Isn't she a beauty?

Aaahhh, we're back in business :) .  We bought a dishwasher and my sweet hubby installed it perfectly.

And, aaahhh, life is good again :)

I pile the nasty, crusty dishes in and, wha-lah, they come out super clean and shiny...fabulous!

It feels good to be a little less busy in the kitchen these last few days.

Speaking of busy, does your life ever just get so busy that you're like, "Whoa"?  Mine does.  And I don't particularly like it. 

Before we had kids, we stayed busy, busy all the time doing anything and everything.  Mostly our "anything and everything" revolved around ministry.  Kraig and I are volunteer youth counselors with the teens at our church so that keeps us on the go for sure.  In addition to that, we used to volunteer in pretty much every other ministry our church has as well!  If there was an announcement made for needing help in ministry, we volunteered...nursery, Awana, video/sound, Care team, music/drama, softball teams, etc.  When we weren't volunteering at church in one way or another, we were hanging out with friends.  Pretty much every weekend we were going somewhere with friends...out to eat, having friends over to our house, going over to friends' houses.  We were busy ALL the time.

When we were expecting Taylor, we made the decision that our lives HAD to slow down.  There was no way we were going to have a little newborn and be constantly on the go.  For one thing, we were cutting two full time incomes pretty much down to one.  That, in and of itself, calls for a big lifestyle change!  But, the main reason we wanted to slow down a little was because we wanted the main focus of our family to be our family. 

I think sometimes we fill our lives with so much stuff that we forget what the main focus should be.  It's easy to want to be involved in everything ourselves or have our kids involved in all kinds of activities, but all too often what happens is we just end up with cranky kids and tired mommys.  I want my kids to know the joy of just hanging out at home.  I want them to have fun playing in our own backyard all afternoon.  I want them to see how exciting board games can be when we all sit in the living room floor and play.  I want them to love the simplicity of cuddling in my lap reading books.  I want them to feel special when we hang out on the couch as a family and watch a movie.  I don't feel like these things would happen for us if we were constantly needing to get here at this time or run there at that time. 

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of weeks when we are busy and that is, of course, bound to happen.  But, for the most part, we try to keep things simple around here.  All too soon, my sweet baby girl is going to be in school and our lives are going to change drastically.  Our schedule will then revolve around the almighty school calendar-HA! :)  Even then though, I don't plan to become super-duper busy.  Taylor will have to make choices as to which activities she'd like to be involved and what's important to her.  And, oh my goodness, too soon after that, my precious baby boy will be in school...AAAHHH!  Whew, these are just things that I cannot think about!

What I CAN think about is a relaxing evening at home watching my sweet kiddos play in a dishwasher box :)