Something beautiful

Something beautiful has happened this past year.  A whole lot of people I leaned on hard left the year before.  That's not the beautiful.

The beautiful is this:

I call home more often.  Just to chat.  Or ask for advice.  Or on really, really hard days, just to have my Momma or Daddy tell me that I'm alright.

And sometimes I think about calling them "just because" but talk myself out of it because we just talked!

I've always been fiercely independent girl.  I've heard that you naturally go back to your parents for more and more bits of wisdom as you get older, as you become a parent.  I'm doing both, so it makes sense.

But this is my stop and smell the roses moment.  Because I am so thankful for the luxury I have been given in wonderful, Godly parents.  I'm thankful to have them to call.  I'm thankful for the prayers of so many.  I'm thankful for good friends and siblings who encourage.  I'm thankful for my niece who popped on Skype the other day just to tell me she missed me and as we chatted, told me she thinks I'm going to make a great mom.

How blessed can a girl get?

Ode to Peanut Butter

Tonight, I made these (okay, someone else made these, mine are still firming up in the freezer)

while belting out 'Til I See You and Hosanna at the top of my lungs (thank you Pandora).

This is the second time I've made them in a week.  Don't judge.  My department is doing an offsite at my house tomorrow.  And people really like them.  And then they like me.  I mean, um...they're just really, really good, and easy!

And can I tell you all a secret?  I think peanut butter is the bomb.  (Do people still say, "the bomb?"  "Da" bomb?)  Seriously.  I used to think it was silly that the food missionaries always stereotypically want brought to them is peanut butter.  Not any more.  I don't eat peanut butter sandwiches - but Thai Peanut chicken?  Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies?  Buckeye bark?  Be still my heart.

Another secret?  Since jr. high, I haven't measured peanut butter once.  Nope.  I just grab a big spoon, pull up a scoop and compare it to a measuring cup, while the cup stays blissfully un-peanut buttered.  It was laziness really.  Who likes to clean out peanut butter from crevices?  Not this girl.  But now, I think I'm a bit smug in saying, I am an awesome peanut-butter-measurer-eyeballer.  It's a thing.  Next winter olympics, wait and see.

Peter Pan.  How I love you.  A Disney hinted treat from my whole childhood.  Mom always told me that peanut butter was not something you bought the cheap-o brand of.  You can taste the difference!  She bought this in a 48938378291 gallon tub at Sam's Club when I was growing up.  Huge.  I was always a little nervous of dropping that on my toes.  But I never did.  I dropped whole watermelon once (home alone, trying to be too big for my britches), but never the peanut butter.  I recently bought, not one, but two of the big old 40 oz tubs in creamy.  And I already had a 40 oz tub of crunchy.  They were BOGO, I couldn't resist.  If I ever move overseas and you visit me - well you know what to bring.

Now all I have to say is:  "Dear Lord, please let my kids be blissfully un-allergic to peanut butter!

and strawberries.

and gluten, please, please let them be able to eat gluten!

Let's face it, Lord, I want my kids to be foodies too.

Amen."