My baby is 1!

So Noah turned 1 last weekend.  Can it really be that an entire year has gone by since he arrived?!?

I was bummed that the day turned cold and WINDY, but all in all it was a fun birthday party at the park.  Over 20 friends came to hang out and celebrate with us.

 I made Noah a banana cake with chocolate fudge icing, aka a Monkey Cake.  I loved how it turned out -- not an exact replica of Deb's...but then again, I'm not a professional food blogger, am I?

He seemed to enjoy it :)

 

After a quick outfit change, Noah then began channeling Moses to finish out the afternoon.

 

Seriously, wouldn't you like to know what he was thinking here?

It was a great day for a great little boy.  What a precious gift he is to me and Nate.

Love you, sweet Noah!

Work Hangover

I couldn't get out of bed this morning.  Our alarm had gone off numerous times, Nate was in the shower, Noah was chatting with the crib toys...it was time to rise.  But. I. Couldn't. Open. My. Eyes.  Maybe it had something to do with the fact that I worked until 10:30 last night.  Nothing like Christmas hours at a retail store. :)  But I gotta tell you, if I had to work anywhere, it doesn't get much better than REI...as evidenced by our store's Christmas picture last year:

 

Can you find me?  (I'm on the left.)  We took another one this year, I'll post it whenever I get a copy.

I'm not gonna lie, it is HARD to work part-time sometimes.  Especially at Christmas time; other things suffer because of my work schedule.  For instance, we will have only eaten 1-2 dinners together as a family for the month of December.  :(

But for the difficulties, there are some great benefits.  Not just the discounts, of which there are plenty.  It's bigger than that for me.  I have some great coworkers who have become friends over the past year.  The managers seriously care about me and everyone else; they go above and beyond to make it a fun place to work.  Like providing meals for all the employees during this holiday season.  And this might sound crazy, but everyone is always happy to be working.  I mean, of course there are people who are tired, or might rather be getting other things done.  But for the most part, everyone is happy and content to be working.  I'd even go so far as to say that there's almost palpable joy in the air when I'm at work.  Sounds crazy, I know.

Anyways, just something I thought I'd share.  I can tend to get ornery about having to work at nights and on weekends (which is generally when I'm scheduled, so that Nate can watch Noah), but when I reflect on my job it is a pretty sweet deal, I think.  :)

Have you ordered your Christmas cards yet?

I haven't.  Oops.  I need to get on that!

It's been several years since I've created and mailed a Christmas card.  I always LOVE receiving them in the mail, but I've let myself get too busy in the past to make them for my family.  Not this year...Shutterfly has come to the rescue!  There's a promotion going on for bloggers right now, you can get 50 free cards for writing up a short review.  Free?  From my favorite online picture site?  Yes, please.  (If you want to write up a review, read about it here.)

I've been using Shutterfly for awhile to store pictures of Noah for friends and family to see.  (If you'd like to visit his site, you can see it here.  It's password-protected, so shoot me an email or comment and I'll send you the password.)  I really love the ease of uploading photos, and the style of the website is great.  So it wasn't surprising that their Christmas cards are cute too.

Have you ever poked around to check them out?  There is a ridiculous amount of styles to choose from in the Christmas Photo Cards section.  Every time I browse, I come up with a different favorite.  Currently, I'm all about this one:

Wouldn't this be the best way to showcase Noah's first year?!

But then I saw this one and really like it too:

Decisions, decisions...

But seriously, I've tried a bunch of other online picture sites, and Shutterfly gives you a great product and makes the process so easy!  

And for those of you who planning holiday parties and want some great invitations, check out the selection of Christmas and New Years invitations.  I want to plan a party just so I can send this one:

So, all of that to say, I really like Shutterfly.  And now you know why!

I'm off to create our Christmas card.  Check your mailboxes to see which design I decide to go with :)

Wow, you're still reading! Well how about an update?

Hi friends!

It's awesome that some of you are still reading.  I've been toying with the idea of writing on here again, and the straw that finally broke my back was the opportunity to get some free Christmas cards by blogging about a certain website's designs.  That post will be coming later today, but until then I thought an update would be appropriate.  Because I'm pretty sure my last post had something to do with charting fertility and pondering a cross-country move.

Boy have things changed.

We were blessed with Noah in January, who has gone from this 

To this

And as far as our home?  We've been in San Diego for a little over a year now, and we're loving it!  The weather is beautiful a majority of the time, we have a home we love, a church that fills us and allows us to serve, and friends that we love.  Being so far from our respective families has been the hardest part, and let me tell you right now that being away from your family when you have a child is HARD.  In more ways than one.  But God has drawn Nate and I together in unique ways in this season, for which I'm grateful.  And praise God for airplanes!  We've had family visitors off and on over the year, which has been so nice.

I'll write more soon, but just wanted to quickly update everyone (which may not even be necessary in this age of Facebook).  Here are the latest family pics:

Off to fold some laundry before Noah wakes!

Sarah :)

Anybody out there?!?!

Soooo.  It's been awhile, my friends.  I'm ready to begin again.

How about you?  Are you still lurking here, or have you given up on me??

Let me know if you're still reading!

Talk to Yourself

I read a quote today that I cannot get out of my head. It is by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, from his book "Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Its Cure." It is based on Psalm 42, which you can read here.

“Have you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? Take those thoughts that come to you the moment you wake up in the morning. You have not originated them, but they start talking to you, they bring back the problems of yesterday, etc.

Somebody is talking. Who is talking? Your self is talking to you. Now this man’s treatment was this; instead of allowing this self to talk to him, he starts talking to himself. ‘Why art thou cast down, O my soul?’ he asks. His soul had been depressing him, crushing him. So he stands up and says: ‘Self, listen for a moment, I will speak to you.’…

The main art in the matter of spiritual living is to know how to handle yourself. You have to take yourself in hand, you have to address yourself, preach to yourself, question yourself. You must say to your soul: ‘Why art thou cast down’– what business have you to be disquieted?

You must turn on yourself, upbraid yourself, reprove yourself, exhort yourself, and say to yourself: ‘Hope thou in God’– instead of muttering in this depressed, unhappy way. And then you must go on to remind yourself of God, Who God is, and what God is and what God has done, and what God has pledged Himself to do. (That is, constantly preach the gospel to yourself!)

Then having done that, end on this great note: defy yourself, and defy other people, and defy the devil and the whole world, and say with this man: ‘I shall yet praise Him for the help of His countenance, who is also the health of my countenance and my God.'"

Wow.

Various & Sundry

A spike!
So this might seem a silly to blog about, but my BBT spiked to the highest it's ever been 4 days ago, and has continued to stay at high temps through today. I'm pretty excited...it seems Metformin might be doing the trick. Whether the outcome is a baby, a period, or just a new development in my path to fertility, I'm overall encouraged that my body seems to be responding positively to the treatment plan I'm following.

The light at the end of the tunnel
Nate's dissertation defense date was set yesterday -- the plan is that he will present his research to his committee and then do an oral defense the morning of June 4th. Wahoo!! He would tell you that the light seems more like a oncoming train than anything else right now...so pray that he can continue to make progress and feel an overwhelming peace about it all.

Coldplay
It is T-5 days until we get to see Coldplay, live in Atlanta. It will be an amazing show, I am sure. Made even better by the fact that our good friends are coming into town so we can all go together :)

Food, Inc.
I am excited to see this movie...perhaps because I am currently reading The Omnivore's Dilemma and am absolutely fascinated -- in good and bad ways -- by its content.

Ebb & Flow
I am on the verge of another life transition, and find myself experiencing alternating emotions of excitement and glee, sadness and loneliness. We are moving, friends are moving. I no longer have the naive expectations that I had when I graduated college...that friendships would remain, and last, through time and distance. Don't get me wrong, I think friendships can, and do, last...despite all the things in life that might get in the way. But they are altered, and right now I don't want that. I like my friendships the way they are, thank you very much. I like weekly visits, and random hang outs, and living in community...I don't want to trade them for intermittent phonecalls and pictures over email or facebook.

But I know that a new community, new friendships, will come soon. And I trust that the relationships I have formed in this season will play out in His good, perfect plan. He does know best, after all.