spooky.

halloween was "cold" this year. at least that's what the thin-blooded folks were saying around here. but this nebraska girl has been waiting for fall. i have been whining that it doesn't feel like fall in florida for 2 months. and i think it is beautiful weather now. sunny days with a slight breeze. crisp chilly nights. it's all relative. what was a "cold" halloween here (63 degrees), would have been a perfectly warm and delightful halloween in nebraska.

i was glad it was cooler to help it feel normal. though it still wasn't quite normal to go trick or treating on a landscape with palm trees and this guy sunning himself in my neighborhood on halloween afternoon...

how's that for a fright? it was actually my first gator sighting in the time we've lived here and i was kind of excited. apparently, as the weather gets "cold" they come up out of the water to warm up. this is something i need to get used to, even though it's not quite as delightful to me as the weather change.

also delightful to me is this crazy holiday, halloween. i don't like the evil parts. and i don't like the nasty candy that my children should not be eating (dots, anything sour, pretty much all of it except almond joys). BUT i love that this one night most of the neighborhood is out. here is the neighborhood gang...

i love these kids. especially my very own "gang members"...

Rapunzel...

(we had some wig issues)

Harry Potter...

Woopy Cushion...

 And Big Baby...

(making good use of his christmas footies)

i love these guys and it warms my heart to know they love each other too...

this is lulu telling tate "you're my mr. flynn"...

it was a good halloween. we were missing our traditions, especially the ones with our family. but we still have each other. and there are new traditions waiting to be made.

like rapunzel throwing up in the night. that's definitely not a treat.

embracing the camera and more

today i am embracing the camera thanks to emily at the anderson crew...

i am realizing even more how few pictures there are of me with my lovelies. 

so i tried. 

i tried to get a photo of me with jack on his 10th birthday.

and this is what i got...

his forehead and left eye along with my chin (at least one of them).

and NO, that dark hair that looks like it is on my chinny-chin-chin is NOT my chin hair. 

my chin hair is much lighter, thank you very much.

disappointing as it may be, this picture is so "us".

not at all what i expected.

but funny.

just like life.

so today i am not just embracing the camera, but embracing my life too.

hey, this is where i live (the family room)

For all my "woe is me" posts and Facebook stati, it really has been going well for us in so many ways

We are settling in and learning to do life in a new place. And this is the new place...

A green house. I have long loved the color green. Not really for the outside of a house, but it's very Florida. And as I often need to remind myself...we live in Florida now. So I need to embrace it. I think the house will look much better when we get our big Nebraska "N" flag waving in front.

Inside we are slowly making our mark on the place. And by that, I do not mean the dogs puking on the tile and Lulu writing on the walls. But, that too. I mean we are trying to make this place represent the values of the people who live in it. These people...

When you walk in, the first thing you see is the above wall. My brother in law painted it a similar coral to what we had in our old house. It feels good to have something familiar. 

As you keep walking, you enter the main room of the house. I have struggled with decorating and arranging it. I don't even know what to call it yet. The living room? The great room? It's probably the family room because this is where our family gathers. On my parents' coral couch. Though it's not in great shape, this couch is a significant reminder of the connecting that happened in my parents' home. And paired with teal, I think it looks pretty great while also being sentimental...

Of course, it looks best of all paired with my sweet girl. 

Though we went with the old by painting the coral in our entry way,

we tried something new with teal in our family room. 

It's a happy color and I really dig it.

My great grandfather's secretary desk is where I pile up and misplace all my papers and 

where I currently sit writing this blog post.

The conversational seating group is made up of the fabulous looking, though terribly uncomfortable, 

seagrass chairs. The kids will choose the hard, cold tile floors over these chairs. 

But despite this fact, I heart them...

 (please note: the elephant has migrated into this room from the study)

The TV is an eyesore, but I think it will be better when we get our artwork on the wall...

Or when we just stick "little miss camera shy" in front of it

(she has shorts on, i promise. itty bitty shorts, but shorts nonetheless).

This reading nook has become a favored spot to spend time alone with God...

Though not as aesthetically pleasing as the seagrass chairs, it is much more pleasing

to my booty. By the way, is it "booty" or "bootie"? I could google it, but I would rather ask you.

The chest is another antique piece from my parents' home. 

It has been fun to have pieces that were virtually unused in their former life, like this chest and

the secretary desk, find new and meaningful functions in our home.

I know it's just stuff. But stuff, when applied correctly, can be part of a healing process.

This corner of the room has two very special items in it, 

in addition to the obvious one sitting on the chair. 

The painting we got in Ethiopia.

And the green lamp that I got from a garage sale. 

When we got rid of so many of our things to make room for the things from my parents' home,

I had to determine what things were truly special to me from my family of origin and

from my own little family.

And this green lamp, crazy as it may sound, came out at the top of the list of things Bill and I had...

Not only is it super cool, but it stood in the background of so many of our family moments

in Nebraska. It cast it's warm glow while I read to my kids, while Jack "scrawled" across the floor

and when Lulu took her first steps. It provided light for countless dance parties and family nights and fights and cuddles on the couch.

And people, I got it for $3!!!!!

If you don't know me well, you could thinking whilst looking at the above photo "my, what a wonderful housekeeper Missy must be since that that ledge is so nice and uncluttered". Think again. Here's all the stuff normally on that ledge, aka "dumping station" moved to the stairs for "fake the world out on your blog" time...

Also cleared off for picture time is the wall behind the couch where I often dump my purse and camera bag or bag from Bible study. And the serving counter where I often dump wadded up receipts and things made in Sunday school that I should probably throw away, right Kim?

But more important than how we decorate this place or how I clean it is how we live in it. The more we do of that, the more we start to feel that it's more than just walls around us. 

It is a home. Our home.

Go for the Gold!

for jack's golden birthday, we needed a celebration fit for a king...

at the bus stop with his subjects friends...

for his birthday dinner he requested breakfast for dinner...

(he is very Elf-like in his love of syrup. how could he even taste the french toast after drowning it?)

the kids had fun with 1 football cake and 4 forks...

then a few days later, it was time for 12 boys to overtake our home and the park across the street 

for a party

(thank you lord for the park across the street!!!)

since it was jack's golden birthday we went for a "go for the gold" theme. 

i found these invitations on laura's etsy shop...

she was so great to work with.

the kids played crazy games like crab soccer and free style long jump...

really, though, jack just wanted to play football with his friends.

i really need to be done with the theme parties and just let the boy free style it.

but we all know i want to have the fun of creating and decorating...

do you get how my pizza fits with the theme?

it might have been a little strange, but i liked it.

the strangest thing of all is that i was actually ready for the party. 

yes, you read that correctly. 

i don't know what happened, but i was ready. and i wasn't stressed.

and i was even showered and had make up on.

miracles do happen.

though i admit i am partly motivated by my own desires in party planning,

the bottom line to me is celebrating one thing...

my boy.

and he had a blast!

as all the neighbors heard.

when i wore a skinny, leather tie

something weird happened here over the weekend. my daughter went to her first middle school dance...

it was a costume dance. first she was gonna be katniss. then she was going to be m&m's with a friend. then she was gonna be a hobo. then she dressed in a cute new outfit and went as...

herself.

and why, on a limited budget, did you buy your daughter a new outfit for a middle school dance, one might ask. valid question. the only answer i have is that i was a middle school girl once. and truth is, i revert to that state every so often. which is what i did when my daughter was crying the night before the dance because she felt like her plans kept falling through for what she was going to wear. and i knew that it was not really about what she was going to wear but about finding her place in a new place. suddenly it was 1983. i remember the insecurity and the inner turmoil and the crazy whacked out hormones. now that i mention it, 42 doesn't seem that different than 12. in that moment, i made a decision you won't find in any parenting book. i'm not proud of it, but i intersected emma's insecurity with a cute new outfit. suddenly i was back in my gray acid washed jeans, matching striped vest and skinny black, leather tie that i wore to a middle school dance in the 80's. i felt gnarly, rad, and totally tubular all in one.

and that's how she felt when she went as herself, only with more modern, less 80's adjectives...

instead out of place and insecure, i wanted her to feel strong, beautiful and fierce. 'cause she doesn't need a costume for that. she just needs to be herself. {she doesn't need a new outfit either, i know, but let's just let give me a pass on that one for now. how can you trust the judgement of a girl in a skinny leather tie anyway?}

and you know how a dad is supposed to feel when his daughter goes off to a middle school dance? protective...

and proud of his little girl, who isn't exactly his "little" girl anymore, but still the apple of his eye...

golden boy.

This is our golden boy...

Not just because he has a perma-tan. 

But because he is ten on the tenth. 

On 10/10 even.

Honestly, it's hard to find words that capture who Jack is. But these images seem to capture his essence...

His charming, bigger-than-life, passionate, fun-loving, "x-factor", essence. His "bigness" is quite evident on the outside, but the hidden jewel inside is his tenderness. As spunky as he may be, at heart, this boy is a lover not a fighter...

 

And, oh how we love YOU, Jack.

Whether shaggy-haired or clean cut.

Whether crazy or cuddly.

Whether loud or...louder.

You are our golden boy every year. Every day. Every minute.

Happy, happy birthday son.

Assistant to the Regional Manager

No one in the working world would hire me as a manager. I am easily distracted, more into fun than productivity, and can't keep track of details. And yet, I am employed as a manager. A manager of my home. And I kind of stink at it.

Especially since we moved. When we lived in Nebraska, I had a rhythm and routine to life. I still was hopeless at details, but I had back up plans and back up people. I really hoped that moving to Florida I would get my act together a bit more. Instead, I have lost my rhythm and routines. I lost my back up plans and back up people. And, quite frankly, I think I have lost my mind. It's feels like my weaknesses are on full display. I spend a lot of my time late, lost, and looking for things.

I know we are still transitioning to a new place, so I want to give myself grace. And I know I can't change my essential nature. But a little input never hurt anybody. So, I am opening it up to my little corner of the blogosphere. What things help you to manage your home and family? I can use help in ANY area...meals, laundry, scheduling, etc. You name it, I am struggling with it. :)

Though the move may have me drowning in sea of details, it also has meant we have many forms of escapism right at our fingertips. So instead of meal planning or laundry we can do things like take a day to go to Sea World with friends...

Having a good time seems to be the only thing I can successfully manage in life. Well, at least I got that!