Wordless Wednesday-Fingerpainting

Seventeen

My baby brother Luke is seventeen today. Here's to the guy who:

...golfs bare chested.

...can ninja with the best of them.

...rips it up on the skateboard.

...has the patience of Job when it comes to waiting in line for a new game system.

Happy Birthday Old Lu.

Weekend Recap

Thank you all so much for your comments on that last post. I was really nervous to put myself out there like that. It's not something that gets talked about much so I was really opening my heart to you all, and you were all so kind.

We are on our last day of a four day weekend. The kids were off of school on Friday and then we had the big storm that ended up being the Big Ice. We were promised 13-20 inches of snow but ended up with lots and lots of freezing rain. The weirdest was looking out the window and seeing snow but hearing thunder and lightning. Kind of creepy but kind of cool.


The kids had a blast playing on the ice. They went out on Saturday in the middle of it all and ran and slipped and slid around the yard. I went out to take pictures and barely made it back up the front steps to get back into the house. It was really a pretty sight, the pregnant lady sliding around outside the front door, practically crawling up the steps into the house. I would have done much better if I would have been wearing ice skates. When the kids came back inside, Jack's hood had a sheet of ice covering it. He was like a little human ice cube. Don't you think these are a little more appropriate than your typical snowman? They scream "ice storm".

We ate homemade chicken noodle soup with homemade noodles. (Sometimes I surprise myself with my domestic abilities) I also nursed the latest round of sickies back to health. I swear, this is the marathon of stomach bugs. It just. never. ends. It's like 26.2 days of sickness, just when we think we have kicked it, someone else gets taken out. I'm starting to get a little T.O.'d about the whole thing, but for now I'm crossing my fingers that this is it and we are done. Please God, I'm begging you. I'm not a health, wealth and prosperity type of girl, but I'll take a little bit of the health part if you don't mind.

So now it's Monday and there's no school. Nate is working from home and we are all feeling pretty cooped up. I might just be desperate enough to take the whole crew to the local fast food playland. We wouldn't really be bringing any new germs to the place, they already have every strain imaginable. Or maybe I will crack the whip on chores and we can get this place spic and span and then take naps. I vote for option number two, minus the cleaning, just the naps.

Why We Have a Million Kids

(This post is controversial. I am sharing MY personal beliefs and where God has brought me. In no way am I trying to force my thinking onto anyone else. There is so much more that I could write about this topic, but I'm going to try to keep it fairly short.)

A couple of days ago I was asked to write about why we have decided to have a large family. The comment brought a smile to my face, I could tell it was written with genuine interest as opposed to the more common shock and disbelief with which most people ask that question.

We started our family when we were young. Very young. We had a son and then less than two years later, a daughter. We were living far away from home, Nate was in college and we were dirt poor. Diiiiiirt poor. As Nate was wrestling with finishing up school and choosing his career path, we discovered that I was pregnant again. This pregnancy came as we took a happy turn in our lives. We had decided to move back to our home town, our lives were moving in a new direction. I remember sitting in a grocery store parking lot before the sun rose, waiting to pick up boxes for packing our belongings. I was oh so nauseous, the first few weeks of my pregnancy kept me on the verge of being sick at any given moment, but I was so, so happy. We were going home. And we were taking a rapidly growing little family with us.

We came back to our home town and we settled in to a new job and a new house and what do you know? I was pregnant again. If I was to be honest, I really struggled when I looked down at those two pink lines. What the heck were we doing? Didn't God know that I was struggling to keep it together with the three little ones that I already had? Why was He throwing another one into the mix so soon? Nate and I spent that next week coming to terms with the news. But then, by the end of the week, I started to miscarry. I was shocked at my emotions. How could I have been so hesitant just a few days ago and now I felt like my heart was being ripped out at the idea of losing this baby. God was beginning to work in me in a small way that I would look back and understand so much more deeply.

We grieved the loss of that little baby. I was faced with feelings that I had never felt before. We had always been able to become pregnant even without really trying or even thinking about it, and here I was, mourning over an empty womb. My heart bled as I watched other pregnant moms with their blossoming bellies, and I felt so raw. So dead. It was a teensy, tiny glimpse into the feelings that women must have when all they want is a child and their bodies won't comply.

We didn't wait the six weeks like the doctor recommended to become pregnant again. I had been hit with a two ton truck, I realized how much I truly desired to have another child. And this is when God started changing my heart. He placed women into my life who spoke new truths to me. He began to take my small little worldview and He tweaked it, and started showing me what HE had in mind. How HE views children. Nate and I battled through this together. Sometimes we were each other's opponents, and other times we were fighting side by side against what society tells us about kids and families. We dove into the the Word of God and we pleaded with Him to show us what He desired from us for our family.

I can't believe how my thinking has made a 180 degree turn. I used to slide right along side the popular thinking that kids were great and everything, but we needed to get them into the world quickly and close together so that we could get them grown and then get on with life. And it didn't seem that harsh when I was thinking it, but now when I look back, that's truly the lie that I was buying into. God challenged me to my inner core when he asked me to rethink my view on children. His word says that they are a blessing. A blessing. Was the way that I was living really reflecting that belief? Did I trust Him to take care of our family? To provide for us and to bring little souls into the world in His timing, or was I going to grab the steering wheel and show Him the best way? These are the questions that were laid onto my heart and I had to wrestle through each one personally and then with my husband.

So far, we have been given six, almost seven, beautiful healthy children. I cannot even begin to express to you the awe I stand in when I look at each one of them. They truly are woven by His hand. If I would have had my own way, who knows what our family would look like right now, but I can tell you that we would have missed out on some amazing blessings and lessons and joys that were planned by Him. I don't know how many kids we will have. It is the million dollar question that we are asked countless times by curious friends and family. All I know is that I don't want to miss out on something that the God of the universe has for me, because I want to limit His hand. Sure, if we had a lot less kids, we would have a lot more money, and a lot more time. You know what, that's not what I want in this life. I want to follow Him, even if his path isn't the most popular one, even if we look like weirdos. I'm learning a lot about myself through these little people in my life. Some things that are amazing and somethings that are ugly. I know I have a whole lot more to learn and I want Him to teach me. If these life lessons are taught through little people who pass though my home and into His world, then bring 'em on. My heart has plenty of room.

Does IHOP Deliver?

Did you know that yesterday was Pancake Day? Yeah, me neither. DANG IT!

Wordless Wednesday- Ouch?

More Wordless Wednesdays here.

Pregnancy Update- 26 weeks

I don't really talk about being pregnant much here. I don't really know why, probably because there is no earth shattering news. Boring, and event less is a good thing when it comes to gestating. So far everything has been smooth sailing. I'm twenty six weeks along today and feeling really good. Yippee!

I don't want to jinx myself by saying this but I think this might be the easiest pregnancy I've had so far, except for with Tyler. With Noelle and Cam I packed on quite a few pounds. I laugh when I see pictures of myself during that time. Aparently I was pregnant in my face. With Caedmon, I started trying to stay active during pregnancy with some walking. When I was expecting Gemma I was running, but had to quit about 20 weeks into the pregnancy, I had so much hip pain. I don't know why, she must have just been sitting on the wrong nerves or something but I couldn't be trusted to walk across the room. My sciatic nerve would shoot a pain from my knee to my hip and up my back and I was always afraid that my right leg would just give out unexpectedly and I would collapse on the floor in a big pregnant heap. I'm crossing my fingers that I won't have to deal with that this time. So far, so good.

I've been able to keep running and boy does it feel good to stay exercising through pregnancy. I feel so much better and have more energy. I'm sure everyone at the gym wonders what is up with the crazy pregnant lady on the treadmill who hogs all the fans, but whatever. I'll keep waddling as long as I can.

Here I am a couple of days ago. The photo quality is lacking, I had to use the camera phone.

Apparently I don't have a head. It's a second trimester symptom. Next week marks the beginning of trimester three, maybe I'll get my head back.

Gosh this is a boring update. How about we talk about food? With the other kids I had some very specific cravings. Tyler made me hungry for Subway ten minutes before they closed so Nate made late night food runs for me. With one of them it was lasagna, with another it was sauerkraut. I'm not kidding, I never liked it before and now all of a sudden I was ordering it on pizza. With another I drank quarts and quarts of lemonade and with another all I wanted was BB-Q ribs. This time something really weird happened. I almost got a reverse craving, and it was unfathomable. For awhile there, I didn't really care about dessert. *gasp!* At least not as much as I normally do. I was able to walk by a pan of brownies and not take one every time. I could hardly believe it. Was this an alien child inside of my womb? What kind of brainwashing was going on inside of my body? But not to fear, a healthy appetite for all things sweet has returned. Phew, that was a close one.

So that's about it for the sixth month. Like I said, nothing very exciting, except for a whole lot of kicking. I think that's pretty amazing. I can't imagine reaching a point in life where I don't get to feel that miracle anymore. What a gift.

Crossing the Laundry Line

You know, sometimes I get a little frustrated when I spend 50% of my laundering time turning clothes right side out, checking pockets, and inspecting whether or not the items really are dirty. Most of that doesn't bother me all that much but today the kids took it too far when I found, in the dirty clothes basket, a sweater still on the hanger. I think we need to revisit the lesson on what it means to "clean your room."

Being Thankful on a Friday

It's been a rough week around here. Germs were flying, people were moaning, stomachs were churning, and odors were wafting. So far, the children have only complained of upset stomachs, no bodily fluids have been released. So I'm thankful for that. Nate has spent the whole week at home. Let me repeat that. THE WHOLE WEEK. I love him. I love being with him. I am so sorry that he was so sick. But it's time to go back to work. Really though, he was so, so, so sick. The kids thought he was going to die. I think he did too. Oh what I would give for a day with temps in the forties so that we could throw the windows open and let in some fresh air. When it's -7, that might not be such a good idea. My children could turn into kidcicles. While I did wash all blankets and linens, now is when I wish I had one of Gretchen's Lysol Bombs. Seriously, that needs to be invented. I would buy a case.

I'm wrapping up the week, trying to be thankful. It's my little February resolution. Here is my list this morning. I am thankful:

• That we only had the stomach flu and not the Ebola virus.
• That I'm a choosy mother and I only buy Jif.
• That big kids can make it to the toilet when they get that churning feeling.
• For Gemma and the way she calls everyone who's name she can't pronounce "La-la"
• For little boys wearing tie dyed capes with no shirt.
• For a date with my 11 year old tonight.
• For lemon bars made with 2 sticks of butter.
• For comfy pants with stretchy waistbands at six months pregnant.

Dad

Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the

outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith. Hebrews 13:7

Thank you Dad for being such a godly leader for our family.

Happy Birthday.

Wordless Wednesday- Set Them Free

More Wordless Wednesdays Here.

The Rules

If I were the boss of the whole world, I would immediately implement the following:

1. No more than one parent per family is allowed to be sick at any given time. If the second parent feels the illness coming on, they must wait until the first parent has made a complete recovery.
2. The number of sick people in a home shall not exceed the number of toilets in said home.
3. All children will come equipped with a "stand by" switch. When a parent is sick, the children can then be switched into stand-by mode and placed in a corner until the parent is well.
4. If the mother is ill with a stomach bug and is with child, the unborn child shall refrain from kicking, rolling or moving at all. Provoking the mother's innards to further turmoil is highly discouraged.
5. All grocery stores will install a drive-thru for families who are ill, thus enabling the mother or father to shop for "sick food" without contaminating the whole store.
6. There will be a limit established for sick days allowable per family, similar to insurance deductibles. Once an individual or family has reached their limit, they will be completely healthy until the next calendar year.

You're Old

Happy Birthday Nate.

I'm glad you are the chief of our little tribe.

Wordless Wednesday- Mother/Daughter Tattoos?

More Wordless Wednesdays here.

Trying To Be Positive.

I'm a pessimist.

There. I said it. I got it out there in the open. Now I typically like to wrap it up in a different package and call myself a "realist", but I'm pretty sure that's not a fair representation on the facts. Yesterday, our pastor gave a powerful sermon about how important attitude is in our spiritual lives. Ouch. Thank you to my husband for choosing seats in the front row so that everyone could clearly see me squirming in my seat during the conviction I was obviously wrestling with.

I'm sitting here this morning, feeling like my head is in a cold metal bucket, sinuses stuffed full as to make mouth breathing a necessity, watery eyes, scratchy voice, the whole shebang. The cold took a turn for the worse last night and this morning I am doing my best to keep my dirty Kleenex pile from engulfing the whole house. Trash can? Oh yeah, good idea. The arctic temperatures are not helping the situation and I'm trying not to let my glass half empty tendencies take over my day. So here is my meager attempt at optimism. Baby steps.

My first instinct when I woke up was to grumble to myself that if it was a little bit warmer, the kids could go outside to play. But we as moms all know that ends up being a whole lot more work than we bargain for. The endless trips in and out of the house. The wet puddles inside the front door. The pile of wet snow clothes in the middle of the living room. No. Maybe warmer weather isn't what I really need right now. And then I remembered a day in early December.........

On that morning I was busy moaning to myself that "Why can't we have snow." and "It's not going to feel like Christmas without snow" and " Is the temperature really in the forties in December? Where is our winter?" Again with the pessimism. So I got my attitude together and gave it a talking to and decided to send the little boys outside to play. After all, it was warm enough, they would be fine. They had a great time and I kept checking my posts, peeking out the windows in the front and back of the house to make sure everything was ok and that they weren't getting into any trouble and that trouble wasn't getting into them. And then I didn't see them for awhile. And then my mother's instinct kicked in. And then I knew that this was one of those pivotal moments. I needed to check on them RIGHT NOW. So I did. And once I found them, I wished that I wouldn't have.





It seems that the ground wasn't completely frozen yet. And that means that the garden wasn't frozen. And there was mud. Yes, Jack was putting the mud in his mouth. A healthy snack perhaps?

So see? I'm thankful that it's cold outside. I'm looking on the bright side. The ground is frozen solid and the garden is covered in snow. It's face shatteringly cold out there and the little buggers have to stay in where it's warm, and not muddy. I'm optimistic.

I told you. Baby steps.

Linky Love

If you aren't reading Julie over at mental tesserae, you are seriously missing out. One of her latest posts, The Best Medicine, is one of my all time Julie favorites, along with Who Needs absinthe?, and Husbands. But all of her posts are my favorite. Also? She is nominated for a couple awards over at the Share the Love blog awards. Go read her, she's fun.

A Cry for Help-*Updated*

*Updated below.

As I sat at the kitchen table this morning with my cup of coffee and my spread of cookbooks and my lists, lists, lists, I had shoppers block. It's kind of like writer's block except it's when you are trying to plan meals for your family for the next two weeks and trying to put together some sort of a grocery list that doesn't break the bank, and you just can't think of anything new. It happens to me every time. I end up just cycling through the same old dinners over and over. My family loves me. Now this morning, it wasn't necessarily the meals I was having a hard time with, but the snacks.

My kids are professional snackers. Jack especially. He doesn't even bother waiting until I have the table cleared from the meal we just finished, he's already on to "what's for a snack?" I have realized the past few weeks that the kid is surviving solely on carbs and sugar. It's really pretty pathetic. I don't want to cut him completely off from snacks, I believe in them. I too can snack like no body's business. It's just that I would like to have some more healthy choices around here. And that's where you all come in. Help me! I know you are full of ideas. Here is a list of some of the things we are doing now, both the healthy and the unhealthy. If you can think of some other options for me, I would love you forever. You just might save Jack from a life of diabetes.

Present Laundry Pile snacking options:

1. A small bowl or ziplock bag full of dry sugary cereal. This is the #1 hit around here, they love it. Their blood sugar levels do not.
2. Cut up carrots, broccoli and celery with dip. Caedmon would eat this all day long if I would let him. Jack, not so much.
3. Yogurt. I buy the big quart size, not the single servings, and still it doesn't last long.
4. Fruit. We love bananas, apples, oranges and grapes. It's just that they only last a few days or so and then we are as doomed as Vasco da Gama's crew to suffer the scurvy.
5. Crackers with cheese and meat.
6. Secret stashes of dessert. Oh wait, that's only me. The kids know nothing about that.

Ok people. Don't let me down. Don't let Jack down. He doesn't need to take insulin shots at age three....yet. Give me you best, kid friendly snacks.

*Updated to add: I knew you guys wouldn't let me down. Thanks so much for all the great ideas. I think I am going to make a master list that I can refer to on grocery list day. Awesome.

Remember

Did you ever notice how quickly memories fade? Or maybe they don't for everyone, maybe it's just me. I'm not a big rememberer. Nate remembers so many stories and details and adventures about growing up. He and his sister and his parents can sit for hours and reminisce about this and that and remember the time..... It's not that I had a traumatic childhood that I am repressing or anything. Completely the opposite. I grew up in am amazing family, we had so many fun times. But I'm kind of sad that my brain won't remember the little details of daily life.

I know we had lemon lime wallpaper in the kitchen of our first house because it was there behind me in a yellowed photograph of preschooler me stirring a pot on the stove. I kind of remember the floor plan of that house, but you would think I would remember more since I was in third grade or so when we moved. For me it takes a photograph to stir up the memories. Last night, Camryn was begging to finish a school project. She is the star student next week so we needed to do the classic " all about her". She needed photos and I kept putting it off because 1. She kept asking at the most inopportune times and 2. I hate taking pictures out of the albums, they never seem to get back in there. Finally I gave in and we sat on the bed together and flipped through pages of years gone by. I got all sentimental because I had forgotten so many things. I had forgotten how delightful Caedmon was when he was 2 years old, how me made us laugh and laugh when he wiggled he rear end and declared "my butt's singing." I had forgotten how long Tyler's hair was when he was in 2nd grade and how his teacher lovingly teased him about it. I had forgotten about the time that Noelle took a shower with her kitten, Striped. That wet, scrawny cat looked so pathetic cowering in the corner of the shower, as far away from the water as possible. I had forgotten about Jack's raggety green snow suit that I had tried to sew all by myself, and about the chipmunk that the kids fed out of an upside down Frisbee on a camping trip. I had forgotten about the time we painted pumpkins. Oh my goodness, it was pure joy to look through those albums and to stir up memories that had been tucked away somewhere in the back of my mind.

So all of that to say, I want to remember the little things, the details of my kids' daily lives. I want to remember more than what is in the photo albums, I want to remember the mannerisms and funny words that they outgrow way too quickly, the things that I don't take pictures of. And because I want to remember them by writing them down here, you all have to read about them too. Sorry, but it's my blog.

This week I want to remember Gemma's newly learned shoulder shrug. Her little shoulders, bouncing up and down as she silently answers "I don't know" with a little grin. I want to remember the pathertic little pony tail she wears in an attempt by her mother to make her hair look a little more girlie and a little less like a toddler mullet. I want to remember how she answers "No" to every question, even when she means yes. You can only tell the difference by the inflection in her voice. I want to remember that when I take her out of her crib in the morning she rubs my cheek with one hand while she sucks her thumb.

I want to remember how Noelle and Camryn sleep together in the top bunk almost every night. Even though I hate it, I want to remember how they toss their backpacks on the bench by the front door and throw their coats on top, disregarding the row of hooks right in front of them.

I want to remember Tyler's never ending showers. How he uses up all the hot water single handedly, because I'm hoping he outgrows that one and that soon it will be nothing more than a memory. I want to remember his laugh while it's still the laugh of a boy, not the crack of an awkward voice change that's just around the corner. I want to remember how he waits just inside the front door for the bus every morning, peeking through the glass to see it come down the street. How he runs across the street to the bus stop in the freezing snow with no hat or mittens and an unzipped coat.

I want to remember the inquiring mind of a five year old, who has so many questions about everything. I want to remember the sparkle in Caedmon's eye when he grins his baby toothed grin. He and Jack carry their little stuffed Curious George's all around the house and imagine all sorts of curious scenarios, some involving dinosaurs, some involving stormtroopers. I want to remember how we had to keep everything even remotely sweet on the very top shelf of the pantry as to prevent Jack from cleaning us out of desserts and eating sugar right out of the bowl. I want to remember how he flew under the radar most nights during supper, eating only the least possible amount of his food and then held out until breakfast and ate two or three bowls of his favorite cereal.

I want to forget the drips on the toilet seat and the globs of toothpaste in the sink.