Reflections on the Royal Wedding

Nathan and I just finished watching a recording of the Royal Wedding, and here are some of my thoughts:

• The shot of the cathedral from the ceiling just after Kate processed down to the front was spectacular. So grand.
• I suppose I won't be able to publish this post unless I say something about the dress: loved it. My favorite part was the bodice; I totally would have worn that, myself. In fact, I nearly bought a gown with long sleeves. The lace was lovely, especially at the neckline. And I thought the delicacy of her veil was very becoming and romantic, too.
  
• As soon as the congregation began singing the first hymn, I thought, "Oh my gosh, this is just like church!" And from then on, I really loved it. I don't know why, but I just expected it to be a more secular wedding, and I was so pleased that it was not. I think I also connected so much at that point because they were singing a hymn that we often sang at Park Street, and I suppose I just felt the connection to the greater Church while singing one of the great hymns of the faith.
  
• I thought that the bishops who officiated the ceremony did a wonderful job, and I enjoyed listening to what they said. I especially liked how they blessed William and Catherine's future children, publicly and before they were born.
• Nathan and I both thought that the music was impeccable. The choirs, the selections, the trumpets, all of it!
  

As it ended, we both kept commenting what a great wedding it was. Not just because of the fantastic pageantry, but also because it honored God.

He is Risen!

He is risen, indeed!

He was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.
Isaiah 53:5

"Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"
John 1:29

Happy Easter, friends.
The Lord bless you and keep you;
the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
the Lord make his face turn toward you and give you peace.
Numbers 6:24-26

Goodbye Forever, Mickey D.

A few weeks ago, Nathan, the kids, and I were running some errands after spending the morning in the garden, explaining what seeds are to Noah. Since it was lunchtime and there was a McDonald's handy, we drove through and picked up some food. Now, we haven't been to McDonald's in forever--we generally do Chick fil A or Wendy's when it comes to fast food. So as we were continuing on our way, eating our burgers and chicken nuggets in the car, Nathan said,

"Wow. This is a terrible burger. I mean, these are really bad."

And I looked at my burger and knew just how very right he was.

Right about that time, Noah piped up from the back seat and said, "Look, Mommy! A chicken seed!"

What? I thought, in confusion. Then, WHAT?! Sure enough, he had found a sliver of chicken bone in his chicken nugget.

Yeah, we won't be going back to McDonald's any time soon. Gross!

Garden Update

Here's our garden as of today! Hasn't it grown?

Our very first bell pepper is beginning to grow. Nifty!

Those heart shaped leaves are my yellow wax beans. The tall stalk is a potato plant, which I did not realize would grow so tall. If I had known, I would have planted my chives and green onions elsewhere, since they're being shaded.

By the way, potato plants are surprisingly attractive, I think, though this picture doesn't really show it.

We annexed another portion of the overgrown flower bed so that we could plant some zucchini, carrots, and more cherry tomatoes. Hooray! I'm so glad we were able to find a place for some zucchini.

In fact, we just stuck a couple in some other overgrown beds, because we had some extra seedlings, and I couldn't bear to just throw them away. And, as Nathan put it, "I'd rather have wild zucchini growing than poison ivy."

Our neighbor had too many cucumber seedlings, so he gave us one, and we planted it in the same overgrown bed. We weren't going to turn down some free cucumber, you know?
If you look closely, you'll see two yellow wax bean plants growing at the base of the trellis.

The very first tomato that appeared on our plants was also the first to begin to turn red. So exciting! This is a picture of it yesterday.

And this is a picture of it today!
The first tomato of our summer harvest!
Hooray!

A Good Baguette

When I returned to the kitchen after a few minutes to continue unloading the groceries, I found this:
It cracks me up that it's about 2/3 of his height.

Who can resist a good baguette, after all?

Blue Bell Fun Run

When I first decided to sign up for a 5K to motivate myself to run, I originally went to Uncle Steve's website, CenTexRuns.com (Central Texas Runs), and found the Blue Bell Fun Run. At around three months away, I figured it'd give me time to work up to the distance I needed. And when I asked Nathan if it was one he'd like to run, we both agreed that there's really no better motivation than ice cream at the end of the race.

At the Bearathon, which was a flat course, I had a time of 34:37. At the Blue Bell Fun Run, which was fairly hilly (and so much harder because of it!), I improved my time to 31:49. Sweet! Really, if I can consistently get my time under 30 minutes, I'd be content. Nathan came in 67th out of the nearly 1700 runners and 13th in his age group with a time of 23:43. Yeah, and how long has he been training for it? About three weeks. Nerd. I've never known him to be out of shape, no matter how long he goes without working out. He has also pretty much been the same weight since we met in college, no matter how he eats. He is a freak of nature.

The next race we sign up for will probably be in June, and it has a 1K for kids--perfect for Noah!

And here's our "Team Benesh" muscle picture, which is now tradition.(Aunt Jennifer's sister ran the race, too; this was at her house in Brenham.)

My First 5K!

So a couple of weeks ago, I ran my first 5K.

It was part of the Baylor Bearathon, which includes a half marathon (reputed to be the toughest in Texas because of the hills) and a 5K. I didn't expect to run the whole thing, because I hadn't worked up to 3.1 miles yet--my goal was to be able to run that distance at my next 5K, which is coming up soon. But I decided to run this one, even though I knew I'd have to walk part of it, because Nathan's brother, Matthew, was planning on running the half marathon, and since he and his wife were in town from England, I thought it'd be a fun thing to participate, too. Nathan's brother, Andrew, and sister, Deborah, ended up signing up, too, as well as Nathan's Uncle Steve and Aunt Jennifer. It was practically a Benesh reunion!

Here are most of us after we had all finished the 5K:
Aunt Jennifer, Uncle Steve, Deb, Andrew, and me.

This picture was taken while Matthew was still running, which explains why he's not in it.

And here he is crossing the finish line. He looks pretty good for having just run 13.1 hilly miles!

I was pretty pleased with how I did--after checking on Google Earth, I figured out that I only walked .15 miles of the 3.1, which is better than I'd ever done before. My time wasn't impressive by anyone's standard, really (about 11 min./mile), but my goal was just to run as much of the distance as I could, and I did that. For my next race, I'll want to run the entire thing and better my time, but for the Bearathon, I was pleased.

I think that the fun atmosphere motivated me, too. Never having participated in a race before, I didn't know how just plain fun it was! I mentioned that to Deb, who reminded me that Uncle Steve says that, in his opinion, "the race is the reward" for the training. Steve and Jennifer run a 5K or a 10K every weekend, so I guess he should know. :) (When they became empty nesters, they made a pact. They'd each do something the other wanted: he joined the church choir for her, and she started running races with him.)

It was a really fun time, and my favorite thing to come out of it might be that first picture. Ha!

This and That

• Today, while I was perusing something five feet away from Jane at Wal-Mart, she got my phone and three-way called my mom in Houston and my sister-in-law in Atlanta on speaker phone. I didn't even realize what was going on for a good two minutes (neither did they). When I finally picked up the phone, I said, "Who is this?" and one of them responded, "It's Mom and Meredith." We all cracked up. I don't even know how to make a three-way call, yet my one year old does. She also set my phone alarm yesterday.
• Noah's potty training is still a work in progress. Oh my gosh, y'all, it is so hard. I got so frustrated and felt some parenting failure yesterday. Nathan and I are trying to force the issue, so I put Noah in underwear for the day, even though we had errands to run. It was a good thing I packed two changes of clothes for him, because we needed both. Ugh. First, he peed at the gym--just a little bit, and it didn't make a big mess. So we went and sat on the potty and changed his clothes. Then, we made a deal at the grocery store. If he got through the whole store and was still dry, he could have a pack of the Veggie Tales fruit snacks that he was begging for. However, we were literally walking to check out when I noticed his pants were wet. Argh! When I asked him why he didn't tell me he needed to go so we could use the store potty, he said, "Because I didn't want to." And then, THEN, not five minutes after his last accident, he peed so much that he left a puddle in the checkout line. When I saw it happening, I ran over to him and said, "Noah! Oh no, Noah! Stop! Hold it in!" Did he hold it in? No. He let it alllll out. Here's my theory: He is completely capable of going to the potty when he needs to go. But he is being completely willful. This has become a battle of the wills. Fun times, I'm telling you.
  
• I counted, and as of today, we have about 75 tomatoes growing on our seven plants. Of course, 40 of them are on our one cherry tomato plant. Even so, I'm still pleased. We may be having lots of caprese salads and making/freezing lots of tomato sauce this summer. I also have plans to plant two more cherry tomato plant seedlings. One is my green & orange striped heirloom variety. I hope it grows well!
• So Janey Beth is a climber. The pediatrician said that of the children she sees who are climbers, the great majority are boys. Noah was not a climber, though. Jane climbs up on the dining room table daily now. Today, she climbed up there while wearing a sleep sack. She scares me!
  
• Noah loves the movie "How to Train Your Dragon," and the other day, as we were getting out of the car in a parking lot that was near a freeway, he stopped walking and said, "Mommy, I hear a dragon. . . . Oh, he went away. . . . Oh, I hear him again! He's coming back!" Cute. His imagination is blooming, and it's really fun to watch.
  
• The other day, Jane ate a whole slice of Papa John's pizza. Oh my.
• Various things on the floor at my house: 1.) Little boy underwear--several pairs. They end up everywhere. 2.) Toys, toys, toys. Noah has been dumping out baskets of toys and then walking away. 3.) The contents of a lavender dryer bag. I guess it's not a bad thing to have pieces of lavender in your carpet, but I do need to get over there and vacuum it up. 4.) Random, mate-less socks. If a sock drawer is not closed completely (ahem, Nathan), one of our cats, Livvy, will often get one sock and carry it with her around the house.
  

My Little Garden Girl

Sweet girl loves to stand next to the spigot for several minutes at a time and play with the water. It's very cute to watch. If I can get the video to upload, I'll post it.

Banana Cinnamon Bread

The other day, I decided to make up a recipe for a banana yeast bread. I combined a couple of recipes I had, tried a couple of versions, and ended up discovering that there's nothing you can do to make banana yeast bread (which is less banana-y than banana quick bread) have a more pronounced banana flavor. It's not like a citrus bread, where you can add some zest. What I found out was that when you add more banana, which is a wet ingredient, you have to compensate by then adding more flour to keep the dough from being too wet.

Anyway, this is what I came up with. In the end, we decided it was pleasant, but not extra special. I'm posting it here, anyway, because I invent precious few recipes, and I figured it ought to be here just for that reason alone. :)

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Banana Cinnamon Bread

1-1/8 cup water
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 tablespoon honey
1-1/2 ripe medium to large bananas, in chunks
2-1/2 cups bread flour
1-1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup dry milk
2 tablespoons flax seed meal
1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1-1/4 tablespoon gluten
1-1/4 teaspoon salt
2-1/4 teaspoons yeast

Place all ingredients in bread maker, set to Wheat cycle, and hit Start. Enjoy!

Picture Perfect

What does it say about me that when I saw the Google Earth camera car driving down my street, my instinct was to hide behind my car not because of privacy issues but because I'm having a bad hair day?