Summer Fashion Week... Are you in?

Dun dun duh!

Summer Fashion time is here, woo wooo!!

If you didn't get to join in on the fun in the Spring, this is your chance!

This is seriously SO much fun, and you won't regret participating...

Here are the ground rules for those of you who are new to the game:

1. Snap pictures of your snazzy Summer looks starting July 12th. (Or, you could start snapping pictures NOW so you will have a plethora to choose from by the time Summer Fashion week rolls around!) Then, post them on your blog.

2. Come back here on Monday, July 12th. On that day, you will find a link list that you can plug your fashion post info into so that everyone can see that you've participated for that day. There will be separate link lists for each day. Each list will compile all the links together for each day so we can see everyone who is participating in one place!

3. Repeat for each day of the week! For each day you participate, your name will be entered into a drawing for a fun giveaway at the end of the seven days!

(This is all just a ploy for me to be able to say THANK YOU for all your continued support and readership here on my bloggity blog. I just adore you guys and am so thankful for all your encouragement throughout the years!)

4. Lastly, TELL ALL YOUR BLOG BUDDIES! Spread the news! The more people we have joining in the fun, the better it will be! Pencil it in your calendars and then go shout it from your rooftop. (Because that wouldn't be awkward AT ALL.)

Here's a small button for any of you who want to start spreading the word... (Just copy and paste that HTML code into your sidebar.)

<a href="http://emeryjo.blogspot.com"><img src="http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa122/emeryjo/Blog%20Button/summerfashionbutton.png"></a>

Or, here's the code for a BIGGER version if you'd like to do a separate post (like this one) to spread the word:

<a href="http://emeryjo.blogspot.com"><img src="http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa122/emeryjo/Blog%20Button/summerfashionweek.png"></a>

I'm so excited to do this again with you guys.

So... are you in?! Please say you're IN!

Jericho.

My husband and I have been on a hard journey. We have spent the last 12 years together- loving each other deeply, but wondering why each passing year brought more distance and space between our hearts. Or perhaps, as we are now realizing, the space had always been there but we have been slowly growing into the knowledge of the disconnect.

One of my favorite things about God is how He's so thoroughly surprising. It seems that every time I think I have Him figured out, or I think I know how things are going to go, He likes to flip me on my head.

I thought my journey towards knowing true intimacy with my husband was going to take the standard (may I say BORING?) path of discovering and discussing each issue that we could muster up until we finally came to a place of forgiveness and... tolerance?

THAT was my idea of 'a good place to end up' after all of this. A place where it wouldn't be quite so hard to show and receive love from my husband... A place where all my walls would be covered up somehow so that, in time, Chris would maybe just forget that they were there.

I could become like a master magician... hiding the Statue of Liberty by sheer illusion and trickery! Voila!

But God has been dreaming bigger dreams over me.

He wants to straight up JERICHO these walls I've built around my heart. He wants them to crumble into dust so fine that they blow away in a breeze. It's a painful thing to submit to... having all your barriers and 'security' taken away... but I'm trying to keep saying YES to Him because I know these old walls are protecting me from nothing but my own life. And healing love.

God has plans for my marriage to FLOURISH. He wants to see us merge and fall into one another and become strong. He wants to see us pool our hearts together and pour them out on the people He brings us into contact with. He wants to see us laugh and smile and play together and become aware of the power that He's given us as a team. He wants us to be fully known by each other... where there's no shame or fear or holding back, just as He knows and loves us.

One of the surprising ways that He has been slowly building this picture of what our marriage could be like is through giving us some opportunities recently to play music together. He has taken something that we both individually love and He has brought us together in it... showing us the joy and power that comes when we unite our voices and instruments for one purpose. We haven't really played music together like that for seven or eight years. There has been something so intimate about it. And the timing of it- the gentleness and sweetness of it, the FUN of it- they are unmistakeably the handiwork of God.

It has given us hope! It has reminded us that God KNOWS what we love and fights for those things. It has reminded me that God is not boring! He is the most exciting and creative thing in the universe... like Macgyver! Times infinity billion! He's like, "Hand me that broken girl and that humble boy, stat!" And he takes two seemingly damaged-beyond-repair things and makes something beautiful and surprising and confounding out of them.

He is so good!

My Child is Allergic to THE WORLD.

We just got back from the doctor's office. Myer had an allergy test today that ended up being completely overwhelming and all kinds of frustrating. I want to write all this down while it is fresh and so I can wrap my head around it all a bit more...

The test itself wasn't all that horrible, they did the 'scratch test', but the results were a bit hard to swallow.

He's allergic to every outdoor allergen- which means that all year around he's allergic to the WORLD.
He's allergic to dogs.
He's allergic to DUST MITES. The doctor told me that I should seriously consider pulling up the carpet in his room and putting down wood floors- as well as no curtains allowed, and every pillow or mattress in the room needs to be encased in (HELLO expensive) allergen covers. Also, I have to wash all the linens in his room (including Ezra's) in 150 degree water at least once a week.

He's allergic to wheat.
And eggs.
And peanuts.
And strawberries.
And probably more foods that they weren't able to test for.

His eczema is not getting any better and he needs breathing treatments and epi-pens and rescue inhalers on hand at all times for when he's wheezing.

They have to take a blood sample in the next couple of days to do more extensive testing and then we have to go back for something called a "Food Challenge" which sounds... about as fun as a nice dip in a shark pool.

On the way out, Myer was screeching and arching and they were asking me to fill out pages and pages of paper work and then the card was declined and I forgot my cell phone at home on the dresser and I just about LOST it. I think the receptionist had no idea what to do with me. haha I was such a disheveled mess at that point. I was simultaneously trying not to cry while writing a check and holding a screaming baby.

*deep breath*

Okay, so what do I need to focus on for the right-now?

I think my biggest challenge will be keeping Myer off of WHEAT for the next month or so until they do the blood draw/food challenge thing.

Do any of you or your kiddos have experience with a wheat allergy? WHAT THE HECK do you feed a child that contains no wheat besides fruits and veggies?

URG. Thanks for letting me vent. And for any advice you can give this floundering & stressed out mamma.

(I think I need a margarita. heh.)

You're about to get a Christmas Song stuck in your head.

Ezra lost his two front teeth last week.

And, BAM! Just like that, he suddenly seems waaaaay older to me.

Every time I look at his little face and see the big gaping hole where his teeth used to be, I feel complete shock. It's almost like those two teeth held the last remnants of his baby-hood inside of them.

The tooth fairy came and took away his chompers, just like the other two teeth he's lost before, but this time I felt a little sad. Because next comes Kindergarten and then Little League and then Prom and then he's only going to come visit me in the nursing home on Thursdays! And the Jell-o will be all melty! And the only one missing any teeth will be ME!

Okay, maybe I didn't freak out quite that much. But it is tripping me out to see my oldest get... older.

I really am looking forward to the age he's stepping into. In a couple of months, he'll be in school all day, and his days won't be quite so... glommed on to mine. Then I'll get to hear about his experiences and joys and hardships and watch the little boy I adore become more of a young man as he stretches against or embraces things with his own two (scrawny white) arms.

I have so much confidence in this boy. He's going to ROCK at life.

(PS. Does anyone know when the "losing teeth" stage ends? There is nothing that ooogs me out more than dangly, unbrushable tooth nubs. *shudder gag*)

Vitamin D & Me.

For the first time ever the sun has been drawing me out of doors instead of pushing me back inside. I HAVE NO IDEA WHO I AM ANYMORE. I have always been known for three things:

1. a hater of running
2. a hater of seafood
3. and a hater of sunshine.

I am typically a snow-lovin' girl and a rain-lovin' woman. Big storms make me feel like I can finally breathe and the moon has always been my orb of choice.

Who IS this me that is tending her flowers and setting up kiddie pools and slip & slides and smiling as she pulls on a tank top in the morning? Who IS this me that is digging through the cupboards for sunscreen and choosing (willingly!) to read her books out-of-doors?

I don't even know. It's like a parallel universe.

Up is down!

Left is right!

Emery is tan for the first time since 1994!

Crazy stuff I tell ya...