Mark and I have now admitted, we are Landscaping/Gardening Dummies. Hence the reason we live in a city…and also the reason our yard looks like my dad’s head (sorry daddy).

However, this weekend there is a nice big sale at a local wholesale nursery. And this year, I have a neighbor who is a landscaping pro! So S came over with his family yesterday and looked at our yard (like he doesn’t see it everyday driving and walking the neighborhood, bless his heart) and came up with a few plant ideas that I possibly couldn’t kill and wouldn’t look like they were thrown there.

Mark’s doing church stuff this weekend, so I was going to brave the sale alone trudging to and fro with 3 gallon plants and a double stroller and a 4 and 5 year old who would rather run around the plants since all of them are outside. Yea, that would be fun. My sweet husband came to the rescue and nicely asked S if he could get our plants (I told him to even offer to help with gas money) and he’s agreed.

I’m still going if something happens with S’s plans. My yard is begging me to.

Right now my goal is to get our big front bed done and have it tie into the addition so the addition doesn’t really look like an addition. Make sense??? Yea, not to me either but I have a rough drawing and orders on where to plant/transplant.

So, Mark and I were talking about it last night and discussed how much we don’t know about gardening, basic plant care, and even lawn care (remember my dad’s head…sorry again daddy). I told him that this was yet another sign we were not inclined to go “agrarian.” Wish we could, but just not smart enough right now and definitely happy where God’s planted us…I just hope that “His stuff” grows!

I’d love to post pictures from my friends baby…no, toddler…no, adoption shower. But I didn’t bring my camera because I’m pregnant and completely forgot.

I had the great privilege of helping a friend plan a shower for our other friend who has completed her adoption for her daughter. Not sure how I helped, though, considering I couldn’t cook…just got last minute things and the invitations. Here’s some of K’s story.

Her and her husband came to visit our church when I was helping in the nursery, signing people in and showing people where to go…a greeter. Anyway, when I met them with their little “daughter” I helped them get around, found out they needed a class to go to and sent them to ours. They were great! I loved getting to know them. It wasn’t long after that they joined our church and that I was able to talk with K. Who I thought was their “daughter” was actually their foster daughter. Unfortunately, they were not able to have kids but instead of closing their hearts and home to children, invited them in through fostering. They felt that was the way they could minister to so many families in our area. Boy, have they done a lot of ministering in several years.

They really wanted to adopt their foster daughter that they first brought to church, however, it was not in God’s plans for them to do so. On July 6th, 2007, only three days after she was born C came into their lives. K didn’t have to go through the nine months of carrying her (although she had been praying for a baby for several years), but she was able to walk out of the hospital with her. C is only five days younger that Josiah and it has been so much fun this past year watching her and Josiah grow up (Josiah was 9 lbs at birth, C was 4!). C was also born on Mark’s birthday which is really cool. K told me she always thought that God would give them a girl and they always had a name picked out for a girl. So, we all started calling her by the name M & K picked out.

However, she was always Baby Girl on paper and to the state, until Wednesday. We were thrilled (okay tearfully excited) when K announced that Baby Girl was now C and had a last name too! This little girl has been prayed for from us since Mark and I met M & K. So, for two years we have prayed with, cried with, and hoped for them to have a child to call their own. God has answered that prayer and in the sweetest way.

Lots of fun tears at this shower. K has never had a baby shower before, and it was so much fun just to be able to pamper her…even though she tried to do stuff and help. Since C is not a baby baby anymore, M & K got to register for some fun toys which I’m sure they’re all playing with right now.

Oh, and M & K are still answering the call to foster children in their home and have two other children living with them, both 5, both boys! They are definitely called to care for others children and have shown that calling as we’ve seen children turn around so beautifully in their care.

Thanks Annette for letting me help here and there. It was an honor. And after I helped, I came home, ate a little, and then slept for over an hour…phew!

I have to say, I’ve been pleasantly blessed this week, and it’s only Tuesday. Today’s been a sleepy, nausea day but yesterday was so good and I was really able to enjoy school with Zoe and Ace.

I’ve got the yucky morning sickness that keeps me out of the kitchen. I’m not thrilled with this and because I felt so good when we first found out, thought I would escape it like I did with Josiah. Unfortunately, it hasn’t happened. Mark is now fixing meals at night, after I’m in bed. He’s also prepping the kids lunches. So, all I have to do is go in, pull out and set out for lunch and breakfast. I’ve had it really bad like this with Zoe and a little bit less with Ace. The smell of cooking food makes me want to…you know. The look of food cooking does the same. No more Food Network or any pictures with food. At least it’s going to be this way for the next four to six weeks.

Anyway, I was thinking yesterday how great it would be if we had friends who would bring us meals during this time instead of post partum. Okay, all my friends, I’m not suggesting this, I’m just saying, I was talking to God about how nice that would be. I will cook my second and third trimester and have enough meals in the freezer for two or more months, so post partum meals are nice but not always necessary. Anyway, I saw a neighbor yesterday and she asked if she could make a meal for us next week. Wow! God so blessed me with that. I wholeheartedly agreed and thanked God for helping us out, even if it’s for one night.

That was one. Add to that, I am not going to have to cook for our family when we visit B &B, which I didn’t mind having Mark do, but it is nice not having to do it either.

And then this is a cool one…I don’t want to put too much, because it may not happen, but we’ll see…Mark was supposed to go to China on a mission trip in October. However, the group felt God calling them to go earlier to help in the earthquake zone in Indonesia (I think that’s where it is) and so they’re going earlier, which means Mark can’t go because he doesn’t have enough days. We really felt God was calling Mark to go to China as that country and it’s people have always been on our hearts. God just flat out closed that door.

Sunday night was Summer Missions night at church and all the groups that went on missions got up and talked. We do a lot of mission work in our church which is awesome and a great way to see how God works.

Let me back this up by saying, I’ve never been able to go on a “mission trip.” I’ve done some mission work around my town but never have gone off somewhere. I’ve told Mark before how much I’ve wanted to do it, but with China, I knew I couldn’t go because of the cost and now because of the baby.

Anyway, our Minister to Mission (or whatever his title…he does a lot) was talking about a recent trip he took with his wife to a church plant. I was familiar with the trip because his wife had talked to me about it and my heart went out to the church. A lot of them are new Christians and are now raising children and trying so hard to follow God’s Word, but not knowing where to start or where to go. Okay, back to the story again (just trying to see how many different branches I can grow). So, he mentioned this at the mission night and Mark and I looked at each other, knowing we just wanted to go there to do what we could (I told Mark I wanted to move there). Then our minister said they were planning on taking a small team to there in October to do a marriage conference. We’re in…if they’ll have us, was what I thought! Both our minister and his wife were excited when we said we wanted to go. Okay, so it’s not overseas, but it’s somewhere where people need God and that’s good enough. I’m excited, but waiting to get all the details before I post where and what we’ll be doing. I don’t care if I’m just holding someone’s baby so they can enrich their marriage, I just want to help! Mark is super pumped…I think it’s the going together and where we’ll be going and who we’ll be going with. We really respect our minister and his wife (by the way this is the minister that Liam asked if he was God) and can’t wait to glean some wisdom off of them!

Now off to rest, some more…just four to six more weeks!