Hard to believe my baby is 4. He looks so much older to me. I’m pretty sure he shoots up at least a foot the month before each birthday. He’s so special and sweet (most of the time) I could just eat him up.

Here’s the cake. I think I’m getting better at this. Maybe…

When we were tossing around ideas for Memphis’s birthday cake, we mentioned making an airplane and Ezra insisted his cake be an airplane this year. He was so excited about it he stayed in the kitchen all day eating frosting with a spoon helping me.

Thank you to family for the sweet gifts. He LOVED them and was so excited about each one. Thank you for all of your support and love!

We enjoyed a sweet Valentine’s Day around here. I whipped up these peanut butter blossom cookies and used chocolate heart candies in place of kisses. (Dark for me. Milk for Brad.) Cute and fun. Plus, I’ve been on a diet for like EVER so it was nice to eat something other than fish and broccoli. I’ve decided that I need to create my own peanut butter cookie recipe. These were a little too sweet. But then again my taste could be skewed right now. Dirt would probably taste too sweet after being on a diet for so long. Once I perfect my recipe I’ll be sure to share. Of course cookies and weight loss don’t really jive so that won’t be happening until these blasted last few pounds come off. Diets make me miserable. Can you tell?

Brad surprised me with this necklace. I LOVE IT! He ordered it weeks ago and it’s been hiding in the  moving boxes in our living room all this time. Sneeky, sneeky.

These two are part of a series of 5 mix and match 8×10 prints from Little Sprout Creations. Available here.

Keep Calm and Love On by The Hands-On Housewife. Get it here.

This one is actually a card, but it would look sweet trimmed and framed. Available here.

If you’re feeling less than optimistic about the 14th, you can give this card instead. So funny.

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

I never tire of a good knitted pouf and these fruit and veggie knitted poufs by Anne-Claire Petit have such personality! They’re organic, too. Isn’t that clever? I like the apple the best. Second place goes to the lemon only because it might not be easily recognizable for what it is if it’s sitting there by itself. Any of these would look super cute in an eclectic style kid’s room.

Available here.

To say it’s been a mild winter would be putting it, well, mildly. It’s January and the Magnolias are already in full bloom. I look forward to this time every year. For just a couple of weeks everything is pink and pretty. I love it!

I know I’m a wuss when it comes to winter. I don’t like being cold. (Is there anyone that does?) But wintertime helps me appreciate the nice weather we enjoy here the majority of the year. To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven. (Ecclesiates 3:1) That being said, I’m especially thankful for how temperate this winter has been and consider it a special blessing to our little family. We put all of our things in storage when we moved out last summer. We don’t have any of our winter coats or our winter blankets. Right now we’re using an old quilt and this blanket I picked up at Ikea. We would normally be freezing in this old house, but we’ve been just fine. Just one more thing I’m thankful for.

You’ve met your end.

Yours was the fate of so many cosmetic items before you.

I can’t really say I’m sorry to see you go. As far as lipstick shades go, we just were never that good of a match.

The first is Lay Baby Lay. Joni has a great eye for design and puts together the most fantastic mood boards. She also shares the sources for her finds so you can easily recreate the look in your own home.

The second is The Boo and the Boy. Julia assembles really fun roundups of various kids’ room themes like loft beds, built in desks, eclectic decor, etc. The majority of the rooms featured have a Scandinavian design aesthetic – my fave.

Images via Lay Baby Lay, The Boo and the Boy,  and  paan architects – architonic

“Because 26.3 would be crazy!”

That’s what several of the signs said towards the end. The whole idea is certifiable if you ask me, but I did it. I ran my very first marathon!

Last November.

Here it is January and I’m just now blogging about it. I probably would have just let it go, but hardly a day goes by that Brad doesn’t give me a hard time about it. “You accomplished a HUGE goal!” he says. “You deserve to pat yourself on the back!”

He’s right. And I did pat myself on the back. I might not have talked a lot about it (I couldn’t. I just moaned in agony every time I moved), but I did wear my finishers medal around town for like a week. I let it do the talking for me.

We got back in town only a week before the race which means I trained for the whole thing on the road. Let me just say that I DO NOT recommend this! Traveling (especially with kids) is stressful enough on it’s own, but when you have to figure out where to get a 16 or 18 mile run in that just brings it to a whole new level. On the plus side, I trained in some incredibly beautiful places. I mean check this out:

Coincidentally, Dooce ran her first marathon the next day in New York. When I read about her experience I laughed so hard I cried. I felt the exact same way and spent the second half of the race debating which was more painful: the marathon or an unmedicated birth. The last 10 miles WOULD NOT END! I’m pretty sure I walked the last 6. Or crawled. I’m not sure. It was all a delirious, painful blur.

I sat next to a woman on the shuttle who had run 79 (!!!) marathons. She told me that once you cross that finish line you’ll know whether or not you’ll do it again.

Guess what. I’m going to do it again.

I’m crazy like that.

(BTW for those of you wondering, natural labor is FAR MORE PAINFUL, but the reward at the end is way better than any dinky little medal.)

We celebrated Memphis’s 1st birthday Monday. He received a lot of ball related presents, so I decided to run with the theme and make cake balls. (FYI cake balls are gross. At least to me. *Gag*)

Memphis, you have been an absolute joy and a blessing to our little family. Seriously. Sweetest. Baby. Ever. We love you!!

P.S. Thank you to family for sending the fun presents. They were a big hit!

Oh, and speaking of birthdays, this is how Brad celebrated his while at my mom’s house:

If any of you have dug through the archives recently you may have noticed some new posts sprinkled in throughout. That’s because I’ve been keeping a separate family blog for a few years now and I have recently decided to merge the two.

I’ve never really sat down and decided on a future for The Modern Home. We started it to blog about building our house, but didn’t plan beyond that. After giving it some thought I’ve decided I would like it to be not just about our house, but about our home. I’ll still be posting all the details of our house and other design related topics, but I’ll also be sharing more daily life/family stuff. Personal posts make it on this blog every once in a while there will just be more of them. Plus, I like to share things like recipes and random bits on our personal blog. Those will now be included on The Modern Home. So I guess you could call this more of a lifestyle blog or a nesting blog… or both… or something… I don’t know.

Anywho, if you’d like, you can click back through and see all of the old Young Love posts from our personal site. They’re labeled under life for now. I’ll try to be more specific at some point.