Ten Things of Thankful week 158

I have poison ivy on my jaw and shoulder that itches like the...like the...it itches so bad I can't even think of an appropriate simile. And there is a fly that keeps buzzing around me and landing on me, including on my actual eye. Yet I will sit here and shoo the fly and not itch and be thankful for all the good things for which I am grateful this week!

I'm a trooper like that.

1. With Phoenix home and baseball over, my days are so much more wide open. I can stay home and cook dinners and people can actually sit down and eat them together.

2. Seeing my boys walk up to the house when they arrive home from soccer practice each night puts a smile on my face every time. Nothing like 2 hours of seriously hard workouts to bring brothers together. I love sitting with them, despite the sweaty stench, when they get home, just listening to them laugh as they tell stories of what happened at practice.

3. The one thing I sometimes regret about moving to the farm is that our kids don't have the opportunity to ride their bikes to friends' houses or even have people over all that often. But, as Bryan and I talked about yesterday, if we had lived in a neighborhood surrounded by their friends, I doubt our kids would be as good of friends with each other. So, I'm thankful that we had the chance to move out to the middle of nowhere.

4. Bryan and I were able to get together with some of our best friends for dinner on Friday night. In the busyness of life, we rarely take the time to do such things, so it was extra fun to do so.

5. Let's give it up for Willis Carrier, the inventor of air conditioning. With the passing of each 90+ degree day, I love him more.

6. We're getting some produce from our garden and around the property. We've been eating plenty of lettuce and green beans and black raspberry cobbler lately.

7. I went to a funeral this week for one of the kindest people I've ever met. I didn't know her well, but I've known her for over a decade. She is the kind of person who makes you feel special just for having the chance to have met her. I kept looking around the church at all these people that I know, wondering how they knew her. It was quite a diverse group of folks. I've been to lots of funerals, but this one hit me harder than most. Partly because she was the kind of person the world needs right about now, but also because she was only 7 years older than me. Yes, sadly she is gone, but looking around that church, you knew how many lives she touched, how much kindness and joy she spread around, and how all of those people have learned from her and will continue to spread kindness because of her.

8. I have been at a loss for summer shoes. I want sandals, but I don't want a pair that has a piece of plastic between my toes and a skinny piece of what seems to be wood as the only barrier between the ground and my foot. I refuse to buy shoes that aren't comfortable the moment I put them on my feet. I had pretty much given up on having any sandals ever, until that dinner with friends on Friday night, in which one of the ladies was wearing a kind of shoe I'd never seen before.

People, I have found my shoe nirvana.

Yoga slings are the best things to be invented since the air conditioner. The soles are made out of yoga mats for crying out loud! I bought the one and only pair I could find in my size yesterday, but I'm considering buying them in every color online now that I know my size. Seriously. They are Fab. U. Lous.

9. On Friday I took the kids downtown and we rented bikes, individual bikes for the older boys, and a surrey for Buttercup and me to pedal the little boys around. In case you've never been here, Indy has a beautiful area downtown called White River Park. It is where the baseball stadium and several museums and the NCAA headquarters are, but it also has a canal walk that leads to the White River, where there are more walking and biking areas. As the boys say, "It was lit." (For you of the older generation who may not know, that is a good thing.)

10. Saturday was our 22nd wedding anniversary. I don't even know how that is possible, but it's true. The kids were gracious enough to not care that we abandoned them for the afternoon and evening, as we went to test drive minivans and buy some shoes and spend two hours having a leisurely dinner at a new restaurant in a nearby town. It was a lovely evening with my groom.

So, how has your week been? Let me in on the good stuff!

Have a lovely day!

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