It's Race Day!!!!

Today marks the 2nd year of the Joplin Memorial Race, and my 2nd year to participate, but this year, I will be running the half marathon. It sounds simple and grand, but I can't seem to wrap my mind around the fact that in less than a few hours, I will be attempting 13.1 miles, and my goal is to run it all. 

Last year, today, next year, and many more after that, I will still have the same reason I am running this race. I am running to honor all the victims that were killed, survived, and who are still picking up the pieces from the tornado 2 years ago. I am specifically running in honor of Lantz Hare, who lost his life that day. 

Last night my husband, Karson, and I went to dinner. I was especially excited about this meal, because the meal before race day is the most important to "carb up." Those who know me, know I eat pretty healthy for the most part, so give me those carbs! We sat down, and I stopped and listened with a smile on my face. At Lantz's funeral, they had a beautiful slide show of his life. A song in particular that stood out to me was now playing at this restaurant. I have NOT heard this song one time since that day. I thought, how ironic that we just got done driving the route I am taking, looking at the specific flag with his name on it, going to dinner to pre-celebrate, and there was this song. Needless to say, I shazamed it, and now have it on my iPod play list. I will proudly run with my Lantz tshirt on, Lisztomania playing on my iPod, and smile on my face. 

Lets do this!! Team Lantz!

Easter weekend!

We began our fun-filled weekend with visiting the bunny:) my husband and I were a bit skeptical on how this would go. He would either be scared (which I didn't think was possible considering he wanted chuckee from the cheese to pick him up) or he would head butt and pull the hair. To our surprise, he sat there with a confused look in his face. He did a little hair tugging at the paws, but no head butt, no ripping the ears off. We were relieved:)
We also made a cake. The little stinker somehow stole the cool whip off the counter and quietly consumed half, while standing under our counter. As we were frantically looking everywhere for it, I happened to peak under, and there he was, caught red handed!
We had a WONDERFUL church service and egg hunt at our house. Our first year to host Easter, and it was a success:)
Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!

It's just a test...

We serve an AMAZING, loving, forgiving, providing God. He has helped us in SO many ways these past few weeks, I want to take the time to share.

  A few weeks ago, Jamie found out that he was part of a cut back at work.  For those of you who believe our economy is on the mends, please take another look.  Instead of getting upset, crying, and feeling sorry for ourselves, I fell to my knees, and I prayed. I prayed that God help us get through this financially, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.  I prayed that HE lead us in the direction HE wants us to go, not the direction we want to go.  

  We talked about it and felt we should keep this private, between us and our parents of course, while he looked for another job.  Being a man, he felt like he let his family down, but in reality, I saw a man that would do anything to provide for his family.  He did odd jobs to make money, and worked over time in the home.  I began getting busier at work, previously things had slowed down for most everyone in my industry.  We cut things out of our budget but couldn't cut too much, because we already live within a budget. Life threw us a curve ball, but we took one day at a time. We had our health, our family, so what more could we possibly want.  We have a lot of friends going through more difficult times because of their health, a family members health, or their own child.  Thinking of what they must be going through, I thought how selfish of me to worry about financies when others are praying for a healthy life.
I continued to pray, specifically prayed for what direction The Lord wanted us to go.

This quote fit our situation...

He got a call for an interview with a company that he interviewed with a few years ago. It's a VERY good company with all the bells and whistles. My negative side thought, "it's too good to be true, he won't get it," BUT with tons of support from family and friends, I stayed positive. Two weeks of interviews, route runs, tests, waiting for references to fill out questions, waiting with stomach in knots...
HE GOT THE JOB!! 
I felt as though we needed to share our story, to show that God does work in our lives. He provided us with ALL our needs when we didn't think we could. He taught us patience (my biggest flaw). I decided that moment, four weeks ago, I would take a different approach to how I would handle the situation.  I'm glad I asked God to help us, because He kept our spirits high.
Thank you to our family and friends that we did tell, that supported us emotionally through this process.
"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me" Philippians 4:13

I am a VERY proud wife!

Play Date!!

We had SO much fun on our play date to House of Bounce on monday with our friends.  It only proved what I have noticed more and more lately, Karson is ALL boy. We need to work on the hair pulling and sharing, that is a FACT. Other than that, WHAT A BLAST;)

Then wed., we got to play with our cousin Zeppelin. Again, we need to work on being the "bully." Karson hasn't learned "gentle" and loves to pull hair and grab.

The REAL bday is here!!!

We started our day out by eating our favorite breakfast, scrambled eggs with cheese, but today is special, so mom and dad put a candle in them and sang Happy Birthday;)

Our Favorite Foods are: Eggs (of course), dog food (when momma isn't looking), applesauce, and really anything we can put in our mouths;)

We spent our day playing with our basketball and basket, he can put the ball through the hoop, then a fun-filled afternoon at Chuck E Cheese. Nana and Papa came, daddy, Landon, Heather, and Jagger.

Loved the cheese pizza, momma thinks it has improved over the years;)

Loved The Mouse!! And loves his best friend Jagger.

Hated the car ride, but momma and daddy thought it was a cute photo opp;)

BFF Jagger

Momma being silly!!

He even scored this awesome tshirt for his birthday!

Some of Karson's favorite things:
Mirrors, songs (specifically: Wagon Wheel, and Father Abraham), anything that makes noise, baths, throwing things, pulling hair, head butting;), hats, eating and playing with dirt, the dogs (they still don't like him), family, strangers (not sure how I feel about that one yet), going jogging with mom, and last but not least, ceiling fans!!


Hope you all enjoyed sharing in our birthday fun! Now it's getting closer to bedtime!!! ;)

Our Little Monster is 1!!!!

Yesterday was our "Lil Monster" Party, and I couldn't have asked for it to be any more perfect. Everyone enjoyed themselves, including adults. I feel like all the hard work paid off, every time I saw that smile on Karson's face.  We started the day with "a plan" that didn't go according to... of course!!  I was busy decorating and running around getting our last minute chores done (with lots of help from some good friends) while Jamie and our little friend Hannah were in charge of wearing him out and putting him down for a nap by 10:30am, hoping for a good 2 hour nap. 45 minutes later, he was ready to party, but just a little on the cranky side;)  He quickly snapped out of it and ran around greeting guests and eating food;)

 I know I sound like a broken record, but they grow SO fast! I can't believe my little guy will be one in a few days. I kept it together, except a few teary eyed moments, when I would get caught up in "last year at this time we were waiting to meet the little guy, and how he has made our lives so much better." Watching him run around and have fun with his little friends was another teary moment. So enough of that...


Here are some pictures from his party, hope you enjoy;)

Karson trying on his monster mask a few days before the event;)

Our photographer does AMAZING work.

His invitations

We had the time as 1:09 pm, the time he was born.

Our photo book that we had all the guests sign

This is our favorite book, so I had this put on the back of the photo book/guestbook

All kid's got to adopt a monster and name them;)

The centerpieces for the tables 

The kids got lots of monster suckers!!

And monster duckies

The kids table was covered in paper so they could color, use monster stickers, and just have fun;)

We had cookies, cupcakes, and Karson had his own little cake.

The food turned out PERFECT, thank you to Mohaska Farmhouse!

Everything had googly eyes galore!!!

We offered monster cookies and cupcakes

Monster cupcakes

We had several of Karson's baby cousins and friends join and wanted them to eat, so we offered bananas and apples of course!!

The BEST monster sandwiches EVER!!

Our fruit monster that I think two of the Johnson men enjoyed;)

Karson's cake, he loved playing with the icing.

After a fun filled day of cake, meatballs, playing, and TONS of gifts, Nana and Papa took him home for a two hour much needed nap, while mom and dad helped pack up the party.  Kids and Adults left, hopefully with bellies full, and all kinds of party favors (monster duckies, suckers, lil monsters, and stickers). One thing I did learn, kid parties can be out of control, and I needed a nap!!;)

Thank you to everyone who came and celebrated Karson's first birthday, and thank you Mohaska Farmhouse for the AMAZING food and service! We HIGHLY recommend them. We hope everyone enjoyed themselves, and we are so blessed to have such a HUGE family that loves our little boy as much as we do.

Easy Applesauce Recipe

One thing that I LOVE doing, is making all of Karson's baby food. Not only is it healthy, and WAY cheaper, it's SO easy!!! Since he has graduated to small bite size foods, I no longer get to make baby food, except his applesauce;)

I make a big batch, so I start out with 10-12 apples. I buy all different varieties to make it taste better.
I also freeze individual servings in an ice cube tray that you can pick up for cheap at any grocery store, that way it doesn't go bad, and we can pop a couple cubes right out of the freezer.

You need a peeler, apple core remover, cinnamon (optional), lemon juice, and a crockpot.

Cut and core all the apples, throw them into the crockpot, add cinnamon, and a little bit of lemon juice.

Cook on low for 6-8 hours, no water needed, stirring occasionally. Yep, its that easy!! Makes the house smell wonderful as well. This recipe is one of my husband and son's favorite;)

ENJOY!!!!!!