i wanted the shock and awe one

+ moms'* afternoon out. My closest friends and I--we've decided that we could write our own Army Wives book based totally on fact and it would still be a hot seller--went to see "Moms' Night Out" at the on-post theater. Our tickets were $1 each and the national anthem played before the screening, complete with patriotic images and footage. I'm not sure which version we watched, but I know some of us wanted to see the "Shock and Awe" version.

"Moms' Night Out" was both funny and sometimes too realistic to actually be relaxing for me, but I appreciated the fact that it's a faith-based film.

+ independence day. We celebrated Independence Day with a last-minute cookout and ended the day watching fireworks from a friend's balcony. The conversation and time together was a better end to the day than the actual displays.

+ yet = still and other PA Dutchisms. My friend told me that my oldest goddaughter recently said, "It is really hot yet." I'm super proud. Also, she brought to my attention that I have a habit of asking my dogs, "Must you go out/potty?" I didn't realize it but it's pretty much the only sentence I use when I ask my dogs if they have to go outside and I'm pretty sure it's a Dutchism.

+ meal-sharing. A month or two (or more, who knows) ago, two friends and I decided to get together to cook for the week, because two of us typically end up cooking one big pot of soup and eating it for the week. And that gets boring. But it's also a pain to come up with meal plans when I'm only cooking for myself and I'm trying to save money. Hence, getting together to cook and then swap food. The first time we got together, we ended up making three pots of soup. This time, we made two soups, macaroni and cheese, and sloppy joes, three of which came from the Daniel Plan cookbook (one of our friends is starting the Daniel Plan).

+ blogging + life. Part of me was surprised to see that I haven't blogged since January and the other part of me doesn't even remember what I've been up to, aside from volunteering, classes, practicum, internships, home life group, church, and attempting to keep up some semblance of a social life. For a while, I was also getting up at 5 a.m. to go running during PT hours, but that's when the temps were in the 30s. Now that the day gets hotter faster, I don't have time to shower in between running and getting to my internship site (but I'm working on that). R&R also came and went somewhere along the line, though I intentionally didn't write about that for OPSEC reasons (but I plan to). And I went back to PA for a few days to visit family and we went to Walt Disney World.

*because we're all at various stages of momhood.