Lent, Day 34 and So On

I still have a lot of other things I want to blog about when I have some spare minutes ... or hours.  But I don't want to fall down completely on the whole Lenten Thankfulness thing!  It's what's kept me going over this very busy season of life.

My Day 34, March 18 (Monday) - I'm thankful for...

• An impromptu field trip to the local fire department to bring our fire fighters all the leftover Ginger Snaps C had made for dessert for the night before (every family brought an additional dessert item, so we were overrun!).  They welcomed us into the station and gave us a very informative tour of both their fire engine and their rescue truck.

• Followed by a lovely drive up to Sandia Crest -- which was closed, but still a fun drive -- and some time for the kids to play in the snow afterwards (I still haven't gotten those pictures off my camera, if you can believe it).

My Day 35, March 19 (Tuesday) - I'm thankful for...

• Taking notice of trees starting to flower in our neighborhood and how pretty they are!

• Our friend (my friend, KF's daughter), SF, whose 11th birthday was this day.  Happy Birthday, girlie.  Love you.  Keep being you! 

My Day 36, March 20 (Wednesday) - I'm thankful for...

• St. Patrick's Day leftovers to have with my eggs for breakfast.

•  Blooming Daffodils! 

 

My Day 37, March 21 (Thursday) - I'm thankful for...

• Z's flexibility on his one-on-one time with me since I was really under the weather.  We played the board game of Life on my bed.  We had good fun and I was able to be comfortably dressed in my pajamas.

• My favorite Wor Wonton soup brought to me in bed (by my loving husband) and not caring too much that it wasn't Paleo.  It was just good comfort.

My Day 38, March 22 (Friday) - I'm thankful for...

• Our friend (my friend SSW's son), WW, whose 8th birthday was this day.  Happy Birthday!  I'm so glad you are part of the SW family now and we're getting to know you better and better with each visit between our two families.  Love you, kiddo.

• Lots of fun Instagram-y moments.  I was starting to feel a little better and was able to notice more of my surroundings like flowers being set up at all the stores and the gorgeous sky and even a sign at the park that had been vandalized in a very entertaining way.  (Go check out my Instagram if you're curious now.) 

My Day 39, March 23 (Saturday) - I'm thankful for...

• Getting our carpets cleaned professionally!  with seven of us living here, plus the dog and many frequent guests, our carpets get pretty beat down.  Now they are all fresh and clean smelling and most of the stains have been lifted.  Clean carpets make a house feel fresher for spring.  Don't you think?

• Our flag-football coach.  We've known him 3-1/2 years now and he really has a tremendous heart for all the boys on his team.  The team worked really hard, but were beat down terribly by the other, very skilled team.  Some of the guys on our team were moved to tears by their frustration over the whole thing.  I stepped back in the team meeting area after the game to snap a couple more pictures and overheard the coach taking all the blame for the loss and just really encouraging the guys.  He even promised to run a lap at the next practice because he'd accidentally locked his keys inside his house and wound up coming late to the game that day!  He followed through on it, too, even though (I heard) he came to practice really sick.  What a nice guy.

My Day 40, March 24 (Sunday) - I'm thankful for...

(Remember that my version of Lent -- for the purposes of this blog -- has 46 days.  I started this whole process not realizing that Lent doesn't count Sundays.  But I kept counting them, so please understand as I continue counting my way.)

• My new (to me) Toyota Sequoia.  Okay, so the Suburban -- which I loved -- was on it's last gasping breaths.  It has been leaking all over our driveway for awhile (getting us in trouble with HOA a couple times), all the warning lights on the dash were permanently lit because the fuse thingamajig wasn't working anymore and was too expensive to fix, it rattled like crazy sounding like all that was holding it together was some Scotch tape or something and in the last couple weeks, it's had some electrical shorts and scary gas pedal issues.  It was time.  So C and I headed down to a few places and investigated options (thank you, Lord, for my iPhone, allowing me to do research on various vehicles while on the go) and finally settled on a less-expensive than my husband predicted 2006 Sequoia.  It's even blue (my favorite color)!  It's in great shape and it filled that Suburban-shaped hole in my heart rather quickly.  I love it.

• C's new (to him) Jeep Liberty.  In order to make the Sequoia even more affordable, C opted to trade in his GMC Sierra, which had a whole lot more value than our crumbling Suburban.  Plus, he commutes 45+ minutes each way to work and that big truck was sucking us dry with the gasoline requirements.  While at the lot where we got my Sequoia, we spotted a good deal on this Jeep -- also a 2006 -- and C has always had an affinity for Jeeps, so we took it for a drive.  Praise the Lord, we both have decent vehicles and he provided us the financial support to afford them.  We own the Jeep in full.  We are making some low payments on the Sequoia, but have a plan to have it paid off by the end of the year.

My Day 41, March 25 (Monday) - I'm thankful for...

Our pediatrician and our dentist (and all the staff members).  We had an appointment with each this day -- S has had back pains for a couple weeks that just weren't improving (prescribed regular regiment of ibuprofen and exercise to help) and O had a routine cleaning at the dentist. 

• Over the years, there have been very few doctors who truly make my heart smile, but our pediatrician is wonderful.  He loves our kids and he happily answers all my bizarre questions and most importantly, he genuinely seems pleased when we come to see him (except not for the fact we're sick).  He tells us all the time how he loves our family and I believe he actually means it.  I've been told by several people that we ended up with the best pediatrician in the whole group -- and we were just assigned to him.  We didn't pick him.  God was definitely part of that plan. 

• We're not as close with our dentist, but the staff there are tremendous and even though generally we're only there every six months or so, they remember things about our lives and are always checking in.  It's good to go where everybody knows not only our name, but how to make us comfortable by remembering little details of our lives that we shared with them last time. 

My Day 42, March 26 (Tuesday) - I'm thankful for...

• Putting to use a cute little wicker basket chest we found on the side of the road for free two days before.  I just knew it would be great for some purpose, but didn't really know for what until I began putting our homeschool room back together after getting the carpets cleaned and then with S's help, we decided it was perfect for keeping all E's toys and books in one place -- neat and tidy -- instead of in several separate smaller containers that were always getting lost among all the homeschooling supplies in this room. 

• Spending some quality time with S just going to Target so she could find a birthday card for a friend of hers and browsing around some of the other aisles together.  We stumbled on a funny book, which I stood and read to her out loud right in the aisle, cover to cover!  It's called All My Friends are Dead (Monsen and John).  It's super silly in the way it's written and of course the illustrations.  We were laughing out loud and not really caring about the other customers with the weird glances our way.  It was so much fun just to laugh so much with our girl who will be a full-on adult in just a couple more months.  Unbelievable.

I know this was a lot for one post.  Thanks for sticking with me here!  How's spring been for you so far?  What are your Easter plans?