Beauty in the Mess,  Birthdays,  Miscellaneous

Beauty in the Mess ~ Edition 02.28.13

Beautiful in His Time is a participant in multiple affiliate marketing programs. The author of this blog may receive commission for purchases or clicks made through links on this website.

It’s the last day of February, and I just got back from a week-long vacation. It’s definitely time to start counting my blessings.

February brought us to the end of my husband’s military career. What a huge relief!! We are both finding ourselves happier and more relaxed. Now that Russ is on terminal leave, we are getting a lot of extra time as a family…time to rest and just enjoy being a family.

But the future is still very uncertain. We have 2 months and 6 days until we are officially unemployed, and that puts a lot of pressure on my husband to find work swiftly. Russ and I are both spending hours on the computer each week pouring over job postings looking for things he can apply to. It’s been a very discouraging process, as each day brings new rejection emails…or simple silence. (I’m not sure which is worse…Does the “no news is good news” rule apply to job hunting?)

But there has been so much beauty in the last three weeks. 

Beauty in…

Watching TV with little boy feet

little feets

Ezra being (somewhat of a) good boy during a cardiologist appointment, a genius nurse who used animal crackers and Sesame Street to keep him still during his ECHO, and finding out that Ezra’s congenital heart defect has completely closed up and he no longer needs to see a cardiologist in the future!

PDA

Valentines Day…when my husband drove over to the chapel to PWOC to deliver this to me in person, in front of all my Bible study sisters. Even though it was inedible due to my food allergies, he wanted me to have it “because it was pretty.” I got to stare at it for the rest of Bible Study!

cupcake

My other Valentine…

valentine

Finding this mess after an extended “nap time.” Instead crying to get out, Ezra has been playing quietly (or not so quietly) for extended periods of time on his own, both in the afternoons for naps, and first thing in the morning. Which is giving me extra time to rest and get housework done!

messy naptime

Little Boy…so thrilled to have gotten to go on a trip to “da REAL cave”

…getting a private tour, just our family and the tour guide.

Taking the scenic route home while Ezra slept.

real cave

Meeting up (in)RL…”in real life”…with some other Kentucky bloggers, who set up an extra time to meet with me since I wasn’t positive that I would still be living in Kentucky at the time of the (in)RL conference. Having a nice dinner and encouraging conversation with Katie Orr from Hello Mornings and Cyndi Spivey from Walking in Grace and Beauty.

bloggers

While eating this brownie sundae:

(minus the brownie)

ice cream 3

Being encouraged by Katie and Cyndi’s to re-incorporate Bible reading back into my schedule.

Making “read before opening” happen five mornings in a row.

(I fell off the wagon over vacation, but hope to get back on tomorrow!)

read before opening

 A picnic with Ezra on a nice warm day:

(he was very excited about chicken and fries)

picnic

Stepping on the scale to see 125.4 lbs…a new low number–

A number that’s on the very high end of my pre-pregnancy weight range!!!

And wearing one of my favorite shirts for the first time in over 3 years:

(I wanted my husband to take this picture…but I got impatient.) 

prepregnancy weight

Then my husband took this one:

tshirt messy kitchen

A wonderful family outing to the big exciting world of Barnes and Noble.

Hitting a children’s DVD sale and getting EIGHT Little Einsteins DVDs for $38.

Ending off the night reading to Ezra in the story time area.

Then hearing him say, totally unprompted, while playing with this globe:

“God made da erf!!!” 

#mustbedoingsomethingright

God made da erf

My birthday breakfast…

Eaten in peace (baby-free) and shared with sweet friends and sisters:

birthday breakfast

Vacation.

Which I was secretly dreading because Ezra never sleeps well away from home.

But I was pleasantly surprised.

We used this setup:

sleeping setup

And he slept like a baby (the kind of babies that sleep), every night.

No night waking!! 

And sleeping in until 6:30-7:00 every morning.

Time with family, a birthday party, free socks, lots of naps, tv watching…

Copious amounts of sugar.

Like this hot chocolate:

hot chocolate

And this ice cream:

ice cream 2

ice cream…as it should be:

ice cream

Warm fires each evening, shared with exuberant little boys.

Who barely stayed still long enough to take this picture:

feet and fire

And then a long 9 1/2 hour trip home, with two hour-long stops.

Finding the 8th wonder of the world

(if you were to ask my husband):

A Cookout restaurant with an eat-in dining room! 

And getting a Cookout tshirt for $1.99.

(And this man…looking daggone sexy in red and longer hair!!)

cookout hottie

And stopping at our favorite half-way point stop:

Bass Pro Outdoor World

Fishies, boats, waterfalls, and lots of stairs…what more could a little boy want?

(We’ve been stopping here several times a year since Ezra was 2 months old.)

My sweet boy saying:

“Hello big fishie! How you today?!?!” 

hi to fishies

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.” 

Ralph Waldo Emerson

4 Comments

  • jellibeanjournals

    Wow, despite the job searching, it looks like you DO have so much to be thankful for, and I love that you try to focus on that rather than the uncertainties that the future holds. After all, that’s in God’s hands anyway. He knows what he’s doing. It almost brought tears to my eyes to read that your sweet Ezra won’t need the cardiologist anymore. Wonderful news! Happy to meet you this Friday morning from Christian Mommy Blogger. Have a great weekend, Aprille!

    • Aprille

      Yes! I am so very blessed! Doing these posts every few weeks really reminds me of how much God has given me!!!!

      It’s a little nervewracking not knowing what the future holds, but I’m just trying to REST and TRUST! Thank you so much for stopping by!

  • momstheword2008

    What a blessing about the cardiologist. I loved the pictures and getting to know you and your sweet family a bit!

    My hubby was once out of work for many, many months. It’s a discouraging time for a man. But God did provide and He will provide for you too!

    Looks like your son had a great time in his room, lol! When my children outgrew their naps I still insisted that they stay in their rooms for a quiet play time. Frankly, the mess was worth it, lol!

    I put their books in a dishpan so they could just flip through to see whatever they wanted and easier to store and put away. One day I learned that I really needed to put up the crayons and markers a lot higher after I saw the lovely mural on the wall, lol!

Leave a Reply