Busy Busy Busy...BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ!

(by cutemummy08)

So, as many of you know, My wonderful parents made the trip out here to Irvine for a visit for the Memorial day weekend. I feel so blessed that they were willing to come. They also helped us mount our TV on the living room wall, which is awesome.

THIS weekend, is our first ever David Shumway Family reunion in Heber, AZ. (with all my brothers, sisters and our kids) At the last minute we have realized that Joe is not going to be able to take the time off to come, so I will admit I am anxious to make the drive on my own. Two year olds can be pretty unpredictable, and am worried I will lose my mind and patience dealing with my two year old all on my own..... but I guess I will just hope for the best. Poor Joe has been working SO HARD, and can't seem to get a break, and will be working his heart out while we are gone. Scarlett and I plan on leaving in the morning, after we get the alignment done on the car. We will probably say till next Wednesday or Thursday. I hope we have a great time, I am sure it will be fine. It will definitely be nice to see everyone again, and I will DEFINITELY be hitting up the thrift stores and dollar stores while I am there.

This week I will be playing the:

(By Callie_Tao)

Hope to see some of you this upcoming week :)

Summer Beauty

A poem

Learning more about myself, thanks to a poem from Bekah Jennings' blog. She modified a poem her cousin's husband had written for his wife, and filled in her own responses. I decided to try it out on my own. I found it to be extremely therapeutic, and quite revealing of myself, as I did the same. The words in all caps are the original words. Feel free to try it and repost it, if you dare.

I LOVE my daughter's smile, and the hugs and kisses she only gives when she means them.
I LOVE the way my husband's and daughter's breath smells exactly the same.
I NEED to take more initiative in making the things important to me come to pass, and even more so, need to figure out what those things are, to gain purpose.
I ALWAYS KNOW that I will have the love of my family, no matter what.

I LIKE to go out to the movies with my husband, and how the time away from our daughter only makes me long to have her back in my arms.

I LIKE to go shopping, but am trying to remember that material items are not what is important.

I WORRY that my daughter will not be a well adjusted child, and will have difficulty with social situations, like school.
I WORRY that my temper gets the best of me too often with Scarlett, and that she will grow up to resent us both.
I WONDER if my husband will ever go back to church, because I really can't see it ever happening.

I CAN GUARANTEE that my favorite color will always be red.

I CAN'T guarantee that my hair will ever remain the same color for longer than a year.
I AM GLAD that my parents are coming to visit tomorrow. I miss my Mom's hugs, and my dad's smile.
I LOVE my family.

I WORRY that my life will never be the one I always wanted.

When YOU BALANCE enough vices in your life for long enough, they start to feel like they are a permanent fixture, instead of just things you carry around.
I CAN BALANCE on one foot for about 3 seconds before I fall over.

I WISH I were braver...
I WORRY that I will die of some strange illness before I can see my daughter grow up

I WANT to be skinny, and happy, patient, and talented.
BECAUSE then maybe, I would be able to let go of the vices, and truly be free.

Flower Facts

Remember these flowers?



Well, I had originally assumed that they were a foam arrangement, since normally that is what these short arrangements are. Those of you who have not spent a few weeks working in a flower shop probably dont know what a "foam" flower arrangement is, so I will further elaborate on that.

^this is flower foam.

It is normally soaked in a bucket of water, so that it can absorb enough water to feed the arrangement for its duration of view. normally you just cut off enough to fill the bottom of a short vase or ceramic container, and then you can poke the flowers and filler into it to keep it in place, while also providing water for the flowers. Some flower foam also provides additional nutrients to the flowers, to help make them last longer. In my search for an image, I have also learned that it is pretty inexpensive! only $1.50 for a brick the size shown, which would be enough for probably at least 4 or 5 arrangements the size of mine, above.

However, upon further investigation of my arrangement, I discovered that this was NOT a Foam arrangement. You are probably thinking, "what's the big deal?" Well, instead of using foam or a

tape grid

to keep the flowers in place, they just simply left all the leaves on the roses to make them thicker and force them to stay in place. Again, you might be saying: "So WHAT?!" Well, just like leaving vegetables in a bowl of water for a week will lead to moldy rotten vegetables, keeping the leaves ON the flower INSIDE the water, will make sick, moldy, flower arrangement. Though the flowers continued to open and look pretty, they began to STINK, and I had to explain to Scarlett that they were "sick" and needed to go in the garbage. I could not save them, or prolong their life.

So the MORAL of this story, is Always remove the leaves from the stems of your flowers up to water level. Babies breath, or fillers such as leather leaf do not need to be pruned of leafage prior to arrangement, as they have a different type of leaves. If you do not wish to remove leaves, use flower foam instead, so that all you have to do is poke the base of the stems into the wet foam to provide your flowers with water and food. The last lesson: Don't buy flowers from the grocery store. We won't even discuss the price my husband paid for this (now moldy) flower arrangement from Ralph's... but it was the thought that counts, and I loved enjoying them for the short time it allowed.

Asleep in a Restaurant

So, tonight we went to this nice Mexican food restaurant called Taco Rosa. It was super yummy, and Scarlett was pretty well behaved, and when she got tired, she just laid down on the nice bench seat and went to sleep with her little blanket right next to me. It was really nice to be able to enjoy a nice dinner, and not have all hell break loose with our two year old. It helped that the couple sitting next to us, were also parents, who had their own 2 year old 14 years ago, and were tolerant of a kid being a kid :). Joe and I both loved our food, and had a great time.

It was dark in the restaurant, and all i had was my cell phone, sorry if the picture isn't crystal clear.

a post of pictures

Me and the Scarlett

these are the flowers joe bought me for Mother's Day. They get more and more beautiful every day. I took that pic last night.

Me



This is a picture of our bedroom. Yesterday I decided to move the bed and finally start hanging things on the walls. I love our room this way. I also figured out how to hang my umbrella from the ceiling, which I really like.

Here is the statue with the one I already had, I just love the way they look together.

This is the whole display on the top of the fridge... I also love my kitchen cabinets.

There is something about these light fixtures that makes me happy. The picture was way too bright, making them look like UFO's with them turned on.. so hopefully you get the gist.

I love this faucet. it actually moves from sink to sink with ease, and makes me feel like I have a top class kitchen, living in the lap of luxury. I love the illusion.

Happy Mother's Day!

My Joe bought me this beautiful bracelet for Mother's Day.


And this, from my sweet Scarlett, picked out by her wonderful Daddy.


He also bought me a necklace and pair of earrings, but they weren't quite my style, so we went and exchanged them today for these items:

Happy Mother's day, to all you Mommas out there. The best gift we have, is our children.

Jewelery images from Brighton.com and Ebay. Willow Creek statuette picture from cranberryjunctiongifts.com

The Magic Kingdom

Just a few fun pictures from the Magic Kingdom, also known as Disneyland. Scarlett's first visit. It was a nice, laid back, enjoyable trip. I am sure there will be many many more to follow.

Cheers, Ears and Tears.

Mothers

A mother's first gift is life, the second is love, and the third is understanding.


A Mother's heart is a beautiful expression of God's everlasting love.


A Mother's Heart is a Patchwork of Love.


A mother's love endures through all.


A mother's love lasts forever.


A mother's love never ages.

images discovered at [jenny ross photography]