Does it make me OCD...

that when I cut vegetables I put them in very specific bowls everytime??

If At First You Don't Succeed...

Try, try again...

But, if you do succeed... do a little happy dance in your kitchen.

Summer in a Cup...

Homemade Ice Cap... Deliiiiicious!

Raaaaandom...

Does it make me OCD that when I see "rainbow colors", I have to put them in a certain order?

My chubbs wants to crawl so bad! She's desperate to get around.

2 Years Ago...

I married the man of my dreams...



We've had some great adventures since then...

Hiking the Grand Canyon

Kayaking along the Oregon Coast

Ice Climbing at 39 weeks pregnant

Having a baby!

Happy Anniversary Babe! Here's to many more adventures. You are the love of my life.

Who Am I?

It seems that I'm going through some sort of identity crisis right now...
Like I'm caught in-between a couple different "me"s and am not sure which one is real.
I don't even know what kind of music I like, or what my hobbies are, or if I like skinny jeans or not, or what I would do if I had 1 hour by myself.
It's a very strange place to be.

It's a good thing God loves me however I am...

In Christ I am: Accepted, Secure, Significant.

Sometimes It Takes a Hail Storm...

to remind you just how blessed you are.
It's interesting how often I take my awesome life for granted, how often I forget how many blessings God gives me everyday... I have SO much more then I need.
I guess sometimes it takes a hail storm to remind me what a privilege it is to have a garden.
A sinus infection to remind me how healthy I am.

Today I'm Thankful For:

>My Garden












>Good Health

>A Beautiful Daughter









>Encouraging Friends

>A Strong and Loving Husband












>Our Cute House










>A Huge Yard (and a dog to play in it)

>Blue Skies

>A Heavenly Father who loves me regardless of how much time I spend with Him or how good I am

>A Welcoming and Friendly Church





PS. I realize my garden picture is not my real garden... it is however a picture of some flowers I made. :)

It's Pouring...

Tim and I are in the Crowsnest Pass right now. Tim leading the climbing training for camp staff at Crowsnest Lake Bible Camp... I'm helping when I can. Right now, however, I am taking full advantage of being a mum and "protecting" Kiriah from the rain by being inside on the computar. Babes is sleeping. Seriously though, it's raining harder then I have seen in a long time. We made it inside just in time. Now I'm off to nap with my sweet baby.

The Greatest Source of Power

I was reading "My Utmost for His Highest" this morning, and these paragraphs really stood out to me:

"Am I allowing my spiritual life to waste away, or am I focused, bringing everything to one central point - the atonement of my Lord? Is Jesus Christ more and more dominating every interest of my life? If the central point, or the most powerful influence, of my life is the atonement of the Lord, then every aspect of my life will bear fruit for Him.
Am I abiding? Am I taking the time to abide? What is the greatest source of power in my life? Is it my work, service, and sacrifice for others, or is it my striving to work for God? It should be none of these - what ought to exert the greatest power in my life is the atonement of the Lord. It is not on what we spend the greatest amount of time on that molds us the most, but whatever exerts the most power over us. We must make a determination to limit and concentrate our desires and interests on the atonement by the Cross of Christ."

For me, time with God is not the issue, I can make devotion time happen - the issue for me is how I spend that time. And it's not about the quantity of time, but the quality of it. Those paragraphs are a challenge for me right now.



In other news...
We're continuing to work on the house... and by "we" I really mean "Tim". The latest project is the bathroom. It's not quite done yet, but is already looking a million times better. My hubby is goooood.
Kiriah is teething I think... she's a giant drooly face and her schedule is all over the place. Also, she is quite clingy, which means I don't get a lot done around the house, but I do get LOTS of cuddle time - which is a very nice treat. I kind of like my babes. She's pretty awesome. And cute. And wiggly. And really cute.


Did I mention that my baby is the cutest ever?

Rocky Road...

Well, here we are in Rocky Mountain House.
We're all moved in and slowly getting settled. It's a lot harder for my heart to settle in then I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong, I definitely think we made the right decision moving here... I'm just having a hard time convincing my heart that we'll be here for a while. I keep catching myself thinking things like "I'll just put this here for now." or "that's just there temporarily."
Anyways...

Some projects we have on the go are:
-laying tile in the kitchen and bathroom.
-cleaning up the yard (can you say 20 dump runs?).
-putting in a small garden.

There are many other projects on our "To Do" list, but most have to wait for more money and time. :)

I was telling a friend today that one thing I've really been struggling with is FEAR. This is the first time that I've actually been out in the "real world". Up until now I've either been living with my parents, or in a community bubble with a husband who totally takes care of me. Now, Tim is at work all day, so I have to step up to the plate and make appointments, meet people, fill out forms, make phone calls... all very much out of my comfort zone. I'm learning and growing, but have had to memorize and quote to myself daily 2 Timothy 1:7 "For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power and love and self discipline."


Baby Girl is calling my name, so I'm off to be a responsible mother... :)
More updates soon...

I am so Blessed:

By a husband who takes our daughter to work in the morning so I can sleep a bit more.
By a daughter who only cries when she is hungry.
By a God who cares so much about me and desires a relationship with me.

My Dolly...

... is just so perfect.
I really could just look at her all day.



She:
-makes the most ridiculous noises in her sleep
-often sleeps with her hands straight up in the air (we joke about how pentecostal she is)
-pees on her potty when we make a "pssss" noise
-has jowls that grow every day
-loves sleeping on her tummy, on my tummy
-poops so loud, everyone knows it
-is just so dang cute!

Kiriah Anne Taylor

Well, I guess it all started later in the day on February 4th. Tim and I had... taken certain measures to try and get labour started. I had little contractions all night (like 15-30 seconds long, 2-4 minutes apart) but nothing that really caused us to panic. When they kept going the next day, we called our midwife but she said not to bother going in to Rocky until things got a bit more serious. I also called my mum and they decided to leave the next morning to come our way. We were feeling pretty antsy by the evening of the 5th and decided that we would rather drive to Rocky at a leisurely pace, pick up some groceries, and spend the night at The Guest House even if baby wasn't coming right away. We continued to "help labour along" and my contractions kept going, though at a rather random pace. We spent the evening, night, and next morning (the 6th) watching John Wayne movies, walking around, and trying to rest.



I don't really remember exact times, but at some point Tim called our midwives again and they agreed that Barb (head honcho midwife) should come over and check things out. At about the same time she got to The Guest House (4:30ish), my mum also arrived. My contractions had really started working in the hour or so before, so I was pretty hopeful that things would start happening. Barb checked me out and was quite surprised to find that I was already 6 centimeters dilated. She called our midwives (Jen and Jess) and told them to get their butts over to us. They had an hour drive ahead of them and Barb thought maybe things could happen fast. At that point I made the mistake of letting myself get comfortable instead of letting my contractions work for me, so everything slowed down quite a bit. A lot of the details have already slipped my mind, but I do remember Tim and my mum taking turns rubbing my back.
When Jen and Jess arrived they encouraged me to go for a walk and then switch things up by laboring in an uncomfortable position for a while. Well that kick started things. My contractions got serious and they started to fill up the birthing pool (aka: a fishy pool :). I guess it was somewhere around 10:30pm or 11:00pm when my water broke. Pretty soon after that my body just started pushing... it was like I didn't even have to consciously do anything, my body just took over. It was pretty cool. I got into the water then and after a couple of minutes Tim got in too. I was on my knees, leaning over the side of the pool and he was sitting behind me. My mum was at my head feeding me ice cubes :)
I pushed for 45 minutes and all of a sudden, at 11:59pm on February 6th, Tim was catching our baby and passing her to me. I sat back on Tim's lap and we just looked. She was so perfect.
We left the cord attached for a while, then Tim cut it and we got out of the pool.



The rest of the night/early morning is a blur...
We got into bed right away and I started nursing Kiriah while Jess gave me some stitches. (Kiriah came out with her fist at her head, so I had some tearing and artery damage) Then while everyone else cleaned up, Tim and I tried to digest the fact that we were parents... we just sat and cuddled and bonded with our baby. It was so awesome.






Side Notes:
Our midwives were AMAZING!
Having a home birth was AMAZING!
Having a water birth was AMAZING!

It was such a blessing to have Tim so involved and interested in everything that happened... also having my mum there was pretty sweet - very helpful!

When we got home from Rocky and had hardly unpacked, Tim looks at me and says "so when can we have number two?"

:)

Coming Soon...

I have great intentions of getting on here in the next couple days and writing out Kiriah's birth story (along with post some pictures). But for now I'm quite happy to spend my time staring at my beautiful daughters face. :)

Sunshiny Goodness...

Yesterday I went ice climbing! It was pretty funny because I couldn't see my feet and you kind of need to see your feet to ice climb efficiently. But it was good fun anyways. Definitely pulling a lot more weight around these days. :)



Today is a BEAUTIFUL sunshiny day! Another restful day off for Tim and I together.

Roses are Red...

And so is my HUGE Amaryllis.
It was taking it's sweet time and just getting taller and taller without opening up... until this morning, when it pretty much just burst open. Crazy.

Oh Mister Sun...

Today was BEAUTIFUL. Sun has been a little bit rare these days around Nordegg, so when he decided to come out we took advantage of it. Tim gathered some other hockey fans and I gathered my wool blanket, camera, book, and chair and we headed down to the lake.



It was an awesome day for Tim and I to just hang out and rest. We are learning to cherish every moment we have left as just the two of us.

Money Can't Buy Me Love...

I paid $2 for this adorable little plant. It was near death in the Ikea "As Is" section and as soon as I saw it, I knew I couldn't leave it behind. I have been tenderly nursing it back to health ever since.



(Apparently it's some kind of Succulent plant, but for the life of me, I can't find any info on this specific one.)

"Earn-Save-Give"

I listened to a podcast this morning by Bruxy Cavey and really liked what it had to say... so here are some notes I took from it:

"God asks us to regularly give a portion of our income to God as acts of worship and thanksgiving. This practice will keep our hearts focused on God and lead to a life of contentment and generosity."
-Edwin Friesen

"Life is not measured by how much you own."
-Jesus, Luke 12:15

Why Should We Give?

1: Giving is at the heart of the Gospel.
-Ephesians 5:2 "He loved, therefore He gave"
-John 3:16
***When we are giving, we are living the gospel.

2: God wants our hearts (and we tend to attach our hearts to the things we own).
***Giving helps me experience the heart of Christ.

3: Giving helps free us from the myth that money can meet our psychological needs.
-1 Timothy 6:17 "Teach those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which is so unreliable. Their trust should be in God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment."
***Contentment is an intentional, conscious, mental state that we need to work at cultivating.

*Giving should be a joy and not a burden.
-Acts 20:35 "...it is more blessed to give then to receive"
-2 Corinthians 9:7 "For God loves a person who gives cheerfully"

21 days and counting...

I know I'm a bit behind in my Picture-a-Day goal... but Tim and I were in Edmonton for a few days, and there is no rest for the weary there. Our time was packed with errands, car maintenance, and baby stuff.
We also had a midwife appointment, which went very well. They tell us that we're boring. Apparently, I am having an uncommonly almost perfect pregnancy. Baby is engaging - which means that it is dropping and settling for birth, and is in a good position. I am 37 weeks todays. That is considered "full term" and our midwives said I am allowed to have the baby any day. Woohoo! I'm just trying to not get my hopes up for an early birth. :) We still have a bit to do to get ready, but mostly I think we are just treasuring these last days of quiet evenings and "us time".

In other news... it got suddenly VERY cold here in the last couple of days. Here is yesterdays picture and the view we get out our windows:



In other OTHER news... we got a new couch and leather chair for VERY cheap from Ikea before Christmas and were able to finally bring them here. I know hardly any of you who read this have been to our house, so you'll just have to take my word for it: we rearranged and love it!! Way more open and baby friendly. Today's picture is of our shelving unit which used to divide the kitchen and the livingroom. We moved it up against the wall and tidied it up a bit.

I may or may not...

... have an obsession with baby booties...
But really, can you blame me?

Happiness...

...is a fridge full of memories.



This is what I see at eye level on my fridge.
Your fridge doors are something that you really have to make a conscious effort to notice everyday. They are easy to take for granted and just look past at the food within... I love it when people come over, stand in front of our fridge and ask me about the pictures. Telling the stories reminds me of the memories I've made, the places I've been, and the people I love.

And that makes me Happy.

A Picture A Day:

So I decided that one of my not-so-set-in-stone goals for the year is to take a picture a day. When I informed my mother of this she FORCED me into putting them up on my blog. :) I guess in a way that means I get to count this as two not-so-set-in-stone goals for the year... a picture a day and a post a day. Nice.

Well I started the picture a day yesterday, so here's yesterdays and todays.

It was frosty frickin' cold last night, but I'm such a supportive wife that I went out anyways to watch a game of pond hockey. :)



There's nothing like a homemade "fancy coffee" on a quiet, lazy afternoon. Love it.