All little girls need kitchens! (and camo?)

Oh my have play kitchens come a long way... it brings to mind an old story told time and time again about little miss j's lack of imagination. haha, very funny guys. The story goes that my mom worked many tedious hours designing, constructing, and then adding an artiste's details so she could give her little girl a play kitchen. Made out of state-of-art cardboard boxes, she made a refrigerator, oven, and kitchen island and then filled it with tons of stuff (food, tools, not to mention oven mitts, and hand-made towels) and what did this sweet little toddler do? I asked what it was and what I do with it... nice! Okay, so my imagination hasn't changed a whole lot, I would much rather read a book (still true) than "play" with barbies, though the occassional barbie dress-up for the formal or conference (haha!) was okay. This all sounds a little familiar... someone else in our house is a book-a-holic... But this momma found a steal-of-a-deal on a kitchen, fridge, shopping cart + accessories! Check out the loot! So, I hope this soon-to-be 2-yr old will like it and not ask me "what do I do with it?!"

My reward for going out g-saling on Wednesday (really I was out getting some diapers and just happened to see the sign)...







Details, oh the details... and check out those oven mitts, apron, and chef's hat (I'm restraining myself from giving it to her early so "we" can play... okay, "me"!






Check out this food-- the wooden stuff can be "cut" by the awesome invention of velcro-- too cute! And name your toppings on the pizza; they are on there with velcro too. They threw in some other tupperware toy stuff and cheapy plastic foods and utensils, etc. but it all so darn cute!




Oh, what a fun metal shopping cart-- it looks sooo real! And it's stuffed with the last of the accessories, food, utensils, tupperware, etc.
I hope she loves it as much as I do!

Now, I'm just looking for a few other things (or how-to's for daddy to make) and we'll have our own little "world" downstairs. G-dad reed, we're working on the hunting lodge and camo... LOL, that's the thing, we don't have our basement finished (might be able to this winter) so where is it going to go... as you can see it's on the unfinished basement floor now so maybe some carpet scraps and it will be okay.

I'm becoming...

A Bradley childbirth instructor/doula!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And even better... I'm going to the training conference right here in Wichita (makes it all possible because I can stay in my own bed, eat my own food, and be close to my daughter/family-- all for FREE! so I only had to come up with the valuable yet expensive conference fees and I'm pinching a few pennies for the great resources...)

I'm so excited I can't really put it into words... actually I have wanted to do this since the 1st day of our Bradley class when we arrived and our instructor had just had her 8th baby (3 days before!) I was shocked (I still had a lot of learning to do about natural childbirth) and I thought, wow! if she can do that, this natural childbirth thing is for me. Carl would tell you that our instructor was "too" informative but not me, I was SOAKING. IT. UP! I couldn't get enough info, videos, testimonies, websites, articles, exercises, you name it! I was bringing this baby into the world NATURALLY-- and until now I couldn't really explain to you why I felt sooo strongly about it besides the fact that it just felt "right". But now I know.

I have been swirling around in my own insane asylum aka my head trying to figure out what God's will for me is... what do you want me to do? what is my purpose on this earth? And I wish I could say it just hit me and now I "KNOW" but I can't... BUT I do trust I'm headed in the right direction with this Bradley thing... The other day I had an enlightening, tear-spilling episode while I was reading the most amazing book-- well, actually only the first chapter entitled Why I teach natural childbirth. And it hit me... God was literally writing the words as I read them. Every page or so is soaked with His Word and everything I was reading was so real for me. I just started crying... this is it, I've been trying to find a balance between learning more about YOU while providing for my husband and my family (without going out to join the rat race which I despise and You know this)-- I can interweave YOU into this... into all of this... into the daycare, into the Bradley education and doula service, YOU are the reason natural feels so right, because you are the Creator of Nature. Seems so simple but so me. Thank you for opening my eyes and giving such peace...
~Your daughter in Christ
Janine Claire Reed Heincker

Sighting....

KU Hawk-bunny....

MY HAIR....

This is what I liked....











THIS IS NOT SO MUCH!