All The Small Things

Yeah, I still have so many posts I want to write. I’m so behind. But I figure if I’m keeping up in either my blog or my journal, then at least there’s that :). And really, the journaling is more important, because it is a goal I set and it is different than my blog. Anyway… I still want to try to blog at least weekly. Keep the details of my life recorded somewhere. The day-to-day minutiae that make up a life :).

So how is The Nilla Life? Oh it’s grand :). I could totally put a million smileys to convey that grandness, but seriously, who has time for that when they barely have time to blog!?! So how about some categories to focus my grandness :)?

Work. Work is going well. I have been given additional duties, and that helps me to stay busy. And I love to stay busy at work. And I am still loving the 4-day work week. I love having Fridays off to run errands and feel like I have extra time to do the important things.

Garden. Wow! That thing got huge practically overnight! I will admit that I have not tended it quite as much as I did last year. I probably need to dedicate more of my Fridays to this endeavor. The tomatoes are humongous. And probably planted too close together… But they all have tomatoes of various sizes (I have some itty-bitty ones, some grape-type ones, and some larger slicing ones). I have a pumpkin plant which may very well grow across my entire garden diagonally! And it has 2 or 3 pumpkin buds on it :). Which is exciting to me, because I love love love pumpkin pie :). My acorn squash plants are also ginormous and will probably out-grow their allotted space. I have 2 or 3 squash buds on one of the plants at this point, but I anticipate the other two will catch up. I have one zucchini plant that has about 6 zucchini. I am just waiting for them to get a bit bigger. I have picked probably around 50 strawberries this year and the most recent ones have been quite sweet. I have been using the chives out of the garden as well as cilantro that I planted from seed :). In fact, I used both of them in my very hot chicken taco soup last night :). I love that recipe, even if it is spicy. I’m hoping there are still leftovers so that I can have it for lunch tomorrow :). My cucumbers are really spreading and I finally have about 5 cucumbers that are ready to be picked! And my pepper plants all have peppers. I’ve left the jalapeno pepper alone (the big one) and it has turned red. The reason for this is because I am waiting for the tomatoes to ripen so I can make my fresh tomato salsa with everything from the garden. The only thing I will have to buy is the onion and lemon juice (which we already have). Everything else is growing in my backyard :). I LOVE IT!

Church. Still doing the Primary thing. I have found it quite interesting how all the kids seem to be on the same wiggle schedule. Haha… It is amazing to work with children and to see how much they actually learn. Yesterday I taught a lesson on our bodies being temples. I often wonder if the kids pick anything up when they are particularly wiggly. But they do. I asked Benjamin yesterday what he learned in Primary and he told me it was about temples and our body and we have to take care of our body so it is healthy because it’s a temple. Good job Benjamin! I was impressed. But yeah, Primary is going well. It can be hectic and sometimes I lack creativity. But I am enjoying the calling and appreciating the growth that I know is coming from it, whether I am fully aware of what that growth is or not…

Jeremy. Oh yes, my favorite subject ;). We had a blissful week :). We had several bonus days and they were wonderful! Mostly we just relaxed and talked and laughed. Truly amazing that we never run out of things to talk about. Something I told him about this past week: chinchipati. Okay, I’m guessing at the spelling, I won’t lie ;). But it’s a Spanish slang term (possibly only used in Panama, not really sure) that I always forget about until I hear it again. It means “cheap, junky, sub-par” depending on usage. How did this word come to my attention on Friday? My mom said she is chinchipati because she is using her purse until it breaks on the strap (it is currently holding on by one thread). It is fun and wonderful to share life with someone so fun and wonderful :). It is a beautiful thing. And this is actually where I will tie in that song-title post. Jeremy is so thoughtful. So remember me telling you about my allergies that kicked up about a million notches earlier in the summer? (I’m happy to report I have had no return issues in the last month, approximately.) Well part of the horribleness was all the sneezing and the runny nose that was driving me crazy, and the itchy nose that was making me even crazier. And I was going through Kleenex like there was no tomorrow! Which made it particularly fortunate that Jeremy had some in his car, because I sure did use up a lot of it! I commented that I should get some tissue to carry in my purse. And then, the next weekend, Jeremy had bought me some individual packs of Kleenex to keep in my purse. In the past, and this usually happens later in the evening, when I keep my eyes open without blinking for a while, they dry out quite a bit. Which is probably mostly normal, but definitely highly annoying because I have contacts. My contacts proceed to stick to my eyelid and therefore are prone to move and become uncomfortable. So Jeremy had noticed that, and so this past weekend, he gave me a little bottle of contact solution stuff so I can moisturize my eyes when needed. And it occurred to me how wonderful and thoughtful he is. Okay, so I already knew. But… Sometimes… Sometimes I see those small things and realize that they aren’t really small at all. Because they come from something large. They come from his love and his heart. They come from his desire to take care of me and provide for me. And oh… How it warms my heart. Yep, he is wonderful. (But you probably already knew that from previous posts ;)).

So yep. That’s The Nilla Life. Ain’t life grand ;)?