1. Why do a 3year old and a 6 year old insist on getting up at 6:00 am? Don't worry, I send them back to bed, but they're still awake at that hour, which means I'm awake at that hour. Really if this continues, it will be a looooong summer.
2. Please keep my aunt and uncle, Jr and Elsie in your prayers this week. They are traveling to China to adopt a precious little girl, Noelle. They've been through a lot in the the past few years, but their faith is strong and they are such an inspiration. You can read their story and visit their blog here. Pray that everything will go smoothly and that they will have safety as they travel. Jr and Elsie, we can't wait to meet her and are praying for you!
3. I've been having a few "blogging" issues lately. I love blogging and love the friendships that I have developed through blogging. My main issue lately is that people I know in "real life" know a lot more about what I'm thinking and what we're up to than I know about them. Does this make any sense? Have any of you other bloggers had this issue? Maybe I should convince my friends to have a blog?!
Although, as I think about it, this blog only shows a tiny slice of what is going on in our life, and only what I choose to post.
I'm probably just crabby from being up every two hours last night. Really, Bella, you're almost a month old. Can we go every 4 hours between feedings at night? And JUST BURP ALREADY! (She has to be the world's worst child to burp. It takes all of forever, esp at 3 in the morning, and if you don't get a burp out of her, she'll spit up.) Nice.
4. I find it completely ironic (and sad) that Jon and Kate of Jon and Kate plus 8 fame, had an elaborate ceremony in Hawaii last August to renew their vows, and are now considering divorce. Keri, I think we have had many of the same thoughts on this family in the past! As Keethapointed out in a recent blog post, marriage takes hard work, commitment, hard work, hard work and more hard work. Obviously, money does not buy happiness. I have numerous other thoughts on the show, but I'll stop -for now.
5. Since I'm "link-happy" this morning, here's one more: I love this. Love it.
Thanks Keri for posting this.
6. Summer vacation begins next Tuesday. Am I ready? Are other moms ready?!
7. How in the world do the producers for The Bachelor/The Bachelorette find a new crop of crazy people each season? And why do I get sucked into watching it each season? I'm pretty sure my IQ decreases a little with each episode.
All right, I think that's it. I could go on and on, but I'm not sure how many people are still reading, and I hear two kids fighting over couch space in the living room. Yes, it's 7:00 and already the kids are having an argument. I think I need LOTS more coffee!
I'm sorry about the lack of pictures with this long post. My camera is refusing to upload pictures on the computer anymore. I have another way to do it, but it's much more complicated, and I'm too lazy this morning.
*Thank you for the comments on my last post. Yes, I am feeling much better...still have guilt...but am trying to let it go more. The most important thing is that little miss Isabella is doing much, much better. She's eating much better AND gaining weight. That's a very good thing.
Do you ever see something while you are driving that just makes you laugh? Well, I'm sure the hubby does, since HE HAS A HARD TIME KEEPING HIS EYES ON THE ROAD WHILE HE IS DRIVING.
Wait, I digress.
That last part had nothing to do with the point of this post. Can you tell it's a major pet peeve of mine though?!
For those of you who don't know where we live, most (if not all) of our neighbors within a one mile radius are Amish. You just never know what you may see while driving or find in your driveway around here. See this post if you are wondering.
Before I begin, let me just say I have complete respect for the Amish faith, but sometimes things just make you go hmm...
Driving home from a baseball game the other night we saw one of our Amish neighbors trimming their shrubs close to the road. No big deal, right?
Except for the fact that they were using electric shrub trimmers.
How did they do this? I'm glad you asked. They had placed their generator on a little red wagon and hooked up the shrub trimmers to the generator, of course.
Seriously???? How about you just call the electric company and hook up to the electric line there by your house permanently? I'm sure it would be much easier to operate your vacuum cleaner also. Trust me, I'm sure they have a vacuum cleaner.
Now, I realize a picture would make this post much more interesting, but really how do you ask permission to take a picture?
"Umm...excuse me....can I take a picture of your wagon and shrub trimmers, because I think it's pretty funny, considering you are Amish and I would like to blog about it?"
I'm thinking that might not have gone over very well.
Don't even get me started on the horse and cart that were driving all over the road AND INTO OUR YARD while the Amish driver was talking on his cell phone.
Yep, you just never know what you may see on any given day. Next time, I may have to take a picture.
Yes, I am still here and alive in bloggy land. Let's not forget the very pregnant part also. Sigh.
I haven't been blogging much lately, probably because when I have time after the kids are in bed, I'm too tired to form any cohesive thoughts.
Not that the thoughts are that cohesive when I'm not tired, but that's another story.
Have I mentioned how ready and anxious I am to meet this little one and kiss some little cheeks, toes, and fingers?
At least the weather outside is beautiful. It's hard to be too grumpy when it's 80 degrees and sunny outside.
I have pictures that need uploaded of Drew's first Tball game, the kids playing in the (little) pool, and other random pictures of our week.
I'm planning on posting those later today or tomorrow-if there's no baby.
I'm thinking it's a pretty safe bet that I'll be posting those pictures. I'll leave you with a picture of Alex coloring Easter eggs that I haven't posted.
*Note for next year*-we probably shouldn't plan on coloring Easter eggs at 9:00 on a Saturday night after the kids have played outside all day and not had naps.
I know...I haven't posted since Monday. I'm starting to go through blogging withdrawal.
It's just that, well, all of the preparations for Christmas are starting to overwhelm me a bit.
I'm hosting my family this year. I'm excited to be hosting, and think it will be a lot of fun. The fact that I can stay in my warm house on Christmas and not worry about lugging two children, a pregnant belly, and tons of gifts to another house is reason enough to have the festivities here.
The problem is that my perfectionistic tendencies are in overdrive. I want everything to be perfect. I have an unrealistic to-do list drawn up of everything I need to get done before the big day. I know it's a unrealistic list. I know my family won't care if not all the corners are clean or the windows are dirty. I know that I am not focusing on the real reason for the season.
Even though I know all these things, its difficult for me to just let it go. I'm working on it. I want to spend time with my children watching Christmas movies on the couch with a bowl of popcorn (which we did a few nights ago, by the way). I want to share in their excitement counting down the days until Christmas, and I want to always remember Drew's toothless grin when we sing "all I want for Christmas is my two front teeth" to him.
But really, did they have to call a snow day today? So what if there was a little bit of freezing rain/ice on the road...SEVENTEEN days of Christmas vacation, seriously? (Yes, I counted!) I'm pretty sure I spent the majority of the day breaking up fights between a certain three and six year old.
So, if I'm absent a little more than usual in the next week, it's because I'm trying to balance the perfectionistic side of me with the mom side. If I don't find the time to blog much in the coming week, I promise I'll be back in full swing after Christmas. I have lots of things I want to blog about!
So, hopefully the turkey will be thawed, the presents will get wrapped, and we'll make some lasting family memories this Christmas season.
Thank goodness for a helpful husband and theragesic (I know, but it's been a lifesaver lately with the arthritis flare-ups).
I'm off to wrap some presents.
Actually, who am I kidding? I'm going to put on some cozy pajamas and go to bed.
Lately, Drew has been having some highly entertaining dreams while he sleeps at night. This is the dream he was telling me about at breakfast this morning: He was upstairs in his bathroom getting ready to take a shower. When he opened the curtian, he saw Shamu taking a shower in his bathroom. Shamu???? Where did that come from?
He finally convinced Shamu to go downstairs, and as he made his way down the steps, Alex and Craig kept throwing fish at him to keep him happy. I agree, it's important to keep a killer whale happy in your home. When Drew went upstairs again to take his shower (after the Shamu fiasco) there was a boy and his dad in the shower.
What??? I'm thinking maybe a certain six year old should stop eating so many cookies before going to bed at night.
Coincidentally, his three year old brother told us at dinner that he had the SAME EXACT DREAM last night.
It must have been the cookies.
I know, I must be running out of things to blog about if I'm blogging about Shamu in the shower.
In other tidbits of life around our household, this was the day I volunteered to help Drew's kindergarten class make gingerbread houses.
What was I thinking? Not only am I not the star fruit cutter in this house, I'm also not very creative-especially with gingerbread houses.
Yes, I'm talking about the hubby. Rumor has it, growing up he would use a tweezers to decorate Christmas cookies, in order to give them plenty of detail. I'm a little suspicious of eating cookies that a tweezer was used on (blech), but I'm sure the cookies looked beautiful.
Rest assured, friends and family that are reading this and will eat our cookies, I do not use a tweezers to decorate my cookies, or use anything else that has been used to pluck hair from my face.
I'm glad we got that established. Ok, where was I? Oh, right, about the gingerbread houses.
It really was a very cute project. Thanks Mrs. Wallace! I forgot my camera (of course), but I'll let you imagine 13 kindergarteners, frosting, and lots of candy.
Most of them ate as much candy as they put on their houses!
Here is a picture of Drew's house. He is beyond proud of it.
Alex keeps asking when we can eat it.
I'm thinking maybe we should try eating gingerbread houses instead of cookies for a bedtime snack.
1. Toys that put themselves back in the toy cabinet.
2. A Scooba (is that the right word?) that cleans the hardwood floors the way I want them cleaned i.e. scrubbing all the scuffs, stains, and toy marks off. Actually anything would be better than me getting down on my hands and knees to clean the floors!
3. Since we're on the subject of cleaning: someone to do the laundry, the cleaning and the cooking, even if it's just for one week. Oh, and this person wouldn't require payment-because as you all know, I LOVE free!! Hey, this is a Christmas WISH list, a girl can dream, right?.
4. A Maurice's (my favorite store) wardrobe. Actually their whole clothing line would be fine. Well, maybe this gift would have to wait until after the pregnancy.
5. A Siesta Key condo directly on the beach. Now, you didn't think I would get through this post without mentioning Florida, did you?
6. Cookies that automatically bake and frost themselves and last longer than two days. (I made Christmas cutouts earlier this week. What a pain to bake, frost and decorate. It made quite a few cookies. There are THREE left). Obviously, there are some cookie monsters living in this house!
7. Snow that wouldn't require cold temperatures. That's really the reason I don't like snow-I don't like being cold. How many times have I whined about this on my blog?
8. That Pioneer Woman's recipes would not make me gain weight. Since discovering her site, I love her recipes, but my behind does not.
9. Speaking of gaining weight...I wish that if you thought about exercising, it would be like actually exercising. Let's say you wanted to work out for forty-five minutes on the elliptical machine. All you would have to do would be think about working out for forty-five minutes to achieve the same effect.
10. A great husband, two adorable, energetic, imperfect boys, one baby on the way, great friends, a house to live in and food to eat.
Wait, I already have number 10.
Sappy as it may sound, that's really all I want OR need. I have been incredibly blessed. I'll deal with not having my top 9, as long as I have #10.
But, if you happen to hear about toys that walk themselves back to the playroom....
Originally tonight, I had intended to take Keetha's challenge and blog ten honest things about myself.
But seriously, I'm exhausted. I didn't realize how tired until just now when I snuggled under the covers and attempted to blog.
Alex has been sick all week long. I know it's only Wednesday, but it's been a loooong week of dealing with vomiting and fevers. At least he seems to be better (he must be, he's picking all sorts of fights with his brother), and is sleeping in his OWN bed tonight. There's nothing that defines restful sleep quite like being kicked all night by a three year old. Last night the hubby took his turn sleeping with him, and I ended up sleeping in Alex's bunk beds.
Let's just say bunk beds are made for people under the age of twenty-one. In case anyone was wondering, the top bunk still holds me at four months pregnant, thank you very much.
Besides being exhausted, I also took a tylenol with codeine to help with the arthritis flare-ups I've been having. (I'm so blaming those bunk beds!) I'm thinking when I'm tired and under the effects of a narcotic, it may be a little risky to do a meme about myself.
And I have my alarm set for 1:00am to try and snag a "Black Friday" deal at Best Buy for a Christmas present. According to their website some prices take effect Thursday morning online. I'm all about saving money if I can, but I am a bit skeptical. I'll let you know if it actually works.
So, instead, I'll save the honesty meme for later this week. I promise I won't forget, Keetha! I hope everyone has a happy thanksgiving and eats plenty of turkey. This year I'm counting my blessings for many reasons: my boys, a new baby on the way, friends, and family to name a few. I'd also like to thank my friends who read this blog (and occasionally comment, ha), and the friends I have made in blog land that I would never have "met" otherwise (that's you Keetha and Keri!). I love you guys!
Wife to Craig, mom to Drew, Alex, and Isabella. I never imagined my world would be filled with words like neurologists, therapy and hypotonia. This is our story...the good and the bad.
Email me at cjyoder@wifi7.com
