zach n kali

Dear Lord, With Thanksgiving soon approaching, I wanted to stop and just say "thanks!"  You have blessed us so richly this year - thank you for Peyton and this amazing first year we've had with her.  Thank you for the incredible ways that Matt is growing and developing.  Thank you for their health, and their humor - thank you that they sleep through the night!  And thank you for Zach's new job - you have shown yourself faithful over and over again.  Thank you for our home and our families...      You're welcome.  What are you going to do now? What Lord?      I have blessed you.  So what are you going to do with that? Well... I thought we might just sit and enjoy it for a little while. We've been working really hard.  And we've spent so much time  in prayer lately, trusting you, and everything!  And I mean, Christmas is coming, and vacation...      Why do I bless you?   Um... for my own enjoyment?  Eat, drink and be merry?      You kno

I woke up this morning with a bad case of The Mondays.  I mean bad.  Monday is usually a reset day for us after busy weekends.  But this morning I was just over it.  I didn't want to unload the dishwasher.  I didn't want to change Matt's sheets (potty training is great, but exhausting).  I kind of just wanted to sit in a corner with my coffee and pout.  But if I decide to be Mrs. Crankypants, then the kids become Crankypants Jrs, and that just makes everything worse.  I just felt like life was on this 'lather, rinse, repeat, lather, rinse, repeat' cycle of monotony. Pick up the toys just so the kids can dump them out again.  Unload the dishwasher just to load it up again.  Read Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs again.  Again again again. But then by my second cup of coffee, I remembered what someone at church said a few weeks ago.  A Stay-At-Home-Mom herself, she felt caught up in the same monotony.  But she shared that she was thankful that God continually was in

I have been having so much fun cooking this week!  Since removing the staples last week, I have been reminded that we eat not only for fuel, but for enjoyment, for memories, and for new experiences.  This isn't a new idea for me, but I seem to have forgotten that these things are not just for entertaining or for large gatherings of families and friends.  I had to dial myself way back when planning Matt's 3rd birthday party - we were having hot dogs and nachos (movie theater food) and I was ready to throw out brats, ciabatta rolls, and carne asada when Zach gently reminded me that we were planning a party for a three year old.  I love food!  I plan any get-together around the food.  But why should weekly dinners get any less respect?  I want my kids to grow up around the dinner table.  I want them to try new foods, to not even look at a "children's menu", and to be excited to come together as a family at night.  Tacos, spaghetti, and turkey burgers have their place

Dear Baby Boy, I know, I know, you're not a baby anymore, but you are my Baby Boy forever.  Deal with it.  But today my heartstrings were pulled in a new way.  Today I put up your first sport's pennant.  It shouldn't have been a big deal.  But it was.  It was the first thing that I didn't "design" for your room.  It was the first thing YOU wanted on your wall.  It was the first semblance of moving from a little boy's room to... well, a big boy's room.  I love your room - the colors, the vibrancy, your growth chart - it's all warm and inviting.  It's a cool little boy's room.  But the truth is that you won't want crayon art or trucks on your walls forever.  That car rug will be gone before I know it.  And one day we'll have to figure out how to paint over that chalkboard.  But it's never felt soon.  And today it did.  It felt like I would be trying to drag you out of bed for your first day of high school tomorrow (ok, so I'

I am in a horrible dinner rut. When I plan our weekly dinners on Sundays, all my creativity seems to leave my body.  It doesn't matter that I have a shelf full of cookbooks, that I am addicted to Pinterest, or that I watch several different Food Network shows.  All I can think of are turkey burgers, spaghetti, tacos, stir fry, pancakes.  Almost every single week.   Even Peyton is eating more interestingly than the rest of us are with her crazy combinations of zucchini and bananas!  I think it's to the point where my family might mutiny. So I'm issuing myself a challenge: for the next month, no staples.  No spaghetti with marinara.  No burgers.  No pizza with chicken sausage, bell peppers, and onions.  I love to cook, but I'm bored with my cooking.  Here's how it will work:  each Sunday I will pull 6 recipes out of my recipe box, which is full of recipes I've clipped from places like Everyday Food, Penzey's Spices, and my mom's own recipes.  My one off

It's time to be updated!  It's time to move on from "The Five Year Plan - Revised" because Zach and I are now on the other side of our first 5 years!  This also means that I am only two years away from being thirty... but more on my own aging issues later. I cannot tell you how many couples I have met who tell me that they plan on having kids "probably in about five years".  Why is 5 the magic number?  Please do not take this condescendingly - I was one of them.  What do we think would happen in these five years that would make us ready for children?  What do we hope to accomplish?  Where do we want to travel?  How many bucket list items do we hope to cross off?  I had it so nicely planned out.  Married at 22, career at 23, kids at 27, house by 30...  With these numbers I'd probably be telling my kids that I would be a grandma at 60 - no arguing!  Who did I think I was?  God?  Thankfully he is patient and didn't smite me for my planning, but I

Dear Mr. Manning, This is my daughter Peyton. She is 8 months old, and the most adorable, precocious, and sweet spirited baby you will ever meet (except for your own, of course). She is a wiggler, a giggler, a smiler, and is in fact named after you. She might not be fond of being named after a male football player when she's 15, but if it wasn't this, then I'm sure she'd find something else to be angry at us for.  Many people who don't know us well assume that my husband chose her name and that he's the big NFL fan, but it was in fact me; I've known for years that I would name one of my children after you, boy or girl. I've been your fan since you were drafted, and have watched you take the Colts from the worst team in the NFL (I have proof in the form of a Monopoly board ) to being Super Bowl champions. And when you became a Bronco, it brought me full circle, back to my dad who has been a lifelong-live-and-die-with-them-don't-talk-to-him-ti

I love the environment.  I am thankful for the clean air I get to breathe and for a husband who knows what's recyclable off the top of his head.  I firmly believe in conserving our earth's precious resources.  But today my kitchen sink was dirty.  Very very dirty. So today I cleaned the kitchen sink with Clorox wipes.  About 20 of them.  I could have gotten out the sponges and the vinegar and the hot water and the baking soda, but today I needed something fast and convenient.  I needed something that I didn't have to worry about spilling and I needed to be readily available to run my football helmet wearing-ball wielding-potty training toddler to the bathroom.  Or snatch a fallen Sophie giraffe for my teething infant.  Or intercept a rogue ball headed toward said infant's head. I also was running short on time and low on energy, so I decided to make a smoothie for lunch.  But the dishwasher was full and I hate doing the dishes, plus my sink was clean.  It would be a

A funny thing happened to me about a year ago. I found out we were pregnant! With all the joy and excitement came something commonly called Pregnancy Brain. I've mentioned this before. Where before I could spend an hour telling Zach about the latest episode of "The Biggest Loser" (sad, but true), I now couldn't remember if I had watched it. My vocabulary was turning into one syllable words. And grocery shopping? If it wasn't written down, it wasn't bought. This unfortunately left us toiletpaperless several times. So writing definitely wasn't going to happen. I would stare at my journal or the computer screen and wait for words to magically appear. But they wouldn't. So I decided to give myself maternity leave. I knew that once our baby girl was born, my brain would return and I would be so inspired by the wonder of birth and new life that the words would just flow out of me. Ah... Hindsight is not only 20/20, it's often hilarious. Peyton was born