chasing the light

I was a grouchbutt yesterday evening.

We'd dropped off the boys at TKD and did some shopping.

I may have mentioned it a time or two,

but I really don't enjoy grocery shopping with my kids.

Frazzles me, actually.

It's not that they are bad, exactly,

but they slow me down.

And ask for things.

Or if they don't ask, they'll verbally 'drool' over things.

("oooh - look at the candy." lip smack. lip smack...)

Which, in my book, is equally annoying

and almost asking...

My Wednesday shopping is going okay, but it still ends up being kinda stressful, because

it's rush rush rush for a few hours

once I get home

to get everything in the house and put away, get the house picked up,

and get dinner fixed so we can sit down to eat at 5:30

so we can leave at 6 for 2:42 (our small group at church).

Plus, we've decided we need to tighten our belts a bit more

and it costs $10 in gas every time I go to town,

so if I skip that Wed. trip, and do my shopping on TKD days,

when I already have to go to town,

well, I have to shop with the girls

(gag)

but I save $520 a year...

So. I did some of the shopping last night.

And by the time we got back home

- without completing all of the shopping -

(plus - midcycle. enough said.)

I was as grouchy as Lex when she's hungry.

I started pulling out dinner fixin's and

happened to look out the LEM widow.

Oooh - Pretty!!

The silver building, the weathered wood, the blue door, the white tree ~ all of it was just glowing.

Especially the tree.

And I thought, "I wonder if the trees in the top field are glowing too?"

(Tyler had taken me up there on Sunday to see them all blooming)

I decided that dinner would just be late;

I needed to chase the light.

I left everything (including a burner on - oops!) 

grabbed my jacket and camera,

pulled on my boots

(Tyler surprised me with a pair of cute boots a few weeks ago :-)

invited the girls to come with me,

and booked it down the hill,

across the creek,

around the garden,

past the goat field (which has no goats, but is still called the goat field)

around the stately tree that never needs to be mowed around

up the little hill through the narrow mossy passageway

and found

that the sun was a little too low.

pooh.

BUT - there was still a bit of light on one tree.

(well, one blooming tree. and a few pines...)

72 pictures and about 15 minutes later,

we came inside.

All of us feeling much better.

(the pictures are all straight out of the camera (no editing)

you can really see the value of being in the light in the pictures of the girls.

Love me some golden light!!)

Smoky came with us. Jack and Lola did too, but every picture with them was a blur.

Lexi got cold, so Lily shared her coat.

my love left me some tall grass in the field :-) 

apple blossoms