What Being Pregnant Has Taught Me (So Far)

I bet when I told you we had a surprise last week me being pregnant wasn't what you expected.

It's not really what we expected either, to be quite honest. 6 months ago if you asked where I'd be right now I would never have said pregnant. Happy, yes. Working, yes. Still in love with my husband, yes.

But here's what I know about expectations, God doesn't care about our expectations. He doesn't care about our schedule, our timeline, our 5 year plan, heck even our 1 WEEK plan. That isn't to say that God doesn't care about His children, their hearts, their souls. It means that He has the final say in planning anything, He holds the keys to the clock of life. He laughs at our plans. And in love He says, "Just wait, I have something way, WAY better."

Ok so if you haven't gotten the memo yet, this baby is a surprise. A surprise that sent me into a shaking, tearful, confused mess that called my sweet husband on a Wednesday morning saying..."Seth, you need to come home. I'm pregnant." 

A surprise that we didn't see coming, yet we are now so excited about. A surprise that we still can't quite wrap our heads around. A surprise that makes me say "God, what the heck do you have planned here?"

A painful surprise too. If you're wondering how I was clued into to thinking I might be pregnant, it was pain. A three week long ache, and then the day after we found out we were pregnant I ended up in the ER with immense pain. Baby was fine, mama is fine, my body however decided to take all of the first trimester symtoms and squish them into a few short weeks. BUT, I've been pain and nausea free since week 6. How crazy is that?! I'm sure you've all heard about fun pregnancy symptoms before so I will spare you the details.

The next 6.5 months will be a journey. A lot of growing, a lot of tears, a lot of excitement, and possibly  probably some fears. We're excited, and I'm terrified. But in that, I have overwhelming amounts of peace.

What have I learned so far?
That God really, truly, completely, wholly is in control. If I or Seth had any say in our current future, this wouldn't have happened right now.
But in that same God I have complete, whole, true, and real trust.
Trust in His timing, first of all. Trust in His goodness, kindness, and love. Trust in His protection, in His empathy, and His care.

I've learned that I'm a really terrible secret keeper, also. If you were part of the million people that we told before we were "supposed" to...thanks for helping us keep our secret.

I've learned that this journey will be one where I may finally learn about humility. My love for this little turkey will outweigh my love for myself. It already does. And to add to that, I can't place my worth, my pride, my anything in the way that I look -- I know that this beautiful little life I have growing inside of me will forever change my body. While that is daunting right now and I am leaning on my selfish feelings about beauty, that will change. I am confident in Gods ability to change hearts and selfish feelings. If He can bring the dead back to life He can certainly stomp on my pride, happily.

This journey is also about grace. Without grace none of us would be alive. Without grace Seth and I would probably bite each other's heads off. Without grace I wouldn't even have the chance of being a good mama. Because of grace, and only because of grace can we love, serve, learn, and grow. My favorite part of grace is that it's free. I haven't earned it, I don't deserve it, it's totally free. I appreciate it more now thinking of all the ridiculous mistakes Seth and I will make as new parents. And I'm thankful that His grace is new every second of every hour of every day.

I'm enjoying all of these feelings for now. Taking them all in and dwelling on how special this journey has been so far. Reflecting on Seth, how much he cares for me and little one and how amazing of a dad he will be. Reflecting on our friends and family, and what an awesome support system we have. Reflecting on the special moments we've had so far, like hearing the heart beat for the first time, and today getting to see little one kick and turn on the screen.

I'm so excited. So many of my friends over the years have referred to me as "mama" and now I get to have that as a reality.
We're so excited. Mostly to watch God's plan unfold in our lives, each day is fresh never knowing what God has around the corner.



We want to say THANK YOU. The utter out-pouring of love from people is remarkable and overwhelming.

THANK YOU -- for believing in us, or at least for believing in the One who holds us. As newlyweds who still are in school, who are trusting Jesus paycheck to paycheck, who are still just trying to figure out what being an adult is you might be thinking..."but they don't know what the heck they are getting themselves into."

We don't.
But He does.
I've said it a million times and here I go again. We trust Jesus with what He is doing.
There are some things I doubt -- but that is not one of them!

Now that our secret is out I'll be back around here more often. I promise not only to blog about baby, or belly rather. Trust me, my belly size and weight gain I'm not really interested in tracking right now.

Also, GO SHARKS! Clearly we're getting little one started young on the necessity of Sharks fan-hood.

Dearest Blog

Dearest blog,

I am so sorry for the neglect. You wouldn't believe how crazy life has been the past month.

I'll update you soon on the details, the adventures, the surprises.

Oh yes, the surprises are good.

You see, ever since I went part time at work life has gotten a whole lot more wonderful.

We have time for fun things again.

Like cooking food.

And making pretty things.

And going on weekend trips.

And girls nights.

And game nights.

And hockey watching.

GO SHARKS.

And visiting my best friends in Seattle.

I've been dreaming again of what it would be like to move there. 

It would probably be the biggest adventure we set out on. 

But we'll see what God has planned.

I've learned so much in the past month about my own plans, our own plans....and how God smashes them with a smile because He has something so much bigger, better, brighter, and more awesome for us. 

You know what else is exciting? 

This girl is getting MARRIED!!!!

I am honored to be her matron of honor.

I'm even more excited to see her so happy with her soon to be husband.

Nothing is sweeter in life than finding your soul mate.

I love this snapshot of them, such a great picture of the smile that he brings out in her. 

I promise I'll be back next week, little blog.

We have some catching up to do.

Some big life updating.

Some surprise sharing.

Some heart opening. 

Until then,

Reflecting on Easter

This Easter was a lot different than Easter's past.

It was my first Easter that my family didn't have a big get-together  It was the first Easter that Seth and I had by ourselves. No Easter baskets, no presents, no morning church. 

Two months ago I probably would have told you that we would be home with our families, visiting our old church, having a normal Easter...but God changed our hearts. You see, I havent been feeling at home in our new church for the last few months. I have yearned to go back home and visit Hope Church, to be with our families, to not have to adjust to being somewhere new because it's so dang hard sometimes. 

I didn't want to put in the effort to committing somewhere new, to serving, to opening up to a new group of people, to meeting new girlfriends. Part of this is fear, part of this is pride, and most of it is just pure laziness. Jumping into the unknown is scary and hard and time consuming, we all know I don't have extra time to spare!

But God has been working on me. Working on my stubborn little heart. I've been putting in time, confessing my fears, my thoughts, my dislikes. He's given me some awesome women to meet and share life with. He's given us a new home. 

Here's most of our neighborhood group -- they have made Monday night my favorite night of the week.

Last month Seth and I felt a call. A call to be at Garden City Church for Easter. A call to become members. I felt the call to finally commit. To leave my stubbornness at the cross and trust Jesus for what He is doing here.

Easter at Garden City couldn't have been more glorious. Not because there is something overwhelmingly special about the music, or the preaching, or the people -- but it is where God wanted us. Resting in His plan is a glorious thing.

And not to mention that three ladies from our neighborhood group got baptized after the service. One of those three ladies has become a very close friend of mine. I know that God picked Michaela to be my friend when we moved here, He is so good at picking friends for us.

This is us a couple weeks ago at the Zoo!


Michaela has a powerful story of how God fought for her and saved her. Watching her get baptized was more beautiful than I could imagine.

Sonja and Stephanie are newcomers to our neighborhood group and it is awesome to watch how God put it on their hearts to get baptized and bam, here they are. One of the met Jesus less than THREE weeks ago -- how good is He?!



Seth's parents joined us at Garden City -- our pastor used to be the college pastor at their church so they actually knew a bunch of people at the service! I love when worlds collide like that, it reminds me of the fact that we are all one Church.
Easter this year was different. We went out for dinner instead of cooking something fancy. I didn't take any pictures of Seth and I, even though I had bought a cute dress for the occasion. We didn't do baskets or eggs or candy. We didn't go home like we had planned.

But we watched Jesus save lives. We got to celebrate His resurrection. We got to celebrate Him bringing our dead hearts alive through baptism.

We rested in His plan.
I'd like to start doing that more often.
Listening, discerning, praying, following.

"Many are the plans in a man's heart, but the counsel of the Lord, it will stand."
Proverbs 19:21

Pinterest Made Me Do It.

It's not that often that I see something on Pinterest and am absolutely in need of buying it.

But in my hopes for weight loss through low carb living I've been uninspired. I've been bored with meat and cheese. I don't like vegetables that much, so its a huge chore to find a recipe that is all veggie that I will enjoy. 

Enter the GEFU Spiral Slicer.

Weird name, I know. It's German. It's like fully german, the box and directions and everything. 

As soon as I saw the picture of it on Pinterest I knew I had to have it. For a girl that grew up on pasta every night, I miss the crap out of pasta. I miss how easy it is and how versatile the recipes are. I don't miss how much weight it kept on me though, and in comes the Gefu.

Heres how it works: Cut off the end of your cylindrical veggie, and turn counter clock-wise against the blades inside the Gefu. I like zucchini and squash best. You can also try carrots, cucumber, radish...there's a lot of options. 

Next: Be amazed at how much 1 squash and 1 zucchini can produce when they are cut in this way. 

Yes people, that is 1 of each. Granted, they do shrink when they are cooked..but I was still surprised at how much they produced!

Next: sauté to your liking. Or leave raw if you can stand to eat veggies that way. I added some left over ground beef and vodka sauce. It was my favorite low carb lunch ever. 

The texture definitely mimics spaghetti. I am so happy that I found this contraption on Pinterest. It was definitely worth the $29.95 price tag. I will be enjoying low carb "pasta" for a very long time thanks to it!

I got mine on Amazon but there are plenty of other online retails to buy from. 

Disclaimer: This post is not sponsored. My blog is not that cool yet, and I really just wanted to tell you how much this has changed my life. 

Happy Tuesday, friends!

Miscellany Monday

I like miscellaneous posts, because I don't much else to say these things other than jumbled up thoughts that somehow make up the story of my life right now.

How was your weekend? We went home to see my family, it was my brother's 25th birthday. It would also have been my Grandpa's 92nd birthday the same day. I've been thinking a lot about my grandparents lately. I think about their love for me as their youngest grandchild and how blessed I was to have them in my life. I get sad for 2.5 seconds until I remember where they are. Oh, for that day!

I bought this little gadget a couple weeks ago.

Source: slimmingeats.com via Rachael Kennedy Creative Hairdressing on Pinterest

And I haven't used it yet. I think today I will try it out! I was kind of bummed when it arrived because its from germany, and therefore there are no directions in English, no special recipes....I think I'll have to search the blogs of people that already own one.

That being said, Seth and I have gotten back on a low-carb diet. I feel less gross already. I also stopped craving sugar already! This diet is my favorite of all diets. Despite it's controversial history I totally believe that you can make low-carb a life-style and not just a few month long diet.

Eating on a low calorie diet however, makes me want to rip my hair out.

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Our church had a guest preacher yesterday, a man named Justin Anderson who is soon launching a church in San Francisco called Redemption Church. His message blew me away. Going back through it in my mind makes me realize how though a sermon can have a similar message of one you've heard before, its all about the delivery. I was broken by the end of it, in the very best way possible. Broken over how I have tried to fit Jesus into all of the broken areas of my life and that simply doesn't work because He offers us a NEW life. He also illustrated the danger of preaching a reduced Gospel, when we reduce the Gospel to solely being about the cross, we miss the beginning half of THE story. The story that God has been writing throughout human history and why we needed Jesus to come and redeem it. We miss the beauty of the grand story of Jesus coming to rescue the world, Jesus didn't just come for me, He came to be the answer to the WORLD.

It made me realize that my struggle with dissatisfaction lately might be linked to the endless focus on MY sin. I'm now going to refocus on the larger picture of God coming to redeem the world. That is such an easier message to preach to friends and family who don't know the Lord. I'm beyond excited about what God is doing in me, in us.

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Last monday I decided to go out on a proverbial limb, a big limb for me to even consider. I bought some soil, some pots, and some seeds and decided that I was going to grow some vegetables.

Yep.

In a couple months we will (hopefully) have homegrown zucchini, squash, bell peppers, and onions. I could have done garlic too, but our town produces enough of that already *snort*.

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This is my last week of working full time at my current job. I am thankful to have had this experience, and grateful that they are letting me stay on part time, but beyond thrilled to finally start substitute teaching.

The last few months have been draining, frustrating, and tough -- but full of growth.  I felt stuck in my job because of our financial situation, because of our health insurance situation, because of my experience ( or lack their of). God has opened the door and allowed it all to work out perfectly, isn't it awesome when He does that?!

Last week I stressed about health care after I learned that part time at my job means 32 hours a week -- I mean, come on. That meant that Seth and I would be dropped on March 31st. That also means that we would have to get private health care for both of us -- which they say is easy when you're "young and healthy"....not exactly true. We found out last week though, that my mom will be able to put me back on her health insurance, and for me being the more risky and injury prone spouse we couldn't have been more excited!! Now all I have to do is get insurance for my husband who goes to the doctor once every 5 years. Easy peasy. 

I'm excited for this new chapter. I'm overjoyed that I get to spend more time at home, cooking meals, getting chores done, having a normal sense of life again. Maybe I'll read a book, or do a puzzle, or craft! 

Happy Monday friends!

Evolution of an Afghan

My journey with yarn & needles started a few years ago.

It was actually Kim who taught me to knit during our downtime from the Living Christmas tree performances at our church. 

It was super exciting to learn a new craft, but I never really went beyond the square. Knitting is hard, there is a lot of things involved to make it perfect, and the risk of dropping a stitch and making a giant hole is huge. 

I have picked up and put down knitting projects over the years, never quite growing the passion that I needed to be successful. I've been seeing neat crochet projects all over pinterest and the internet lately, and I remember growing up that my grandmother would make me some beautiful stuff with crochet. 

I decided that in 2013 I would learn to crochet. It looked easier and a lot more fun, and the projects looked like I wouldn't get bored with them!

First thing I did was buy a book, which wasn't really good for this visual learner. You laugh, visual learning is obviously through pictures, but these days with the evolution of videos I realize that I depend on videos to teach me things! The book was ok, but I turned to YouTube to help me with the basics. Once I learned the basics I yearned to start learning granny squares.

I started looking online at patterns for different granny squares and practicing them. The techniques for making granny squares varies, so I had to make a few of the same pattern before I got the hang of it. Even though my current project is a huge undertaking for a novice crocheter, I am LOVING how it is coming out. I love even more than you can see how much I have progressed in making the squares over the last couple months. 

The beginning: I started with a handful of squares with the same color pattern. It's easier to make multiples at a time working progressively. I make 6 small circles, then do the 2nd layer, then the third on all 6. You get the picture. 

After making a few with different patterns, using the same 3 colors, I decided to try and connect them. 

It's MUCH harder than it looks. Especially when you are not used to having a consistent needle tension. My first few connections were really tight and puckered in random places. Now that I have the hang of it is getting a lot easier to connect them. 

On superbowl Sunday instead of watching the game, I decided it was time to stitch together everything that I had so far to see how many more squares I would need to complete it. 

I saw that I would need A LOT of complete squares to make it as big as I want it.

But that's ok, I keep learning and growing and its fun!

I'm also learning how to hide my yarn ends and to make sure the connections are solid. This has been a frustrating process indeed, I would be checking my connections and pull something random, and 3 pieces would suddenly unravel. 

As of today...this is how big it is. 

ah! I just love it. I think I will put a dark blue border around the whole thing when it is finished to give it a polished look.

Next time I will up to connect them as I go instead of stitching them all together when I have a certain amount of squares done...that makes for less cutting yarn and hiding ends. 

Thanks for following me on this journey.

I am so excited to show you the finished product when the time comes!

Happy Saturday :)

Raspberry Cream Tart...Or you can just call it "Heaven"

Happy Pinter-test kitchen!

I still haven't been doing a lot of pinning lately, but after pinning this recipe and glancing around at what I've been missing, I'm determined to get back on there and find some inspiration! Particularly dinner inspiration, we've been in a funk of taco night and grilled chicken because I'm too lazy to do anything fancier. 

Anyways, I'm really excited to share with you today the most amazing tarte I've ever made. I think it might be the only tarte I've ever made, but I promise it is the BEST.

Seth and I are part of a wonderful little Neighborhood Group at our church. We meet in our leaders coffee shop, we each bring a part of a meal, and we meet and talk about the sermon and what God is doing in our lives.

The food themes have been pretty basic over the past couple months: Southern, Breakfast for Dinner, Mexican...and I thought we needed some excitement. On Sunday afternoon after church, I saw one of the girls in our neighborhood group and grabbed her to ask what the food theme was because I hadn't heard yet. She told me that there wasn't one decided so I quickly thought..lets do "Food that starts with the letter....R!" We started dreaming up all of the random things we could make.

People were a little befuddled about my letter choice, my husband says "Why not Q?".

But we heard exciting things like ravioli, raddish, rotisserie chicken, rolls, and rice! It was surely going to be interesting. I decided on something "raspberry", and obviously that needed to be a dessert. So off to the internet I went to find something perfect.

I found this yummy tart on the first link I clicked: I was sold right away.

At first I was a little intimidated, I mean, that crust looks homemade, and what the heck is a tar pan? This wannabe housewife did not know that there was such thing as a tart pan.

I did have a pie pan though, a really cute red pie pan that I hadn't used yet. It wasn't quite 11 inches like the recipe called for, I believe mine is about 9 inches, it turned out delicious anyways.

Here is what you'll need:

1 16.5 oz roll refrigerated sugar cookie dough, cut into 1/2 inch thick slices

2 3-ounce package cream cheese -- I don't know what country they make packages of cream cheese that small, I grabbed an 8 ounce package and did just fined.

1/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1 teaspoon finely shredded lemon peel

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups fresh red raspberries, blueberries, or blackberries

2 teaspoons sugar

powdered sugar

1. Press cookie dough slices into bottom and fluted sides of a greased 11-inch tart pan with removable bottom. Do not prick. (Or, press onto bottom of greased 12-inch pizza pan.) Bake in a 350 degrees F oven 20 minutes or until light brown. Remove from oven; set aside. 

Notice how I bolded the word greased? Yea, I forgot to do that, and we were scraping the pieces out of the pan all night because they were stuck. I will make sure I do that next time so we have clean cut pieces!

 1.5 Eat extra cookie dough because your pan might be too small. 

1.8 Marvel at the giant cookie you now have in front of you, and try not to eat it. 

2. In a small bowl, beat cream cheese with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add 1/4 cup sugar, egg, lemon peel, lemon juice and vanilla. Beat until combined. Pour cheese mixture over warm crust and spread evenly.

I finally had the chance to use my zester that my MIL bought me. It worked really well! I'm not sure if this counts as "finely shredded" but there weren't any large pieces of lemon zest in the final product so I consider it a success!

This was also my first time using my kitchen-aid  I don't think I can ever go back to stirring something with a fork (my usual method)!

2.5 Try really hard not to eat the filling before you put it inside the giant cookie, I mean crust. 

3. Place the 2 cups raspberries in a single layer on top of cheese mixture. Sprinkle raspberries with 2 teaspoons sugar. Bake for 15 to 17 minutes more or until or until cheese mixture is set. Transfer to a wire rack; let cool for 30 minutes before serving. 

Tada!

4. Just before serving, sprinkle with powdered sugar. Garnish with additional fresh berries, if you like. Makes 8 servings.

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You guys......

I normally don't have a lot of faith in what I cook, but holy smokes, this tarte is to die for.

The texture of the cream cheese filling mixed with the cookie dough..it is M-O-I-S-T perfection. 

It was completely gone before we left neighborhood group.

I licked the knife.

I licked my fingers which scraped the knife.

It is embarrassingly good. 

Now its your turn to make this delicious treat!

Thanks, Jess for this fun opportunity! I wouldn't have love handles without it :)

Oh, PS -- Seth and I have been married for 6 months today. Wahoo! It's gone by so fast :)