Happy birthday, tiny one...

Happy birthday, teeny one. And yes, you're still teeny at the ripe old age of 1. I love it...

We're at my parent's house. Its my refuge when David is working too much. The original plans to go to the beach for Memorial Day fell through when the working started, but I'm thankful for this place where I can always get help when overload comes...

I made a chocolate peanut butter cup cake since I saw it on the internet, and I wanted to. =) I made Evan a cupcake sans peanut butter or frosting, and he dived into it with gusto. He also had his first hamburger bites, and that was also a hit. Old family friends came over to sing "Happy Birthday" to him. The oldest boy just graduated from college, and I remember when he was a little kid parking cars at my wedding. I'm gettin' old.

It was a good low key 1st birthday overall, and we'll celebrate again next weekend at the park with some friends. David will still be working, but he thinks he can take off for a little party. And I'm going to make a rainbow cake. Stay tuned for pictures....

And Evan, here are some things Mommy loves to remember about you now that you're one...

- You said your 1st sentence on the day before your birthday. I took you out on the porch, and David was coming up the walk. I said, "Who is it?" You squealed, and I swear that you said, "It's Daddy!" You said it several times in a row. I'm glad that was your first sentence.

- You've started shaking your head "no" when you don't want to eat something. That something is usually a green vegetable. Your favorite fruit is bananas, and you had your first real banana recently.

- If a baby could live on Cheerios alone, you would do it. You love to pick them up and shove them into your mouth as fast as you can.

- You like to pick up things and chuck them carelessly over your shoulder. Seth never did this.

- You're a babbler and a squealer. You always seem to be telling me something that I'm not bright enough to understand. When Seth does something you think is exciting, you squeal and squeal.

I love you, sweetie. I took you for a little walk, just the two of us, when it was almost 10:30 a.m., remembering what I was doing this time last year....

snatching victory….

 

 

Sometimes it seems like I push and struggle through the day, attempting to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. =) Yesterday was one of those. Evan was fussy from the moment he woke up unless I was holding him, most likely the result of the bulging upper tooth trying to poke its way through.

But I soldiered on and reminded myself that the effort is worth it. Right? =)  Seth and I learned about snakes and did a snake craft (see www.firstschool.ws for a great snake you can print out and make into the shape of an S with ovals). I made him a playhouse with the folding table tent cover that David’s grandmother had sewed for her grandkids many moons ago. He played with his flashlight and toys in there for quite awhile, enjoying a respite from baby brother’s prying fingers…

And when I wanted to just quickly put Evan down at the end of the day, I didn’t. I rocked him, nearly falling asleep myself, and enjoyed his presence instead of thinking about how much his neediness had worn me out during the day. And when that was over, instead of wearily walking downstairs, I thought of how tired David was with all his overtime, and I cleaned up the bathroom from baths so he wouldn’t have to do it.

It’s easy to just give up when it seems like a lot of work to keep going. But if I just keep pushing on and trying to give and love despite the tiredness or frustration, I usually reap a rich reward. Can you think of a time that you’ve noticed this to be true in your life?  Can you think of a time when God rewarded you by making the road a little easier when you didn’t give up?

swagger wagon….

Ok, this is hilarious. I guess I’m one of the 3 people who hadn’t seen it yet, but you’re one of the other two, enjoy….

 

work….

David’s working the next three weekends, including this one. He’ll also be coming home late and working some nights… who knows how many? I don’t want to think about it.

We didn’t know this until Thursday. Great way to come crashing down hard from vacation, huh….

Since I’d scheduled a hair appointment already, he agreed to work from home today so I could go. I got there to find out that someone had scheduled it wrong. I couldn’t get my increasingly long dark roots highlighted after all.

And now I’m having a pity party because it looks like this chore won’t get completed until this time of too much working is over….

Back into the hate part of my love/hate relationship with David’s job….

The end.

The knight and the dragon…

 

When we were at Vance and Terri’s house, I picked up this book to read to Seth. I already loved Tomie dePaola’s “Clown of God,” but I didn’t know he’d written others.

The thing that I love about this book is that it encourages young children to open a book to find out what they need to know. The knight reads a book called “How to fight dragons” before he issues an invitation to the dragon to come and fight him. The dragon reads a similar book about fighting knights. They consult books to learn how to build armor, swish a trail ferociously, and finally, on how to build a barbeque when the fight doesn’t work out so well.

Since going to a book to find information that you’re lacking is an important skill that I hope to impart to future generations, I’m excited about a book that teaches that lesson with so much whimsy and fun…

nice to be home…

It’s nice to go away. And it’s nice to come home. At least part of the reason you go away is so you can come home and have a renewed appreciation for it. =)

We have hardly anything to make a complete meal here, but there was a frozen meatloaf and some stray red potatos in the pantry. Those are in my oven now, meatloaf on a rack, potatos cut, canola oiled and salted, and I’m hoping David will smile at the smell when he walks through the door. The baby sits with his Cheerios a couple of feet away.

Lots of laundry whirring away in the hall off the kitchen. Double stroller sits in the shade by the curb from where it served as seating for the Seth and Tricycle show right before naptime. Anniversary roses are slowly opening on the kitchen table…

Pretty blue house with white flowered hanging baskets and red impatiens by the door… I do love thee.

Driving through the night…

We just got back from our family vacation to sunny Tampa, and I thought I’d share a little bit about how we did it. Now, the drive from N.C. to this part of F.L. is about 10 1/2 hours. We’d never attempted a drive this long, and we were pretty nervous about it. The longest the boys had ever driven in the car before was 4 1/2 hours, and they were melting into hysterical puddles by the end, even with plenty of snacks and videos for the oldest…

Soo… David thought maybe we should try an overnight drive. I was even more nervous about trying this than a long day drive. What if they didn’t sleep? What if they were awake and crying all. night. long? It didn’t help that my friend Rachel had this happen to her on an overnight drive to N.Y. To quote her: “I remember thinking to myself, ‘This must be what hell is like. I want to die.’” Unquote.

Needless to say, this did not inspire confidence. But… we were crazy enough to try it anyway. We put the kids to bed at 8:00 and woke them at 9 to put them in their carseats in p.j’s. We thought that this would help them go back to sleep more easily once they were in the car. Hah! They were awake, but happy and quiet. Seth sang softly to himself on and off for hours.

I drove the first few hours, listening to a book on tape on the Ipod. We switched drivers at a gas station and kept going. The boys slept on and off. Despite being stopped for an hour and half at 1:30 a.m. for a horrible wreck on I-95, things went really well the whole way. If they boys woke up, they were happy and quiet before drifting back to sleep. It was amazingly good.

We got to Tampa in time for breakfast, both boys took morning naps, and then we all took an afternoon nap and went to bed a little earlier than we might’ve otherwise. The recovery wasn’t too bad.

The recovery after getting back was a little tougher because we were all more tired from not getting as much sleep on the trip as we normally would at home. Evan is also battling a bug, so he whined a little more in the night on the drive. But it was still a pretty pleasant trip and recovery.

Doing it this way means we’ll be going to Tampa more often because its not horribly painful, and I won’t be dreading the trip… though Vance and Terri might. We’ve heard that their whole family is down with Evan’s nausea bug. We’re sooooo sorry. We love you, guys.

9 years of wedded bliss…

 

9 years ago today… we said “I do” to everything that we didn’t know that this new life and love had in store for us. And I love him more today than I ever even knew was possible back then….

And we even got to look at this while we ate a quiet anniversary dinner in tropical Tampa…

 

crayola bomb…

 

"Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A beauty bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air - explode softly - and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth - boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn't go cheap, either - not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination." ~Robert Fulghum

curious george learns the alphabet…

 

Just thought I’d tell y’all about a good book that I picked up at the library. This is an old, sweet story about the man with the yellow hat teaching George his alphabet.

The illustrations are the best part. Each letter is used to make something that starts with that letter, and the author does both lower case and upper case letters and explains how they’re different.

The man with the yellow hat takes breaks between teaching the letters and shows George how he can use them…

Anyway, I thought it was a great teaching tool, and I wanted to share! Enjoy your Monday!

Glasses wearer… and not lovin’ it…

I’ve been wearing my glasses for about a month… and I don’t enjoy it. They’re bent, and they’ve been stepped on too many times. I want my contacts back!

But the reason I’ve been wearing my glasses is that my contacts are so foggy that they drive me crazy. I’m guessing its the unusual amounts of pollen we’ve been having lately. I try wearing them for a couple of hours, and I have to take them out again because my vision is so blurry, and I’m tired of blinking to try and clear it.

I’m thinking about taking the new years supply of Acuvue Oasys back to my eye doctor and asking for something else. Has anyone else out there tried Air Optics? They’re supposed to be a little less likely to get dirty so quickly. Anyone else had this problem with contacts?

I’m learning how much I’ve taken my ability to see for granted. I’m blind as a bat, and its amazing how much it irks me that I’ve been stuck with my glasses for so long. I’d consider Lasic, but I’m afraid they wouldn’t get it right, and then what would I do? This pair of eyes is faulty, but they’re what God gave me…

Any advice would be appreciated…

a cruel joke…

As I was getting ready for church this morning, I couldn’t help but think how different this day was 4 years ago. On that day, I didn’t go to church. It was too hard to see the pastor hand out roses to the youngest mother and the oldest mother and the mother with the most children… I stayed home and read my Bible by myself and wondered what kind of cruel joke I was in for this time…

After 3 years of infertility and 1 miscarriage, I was due for the last pregnancy test of my infertility treatments. And based on the way the clinic did things, testing exactly two weeks after the egg dropped, I was supposed to have my test on… Mother’s Day. Since it was a Sunday, I didn’t have that test. But I was dreading it. I thought God was giving me one more opportunity to struggle through a tough holiday.

Instead, He was smiling in kindness. There wasn’t another test of resilience to pass. I’d made it to the end of my long journey. He’d planned from long ago for me the have the best Mother’s Day present that I would ever get. That Monday, I found out that Seth was here…

There are a lot of women that were missing from church services all across America today. They’re hurting, and I never forget them each May. Say a prayer for those that think God has forgotten them among all the countless happy women hugging their babies and grandchildren…

happy mother’s day, y’all…

This is my first Mother’s Day as a mother of two! Last year, Evan was kicking and punching in my tummy, but he wouldn’t come out for a couple more weeks. I tell him that he’s way cuter this year than he was last year… =)

I’m a mother, but I’m also celebrating my own mom. And since I’ve become a mommy, I’ve become marginally less selfish, and I don’t mind as much that this holiday isn’t all about me. Sure, I like the pampering. David got me a chick flick from Redbox and a candy bar from the local grocery last night, and I think I’m getting a homemade card from Seth tomorrow… but Mother’s Day doesn’t have to be a huge deal. My life is pretty sweet. Every day pretty much is Mother’s Day when you get lots of baby hugs and kisses…

First pool day of the season…

 

It’s pool time around here! Yes, I know, I know, it’s the middle of May. But with all the global warming and all, it’s 90 degrees out…

I have a friend named Kristi. A lot of you probably have a friend like her. She usually has the coolest thing around. If its new and cool and exciting, she probably has it… and she probably found the best deal on it available. So… she has this super cool pool. It has two sections, a sprinkler that wets the slide, and these neat rampy things that you slide balls down into the water. Way, way cool…

Yes, Seth is wearing a swim diaper here. Why, you may ask? Because, despite the fact that I put him in a swimsuit to go over there, he had a poopy accident (the only kind he really ever has), so I had to put him in one of his brother’s swim diapers so he wouldn’t be nekked for the photo. And so continues the tradition of me having no pictures of Seth in the water without wearing a swim diaper. I’m so tacky. But I tried this time…

And I am proud to say that I have a baby water nut. He LOVES the water. Actually, he’s such a water nut that when he’s in the tub, and he wants to get up on his knees, he rolls over and lets his face go under for a second, all so he can get up on his knees. He comes up sputtering and coughing, but he’s not scared to do it. Hmmm, I guess that’s probably a testimony to him wanting to be up and moving more than he’s afraid of the water…

 

I can admit when i’m wrong… sometimes…

Ok, so this exercise class thing….

The first day was torturously brutal. But I’ve been doing it for about 3 weeks now, and while it’s still making me sweat plenty, I don’t feel shaky and on the edge of collapse anymore when I get home. This is a HUGE praise! That and the fact that Evan sleeps and Seth graciously consents to eat a pile of Goldfish while I take a shower both help as well…

And… I actually look forward to sweating with the gals on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I don’t know why exactly. I can’t completely explain it. But maybe exercise does make you feel somewhat better. Now, it’s still isn’t enough motivation on its own without vanity, but I can now understand why people claim that it helps them feel better overall.

In other news, looks like I will not be the skinny, flat tummied woman of my dreams in 9 weeks. And if anything, my arms are bigger, not tinier, though they jiggle a smidge less….

Though my abs are definitely tighter, that lovely ball of fat stuck on top of them doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. And I’m starting to get worried that the sticking out tummy thing is permanent. It doesn’t feel like I have that much fat on there, but it’s like my muscles refuse to go in or something. Maybe the result of two c-sections? All the cutting through my stomach muscles? We’ll see. If I wean Evan, and I don’t drop the last 10 pounds, then it will be over, and I’ll concede.

And interesting enough, though I eat better most days, I feel like I’m eating more on others. I guess Time magazine was right when they said that studies have shown that exercise doesn’t help you lose weight because you eat more when you exercise… Gah!

And now the baby who got a GOOD afternoon nap today is waking up. Gotta run….