Memorial Day Weekend

Maybe the biggest news ever

I know I already posted once today but I had to tell y'all some big news.

EMMY AND ETHAN ARE GETTING MARRIED

The end.

When cabin fever sets in...

I'm so glad they can entertain each other. I kept asking Charlie, "Where are you?" because Ty has called the cabinet his 'office' and he 'goes to work' in it and hearing Charlie say that is hilarious. Well, to me, anyway. I'm sorry she wouldn't say it because there's something universally funny about Charlie going to work since we all know about her work ethic.

Another first

It was love at first bite.

Mommy's Cancation

I'm home.

I'll be honest I wasn't fully ready to be here until about an hour before I made it home. Once I switched over to fully missing it, though, I couldn't get here fast enough.

Weird how being out of the routine and feeling "free" from responsibility doesn't satisfy as much as you'd (I'd) think it would. I craved free time to see a movie, (which I did do-Letters to Juliet-a sweet very pretty movie) eat an uninterrupted meal, (which I did multiple times,) and sleep late, (until 8,) and fulfilled all of my desires in two days. Two days.

If you'd have asked me exactly a week ago how long I'd have thought it would take to feel rejuvenated I'd have laughed at a "two days" reply. But I'm here. I'm home. And I'm so glad.

I had the best time riding to and from the wedding in Waco with my family + my second family, (other than my actual second family=in-laws, etc) catching up and reliving the days when we'd all travel together pre-marriages and babies. I was reminded of when I got sick on a flight in high school that I'd forgotten about. See, I thought, I'm not crazy, I've always had issues with flying. I get/have (which is right?) motion sickness and apparently it showed up way back when but I didn't put a halt to all air travel because who does that. I should have. Probably. But then I'd have missed a lot of fun trips so I'm glad I didn't.

I'm not making a lick of sense any more than before my vacation.

Dang.

I hoped some of the laying out by the pool, chick-flick watching, and sleeping late without responsibility would help me in the writing department. Oh well.

My favorite thing to hear over the phone while I was away is the kids' interpretation of where I was. Sean usually says, "Mommy is at the store" when I'm running errands but this time since it was for multiple days he said, "Mommy is on vacation" when they asked for me that first day. Ty got it and was fine with the answer. He can say, "vacation," and since he has transferred to being a daddy's boy he didn't miss me that much. Charlie would ask for me and she finally learned how to say 'vacation'. Her version: "Mommy on cancation!" So I'd talk to Sean and he would put her on speaker phone and he would ask her where I was. S: "Charlie, where's mommy?" C: "Mommy on cancation! Be back soon!" It was so cute.

I walked in the door as the kids were finishing lunch and Ty and Charlie ran over to hug me. Joy started crying but that's her love language right now so I took it as a compliment and that she was really glad I was home. It was bliss. Now the girls are napping and Ty is at school so excuse me while I go catch up with Sean and tell him all about what happened to me in the car on my way back here. It involves an uninvited spider.

I'll spare you details in case some of you have the same irrational fear of spiders that I do.

You're welcome.

Snake hunting

First, if you notice new ads over to the right that might not be something you'd think I would endorse here, please ignore them. I've written to the people in charge of that part of my blog and asked them to take those ads down and they are always very prompt to do so. Since it's the weekend I'm not positive it can be remedied until Monday. It is a wonderful company to work with so I know you won't be seeing those particular ads for long. Until then, bear with me.

This weekend is my mommy vacation.

I'll probably never come back so it's been nice knowing you.

No I will certainly come back at some point next week, (the benefit of Sean's job is that when he is home, he is home all day,) which gives me great freedom to do things like this. Where is my vacation, you ask?

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

My hometown. With an 0ut-of-town wedding of a lifelong family friend thrown in.

Apparently Mom and Dad have seen a snake recently so part of the weekend will probably be devoted to hunting snakes. Hunting snakes is kind of a family tradition since we grew up having to deal with them every summer. It's not too bad really-kind of fun since no one likes snakes. As long as I have on some good boots and something to shoot with I don't mind snakes. Spiders, not so much. I'm terrified of those. Ask my parents. Where they live there are both spiders and snakes and I'd go for the snakes any day.

Logical?

Nope. But when have I ever been logical?

Ok signing off...

Y'all have a great weekend!

Shopping

Mom did you get some candy for me at the store?





I'm looking but I don't see it.

Nope you don't get any candy. Sorry sister.





Mom you really need to let me handle the shopping from now on.

The Pilots Wife

I've added a new blog to my list of ones that I read recently and wanted to tell y'all about it. She's the cutest gal whose husband is a pilot and they have a son named Miles. How cute is that? She hosted a giveaway on her blog and today picked the winner.

It was me. I'm just being honest. I didn't rig it or anything it just happened to be my number that she drew and I'm really excited. Mainly because what I won is something that I'll use every day but would probably have never bought myself. Y'all check out her blog and see what I won!

See, giveaways really do work for the one chosen...and I'm gonna be doing another one soon!

Here is the link to her blog. Enjoy!

Her ears they were a ringin'

This girl must be tough


Look at her muscles. I mean really. She must be tough. If she hadn't been burning up this morning when I picked her up I might have missed the fact that she had a raging ear infection. I thought she was just teething.

Which she was. Is. Teething. She's wanted me to carry her around and taken mini-naps for about a week but slept fine at night. She must be tough! Earlier today after we left the Dr office, though, she wasn't looking so tough.


See. Awwwww. I felt sorry for her so I gave her the bun of my sandwich on the way home. She loved it. Who knew hamburger buns could soothe a sore ear?

I'd just like to throw in that due to Wednesdays being horrible days for our our moms coming to help, I took them all with me. The appt was at 10:30 and Ty starts school at 11:45. My Dr office is 38 minutes away. I know I know. But I'm not switching. Pediatricians' offices are not always in time. You do the math and tell me how in the world I made it back to get him to school on time. It was a Wednesday miracle.

And I'm glad that she is already starting to feel better. See, ear infections are new to me. I've taken them in for what I thought was an ear infection approximately 728 times, (just a ballpark figure,) but each kid has only had one. I'm so lucky!

Putting them all to bed early so I'll say goodnight.

But not before wishing Mr. Cody a Happy Birthday! He is one year old...how did the time fly so fast? Carley wrote a sweet picture-filled post about his first year. Love him!

A real update

I tell you what-the days get away from me! People used to ask when I had time to blog with my kids still (obviously) at home and I'd explain my windows of time. Lately I feel like those are gone-Joy is not exactly the sit and watch type like Charlie was at this age and I love it but it's cutting into my personal time.

Ha ha. But I'm kind of being serious.

Motherhood is my job like it is most of yours so when someone needs me I leave the computer, even if it's an appointed blogging time. For the last few months the lack of time issue has gotten worse and honestly I fought it. I'd feel frustrated when Joy didn't nap more than an hour, (which is pretty normal now for her, especially in the morning,) and I'd only have about 15 minutes of shared nap time to write and read other blogs. It's such a breath of outside-my-house-and-myself fresh air that I have no intention of giving it up. Reading about other people and what they're dealing with and learning gives me such joy. I'm an extrovert. I love people and feel isolated if I'm not around people pretty often during the day. On days when the kids don't have activities or I don't have obligations I'll write during nap time, their bedtime, and then if they are consumed in an activity a little in-between. Snippets of time here and there don't always add up to a streamlined, entertaining post but I appreciate that y'all don't care. I'm always refreshed after sharing what I am learning and hearing the same from you. What God is doing in your home, what you are realizing about this job He's given you, funny stories about the stunts your kids have pulled, you know, the real stuff. We are connected in ways that only He could orchestrate and I love that.

Anyway.

This weekend was fairly uneventful. We learned updates about a few of the things that went on during the week last week. Owen, my newest nephew, is doing great. He was born with a condition called imperforate anus which was not detectable before birth. We got the call that Leslie's water broke then waited and waited to hear from them and prayed that all was okay. When we got word that Leslie was fine, (I felt pretty confident in her being okay because she uses my same OB and I love him and you have heard me rave about him,) we were worried about the baby. We were relieved to find out that his condition is treatable and since that surgery the evening that he was born, he has been doing really well. He is expected to have another surgery when he reaches a certain weight so I'd love it if y'all would continue to pray for his growth. He weighed right over 7 pounds and they want him to double in weight before the next surgery. His care will be easier on his parents once the second surgery is performed. Grow baby grow!!

As far as we can tell, we are still going to Florida and I'm asking people I don't even know to pray for me since there's the whole traveling thing and the whole method of traveling thing and the whole flying is now our method of flying thing. I'm nervous. I need meds. I haven't even begun to get nervous about remembering to pack everything because I'm so focused on the flying part. Ty and Charlie will probably love it and I'll be crying. It's a sad case, y'all. I am a sad case. I am very excited about the trip in my own special way.

Charlie and Joy are now separated again because I learned that Charlie is cutting her last two molars. I thought she had them all, (what kind of mother am I that I can't tell,) but after weeks of her not acting like herself I took her to the doctor and found out that she had a reason for acting whiny/clingy/waking up screaming periodically during the night. Bless her heart. Since Joy is teething too, (hers is so much more obvious because the teeth are right in front! I'm not a dentist!) she wakes up during the night crying so they just kept waking each other up and then when I went in to help the one crying, the other one got her feelings hurt when I'd leave her in there. It was a bad cycle of little girls crying and me feeling guilty. So I did what I would normally do in the situation: whatever made things easier. I moved Joy back to her pre-roommate room. They both miss the roommate situation. Joy goes over to her crib in Charlie's room and hangs on it when I put Charlie to bed. Charlie says, "Bay Joy go nigh night over der..." but for now I think they're both getting more sleep the way it is.

Ty has school for a few more weeks and I'm seriously starting to wonder what we will do all day once it is over. He loves school and does really well on school days. He looks forward to it and his little friends are well, his friends. He will miss them and his teachers over the Summer and I'll miss knowing that he is using his brain in ways that I don't know how to imitate at home. He has learned so much and I don't want to cut him short because I'm not equipped with all of the things they have at school. I know it's silly since I'm his mother but I'm not as creative as I once thought I was so I'm envisioning him going back to school in the Fall and his teacher going, "What did you actually DO all Summer? He has made no progress!"

It's the insecurity from student teaching coming back to haunt me. My mentor teacher was precious and Godly and a veteran teacher. She was wonderful to me and I kid you not looked at me during "full responsibility" and said, "You were not cut out to be a teacher." I died laughing because I was praying I could do something other than teach once I graduated because it was so hard for me. I hated that I had to teach the kids stuff when I just wanted to talk to them all day. I felt responsible for doing the impossible-teaching them something-when I felt like it was more important that they were enjoying themselves and being obedient and learning how to be little people. My mentor teacher was instrumental in helping me pursue counseling. It fit my personality and my desires and strengths. Teaching, to me, really only highlighted my weaknesses. Emmy got all of the teaching gifts when God was handing them out.

Teachers out there, I am so on board with helping you from a far and supporting you and asking for you to get paid more than you do. I'll even substitute for you when you're sick. Just don't ask me to do your job. I'm terrible at it.

The end.

The weekend

Words coming soon...

Pride comes before the...

Before the what? Before the fall.

To be honest I've been in a slump. I had a few bad experiences in the last few weeks where I was trapped in a need-to-discipline predicament. Out in public, people watching, my kids disrupting, you know, the bad kind of trapped. It made me stop trying new things with the kids and just sticking with the familiar: places I knew they'd all stay happy. Places where I could bring their snacks and various forms of bribery and all would be well. The problem is that then I get cabin fever and use the time when Sean is home to go to all other places. These are the places where they are all happy 99% of the time. My fool-proof places:

Target

Costco

Sams

Sonic

Church...this one is questionable given Joy's issue

Friends houses

Family's houses

and that's about it

So I got a wild hair. Yesterday I wanted to get out during the break in thunderstorms and thought, "Sure, we can do this...we can all go return the necklace I bought last weekend...I can keep them all happy and obedient and it will be fine...at Charming Charlie's. If you've been there you're holding your breath. It's like Sam Moon but with more stuff ON THE FLOOR within reach. God love me I was hurting for entertainment wasn't I?

At the risk of making you choke on your food I'll cut right to it--it worked. They behaved, I returned, I loaded them all back up in the car and announced that since they had done well we'd get to have ice cream at home. It was a sweet car ride home. All were aiming to please and I was, well, proud of myself. Look at me. Look at my kids behaving.

I am totally rockin' this thing.

Then today I went to Target. I mean, if I can do Charming Charlie's I can do Target. They love Target. There are the lights and the vacuums and all sorts of things to look at. Have I mentioned before that we go to Target to look at the vacuums? Ty and Charlie love the vacuum aisle. Seriously you'd think I used my vacuum often as much as they love it. Maybe that's why they do-they don't see if very often.

Anyway.

We were sashaying, (I have no idea how to spell that or if it's even a word...) around feeling proud when I decided to go spend one of Joy's birthday gifts, (a gift card,) on a new toy for her.

Target on a Saturday in the toy department.

I can SO handle this.

Right about the time we were turning to leave the Kai Lan section, I heard something. It sounded like a hail storm. Do you know what it was?

A brand new package of Mini Sweet Tarts hitting the floor. The big package that you can only but at Target. It holds approx. 452 pieces. Charlie was holding the bag upside down with a look of, "Aw man that did not go the way I wanted it to," on her face. The sweet tart things are great for the kids. Go buy some if you haven't tried them. They are mess-free and you can give them like four and it takes a whole shopping trip to chew them. I bought the new package because we were anticipating an afternoon of errands. I guess Charlie had other plans and wanted to go ahead and open them and I was so focused on finding a new toy for Joy that I missed her clawing into it. I was embarrassed and frustrated that I was now going to spend the next 2 hours picking up all of the little pieces. It might have taken even longer than that.

I bent down to start picking them up and showing Ty and Charlie how to put them back in the bag when four little sets of legs caught my eye and I looked up. Four school-aged kids bending down to help me. Their dad was directing them to help me, (he was helping too,) so that the mess could get cleaned up quickly and I've never been so grateful. I said "Thank you" to the kids and the man as many times as I could and then watched them walk away. Then I told their mom how well they responded and how grateful I was when I saw them walking around the store after I regained my composure.

My Super Mom flag just got knocked down to the Regular Mom level.

Before

This was before the face plant in the shower


Before dinner even


The dinner that she wore on her forehead


And had no idea

This was before school. We styled his hair crazy because it was his teacher's birthday. Really I just needed to kill time after baths.


He loved his hair and kept walking by the mirror saying, "Look honey I have crazy hair!" He calls me honey because obviously I've called him that one too many times.

He has started calling Sean that too which I find hilarious.

S: "Goodnight Ty I love you..." T: "Goodnight honey I love you too..."

makes me laugh every time.

Let's just say it was stressful

It seems like weeks since I wrote a post. Has it been longer?

For starters, I woke up last Friday feeling awful. Virus round 1. Or so I thought. I called for reinforcements, (Nattie,) took a phenergen and went to bed. I woke up a few hours later feeling totally fine. We used about three cans of Lysol on Friday trying to keep everyone else from getting sick and now looking back I think there was nothing to worry about. It had to be something I ate and thankfully I was 100 % by the next day. No one else got sick at all. Either Lysol lived up to its name and beat even the Vomiting Virus, (y'all remember that I call it by name and capitalize it,) or it was just food poisoning. I missed the last bible study which was very sad for me and didn't do anything Saturday morning just in case. I still made it to Brooks' wedding on Saturday night and then Sunday we went to Denton to see Sean's family.

Ana got sick Saturday night, (similar to what happened to me but much much worse,) and ended up in the hospital in our hometown. She's pregnant, after all, and felt so bad that even phenergen didn't help her. I've never had nausea that phenergen wouldn't cure so I felt awful for her. We're still not totally sure what she had but they're thinking food poisoning for her too. I didn't get close enough to get her sick I know what you're thinking! Actually I thought about it for a while until I realized I hadn't gotten close enough. Maybe I'll start capitalizing Food Poisoning too. Hmmm. Yes I think I will. Food Poisoning=Evil.

Things were pretty calm around here today until bath time. Joy has started getting in the shower with me and just milling around playing. It's safer than putting her in the bath with the big kids and I can get showered and ready for bed earlier than if I waited for them to all be in bed. Reminds me to tell y'all I was in bed last night at 8:30 and slept until 7:30 when the kids woke up. Glory. Anyway, I was rinsing shampoo out of my hair when she fell at my feet and started crying. I lifted her up and blood was running out of her mouth. The next few minutes involved me trying to figure out exactly what was bleeding, getting the big kids out of the bath, (it's an open bathroom so I can watch them while I'm in the shower,) putting her in the bath so I could clean up the blood, watching Ty pee on the floor from a full bladder/mommy focusing on Joy, Charlie pushing Joy down in the tub, "Baby Joy you sit down wight now!", disciplining Charlie for pushing, Ty crying from embarrassment that he had an accident, me calling Sean asking him what he thought I should do about Joy, and Max stealing cookies (Nilla wafers) right out of the bowl in front of me.

Let's just say it was stressful.

Joy's mouth stopped bleeding after a few minutes and I looked/felt in her mouth. She hit her lip with her brand new top teeth and the teeth bled a little bit but the bulk of the injury is her lip. Bless her heart. I'd give her Motrin but she knows how to spit it out now so it's kind of pointless. I've tried Tylenol too...the generic kind...y'all consider yourselves warned about the recall...but it doesn't matter what flavor-she'll spit it out. Little toot.

Maybe if it hurts bad enough she'll reconsider.

My brain hurts from the bath time drama. I'm off to bed. May the Good Lord give you rest tonight no matter what your day was like. And may tomorrow be injury and illness-free.

I just entered Emily's giveaway for a pair of cute earrings. I feel better already.

Good day so far

We've had a lot of things going on in my corner...some of it minor some of it not so minor. Praise the Lord my sister-in-law Ana is feeling better. She got very sick this weekend but thankfully she is home now resting and baby Sally is doing just fine too. Poor thing left Brooks' wedding early she got so sick.

My newest nephew needs your prayers. He was born yesterday and had surgery last night. He has a condition requiring multiple surgeries and for now he is healing up just fine but will you pray for him? His name is Owen. He is my nephew on Sean's side. I'll update as I can about more specific things but it's not my story to tell now.

Those are obviously the major things and the minor ones...well, they're just normal things. Like the crying in the picture. Taking it in stride. Life is good!

Thank y'all so much. I've benefited from the prayers of many of you!

It was a beautiful day

It was a beautiful day for a wedding. I had a wonderful time. Was so proud of the groom and his whole family. My second family growing up. I have, once again, not one picture of the bride. This was our only picture. But I love the picture. You can see I picked dress #1. Went to Charming Charlie's for the first time. OH.MY.WORD. I don't get overwhelmed by jewelry often but I got overwhelmed. I'd like all future gifts to be gift cards to that store. Fun. Picked out some fancy pearly things that I'll wear a lot. That store=happiness.

I got to talk to some of my oldest friends and laughed along with them that I have three kids. No one, least of all me, can believe it. They did just fine with Sarah and only cried for us until she served pizza. Then they stopped, she said. Funny. Love those kids. Love my family.

My 1 year-old may never remember this but I will

Today Joy is one year old. Her first birthday. She has no idea how big of a milestone it is. All she knows is that she gets to eat special snacks and treats today and that we sing to her a lot and the big kids clap for everything she does. She probably will not remember anything that happens today and that's okay. I will.

I'll remember when she was eight days old and we walked, (me, very slowly,) to the little park down our street to take a picture of the three of them. She slept most of the time and we buried Smarties under her to give the big kids motivation to act interested in her. It totally worked. Look how excited they are to be sitting by their baby sister! NOT.
I'll remember outings like this one when she behaved better than her big sister
I'll think back to her first attempt to swipe some Cool Ranch Doritos from a sibling
Her first time to wear a life jacket and go out on the lake at Nattie's house
Her first Christmas card pose
her first kiss or "love bite"
her first sisterly snuggle
Her first time to wear hot pink. That's a lie. First time to wear THAT hot pink dress.
Today I will think back to her first time in the best walker on earth.
and to her first trip to Northpark where Aunt Emmy followed her around
and to her first ride in the "wagon" at Mimi's house.
I'll think back over the trips to Nattie's house where she learned the ropes as a country girl
and when she first cared about shoes
When she used to wait for her brother to walk home from school with daddy and clap when she saw him. Every single day. Even though he only goes to school for three hours.
I'll think back to her first trip to Double Dip when she was a week old and how she slept through the whole thing
I'll remember how Sean took pictures of her when she was exactly 6 months old, the day before her surgery to remove her "thing" that had worried us for so many months
I'll think back to when she first opened her eyes for more than 2 minutes at a time...when she started "waking up" after the c-section drugs started wearing off
It'll hit me around mid-day that she has taught me more about Christ and His sacrifice for us than any other person, all of it taught before she was even born. I would have traded my life for hers without question and was afraid but willing to do what she needed to survive.
I'll remember that she held herself up way sooner than her big siblings did. I'll remember when I realized that she was a 'go-getter'
I will be reminded of her first few attempts at pulling up when she hit her head and never cried. How watching her would show me that she had little if no fear about trying new things.

She still doesn't. Today is a huge milestone for her and for me.

There were times I didn't think we'd survive this year and we have. There are moments of panic and being overwhelmed sure. I had one yesterday when we met Carley and Jennie and their kids at the mall for lunch and following a rough morning at home, I was so relieved to be out of the house. Then Ty spilled his drink and started crying. Actually yelling/crying. When I leaned over to discipline him Joy grabbed my sandwich and threw it onto the floor. And I almost cried. I was so frustrated after the morning and all I wanted to do was eat and talk to my friends. My partners in crime. My fellow moms who I swap stories, struggles, and victories with. Then Carley offered to go get me a new sandwich and I told her not to because it would make me cry. She did anyway and Jennie encouraged me with sharing her own story of needing a mommy vacation recently. I didn't feel guilty anymore. It felt good to just breathe and know that I'm not alone in thinking this job is hard.

There are so many things to be grateful for. On days when the tasks are stacking up in front of me and I feel like crying, I still do. But I remember on days like today that for a whole year I've taken care of the coolest three little people in the world. I've been slimed, hugged, kissed, and thrown up on countless times and I'm a better woman because of it. I'm living my dream.

So Happy Birthday to Joy. We are crazy about her...some of us more than others. Ty loves her in his own way he just wants her to stop taking his stuff.

The End.