Bluebonnets!

A few days ago, Jason had the fabulous idea to load up the fam and drive to the country for some bluebonnet viewing. Somewhere in the recesses of my memory I recalled that there was a bluebonnet trail around here somewhere, so . . .

After checking the Ennis Convention and Visitors Bureau's website, I found that the town was conveniently holding its bluebonnet festival this weekend too! So we shared the idea with Caroline, who proclaimed that "it's not bluebonnet festival, it's bluebonnet day," and that we would get a chocolate milkshake as we looked at the bluebonnets. Alrighty then.

First stop was the festival for a quick pickup of the bluebonnet trails map. The quick stop turned into an hour and a half of bounce housing, shopping, pony and whale riding, and corn dog and kettle corn eating.

"I call this pony Princess!"

Whale riding, Ennis bluebonnet festival style

Sweet Julia, having fun just watching with her daddy

After the festival stuff, were were off to see some bluebonnets and take some pictures! This Panhandle girl didn't see bluebonnets until she was a college student at Baylor, and I could never understand why it's the state flower of Texas if you can't see it in Perryton (hey, Perryton is part of Texas too!!). But now that I've seen it, I do love bluebonnet season . . . the beautiful azure sea of flowers tipped with little white caps . . . the way they appear seemingly out of nowhere in meadows, in neighbors' flower beds, and alongside even the busiest of highways . . . popping up nearly always around Easter time, serving as yet another reminder of God's continuous renewal and everlasting love for us. And today I got to smell the perfume of a field of bluebonnets -- I'd never smelled that before, but it's wonderful!

So we got the kids out and tried to take some pictures of some moderately willing subjects -- here's a couple:

Caroline kept wanting to get back into the car to watch Mary Poppins on her DVD player. At 3 years old, she's already bored with Mom & Dad's plans! Caroline can already make the words "Dad" or "Mom" into three-syllable words. Three going on thirteen, I guess! I can remember being a kid and wanting to read my book rather than look out the window, so I decided to respect her wishes and didn't insist that she watch field after field of flowers at 35 mph (I can see how that might be a little boring for a preschooler after the first 10 minutes or so). So as we drove, JuJu slept, Caroline watched her movie, and Jason and I rolled down the windows, enjoyed the countryside, and talked.

Caroline loves to watch movies -- just like her daddy!

We found another field near the end of our drive with bluebonnets and Indian paintbrushes and got a few more pictures by informing Caroline that her posing was a condition precedent to acquiring the chocolate milkshake. JuJu didn't even bother to get out of her carseat at this stop; she was obviously over all the picture taking too.

Beautiful field of flowers

More pictures? Seriously?

One last stop on the way home: Kincaid's for burgers and fries, as well as for that bluebonnet day chocolate milkshake!

It's been a long, long time . . .

Well, I see that it's been over a year since we have made an entry on our blog. You might think it's because of the boringness . . . but no, it's been a very eventful year. I have been composing this post in my head for a long time, and there was so much I wanted to say about my journey over the last year and a half, and maybe I'll write more in the future about that. But for now, suffice it to say that I stopped blogging around September 2007, when I learned after about ten months of trying to have another baby that I had a blocked fallopian tube. I was devastated and really went through a period of despair. But I have several friends who have been on this journey, and from some of them I got a recommendation for a good doctor who, with lots of pills and injections (and the answered prayers of our gracious God), helped us to get pregnant again! And now we have a sister for Caroline: Julia Elizabeth, born on November 14, 2008!

We're starting this blog back up again (hopefully with some amount of semi-regularity) because it's been very crazy over the past year, and I find that I don't remember things that have happened even a month or two ago (lack of sleep and utter disorganization will do that to you, I guess). So I hope this will be a way to capture my memories while at the same time sharing our lives with friends and family, both here and far away. Plus, I think this blog is linked on a few of my friends' blogs, and I don't want them to delete me :) Our lives are pretty busy now, maybe a bit less boring than they used to be . . . but definitely blessed beyond measure.

Home from the hospital, our first family picture - November 17, 2008