Puddle Jumping

Tonight, the sky opened up and rained down on the great metropolis of Momence. It was just a short shower, not nearly enough to raise our yellow lawn from the dead, but it did leave behind a series of shallow watering holes.

I threw caution and dry clothes to the wind and invited Emma on a puddle jumping date. She was stoked.

We splashed around in the puddles in our driveway. Then on the sidewalk. Then down the street. Then she said, "I have an idea. Let's take a little walk." "Yes," I agreed. "Let's take a little walk."

So there we were on a quest to find the biggest, bestest puddles in town. "Ooh, look over there," I said. "There's some great looking puddles."

"Yes," she said. "Perfect for a little girl and a grown up to jump in." I laughed out loud at her perfect articulation.

We continued our puddle walk another a half-mile or so, and then turned back toward home for dinner. We revisited the deepest, muddiest spots we'd found along the way.

Passing through a parking lot, Emma took note of all the cigarettes and other debris on the ground. "Mommy, why do people throw things on the ground?"

"I don't know, hon. They shouldn't should they?"

"No." (Pauses for contemplation.) "We should tell all the people in all the world to stop throwing things on the ground."

"Great idea," I agreed.

"We can save the world," she said matter-of-factly.

"Yes," I laughed. "We can save the world."

Teach us to pray

Every night, Robert and I pray with Emma before she goes to sleep.

Depending on how exhausting the bedtime routine has been, our prayer time looks a little different each night. Sometimes I pray, sometimes Robert does, and sometime she insists we both take a turn. And often, after we're done, she prays all by herself, including every family member and stuffed animal within sight in her list of "thank you for"s.

Lately, Emma has taken it upon herself to lead us in prayer. She says, "Repeat after me," and then Robert and I follow faithfully along, never knowing exactly where her ramblings will take us.

This is a typical prayer:

"Dear Jesus" (She pauses for us to say "Dear Jesus")

"Thank you for this day."

"Thank you for your blessings." (I wonder if she knows what this means, knowing that she's mimicking my oft-uttered prayer.)

"Teach me to be a good girl" (Robert chooses to insert "boy" instead.")

"I love my Star Wars figures."

"I love my Cinderella." (The stuffed horse directly beside her that she's named after her favorite princess.)

"I am so beautiful." (I chuckle as Robert goes with it.)

"In Jesus' name, amen."

As we turn off the light, and say good night, I can't help but smile.

I'm thankful for our funny little girl, and the God who is always there to listen to our silly prayers.

30 by 30 (Part Deux)

I'm now less than five days away from my 30th birthday, and so I figured I might as well get this end of the "30 by 30" challenge report out of the way.

Short of a miracle and liposuction, coupled with a full-limb amputation, I will not meet my goal. Since July, I have lost approximately 10 pounds (give or take a few ounces, depending on whether or not I had pizza the night before), not the 30 I would have hoped for. Bummer.

What happened?

Holidays. Birthdays. Tuesdays. Taco Bell. I have no good excuse, I just didn't pull it off.

BUT, as mentioned in a previous blog, I'm focusing on the lovely. And you know what? I think I look lovelier than I did 10 pounds ago.

Furthermore, that 10 pounds is on top of the 30 pounds I had already lost when I began this challenge. And 40-some pounds was enough to prompt a genuine "I'm proud of you" from my doctor at my last annual appointment. That felt pretty darn good.

I'm also coming to grips with the fact that 30 is not a magical age where I immediately begin the transition toward death. Sure, I've sprouted a crazy amount of gray hairs over the past couple of weeks, but I think that's more related to stress than impending elderly-ness.

30 is not the end of me being young, and it's certainly not the end of my quest to achieving a healthier weight. I'm still hoping to rock (maybe easy listening is a better analogy?) a new, smaller-but-still-one-piece swimsuit this summer as I float around whatever lazy river I can find.

There's really no change at 30 -- except that I can FINALLY remove that ridicules countdown calculator from the sidebar that's been haunting me for the past six months.

That, my friends, is something worth celebrating.

Whatever is lovely

hello blog. it's been a while.

have i been avoiding you? yes. because of the 30 under 30? mostly. (we'll talk about that some other day)

so how do you welcome me back from my long absence? by suddenly making my shift key stop working so that i can't capitalize any letters. okay, i suppose i deserve that.

anyway, it's been a long day. a reaaaaaaaallllyyyy long day.

there have been a lot of those lately. days where i have more places to go than i can possibly go. more things to do than i can possibly do. more people to see than, well... you get the picture.

in fact, it's been downright discouraging.

i've dwelled on it for far too long, and have finally decided that what i really need is a paradigm shift. afterall, the frustrations, the stress, etc. are not going to disappear anytime soon.

so... i'm repurposeing this blog, dedicating my posts to the embodiment of of philippians 4:8.

'finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable -- if anything is excellent or praiseworthy -- think about such things.'

i won't be able to post every day. maybe not every week. maybe not even every month. but i will try to post something pure, lovely or admirable on here from time to time, if for no other reason than to remind myself that life is good, and god (with a capital g) is definitely good.

so here's my lovely thing for today...

i took emma to dance class tonight, which she loves, loves, loves. she looks forward to it every week and gets downright giddy about wearing her pretty pink leotard with matching pink tights and ballet slippers.

she also loves the fact that there is a heartily stocked candy store in the mall, directly beside the dance studio. emma knows that if she is a good girl and listens to everything her teacher says, mommy will take her to to the candy store after class and let her pick out whatever candy she wants.

tonight, after we left dance class and picked out our candy, i walked across the parking lot toward our van holding emma's thick-mittened hand. it was a quiet night with no one around, so we chatted uninhibited along the way.

i asked emma, 'do you like your dance class?'

'yes, mommy,' she replied.

she returned my question with a question. 'do you know what i like even more?'

i smiled knowing she was thinking of the long, gummy snake i was carrying in the brown paper bag in my right hand.

'what do you like even more?' i humored her.

'i like you and daddy more.'

in my humble estimation, that's about as lovely as it gets.