinner date!

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

A Busy Graduation Weekend - Part 2

Yup, below you see images of this Aggie family in Texas Tech grounds. We went from TU to Tech in one weekend. I, honestly, never would have imagined such a combination for a weekend endeavor. But, we wouldn't have it any other way. These two institutions provided both our brothers with foundations that they need to get to be closer to their respective vocations.

After the long drive filled with wind farms, good old Texas plains, and some nausea from our sweet Sweet P, we arrived to land of the Raiders.We took it easy that evening enjoying family and then hit the sack! We were feeling the drive but so glad to be where we were! God was so good to us throughout our drive and time that weekend! We couldn't be more grateful for the amazing care he shared with us and the awesome love!

Below is Seph with his Nana! She couldn't wait to get her arms around you, sweetheart!

Nana looks like she's mid-laugh here, but here's a pic of Seph with his Grandpa Ram and Nana.

Our Seph with the lovely Miss Amy! Uncle Godfather's beautiful girlfriend came to support my bother during this huge accomplishment!

Grandpa Ram entertaining Seph with a rolled up booklet. This game never gets old and seems to do magic in the realm of occupying our little mr. every time!

Seph moved on to other holes that he could stick things into. Grandpa Ram's mouth seemed like an interesting place filled with foreign objects to explore. Grandpa Ram was a good sport about it.

G-G also came to be with us this weekend! Such a gift to be able to have her at Uncle Godfather's graduation!!! Not only was she there to support her grandson, but she also got to give lots of cuddles and share smiles with her first great-grandson! We loved having her there and are so grateful to God for blessing us with this precious gift of her time and presence!

My love and my brother along with our sweet Seph! Three incredibly important people in my life who I love so much! :D

Proud Parents!

Uncle Godfather and his beautiful girlfriend.

Our amazing grandma/G-G. She's so beautiful!

My Aunt came to show her support for her nephew too!! 

Family Pic!

There were so many great pictures from this weekend and only so many I could post. These two below are a series of two that had us all laughing for quite awhile (or at least I know I thought they were hilarious!).

As soon as Uncle Godfather left the ceremony to come find us all he could think about was his diploma. It was his precious. He had quite the grip on the entire time with us and would not let it out of his hands until...

His godson got a hold of it! Uncle Godfather's face is priceless! And, Seph's joy, smile, and laughter all come through these two pics. My little mischievous monkey got a hold of Uncle Godfather's diploma and chucked it! Guess he was just trying to express his sentiments towards the Raiders.

Overall, an extremely hectic weekend, filled with so much goodness. We loved every moment and could not be more happy for both of our brothers. They are two wonderful men that we love so much and are so proud of all they have done on their journey towards getting their education.

Thank you Uncle A and Uncle Godfather for being a part of our lives. We are so grateful for both of you and thankful that we could share in such a wonderful time in both of your lives!

XO

Without confidence and love, there can be no true education. -St. John Bosco

A Busy Graduation Weekend - Part 1

We had a crazy busy graduation weekend back in May. Yes, I said May. As life would have it, this is the weekend that began the non-stop series of life happenings that have kept me from updating. So, for the sake of keeping up with all our fun times and memories, I'm backtracking - majorly!

Uncle A graduated from UT! We couldn't be more proud of him! He has always excelled amazingly academically and this milestone has demonstrated nothing short of the amazingness that is GeekMan's brother. We had such a great time and were glad that we could be there to celebrate his accomplishment.

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*On a quick side note, but something I want to remember, this weekend was when I started having my first signs of pregnancy with our Sweet P. The nausea was setting in as well as some fatigue. I attributed it all to all the traveling we were doing, but I did have my suspicions.* :)

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Below, you can see Seph enjoyed himself too! He had his first ride on an escalator and loved it!

Below is Uncle A and his beautiful girlfriend taking in the moment.

Proud parents.

Proud brother, sis-in-law (me), and nephew.

The afternoon after the Friday night graduation, we all had a lunch to celebrate Uncle A. It was so great to so much family!! A good majority of Aunts, Uncles, and cousins from the valley made their way to show support and pride in Uncle A. Lots of fun stories were shared and beautiful words on the journey that Uncle A has taken thus far. It was a great time filled with love, laughter, joy, and family!

Family pic!

Seph with Grandpa Wooley.

My love and his brother.

Seph enjoying Uncle Mario. They had some fun times together that day. Fun times that involved ice cold water and cups.

Seph and sweet Allison were having a great time together. They were all about sharing blueberries and smiles.

Very soon after the lunch celebration came to a close we made the trip from Austin, TX to Lubbock, TX. Yes, we were not just celebrating one brother's graduation, but two! My brother was graduating from PT school through Texas Tech. Which means, we had a lot of driving to do in a short time. Fortunately, my brothers main ceremony was on Sunday afternoon allowing us to get our travel on on Saturday after lunch.

We came across tons of wind farms. Or perhaps, just a few wind farms that stretched out over vast amounts of land in West Texas. Either way, they were quite the site, and my lovely Geeky husband was beyond excited about this part of our excursion.

Our time celebrating Uncle A was quick but so wonderful. We were grateful that we were able to share this amazing milestone with him and we could not be more excited for all that is to come for such a great guy!

We love you Uncle A!!!

All. Day. Long.

Laughter and Joy just keep on coming!

Enjoy!

ohhhh, the laughter!

Last night, Bigfoot was soo full of laughter! We hosted bible study at our home last night. Typically, our little man is just mesmerized by all the kids running around having fun while us adults get our bible study discussions on. But last night was different.

He did maintain his mesmerized and intrigued gaze throughout the study portion, but once families started leaving the kids were asking to see our pup, Lily. Of course, we obliged and brought our pup out and started showing the kids all the fun tricks she knows (always a fun hit with the younger crowd :)). All the kids were laughing and enjoying what Lily was able to do, which I anticipated, but what I did not anticipate was that Bigfoot joined in the laughing crowd and began laughing at Lily also!

This is a very different kind of laughter for this little home. Bigfoot has noticed Lily around - obviously! He sees her walking, he has heard her barking a number of times, etc etc. In terms of his laughter, normally, we get some fun laughs by showing silly faces, endless games of pick-a-boo, some fun parachuting/superman action, and tickling; but this time he identified something that he found was funny without any sort of prompt from the ever encouraging parental units! Bigfoot was looking at Lily and would laugh the cutest baby laugh ever every time Lily barked on command. Then we, of course had to encourage this amazingly fun time. Next thing you know, this mom and dad were prompting our Lily to “talk” aka bark and laughing hysterically alongside our laughing Bigfoot.


Haven’t laughed that hard in awhile. Thank you, sweet little one, for a great laugh.

He’s such a sweet boy! Lately, every time either of us bring him tolaughter like this he ends up getting hiccups - poor baby!

Bigfoot sharing his baby laughter with us at 9 weeks! Such a sweet gift- thought we’d share :)