Life is what you make it.... Or is it?

Lately things have been a little stressful around here. I still don't have a job and I STILL live out in the country in the Shuler compound. I've been focusing so much on applying for jobs and trying to get interviews that it has consumed me. I've also been focusing on this human being growing inside me and I wonder what it's going to be like when she is born. Will I be a good mom? Will we be able to provide her a room of her own one day? Will I be able to handle my world being completely being turned upside down? Will my house ever be finished? Will I ever be happy out here in the country? So many questions.. yet so few answers.

Sometimes I feel like I'm losing sight of this person I know myself to be. My world has already been turned upside down living here in the country. I NEVER in a million years dreamed I would be living out here with the scorpions and critters and 14 miles to the nearest grocery store. Everything is the opposite of what I wanted or envisioned for myself. I chose this man I love (or rather God chose him for me) and he came with a tractor, land, a family only .2 miles away from us. And I'm still figuring out how to be married and to fit in and deal with a life I never got to choose for myself. I know I could have chosen not to marry him, but I couldn't see my life without him. So really I had no choice.

I've been stressing about having no choice but to live out here with all of his family and never-ending projects they have and it has made me a little bitter. And my bitterness has turned to rage and my rage has turned to tears. And I struggle with this non-choice and with my life the way it has turned out. One time driving back into town from being gone for a weekend, I actually cried my eyes out when I saw the green sign reminding me I'm back in this town. I yelled out to God, "Is this REALLY MY LIFE?!"

People say that life is what you make of it. Sometimes I think life is NOT what you make of it. Life happens. Life is.....I know you have to make your choices, but what about the choices that make you or you never got to make? What about the choices you have tried to make and then realized God has made them for you??

What if we always spend so much time trying to make life happen and we miss out on the pain and the beauty and the lessons we learn along the way? I've been so focused on my sadness, loneliness, bitterness, and finding a job, that I can't see anything else. I'm so focused on my future that I can't look at the present and realize that every day is a gift.

But I do look forward to the day where I can look back at all this and say, "Remember when I was so miserable that I almost missed out on that really awesome thing that happened?!"

House Update and Big News

It's been forever since I've posted anything on here. I'm not sure anyone is out there and listening to what is going on the Shuler house. BUT, it's fun to post on here nevertheless. :) I've been finding myself with quite a bit of free time lately. I lost my job a few weeks ago. My company cut the marketing department (which was just me.). I had a feeling that something was going on and they were struggling financially, but I just thought I would have more time to find something else. It came as quite a bit of a shock to me. But all things happen for a reason and I have faith that there is an even better job out there for me. 

We haven't worked much on the house lately. The only thing we have done recently is varnish the cabinets for a second time.  Oh, and we also got more doors made and had our blacksplash installed. It turned out really well! Here are a few pics.

The Big News is that we are expecting! Our baby is due March 13th and we couldn't be happier! We are scared and excited at the same time. Luna is excited to have a big brother or sister. We find out the sex of the baby Oct. 14th. We are counting down the days! 

 

feeling blue

 

Lately there have been a lot of things happen that have led to the current subject line. Life in the country is hard sometimes really, really hard. I don't think it all started with finding scorpions, but it definitely didn't help.

It's an accumulation of seeing many sad things and seeing death in nature. And I think my hormones have something to do with it..ha!

Nature is so beautiful, but it's also beautifully cruel. One must die so another can live. The scorpions kill the spiders, the spiders kill the insects.. The yellow jackets who have built several nests on our house lately eat the spiders and insects too, I think.. They also drink the nectar of flowers.. But where is the beauty in what I just described?

Speaking of nectar and beauty, I have to mention the hummingbird. The hummingbirds are so beautiful and lately I've been obsessed with them. We have had 3 die at our house since we have been feeding them. They are so delicate and so beautiful. I have moved my feeders three times because I've seen 2 fly into the big, glass windows at my house and die. I've also witnessed the near death experience of one who was stunned and then after 20 minutes of regaining composure, he flew away and I breathed a big heavy sigh of relief.

The other one I found just today and his head was missing.. I think the weapon that killed him was not our window, but instead big claws and paws of a feline species. Maybe I won't get an outdoor cat after all..

Last week I found a dead fawn in a 4-foot hole that was dug to put in a fence post that was never put in. I just cried and cried and cried and cried.. A deep sadness set in my bones and I just couldn't shake the gloominess. My empathy had crossed the line of maybe the point of no return because I just could not stop the tears.. and it poured over into many areas of my life. I wasn't happy with my secluded life in the country.

I felt like that deer, trapped and stuck and couldn't find my way out.  Then the guilt game started and I wondered why I couldn't have found it sooner and I might have saved it from it's ruthless demise. But I was too late and I was too late.. Where was the redemption? Where was the beauty in that?

Then I thought about the dead hummingbird. I was/am desperately trying to find my happiness here in the country, and then as soon as I saw a blaze of vivid beauty and hope burning bright, it fluttered, flickered and died.

Where is the peace when the mind is filled with dreary things?

Tradegy of letting sleeping dogs lie

It’s justified to feel.. feeling so freely

Every image, word, and thought pricks so deeply.

Careless, cutting thoughts and words takes a toll.

Eyes wide open and stinging…

it’s so painful to live this way

Moved by everything…

Shaken by everything

The tragedy of letting sleeping dogs lie..

You aren’t one to let things by

Up until the final breath

You will fight hard and long for its plight

Because you must..

You must fight for all the unjust

And it’s okay to live this way

Moved by everything

Shaken by everything

I’ve been in your shoes

Loved with those bones..

Believed with those unbelieving eyes

Took some deep, heavy sighs…

Obsessing with life, tragedy and beauty..

Don’t be ashamed..

Make no excuses, no regrets

It’s big and bold and strong, giving life to those beautiful bones

Hope springs forth from the silence it brings

Perched gently on the tips of butterfly wings.

Rain, Rain come again some other day...

As much as we need the rain, we have literally been stuck at our house not being able to do anything. All the work we wanted to do on our house was to be done outside. We were planning to put in the rock base to make our driveway. Every time we plan to put in the driveway, it has rained or something has prevented us from doing it. That's life though! 

We have recently put a coat of varnish on our cabinets and have installed three cabinet doors. At least that is some progress. 

So this weekend we went to see The Great Gatsby. The movie was good, but the book is better. That is by far my favorite book, ever. If you haven't read it, you are doing yourself a big disservice. This is one of the greatest pieces of literary fiction ever written. Fitzgerald is amazing the way he beautifully crafts his words; it is pure art and beauty. 

 As I sit and write down this blog post, it is raining again. But  just maybe we needed a weekend to just relax and enjoy the beauty out in our secluded neck of the woods...

The muddy road that leads to our house

Sudan hay that Micah and his brother planted

We have 2 cabinet doors!

Hail storm we had a couple of weeks ago

New Bed/furniture

Here is the newest furniture we have added to our house! We bought it at Copenhagen. That place is a modern lover's dream. If you are into modern furniture, you will love this store.

Micah has been complaining that his back hurts and he isn't getting good sleep. So we decided to bite the bullet and get a new bed frame for his California King mattress he had in storage.

It's a sleep number bed and I was really surprised that it's just a glorified air mattress! Each side is adjustable and you can make it as firm or as soft as you prefer.

It's higher than it looks in the pictures, even though it is a low bed.

New bed

Modern bed

Even Luna B loves it!

New Bar stools from Copenhagen

Summer's "not so" famous protein pancakes

Because I've been somewhat of a health nut these past couple of years, I'd like to share with you an awesome recipe I've developed for one of my favorite breakfast foods - pancakes!! Who doesn't love pancakes??!! If you don't love pancakes, get the heck outta here!! :) The big problem with pancakes in the carb content and the sugary syrup added on top.

One big health tip I've discovered in all my health and nutrition reading is that sugar is the enemy and fat doesn't make you fat. Sugar makes you fat. Sugar is stored in your body and fat is usually in the form of protein and that doesn't store on our bodies. It's crazy how many people still look for low fat foods thinking they are doing something good for their health. Actually, most low fat foods have added sugars to make up for it. Ludicrous!!

I found a recipe for protein pancakes and I've modified and experimented with it and make up my own concoction of goodness. The consistency is a little different than most pancakes; however, it is almost just as good!

The recipe:
2 eggs
1 scoop Vanilla Whey protein powder
2 TB coconut flour
1 TB baking powder
2 TB xylitol
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup milk
sprinkle of mini chocolate chips (if desired) 

Mix all ingredients together in a medium mixing bowl. The batter will be slightly thicker than most pancake batters so take some time to flip over the pancake once you pour on the griddle.
The hardest part of this is the flipping part since they are thicker than normal.

Recipe yields 4 large pancakes.

I hope you enjoy these healthier, low carb pancakes as much as I do!!!

Goodbye to apartment life!

We moved in the week of my birthday; feb 12!

This is the day we have waited for - to move in to our home in Center Point. We had some complications that prevented us from moving in sooner, but we prevailed. We also were visited by a nasty scorpion on our inaugural night! ugh! But we also prevailed from that too. 

When you are taking on a big project like building your home, there will always be issues and big bumps in the road.

I became aware of our first big bump after the toilet would not flush. Micah had just left for work and I was getting ready for work.

I will spare you the dirty deats, but let's just say that sometimes crap happens and it happens to everyone!

We found out that when they poured the slab, someone drove a wooden stake through our water pipe and didn't say anything about it. We found this out by calling a plumber over with a camera to find the blockage in our pipe.

We rented a tool to blast through the rock and climbed underneath to fix the broken pipe.Actually, my brother in law Chris did this for us; we are so grateful!  Here was the evidence above.

Fast forward 3 weeks later and we have been able to flush and have overcome our dirty debacle. Here are some updated bathroom pics.

Micah designed this mirror himself. So as you can see, I'm not the only one in the family who is a creative genius! haha! I love our bathroom and the way it has turned out. The bowl sinks tend to get a little messy and the water splashes out quite easily. So if you want to minimize the hard water stains, you have to be careful. I'm not that good at being careful.. but I'm learning. I also found the best cleaning product for these stains: vinegar and water!!! It works better than CLR and doesn't have all the obnoxious fumes!

Here is where we put our bed. We plan on getting a partition to divide the space and so we don't have to make our bed everyday! ha!!

I will post more pictures later!! Happy Friday everyone!

It's been a while

So it's been a while since I've shown pictures of the house. We have made quite a bit of progress on the inside with the cabinets, trim work, bathroom tile, flooring, and painting.

We moved out of our apartment at the end of December and moved into Micah's parents until it's more livable. That entails getting the flooring finished, which is almost done, and getting our shower door installed. That will be finished next week.

There has been so much happen these past few weeks. 1. Moving out. 2. Moving into the country. 3. Missing the city. 4. Missing my Luna B. who is currently staying with my parents until we can move her into our house. 5. Having my whole world turned upside down.

That is all.

I know this will all be worth it once we move in and have a home of our own. But until then, it's tough.