Where Did the Summer Go?

Chad is at school right now. It is his first day of classes for the fall semester and I can't believe our summer has ended. We have been blessed to have had a great summer filled with so many memories and awesome experiences! I am not looking forward to loosing my husband (or so it will seem for the next however many months) since Chad will be working full-time AND taking 16 credits in school. How blessed am I with such a hard working husband? I am so thankful for his hard work especially when I realize he is doing it to bless us and our future family. Did I mention he is holding like a 3.8 GPA all the while? Amazing I tell you... not to mention he is a cutie too!

The up-side of the fall schedule starting is that our life will be more normal. It is crazy to think that I can get to a point where I crave some regularity in my day-to-day life. I am excited to get organized (I am talking literally organizing my house... I am probably half way through going through everything and organizing and tossing what we never use... feels good to simplify!) and I am excited to have more time to work on the things I need to be busy with.

For any of you who don't already know, I now own my own business called Letter Lace. I am your one-stop source for all things announcements! Baby, graduation, wedding, holiday, special events... you name it. I have been official since the beginning of summer but with everything we have been up to I haven't advertised or gotten my website up and running. Everything I have done so far has been word of mouth, which is great, but I am excited to have more time to devote to building my business and being a bigger helper with our monthly income. This is an exciting and daunting task all at the same time.

To kind of celebrate (or not...) back to school time we invited our friends Debbie and Eric over for a little BBQ yesterday evening. We usually invite more over but since they have been nice enough to share so many yummy things from their garden lately we thought we would invite them to share with them the yummy ways we have been enjoying some of the goodies along with a few other things we could enjoy. Chad grilled us some bratwurst and italian sausage burgers (Johnsonville just came out with burger patties made out of their bratwurst and italian sausage meat and let me tell you... delish!) along with some yellow squash, zucchini and honey & balsamic carrots. The squash and zucchini were both from Debbie's garden and I coated them with olive oil and italian breadcrumbs before Chad tossed them on the grill... my new favorite way to eat them by far! The carrots were from Chad's parents garden and we steamed them a bit before Chad threw them on the grill and brushed on a mixture of honey mixed with balsamic vinegar... one of our new favorites of the summer. Debbie and Eric brought dessert which was amazing. Chocolate zucchini cake with walnuts and chocolate chips. I went back for a healthy (or unhealthy I suppose) helping of seconds for the cake. So moist! Perfect topped with cool whip.

We will still enjoy ourselves with special occasions from time to time but for now we will have to get used to a simpler life for awhile. Whenever we get burnt out we will have to think back to our busy summer and be thankful for the blessings of all our activities.

"Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work and wholesome recreational activities." -The Family: A Proclamation to the World