practical strawberry

dusting off cobwebs

2012-02-04T21:27:00.000-06:00

so now it is february. as the sidebar will show for all of posterity, i have neglected this space for all of january, almost like january 2012 never existed. accept for the fact that, quite the opposite, january was a very full month.

so full in fact that i decided to live it instead of write it. my mom's birthday, a million family birthdays, a tea party, an awesome gathering of friends, lots of work days, days spent at the park (in january!!!), the arrival of chickens.... a very full month indeed.

so yes, i was busy in january, but i would say my bigger reasons for not writing are:

1. tim acquired an iphone for me in december, so i do most of my at home computing on that. i can read blogs and check facebook, but it helps me from getting sucked into the internet for hours at a time because staring at the tiny screen gets uncomfortable after awhile. since i spend my work time in front of the laptop, i don't really want to pull it out and fire it up when i'm not working. this is good for my life, but bad for blogging.

2. as i've said before, i'm not a brief person. obviously, you know this. so i don't really care for posts that are just a picture and a few sentences. and even doing that would probably take me at least 30 minutes by the time i fire up the computer(because i think it takes all of 2 minutes. i'm just that blessedly impatient!), upload the picture, etc.

3. i feel like other people are in my head stealing my material and writing it better than i can. so why bother.

i remembered that i had written a post back in yonder days entitled, "why i blog" so i looked it up to remember, why did i used to blog more?

well, i still find those things to all be true-i find writing to be therapeutic, i like to put on a good show, and i think honesty in the blogosphere is important, even if my part in that space is a teeny, tiny speck. but my life has changed a lot since march of 2010. max was 1 1/2 when i wrote that, ben was 3 3/4. ben is practically a grown up now and max sometimes goes whole afternoons without throwing a major tantrum. and max used to nap back in those days. and tim's work schedule was different. while he still has crazy hours, back then he often wouldn't get home until midnight or later. and i work a couple days a week and get to interact with other adults who i get to joke around with. and at least from what i read online, i find a lot more honesty than i used to. way back when, it seemed like everyone else had the perfect husband, the perfect kids, the mostly perfect under control lives, and the perfect food, crafts, etc. i felt the need to express that, while my life was good, it fell short of perfection every once in awhile.

i really like writing, but, most of the time, i have other things that i'd rather be doing at the end of the day. this post resonated with me on the feminist housewife-the idea of prioritizing. while tim and i fantasize about days that have 30 hours, or even just 26, i don't have enough hours in the day to do all the things that i'd like to do, and at this stage in my life, i've found sleep, time with my husband when he's around, and a clean house are more important to me than writing.

that being said, i'm really going to try to carve out some time to share a few things that have been in my brain and not have to spend each blog post explaining why i haven't been blogging.

until then, over and out.

2011

2011-12-31T22:23:00.004-06:00

today as i thought about the passing of another year and what i wanted to say about it, i cried. yes, i'm exhausted from a very busy week, which always makes me more sensitive, but honestly, it's been a pretty tough year. not that any of our last seven have been praticularly "easy" years, but this one has been especially hard on me. tim's job keeps him away from our family a lot. our boys are exhausting. i don't know what the future holds for our family.

but i also know that these struggles are blessings. tim has a secure job that he likes. our boys are amazing. these challenges help me to grow and to trust.

and a lot of really great stuff has happened this year too. our friends and family have welcomed so many beautiful babies into this world. we've had many really great days together as a little family, finally learning how to treasure the precious time we have.

2011-you brought me to my knees many times. but you also taught me a lot. i'm tired but thankful. thank you Father.

holiday recap

2011-12-31T21:38:00.003-06:00

yes, i know that it's still the Christmas season, but after new year's it doesn't really feel like it to me. i wish we had wonderful traditions with our little family, somehow highlighting the 12 days of Christmas, the Feast of the Holy Family, Epiphany, etc, but we don't. so to me, this is the end of the Christmas season, and i can officially say that we survived.

after my whiney post about santa, i decided i could either be a grinch about Christmas or i could just do my best and roll with it. tim insisted that he wanted to do the santa thing, even pretending to call santa on his phone when ben was having a meltdown on Christmas Eve. i really had to bite my tongue, but i did. in fact, when tim fell asleep on Christmas eve when he was supposed to be helping me get everything ready, i was the one who placed their santa present under the tree and disposed of the santa snack. the boys were excited in the morning, but they really didn't make a big deal out of it and really didn't have much time to linger thinking about it because we needed to get out the door to Mass.

our Christmas miracle was that we made it to Mass ON TIME and the boys were mostly good. it was a wonderful gift to me.

after spending a fun Christmas Eve with my big family, we spent a relaxing Christmas morning with Tim's family. the boys got some really cool, thoughtful presents and we had such a nice time being with his smaller family. Christmas night was spent at a big gathering of tim's extended family, which was also a really nice time to catch up with some of his cousins that i hadn't seen in awhile.

by the time we finally made it home we were exhausted, but also filled with gratitude to be surrounded by so many wonderful people. if we were responsible adults who made good decisions, we would have went to bed, but instead we welcomed one of tim's oldest friends out to our house. since we hadn't seen him in a while and he was only in town for a very short visit, we didn't want to miss out on catching up with him.

the 26th brought another very fun but very exhausting night as we hosted a gathering of friends late into the night.

the rest of this last week has been a whirlwind of more wonderful people and not so delightful mornings, being woken by the boys far earlier than i would prefer.

we are so, so blessed to be surrounded by so many wonderful people. for tim and i, the struggle is in how to balance our desires to socialize with our responsibilities and with the needs of our family and our wimpy, sleep needing bodies. i think if i could sleep for a week straight, or maybe all of january, i would feel recovered.

blurg, blog

2011-12-31T21:21:00.002-06:00

back in november my fantastically nerdy brother pointed out that i should try to make it to 40 blog posts for the year. in 2009 i had 30 posts, 2010 had 50 posts, so 40 posts would nestle right in the middle. at the time i think i had 7 to go. although my posting has been pretty few and far between, i figured i could do it. i had several projects i had never gotten around to posting and i knew i would have something to say about the holidays, so in my usual style i procrastinated.

well, it's now new year's eve and i'm only at 37. i've oscilated between being lame and doing several filler posts like last year or just leaving it at 37. this has been an odd year anyways, so why not leave the number that way. but i just can't do it. and it's my blog. and anyone who reads this is kind enough to put up with me anyways, so...onward to 40.

santa santa santa

2011-12-20T20:44:00.004-06:00

i am stranded in bed and i'm bored. if i lay still in bed, i don't feel sick. then i think maybe i'm feeling better and get up, then feel sick again. no, i'm not pregnant, just trying to fight off a bug. since i've exhausted apartment therapy and because it makes me want to get up and do projects (cue nausea) i figured i'd dust off some cobwebs over here.

for most of the month of december the boys have been talking about santa a lot, which reminded me of these posts i had written way back in the day about Christmastime. rereading them was funny. not so funny that it's pretty much the same stuff that i'm struggling with two years later.

before the holiday season rolled around, or maybe it was right after thanksgiving when some people were starting to put up decorations, ben declared one night while we were driving home that, "santa's not real, right mom?" i asked him a little bit why we thought that, but before we really got into it, we somehow got distracted. i kept meaning to revisit it with him and clear things up once and for all, but i'm a little paranoid that if i tell him the truth, he'll ruin it for some other kid. and with all the santa stuff swirling around now, he's back to thinking santa is real, mostly.

i've always been vague about santa. when he asks questions i ask him what he thinks. i talk about the santas we read about in stories or he sees in shows. now that max is older, him and ben have santa discussions-does santa have a car, does santa have kids,etc.

last year we were at the mall in december and he saw the santa that was there for picture ops, and although we didn't do pictures, because it was a tuesday morning and the mall was mostly empty, we had a really sweet experience with a very kind man. the other night as we were driving into my parents' neighborhood i saw a santa walking out of a house to his car and intentionally didn't point him out because i'm mean like that and didn't want to deal with the questions. but then ol maxey the hawk piped up from the back seat, "I JUST SAW SANTA!" ben chimed in that he saw santa too, but thought max was referencing the snow globe inflatable that we were driving by and then we were at grammie and poppa's. but as i unbuckled him from his seat, he said very definitively to himself, "i really saw santa."

so they've seen the guy (although even when we saw the mall guy, ben knew it was a guy dressed up as santa, but then goes back and forth in his belief) and santa is what every acquaintance talks to them about and what toys they're going to get from him. i want to make them wear shirts that say, "please don't ask me about what santa is going to bring me" because it totally reinforces the message that christmas is all about presents. i don't want them to be the brat that i was and only care about the stuff part and be disappointed when they don't get everything they want.

i just don't think i can make a convincing enough case for Jesus and "the reason for the season" when the competition is presents and the big guy in red.

i really just want to blurt out "SANTA'S NOT REAL!!! SANTA IS ***NOT*** REAL!!!" but oh man, i do not want the dirty looks from another parent when ben says matter of factly to their kid that santa's not real.

on my other "issues" i wrote about two years ago, we're still working on those as well. i just don't think there's any way around the Christmas eve/day chaos. my family has always celebrated Christmas eve with our immediate family. it got moved to new year's a couple years ago because my sister's family was sick and i tried to push that that become the new tradition, but it was not well received. i love the tradition and of course, the time with my family but it's just hard to then wake up early the next morning and catch Mass as we drive across town to make it to brunch with tim's family; something i also really enjoy and people i dearly love and want to spend time with, but just tiring. in tim's family, they then celebrate with cousins/aunts/unces at a big, big gathering on Christmas evening. this has always been the exhausting icing on the cake. i like his extended family, but we are just ragged by that point in the day. last year i put my foot down and declared in advance that we just couldn't do it. and we didn't, but i still felt badly about it. this year, since the boys are older and max isn't nap dependent, we're going to play it by ear. there are some members of his family that we would really like to spend time with and catch up with since it's been a couple years, but not if we're melting into tantrum puddles. (i'm not just talking about the boys!)

i suppose this all wouldn't be so stressful if tim had off more time from work, but he doesn't. he'll be back to work on the 26th and we're actually hosting a gathering of tim's old high school friends on the 26th with them possibly arriving before he's even home.

it's just sooo difficult. i genuinely like all these people and want to spend time with them. just not in the span of 48 hours!!!

(and this is where i feel like a totally ungrateful brat. some people have NO ONE to spend the holidays with.)

vanity, thine name is boots.

2011-11-27T23:26:00.002-06:00

for over a year, i have been on the hunt for the perfect boots. i've spent at least a few nights staying up too late searching around online for the perfect boots.

one of the problems with finding the perfect boot is that i wanted a boot that was casual enough to wear with jeans but nice enough to wear with skirts for church. the "church" part of that being the hitch. there have been several pairs i've found that would look totally cute with skirts in a bohemian, hippy way, which is totally fine for me. but i try to be normal for church. the pairs that i have found that would be nice enough to wear for church are too boring for everyday jeans wear. i'd finally given up on finding the perfect hybrid boot and decided to just look for something that i liked.

and i found them! tonight, while looking on amazon for toy dealz for wee ones on my christmas giving list, i got a little distracted and stumbled over to the women's boots section. okay, i'll be honest-i got onto amazon to look at toys, but never even made it there. and there they were: all leather, motorcycle boots that weren't too motorcycle-y, perfect color, and way on sale. like regularly $199 on sale for $52.05 with free shipping. these boots. i got tim's approval. i didn't even have to get up off the couch to get the credit card thanks to amazon's oh so dangerous saved credit card info feature. but i just couldn't hit "add to cart".

although i had resolved boot finding problem #1, there's still pesky problem #2: i don't really need boots.

for practical purposes, it would be nice to have some warm, hiking boot type footwear for when it's snowy, but that's obviously not the kind i had picked out. no, the kind i picked out are completely and totally for cute purposes. which is a little silly considering the hip and happening places i go, like aldi and... my parents' house.

i know i could totally justify them, telling myself that even moms deserve to look cute sometimes. after we had our garage sale, i was going to use my allotted fun money as boots money to finally pamper myself. but i just haven't been able to pull the trigger. not even with the super on sale ones i found tonight.

when it comes down to it, it just feels too frivolous to buy shoes that i absolutely don't need, purely for the sake of cuteness, when i could do something worthwhile with that money. for $100 i could buy three piglets for a family in need through food for the poor . or, less altruistic but still not completely selfish, i could use the money to buy some yummy, healthful foods i've been wanting to incorporate that just seem a bit too pricey or some fun schoolish stuff for the boys.

but when all my analysis boils down, i think the truth of the matter is that i would feel fake wearing them. i'm not a boots-to-the-grocery store kind of gal. sure i try to look decent when i'm out and about, but boots are a statement item and i don't really feel like i need to be making that kind of statement. i'm okay with being a nondescript, non-attention getting dresser who just goes about my business. i know when i see gals wearing boots at the grocery store i take notice and start judging-do they pull off the look? look totally ridiculous? maybe if she weren't so full of herself she would be a better parent and could control those wild children? gah-how is she so put together-cute clothes, perfect kids? i know i'm neurotic that all that goes through my head just analyzing someone else's apparel, but i also know i'm probably not the only one. and i sure as heck don't need to be trying to get extra attention. ben and max are plenty helpful in the getting attention department.

i think i'll just stick to wearing my mario bros shirt that i stole from my little brother ten years ago when i'm feeling wild and crazy.

what do you think? am i being totally crazy? do you have issues as well? the more i think about it, i'm reminded of this post about my pigtail issues. hmmmm.

oh ye internets

2011-11-19T23:24:00.000-06:00

this post was supposed to be about the things i've been doing instead of blogging. things that i've enjoyed, but that just don't allow much extra time to write. and then of course, the jessie spano, saved by the bell quote comes to mind, "no time! there's no time! there's never any time!" and then the meltdown where she sings to zach:

i think this is a pretty memorable saved by the bell moment. so memorable, in fact, that when i googled "jessie spano there's never any time" i found these blog posts.

creepy. me and jimmy think alike.

and then i also found this...

or i could just copy and paste this whole post and pretend i wrote it. she even uses the you tube video i used.

when the huffington post has a graph of jessie spano's caffeine intake i feel like my joke is sufficiently lame.

so, this post actually morphed into another post that's been in my mental drafts for over a year.

the internet is, to me, fascinating and inspiring and totally bizarre. i'll come across blog posts of complete strangers that i have never read before that are exactly what i am thinking at the time, like they are my cosmic internet brain twin. sometimes it's amusing, but usually, it weirds me out a little.

a long while ago, i was thinking about renaming my blog to something that wasn't so frivolous. i thought, "oh, 'the extraordinary ordinary' would be a brilliant, totally profound name. like how motherhood is totally ordinary and yet totally extraordinary all at the same time." so i googled it. of course, there are several other blogs with this name, several of them with the exact same tagline that i was thinking of. one of them, this one to be precise, had a picture of her feet wearing red shoes, much like the picture in one of my first blog posts. and, when i looked up her blog to link to it, she had posted about halloween, when her two boys dressed as ninjas. MY BOYS WERE NINJAS FOR HALLOWEEN. as were probably several other million little kids, but still, weird.

i've never liked to be a copy cat. in seventh grade, i wore elmo bowbiters on my bright blue adidas shoes to show the world what a bad ass nonconformist i was. if i do copy, like with projects, i try my best to give credit. but come on-people are stealing the content right out of my brain.

at least i'm not the only one who seems to have this problem, as evidenced by this article i had read awhile ago about that steve jobs/apple silhouette that was all over after jobs died.

it's hard to be an original these days.

a funny

2011-11-18T20:36:00.003-06:00

since i don't seen to have any "time" for a real post, let me share this. i'm a little embarrassed by how much it amused me. i may have snorkeled a few times.

hope you enjoyed. and maybe snorted or snorkeled.

question

2011-10-24T22:20:00.002-05:00

to those of you who use google reader: when i publish a post, then realize there's an error in it and go back and edit it and repost it, does it show up as a new and different post? what i'm asking is...is their proof of my neurosis lurking in your google reader?

happy faces happy tummies

2011-10-24T22:15:00.002-05:00

of course when i muster the energy to write, blogger has changed the format/template. dear world: i don't like change. it is not helpful. regardless:

today was a good day.

i used to think that a perfect day would look something like a hallmark commercial. breakfast in bed, tidy, well behaved children always smiling and laughing but never actually making any noise, nice house that's perfectly clean and in order as the backdrop, yummy looking food that the mother either doesn't have to prepare or clean up after or that she joyfully prepares in her cute stylish outfit without nary an interruption from those quietly smiling children.

yah, that's just not doing to happen around here. tim tried to make me breakfast in bed once and the boys screamed from the dining room table because they wanted to be with me. when i gave in and let them join me, they stole all my food and something ended up getting spilt. not relaxing. i've come to accept that even the best of days, at this stage of my life, are going to involving preparing food, breaking up squabbles, wiping bottoms, and weathering max fits. because in case you didn't know, it's really hard and totally traumatic for max to have to get his own socks out of the drawer. not even put them on, just get them out. we had two of those meltdowns today.

i have this yummy yum yum to thank for setting the mood of our day. when i saw the recipe last night on angry chicken, i knew i wanted to make it today. this was the fourth recipe i've tried for something like this. for awhile i was stuck on trying to make them in a muffin pan as individual popovers, but they always got stuck and i hate cleaning the muffin pan. this recipe was perfecto! gotta love cast iron. ms. amy karol called hers a dutch baby. when max asked what i was making for breakfast and i told him a dutch baby, he seemed confused and suspicious. i decided to just call it a puffy oven cake, which is what my nephew calls this same sort of creation.

we put extra butter and a little maple syrup on ours after taking it out of the cast iron. the boys enjoyed watching it deflate but it always makes me a little sad. so lofty and then so flat. side note: i used whole wheat pastry flour and it was still totally delish.

i was a little nervous serving it to the boys because, like i've said, i've tried something like this before and i don't remember the boys loving it, but i think i put jelly on it once and blueberry sauce another time. plus, since it was super easy to make and fun for me, i figured naturally they would hate it purely to spite me. but oh happy day! they loved it! so much in fact that i made another one for our afternoon snack. i love how easy these are.

because the weather was absolutely beautiful, i decided we should have a picnic. puffy oven cakes are even better when eaten lying down soaking up glorious sunshine.

and a little kombucha because momma was feeling really wild and high on vitamin D.

ben wanted to use the camera and this pose was his idea.

while the boys played on the driveway and in the forest, i enjoyed this view.

last monday the wind blew from the north and it was cold and cloudy all day. max's behavior left me in tears several times, i was totally depressed mourning the end of sunshine and the approach of winter and tim and i had a huge fight.

today i spent my day washing windows, preparing food, cleaning up, doing laundry, and parenting. AND BASKING IN THE SUNSHINE. it was no hallmark commercial for sure. the moms in hallmark commercials certainly don't raise their voices or discover their darling offspring throwing wet, dirty rags at the freshly cleaned windows.

but today was still pretty great. thank you God for the sunshine. and the charming offspring who say sweet things like, "momma, i like your fancy hair."

oh my darlins'

2011-10-05T21:24:00.005-05:00

i've mentioned before that my boys drive me crazy, right? what's that you say? "every time you mention your boys, you explain how they make you crazy. it's getting a little old mary." well sorry. this is my life. a big 'ol pot of crazy.

a lot of the time, the brand of crazy is of the frustrated/annoying persuasion. max is a bit volatile and we're never quite sure how he's going to react to things. plus, even when the kid is happy, he sometimes headbutts me, HARD, to show his happiness. and screeches like a pterodactyl. if you hear the screeching and look over to see max grinning at you with crazy eyes: protect yourself.

max is capable of doing a lot of things, like dressing himself, but if he doesn't want to, which is most of the time, he just won't do whatever it is you want him to do and will throw a mega huge fit about it. there are also a few things that max can't do, or that i don't have the patience to allow him to do, like doing every step of making the french toast, including cracking the eggs, that he very adamantly insists he can and should be allowed to do. i've been hesitant to let him carry the one precious egg that we get every few days from our hens because i don't want it getting broken. the first time i let him carry it he kept running after ben, even after i told him to stop running, and was being silly and dropped the egg. it didn't break but i confiscated it from him because of his unfriendly to precious egg conduct. he found that majorly offensive. the next time he was with me when there was an egg, he begged to carry it and i let him, reminding him not to run with it. i was so proud of him for carefully marching next to me and making it all the way to the house without any egg offending behaviour. then he smashed the egg on the big tree stump we have by our front door. careful, careful, careful, SMASH!!! yep, that's max alright.

so sometimes, they make me crazy with frustration.

but sometimes, the craziness is of the mind blowing, totally beautiful love kind. a lot of those moments take place when they are sleeping. i love me some sleeping boys. they're so quiet when they sleep. except for when they thrash and talk in their sleep and sniff their nose eighteen times while sharing my pillow with me. but i'm not talking about those times.

i'm talking about times like tonight when ben sings me a song. we were driving home from tim's parent's house and were talking about something that reminded ben of a song from veggie tales: madam blueberry. he started singing "i'm so blue" and i started to laugh. he asked me why i was laughing and i told him that his singing made me so happy that my happiness came out as a laugh. he then said, "well, this song will make you even happier."

"i love my mom.
she is the best.
we are so happy when we are together.
she is so nice.
i love her and she loves me."
(lots of repeating)

during ben's singing max started to sing but then started to yell at ben for "erupting" him. (how appropriate that max pronounces interrupting as erupting. he certainly is our little volcano.) for about ten minutes the boys fought over who's turn it was to sing to me. i tried to intervene, but i find parenting while driving to be really difficult. i finally just turned on the radio and turned it up to block them out/distract them. it was a bluegrassish instrumental song and it caught their ears. then they started singing again, together but singing their own songs. i turned off the music so i could listen to them. i couldn't hear max very well and he kept fading in and out, but what i could hear was "i love momma" over and over. ben was singing his song again and he also sang about looking at the clouds and about how he wished we lived in metrocity where robots would take care of us.

yep. crazy beautiful. with a little dose of crazy frustrating thrown in the middle to keep me from floating away, of course.

oh those boys.

going going going (and a prayer).

2011-09-28T21:00:00.006-05:00

this month has been way busy. not just the normal exhausting that comes from trying to wrangle my boys day in and day out, but some days,literally, leaving the house in the morning and not getting home until bedtime kind of busy. those are of course the exceptionally busy days, but we are just not used to that level of activity. and even our regular at home days have been quite full catching up on the things that don't get done on the "going" days.

i'm again working part-time, so that ties up at least one full day and two mornings a week. i also watch a niece and nephew two other mornings a week. that schedule leaves us with two open days a week, which had been working pretty well for us, keeping us from getting stagnant at home and on each others' nerves, while allowing time for necessary tasks like laundry, cleaning, etc.

but september feels like it hasn't had any free days. the first week of september a dear friend welcomed a sweet, chubby babe into the world, so we were helping out their family on our free day. the second week of september the boys were sick, but i was still getting things ready for the party i hoped they would be well for. they weren't, but since it was a joint party for our whole family, food still needed to be made and delivered. last week we had a garage sale with several families. this week we had an end of the month goal we needed to make, so there was some extra push at work. our family was also blessed with another handsome little guy this week, so i've been working to get some extra food made so i have an excuse to go snuggle him.

all of that is a very long explanation for something that (if it weren't completely impossible for me to be brief) equals...i've been too busy for writing.

there have been so many things that i've wanted to share, and maybe i'll get around to them yet, since i'm fully expecting october to be lazy and peaceful and full of long stretches of uninterrupted time ; )

in the meantime, i'll leave you with this prayer. my brother introduced me to it and we start each workday with it. this last week, he invited the other people in the office to join us and it's truly beautiful hearing our voices join together in petition to St. Joseph. we've prayed it enough that i've started to memorize it and when i'm feeling exhausted or discourage or becoming too prideful, i remind myself, "all for Jesus, all through Mary all in imitation of thee oh Patriarch Joseph."

Glorious Saint Joseph, patron of all who are devoted to toil, obtain for me the grace to toil in the spirit of penance, in order thereby to atone for my many sins; to toil conscientiously, putting devotion to duty before my own inclinations; to labor with thankfulness and joy, deeming it an honor to employ and to develop, by my labors, the gifts I have received from Almighty God; to work with order, peace, moderation, and patience without ever shrinking from weariness and difficulties; to work above all with a pure intention and with detachment from self, having always before my eyes the hour of death and the accounting which I must then render of time ill spent, of talents unemployed, of good undone, and of my empty pride in success, which is so fatal to the work of God. All for Jesus, all through Mary, all in imitation of thee, O Patriarch Joseph! This shall be my motto in life and in death. Amen.

three

2011-09-17T18:06:00.005-05:00

late last night as i was getting ready for bed, i recalled to tim that three years ago at that time, i was accepting that i really was in labor with our little one and that i wasn't going to be getting any rest that night.

i pulled out max's birth record and we reminisced for a little bit about that wild night. so much of it seems a blur. a very exhausting blur.

kind of like the last three years of life with max. a very exhausting blur, with flashes of time and experiences that are so beautiful that we decide to keep him around for a little while longer.

max, you make me crazy. with frustration and with love. you are just as stubborn as i am and as handsome as your daddy. you have always been a boy with an opinion. you never stand still and smile for the camera because you are too busy going, going, going. or because you just don't want to. you are so inquisitive and observant you wear your momma out.

for all of those things, for you, i am thankful to God every single day. some days i have to wait till you've been asleep for a couple hours to feel that thankfulness and sometimes it floods me and moves me to tears as i lay between you and ben, stroking your hair as you lay your head on my tummy and drift off to sleep. you, like your brother, have pulled me and stretched me and made me grow in ways that i've never wanted to grow, but know that i need to.

happy birthday maximo.

kc time

2011-08-28T23:56:00.000-05:00

a couple weeks ago my mom and i, along with the boys, escaped to kansas city for an overnight stay. because the boys get restless in the car and are quite tricky going to bed, we'd never done any long trips with them or stayed the night anywhere other than grandma and grandpa's, so this was an interesting experiment.

i realize that some might not consider a 3 hour car ride a long trip, but for me, that qualifies. amazingly, miraculously, happily, the boys did very well in the car.

we left around 3pm, hoping that maybe, just maybe, the boys would nap in the car. and they did!! for about half the way up!!

mom and i enjoyed the time to talk and the glorious cloud displays. as much as i don't like riding in cars, the flint hills really are a pleasure to drive through.

i love clouds.

when the boys woke up and were getting restless after a pit stop, we were saved by the DVD player.

(ben's tv stare kinda freaks me out.)

we had such a great time spending saturday evening and sunday with my brother and his family. the boys loved cousin time...

and new electronic toy time...

and it was so nice to just get to hang out with my brother and wonderful sister-in-law since we usually only get to see them at big family gatherings where it's always a little (or lot) hectic and overwhelming.

plus, i finally got to see their oh so cool house in it's completed form. tim and i had seen it the summer before they moved in when they were still finishing it, but we hadn't been back up that way in almost three years and had only been able to marvel at it in pictures.

i totally have a crush on their house. i didn't want to be creepy and take tons of pics of their living space, but their house is just so. dang. cool. (if you want to read more, the house was featured in dwell magazine here.

i love the clean lines, the unconventional use of building materials, and ALL THOSE WINDOWS. definitely not your average suburban ranch! i have to admit, if i had just seen this house featured online and hadn't personally been in the space, it would seem a little sparse and a bit cold-so much open-ness would seem uncozy i suppose. but it is the perfect blend of cozy and private in the bedroom areas and open and peaceful in the living room/dining room/kitchen area.

they designed this gorgeous wooden room divider to basically create another "room" in the big open living room. so, so beautiful. (i was super thankful my wild ones didn't slam into it and break it.)

did i mention the windows?! such a view!

on sunday afternoon my kind and patient sister-in-law took me to trader joe's, which i had been longing to go to for a long time. although the store had been open for over a month, it was like it was the opening day and was totally packed. i'm sure part of that was that it was the weekend-it seemed like a lot of people where checking it out and just wandering along. although it didn't live up to the utopian grocery i had built it up in my mind to be, i would be happy if one came to town. some of the prices were pretty good, some just the norm. the selection was interesting and it would have been fun to just wander and look but the crowd just made me want to grab a few things and GET OUT!

we honestly waited in line for about 20 minutes. but the company was good and the people watching was top notch.

after checking in with the boys and picking up mom, j took us to urban arts + crafts-a totally awesome fabric/bead/yarn/crafts stuff shop that is within walking distance of their house.

it would be seriously dangerous to our budget if i lived so close to soooo much beautiful fabric.

it was cool to see anna maria horner's fabric in person-i have long drooled over it via the interwebs. the voile feels as soft and light as she describes it to be and would be so delicious to make skirts and dresses out of if i had those skillz. serious fabric lust occurred at that store.

after a little more time back at the tree house snuggling the sweet little princess we had to get on the road.

again the boys did well in the car. thankfully grammie is very, very patient and i'm pretty sure, loves the boys more than i do.

a long post for a short trip, but it twas a good trip.

da shelf

2011-08-21T23:48:00.000-05:00

i have some blog catching up to do. i blame tim's work schedule. and my laziness.

we have hard water so we have to buy bottled water. it's a major pain and has led to much marital strife and annoyance-it's actually pretty rediculous how much stress this issue has caused tim and i.

for several years now, our system has consisted of refilling our five gallon water jugs and then filling a pitcher from those that we keep on the counter or fridge, depending on the season. but the pitcher would never last the whole day and always seemed to be annoyingly empty at the worst possible times. plus it was hard for the boys to be able to get themselves drinks with that system. ben was finally able to get himself drinks with minimal messes but when the pitcher was full it was too heavy for max to handle. after five years of getting drinks for little boys, i was ready for them to take over that task.

back in september of 2010 meg at sew liberated had this great post: quenching thirst, montessori style. at the time i read it, her system seemed like a great idea, but i just never put it into action. i think i was being cheap and decided i would just muddle along with our free pitcher system instead of buying a water crock. plus, i was pretty certain the boys would make huge messes with unlimited access to water.

but the idea stuck with me and this spring i was totally fed up with our annoying system. while researching water crocks online, i remembered that my aunt and uncle used to have one on a stand in their dining room, but knew that they no longer used it. being the cheapskate that i am, i called her up and asked if she still had it around. sure enough, she did, and gifted it to me, but no longer had the stand. it needed a new faucet and gasket so i set it aside and procrastinated ordering them.

i finally ordered the new parts in july and when they came, gave the crock a good scrubbing and had tim put it together. we started using it with it just sitting on our counter. it was nice because it held more water than the pitcher we had been using and ben and max could reach it, but tim wanted to be able to just put the whole five-gallon jug on top of the crock instead of filling the crock every couple of days. but when he would do that, it would block the upper cabinets that stored everyday essentials like plates and glasses--no good.

tim wanted to order a stand like this one but i really didn't want to spend almost $50 for something so simple, plus i wanted to have shelf space on the stand. so i said i would build a shelf. *insert tim's skeptical eyebrows raised look here.* in our years of marriage, i may have developed a reputation for saying i would make things that haven't quite materialized. tim has been patiently waiting five years for a tshirt quilt and a lemon meringue pie.

but this time i was really going to do it. i drew up a rough sketch-pretty good for me since i usually just start screwing things together-and called my little brother to see if he would be game for helping me.

with my boys at my parents' house, i went to lowe's to get my supplies: sandpaper because i forgot to bring some from our house, screws, and one 2x12x12 untreated board. fyi: lowe's will price match anyone else, plus 10%-no printed ad necessary.

i thought i was so clever for having them make my cuts for me, which is free, saving myself and brother the time of getting out the saw and adjusting it, but they didn't make the cuts the right length. brother and i persevered anyways, just screwing it together and ignoring the gaps, because i was running out time-the boys' movie was almost over, and i really just wanted to get the project done.

when we stood up the finished shelf it looked great, except for a suspicious feeling that it looked a little too wide to fit in the space i needed it to. i tried to ignore the feeling all the way home, but upon bringing it in the house, it was proven that yes, it was too wide. being the expert carpenter that i am, i hadn't accounted for the width of the boards on the sides of the shelf, which was about three inches because of my thick board.

i was soooo frustrated. i had already been having a very cranky week and i needed this to be an easy project to perk me up and that wasn't happening.

after literally dreaming about fixing the shelf, the next day i took it all apart and attempted to cut it with our circular saw. the thing with our saw is it doesn't cut staight through the board-it cuts at an angle because it's messed up. i tried to adjust it and thought i had fixed the problem, but nope, it still cut at an angle.

totally irritated, i called another brother (there's a lot of perks of having six brothers)and asked if he could help me. i think he could hear the crazy in my voice because he kindly agreed to let me and the boys come over. i would say he helped me fix the shelf, but he actually did all the work while i stood there and watched. he sympathized with me-we both enjoy doing projects but with limited free time, we both get really frustrated when they don't turn out right the first time because then we have to wait awhile to be able to fix them. granted my projects are small and simple and his are big and amazing, but it still made me feel better knowing i wasn't totally crazy for getting so annoyed over a shelf.

the shelf now fits perfectly and allows for a nice display space for some on my colorful treasures, as well as a spot for glasses so the boys (and second kind brother's kids)can help themselves to a glass of water-YAY! admittedly, we had a few accidents in the first couple days of use-max would be so mesmerized watching his glass fill up that he would stand there watching as his glass overflowed and water poured onto the floor. but now with a couple weeks of use under their belts, i think the novelty has worn off and we haven't had any more spills.

now, whenever i get a drink, i think of two of my very sweet brothers who helped me. and the price:

$24.78 sure beats $50 and i still have a few screws leftover and the sandpaper has me ready for my next project.

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

2011-08-06T22:05:00.002-05:00

as a mother of two "energetic" boys, i sometimes fantasize about having one of these suits.

like tonight, as i was getting the boys' toothbrushes ready for them, max was jumping up and down on his stool and landed on the back of the stool, making it flip over....on top of my foot. steel toe boots should be worn around here at all times.

then as i was putting on max's night diaper, we was wiggling and kicking. i asked him to lay still, which he responded to with a high pitched chirp and a bicycle kick...to my nose. i did not keep my cool. that's a silly little quirk of mine-i don't react well to nose smashes.

the protective face mask would have saved the day on that one.

the other night, after a pretty rough day, the boys were being wild as i laid down to read to them. while i was correcting max about something, ben delivered the book he wanted me to read by dropping the hardback book on my eyeball. again-protective mask would have sava da day!

i can't count how many times i've been reaching over to help the boys with something and they jump up or throw themselves backwards, smashing my nose/mouth/teeth.

when i tuck the boys in at night, i lay between them and read to them and we say our prayers. max is always getting up to get more books or get a better view of a page or get yet another drink of water. to get up from a laying position, he has to firmly plant an elbow in my chest or ribs to heave himself up. both boys have also always done that if they're sitting next to me in a chair or on the couch and they get up. chest pads-yes please.

i feel like i'm a pretty tough gal, but geez, sometimes i'm just ready to throw in the towel. it's particularly tough because tim's not home very often, so i don't have a tag-team partner to throw into the ring when i just can't be patient anymore. and i've never been a very patient person. although i joke about my frustrations a lot, some days, it all just seems like too much.

God, grant me the strength to mother these boys.

LBJ, NFP, TOB, LOL

2011-07-28T20:50:00.002-05:00

this week is "national natural family planning awareness" week. when i saw that in the most recent issue of family foundations, the magazine of the couple to couple league, i filed it away in my brain, thinking, "hmmmm, that would be a good time to hash out some of my thoughts that have been floating around in my brain."

but when i try to sit down and write about nfp, i can't get past my amusement that, in my head, when i think of "n. f. p" i can't help but mentally sing the letters to the tune of "lbj" from the musical hair. then i get further distracted thinking i should make up my own nfp appropriate lyrics to go with the rest of the tune. the part that amuses me the most about this is that i've only seen hair (the movie) once and listened to the soundtrack a few times while my brother learned the lyrics to one of the songs for an audition back in high school. so tonight, i decided to youtube the song to hear what the rest of the lyrics were, because all i remembered was the "l.b.j" part. and this is what i found.

after listening to the song, i still couldn't really figure out what they were saying. (i can never understand the song parts of musicals-which is why i have a hard time following the plot and don't like musicals. i know, i'm weird.)all i could catch was lbj, lsd, cia, fbi, cackle, cackle, cackle. so i looked up the lyrics and they are:

LBJ took the IRT
Down to 4th Street USA
When he got there
What did he see?
The youth of America on LSD

LBJ IRT
USA LSD

LSD LBJ
FBI CIA

FBI CIA
LSD LBJ

no wonder it didn't make any sense. and then i thought, "well, those lyrics are pretty simple, i should be able to come up with something nfp appropriate to go along with that." but i got nothin'.

---

on a somewhat related tangent, initial abbreviations really annoy me. i'm very literal, so when i read clever, instant message/texting abbreviations, my brain gets confused. like when someone comments on facebook "rofl" to something that amused them, my brain thinks, "why are they rofling?" (which is like ralphing. translated-they are vomiting.) i hate all the mothering related message board lingo-"cding and bfing sahm to 2 dds". WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!!! okay, i know what it means, but come on people-use words! (i know, i know, this coming from the girl that refuses to capitalize, but still.)

as i was reading family foundations the other day, embedded in an article, it had an info box entitled, "understanding TOB". i read that as, understanding tob, like a word that rhymes with job, like the guy in the bible. and i'm thinking, who is tob? is that short for toby? i don't remember there being a toby in this article. and then i realized they were talking about theology of the body. dangit people. words. words i tell you!

little black dress, when mentioned in magazine articles like, "every woman needs a LBD" makes me think "lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender" (lgbt) or "latter-day saints" (lds) "why does every woman need a mormon lesbian?" it's so confusing to live in my head.

and finally, this rant wouldn't be complete without a discussion of the term "woot". a lot of people use it on facebook (yes i'm looking at a few of you) and it makes my brain glitch. at first, when i saw it, i just didn't get it. then, after seeing it enough in context, i figured it meant something like "hooray" or "good for you/me". but where did this come from? so i googled it and this is what i found on wikipedia. i still want to ask people, "why do you use that term?" i suppose i'll still be your friend if you do, but just know that your making my brain hiccup when you do.

---

well, i think i've sullied the good name of natural family planning enough. i really thought i'd be able to pull out of my goofy mood, but the headache that i have makes brow furrowing deep thought hurt, so i just couldn't do it.

peace out. woot woot!

"i'm dyyyyyyying"

2011-07-19T21:46:00.004-05:00

in case you haven't noticed, it's a tad on the warm side around here. yesterday i was really tired from a busy weekend and my tolerance for everything, but especially the heat, had reached an all time low.

as i stumbled around the kitchen trying to figure out what to feed the boys for dinner, i kept catching myself almost crying out, "i'm dyyyyyyyying!" the only thing that stopped me was the knowledge that my boys would then repeat it in moments of boredom or annoyance and i would have only myself to blame for the new addition to their whining repertoire.

searching the fridge, the only thing that sounded edible was iceberg lettuce. cool and crisp. "yes", i mentally declared, "i'm going on an iceberg lettuce hunger strike until this heat lets up!" figuring the boys might not be too wild about the idea, i think i finally made sandwiches for dinner.

when it's this hot, i have no motivation to cook. (not that i'm really super motivated when it's a more reasonable temp.) standing in front of a hot stove-nope. steamer or crockpot heating up the kitchen-no thank you. baking-out of the question!

i actually did all those things for a good part of the day on saturday and sunday morning to get ready for ben's birthday party on sunday, which i think brought on my "i'm dyyyyyying" episode yesterday.

while i find the weather and the parched landscape it's creating pretty dreadful, the colors in my kitchen these days, when i brave the heat and make it to the store, are quite beautiful.

to me, the color combinations in a peach (and the flavor) are proof of God's existence.

and of course you have to have watermelon in the sum, sum, summertime.

though i'm not a big sweet drinks type of person (unless it has alcohol in it), my guys sure enjoy "special drinks", so i made watermelon lemonade sweetened with stevia.

i think i enjoyed the color as much as the flavor.

since we can't live solely on pretty fruit, the grill comes in handy.

for me, the epitome of summer food is any combination of basil and tomatoes. with fresh mozzarella, on fresh bread with parmesan, cracked black pepper, and evoo, with pasta, i love it all.

my issue with summer food is that i have a hard time buying it at the store. my parents always had a big garden growing up, so summer food was food we grew. watermelons and cantaloupes came from a family friend up the road. cucumbers came from my uncle next door. tomatoes were so fresh i swore i could taste the sunshine in them.

but so far, my own attempts at gardening have proven pretty worthless. i work on saturday mornings, so the farmer's market is out of the question. i treasure produce that we're given by family, but this year it seems like everyones' gardens are suffering. to buy a melon or tomato that i know has been shipped across the country seems silly when i live in the agricultural heartland. but alas, i should just be thankful i'm able to buy food for my family. and continue to try to improve my garden soil. and maybe check out a few gardening books ; )

so what do you like to eat in the summertime?

little big chair.

2011-07-10T21:57:00.000-05:00

when we were engaged tim's mom gave us a cool vintage chrome dinette table and a couple of unmatched chairs. i used it in the house i shared with a couple other girls and then after we got married and settled into our house, we fetched them.

one of the chairs had seen better days. it was fine comfort wise, but esthetically, it was gross. or more specifically, the seat was gross.

a couple of years ago, in a fit of random crafty energy, i took it apart, determined to recover it and make it presentable. when i was taking it apart, the bolts were really weird and i wasn't sure that i would ever be able to get them back together, so i abandoned the project. (i do things like this a lot.)so there it laid, disassembled, under my craft table for a couple years.

(i also wasn't very motivated to finish it because we didn't really need another chair. i don't like doing projects just for the sake of having a project, especially if it's going to cost me anything.)

in june i was cleaning out and decided that i needed to either finish the chair or just trash it.

spurred by my self imposed ultimatum, i went for it. i burrowed my dad's staple gun and went to town on the seat, using a thrifted sheet that hopefully had a busy enough print to hide wear on the fabric. fast and dirty is an appropriate description of my reupholstering style. seriously, looking at the underside of this chair makes me laugh.

i just went over the old fabric because i knew the stuffing of the chair would crumble if i took it off and i wasn't at all interested in having to buy new batting or stuffing.

once i finished the seat i decided to put the chair back together, that way, if the bolts wouldn't go in (the problem i suspected two years ago) and i had to pitch it, i wouldn't have wasted any more time on the backrest part of the chair. after trying to put the chair together for over 45 minutes, some swearing involved, i was about to throw it out the window. instead, i went to bed and asked tim to take a look at it on his next day off. he got it in less than 10 minutes. (score one in the "why i should keep him" category ; )

i hesitated on the backrest part of the chair for several weeks because i wasn't quite sure how to recover it. the way it had been done before looked a little more detailed (read: effort requiring). remember, i am a lazy, fast project crafter.

last sunday, i was in a cranky mood and i was tired of the unfinished chair sitting around so i went with the "i don't care how you turn out-i'm tired of looking at you" method.

i learned a pleasant thing about myself: i enjoy hand sewing. that's what i had been trying to avoid, but turns out, it's very peaceful and satisfying.

so i got the chair done. i feel like it turned out well, but honestly, just like i felt two years ago, i don't really need another chair. sure it's nice to have to pull up to the table if i need an extra chair, which i have already used it for, but i actually already have another extra chair stashed in a different corner. so right now it's the glorified basket holder for toys and other stuff that need to go upstairs but i'm too lazy to actually take upstairs.

the thing that i really do like about this chair is the funny little face that the back of it makes. i had planned to paint the screws white, but decided to keep it this way. it reminds me of the little brown guy in a game my brother plays, little big planet. apparently, his name is sackboy.

it's okay if you don't see the resemblance. i know it's there.

an ode to june

2011-07-06T19:49:00.003-05:00

i'm not ready for july. i'm pretending that the awesome celebration we had monday was Family Fest 2011 and that we're still leasurely hanging out around mid-june.

i don't know why, but july makes me feel a little panic-y. maybe because as a student it meant summer was almost half over. then as a grown up, the first july of our marriage, we grieved the loss of our first little one. the next year, when i was pregnant with ben, july meant baby was coming soon and we were not at all ready. and then he came, not in the way we had planned, the first of many trials in those early months. and of course there's the crushing kansas heat that sucks the life out of you ten seconds after being outside.

but june, oh how i love june. this year i decided it is officially my favorite month, even though it was a questionable june this year.

if we're lucky it starts out coolish and sometimes even rainy. it's laid back and slow with little expectations or plans.

i love the first sounds and sights of summer that emerge in june. lightning bugs. berries. summer nights.

i fell for tim in the summer nights of june. i lived by myself for the only time in my life starting that same june.

i quit a job that i hated in june in a bit of a huff and it felt awesome.

tim and i seemed to finally hit our stride that first year of our marriage in june and then were filled with excitement when we found out we were going to become a family of three the same day my brother got married. we carried that fun little secret for a couple weeks and then got to know the joy of sharing that news with family.

when i was pregnant with max, ben and i had a really good june. we ate breakfast and lunch on the deck most days. we puttered around the house and the yard. ben was between really trying stages of development and was really fun to hang out with. we enjoyed my parents being closer after their may move.

the last two years i don't remember much of june, but i'm sure they were above average.

goodbye june. i wish you would have stayed longer. and been longer. i miss you already.

oh mittens

2011-06-28T22:39:00.004-05:00

max has been having a hard time lately expressing his wants and needs. and by lately, i mean the last 2 years of his life. here are some recent examples: max-"i don't want a fork. i don't want THAT fork. I DON'T WANT A FOOOORRRRRRKKKKKKK!!!!" while pushing the fork away at the table. me-"well then you can go get whatever utensil you want to eat with max." max, completely calm and cheery-"i want that fork." and then he happily eats his dinner.

or: max-"i don't like this dinner. i don't want that food." said with varying degrees of snotiness. me-"just try one bite max. usually you like (insert whatever we're having for dinner)." max-more snotiness and pushes his plate away, resulting in a time out complete with screaming and crying. when he is finally returned to the table and given one bite-" i like this dinner. thank you mommmy." then proceeds to eat all of his dinner and ask for more.

yesterday, to prevent a meltdown about a lost sticker, i quickly intervened and gave him a new sticker. little did i know, that darn little helicopter sticker would cause us much strife. me-"max, do you want it on your shirt, right here, like this?" carefully asking to avoid a freak out over an ill placed sticker. max-"yes." then, instantly upon me placing the sticker in the approved place and position, max-"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!! NOT LIKE THAT!" i encouraged him to ask nicely and helped him flip the sticker over, which he declared the proper position. again-"NOOOOOO!!! NOT LIKE THAT!!!" and that's how the insanity continued. i told him because he was being rude i couldn't help him. and we were trying to get out the door. he kept flipping it from right side up to up side down. nothing was right. after screaming and tears he finally got distracted, only to resume the fit at my parent's house. God bless my mother for intervening with some different, less frustrating stickers. curse you helicopter sticker.

this morning at breakfast i served max his fried egg whole because we've had some "issues" in the past over me cutting his egg into pieces. after eating his toast he asked me to cut up his egg. i asked him several times if he was sure he wanted me to cut it up. yes, he was sure. and for about ten seconds after cutting up the egg, i thought everything was going to be okay. but no. suddenly and very dramatically, he had a change of heart. he NEEDED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! his egg to be whole again. i just cleared my plate and went and got dressed, soo not in the mood to listen to another egg fit.

i'm recording these max moments so that in 30 years, when i look back at pictures of max, i'm not fooled by those golden curls

i love you dearly max, but you make me crazy. you're lucky you're cute.

and that, occasionally, you sleep.

nom nom nom

2011-06-24T16:09:00.000-05:00

the other night i made these black bean burgers. i changed the recipe a little bit to suit my taste/laziness, leaving out the cumin because i didn't think i had any, but i'm pretty sure i do, and used one can of well drained rotel in place of the green onions and tomatoes. for the cilantro, instead of measuring it, i just chopped the stems off the end of the bunch and threw it in the cuisinart. me loves cilantro so too much isn't a concern.

i froze most of them but then ended up pulling them out of the freezer for an easy lunch to serve my sisters and some nephews. popped in the oven for about 15 minutes at 350 and they were ready to go. i served them with an avocado mashed up in mayo, but i think guac would be a better topping. i just didn't have enough avocados on hand to make quac.

overall, i thought they were pretty good. not like crazy delicious, order them at a restaurant good, but tasty, healthy, and pretty economical considering they probably cost $2.50ish to make eight good sized patties-something i'll make again to pull out for lunch.

you see, i'm terrible about eating lunch. the boys usually eat pb&j or quesadillas with carrot sticks and fruit, but i get tired of that, so then i just don't eat. and then, mysteriously, i'm really crabby and tired all afternoon and get to the point were nothing would make me happier than a double cheeseburger. drool.

i'm trying to be better about taking care of myself instead of investing all my energy (or lack of) and resources in the boys. not only does my body feel better when i eat-duh, but my mood is better. instead of feeling like a frumpy sahm who eats the boys leftover lunches as i clear the table, i feel like a grown-up who is rewarded with a tasty lunch after a morning of work and play.

the challenge is doing this on a modest food budget. i've often told tim that if we had excess money, i would much rather spend it on food than a bigger house or better cars. buying all organics and not thinking twice about buying five new ingredients for a recipe that i will have no other use for-yes please. but for now, not my reality.

so my lunch criteria is healthyish, tasty, and frugal. oh, and easy. leftovers are great but not always available. so what do you have for lunch?

ye elusive time

2011-06-13T17:42:00.006-05:00

yes, i haven't posted in a while. most of the things on my mind these days are too tricky to try to hash out into words. or not very positive. or we're too busy having fun and living to stop and write about it. you know-life.

so let's see...what have we been up to?

:: outside time!! sandbox. water time. the pirate ship. the park. picking mulberries. it doesn't matter what it is. the day is always better when we get outside time. i'm sure the vitamin D helps a bit.

:: chickens. we got a new batch of chickens last week and so far, they're all still alive. we haven't had the best track record with remembering to lock them up at night to protect them from predators. i'm determined to keep these ladies alive, so here's hoping. the boys think they're pretty interesting-max especially likes them. he calls them the "stister chickies" (because he thinks they're all sisters).

:: garden. i had hoped to have a big garden this year since i didn't have a nursling or baby demanding my attention and energy, but that just didn't happen. now i'm glad i didn't waste my energy because the whole thing got smashed by the crazy storm we had last week. i also cleaned out our front flower bed that had gotten hideously overgrown and mulched it-such a sense of accomplishment every time i come home.

i don't understand how the hail made the rest of the plant vaporize. apparently an hour of hail will do that.

:: kiddos. in addition to my own two beautiful little beasties, i've been watching a few extra little cuties two mornings a week.

it certainly gets a little hectic at times having five very strong willed cousins under my care, but it also provides a few moments of great beauty and bonding.

mr. j man is the perfect bridge between ben and max and really adds to their imaginary play. he can be pretty shy, so it's really nice getting to know his personality and listen to his stories.

little miss is so fun to have around and it's so sweet watching my boys with her. whenever she gets upset ben is quick to jump in and cheer her up. and as much as i never would have thought i'd hear myself say this...it's kinda fun having a toddler on my hip to chat with, especially since everything she says is sooooooo adorable.

the five year old crocodile (or is she an alligator?) is definitely the most challenging, i think because she's the most hard-headed and is so independent. but man, when i can get her to laugh or when she belts out a song while swinging, it's pretty awesome.

:: not sleeping : (
max migrates into our bed almost every night. i would be fine with it, except he's a really wild sleeper and likes to turn sideways and start kicking in his sleep into my back. if he would climb in on tim's side that would also be okay, since tim sleeps like a big, furry log. but no, only on my side. most nights i don't even wake up when he comes in, so it's hard to break him of the habit. some nights, like last, i put him back in his bed after i was woken up by his flailing, only to be woken up again early this morning to more flailing. i would love to have a night vision video camera to catch all the sleepless nonsense.

max is also at the stage where he's up way late if he gets a nap, but a total mess if he doesn't get a nap. i NEED the break of his nap so then i just put the boys to bed later. unfortunately, ben really needs to go to bed earlier, otherwise, after a few days of staying up too late, he has meltdowns galore. plus, their late bedtimes cut into my precious quiet me-time.

to top off the sleep issues, tim's work schedule is always changing and he rarely gets off when he's supposed to, so he's up really, really late and then sleeps out really late. sometimes, right as i'm getting ready for bed, he comes home, and since that's our only time to chat, i stay up late, without the luxury of a later wake-up time. i, like ben, have been known to have meltdowns galore when i'm exhausted. i fantasize about going to my parents' house every night to sleep, uninterrupted, ALL NIGHT LONG!!!

oh sleep. how i miss you.

honestly, i think messed up sleep is one of the hardest things about parenting, and the thing i was least prepared for.

hope your summer (although technically it's still spring-HA!!) is off to a good start.

tear

2011-05-30T15:39:00.003-05:00

today i said goodbye to these old friends. tim and i bought them, old theatre seats, when ben was a toddler. sometimes after dinner, when we felt like doing something but had no plans, we would go stroll around a huge antique mall that's close to our house. ben would chill in the backpack and we would chat while looking at all the interesting treasures. honestly, we only did it a handful of times, but it was always fun and was a good winter activity, until ben got too grabby and i got pregnant and too nauseous.

close to christmas time we spotted these and really liked them. we didn't really have any place for them in mind for our house and the price was kinda high, so we made an offer that we were comfortable with and figured that the vendor wouldn't accept it. but then he did, and we hastily bought them, making the chairs our christmas/birthday/anniversary present to each other.

but like i said-when we bought them, we didn't really have a place or plan for them in our home and they just floated around, never really being very useful. i had decided a couple of years ago that we should probably just sell them, but knew that we'd have a hard time getting what we paid for them and i felt stupid losing money on our impulse buy. i'd posted them on craigslist a few times but hadn't gotten any interest, except for shady scammers, further killing my motivation.

yesterday morning, it popped into my head that i should post them and did a quick listing. when i came back from church i already had a text about the seats. i got excited, planning out which project i would tackle with the extra money. unfortunately, i got a speeding ticket last night. (much deserved-i'm terrible about speeding. part of my impatient nature.)

when the guy came and got the seats today, i was sad to let them go, but especially annoyed that the money would just pay my ticket. tim was sweet and said i should still do a project. i'm blessed to have such a kind and generous husband. i probably would have scolded him if he was the one who got the ticket. when i told him that i got one, we was very sympathetic.

it's silly how attached i get to things-old tshirts, books, old papers and letters, and in this case, furniture. it's good for me to watch hoarders and home organization shows to keep me from going down that road ; )

style.

2011-05-25T21:21:00.004-05:00

if i were to take a survey about what my style is for dressing my boys and my choices were 1.) preppy 2.) punk rock 3.) sports wear...i would have to make up my own category-simple and free. or ragamuffin/orphan child. okay, that's really just their behavior ; )

for the most part, i'm pretty laid back about what my boys wear. we've been blessed with lots of hand-me downs and generous gifts from a friend the boys charmed into being their adopted aunt/grandma. tim's mom usually gives the boys a few cute outfits for their birthdays and occasionally my mom finds some really cute stuff at garage sales. i've honestly not bought anything for my boys other than a few outfits for ben when he was a baby, that honestly, we didn't even need, and socks and underpants. and their super sweet aunt/grandma even gave them socks for christmas : )

it's probably a good thing that i'm pretty low maintenance myself, otherwise i would spend all my energy trying to wrestle and battle my boys to look presentable.

sure ben-plaid with plaid covering most colors of the spectrum is very handsome.

and of course you would want a similar look for the day, max.

the winter after max was born, one of ben's cousins gave him some black snow boots that he had outgrown. ben's other shoes at the time were some really cute chuck taylor converse high tops. way cute, but a total pain in the tush to put on. so we often let him wear the easy to put on snow boots. and the habit stuck. if you saw my boys at all this winter, you would have seen them wearing their boots. bright sunny days=boys wearing snow boots. sometimes it was a little embarrassing, like at mass when their pants wouldn't stay pulled over their boots (at least making them look a little more normal) because of their constant wiggling or when they would stomp back from communion. or when strangers at the store would point them out and give me dirty looks like i was a 14 year old neglectful mom. and i would explain that they had perfectly nice non-snow boots shoes at home, but preferred to wear boots. apparently it didn't bother me enough to wrestle them into their chuckie t's or buy them other, easier to put on shoes.

but now that it's summer, ben is still suck on his boots. they're easier to put on than his sandals and he likes the fleece lining. (i think they make him feel tough. boots are more appropriate for pirate adventures than sandals.) i had max broken of his boot habit because i put his sandals on for him, but then his cousin, who he totally adores, gave him some black church shoes. now, although i'm pretty lenient about their apparel, i've always had a thing against black shoes. i let him wear them on sunday and had to admit that they were pretty cute, but when he wanted to wear them with shorts yesterday, i totally cringed. i tried to talk him into his sandals, but he was really insistent. i gave in and sent him to get some socks to wear with them and of course he came back with bright red ones. since we were just going to my sister-in-law's house, it wasn't worth the fight.

matching out the door, proud of his style victory.

as i was driving, i again cringed when i remembered i needed to stop at dillon's on the way. then i braced myself for more condescending looks about my obvious neglect and our pitiful poverty.

i had to get a picture of them both in all their glory. ben was proud of himself for matching his shirt and shorts. max's shorts he picked are actually pants that are too small and fit like capris that i rolled up. his socks, although both red, don't match. and of course, the lovely footwear. combined with their awkward prom-esque pose, maybe ragamuffin/orphan child really is the best description of our style.

long long ago

2011-05-15T15:03:00.007-05:00

this post is made possible by the miracles of max AND ben napping, me not needing a nap, and the fact that i have to wait to pick up a tool from my brother before i can start my next project.

back in march, when winter was dragging on and on and i was about to go nuts, i decided to finally tackle a project i had been thinking about for a long time. i had actually planned on doing the project in january and my big sister was going to help as my birthday present, but i wasn't feeling well the night we had planned to start. then i kept putting it off, pretty certain that it was going to be more work than i had initially thought.

my plan was to turn this blank wall, between the kitchen and laundry room, into a chalkboard wall. the part that caused my hesitancy was deciding whether or not i wanted to also make the wall magnetic. the door next to this wall is metal and i use it to hang up the boys' art. did i really need two huge magnetic surfaces right next to each other? i didn't want the wall to get cluttered or to have papers get knocked off the wall as i walked by, and it just didn't seem like i would use the wall for magnets. but...if i didn't make the wall magnetic and then changed my mind, i would have to redo the chalkboard part, as the magnetic paint is a primer and the chalkboard paint is the top coat.

both tim and my sister, knowing me well, encouraged the magnetic primer so that i wouldn't have any regret. better to have it and not use it than to wish i had it.

because the magnetic primer would need at least three coats and it needed at least an hour to dry between each coat i had two choices-work on the project every night for a week, having to drag out my supplies each night, or, get rid of the boys for a whole day and tackle it all at once. knowing my usual lack of energy after the boys are in bed and the fact that i HATE paint clean-up and didn't want to have to do it each night i worked on the wall, i asked tim's mom if she could keep the boys for a day. because she's totally awesome, she kindly agreed.

i was glad the boys weren't around because the wall, as i suspected, took a lot more time and effort than it should have. instead of the three coats of primer the can recommended, i had to do five coats, waiting an hour between each coat. after each coat, i would check to see if a magnet would stick and the pull was too weak to hold anything up. i actually had to run to lowe's to get another can which really ticked me off since the stuff cost about $20 a can.

after five coats of the goopy, messy, horrible smelling magnetic primer, i called it good.

next went up the chalkboard paint. it went on a lot easier, but i was really nervous that it would actually work because it just looked like black glossy paint. i wouldn't know for 24 hours, because i had to let the paint cure, which was really hard for little 'ol impatient me.

as i drove to pick up the boys from tim's parent's house i was totally bummed. the project had taken all day to paint one silly little wall, i was a mess, and i was pretty certain the whole thing was a bust. i spent most of my drive writing mental letters of complaint to the two paint companies.

well...as it turns out, the chalkboard wall actually did work. i rubbed the whole thing with chalk and then erased it, per instructions that i had seen of other blogs but that wasn't mentioned on my brand of paint, and away we went a drawin'.

of course ben had to draw a rocket in my flowers.

and a jeep driving through my daisies.

the magnetic part is still pretty weak, but it has enough strength to hold one piece of paper. if i were to do it again, i think i'd just skip the magnetic part. and i did call the company that made the magnetic primer and requested a refund for the second can of paint, which i shouldn't have needed, and they sent me a check without any hassle.

i've had mixed feeling about the wall. it's great to use for my to-do lists and sometimes while max is napping, ben and i sit down and draw together. but mostly the boys scribble on it, then ignore it for days, which just makes one more visually cluttered thing for me to deal with. or they squabble while drawing because max likes to erase ben's work to get a rise out him. and it makes a lot of dust.

but last night my sister and several of her boys stopped by. the boys hadn't seen the wall yet and kept going on about how cool it was. my nine year old Godson is pretty selective about what he considers "cool", so it made me feel pretty good that it passed his approval. and then i saw this at the bottom corner of the chalkboard this morning, written, hopefully by the seven year old and not the nine year old ; )

that little message made all the work totally worth it.

sigh

2011-05-09T15:53:00.004-05:00

so i guess i never said which monday i would close the comments for my little reader appreciation giveaway ; )

we've been very busy and very tired around here, which seems to be my constant refrain. plus our computer has become really slow, so it's frustrating to spend my precious little free time trying to upload pictures. i think i need to move our pictures onto our external hard drive to free up some space, cause this is ridiculous.

ben helped me draw the names of the winners. yes, i wrote out the names, old fashioned style. i prefer to do things in the most time consuming, primitive way possible.

so if the following people could email me their addresses-mary_strawberry(at)yahoo (dot)com, you can expect something in the mail in oh....considering my speed of action around here....about two years.

*army wife-i realize that's not your name anymore but my brain was frozen at the time and i couldn't remember your married name. please forgive me.

the michelles really dominated on this one. ben must be partial to the name michelle. max pronounces it sha-shell.

a truth and a treat.

2011-04-27T18:58:00.003-05:00

truth: i am a very bad commenter. most days i keep the laptop on the dining room table and get online during lunch or dinner to distract myself. but then i end up getting on the computer several other times throughout the day just because it's there. turning on some pandora for the boys-oh i'll just check facebook. avoiding making dinner-i'll just read a few quick blogs.

that behavior is a problem for several reasons. 1.)although it distracts me from the boys, it usually just makes them wild to get my attention, which just makes me mad. they tend to be in whatever room i'm in and the dining room isn't a very exciting place, so they just squabble. 2.)it majorly reduces my productivity during the day. i just can't seem to resist the siren call of the computer as i walk through the room. 3.) it's really not relaxing. the table isn't the most comfortable place and i find myself feeling rushed. hence, i don't tend to comment when i'm scanning blogs, which makes me feel guilty. i love comments and i know everyone else does to. when someone gives a helpful tip or writes something inspiring or funny, i want to and should thank them or acknowledge them. i always intend to go back later and comment, but i never do.

so i've stopped putting the computer on the dining room table-the room that i pass through a million times a day, and moved it to the family room. i only go out to the family room to chill and if i do sit down during the day and get on the laptop, the boys seem to get distracted by the toys and books that are here. but mostly, i just don't get on the computer during the day nearly as much, although i'm still working on it. although the boys can get annoying by our third shared meal of the day and i wish for the distraction of the computer, it's been really good for me to just step back and really listen to them, chat a bit, and watch my odd little chipmunks eat. then when i sit down after they're in bed, i'm actually relaxing in a big comfy chair instead of feeling rushed.

so because i've been a bad commenter, because you gals (and guys) are great, and because i have a little dollar bin addiction(worthy of it's own post), i'll be giving away five "thanks for being rad" prizes. sorry-no le creuset cookware. think stationary (another addiction) or some other random treasure i find in my craft/crap room.

leave a comment about where you keep your computer and when you like to compute/blog, or you can scold me for my rude online behavior. (mellen, because i love you, i'll accept a facebook comment, but it has to make me laugh to win you a chance.) comments will be closed next monday. peace out.

busy and tired (in a mostly good way)

2011-04-19T21:43:00.006-05:00

life has been crazy with tim's store opening, but i've been trying to roll with the punches...instead of getting my panties in bunches. (BAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! i'm really tired. be warned. things like that are hi-larious in my tired brain.)

max is dazed by the beauty of the new store.

but seriously, i've been trying to focus more on the good stuff and not dwell on the crappy stuff lately. because there's always going to be crappy stuff. unfortunately, as much as i'd like to think that if i figure out the perfect equation of sleep, diet, play, home organization, etc that life will be perfect and easy, IT NEVER WILL BE PERFECT. because as i've been reminded a lot lately, this isn't Heaven.

i'm not a naturally optimistic person and a lot of times the personality needs of my charming boys and myself don't match up, but i've been trying. i think lots of outside time and sunshine, combined with a good multivitamin and b-vitamin, and most importantly, more prayer, is helping. but i'm also pretty certain i will struggle with my little optimism issues my whole life. alas.

so some things that i'm grateful for these days:

this picture represents outside time!!! our new backyard fence!!! and max's hair. and his personal style. in the morning max's hair is totally nuts and it makes me smile. on this particular day he didn't want to change out of his jammies, insisted on the tie and too small spider man sandals, and his socks didn't match. he's my funny little old man.

ben talking in a british accent. the other day we watched a you tube video of a british kid showing how to make wasp jars. although our wasp jars didn't work, ben has been talking with an accent on and off and it is awesome. he's totally aware of how funny i think it is because he uses it to ask me when he wants something. he definitely has tim's ear for voices and that makes me very happy.

art time. although i can be impatient with it because max ends up making a mess most days unless i diligently watch him, i love watching what emerges from their little brains. usually max scribbles but on this day, he very intentionally painted this guy with his watercolors. within the last couple months ben has started drawing pictures that represent things and his descriptions are pretty amusing, albeit lengthy. which has led to...

ben's wall 'o' pictures. inspired by flint lockwood from cloudy with a chance of meatballs, who has pictures taped up on his wall, he asked to hang a picture on his wall. i'll admit, at first i resisted. even now, i'm selective about which pictures we put up. sometimes he wants to hang up paper scraps that he cuts from coupon fliers like pictures of chuck e cheese or pictures of dogs or pictures that he's just scribbled and i distract him or hang them on our other art wall. although i feel a bit controlling by not letting him have free reign over what we hang up, i think it looks really cool like this instead of so random and cluttered (read: trashy) and he is very proud of his wall.

okay, this is more outside time. but it's also brotherhood. the boys are better brothers when they are outside. they tend to fight and squabble so much more when we are inside, and while i realize that's part of being brothers, it's not very pleasant. when outside, max follows a little bit and i love watching ben lead and i love listening to their conversations. on this day, they were exploring part of our pasture/corral and declared this old washed-out bridge to be their "idea spot". it's also really gratifying to see our boys explore our land. our little spot of earth has been a lot of work and frustration for us and i've always consoled myself that it would be worth it when the boys were older. getting to see them wander makes my efforts seem worthwhile.

the beginning of garage sale season. although i'm not a die hard garage saler, picking up treasures every once in a while is pretty fun. although i didn't think this police van was worth a $1, ben really wanted it and i gave in because it came with the four lego guys. it proved totally worth it when ben named the guys blueberry, raspberry, blackberry, and 'frigerator. right now we're keeping our eyes peeled for blueberry, who has gone missing.

and as i sit here and type, i'm thankful, in a weird way, for tim's cold. although it's meant that he is pretty much sleeping any time he is not working, it has made his voice raspy, which i totally love. he's playing a video game right now with his headset on and listening to him talk is funny. the other day he had no voice at all and had to whisper everything. although he didn't appreciate my mocking him, it was entertaining.

so that's what we've been up to. trying to savor the good and accept the not so good-it's all part of this life.

thank you.

2011-04-07T11:28:00.001-05:00

thank you all so much for your kind and encouraging words and advice. honestly, i was almost in tears reading (and rereading) your comments. it really meant so much to me that you took the time to offer me support, and in doing so with your comments, helped other mommas. i'm looking forward to checking out the resources you recommended, and then knowing i have people i can hash out the ideas with-sometimes when i read parenting books i just can't quite figure out how to translate the words and principles to real life. again, thank you.

i hope i didn't worry anyone too much. two sisters, one brother, and a friend all called and offered help, not even mentioning my blog post or out rightly questioning whether i'd totally gone off the deep end ; ) unfortunately, as they were generously offering help and i was trying to let my pride go and better accept help, max was fighting a tummy bug that i didn't want their kiddos exposed to. i promise guys, i'm not just being stubborn and prideful (this time)-i have the mountain of dirty diapers to prove it.

making an effort to at least try to address some of our issues, i took max in and had him checked for food allergies. we have tons of food allergies in my family and they manifest themselves in not so obvious ways. thankfully, he was mostly good and we're working on the slight sensitivity that showed up. we're also trying some new relaxation/destressing energy work when i actually remember to do it.

riding the productive momentum of max's appointment, i finally went and got an adjustment from my amazing cousin, dr. jamie arnold. i generally put the boys ahead of myself when it comes to health, but as she said, i can't take care of them if i feel like crud. i felt instantly better after my adjustment and am hoping that once i get back in the habit of taking my vitamins, i'll have more energy and won't feel so overwhelmed. as michelle t. said in her comment, "When things tend to get scary with the kids it really has much more to do with my stress level than them just acting scary for the fun of it." so true.

while reading faith and family magazine the other day, i came across an article about a mother trying to raise 11! children by herself. while i am in no way comparing my struggles to hers, her words struck a chord- "...and by all means accept their [friends] help. By accepting charity, you give others the gift of practicing works of mercy and help them achieve holiness". i am surrounded by family and friends that want to help. my boys love the time they get to spend with aunts and uncles, cousins, and friends-literally every morning they ask, "can we visit somebody?" they are almost always good for other people and really are pretty charming little fellas to be around (in small doses). it is my pride, and the lies of satan, that tells me that they are solely my responsibility and i shouldn't dump them on other people and that i should be able to do all of this on my own. it is my laziness that keeps me from keeping a basic schedule and making a rough plan for our week on sunday so that i can have the help i need without imposing on other people. i knew this at the beginning of lent (and have for the last several years!) but continue to cling desperately to my will, detrimental though i know that it is.

like danielle talks about in this post, so much about motherhood is dying to self and in doing so, growing in holiness. although most days i'll only admit it through gritted teeth, and some days it's impossible to have the mental clarity to see it at all, i'm thankful for my challenging children and imperfect marriage because i know that if i accept the opportunities, they will strengthen and refine me. if i had a perfect husband and cherub children, i would be so full of myself and how brilliant i must be to have created such a perfect life that my soul would be lost. i would have stayed obnoxiously prideful and disgustingly judgemental and my spiritual life would have been very superficial and mostly just going through the actions.

finally, thank you so much for your prayers. words cannot express my gratitude. i never cease to be amazed by the power of prayer. proof of their effects is that i was finally able to step out of my indecisiveness and take some action. another proof was that when tim walked in the door last night after a 13 hour day and shared his schedule for the upcoming week, it included several closing shifts which means he gets to spend part of his day at home!!! he hasn't had one of those shifts in over six months and with the opening of the new store, i was entirely convinced (as was tim) that he would be there all day, every day for at least several weeks. right now he is upstairs playing legos with the boys, building cars in "big daddy's custom car shop". such a blessing for our family.

thank you.

help!!!

2011-04-04T20:35:00.006-05:00

(i was going to keep this post locked away in the drafts vault, but i feel like it's important to be honest. or maybe i'm too honest and over-sharey and need to just be quiet.)

i got to escape to lawrence this last weekend as a sanity break, as tim is now going to be gone from us even more than the 12 hours a day that he was as he opens a new store. it was a much, much needed break, but i fear after today, apparently no amount of time is enough to refresh me from my boys.

before i even had a chance to regale you with tales of my adventure (which included attending a roller derby) i am back in the trenches.

the boys were actually pretty good this morning, which was refreshing because they normally are constantly squabbling. they both want what the other one has and it's near constant conflict and whining that sometimes escalates to them yelling at each other and pushing/hitting/kicking/biting. the physical part is mostly max, ben starts most of the yelling. some days it has me in tears because i'm just so frustrated and lost about what do to. but most days, i just get tired of it and angry and want to just yell at them to shut up by the end of the day because i'm sooo fried. i don't, but i know that my mood and actions aren't the most patient and loving.

the fun started at lunch time because it wasn't something they liked. i knew they had had pb&j way too much over the weekend and seemed kind of breaded out, not eating their toast at breakfast, but also wouldn't really want anything else. meals are another major frustration because between the two of them, one child is usually whining, or even if it's something they don't directly dislike, they won't eat very much because they get bored or restless, and then they're hungry and wanting snacks soon after meals. usually i don't give in and send them to eat their neglected meals, but again, oy vey with the whining!

while max was napping, i heard ben upstairs in my craft/crap room. he likes to hang out up there and i usually let him, but i decided to check on him. he was playing with some pins that had been on my table, and showed me how he liked to wedge them between the gaps in his teeth so he looked like a walrus. we joked around and i took some pictures of him and just as i was thinking to myself what a nice time we were having, i noticed a wet spot on the carpet.

it was in the same spot that it had been wet another day when he had been alone upstairs. the other time i had asked him why the floor was wet and he said he didn't know, not acting suspicious at all. because me and max had been up there all that morning, i figured maybe max had knocked over my water, even though i didn't remember having a water bottle with me. today, i pressed further, pretty certain that he had peed on the floor. i asked him why the floor was wet and he told me that he had been thirsty so he got a glass of water and when he brought it upstairs he *insert sounds effects and wild hand gestures indicating the glass fumbling out of his hands and falling on the floor*. he was so detailed and matter of fact about it, but i just knew he was lying. i asked him where the glass was that had fallen and again, very cooly, he told me he had already taken it back downstairs. finally i just said, "do not lie to me. you have to tell the truth-did you pee on the floor?" he finally nodded his head and did his "i know i'm guilty and in trouble but maybe i can still charm you" grin. i didn't want to explode, ensuring he would never tell the truth again, so i calmly sent him to get a towel. i made him clean it up, and as he was, the thought hit me that this wasn't the only place he'd done this. i asked him if he'd peed on the floor anywhere else and again, at first he lied. after asking him directly if he'd done it in his room, he admitted that he had. (sometimes i've noticed wet spots on the carpet in their room, but it's always by their dresser where we keep a glass of water at night, so i thought maybe it was spills.)

THEN i remembered there being a mystery wet spot in my mom's play room/storage room after the boys had been playing down there. i had asked them both about it at the time, but they both seemed pretty oblivious. we figured it must have been from some sweaters that she had hung to line dry the day before because it was kind of behind the play kitchen away from where the boys play and right under one of her drying lines. i was so pissed off (har har)when i realized what he had done, but stayed very calm and directly asked him if we had peed on the floor at grammie's house? again with the nod and grin. i was mad, but even more, my brain was spinning trying to figure out how to best deal with the lying situation. peeing on the carpet is gross, but having a kid who can tell a very nonchalant, detailed, believable lie is really upsetting. i didn't want to come down on him so hard that he would just never admit the truth and stick to his lies, but at the same time, i also wanted to scare the bageezus out of him and have a punishment so horrible that he would never lie again. mostly knowing that wasn't possible, i tried to explain to him how disappointed i was that he had broken my trust and stayed very quiet. then he asked if he would still get to watch a show when max woke up-the normal routine. bling went the light bulb-the perfect punishment/consequence. i explained that he wouldn't because of his lies and naughty behavior and he erupted in tears and screaming. call me a mean mom, but i'll admit, that part was pretty gratifying to see him finally really upset over the situation. he kept screaming for at least ten minutes, mostly about how he wouldn't say he was sorry to grammie because it would be too embarrassing, and of course, about how he still wanted a show. several times i talked to him about the importance of being an honest person, but he just screamed.

max woke up during all of that and in a subtle effort to calm ben down a bit and to try to snap max out of a grouchy mood, i gave them graham crackers for a snack. ben immediately stopped screaming but max started. REALLY!!?? max was mad because he wanted " a lot. A LOT!!" of graham crackers. i tried to explain to him that they were all gone but he just kept raging. after having to put him in time-out, he only calmed down because i put his snack in a bag and we left the house.

he was majorly whiney in the car and in the few stores we went to, throwing several fits in target because he wanted to run instead of being in the cart, which i never let him do.

he finally calmed down and cheered up when we got to my parent's house, and thankfully, ben apologized for the carpet issue without any prompting. dinner was of course a struggle and draining, although i'm used to it. after dinner they went downstairs with my dad and watched a show-i totally forgot to enforce that ben shouldn't get to watch tv.

when he got home, because it wasn't quite bedtime, i decided to have the boys help me pick up the house a little-just going from room to room and picking up the toys. ben did a good job, but max, as he always is during clean-up time, was totally stubborn and resistant. first i had to take away the special toy i brought him from my trip, them he lost his bedtime story. he stares me down if i do a "i'm going to count to three and if you haven't picked up that toy..." , totally unwavering until i get to three and move towards him to take him to time out, at which time he finally says, "i'll do it! i'll do it!" but when i give him the chance, he'll just huff and plant himself again, totally not doing it. anymore, even if he says he's going to do it, i still take him to time out because i know i need to be in control and stick to what i said.

so tonight i left him in time out until bedtime, and when i did go in, ben and i had to endure his screaming while i read to ben because max wanted his story. i finally told him i was going to put him outside his door if he didn't stop and that lessened him to quiet whining and sniffing.

i try to be consistent with my discipline, but i know some days i don't do as well as i should because i'm just so worn down and tired of being "on" and in charge all day. i feel like i would need to go to bed when ben and max do to even have a chance at having enough energy to keep up with the boys, but then i wouldn't ever see tim or have any time to myself. many days our relationship already feels like a business partnership discussing logistics, if not just two exhausted zombies staring at each other at the end of the day.

i started reading the love and logic book but at the end of the day, i'm not in the mood for it. (i had skimmed it before and used what i had heard from family and friends. i've tried to go to the class several times but it has never worked with tim's work schedule.) plus, as stubborn as my boys are, and max especially, i don't have much faith that it would work.

my brain spins about how i can try to make things better, some doable, others probably not, or just not very reasonable: changing the boys' diets, new supplements/vitamins for me and the boys, more physical activity, different jobs, putting the boys in day care, etc. etc. etc. i make myself crazy trying to analyze what would help, but honestly, i often too overwhelmed to do the simplest things that i know would help. some days are a little better and i think we're on the up-swing/we've finally started to get the hang of his whole crazy situation. then other days are really, really bad. or in the middle, but pretty unpleasant.

i think i just needed to get this all out, but, seriously, if anybody has some sage momma advice, i am all ears. or if you could say some prayers for our little family, i would really appreciate it.

watch as i can make any post way...too...long.

2011-03-28T23:12:00.000-05:00

subtitle: a recent project

i have always disliked our "entryway", which is really just the space behind our front door, but have never known quite what to do with it. because we don't have an attached garage, this is the door we come in all the time and this is the space that should in theory store all the appropriate "just came in the door" stuff. i think this is an issue that a lot of mommas struggle with. i've heard women fantasize about spacious mudrooms more than chocolate or a tropical vacation.

when we first moved in, someone in the family was getting rid of an oak, 4-peg coat rack with embossed hearts and flowers. totally not my style, but it was free and served the purpose of hanging coats. so we hung that up and used it for awhile.

then, after ben was born and i cleaned out my massage room at my cousin's office, i used the mirror with hooks that i had been using there. i liked the look of it (obviously, because i had bought it) but not so much how it looked in it's new home, the hooks were really small for coats (tim's coat is quite heavy and doesn't stay on little hooks), and when tim helped me hang it, we hung it too high-that's the problem when there's almost a foot difference in our heights. i had to stand at the other side of the room to see myself in it. i would have lowered it, but we had to put anchors in the wall to support the weight of coats and i was too lazy to buy new anchors and try to put them in by myself. (tim would not have been very happy helping redo the mirror-he HATES house projects.) but again, it mostly worked, so i just tried to ignore it.

(this picture looks weird because i cropped out the rest of the picture-tim caught a dinner guest who hates to have her picture taken in a very uncomplimentary pose. the picture was taken in september, so it doesn't show how overflowing the coat rack would get in the winter. )

when max was a baby i added the baskety tower thing to store hats, gloves, keys, etc. i had really gotten a bee in my bonnet that the space needed something of the sort, but after pricing said items and not finding anything i liked that i thought was worth the money, i was stalled. then my mom's neighbor was getting rid of this and my mom snagged it for me. price: a couple loaves of homemade bread as a thank you to said neighbor.

that arrangement worked for awhile, although i wasn't totally wild about it, but then we added our wood box by the wood burning stove and it took over the space of the baskety tower thing. plus, as the boys were getting bigger, we had more stuff that needed to be hung up. the five stubby little hooks just weren't enough for all our stuff, especially when we had friends over. although i have absolutely no problem plopping our coats on the floor when we visit friends, i always felt like a terrible host not having a place to hang the coats of our guests.

enter solution/entryway #3. this summer i got this odd expandable coat rack thing, again free, and decided to give it a try.

i really don't know why i bothered to hang it up. i didn't like it and knew i wouldn't be satisfied with it, but i think the thing that allowed it to stay was the fact that it had really long pegs that would allow us to pile a ton of coats on it. plus the screws and anchors were already in the wall, so i didn't have to invest any effort in hanging it.

then when we combined ben and max into one room and put their mattresses on the floor so their beds would double as a huge trampoline, ben's headboard got put by the door to be moved to the garage. i had seen on this post on better after where the gal turned a headboard into an entryway table and i thought i might do the same, minus painting it.

the headboard would allow for a place to drop our keys and a place to put the million things that needed to be taken to people/returned-a bible left at our confirmation retreat, a necklace my boys broke that i was going to my brother to fix, some stuff to return to lowes, etc. the little sliding doors would be perfect for hiding all that stuff.

but as you can see in the picture, the coat rack totally overwhelmed the headboard, the headboard was really too big for the space, the little doors didn't slide well so stuff just piled up, and honestly, this is more of what it looked like most of the time (or worse):

the space just kept nagging at me, largely because this was my view from my spot at the table for breakfast, lunch, and dinner:

okay, i guess i could have looked out the windows, but the space really bugged me and i couldn't let it go. all winter i stared at this wall trying to figure out what to do. i wanted the space to be functional-no more precariously piled up coats or pesky little hooks, as well as aesthetic. well, at least as good looking as a wall of coats can be.

back in december i was at hobby lobby picking up some candles for our advent wreath and on a whim, bought some hooks for half price that i thought would work well. they reminded me of these from anthropologie but were $1.50 instead of $18 each. (now that i went back and looked at the anthro hooks i realized mine aren't really like those, but oh how i do love anthropologie. last winter i fantasized about getting an assortment of anthro hooks for the space. it remained a fantasy because although it would have been killer cute, the hooks wouldn't have been very functional and it would have cost over $100 for hooks!)

since i bought the hooks spur of the moment, i didn't really have a plan for them. i knew that i didn't want to mount them directly to the wall, but hmmmm, what to do? so they sat for awhile. then soulemama, my wanna-be soul sista posted this project. i had thought about mounting them on wood like that, but needed to get the visual confirmation that i would like it. yes, clean and simple-i liked it indeed. then i saw this post and totally fell in love with the awesome rustic-ness of this wall. after letting my thoughts marinate for a few days, i couldn't take the taunting anymore and decided to tackle the wall once and for all.

i grabbed some wood that i had stashed upstairs after me and the boys took apart a mattress support from an old bunk bed one night when they were driving me nuts (controlled deconstruction is much better than their usual brand of destruction) and started laying it out.

then i had the boys hold it up on the wall to see if i liked the look of it.

i had two options of length. i liked the look and color of the three smaller boards, but i liked the length of the two wider boards. so i decided to use the length of the longer boards as a guide and piece together the smaller boards like the pallet wall to achieve the length i wanted. i spent quite a while piecing the boards together since a lot of them were warped and left too big of gaps when put together, had everything marked and was ready to make my cuts. i even had the forsight to mark each board so the puzzle would fit back together once i'd made my cuts. (note: the boys were literally running around me in circles as i did this after they finished their art projects i had tried to distract them with.)

just as i was ready to go get the saw i sat back and looked at what i was about to do. i would have to secure each of those little boards on the wall and some of them would have to be strong enough to hold the weight of the hooks and coats. i would have to use screws and need to hit studs, not like the little finishing nails used in the pallet wall. although i knew it was doable and would look cool, i decided the little boards just weren't worth all the effort. so i accepted using the wider boards and waited for tim to get home.

as i said earlier, tim hates helping with projects, but he was mostly very patient with this and fortunately it didn't take us very long to get the boards up after i got all the hooks screwed to the boards.

and in all it's coated glory:

although it's very simple, i'm really happy with how it turned out. it wasn't so much the most recent project itself, but six years of it being not quite right hanging over me. i'd considered a lot of solutions over the years including a hall tree or hat stand, plans that included a bench or cubbies, things that i could buy or make. but nothing seemed quite right for us. and for now and for the forseeable future, this seems right. we have space for guests to hang their coats and bags, the boys can reach to hang up their own coats (and DO! when i remind them),the baskets for shoes and hats are realistic, as opposed to a tidy shelf for shoes that i knew my guys would never use, and it's not too bulky. best of all was the cost: $12 for eight hooks. the wood and screws were free.

one down, two more projects to catch up on. although the other two *shouldn't* be as lengthy. they don't have as much history and emotional baggage behind them.

life keeps going

2011-03-21T20:28:00.006-05:00

with everything that is happening in our world, i haven't really felt like writing. you see, the content of my blog seems to fall into two categories- 1.) whining about my boys while at the same time knowing that i am incredibly blessed. and 2.) my projects. i don't watch tv so all of my news comes from npr in the car or my yahoo home page. sometimes i go days without getting in the car so the radio isn't a consistent news source. after a totally frustrating day, i'll get on the computer, locked and loaded and ready to unleash my wrath of frustration about life, then i see the newest problem facing the people of japan or the escalations in libya. then i feel more miserable realizing just how weak and ungrateful i am. or my projects seem so trivial and selfish in a world were sooo many people have so little.

but feeling depressed and worried about the state of our world doesn't help anybody. i wish i could say that i've used my frustration with my boys as an opportunity to pray for others in our world. i've tried, but mostly i've just felt really sorry for myself to an epically pathetic degree. proof of this is that most of my pictures of the boys of late have been taken while they are sleeping. it's my weird way of reminding myself that, yes, i am blessed. although they make me question, "what is insanity? do you know it when you've gone crazy?", i'm thankful for them. i also take pictures to prove that, even in their sleep, they're wild.

by posting this, i realize i'm showing my laziness to all the world-i don't change the boys into jammies every night. some nights it's because one of them falls asleep in the car on the way home from my parent's house and i don't bother to wake them. mostly, it's because i'm too tired at the end of the day for one more battle. max hates changing his clothes and sometimes it leads to major screaming fits. ben's better about it, but he used to be the same way. please don't call srs on me.

max started the night on the purple pillow by the penguin. sometimes when i go in to check on them before i go to bed, i honestly have a hard time finding them for a few seconds.

even with the rail, i sometimes hear max fall out of bed. ben used to roll out of bed all the time. their wildness is a majorly annoying when they sleep in our bed. they have an uncanny knack for rotating to a horizontal position and taking up most of the bed. but i was a very wild sleeper as a kid too, so i have only myself to blame. i just don't for see bunk beds in their near future.

(maybe i'll get some project posts cranked out soon.)

lent

2011-03-10T12:40:00.002-06:00

because i'm a procrastinator, i usually wait until ash wednesday to think of what i should do for lent. it usually leads to a half-hearted attempt at something that is either too impossible or something not very meaningful. and i waver about what i'm going to do because i'm lazy and i don't like to do hard things.

this year, instead of giving something up, because i tend to be an action person, i'm going to focus on doing instead.

i constantly struggle with being a better wife and mother. the boys overwhelm me with their constancy and i'm often cross with tim because i feel exhausted from all of my responsibilities. i've long known that i would do better in my vocations if i were more organized with my time and tasks. when ben was a baby i read "a mother's rule of life" but was frustrated with it because my life was much too unpredictable at that time and i was so sleep-deprived, all i could ever accomplish for a day was nursing and preparing food.

over the last four years, i have written up many, MANY "schedules" and "routines" for us to follow for our days and weeks. but again, i would quickly get discouraged with the constantly changing needs of the boys and work. one day would go great, then the next day the boys would be extra "charming" and nothing would get done or follow order, then i would give up, declaring that it would never work. on top of the needs of the boys and the house, i was always resentful of tim and his lack of schedule or demands. why should i have to discipline myself to go to bed at a reasonable time and get up early when he got to stay up as late as he wanted and then got to sleep in. and in regards to our household, tim is very undemanding. he never complains if the bathroom hasn't been cleaned in way too long or if the laundry baskets have been sitting in our room, full of unfolded laundry for several days. i'm not great at self-motivating, so without the "threat" of his displeasure or with the incentive of his praise, i often just didn't do the stuff i needed to do.

living in a cluttered house, where everywhere i turned, i was reminded of tasks that i was ignoring was exhausting. i was resentful of the boys, because if they weren't demanding my attention, i could just get the stuff done. and when i did get things done, they were quickly undone by my three guys. arrrrrrrrgggg!!!

i've slowly but surely gotten better about some things, but i still have a long ways to go. thus-my goal for this lent. i'm really going to work on being a more disciplined person, knowing that although it will be hard, the benefits for our family will be invaluable. i'm not going to give up and i will focus on offering up my frustrations and interruptions. i will be realistic about what i can accomplish in a day, not setting myself up for failure with an impossible list. i'm going to focus on the things that really make a difference in my mood and attitude, like cleaning the kitchen every night (which i've mostly conquered, but occasionally drag my feet on and then get super annoyed that tim never pitches in to help), clearing off the table every night so that i'm greeted by a clean slate each morning instead of piles of paperwork that nag at my attention, folding the laundry on my set day, and following a more focused daily routine that includes time for work, play, and chill. (and maybe even exercise if i'm working for a truly awesome lent.)

so far, i've failed. i did get all the laundry folded and put away yesterday and cleaned the kitchen, but there has been no order to our day today and growing frustration. oh to conquer my laziness-only by the grace of God.

fun with frames

2011-03-01T22:59:00.001-06:00

another one of those posts that never quite got out of my brain was about my little picture frame painting obsession that i've developed. i was reminded that i never clarified this project when a friend, having seen one of my posts, asked for some pointers.

it all started christmas of 2009 when i had the boys paint pictures to give to a family friend as a gift. because i was trying to save money on the gift, hence the idea of giving original artwork from the boys in the first place, inspired by better after, where people are constantly breathing new life into old, beat up items by painting them, i dug out some old, odd shaped, over sized frames i had in my craft/crap room and painted them black with some craft acrylic paint i had from another project. using the glass pane as a template, i then cut out the part of the boy's painting that i liked the best, and framed it. ta da! super cool, sentimental, thrifty project. (pretend i took a picture of the finished project.)

i next turned my crafty thoughts towards these embroidered towels that tim's mom had given us for our wedding shower, over six years ago.

tim's great grandmother had embroidered them, and while i really liked them, they had sat in a box, unsure of how to display them. i thought it would be cute to frame them, but since i didn't really have anywhere to hang them once completed, i left them sit in their box. (i don't like doing projects just for the sake of doing a project. it has to have a use or a purpose. and generally, be thrifty.)

then the whole kitchen project happened and i had this weird blank space open over the new stove, with that odd little hole in the wall that needed to be covered up.

and since tim's mom had given me a whole box of old frames over the summer because she knows i like to hoard random junk, i set to work painting a set to display the towels.

i liked the size of these-8x10 and the slight variance in their size and design. i figured once painted the same color, they would be interesting, but not too matchy matchy.

while max napped, i let ben work with me. the craft paint is pretty forgiving using cheap sponge brushes, so i just smoothed out any globs that were too big on his frame.

i think i let him help with two coats of paint, then i finished the project after the boys were in bed that night with two more coats of paint.

the next day i cut the towels to the framable size (i had a hard time bringing myself to cut into them) and really had to work to get them to fit into the frames. at one point, i was having such a hard time fitting them in and the boys had started to go nuts, running circles around me, that in frustration, i yelled out, "OH FART TOOTS!!!" ben stopped dead in his tracks, gave me the weirdest look, and burst out laughing. after scolding myself for such crass language, i persevered and had these beauties to show for my hard work.

i think they fill the space above the stove well.

then of course i did these blue ones back in december.

and then the black one for our family picture.

boring oakey before:

dazzling, more contemporary after:

today i was plotting my grand finale of painted frame projects-a multiple frame display wall. but that one might take awhile, if i even decide to attempt it.

so go paint something and make it new. shazam.

blessings and chaos

2011-02-26T08:08:00.002-06:00

i want to thank you all for the tv watching affirmation in my last post. your words meant a lot to me-it's always nice to be reminded that i'm not the only mom who needs a break. and thanks for your recommendations. when census guy mentioned shawn the sheep, i couldn't believe i forgot to include it. ben loves that show, and honestly, i find it pretty amusing too. we're big wallace and grommit fans, tim especially, so anything nick park creates is going to be a hit around here.

i didn't hit my self-imposed post deadline this week. life has been full in good and annoying ways. but that is, of course, life. i really enjoying writing, but carving out the time or brain power is often a struggle. i can't have long periods of concentrated computer time when the boys are awake, or at least not if i want to keep my walls relatively clean of "artwork", the fridge not pillaged by two marauding beasties, or the boys from brawling. but by the time the boys are settled in bed, i feel like my brain resembles those "this is your brain on drugs" commercials from the early 90s with the fried egg. not exactly a brain that is conducive to writing.

but i think about writing all through out the day, formulating many posts that never come to fruition. i think i do this since i don't have any one to talk to-the boys don't count. once, deciding that i needed to talk to the boys instead of keeping all my thoughts in my head, i shared a business idea with ben that i had been thinking about a lot. he totally shut me down, in a nonsensical three year old kind of way. silly mom.

anyways, this is the post that has been rolling around in my head for a week. it finally gets to come out.

-----

last saturday, me and the boys had a wedding to attend. honestly, weddings are tricky for me. they usually fall during nap time, so they require either skipping the nap (nightmare) or rearranging the daily routine, which my boys don't do very well. i usually feel frumpy at weddings compared to all the young, single, or newly married without kids gals that i compare myself to that seem to populate the weddings we go to. having been pregnant or nursing for most of the last five years, my clothes are in a constant state of not fitting quite right, and, since i'm usually holding a wiggly child or chasing one, utilitarian and practical outfits are necessary. necklines and hemlines suitable to bending over and being tugged on a lot, accessories that aren't to tempting to pull on, comfortable shoes-you get the idea. "mother of young children" and "fashionista" don't usually go together very well.

a couple of years ago, not wanting to feel frumpy for a wedding we were going to, i insisted (to myself) that i was going to get cuted up, wearing a dress and heals. although max was eating solids and i brought a sippy cup of milk for him, because he had skipped his nap and was exhausted, he was would have no part of it and was becoming a hungry, angry monster toddler. i ended up stripping in the bathroom so i could nurse him. before that, all through the dinner, ben kept touching me with his greasy fried chicken and ketchupy fingers. nothing makes a gal feel foxy quite like stripping in a bathroom or being covered in dinner debris. take that vanity!

the boys add a certain level of constant, sometimes chaotic, energy to my days, so weddings are no different. by the end of the wedding mass, or any mass, i feel like i've tried to contain two very cute, very loud, very active spider monkeys in a small space, while spectators either scowl at their antics or encourage them with giggles and waves.

at the reception, the monkeys wriggle free of my exhausted grasp and run laps, flirt, and fuel there energy with the oh so cute hershey's kisses that are strewn on all the tables. any attempts i try to make at conversation are interrupted at some point when i have to go find the boys because i can't see them anywhere. keeping somewhat constant visual confirmation on two shorties in a crowd of hundreds of people can be tricky, especially when the room has exits.

we usually come home from weddings with me feeling exhausted and frazzled, envious of the well dressed people who could just sit and have a conversation while they sipped their adult beverage, while the boys are buzzing around house, hopped up on treats and energized from all the people. oh, that, and they're hungry. because of course they didn't eat at the reception, not fond of the food and too distracted by all the people.

so like i said before, weddings are tricky for me. the refreshing thing about the wedding that we went to last weekend was that it was much of the same, and yet, very, very different.

the wedding itself was beautiful-simple, elegant, and sacred. it's difficult to describe how the ceremony felt so different than most weddings i've been to, but it did. instead of feeling like everyone wanted to get the mass part over with to get on to the real party, it was a reverent embrace of the sacrament of marriage. it spoke of sacrifice and service and real love, not just romance. and all of that was affirmed by those in attendance. (i must note, i was able to actually take in the wedding, and even *gasp* listen to the readings because i wasn't trying to contain the monkeys. tim's parents kindly kept them at their house so that max could nap.)

instead of my usual feelings of envy as i looked around at the other guests, i was inspired and thankful to be surrounded by so many good people. next to me in the pew was a dear friend who had spent the last week taking care of four sick kiddos while another one snuggled in her womb. her husband was home with the kids- that's real love. on my other side was another dear friend who was my "date" for the reception, agreeing to help me wrangle the boys- service. tim wasn't able to come, like most events and gatherings these days, because he was at work, providing for our family-sacrifice. there were more families with small children at this wedding than any other i have been to. tired parents and wiggly little ones-a celebration of life. (although, even with all those little one's, there was not a single frumpy momma in that church. beautiful, stylish, and faithful-what amazing friends!)

the reception was much of the usual for me. interrupted conversations, interrupted meal, messy hands coming at me, trying to keep track of the boys, etc. but instead of feeling jealous of everyone else who was able to act like a civilized adult, i was uplifted by the many moms and dads around me who were also in the trenches of parenting- nursing babes and chasing kids. while taking ben to the bathroom for the second time in five minutes (during dinner, of course) i had to smile and joke with the other moms in the bathroom-one changing her baby's cloth diaper and using a hand towel instead of a prefold because she hadn't had time to wash diapers, and the other, the matron of honor, taking her twin flower girls potty and trying to treat a stain in one of their dresses. at one point i couldn't see the boys, or any of the kids that they had been playing with, and started searching, feeling a little panicked. one dad noticed the "crazed momma searching for her cubs" look in my eyes and assured me that the kids were playing hide-and-go-seek. as i stood there, relieved and taking a moment to relax, right in front of me, six little ones popped out from under a table cloth and scattered in all directions. so. dang. cute.

i'm often overwhelmed by motherhood and marriage and the responsibilities of being a grown up. i'm so very, very thankful for the amazing friends and family that i have around me, living out their vocations, inspiring me with their strength and sharing our struggles and our joys.

just call me ming ming, tasha, or uniqua

2011-02-16T08:13:00.005-06:00

before tim went on a 13 day work trip back in december, he signed us up for a free trial of netflix. through his playstation 3, we only watch shows and videos on demand-we've never actually requested a movie in the mail. we had considered doing the free trial several times, but had avoided it because i was pretty certain we would enjoy having it and wouldn't want to give it up when the trial was over. but i didn't want to pay for the service either. well, it turns out that i was right-the free trial sucked us in and we are now subscribers.

as much as i would love for us to be a no television family, i just can't do it. ben is a very constant kid, always wanting me to do an activity or project or play a game with him. i try to engage him and keep him busy, while also trying to encourage (and sometimes force) him to have quiet time by himself, but it's just not enough. with all of the parenting/interaction falling on me most days because of tim's work schedule, i just need a break sometimes. and by sometimes, i mean several times a day. : (

before netflix, because we don't have cable, we only watched pbs and movies. i liked pbs because it was usually somewhat "educational" and because it didn't have commercials. the problem was that unless i caught a show right when it was starting, ben would be annoyed or would what to watch more than one show because he only caught a part of one. the other problem was that max was starting to develop opinions about what shows he liked and disliked (ben will watch pretty much anything the magical glowing box has to offer)and he seemed to dislike a lot of the pbs shows-especially the ones on in the late afternoon, when i need a break the most. the last thing i wanted was them arguing over the very thing that was supposed to give me a break when my sanity was at a tipping point.

(an old picture, but proof none the less of ben's total and unflinching attention to the tv.)

netflix to the rescue. i can pick when we start a show and we have a larger selection of shows to watch. i try to keep our viewing times at set times of the day, other wise the boys will whine and beg for shows all the time. ben would very happily watch tv all day. and sadly, when both ben and i where sick, we did. max will watch for about one show, but after that he'll find something else to do, watching on and off. it was very strange experiencing what life would be like if i let my kids have the tv on all day-very tempting and certainly a lot less work for me, but of course not what is best for any of us.

as we explored the new shows available to us, the backyardigans became a fast favorite of both myself and the boys. if you've never seen the show, as i hadn't, this is the wikipedia plot summary:

The show is an animated musical-adventure series aimed at children between the ages of 2 and 10.[4] In each episode, the show's five friends—Uniqua, Pablo, Tyrone, Tasha, and Austin—rely on their vivid imaginations to transform their backyard into completely different worlds, in which they go through many sorts of stories and adventures. The time-frame of the show can range from a few hours to more than one full day, but in reality, the story always ends just in time for one of them to invite the others for a snack. The imaginary story then reverts to the backyard, and the characters all rush to the house of the person who offered the snack and enter it. After a second, one or more characters open the door, quote the catchphrase specific to the episode and then close the door, ending the show. The episodes focus on music and dancing as much as they do on the stories, with each one featuring a different music genre (such as big band, reggae, Spaghetti Western, polka, Motown, and disco) and four new songs, usually with at least one rearrangement of a well-known or traditional song. For example, in the episode where Pablo, Uniqua, and Tyrone imagine they are secret agents and they are going under the laser beams of a door, they sing the "Laser Limbo Tango", which is sung to the tune of the popular Chubby Checker song, "Limbo Rock".

the songs are clever and catchy and the corresponding dances make me want to stand up and try to reenact them. i can't think of any kids shows that i actually enjoy watching, other than backyardigans. a bonus of this show is that it has really encouraged ben to use his imagination-something he really didn't do much of before. and i can't blame him-i'm totally NOT an imagination player. like, it's almost painful for me. but i'm trying to be better. the other morning we got the whole house picked up because we were pirates ( i was tasha, ben was pablo, and max was pablo two. we have to refer to each other accordingly, otherwise ben is quick to correct.) and we had to follow the treasure map from room to room searching for the treasure. (i did reward them with an m&m when we finished/found the treasure. and yes, my boys are so deprived that ONE m&m is a valid treat.)

another show that the boys really like, but i find totally annoying is wonder pets.

whenever we play an imagination game and ben dictates that we're the wonder pets characters, i always have to be ming ming, the duck with the speech impediment.

the only merit to the show is that i can sometimes get the boys to get in the car faster if i call it the "fly boat" and call them by name while singing the wonder pets song. (yes, i stoop to that level sometimes.)or when i need the boys to help me with something and sing the song "we're not too big and we're not too tough but if we work together we've got the right stuff!"

to add to the annoyance of the show, tim will often walk around the house (as does ben) quoting ming ming about how "sewius" any possible situation is. i try to skip over the wonder pets icon really fast when we're scrolling through, looking for a show to watch.

the boys also really like dora and diego, and while i find them annoying, i can ignore them much better than wonder pets.

so that's our life these days. pretty wild and exciting.

what do you do with your kiddos to keep them entertained when you need a break?

valentines

2011-02-09T15:03:00.009-06:00

please excuse the pictures in this post. late night pics=poor quality. but i figured sub-par pictures are better than none at all.

a couple of saturdays ago tim's sweet momma hosted a valentine making party. she had hosted one two years ago and it was so much fun, so i was really looking forward to doing it again. it is so interesting to sit around a table with other women and watch then create, have some peaceful, UNINTERRUPTED creative time to myself, and of course, just chat. i love to see the ideas that other people come up with-the creative energy really seems to brew and build.

i love to see how people's personalities come out in their projects. tim's sister had an idea of who she wanted to make her valentines for and worked accordingly, customizing each card for the recipient. i, on the other hand, just spent my time making cards that i liked, trying to incorporate different ideas and elements that i thought would be interesting, with no one in particular in mind to receive them.

one of the best parts of the morning was that tim's dad sat down with us for quite awhile and made a card for jeannie. i didn't get to see the final product-we made him hide it away until valentine's day to give to her, but i'm sure it's dazzling. i know i've said it before, but it's worth repeating- i'm so blessed to have such wonderful in-laws. they are kind and generous, and honestly, they're just fun people to be around.

(while we had all the supplies out, i made a card for some friends' wedding that is coming up. aren't their wedding invitations so cool.)

i picked these up on clearance last year-not because we watch yo gabba gabba but because i thought they were so squirrelly. since i didn't get christmas cards sent out, i've been working on sending out valentine's day cards and have fun putting these in for the kids in the families. my motivation for sending out cards, other than telling our family how much we love them, is to give them our most recent family picture.

(the frame for the picture is another one i painted. such a rewarding, cheap project.)

i'm pretty proud of myself for getting such an early start on sending out the cards. i always have such good intentions, but don't actually start trying to send out cards until right before the holiday, and then it just doesn't happen. even with the million interuptions of the boys, i'm pretty certain i'll get these finished in time. huzzah for small victories!

summary of an away

2011-02-02T14:45:00.007-06:00

life has been pretty full around here. family gatherings, illness, a craft project, a book read, more family time, organizing, and of course the boys. nothing too dazzling- just things that consumed the time (and energy!) i would otherwise spend writing.

family time:

for my birthday, tim's mom hosted a dinner and game night. i am so blessed to have such an amazing second family. tim very sweetly got off work a little early, then after hanging out with us for a little bit, took the boys home to put them to bed, allowing me to stay and play balderdash with tim's brother, his wife, two of their boys, and tim's uncle. they are all such clever, funny people, including the boys, and we laughed sooo hard. i couldn't believe how late we stayed up.

fortunately for me, tim then had to stay home my whole birthday weekend(!!!) because his back was really bothering him. bummer for him but totally awesome for me to get to have him around and have help with the boys-even if he was mostly restricted to the couch and recliner. having some quiet time to myself was the best present.

house:

i've been cleaning out the house, organizing, and rearranging furniture. being stuck inside for so much of our days makes the changes exciting, even if just for a day. it amazes me how just moving one thing can distract the boys and awaken creativity.

normally i am a saver, and tim is big time, but lately, i have been cleaning out a lot of stuff. our house isn't huge and i want to make the most of the space that we do have. more than toys, the boys seem to need space. to run, wrestle, jump, and play. with all their busy buzzing about, i seem to need more open space too.

crafty time:

one of my college roommates was expecting a little girl at the end of january and i knew i wanted to make her something. i had really been wanting to try to make a bunting for awhile, but just wasn't very motivated. when i visited jenny in december and saw the nursery, i knew exactly what the blank wall above the crib needed. when baby piper came early, i had to kick the bunting up the priority list.

i was so happy with how it turned out, but couldn't get a good picture of it. (not that i tried very hard. i was really eager to get it in the mail.)

i used this tutorial as my starting point, but because i have a complete inability to follow directions, i had to make some changes.

instead of running the string through it, i used bias tape to finish the top. i think this was easier and bonus-i already had the bias tape. i think my mom had given it to me a couple of years ago when she moved and majorly purged her craft room. (proof of my hoarding.) i also changed the measurements and hand embroidered the letters.

it was really hard for me to slow down on this project and really take the time to do it right-ironing all the pieces, hand embroidering, double sided with finished edges. i tend to like fast projects, so when this one dragged on for several days, i had to fight my impatience. i'm so glad i did. and most importantly, jenny really likes it. (and i'm sure piper does too.)

book:

tim, being the sweet guy that he is, picked up anthony bourdain's kitchen confidential for me from the library. we like watching his show on netflix, not so much for his personality, but for the places he goes and the food. because of his personality on the show, i was hesitant to read the book, certain it was going to be pretty crass. when i finally picked it up, i was quickly proven right. i almost stopped reading it several times-i really dislike vulgarity. but when he's not describing the way the kitchen staff talks to each other or his personal life, the food and restaurant parts were pretty interesting. i like food and i like reading about food.

more family time:

for my goddaughter's first birthday, i had her and her siblings over for dinner so her parents could have a break. really, i just wanted an excuse to snuggle and kiss and smush her with love.

sometimes i offer things before i really think them out. dinner by myself with five kiddos ages 4, 4, 3, 2, and 1 certainly wasn't a very logical way to spend my evening. but we all survived and i got the snuggles i needed.

as a bonus, i got to take some pictures of the "quilt" i made for my goddaughter when she was born. like with the bunting, i was hasty in giving it to her and never got any pictures. along with the quilt, i gave her an outfit that said "sweet pea", so that was kind of the theme for the quilt.

she didn't like being put down. i quickly accommodated her with more snuggles.

and of course the boys:

they're still alive. and cute. and making me crazy. ben is sick right now. the other night i heard him crying in his bed and when i went to check on him, i got to feel the cold squish of vomit between my toes. ah the joys of parenting.

so that's what we've been up to. now to tackle february.

i'm going to try posting weekly, with wednesday as my goal. i won't go into the overly extensive analysis that led to this decision. but that's my goal.

interesting

2011-01-09T22:54:00.003-06:00

i just realized i have over 40 draft posts waiting to be developed or edited or forgotten forever.

sometimes i have a funny topic come to mind, but am too tired to write, so i save a title to remind me later of what i wanted to write about. or sometimes, i start a post, but realize it is too meaty of a topic and i can't quite wrap my brain around it or hack it out the way i want it. the thing is, i don't think i've ever developed a post around one of those titles i left for myself and i never go back and try to fix those posts i just couldn't quite figure out.

some titles that have been abandoned:

green
blackberry heaven
biting baby dan doll
moo moo thunder

and the "post" that i left most recently that made me realize how many times i've done this-"the oxford comma".

this little haibit amuses me.

six

2011-01-06T22:32:00.002-06:00

tomorrow is tim and i's sixth wedding anniversary. to some that might seem like a small number. to us, it is quite an accomplishment. we won't celebrate with fancy gifts or even a shared dinner. if i don't say anything, i'm not sure tim will even notice-his schedule is a blur of days and often, he has to really stop and think what day of the week it is. but as i pause to think about that number and that amount of time, i have a deep and calming peace.

in the last six years we have had nine different jobs, six cars, and bought a house. i started massage school two weeks after we got married and finished my clinicals nauseous with ben in my belly. in the first year of our marriage we mourned the loss of a babe, buried both of our grandmothers on the same day, and celebrated new life. our boys have filled our lives with great joy, great frustrations, and great sleep deprivation.

i would like to say we have tackled all of those things with grace and unity. we have not.

marriage is not a romantic comedy. love is not easy. children and jobs and houses are stressful.

but we are still together, in spite of our fiery tempers and our selfish natures. through the power of God's grace and the help of our families, we are still together.

i thank God for the humility my marriage has taught me.

when tim and i were planning our wedding, with our brains turned to mush by infatuation, we would coo to each other that we would make each other saints.

while i know that marriage is my vocation, and that i have the ability to be sanctified through it, it is certainly not in the way i envisioned those many long years ago.

sadly, i have sometimes fallen into the grave trap of thinking marriage is all lovey-dovey and happy days. no, marriage is sometimes just hanging on when the ride is rough.

i am thankful for these six years. it has certainly had it's rough and bumpy days, but those days make the beautiful days so much more beautiful.

....----===

2010-12-31T23:45:00.004-06:00

the perfect finish to my 50 posts for the year was supposed to be our family slide show.

a few years ago, for our christmas eve gathering, one of my brothers suggested that each family compile a slide show of their family for the year. it has become the best tradition and i really wanted to share our's that tim made to wrap up our year. but alas. i can't upload it. i tried. i'll never succeed at reaganing.

i should have just stopped with my last post, although this one takes me to 50. oh well, things will never be quite as i imagine, but i'm okay with that.

goodbye 2010. hello 2011. can we please be friends?

preparations for the new year

2010-12-31T22:31:00.004-06:00

in my ideal world, my husband wouldn't have to work during the week between christmas and new year's. we would spend the time reflecting on the year behind us and looking forward to the new year ahead of us. make some family resolutions. relax. enjoy a slow and blessed holiday season that didn't end on december 26.

but really, the reflecting and resoluting part isn't tim's style anyways, so i did some for myself.

2010 was a very full year for us-in good and bad ways. but we are still all together, and for that, i am most thankful.

there are some things that i hope for my family in 2011, but mostly i'm going to try to work on me. more exercise. sleep. prayer. mass! gratitude.

there will always be some hard days. and probably never any easy days (at least in the short term). but there will also be many, many very good days. and i will be thankful for them.

so to prepare for the new year, i tossed these guys into the pasture (not ben and max!):

i'm not kidding that these were still on my porch until two days ago.

and i cleaned my kitchen:

which had honestly looked like that for two days.

and today, while i was away at the shower and on my mini-road trip, tim cleaned the rest of the house. even the bathroom. and when i came home, instead of commenting on the few things he missed or didn't do, because his style of cleaning is a bit different than mine, i said thank you. many times. and i meant it. because although he didn't clean the paperwork off the table, he made the bed the way i like-way different than the way he prefers it, folded a special quilt on the bed because he knows it makes me happy, and put a bottle of water on my bedside table. waking up to a clean house and a clean start in the year new-a very nice thing indeed.

i might actually get the hang of this whole gratitude thing yet.

some splaining

2010-12-31T22:15:00.003-06:00

(you may be asking yourself, "why is mary posting multiple times in one night?" it's not normally my style, but my dear crazy bro requested/suggested i post 50 posts by the end of the year because, at the time, i was at 45 posts for the year and he thought 50 was a nice tidy number of posts.

yes, he might be a little neurotic-especially after his post in the comments section of my holiday breakings and makings post, showing that yes, in fact, there are other brands of waxed paper than reynolds/cutrite. but the funny thing was, i too had looked up waxed paper online, and was going to make a post solely about waxed paper, entitled "paper of the waxed persuasion".

so, although i hadn't planned on four more posts for the year, i figured, well, i can either watch a movie tonight, or i can do something that hopefully brings a smile to his face, while catching up on a few posts. and since he's in my top six of favorite brothers, i thought i'd go for the smile.)

busy busy

2010-12-31T21:24:00.006-06:00

since christmas, we having been going, going, going in a mostly most delightful way. we've gotten to spend lots of time with family and friends and although each day i've gone to bed exhausted and our house messier, each gathering or event has been too special to pass up. christmas eve complete with the world's best egg rolls and family slideshows, christmas day, cousin kwanzaa, dinner with tim's parents, dinner and games with old friends, a "pilgrimage" with one of my super cool brothers and our Godson, a bridal shower brunch, and a mini-road trip with an amazing friend to visit an old roommate who is expecting. that's a pretty busy week by my standards.

(cousin kwanzaa) life is always better when this guy is around.

for the pilgrimage we took our nephew to mcconnell air force base, where the parish is the st. maximilian kolbe military parish, which is one of his patron saints.

i had thought this was a statue there and really wanted to get some pictures of him with it, as well as better pictures of it for myself (i had seen a picture of it from a friend that wasn't very clear), but it turns out it was a picture/plaque on the wall with some dimension to it. i'll admit i was a little disappointed, but really, it is a magnificent piece of art. the "parish" is pretty plain-a chapel like room that is used for different faith/denominational services.

looking around the chapel my brother noticed this:

the wall behind the altar has the dark green curtains. when you stand next to those curtains and look up, you see this cross and crucifix, that can be lowered down depending on the needs/desires of those gathering. there were also statues of St. Joseph and Mother Mary on little revolving door pedestals, so they could be turned out or put "away". i should have taken pictures, but alas, i wasn't thinking for blog purposes.

the other cool part of the visit was walking around the air park-a groomed, landscaped area where they had nine decommissioned planes that had all been at mcconnell at one time.

the nephew thought it was pretty cool.

(don't try to go to the base on your own, wanting to see the planes. we had a tour guide-one of tim's friends works on base and generously showed us around.)

i'm so thankful for all of the wonderful gatherings and events over the last week, but i'm also ready for some chillaxing time. now, if i can just explain that to the boys.

holiday breakings and makings

2010-12-21T16:01:00.011-06:00

nothing warms a mother's heart and puts her in the mood for christmas quite like having to put her kid in time-out a gillion times for taking ornaments off the tree.

and no, i'm not referencing max's behavior. ben is the one taking ornaments off the tree. over and over and over. we didn't put up our tree until yesterday and it has been constant touchy hands. this morning, after breakfast, he went straight to the tree and took off an ornament, which max then copied.

i think this was the only really breakable ornament tim put on, avoiding a lot of our more fragile ornaments. and max managed to find and drop it. if our ornaments were just uniform, pretty decorations, i wouldn't mind as much, but all of our ornaments are from someone or from our childhoods and i'm pretty sentimental about them.

it wouldn't be nearly as frustrating if ben just took them off to look at them, then put them back on the tree. no, he carries them all over the house and plays with them like toys. i know he's just an impulsive little boy and a lot of the ornaments are very cute-my mom gives the boys a new ornament every year. but it's that fine line between letting him explore and teaching him that sometimes he just needs to listen and some things are off limits. i'm sure the novelty will wear off and he'll leave the tree alone, but right now, it's really taking the fun out of the tree.

this afternoon, while i thought max was napping, ben and i *tried* to make chocolate covered peanut butter crackers. i was so pleased with how they were turning out, dreaming of all the people we were going to give them to. of course, max didn't actually nap and this was our final product:

yesterday while shopping, i forgot to get waxed paper from dillons and aldi didn't have any. not wanting to make another trip, i figured i would just grease the cookie sheets really well. i should have listened to the nagging little voice that kept telling me that greasing the cookie sheets wouldn't be enough. the chocolate totally fused to the baking sheet and even after putting them in the freezer, would not release without taking part of the bottom cracker with it.

fortunately, it's only tuesday, so i have time to remake these. the flavor was really good-i ate quite a few to ease my frustration. i'm sure tim will help eat the mistakes, but there's so many-neither of us need that much junk.

in other making news:

i wanted to make something for our Godson/nephew so i stamped this robot on a onesie, adding the heart to cute it up a bit. but after staring at it for a few minutes, i decided the hollow eyes were kinda creepy, so i colored it in.

it turned out pretty well, but took way more work than i had expected. what was supposed to be a five minute project became an hour+ long project that required touching up after i heat set and washed it. it probably would have gone better if i weren't using the rounded end of one of ben's plastic watercolor brushes to do my painting. again, i should have trusted that little voice that kept telling me to stamp a piece of woven cotton and then applique it onto the onsie, but i was lazy and didn't listen, making more work for myself.

i finally, after starting and undoing many hours of knitting over the last couple years, FINISHED a project-a scarf.

(i don't know why ben was being weird for this picture.)

i was really happy with how this project turned out, especially since i had gotten the yarn for free. so pleased, in fact, i decided to make another scarf, again, with yarn i already had.

my final project was probably my favorite, but that could be because it was so well received by the recipients.

i started with two free frames that tim's mom was getting rid of this summer:

(are you sure you don't want these lovely frames anymore? what? you think they're tacky and outdated?!)

let ben help me paint them with some acrylic paint i had from the robot project:

then added pictures of the boys.

one went to a dear friend of ours and the other went to the woman who comes in after our adoration hour. she really enjoys the boys and i knew she was bringing presents for them, so i wanted to have something for her. i had planned on keeping the second picture for myself, but after debating what i could make for her, the Holy Spirit prompted me to not be selfish and give her the picture. i'm so glad i listened-she loved the picture. she seems like a pretty tough old gal, but when she opened the tissue paper, she got pretty misty eyed and choked up.

today has been a really frustrating day, but after recalling some of our successes and accomplishments, it doesn't seem quite so bad.

kitchen: part 3 the big reveal (gah!)

2010-12-15T21:03:00.002-06:00

i left off with us going crazy. more crazy than normal. my window idea had been shut down and i had to come up with a new way to open up the kitchen. i just couldn't go back to the isolated space that it had been.

i usually prepped food where the big pile of junk is sitting on the counter. if the boys were at the table, the top right edge of the picture, i obviously couldn't see them, and couldn't really hear them very well either. it was also very awkward when we had friends over for dinner, as i was basically cut off from everyone else as i finished up cooking in the kitchen.

the most logical idea seemed to be to knock down that dividing wall, opening up the kitchen to the dining room. i have always wanted an island/bar and here was my opportunity. there were just a few little facts that made that idea a problem. 1.) the wall is load bearing. 2.) the other side of that wall is the only thoroughfare to the family room-putting a bar/island there would make traffic awkward. 3.) we would lose a lot of upper cabinet space. 4.) as soon as you walked in our front door, you would be able to see into our (not always spotless) kitchen. 4. that project would add way more time onto the project than we had to work with.

so, while it was a wonderful fantasy, it really wasn't going to work to tear down the wall. i just had to let the whole kitchen expansion dream go.

what i needed to focus on was counter top. on friday morning, my mother-in-law and i went with my boys to a place that could have our c-tops ready by tuesday IF we picked something they had in stock. we picked one that we thought might work, but then after going back into the warehouse and seeing a whole eight foot sheet of it, realized it would NOT work. then the very nice sales girl showed us another sheet, one that we had really disliked the two inch sample tile of, and it turned out, we really liked the actual counter top. while the sample tile made the color look like a beige alligator skin, the actual sheet of laminate was a nice white-grey marble. i was in a little bit of disbelief that we had actually found something we really liked, but i was really excited and so thankful to have my mother-in-law along to affirm my decision. as we left, we joked about how misleading those little sample tiles can be! (remember this point.)

to some it might not seem like picking your counter top color would be such a major decision, but for me it was. i really wanted to get it right and be happy with what i picked for a long, long time. having that decision done was a huge relief. i just needed to have my nephew call in the measurements and we would be set.

but once again, my happy bubble of having a decision made was burst. my nephew had relayed the plan to his dad (again, his dad is my brother who did a lot of the work building our house) and my brother called me to explain why we couldn't use the counter top from that place. because the counter top was the prefabricated sheets that had the rise in the back, we would be repeating the same disaster of having a million seams that didn't match up because our kitchen has weird angles. thank goodness for my wise brother, but of my goodness, i about lost it. i was resigned to having to wait two+ weeks for custom counter tops, but then my oh so sweet brother offered to build me the counter top. yes, that's right-build it himself.

how? how are you going to build me the counter top, i asked. he had worked in a cabinet shop while in college and sometimes they made counter tops. i knew he was capable-i mean the guy can build a whole house. but how would we get the needed supplies? we didn't exactly have a cabinet shop at our ready like he did back in the day. he reassured me that lowe's and home depot both carry the laminate sheets and all the other needed supplies. i just needed to pick a color and he would work on building it the next day-saturday. (now, please take into account that this conversation took place at about 7 pm. so i need to track down and pick an in-stock color before those stores closed at 10pm. i also needed to pick out the sink i wanted and the faucet, so he could take those sizes into account. and remember that i hate making fast decisions on major things. double blurg!)

after putting the boys to bed, off i went. i think i called my mom as i drove across town, whining about how my head was going to explode. she reassured me that it would all work out and promised to pray for me.

at lowe's i stood there, staring at my options, trying with all my being to will what i wanted into existence. but absolutely none of the five options would work. they were either really, really dark brown granite styles or totally plain-white and almond. so help me Jesus, i was not going to go through this whole ordeal and end up with almond counter top again! my last hope was home depot. i didn't have time to make it to the store, so i had tim call them and double check if they had sheets of laminate in stock and if so, what were the colors. i had the brochures for every possible laminate company, so if i had the names of the colors, i could look them up. heck, i knew half the colors off the top of my head from looking at the brochures so much! when i got back to the house, i searched and studied the brochures, but there were two colors that i couldn't find. the other colors were all dark options and wouldn't work. i went to bed holding out hope that one of those two colors would be the magic solution. i really wish i could remember their names-they were totally vague and gave no clues to what the color might be. we'll call them tumbled rocca and grecian glaze.

early saturday morning, tim and i loaded up the boys and went to home depot. when i asked were the sheets of laminate were, they directed me to the prefabricated, devil counter top with the back rise that we couldn't use in our kitchen. when i clarified to them that i just needed sheets of laminate, they told me they didn't have any. daggers were shot at tim. this was my last hope, MY LAST HOPE, and they didn't even have any sheets of laminate. it didn't matter if tumbled rocca was the most beautiful counter top in the world-i couldn't use it in my freak kitchen!!!!!!!

we went back out to the car and i literally almost started crying. i was so exhausted and sleep deprived. what the flippidy flip were we going to do. my sweet brother was willing to give up a saturday to help us, but we had nothing to work with. again, i think i called my mom. i was just so defeated. it seemed like every time we made a decision, it was undone, or something would fall through. she suggested we try some local places and gave us the phone numbers.

the first place said that yes, they had some laminate sheets- in gold, almond, and a few pieces of dark purple. oh yes please. that would be lovely. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! DARK PURPLE!? the next place said that they had a little in stock, but they weren't sure on the colors. but they also said that they could order a specific color for us and it would be in on monday. if nothing else, monday was way better than several weeks, so we headed to farha's building supply. when the guy showed us the odds and ends pieces that they had i would have lost it, because there was certainly some dark purple in the group, but i remembered the whole ordering thing and pressed him on that, explaining our situation and practically begging if there was any way they could get it for us that day. while the super helpful guy called the supplier we looked at colors.

remember how i said you shouldn't pick your color based on the tiny two inch tile that's a pretty poor representation of the real color. well, that's exactly what we were doing. we could have gotten the color that i originally picked with my MIL, the color i knew i really liked, but we would have had to wait, because that color came from a different supplier/manufacturer. if we went with a different brand, we could in fact pick up our laminate, directly from the warehouse, that morning!! banking on all the prayers my mom was praying for us, we picked a color we hoped would work. yay for local businesses. i was really impressed with farha's. although it's really small and kinda rough looking, the service was great, the price was great, and they actually were able to get us what we wanted and needed better than the huge chain store with the supposed endless selection.

we had to high tail it out of there because we had to get our truck and get back to the warehouse before they closed early since it was saturday. plus, we had two very restless, very cranky little boys who had had enough of all the shenanigans.

after the whole counter top ordeal was settled, the rest of the kitchen came together pretty smoothly. (or maybe i'm too tired to write about the project any more and have blathered on way toooooooo long as it is.) my brother, nephew, and tim built a gorgeous counter top-when they brought over the particle board base to check the size, my eyes welled with tears. my brother rolled his eyes and requested that i not cry. i'm pretty certain he made a mental note not to be around when i saw the finished product.

after the counter top was in place, i had the divine inspiration to just switch the stove and the fridge to open up the kitchen. thank you Holy Spirit. i really debated, but in end, we bought a new stove-a flat surface, black one. our other stove worked fine, but it was our last almond appliance and had regular burners and just didn't look very pretty. i'm soo glad we splurged on the new stove. the kitchen just wouldn't have seemed "done" with the old stove. thank you to a different amazing brother who did some rewiring for us, making the switch possible.

i have the most amazing family. without my brothers and my nephew, there's no way we could have accomplished this project. i can't imagine how much it would have cost to have contractors do the work for us. thank you, thank you, thank you guys. (although they'll never read this.)

so without further delay.....

to refresh your memory: isolated, crappy counter kitchen.

and AFTER!!!!!!!!!!!

happy kitchen.

in the old kitchen, this would have just been a picture of the side of the fridge. soooo much more open.

look ma, no seams or ledges!

again, in the old kitchen this would have been a picture of the fridge. big blocky mcblockerson fridge. now, i can stand at the stove and visit with guests at the table.

there are still things that need to be finished. the curtain is actually a pillow case that i thrifted and i need to rework it into a curtain. or take down the curtain rod completely. the drawers have no pulls on them and probably won't for a long time. a rug covers the area in the floor that lacks hardwood, there next to the fridge, were the huge pantry cabinet was that we decided to leave out.

i'm sure you were expecting something much more drastic after this whole saga that i have written. the changes were pretty simple. but for me, they were pretty major. i really hated our kitchen before. i love my new kitchen and am so thankful for it. and we got most of project done in time to see my nephew off to college!

what do you think?

now i think i'll work on some writing exercises that force me to be more brief. cause, dang! those posts were way too long.

kitchen: part 2

2010-12-11T16:08:00.005-06:00

so it took me a little longer to come back to this than i expected. max was beastly for most of the week and tim is out of town, so i have been mind-numbingly exhausted. but i'll see how far i can get tonight.

so i left off with us realizing we (my nephew) were going to have to tear apart the kitchen. i should have taken notes during the process, but at the time, i thought i would never forget. but now a lot of it has blended together. such is life.

my nephew had to go finish a project tuesday evening, so the plan was for tim and i to get everything moved out of the kitchen and ready for demolition. tim, seeing that i was about to loose it, sent me and the boys to his parent's house and promised he would get the kitchen ready.

after finally settling the boys in, i stayed up way too late looking at all things kitchen on the interwebs. counters, cabinets, fixtures-i had no idea what we would be able to salvage and what all would have to be done. i had wanted a new kitchen for so long, but just really didn't know what would happen. would we be able to salvage everything, going through a ton of work to have the same ugly kitchen but saving a lot of money, or would we have to replace everything, getting a beautiful kitchen, but lose our savings account in the process. i finally went to bed with my brain spinning.

wednesday morning my wonderful, dear, amazing mother-in-law watched the boys while i went to home depot to get a rough estimate of prices on anything and everything. i wandered around and around and around their display kitchens. then after settling max in for his nap, i headed back to our house.

i was greeted by a dining room that had the contents of the kitchen vomited all over it, including the fridge and large pantry cabinet. all the bottom kitchen cabinets were out in the yard, along with the counter top and sink. a dehumidifier was going to make sure everything was completely dried out. after talking to my nephew about the damage, we concluded that that all the bottom cabinets could be reused, minus the sink cabinet. we choose not to reuse the sink or faucet, which were in terrible shape, and i was so happy to see the counter top smashed. it was such a relief that the cabinets were mostly fine. although they look rough and need to be refinished, they are solid oak and have potential. i didn't like the feel of any of the cheaper cabinets i had looked at and new solid cabinets would have totally broken the budget.

after a little more clean-up, i headed back to tim's parent's house. i had a better idea of what we needed and had to start figuring out what i wanted. we needed a new counter top, sink, faucet, and some kind of back splash. i wanted a new floor plan that opened up the kitchen instead of going back to the tiny kitchen of isolation.

i really don't know what i would have done without tim's mom and my mom during this whole process. i bounced so many ideas off them and rambled on and on, trying to get all the jumbled up confusion out of my brain and worked into something do-able. tim's mom was so helpful with the boys and my mom was such a prayer warrior for me-praying for peace and wisdom, that i could get this all figured out in such a small amount of time.

thursday morning i was back at lowe's and home depot. my nephew was going to be working on resetting the cabinets and building the new box for the sink and i needed to make a counter top decision. at first i looked at a lot of really dark samples, thinking eventually i would like to paint the cabinets white. after talking to my mom, i got realistic and decided to pick something that would go with the existing cabinets instead of adding more stress and more projects to my life. but as i talked to the kitchen associate, one major problem became very clear. anything i picked would take at least two weeks, but more likely three or four weeks to be fabricated and installed. we didn't have that much time. blurg.

when i explained all this to tim's mom, she mentioned a place in town that her sister-in-law had just used on her kitchen project that had a really fast turn around time for counter top, but you have to install it yourself-they just make the cuts. i called the place, and they confirmed that yes, as long as i picked a color they had in-stock, they would have it ready in three days. three days was much better than three weeks, but i was still pretty hesitant because they only carried eight colors in-stock. having studied what seemed like every color of laminate in existence, i knew there were a lot of colors i didn't like. but i thought it was worth a shot, so we planned to go there the next day and take a look.

in the meantime, i went back to the house to pick up some things and talk to my nephew about the plan. as i stood in the kitchen, i just kept getting disheartened that it was still going to be the same dungeon kitchen, even if it had new counter tops. and then i had an *idea*. what if we added a window?! a window above the stove, so that as i cooked dinner, i could keep an eye on the boys in the backyard! a window that would let in glorious sunlight! a window that i could see the beautiful sunsets through as i cleaned up the kitchen in the evening! yes! a window was the perfect solution for my sad kitchen! my nephew was a good sport and agreed to try to work out the plan. i left and for the first time, i felt really excited about the whole project. something good really was going to come out of all this work and stress. i stopped at lowes on my way back to bel aire, checking out sizes and styles of windows. i think the window guy thought i was nuts, getting almost giddy over a window. (i didn't realize i had paint in my hair and smeared on my face, adding to my crazy lady look.) i discussed the window with my mom, sister, and mother-in-law and they all thought it was a great idea! yay! progress! it finally seemed like things were coming together.

but then the call came. thursday night my nephew called after discussing the window plan with his dad-my brother, who helped build the house. the window was still do-able, but it would be way more work and expense than we had thought because of the way the house was built. as much as i wanted it, i had to axe the window idea. my nephew was so sweet and supportive, insisting that it could still be done. but i just didn't feel like it was worth the extra resources.

late into that night, tim and i discussed the option of opening up the kitchen a different way-knocking down half of the wall that divided the kitchen and dining room. could we recreate a big island for baking, or maybe a bar?

ahhhh! this project was making us crazy!

saga of the kitchen Part One

2010-12-02T22:01:00.005-06:00

i hadn't planned to write this in parts, but i'm tired and need to take a break. although i hate to keep you hanging with the rest of the story, if i just save this as a draft, i might never finish it. i need the accountability of it hanging out there unfinished. so if you hate "to be continued"s as much as i do, you might want to wait until i finish part 2.

i've hesitated to post my new kitchen for several reasons:

1. i don't feel like it's totally "done".

2. we (and by we i don't really mean us. my nephew did most of the work.) did this project in august. it is now december. the time for project bragging has expired.

3. i haven't been very happy with the pictures i've been able to capture of the "after" and the before picture doesn't really do justice to the awfulness of the kitchen. the battery on the camera was dead on demolition day and the project was so crazy, i didn't get ANY pictures of the progress.

4. i'm not a brief story teller. and this project was epic for me. i knew this would be a reeeeally long post.

but i promised "housey" things and i feel like i can't get back to ranting about motherhood until i produce a house post ; )

this is what our kitchen looked like before.

(i don't even know why i took this picture. it is from january.)

it was functional, but i really hated it. it was claustrophobic and honestly, i looked pretty rough/totally embarrassing. if you look closely you can see how all the angles on the counter top have a darker line going to the back. that was caulk. this tiny kitchen's counter top consisted of seven! pieces of counter top pieced together. the corners were obnoxious ledges that really ate up space. our house has some "quirks" to it, but this kitchen was beyond quirky. it was just ugly.

when we first moved into the house, the kitchen walls were a dark wine/burgundy color. combined with the oak cabinets and floors, the kitchen was a dark, depressing place to be. a couple of years ago, totally fed up with the dark walls, i painted over them with white primer. and then i left it that way. the kitchen was so hopeless-i knew there was no color of paint for the walls that could magically pull of the almondy blandness together into something i liked.

this last spring we got a new dishwasher and fridge thanks to the government and their energy efficient rebate program, so we replaced the almond appliances with black. but it wasn't very exciting to get new appliances because the room was still a yucky cave.

then august came. we discovered some mold under the kitchen sink and ended up taking out all the bottom cabinets and moving all the appliances out to make sure we got the problem totally cleaned out.

the timeline of events was insane! the problem was discovered on thursday. ( i don't even like to say the "m" word. it makes me shudder.) we ignored it until tuesday when tim had the day off because we didn't really know how to deal with it. when tim went to clean it up, we realized there was more than we thought. i don't remember why my nephew stopped by, maybe we called him, and within a couple of hours he had started to rip the kitchen apart.

my nephew, my dear first nephew who was born when i was in the second grade, is totally amazing. he's worked different kinds of construction for a couple of years now and helped with tons of family projects since he was old enough to slam a hammer. he's certainly not an average teenager. fortunately for us, the construction company that he had worked for over the summer ran out of work for him the week we discovered the problem. THANK YOU JESUS!!!

that's where the timeline got crazy. we had a week and a half to rip out, clean up, and put everything back together before he left for college. i think it goes without saying, but i'll say it anyways-i was a smidgen stressed.

a different kind of adventure

2010-11-28T09:15:00.004-06:00

i'm supposed to be in st. louis right now. it was just going to be a quick trip-ride out with one of my awesome cousins today, do a little shopping tomorrow morning, then head back home by myself with a car she needs returned to our lovely sunflower state.

but i'm not there because ben and max are sick. max is on the mend from a pretty nasty cold/fever thing and ben got sick during the night last night. because i have an amazing mother-in-law, as of yesterday, she was still willing to keep the boys today, knowing full well that max might be quite unpleasant. and really, she probably would have still kept them, even with both of them sick, because she really is that wonderful.

but i just couldn't do it. i gave up a totally rad road trip with my way cool cousin who i rarely get to see, finally getting to go to trader joe's, as well as what i was dreaming to be a totally enchanting stroll around the st. louis galleria, which apparently is a pretty nice mall. that might sound odd-mary, a mall rat? while i'm not a huge shopper per se, i really enjoy walking around cool stores and people watching. add in a yummy coffee and no kids to chase and it sounded like quite the fantasy. anthropologie, h&m, urban outfitters, restoration hardware-all passed on so i could spend the day as a human kleenex.

so max brightened my morning as he proudly stumbled around in tim's boots. and my daddy brought me stew and freshly baked bread and stayed with my napping boys so i could go to Mass. although i was pretty bummed about not getting to go, receiving that act of love and kindness from my dad and having ben tell me several times that i was his best momma because i take such good care of him, made my very tiring day not so bad after all.

i had been wanting to make advent more meaningful and mindful this year, so i guess this was God's little gift to me to help me slow down.

addendum

2010-11-17T22:43:00.002-06:00

after my last post, i feel a need to clarify.

i don't want to sound whiney about motherhood. because i know, sometimes i do. you can almost guarantee that any time i write a post like my last one, we haven't gotten to see tim in awhile. i already knew it before, but this time of tim's work absences reaffirms for me God's design for marriage and parenthood-children need a mother AND a father. the boys behaviour and attitudes really start to change when they haven't had daddy time in awhile. when they get to spend time with my dad or their awesome uncles, i can even see a difference. our society doesn't do men justice-YOU ARE JUST AS IMPORTANT AS MOMMAS! i know i didn't value tim's role enough and often felt sorry for myself that i had to carry the bulk of the parenting load. of course, when kiddos are nursing babies, this is more true, but as the boys get older, i can see the difference. i also see how much i took tim for granted for myself. i need that teammate that gives me a break from the boys. i need that emotional support. i need that adult companionship.

but getting back to my point-i don't want to be whiney. i know there are bigger, badder things going on in the world than my little problems. lately i've been reading about and praying for a family that will loose their adopted daughter-the only family she has ever known- after a long and frustrating legal battle. i cannot even imagine what that would be like. then, today i received an update from this organization-food for the poor. i cannot fathom going on with life after watching your own babe starve to death. (their gift catalog is a great christmas idea, especially for those hard to shop for people who already have everything. give them a goat!)

hear me, hear me: I KNOW I AM BLESSED, BLESSED, BLESSED!

but i am also weak and wobbly and sometimes i get really overwhelmed. God knows how weak and wobbly i am and gives me very small crosses, but to me, sometimes they feel very, very heavy. "sparkles and rainbows" is the kind of post that i needed to be able to read myself, and it seemed like it resonated with a few of you as well. a piece about how even blessings can be hard. because when i'm worn out and it feels like i've been on duty all day and all night for the last week, i really start to doubt myself-yes satan, i know that is you. when i see an acquaintance from high school update her fb status about how even when she's home from work sick, it's a wonderful day because it means she gets to be with her toddler, i start to think i am a beast of a mother. why don't i love my boys as much as she loves her kid? it's hard to think clearly when you're exhausted. sleep deprivation is a nasty thing!

sometimes my boys are naughty and sometimes they are polite and generous and everything i have hoped for. sometimes my husband lets me down, but sometimes he is totally amazing. sometimes i am a really great wife and mother. but other times, i would be ashamed if my nastiness were caught on video. most of the time, we all fall somewhere in the middle- we are all human.

as much as weak and wobbly me wants motherhood and life in general to be easy, i know that it will never be that. anyone who projects that image is not giving the whole picture, either intentionally or unintentionally.

some parts of life will always be hard. but as tim said one night as i was on the edge, "it doesn't have to be this hard." so i try to do the things that i can do to make our life "easier": make our home more efficient and tidier so it's a pleasant place to be, reach out to our support network of friends and family, get more sleep (fail!), and the "thing" that i need to improve on the most-PRAYER. pray for strength. for wisdom. for courage. for others in the world who are suffering. and in thanksgiving.

so...it's not that i don't want to be a mother or that I want different kids. it's that i want to be a better mother (and wife and person) and sometimes i don't like what i see. But I know that, with His help, and the intercession of my Mother Mary, i can be better and stronger.

i'll try to lay off the rambly posts for awhile and show some house stuff next time.

sparkles and rainbows

2010-11-14T21:12:00.005-06:00

for some women, motherhood seems to come very naturally. for others, it is a bit more challenging. although i never thought i would find complete and total fulfillment in the role of mother, i never expected it to be as hard as it is.

by the time i got married, i had eight nephews and one niece. i had been babysitting on my own since sixth grade and had even watched two of my nephews for a week, by myself at their house, when i was sixteen. so it's not like i had never been around kids, or only been around then in a "fun aunt" kind of role. i thought i knew what it was all about. while i didn't totally love all of my babysitting time, i enjoyed my nephews and loved them deeply and knew that i was a good caregiver.

but OH MY OH ME what a difference there is between being a caregiver for a day or even a week and being a full-time, always in demand, having to figure out what to do when your child is sick, or not napping, or not eating, or screaming for an hour... parent.

to be honest, i really struggle. this last month has been especially hard for me. my boys are totally awesome, but i often feel like i'm not the right mom for them. or for any kid for that matter. i read articles or blog posts of moms who talk about how their kids are like sunshine to their proverbial gardens. i used to beat myself up a lot about those things, and they still get to me, but for the most part, i realize they are either only choosing to focus on the positive or that maybe they have kids who are a little more laid back than my little beasties. i could paint a picture of purely motherly bliss if i wanted to.

"ahh, brotherly love." except that they were actually fighting and jockeying for space in the truck when i took this picture. and then max bit ben because ben kept smushing him.

or this one. a fun snack in the super cool fort that i made for them in the newly cleaned out upstairs. reality: feeling exhausted and knowing that ben would whine about any real dinner i made, i gave them popcorn, cheese, and pears while i laid on the floor and read a magazine. then max ruptured my spleen when he jumped on me because i wasn't paying attention and ben started to complain that he was going to throw up. he recovered, but was again bitten by max because max wanted the lego helmet that ben had. yes, brotherly love indeed.

some moments really are just wonderful and beautiful. but for every wonderful beautiful moment, i would honestly say i have an equal amount of moments where i can feel my blood pressure rising and i shout to myself, "what the frick frack is he doing!?"

i've been trying to remind myself that i'm a mother because it's my vocation and not because i'm looking for a fun filled joy ride of kisses and giggles. our culture is all about doing what you want, when you want, and i feel like children are becoming, for some, more like an accessory than a being with a soul, entrusted to be raised to know, love and serve Him.

but yowzas! this whole raising and teaching gig is hard. for me it is agony and ecstasy and a lot of in between. so much pain (emotional and physical) and frustration and so much beauty.

i'm glad i didn't fully comprehend what i was signing up for when i became a parent. i would certainly have locked my chastity belt, thrown away the key, and ran for the hills. but since there's no turning back, i'll just have to keep taking pictures of my cute boys and trying to block out what was really going on in the picture.

i keep trying to explain to them that unless they tone it down, they will not have any other brothers or sisters. (ben makes frequent requests.) i think max wants to stay the baby of the family because i swear he keeps kicking it up a notch.

back.

2010-11-11T21:51:00.011-06:00

we're just going to ignore the fact that i've been gone for nearly a month. ben says it's okay, and with those smart looking glasses, it's obvious he's the boss. life's been full to say the least. and by the end of most days, my brain has been reduced to a bowl full of mush. (guess what book i read the boys before bed tonight. )

ya know what is good to do when your brain is mush? when really you should just go to bed? watch shows via the interwebs!! the other night i got sucked into an episode of "16 and pregnant". i justify it to myself by clasifying it as research for work. it would make my job so easy to just watch an episode with a class, analyzing it in all it's immature, trainwreck of relationships glory. so next time it's been a month since i've updated and you need to black hole some time, go watch some trashy tv. you will then want to call your parents and thank them for the utopian childhood you had in comparison to some people out there in the universe.

as evidenced by the picture of ben, we have a new camera. it was a painful process for me, but i'm pretty pleased with what we ended up with-a simple little canon powershot. at one point, tim was so sweet and suggested i just get one of the super spiffy, way awesome cameras i lust after. that kind of financial decision might be easier if i wasn't the one who did the budget. no sweetheart-i don't think a camera is a valid reason to dip into the investment account. seriously, i looked at several of the more artistic crafty blog i sometimes browse and saw what kind of cameras they use. as much as i wanted to join the "cool girls with big nikons" club, i wasn't going to drop a grand to get in. i'm still figuring it out, but without reading the manual and maximizing it's capabilities, i'm satisfied. if my pics are just too amature for you, get da heck outta here!

the following series of pictures is proof that i have spacial issues. anytime i try to take a picture by holding the camera out in front of me or above me, it's just not going to work. i was trying to finally take pictures of the huge hail stones that pumeled our house back in september. they have been taking up room in my freezer and although i hated to just let them melt, what do you really do with bowls and bowls of hail stones? save them for all posterity so i can show my grandkids what life was life back in the year 2010?

after the last hand out of the frame picture, i gave up and went and got a dang tangerine to use as a size reference. point proven! the hail was huge. let's not talk about how i very irresponsibly ran out into the storm to collect these. about how i darted from tree to tree to get the really big ones, while thinking, "hmmmm. if one of those hits me, i'm pretty sure it could kill me. and the boys would be alone in the house." but of course i didn't go back out into the storm after having that epiphany. no, that would have been irresponsible.

so that's what you've been waiting an almost month for. cute ben and bad hail pics. i promise, i'll do better next time. i just needed to break the fast.

huge sigh of relief

2010-10-13T14:44:00.004-05:00

it has been a very busy several of months around here. much of august was consumed by our kitchen project. as soon as i got things cleaned up from that, i had a big push for work before our grant ended. today i finished up my last site and don't have any more scheduled for the near future. during that time we had several other small house projects and put a new roof on the house. all while tim was gone for 60+ hours of the week and the boys needs didn't magically freeze or wait.

as i drove home this afternoon, i felt like i could finally breath for the first time in a long while.

riddle me this

2010-10-09T22:03:00.003-05:00

i wasn't going to post tonight. but then i realized we didn't have hot water in our house for some reason. then i ate a good sized portion of chocolate custard with peanut butter cups to soothe my weary endless-house-project soul. and now i'm a little hopped up on sugar. i thought about harnessing the powers of the white pony to clean the bathroom. but, that would require getting up off the couch, so i came here instead.

i've been thinking about this space a lot lately. (because, although most people don't realize how neurotic i am and how much i analyze things, i do. constantly.)(and apparently this post wasn't enough to convince me.)

blogs are funny little creatures. in my mind, blogs kind of look like alots. when i told one of my cousins that i had a blog, she giggled because she thought blog was a funny word. and people who write blogs are bloggers, which to me, sounds like boogers. to me, that is the most ridiculous professional title, a professional booger. i envision this conversation at a party: bob-"so what do you do?" betty-"i'm a blogger." bob-"oh. what do you blog about? politics? religion? education?" betty-"ummm....no. i...ahh...blog about what i had for lunch and the funny thing i overheard while waiting in line at walmart." bob-"oh. very meaningful. and people pay you for that?" betty, shrugging and wrinkling her face up-"yep."

i've stumbled across several new-to-me blogs as i decompress in the evenings of professional bloggers and i think, "geez, that would be nice to get paid to do that." but then i really think about it and realize, although it seems like a pretty cushy job, i really wouldn't like the intrusion and the pressure to perform. but then i get all competitive and think, "well, what makes them so special that millions of people read about their slightly interesting/mostly normal life? i'm special to ya know!" and then i call my mom to be reaffirmed that i am indeed special. and i can hear her roll her eyes. so i hang up and remind myself that i don't even like those kind of blogs and that i don't want to make money just for the sake of making money. oh how hard it is to tame my competitive spirit.

the type of blogs i like have meaningful content. some times i'll read a post, like this one, and think, wow, that's exactly what i've been mulling over in my head and she articulated it much better than i would have ever eeked out in the two hours i tried to put it on paper. one of my consistently favorite blogs is soulemama. pretty much every day, she offers a little bit of beauty or wisdom. i like that i can go there and count on a new post.

but most of the time, at the end of the day when i sit down, my brain is waaaay too tired to come up with something meaningful and there's no way i could post every day. shoot, once a week is a push for me. but then i feel like i'm letting you, my vast and plentiful audience, down. i really enjoy several other blogs, but am a bit sad when i go check them and they haven't been updated. so i kind of lose interest.

so what's a girl to do? i'm not quite sure.

happy day

2010-10-01T08:58:00.002-05:00

this week has been stressful.

trying to work. taking care of mitter max, who has the cincinnati hot poops. coordinating wootang roof-fest 2010. still not having a camera. constantly squabbling boys. only seeing my husband when i should be sleeping and spending that time discussing the sick boy and the house.

this week has had joys as well.

celebrating max's birthday with our wonderful families. getting to help my incredible mother-in-law, if only in a small way. feeling the love of my brothers who will assemble to help us roof tomorrow. the few moments when the boys aren't trying to kill each other when they are best buddies.

i'm trying very hard to chose to have a good day today. if i could have this song on constant replay, i think it would help. it is 3 minutes of bliss. the boys and i have watched and listened to it over and over and over and can't help but giggle and dance and laugh. (and no, this video is not a hint of any sort. one has to have a husband to get in the family way.)

Magic- A Belly Grows from The Panic Room Videos on Vimeo.

happy friday. happy feast of st. therese.

welcome

2010-09-24T22:39:00.002-05:00

if you're stopping by from moneysavingmom, welcome. sit back and take a look around. i hope you enjoy our blessed brand of craziness.

click

2010-09-13T16:43:00.005-05:00

that's the sound of my brain taking a picture. i've been having to take a lot of brain pictures lately because our camera is broken. (that's actually what inspired my last post, because i never appreciate our camera until the battery is dead or now, broken. it's a luxury, not a necessity to have a nice camera. when i take things out of the necessity category, it makes me realize how really very blessed i am.)

so if my camera were working, these would be the pictures i would post.

-my boys "reading" on top of the submarine tim built them out of boxes. they were frighteningly quiet out in the family room so i peeked around the corner to see them perched atop the U.S.S Peter T. Hooper. *click*

-the U.S.S. Peter T. Hooper herself, in all her glory. *click*

-the sand castles we built in the sandbox this morning. it was a glorious morning and we soaked it up outside. when we got our new fridge i kept the door shelfy box things from the old fridge (since i new it was going to get trashed :( i figured i could at least repurpose something out of the deal.) one of the shelfy box things got sent to the sandbox and it makes great bricks. now, don't let your imagination get too carried away. i didn't make a sandcastle out of shoe box sized bricks (yet!), but they did have multiple levels and i was pretty proud. *click*

-our feet and hands after playing in the sandbox. we were grubby little puppies when all was said and done. thinking about it just now, i dread looking in the bath tub. but at least it was a happy mess. *click*

-seven kiddos sitting against our deck rail eating dessert with evening sun making them glow. we were blessed with the wonderful company of three momma friends last night and their nine children. beautiful chaos! at one point, i think there was ten kiddos, from ages 7 down to 9 months, in the sandbox. *click*click*

-house projects i have been working on, including our new! kitchen! i've been trying to stream line and organize this summer (and the last three years) to make our house a more peaceful home. i really hate clutter. it stresses me out and turns me into a very bad wife, mother, and person. the rub is that tim and i are both accumulators and we have two small children. stuff can take over very quickly around here. it's a work in progress, but with some serious inspiration from the Holy Spirit and help from my momma, i'm happy with my results. *click*click*click* and *click* (the kitchen required a few extra pictures : )

well, that sums up life around here. hope you enjoyed the pictures. (bah ha ha ha ha. i crack myself up.)

here's a couple pics from the archives because this is really were i take a lot of my pictures-at the table, were my boys hold still, if only for a little bit.

sticking out his tongue for pictures is in his genes.

"an empty bowl doesn't count, max, if you've just moved all of your breakfast to another bowl."

the look that will take him far in life.

when it's gone

2010-09-11T21:05:00.004-05:00

(not that it was all that difficult, but i'm pretty proud of myself for figuring out how to embed a video. techno nerd i am not.)

i really like this song and video. maybe i feel a connection with them because i know how to do that cup rhythm. (okay, i feel no connection-i just wanted to brag that i can do that cup thing.) the boys really enjoy watching it as well. it is the anthem for all the things that i take for granted until they are gone.

-sunshine. fall sunshine is so melancholy for me because i know it will soon be gone and i know that i have not soaked up enough of it.

-max going to sleep easily. (although even before, "easily" was a relative term.) he figured out how to get out of his crib and the pack 'n' play is no barrier either. but we'll find a new normal eventually. growing pains.

-tim. we, but most especially myself, soooo took our time together for granted. a year ago, i'd get cranky when tim got home at six, knowing that if he hadn't goofed around at work, he could have been home by five. now 7:30 feels like bliss and a day off is like the queen's birthday!

-$$$$$. i really can't complain about money. we have a home. cars. food. money in the bank. and other than our home, no debt. but wow. if i could go back three years and give myself a good throttling, i could have used some attitude adjustment. even then, i knew in the grand scheme of things we were doing well, but on the day to day of life, i whined about things being tight. things are way tighter now with tim's job transition, but things will get better. so instead of whining about our new budget, i've been trying to focus on the freedoms that we have. the freedom from debt that has allowed us to take a much lower paying job with huge potential for growth. a job that my husband really loves instead of one that causes major stress and anxiety. and freedom that, although things are tight, i don't have to drop my boys off at daycare and go to work full time.

-uninterrupted sleep!!! i don't think anybody appreciates this until it's gone. even more than uninterrupted sleep, what i really miss is the ability to sleep in. when we were first married, it was the norm for us to wake up after 11am on the weekends. (well, i would wake up sooner, but go back to sleep several times to try to keep pace with ol timmy boy, a man who's sleeping skillz never cease to amaze me!) we are both night owls, which is not conducive to boys who are wild and ready to go the minute they wake up.

i could go on and on. i have a very ungrateful heart. i hate it sooo much and i hate it when i see it in ben. always wanting more or what others have. i often pray for a grateful heart and God is slowly helping me to change.

many of the things that i am critical or ungrateful or whiney about are things that if i really wanted to, i could change. it's empowering (and humbling) to admit that many of the things that i say "i can't" to are really things that i chose not to do.

it also helps me to think of stages of life as seasons. seasons that will pass. summer really doesn't seem all that long in comparison to a whole year. and although i will be raising children for a good many more years, this very, very intense season of life with small children will soon pass. yes, hopefully God will bless us with more babies, but ben and max won't always be so demanding and will hopefully, eventually, be *gasp* dare i say it* helpful. i look forward to lovingly enslaving my children with yard and house work. and just like i look back and wish i would have enjoyed summer more fully, i'm sure i will look back and miss my babies. (although i try to take pictures and videos of the horrid tantrums so that i won't forget what life was really like instead of just looking at pictures of smiling cherubs.)

when i was a kid, one sunday after lunch my dad read us a story with a poem. it has always stayed with me, but i think of it more often now, with the joy and frustration that fills my days. the poem itself is kind of cheesey in my opinion, but what really stayed with me was the context of the poem. although he didn't write the poem, the guy who shared the poem-the guy the story was about that my dad was reading to us, was a man who had no family, who lived in a home for lepers, and had lost his eyesight and was significantly crippled by leprosy, prayed the poem.

I've never made a fortune
and it's probably too late now.
But I don't worry about that much,
I'm happy anyhow.

And as I go along life's way,
I'm reaping better than I sowed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

I don't have a lot of riches,
and sometimes the going's tough.
But I've got loved ones around me,
and that makes me rich enough.

I thank God for his blessings,
and the mercies He's bestowed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'cause my cup has overflowed.

I remember times when things went wrong,
My faith wore somewhat thin.
But all at once the dark clouds broke,
and the sun peeped through again.

So God, help me not to gripe about
the tough rows that I've hoed.
I'm drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

If God gives me strength and courage,
when the way grows steep and rough.
I'll not ask for other blessings,
I'm already blessed enough.

And may I never be too busy,
to help others bear their loads.
Then I'll keep drinking from my saucer,
'Cause my cup has overflowed.

Like i said, it's not my style of poetry, but if a man who is blind and crippled feels like he is drinking from his saucer, i think i can find a few things to be grateful for too.

y'all gonna make me lose my mind.

2010-08-29T13:11:00.013-05:00

i am beyond fried today. max is being "tricky" and has been for the last three weeks (or two years). seriously, i almost burst into tears multiple times at Mass this morning, and i'm just not that kind of person. but max fell asleep on the way home and STAYED asleep when i brought him in (cue clouds parting and choirs of angels singing.)

after i plugged ben in, i went to pull my hair up because i was really hot and thought i would amuse myself with a blog post about it.

my hair is really thick, so if it's on my neck i get way hot and it makes me crazy. like, "i'm going to shave my head if this hair doesn't stop touching me" crazy! i like it when my hair is short but it takes frequent haircuts to keep it that way because my hair grows fast. i'm more of a once a year haircut kind of gal than every 6 weeks. i also avoid cuts because i have this fantasy that if i grow my hair long, it will magically curl and tussle into soft, perfectly imperfect spirals. so i avoid cutting it. but then i get crazy hot.

if i pull my hair into a stubby ponytail my boys see it as their duty to pull it out or mess with it-which totally makes me crazy and i end up growling that if they touch me again i'll bite off their hand. it's also really annoying in the car not to be able to put my head back on the headrest. so i put it in pigtails when i get hot. (ben still plays with the pigtails but since they're easier to fix it doesn't bother me quite as much. i have had to bite his hand off a few times though, because when i put him in his car seat, he pulls my pigtails like bell chords and makes accompanying sounds. chomp!)

so why are pigtails blog worthy. well, they're really not, but my need to discuss this matter is based on the fact that...i'm not a pigtail kind of girl.

pigtails are for little girls, coy playgirls, or southerners/farm girls who wear red gingham button down shirts tied above their belly buttons.

i am none of those. i am a ponytail kind of girl. not a high ponytail (ditzy) or a low ponytail (studious), not a side ponytail (trendy)or a cute, perfectly messy ponytail (i envy those), just a middle of the head ponytail that attracts absolutely no attention. honestly in middle and high school, unless my hair was short, the number of times i wore my hair down could probably be counted with both hands. i always wanted to be one of those girls who wore different, cute hairdos, but i lack the patience, skillz, and motivation. i am a wash and go kind of gal.

so when i wear pigtails, i feel like i'm living a lie. i'm advertising to the world that i am a person that i simply am not.

i envy the veils of religious sisters and islamic women who wear head scarfs. a couple of weeks ago, a friend and i joked about starting a "wigs for white girls" club.

maybe i should just go get my hair cut.

don't be fooled into thinking max actually napped the whole time that i wrote this post. no, i actually stopped and came back to it, because it was obviously that important.

peace out.

(like my new sunglasses? although they are very not me, i think they're super cute. guess where i got them. tim bought them for himself and although i tried to stiffle my laughter, he instantly knew they were girl glasses based on my reaction. he had his suspicions when he bought them but because they were only a dollar and he was tired of squinting, he took the chance. he always gets paranoid when buying glasses because he can't tell the difference. i bought him some for christmas that he really liked, but he lost them, along with three other pairs, so he gets no sympathy from me.)

absent

2010-08-22T10:34:00.002-05:00

i may sometime return to this space. as i'm sure most of you saw the vague postings of on facebook-we are redoing our kitchen. we had a mold situation that has been a bizarro blessing in disguise.

until the dust settles...peace out.

and the winner is.....

2010-07-30T14:18:00.004-05:00

i didn't want to send you into the weekend with suspense over the giveaway. so with out further ahhhchoo....

the winner picked by random number generator was...

elizabeth! it is appropriate that she won because she had several comments, but each time she made new word suggestions. so if she made multiple comments just to up her chances, she did it in a clever enough way so as to not attract attention. plus, it was her first comment that won it for her. so maybe matt isn't the lucky one after all. (although he has you and the girls, and that's pretty darn lucky!)

my favorite word suggestions were snorckel from erika and schnixzel from jja. they were all really good, but i felt like they didn't quite embody the apparently completely unique to me phenomena that is my "caught off guard, laughed out my nose because i forgot to open my mouth" action, which i think i will from here on out call snorkeling. several of them had to be thrown out because there was no way my little brain could figure out how to say them or remember how to spell them.

amanda wins a special prize for saying "sneeze pee" and census guy was disqualified for using one of my very least favorite words-fart. (even just typing it now makes me send a scowl out into the universe directed at him.)

because i never win anything and because i'm a pretty totally fantastic nice person, anyone who emails me their address at mary_strawberry(at)yahoo(dot)com before next wednesday will receive a prize in the mail in 6-8 weeks. (or maybe even days if we all get lucky.) be assured, i will sell your personal information to as many scammers as possible, so please also include you SSN# to make it worth my time.

have a great weekend.

buying friendship

2010-07-26T12:55:00.005-05:00

because tim is on his way home with a free! pizza from knolla's,

because i finished the work that i had been putting off even though i would have rather stuck needles into my own leg,

but mostly because you guys crack. me. up! with your comments,

i am doing a giveaway.

seriously-you guys encourage me, commiserate with me, and literally make me laugh out loud. and sometimes through my nose. (can someone please give me an accurate descriptor of the action of exhaling/laughing through one's nose. neither guffaw nor snort is quite appropriate.)

i love stationary and love getting mail-who doesn't?! pretty/cute cards are such a satisfying cheap thrill for me. so as an excuse to buy more cards and in an attempt to thin out my own stash, for christmas i made these compilation sets of a bunch of cute, blank note cards. i gave them as part of my gifts to tim's mom, my sister, and several other people. this set was intended for a friend, but then i didn't want her to feel obliged to get me a gift and set the precedent for gift giving between us, so i didn't give it to her. (yes, i know i over think things.) they have been sitting in my craft/storage room ever since, longing to be loved.

so leave a comment giving me the word i desperately need to describe what i do when elizabeth describes matt rolling her down the stairs and using the word "girth" in her comment. (see the comments on my last post if you are confused.) if you need me to imitate what i do, ask me in person. i considered doing a video of my snort laugh but that would be weird even for me. (but in person i have no problem ;)

i'll select a name at random, but the best word might garner an extra prize. (brother-if you win, i'll man things up for you, drenching the cards in beer before i mail the package to you.)

thanks for brightening my days with your comments. seriously, thank you.

hot time. summer in the city.

2010-07-24T20:50:00.003-05:00

put on your imagination eyes. the camera needs to be charged so no pictures have been taken this week.

we stayed at our annual vacation resort this week for two days. red hot bel aire!!! tim's parents were out of town and graciously told us we could hang out at their house, eat their food, swim in the pool, watch cable, and bask in a fully ACed house. we had talked about it for several days, but other things kept coming up. then, tuesday night after dinner, tim decided to pack up and go. he packed for himself and the boys and left me to come after i went to knitting.

inspired by his light packing (stuffing their clothes and max's necessary multiple special blankets into their respective pillowcases) i to (too? whatever) packed light. i felt the nudging to pack food for us but was being lazy, and, slightly annoyed that tim makes things look so easy and i always seem to over complicate things, i didn't.

once we got there and i realized there wasn't much food (i know, really, how rude of them not to fully stock their fridge before going on a week long vacay!)i refused to go grocery shopping because i didn't want to have to pack home whatever didn't get completely consumed, and well, i just didn't want to go shopping.

(this could be a post itself: mary's weirdness about grocery shopping. i'll spare you this time, but just know, i have issues. lots of them.)

my avoidance of shopping and therefore lack of food definitely effected the quality of our vacation. if nothing sounds good to me, i just don't eat. or if there's only enough cereal for the boys to eat, i just don't eat. but the catch is, when i don't eat, i get "grouchy". it takes me a really long time to get uncomfortably hungry, but in the mean time, i will have been "grouchy" for a looonnnngggg time. if tim ever makes this connection, i think he'll just start pinning me down and stuffing food in my mouth when the stink-eyes start shooting his way. (on a funny cereal note-proof that my boys are seriously deprived in the cold cereal department: ben got really, really excited about fiber one cereal, the blandest cereal ever!)

the fact that tim had to work both days we were there and that i had work stuff that needed to be done could have also been a factor. or that i was deliriously tired, but instead of going to bed early one night, i got sucked in to "i didn't know i was pregnant" on tlc. lack of sleep also makes me "grouchy".

or the fact that there was a pool-cool, refreshing, and tempting, calling out to us, but i wouldn't let the boys swim. max is way too daring around the pool and i didn't think that i could handle both boys by myself. i finally gave in one evening, and with the help of all of our guardian angels, managed to stay alive and have a good time.

or the fact that my boys aren't good sleepers, which is amplified by being away from home. ben fell out of the (quite high) queen bed twice both nights. it didn't seem to bother him much at the time but he seemed pretty grouchy during the day from the interrupted sleep. max actually spent one of his naps sitting up in the pack-n-play. he fell asleep while nursing but woke as soon as i layed him down and threw a fit. after he quieted down, i went in to check on him and yep, he was sleeping sitting up in one of the corners. i think it was the biggest "doh! i don't have the camera" moment of my parenting thus far. i watched my adorable sleeping budda for a while before ben started yelling for something and i dove out of the room to silence him.

after really only staying for one whole day and one morning, i threw in the towel on the vacation that was anything but. we headed home at max's naptime and of course, he only slept in the car and didn't transfer in to the house. damn you, illusive transfer-of all days!!

by thursday evening i was very, very "grouchy".

i learned a few things from this "vacaton".

1. don't think that staying up way too late will make me any less grouchy just because we are in a different environment.

2. my already very poor time management skillz don't stand a chance against cable television. i really can't resist the beast.

3. a vacation, when both parents are working, is not really a vacation. thinking any differently is just a set up for failure.

4. although a pain in the tushy to plan, food is very, very important. me need to eat.

5. i love, love, LOVE my king sized bed. although not very aesthetic, (monica, i think you mentioned this.) the amount of space is soooooo essential for us.

don't get me wrong-we had some fun times in the exotic land of bel aire. but it was good to come home.

something clever

2010-07-13T21:08:00.007-05:00

i was reprimanded last night by a reader (although one who has never left a comment-ahem missy!!)that i haven't been blogging enough lately. reasons for not blogging include:

-i'm lazy.

-i've been tired.

-i've been busy.

okay, i'm lame, i know. my lack of blogging is certainly not for lack of material. plenty of weird and noteworthy things happen around here. but with summer comes later bedtimes for the boys, which means less computer time for me. actually, when i really think about it, in the winter i go to bed later than the summer. so that meant: the boys would go to bed around 7, then i would curl up with the computer for warmth and stay up really late. i think i stayed up so late because although my brain was exhausted from the boys, my body was still restless from lack of activity. i'm pretty worthless in the winter and really should just hibernate. (maybe the boys will get the memo this year.) but i feel unfulfilled from the lack of activity and the dark gloom of winter so i seek stimulation and cheeriness online. amongst all that random computer time i would eek out a few blog posts.

but now it is summer-ahhhhh glorious summer! i'm doing so much more because i'm not half frozen and my body, as well as my mind, are both pleasantly tired at the end of the day. my computer time is just enough to keep up on blogs i read and facebook, but not the endless internet wandering of winter. (wow, no wonder i feel so pathetic during the winter.)

and i've been working on house projects. and we've had a lot of family stuff. (i feel like i've said all this before, but i'm too lazy to go back through old blog posts. see bullet point one.) and when i've been away for a while, the mental que of posts builds up and then i'm overwhelmed into inactivity.

so this is what you've been missing. it is guaranteed random.

our "daycare" kid is with us this week and as i was walking out the front door i couldn't resist trying on his sandals. my feet are only slightly bigger than an almost six year old's. i used to worry about ben being tiny. now i thank my lucky stars that i don't have monster children. although maybe i wouldn't give in to max demands of being carried all the time if he weighed 40lbs. or maybe he could carry me. hmmmm. (is it weird that i tried on his sandal? i didn't think so until i wrote this and then i kinda felt like a creeper.)

(excuse me. lord maximillian has awoken. i must go fluff his royal pillow and lull him back to sleep.)

(i'm back. he's lucky he has gloriously soft, golden curls i can kiss and stroke and kiss some more as i nurse him. seriously, if it weren't for his hair, i would have weaned the boy in february.)

me thinks these tiny toes are much cuter. ben got these sandals for his birthday and max thinks they are his. he threw a huge fit when ben dared to wear them. when ben first opened them max begged to wear them. so i put them on him, with the elastic cord still on them that holds the two sandals together-it made max waddle like an inmate. he thought it was pretty funny.

thanks for all your kind comments about "blurg" and the whole car situation. i read all the comments to tim because really it was his decision and kindness. because the whole reclaiming the car mess happened in the middle of the night, i actually woke up in the morning hoping it was all a really annoying dream. of course it wasn't, but we both just let it go pretty quickly, which was totally a grace thing.

after a week of back and forth with different interested peoples, we sold the car. again. because it's kind of a niche car, even though it wasn't running, there were still quite a few people who were, in fact, interested. the kid who bought it actually paid more for it than we sold it for the first time, but we bought the parts he would need to fix it. so it pretty much evened out and we didn't have to spend the time (that we didn't have) to fix it. the story could still not be over because he's making payments to us on the car. not ideal, but he was willing to pay the most and his down payment was what most people were willing to pay total. so we'll just wait and see. but my goodness, does God sure have a sense of humor about how he provides!

these gorgeous lilies are blooming in front of our house. because the flower bed is so terribly neglected and overgrown, combined with the fact that the grasshoppers DEVOUR them, they are almost depressing for me to look at. so i brought them inside and played with them. ben ooooed and ahhhhhed at them and max literally climbed up on the table after his nap as soon as he noticed them and kept exclaiming "pitty! pitty! pitty! (pretty)" as he jabbed at them.

i settled on this little jar and these happy little bottles. i love random jars and bottles so much more than vases. the bottles are from a trip tim and i took when i was pregnant with max. while strolling mass street in lawrence we stopped into a fun little import shop and tim picked up a bottle of orangina (the round bottle)and i got a bottle of "sanbitter". i picked it solely because i liked the bottle and knew i would save it. fortunately i had no expectations for the drink inside because it was awful! a fun memory of a great trip that is now repurposed on my table.

the cloth underneath the flowers is a burp cloth that i remember using for my baby brother. i love the fabric, and again, it makes me happy to see it getting a new life.

several other events deserve there own posts but i just needed to break the blogging fast.

random, as guaranteed.

blurg.

2010-06-25T14:07:00.003-05:00

please weigh in on what you would have done. i'm really curious to get opinions:

tim sold his nissan 240 sx to a guy from fort riley last night. the guy was really excited and happy with the car, we signed over the title, money in hand, car was sold.

on his way back to fort riley, somehow the fan ate the fan casing, spraying shrapnel in the engine, cutting a fuel cable, thus killing the car. total freak accident that was in no way a pre-existing condition of the car.

the guy calls tim in the middle of the night, tim drives to mcpherson, reclaims the car because he feels bad for the guy, giving him his money back, even though he knows it was in no way his fault, and has the car towed (fortunately for free-AAA) back here.

now we have the broken car, and although i'm very frustrated, i kinda feel like it was the right thing to do, but still feel kinda torn. so what would you do, cause either way someone is out of luck.

discuss.

blessed

2010-06-24T22:30:00.008-05:00

although today certainly had it's "if you whine one more time, my head is going to explode!" moments, overall, it was a very blessed day.

my fabulous nephew/partner in crime and decoration who helped me turn ben blue last summer (the link didn't work for some reason) came over this morning and made my day a happy, productive, more quiet than usual day.

seizing the coolness of the morning, we went outside after our late breakfast and i got to work on cleaning out the garage ALONE!!! while nephew extraordinaire entertained the boys. normally the boys are right with me, doing and undoing whatever i am trying to do. so, although i had tried many times, cleaning out a very messy shed with their help just wasn't working. to have the luxury of working on the project alone was beyond words wonderful. the task itself was really gross and overwhelming, but i made really good progress and am quite satisfied with my accomplishment. major, major, major! accomplishment!

while i was cleaning out, nephew asked if they could play with the (unused)tomato cages that were laying next to the garage. i made a lame joke about pretending to be tomatoes, he humored me and laughed, and then i said sure. i thought maybe he was going to make an obstacle course with them, but instead he put them on the boys and they thought it was really funny. ahh the simple pleasures.

i may not have gotten a garden planted this year, but these little creatures have been growing like weeds and might earn me a purple ribbon at the fair.

then nephew laid them end-to-end and challenged ben to crawl through.

we can't resist a challenge in our family. ben was quite pleased with himself and i have to admit, i was pretty proud to. it was quite reminiscent of the ridiculous things we did to entertain ourselves growing up and it made me happy that ben was game for such quirky goofyness.

they also played jail and alien with the cages, all without anyone being impaled by the pokey ends.

while the boys played and i cleaned, tim was able to focus on returning calls for a car we are selling and was actually able to hear the people without the boys being crazy yahoos in the background. we received a great response on our craigslist post for the car and if all goes well tonight, we will have the car sold in just a little over 24 hours since posting. God is good.

although we are both sad to get rid of "daddy's fast car", it was not practical and at this stage in our lives, we couldn't justify the expense of it. but gosh was it fun to go on dates in that noisy car! hopping into a four-door cavalier just isn't quite the same. just thinking about it makes me want to call tim and cancel the sale. alas.

tim saying goodbye.

while i was taking a few pictures of the car to remember it (sniffle, sniffle), i noticed a katydid on the window. although i didn't notice the reflection of our house until after i took the pic, i really like all the layers in the shot.

after tim left for work, i got out the boys' little wading pool and they had fun cleaning/filling it. give my boys water and scrub brushes and they'll be happy for a long time. as long as i don't mind dealing with the mess and accept that they'll be totally soaked when they're done "cleaning", it is a great activity when i need a break.

one my way to walmart after returning my nephew my mom called and invited us to dinner-could my day get any better?! my parents have been immeasurably helpful with tim's crazy schedule and we go over there a lot. in exchange for fabulous food, i beg to clean her kitchen in an attempt to earn our keep. we truly are blessed.

to top off the day, before i sat down to dinner, tim called with exciting news about his job. although nothing is official, he may get promoted several months sooner than we had thought he would. i was so excited and relieved and proud of him, i nearly cried while on the phone.

thank You, Father, for all these blessings. when i am weak, these days where i can almost literally see Your hands at work renew my spirit.

now off to collapse into bed.

t.i.r.e.d. !

2010-06-17T21:04:00.002-05:00

(too lazy to upload pictures. maybe someday. it's good exercise to use your imagination.)

i've been quite a busy little bee lately-hence the absence. (sorry to leave you dangling in suspense, elizabeth.) okay, honestly, i've been plenty lazy with a few spurts of super productive.

the day of my last post, when i escaped for some craft therapy, i came home to a half way painted master bedroom. whah, what?! yes, instead of cleaning the house and taming the boys, tim plugged the boys in and started painting the bedroom. we had given the room up to ben last fall but were ready to reclaim it and hoping to put ben and max together, finally. painting the room had been on my to-do list and i had already bought the paint but just hadn't tackled the project yet. it had been a nice, soothing "herbal" green before, and i now wanted it white. plain white. after laying in bed and being nauseous while pregnant with max, the color wasn't very soothing to me any more and i just wanted a clean look. but i knew it would take several quotes to cover and was waiting for a magical, elusive burst of energy to start.

so i came home to even more house chaos than when i had left. praise the Lord i had the strength to bite my tongue and just thank tim for starting the project. it was very sweet of him to help me (as he knows one of my love languages is acts of service, along with quality time ((joel)), but my goodness did my tongue hurt. tim is not a project kind of guy and will do whatever it takes to get the task done as fast as possible. (or whatever it takes to avoid the project completely.) in the process of helping with this project he scratched the wood floor and broke the glass in a very sentimentally valued, large piece of art. as i came into the bedroom to behold it's glory, which he declared done, i observed walls that looked what could be best described as sad green walls that had been white washed. he had already done nearly two coats, but they would definitely need more. i painted for awhile but then just had to let it go for the night and thanked tim for giving me the motivation to start.

the next day i first tackled the house, then over the course of the next couple days, finished up the painting. once it was done, tim admitted that it looked so much better than his version and apologized for the floor and picture. although we've moved our dressers and bed in and are using the room, it is far from my done vision. i wish i could reveal an awesome, totally put together project but i'm trying to get creative (read thrifty)and it takes a lot more time and energy than just going to the store and buying a room in a bag. but i already love it so much more than before and nothing, NOTHING beats getting to look out the window at night to a starry sky and wake up in the morning to cool breezes. and that's what money can't buy.

so that was and continues to be a big project, along with consolidating the boys and their stuff in one room, cleaning out and organizing clothes, and restoring our upstairs to a lounge/storage room from a bedroom/closet/storage room.

to aide the cleaning out and organizing, today, a friend and i started our garage sale. the house already feels lighter and maybe i'll use some of the cash to finish up my projects. but it was a big undertaking. probably it's own post. several rooms had already been purged in may, knowing we were going to do one some time this summer, but all of them got cleaned out this last week.

last night we stayed up too, too late getting stuff ready and i only got four hours of interrupted sleep before heading back to the garage sale, zombie style. of course, instead of writing all this i should have went to bed, but i needed to wind down a little and wait for ben to fall asleep because he's....sleeping in our bed. the boys in the same room isn't working so great, but, eh, we have a king sized bed.

so cheers to getting stuff done, even if it means i'm totally pooped!

craft therapy

2010-06-02T17:56:00.001-05:00

yesterday i was having a really challenging day, feeling really overwhelmed by work, the boys, the house, life. because it was tim's day off, i left, with no boys and no plan. after dropping off paperwork at work and clearing my head over a sandwich and a newspaper, i headed to the goodwill. i love thrift stores and was not disappointed yesterday. this happy print was just what i needed to lift my spirit.

yes, it may have been a bed sheet, but it didn't have to be used as a sheet. for $2 i got several yards of adorable, soft knit fabric, begging to be crafted into something for a sweet little girl.

after a quick call, i headed to my sweet momma's house and this happy little room.

i should have taken more pics yesterday because this one really doesn't do it justice. on the shelf is a cute row of thimbles and a pincushion that reads "i (a heart) my mom" spelled out in needle heads that i did long, long ago. i love her little craft room, were the sewing machine is always set up, she has every color of thread i could need, and sharp scissors always in their place. but most importantly, she kindly, with the bribe of a shoulder rub, threads the machine for me and even makes me bobbins. yes, i own a sewing machine. but it is not magically threaded by a fairy who then offers helpful tips and keeps me company.

not wanting to deal with a pattern, i invoked the help of my paternal grandmother, eyeballed the fabric,and started cutting. i used the elastic edge of the sheet as a waistband, sewed up the side for a skirt, and made a hem. once it was done, i walked over to my brother's house (who lives in the same neighborhood) and tried it on my niece, the intended recipient. she showed her approval in her own 16 mo. old way-namely, not pulling it off. because it was a little big, i went back to the happy room and sewed up the side a little more. then i made two more for two other nieces.

when all was said and done, i had this much thread left:

it felt so good to accomplish something, with no interruptions from the boys and no demands being placed on me. granted, the skirts were pretty wonky (and wrinkly), but i don't think the girls mind and fortunately they have very kind mothers who don't judge or look too closely.

honestly, more therapeutic than the sewing was getting to see my adorable nieces, along with their cute brothers and understanding parents. by the time i wandered home, my boys were beautiful again and tim had undertaken quite an interesting surprise.

oh this crazyhardincredible life i live.

he said whoops.

2010-05-28T21:37:00.002-05:00

tim broke our computer, so i have been disconnected from the interwebs. it's been a blessing in some ways, but really, really annoying at other times. ol timmy boy always complains about how slow and buggy our computers get, but he's the one who makes them that way. good thing he's cute. (he hears that a lot at our house. our vanity is the only thing that keeps our family together.)

i don't really have anything to write about. i'm at my parent's now, with no children, and i'm ignoring them while they pray in the other room just to write this. and check facebook of course. so to a certain someone who demanded i write something-yes watermellen, i'm looking at you- here it is. there were also demands for funny but i don't think it's going to happen. when the computer gets resurrected i've got some pretty good pics to post.

i think i better give my momma my attention. i luv ya folks, but she's my momma for pete's sake and she's pretty fantastic.

that'll do.

2010-05-17T22:52:00.012-05:00

after the last couple posts, it's only fair to share our very good day today.

tim had the day off, which is becoming like a holiday around here. back when he had a "normal" schedule, the weekends weren't really that big of a deal. now, i look forward to days off oh so much.

after i fed the boys breakfast, tim took them on an "adventure". (pretty much any activity that is daddy only is called an adventure because when ben was little (and max now), ben didn't like going places without me. so if we played it up as an "adventure", he was game. and really any amount of time spent with tim IS and adventure, because no one, including him, really knows what's going to happen.)having tim up and functioning before 9:30 is a pretty big deal, so having all three of them out the door by that time was HUGE!

tim took the boys to his mom's while he got some jobs done and i got to have quiet, uninterrupted work time. by the time i saw the boys in the afternoon, they were the cutest little guys i had ever seen. amazing the power of just a few hours to refresh the momma spirit!

we stopped at freddy's on the way home for an early dinner, so when we got home we just got to chill as a family. so. nice.

(uncle sam wants YOU!)

around six i gave the boys a snack and sent them outside to burn off energy, where they made grass hats-putting freshly cut grass on their heads. (my Godfather/brother/neighbor came over and mowed our foot-high yard last night. i almost cried.) after the grass hats, tim gave them baths and they went to bed.

THEN!!! i got to go on an awesome date with my husband. an already great day totally blown off the charts. i got "cuted" up because i was tired of being a troll mommy and we went to timberline. the food was soooo good and it was nice and mellow because it was a late dinner. in an alternate life, tim and i meet up for late dinners often at quiet spots around town. but tonight i was just happy to get to tell a story without interruption, no potty breaks were needed, and the only food i cut was my own.

on the way home, i was cold, so as a joke i put on ben's sweatshirt.

it was a lot easier going on than coming off. i got stuck for a bit while tim laughed at me.

i love this dress. i can't help but feel happy and carefree when i wear it. (except for the windy day that i wore it to mass. that's a doozy of a story.) and my red shoes. they also make me happy.

our days haven't been quite so "challenging" lately. i've been trying to reach out to our support network of family and friends more, which helps break up the monotony and keeps me and the boys from getting totally done with each other. it's silly really-we chose to live were we do so we can be close to our families and dear friends. but i don't like to "bother" them and ask for help. but my boys really are wicked cute and quite fun and for the most part, it's more like sharing the boys with our loved ones than bothering them. i just have to put my obnoxious pride aside that tells me i should be able to do all this on my own. supermom i am not. but that's okay because God has given me what i need. and then some extra blessings on top of that.

so reach out and feel the love. and pray out loud. i find that really helps!

hmmmmm.

2010-05-07T21:36:00.004-05:00

that last post is a hard one to follow.

the sunday evening after i posted it, the boys and i went out to my brother's house. my dear friend and sister (in law) commented that she had read my blog recently and was happy to hear we were doing well and were finding a new balance with tim's job and our family life. i was puzzled, having posted the blow-out "tired" post most recently. but she was referencing the post before that one, written only a couple of days before "tired", which talked about how it seemed like tim's schedule was settling down, the boys and i were happy to be able to be getting outside, etc. yes, i realized, that in the span of a few days i offered totally different view points of our life. talk about bi-polar.

but that's just how i am. when things are crappy, it's hard to remember that that's not how my life ALWAYS is. (which is another reason this space is nice-i can go back and dwell on a really good moment when there have been too many rotten ones and the fog is getting dense.) i have a hard time keeping perspective, but verbalizing often helps me.

my bi-polar posts were also proof of how one week seems much, much longer these days. sometimes tim gets two days off in a row. the day before the two day stretch, once the boys are in bed, i feel like i can breath. finally, we'll have some time with him and we can get some things done. and then the days blink by. and the other five days and the crazy schedule seems like they stretch on for weeks.

the good part of all this is i have come to appreciate my dear spouse and parenting teammate sooooooooooooo much more. i see and feel how much better our family is when we're all together. sadly, i used to often take tim's good traits for granted and often focused more on the areas that needed improvement. although i'm still not a perfect wife (please resist outbursts of laughter at that heinous understatement), i try to be more thankful for all the things tim does really well and to verbally tell him how much we love having him around and how much we just...love him.

after writing that last post, i did at times feel like, maybe in fact, i am just a bad mommy. but i know that's not true. your kind comments reaffirmed that. but what really affirmed it for me was:

last weekend i sat behind two of my brothers' families during my nephew's First Communion. i'll admit, i was very distracted by my beautiful nieces and nephews, but more, i was taken by the beauty of watching my sisters as mothers. these are women who are also tired. women who have given their bodies over and over for their children, lost too much sleep, have husbands who are gone more than they would like. mommas who stay home with their babes at this point in their lives because they know that that's what is best for their families. i got to see little glimpses of their true love for their children-subconscious things like stroking their hair and kissing their heads, checking on them while they sat or played underfoot as the congregation stood, holding them even though their arms were tired. no, they may not always gush on and on about their children and how motherhood completes them and how they couldn't possibly be any happier. true love isn't defined by warm fuzzies. i looked up to the cross and thought about true love. sacrificial love.

so sometimes i might feel like a bad wife and mother because my thoughts and feelings aren't always pure bliss. and while i do truly believe that we called to be joyful in our vocations, when i'm not so good at that, i'm reassured by my actions that, yes, i really do love my guys.

tired.

2010-04-24T21:18:00.003-05:00

the following is a (very long, oh so bright and sunny) post i wrote last night. obviously, we've lived to see another day. i share this because this is real life, or at least real life for me. not every day (or week or month)is like this but some certainly are. i'm tired of seeing celebrities and some facebook "friends" who dote on and on about how wonderful their children are, how happy they are, etc. in the past, some of those celebrities who gushed about how wonderful their marriages are, are the same ones who are now divorced. i love my family and some moments with them are pure bliss and ecstasy. but other moments are pure agony. no one advertises their shitty days in all their full blown despair. we may joke that, "ahhh, the kids are driving me crazy!" but that's not really the same. i think there's some validity in not "airing one's dirty laundry for all the world to see", but in this age of facebook, twitter, and blogs, it's equally unfair to only advertise all the really wonderful parts of life, family, and parenthood. because sometimes that imbalance makes me feel like a totally horrible wife and mother for not feeling like my life is all sunshine and rainbows or that i'm not doing enough because my boys are way more beastly than other kids. maybe i just need to disconnect from those things so as not to scandalize myself. i'm considering it.

any of this make sense??? well,anyways, you've been warned...

i'm done. i'm not going to joke about how challenging my boys are, but then share something cute that redeems them. i'm not going to "put things in perspective" because we have food on the table and a roof over our heads. right now, at this moment, i would rather be living in a shelter with an unemployed husband. (yes that is drastic, but i'm pretty sure that's how i feel.)

tim is working all the time and i am going crazy...well...pretty much all the time. yes, there's phrases i've said in the past, trying to look at the bright side, trying to convince myself that this could work, like, "yah, he's gone all weekend but we can usually hang out with family on the weekends and then we get to have him to ourselves when he has two days off during the week." yes, this is kind of true, but two days off and then not seeing my spouse and parenting teammate the other five days is just not cutting it. because he's working in a restaurant, a regular shift runs from something like 11am-10pm. but because he's working on the way other side of town, he has to leave an hour early for work. so that means he leaves around 10am and gets home around 11pm. to say tim is not a morning person is a huge understatement. he loves the nighttime so working late is no problem for him. it just means the boys hardly get to see him and if i stay up to try and have a relationship with him, i'm exhausted the next day, because i still have to get up with the boys. long days for him and "there's really no word for me to describe my days" for me. and ben is always saying how much he misses his dad-it breaks my heart (that is, when my heart and brain aren't already numb.)

often when someone works tons of hours, it means they're making more money. nope. way more hours, and less money than his old job. yes, this is basically an investment, like going to college, but i'm so beyond wanting to hear that. so i need to work so that we don't have to use our savings, but i'm a bit short on extra physical and mental energy these days. and my job isn't exactly a clock-in, clock-out, no brainer kind of deal. i not so secretly just what to work as a cashier-a job that requires very little of my energy. but my job is good pay and allows me to work less hours for the same pay as a more menial job. because i feel like i need to be with my boys. they are my responsibility and i don't want someone else raising my kids for me. i think.

honestly, some days, a lot of days recently, i just want someone else to raise my boys. drop them off at daycare, work full time, come home, spend a few hours with them, and put them to bed. because they are SO EXHAUSTING.

when i don't work at all, like i have been for the last couple of weeks, they drive me crazy. ben is in one of his more difficult stages. (he's cyclical-i usually get a reprieve of a couple of normal-to-sweet ben weeks before another couple months of "challenging" crash over me.) right now everything i ask of him is, "i don't want to" or a very snotty "NO!" and everything i give him to eat earns a "i what something different". he is either teasing max or yelling at max to do want he wants him to do, sometimes sneakily throwing things at max, bopping him, or pushing him. he is a very constant child and rarely plays by himself, always wanting to be in the same room/place i'm in. my only real break from his constant questions, requests/demands, and pokings is tv. but i really don't want him watching a lot of tv, so he gets two shows when max goes down for his nap. ben won't nap so unless we've gone somewhere in the afternoon and he crashes in the car, he gets really tired and therefore uber cranky and irrational within a couple days. but if he does sleep in the car, he's up really late. ben has never been a good sleeper and often still comes up to our bed at night. if i have the energy to fight the melt down and feel like the meanest troll mommy in the world, i take him back to his bed. but most nights i'm just too tired. because i've had nearly four years of interrupted sleep!

ben is not a terrible kid. i know this, despite what i say. he can be very sweet, super friendly, thoughtful, generous and in my opinion, has been blessed with a very smart little brain. but goodness gracious is he demanding.

max basically seems like ben 2.0 in a lot of ways. which is wonderful in a lot of ways, but also, to be completely honest, fills me with some feelings of dread. he always wants to be with me, is super energetic, and very volatile.

so, like i said, some days i really just want them to be someone else's responsibility. but i know in my heart that mothering-teacher, moral guide, dietitian, etc is absolutely necessary. so i work part-time, and then come home and make up for the time i missed with full-time mothering and taking care of a home.

i feel totally exhausted mentally, physically, and spiritually. and that's with the help of family and friends. i pray for those that don't have the thread of family and friends to keep them from falling completely. right now i feel like i'm just stumbling, stumbling, stumbling along.

yes, i should "offer all these things up". i do use my frustrations as reminders to pray for those mothers who are struggling without support, for families with very sick children, for the souls in purgatory, for our priests, and our church. but i'm just not very good at that.

and i'm tired.

so there it is. like i said, we've lived to see another day. we're working on reorganizing some things in hopes that it helps us all, and most importantly, praying for grace, wisdom, and patience.

ahem.

2010-04-21T20:26:00.007-05:00

it has been a while since i posted. obviously. i wish i were a fast writer, but i'm not. a "quick" post always takes more time than i would like it to. but i've missed preserving my thoughts in this space. as cussy as my memory is, this space is a good way to keep track of things/vent/blather.

although i don't think we've really been any more busy these last couple weeks (all my days since becoming a mother seem rather full, regardless of our happenings) we have been outside a lot and for me, away from the computer, which is a good thing. oh to be outside! how it soothes my soul. and goodness do the boys need it! to make dinner while they play outside instead of whining under my feet is amazing. when i come in the house to grab a drink, i realize how stuffy and stagnant the house becomes after a long winter. it's hard to articulate, but it just feels so good!

i've also been cleaning out the house and reading real books-it's good to have projects.

and my favorite thing that has kept me away from blogging-it seems like tim has been home more. hours wise, he's working the same amount, but because i haven't been working much, i'm home when he's off and it has been a much, much, much needed infusion of family and couple time. even just his presence around the house is wonderful-like this evening he is home and in the other room playing a video game, and even the sound of the car racing gives me little warm fuzzies. it's amazing how much we took our time for granted when he had a more regular work week. in a way, it's been really good for us. hard, but good.

here's some pics to catch things up. and because my boys are cute-because hey, if you got 'em, flaunt 'em. (as everyone who knows me, knows that my personal philosophy.) (what does a sarcastic emoticon look like?)

his ability to look through my soul in this picture is because he was watching tv while i cut his hair and then took the picture. nothing phases him in tv mode.

i don't think a single day goes by without wresting. oh the tackling in this house.

evidence of our need to be outside. he wanted out IMMEDIATELY after breakfast. footie jammies are the equivalent of shoes, right?

i peeked out the door while cooking dinner to see this. max ticked off and ben chillin in his thinking cap. maybe max is annoyed i'm preserving for posterity his poor apparel choices. 12mo jacket, 2T (maybe 3)sweatshirt, 9mo pants, and ben's sandals. ragamuffin is the standard look around here.

and one more, because after a few days, even the really hard, crazy days, lose their harsh, rough edges and i can laugh at them. on this particular day, ben and i both weren't feeling well, max had been sleeping terribly (meaning i was exhausted and he was extremely "disagreeable"), and i didn't have the energy to not let him eat with a toy screwdriver as his only utensil.

a funny

2010-04-04T20:52:00.002-05:00

my brain is so crowded with pretty heavy thoughts, but i think this little gem of a story is probably more pleasing to the court.

today we spent easter at my aunt's house with a good portion of my dad's family.

(this is where a couple of paragraphs would have been describing my family, trying to set the tone of the story. i tried to write them, but felt like i just couldn't do the clan justice. i think we are a pretty "interesting" bunch of people, but i think a lot of families are pretty cooky if you really know them. but maybe not. are we exceptional in our oddness? regardless, i find my family pretty dang amusing.)

(this is the paragraph i tried to write describing my cousin zach. he's especially amusing. my brain is way way too tired to do him justice.)

max was carrying around ben's half empty bubble bottle (i guess i really am a pessimist) and fell, spilling a lot of the bubble solution out. before he could decide if that upset him, my cousin reached down and filled it back to half full from his bottle of beer. beer, in his opinion, looked more authentic than water because it created the line of foamy bubbles. zach didn't want to insult max's intelligence because he would have noticed the lack of bubbles.

******

******

booo. i totally destroyed the story. apparently i can't write about my family-much to complex a topic to capture the appropriate nuances of. this really isn't worth posting but i'm giving myself an B+ for effort. maybe sleep is a better idea.

nope.

2010-03-31T21:57:00.003-05:00

i was going to post tonight, but then tim turned on a stand-up comic performance and i've been distracted. i won't name who-i don't want to promote or condone such viewing. but i have to admit he can be pretty funny. and it's nice to laugh with the hubby. heck, it's nice to just get to see the hubby.

maybe next time.

why i blog

2010-03-20T21:23:00.003-05:00

(this picture has absolutely nothing to do with this post. i don't really know why i do these things.)

i don't like the word blog. i really dislike the term blogosphere. although i sometimes really enjoy reading blogs, i have grown somewhat disenchanted. i like to look at crafty blogs, but i never actually craft any of the ideas i see. more like a drug addict, i jump from blog to blog looking for my next visual "fix" that makes me happy for a few moments. then i go to bed way to late and am then sleep deprived and cranky with those that are most important to me. : (

like i said, i have grown somewhat disenchanted. so lately, i have been thinking about about my role in the whole world of bloggity blogs. why do i blog? is this really worthwhile? am i just one more .blogpresspad.com in the over saturated world of blogs? so i really thought about it. my conclusions, in case you care are:

-writing is very therapeutic for me. after cussy days, i can write it all out and then call myself out as the big whiner that i am. it helps put things in perspective for me, big time. it helps me keep track of our full little life and reminds me how hard, hard, hard and wonderful our little life is. it also gives me mental clarity, nailing down thoughts that have been swirling in my brain for too long.

-i like to entertain. because i pretty much only think of the few people who leave comments as my audience, who are people i know and like in real life, it's like trying to make my friends laugh. or whining to my friends. which ever the case may be. one of my dear brothers and i have a similar sense of humor and back in the days of email, we used to send each other stories of funny things that happened to us or that we observed. a weird incident at walmart-mental note to tell brother. made a fool of myself doing....-email brother. this is my way of reaching a much larger audience with my ridiculous observations and enjoyments. and i can't see you rolling your eyes at me when you think i'm just a dork or hear the crickets when my stories deadpan. not that that ever happens. (cricket. cricket.)

-and to be completely honest, because i think honesty is really important, i'll admit that i write in this little space because i hope it somehow helps you. who ever you are. helps you by making you laugh. helps validate your feelings of frustration or helps you realize that there really is a lot to be thankful for. helps you understand that some people in the world (me) are really crazy and thank God you are normal and sane. if i ever wrote anything factual or informative, i would hope to educate you, but because that doesn't happen, please just pray for us crazies in the world and be thankful for your sanity.

i've written before about trying to use my time more wisely. eating my humble pie, i'll admit that i haven't. i haven't broken the facebook curse and still stay up way, way too late on the computer. but i'm renewing my efforts. that's all i can do.

cluster cuss

2010-03-19T20:08:00.004-05:00

(proof that i didn't give then away to a nice stranger. you'll understand in five minutes why i *might* give them away.)

seen the movie fantastic mr. fox? it's a good one. without tim i would know nothing about pop culture. so tim made me watch the movie and i found it amusing, because, in a little way i feel like i'm married to mr. fox. tim makes things happen when he really wants them to happen-like getting me to marry him. darn that clever fox.

i'm delineating from my point. in the movie, instead of cursing, they insert the word "cuss" where a curse word would be. instead of "what the hell?!" they say "what the cuss?!"

well, today has been a real cuss of a day!

the day started well until max heard me say to tim, "i'm going to take a shower." max does not like to be apart from me. unless it's his idea. if it is an imposed separation, he gets irate. case in point: max adores my dad. he will go anywhere with my dad and searches my parents house for him. one day, i tried to give my mom a massage and shut the door to have privacy. although he was with papa, because we were forcing him to be separated, he threw a royal fit. i swear i'm in an abusive relationship with my children.

so max screamed and clung to me as i tried to go downstairs. i peeled with off, tried to get my momma ears to ignore him, and went to enjoy a long, quiet shower. just as my stress was starting to melt away, ben stormed into the bathroom announcing he had to poop. in his haste to make waste, he forget to shut the bathroom door, letting in cold air and letting out all my coveted bathroom steam. (i like when the bathroom gets steamy and don't use the exhaust fan. tmi? whatever.) worse, he let max in, who stood next to the tub, ripping at the curtain, and SCREAMING at the top of his lungs. of course ben needed to be wiped and kept announcing the fact to me, but there was no toilet paper in the bathroom. so trying to fend off max, ben and i were yelling for tim while max overpowered us with his screaming. ahhhhhhh, nothing says relaxing quite like that.

and the day pretty much went on like that. like i said, a real cuss of a day.

but then my boys flash me a smile or tim does something sweet amidst the chaos and it brings me back from the brink. some days are normal, but some days, oh the "some days"!! never, until marriage and then children, had i felt such betrayal, rage, and love. gah, i think i'm losing my mind.

(don't worry, i'm just in a horrible, terrible, no good, very bad, very pissy mood. if i weren't such a bitter betty, writing this out would have almost made me smile at the chaos. it did take the edge off, a bit. if only we had some wine. but alas, i guess i'll just have to clean my frustrations away.)

swirly brain

2010-03-12T21:20:00.003-06:00

that could seriously be the title of pretty much every post i write. my brain is always a flushing toilet bowl of thought. although i like to think the ideas and concepts i mull over and over and over and OVER are of a little more quality than the contents of an average toilet bowl.

you see, being a generally melancholy person, i have a rather debilitating condition known as "paralysis by analysis". i'm always thinking, but oh how painful the doing part is. i usually just over think an idea until i'm so sick of it that i move on. or i talk myself out of ideas before ever trying them.

i'm so NOT a trial and error type of person it's frustrating. success at first try or not at all. all or nothing-that's me. there are so many things that i can see how the middle ground would be advantageous, but i just can't quite do it. when we had chickens, i hated keeping them in their small pen so i would let them free range. i knew this was best for them in theory, but in actuality, they were getting slowly picked off. would it have been better to have chickens in a pen that occasionally free ranged and were still....alive?! of course. but no-i couldn't let go of the principal that it was best for them to free range. and all the chickens died. those poor girls-God really needed to humble me on that one.

so my brain is swirling with all kinds of thoughts. business ideas, world saving ideas, food ideas, home improvement projects, mary improvement projects....until i get so tired of hearing myself think i almost go crazy. and sometimes i unload these ideas on my poor friends and family. i really wouldn't hold it against them if they rolled their eyes at me and spaced out as i launched into my newest dissertation. but they don't, oh my dear, kind friends. they at least wait until my back is turned to roll their eyes.

(if i ever find my phone cable, i'll post some amusing pictures. until then you might as well stop checking in. the swirly brain might get messy.)

large print

2010-03-02T13:14:00.003-06:00

(that title has nothing to do with this post really. it's just the first thing i saw when i looked up.)

i'm here sitting in the library of my youth. i'm in my hometown doing classes for work. i should be working, but, obviously, i'm not. someone else is slaving away watching my children. i should be working, but, i'm not.

i'm in a much more melancholy mood than is helpful for my work. i try to muster all my energy and enthusiasm for class, and then feel the adrenaline wear off as i head home. but i just don't have the pep today. they stare blankly at me, and i'm really tempted to just stare back at them until they respond. but the tough gal routine doesn't win them over in the way i feel it's necessary. i might need to bring candy tomorrow.

oh so many thoughts that i could pour out about this "hometown" of mine, or this library, or this job, or this melancholy. but i'm tired. and i need to go.

chatty benny

2010-02-27T22:02:00.006-06:00

ben is a talker. and a questioner. and a very interesting kid. here are some of our conversations of late.

ben: momma, when i'm as big as daddy will i still live with you and daddy and will max still live with you?
me: well, probably not ben. mommmy and daddy don't live with our parents anymore. you and max will probably have your own houses.
ben: nooooo. i want to still live in this house.
me: well, if it's God's will for you to still live in this house when you're daddy's age, that's fine with me.
ben: (looking upwards) God, can i still live with my parents when i'm my daddy's age?
(i was REALLY curious as to what was going to happen/be said next.)
ben: (very matter-of-factly) God said yes. (and then he walked out of the kitchen.)

driving home tonight from a wonderful evening with friends and family ben had several cute/funny things to say.

ben: momma, i'm really missing my data. (the way he says da-da sounds more like data because he runs it together.)
me: i know buddy. it's hard when daddy works so much. we can pray for daddy that he has a good night at work. and i'll pray for you to be strong, buddy.
ben: thanks momma. do you really miss your husband?
me: yes ben, i do.

a little while later, ben was chattering away and i really wasn't listening until he said, "oh, i'm sorry momma. i won't ask anymore questions. you need to focus on driving. right?"

and still yet later (because of course he couldn't just fall asleep like max)
ben: mom, i really want an attic at our house like in the penguin movie.
me: well, our upstairs can kinda be like an attic. would you like it if we pretend it's an attic.
ben: no. an attic needs to have a ring, with a string, that you pull down and steps come out. then you go up the stairs and there's a huge telescope there.
me: hmmm. i don't know about that, ben.

our life is never dull.

but i wouldn't have it any other way. i think. ; )

hearth pants

2010-02-11T22:16:00.007-06:00

this is the story of tim's dazzling pants and my husband, the designer.

our house is cold in the winter. we have an awesome woodburning stove that heats most of the house up really well, but we are lazy and keeping a fire burning constantly as the sole source of heat is a lot of work. well, it's more the wood collection that is the main issue, but, well, never mind. instead, we usually give in and rely on our inefficient furnace. at night, once the boys are tucked into their warm beds in their cozy rooms with thermostat controlled space heaters, we turn the heat way down.

tim does not get as cold as i do and gets tired of my whining and overall grumpy attitude about being cold. whenever possible i punish him for not collecting firewood by touching his bare back with my ice paws and wedging my cold feet into his knee pits in bed.

because tim is kind hearted, but still not motivated enough to get wood for a fire, we made me some "hearth pants" last winter. calling them hearth pants would imply that they are to be worn around a fire. not true. no, the hearth pants replace the fire. they are a pair of tim's sweat pants sewn together with the early 90's kstate rap pants i had gotten at the goodwill while in college. warm-yes. fashionable-no.

i resisted wearing them because nothing says frumpy quite like men's xL sweat pants worn under poofy at the top, tight at the bottom hammer pants. and they are heavy. wearing the pants was like wearing those subtle leg weights, but in bed. it was an effort to roll over.

(edited to clarify, per donkeyknight's comment about my "washcloth socks"--those washcloth socks are part of the hearth pants-the part i actually appreciate the most. they are the xL sweats that stick out the bottom of the rap pants and make for cozy slippers or booties. tim has to really stretch the pants to use the booties.)

but tim was off the hook. whenever i complained about the temp of the house, implying that he should get firewood, he would cheerily offer to get me the hearth pants.

i honestly only wore them a couple times-to bed when tim was gone and i couldn't stand shivering myself to sleep.

at some point tim realized that his fabulous creation was one size fits all and that he, too, could enjoy the luxury of such stunning pants. many a late night, the hearth pants warmed him as he gamed in the chilly family room. they are also his go-to pants for snow adventures, as shown in the previous post and the following picture.

(my guys preparing to go out into last winter's late march snow.)

this winter tim had somehow forgotten about the hearth pants, which i had buried in the bottom of his bottom dresser drawer. one night he was cold and was lamenting that he used to have a pair of sweatpants, but didn't know what had happened to them. when i reminded him that they were half of his glorious creation, the hearth pants, his eyes lit up. he gasped, "the HEARTH PANTS!! where are they??" he quickly unburied them and marveled at his genius for creating such wonderful pants.

the same night tim made the hearth pants, he also made me a "nursing tunic". again, my complaint was cold-based, chilled when i lifted my shirt to nurse max. so tim took an old undershirt of his (again size xL, hence the "tunic" part of the name, i suppose) and cut flaps for "easy access". the shirt was renamed the "booby buffet" but was never worn. absolutely no pictures were taken and i think i eventually cut it into rags.

tim has not added any more garments to his clothing line, but when he does, i will reveal them, and their wonderful names, here.

when it's time to change

2010-02-10T11:58:00.004-06:00

(my guys enjoying the snow. note tim's pants. there's a great story about them. will i ever get around to sharing it-probably not.)

we are doing much better since the last post. the boys and i are mostly well again-in body AND mind. we've had the luxury of spending a few FULL days with tim, which has been wonderful. it's amazing how much we took him for granted when he used to have a mostly regular 40ish hour a week schedule.

for those who don't know, tim is now working for freddy's frozen custard. this has been a labor of exhaustion (and some delish food and custard) because, while still fulfilling his duties at his old job, he was working increasingly more hours at freddy's. freddy's is an awesomely run company, in part because most of their managers start at the bottom as custard scoopers and steakburger smashers themselves. it's such a respectful environment and that attitude definitely transcends to the customers, or guests, as they are considered at freddy's. because of his hard work over the last couple months, he has now joined the management team and gets to supervise others as they smash and scoop. it's such a great fit for tim, who loves helping people and is such a fun and caring guy. the perk of yummy food doesn't hurt either.

although this big change has been hard on our little family, it's also had a lot of unforeseen blessings. we value our family time so much more now, the boys and i have gotten to spend a lot of time with our family and friends, and tim is refreshed and renewed by his new adventure. it is so good to see his spirit alive again. oh, and the food. it's good stuff.

my presence around this space could go one of two ways in the coming months. because of an increased commute to his new store and the frustration over his divided attention, i'm going to be taking over most of the responsibilities from tim's non-profit job. while i'm excited to resume the work i did before max was born, and thankful for the opportunity to provide for our family during this transition time, i'm hesitant. nervous about balancing my mothering time with work. and nervous about venturing back into this challenging work in a more visible way. so i might not be around this space much. OR i might be around more, avoiding paperwork and not having the boys around constantly. honestly, i'll probably be around as much as i've always been, lazily posting whenever i muster the brainpower.

any prayers or warm fuzzy thoughts would be appreciated as i put on my big girl face and head out into the world.

practical strawberry

*dusting off cobwebs*

2011

holiday recap

blurg, blog

santa santa santa

vanity, thine name is boots.

oh ye internets

a funny

question

happy faces happy tummies

oh my darlins'

going going going (and a prayer).

three

kc time

da shelf

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!

LBJ, NFP, TOB, LOL

"i'm dyyyyyyying"

little big chair.

an ode to june

oh mittens

nom nom nom

ye elusive time

*tear*

style.

long long ago

sigh

a truth and a treat.

busy and tired (in a mostly good way)

thank you.

help!!!

watch as i can make any post way...too...long.

life keeps going

lent

fun with frames

blessings and chaos

just call me ming ming, tasha, or uniqua

valentines

summary of an away

interesting

six

....----===

preparations for the new year

some splaining

busy busy

holiday breakings and makings

kitchen: part 3 the big reveal (gah!)

kitchen: part 2

saga of the kitchen Part One

a different kind of adventure

addendum

sparkles and rainbows

back.

*huge sigh of relief*

riddle me this

happy day

welcome

*click*

when it's gone

y'all gonna make me lose my mind.

absent

and the winner is.....

buying friendship

hot time. summer in the city.

something clever

blurg.

blessed

t.i.r.e.d. !

craft therapy

he said whoops.

that'll do.

hmmmmm.

tired.

ahem.

a funny

nope.

why i blog

cluster cuss

swirly brain

dusting off cobwebs

tear

huge sigh of relief

click