A Day in the Life...

Today, we...

Flew a kite

-er-

Got a kite stuck in a tree.

...Got it out and repaired it.  Yes, I climbed the tree to try to get it.  Failed, but, we eventually managed to get it down.

Looked at our new fig bush, noticed it has open leaves.

Hung laundry...

Learned about whirligigs...

Explored grass...

And, maybe, tried eating grass.

Learned to feed the chickens scratch.  They actually had the chicks eating it from their hands.

A good, busy day.  We also explored the Berlin library. We like it, it's smaller than the Wicomico library, but I think that's a good thing.

Troy finished making the shed into a coop.  I'll post about that very soon.

Oh, and, FYI, best shoes EVER.  Sanuks.  Get yourself a pair.

Zero

That's how many pictures I took of our family in our Easter outfits.  We actually all got matching outfits.  Not IDENTICAL outfits, but we matched our colors.  Green, denim, white.  Get the picture?

We do have pictures of our egg hunt.  More of them later.

We had a great day.  We didn't wake up in time to go to the sunrise service on the ocean, but I hope to have that be one of our yearly activities as soon as the girls are old enough.  Apparently, it was a good one, nice and warm, beautiful sunrise.

Our church services were wonderful.  Well attended, full of joy and energy.  It is already seeming like we made a good choice to move our services back to our old building on the beach.
What, I haven't talked about this?
We've been meeting at our school building for over a year, the church has been there since before we moved here.  But, in the summer, the people on vacation can't find us.  Literally, I've had people walk in and say they've been driving around for 45 minutes trying to find us.

So, we moved back across the bridge to our building a block from the boardwalk.  I can watch the ocean from my perch behind the drums.

Yep, that's the ocean beyond the boards.

So far, we have had so many more visitors on vacation, I'm overwhelmed.  I had no idea it would be this way.  Yay God!

Back to Easter...

We had lunch at our house.  Our local family came over, helped with the food, set up a great egg hunt.  It was a nice, relaxing afternoon.

Then, we went to Lowes to get windows for the coop.  Troy put them in today, along with perches.  It is a real coop, now, looks so good.  The girls love it.  They hopped right up on their perches when they cooped up tonight.

The holidays remind me to be thankful for my girls

I have spent so many Easter Sundays making baskets.  Baskets for those I loved, but not for my own children.  I made baskets for my husband.  I made baskets for my dogs.  I made baskets for our friends who would come visit on their breaks from college, some of those years, my brother was in the group.


But, each year, I would dream of the children I hoped to someday make baskets for.


Infertility hits each person differently.  For me, it was 7 years of trying to have a baby, fighting cancer, losing babies early to heaven and using assisted reproduction.  I consider us super successful.  I know of so many people who are still trying to have just one baby join them on this earth, and I somehow managed to be blessed with three!


So, as I put together three Easter baskets this year, I fight back the tears as I think of how thankful I am that Jesus loved me enough to let these three precious little girls join my family.  And, I breathe prayers for those I know who are still going through the fight to just have one child.  And for those I know who have faced pain and triumphed.  

This being Easter, a holiday that has some meaning to us in our religious lives, I also think of how God must have felt when He had to turn His back on His only Son those long years ago.  If I ever had to turn my back to my children as they cried out to me, my heart would be breaking.  It would be something I would never be able to forget.  And yet, God allowed this to happen so He could provide a way for us to join Him forever.


We have a song for our service tomorrow.  One of the verses seems to fit what I feel right now...


Whatever happens...whatever you see...
Whatever your eyes tell you has become of me
This is not...
Not the end...
I am making all things new again


There is hope for everyone.

Our second batch of chicks is here

The chicks I ordered a couple of months ago are finally here.  They hatched on April 11 and arrived on April 12.  Our delightful postmaster delivered them to our door.  She is such a sweetie.  She lives right down the street from us, which, out here in the country is probably about half a mile, but, she's only about 6 houses down.

So, by now, they're 4 days old.  They have wing feathers already.  They are adorable, but, we aren't giving them as much attention as we should.  They run from us when we try to pick them up.  Aves loves to pick them up and rub them on her cheek to feel their softness.

Because we have them in the tote the red stars were in, I had to move the red stars outside to the shed/coop.  I spread pine shavings on the floor, got them a nice large water container and food container, a small bin and some sticks as roosts.  They're temporary roosts, we are making some permanent ones tomorrow.  It's so funny to watch them try to climb up and down the sticks.  Like walking a tightrope.

I learned to watermark!

After my friend posted a reminder of how important watermarking is, I found an excellent online tutorial on photoshop elements and tried it out.  It was way simpler than when I had tried it in the past.  I am so proud of myself.

Isn't she pretty!