SO FAR SO GOOD-I think!!

This is week 2 of me working part-time. I have not killed anyone or myself yet so things are going pretty well. That is not to say that I haven’t thought about it.

So far since this started:
• Jackson got mad and peed on the floor, once last week and once this week;
• Cooper busted his lip-TWICE;
• laundry seems to never be caught up;
• kitchen is a never ending task;
• when I lose my patience I try to hide in the bathroom until I can get it together;
• Jackson has decided he doesn’t need to nap which means mommy hides in the bathroom seeking patience more often than she should;
• the boys sleep until 7:00/7:30 which means I can either have alone time or sleep late;
• we have had a play date at the park with Madi;
• we go to the walking park regularly and Jackson is fairly well behaved;
• daddy comes home to dinner on the table rather than having to wait for me to get there to cook;
• No naps for Jackson=fairly early bedtime with no fuss
AND
• Next week we are planning a trip to the zoo!!

It is still too soon to tell but we may survive this and actually end up enjoying it. Now I just need to get brave enough to take them both to Jackson alone to catch up with our out of town friends.

10 Random Things

1. I believe in the power of prayer and spend more time in prayer each day than I do anything else.

2. I love living close to my family but not so close that they are in my business-far enough away that I have to hop in the car but close enough that I don’t have to wait long if I need them.

3. My husband is my best friend and has been for more than 10 years. He is the first person I want to talk to when something good, bad, scary, funny, etc. happens.

4. I have no pets and I want no pets. I’m certain that one day the boys will want a dog or something and I absolutely dread it.

5. I love love love to exercise but have been horrible about making the time to do it regularly since Jackson was born.

6. I love watching Jackson figure things out. He is so much like his daddy.

7. I love reading my favorite books over and over at least once each year.

8. I love the Office. It is my guilty pleasure.

9. I have an incredibly high tolerance for pain that is countered by an incredible fear of it. The anxiety worrying over the pain is much worse for me than the actual pain.

10. There were a few times last week when I thought I would rather pay someone my entire full time salary to stay at my house with my kids than stay home with them myself. (isn’t that terrible?? And yes I do feel guilty for feeling that way)

RANDOM WORRIES

Today was Jackson's first day at the sitter. We love Miss Kim. She has always been so good to Jackson she loves him like he's her own and I know that when he is there I have nothing to worry about. BUT those of you who know me well know that I WORRY whether it is justified or not it is what I do. I am not worried about how Jackson's day will be with Kim I am worried about how Jackson's day will be without daycare. Will he miss his friends, will he wonder why he is not at school (even though i tried my best to explain), will he miss the play time and stories, will he remember his friends, will it make me sad to see how excited he is to see them when we run into them in Wal-Mart. Random I know but still things I worry about and yes I know worrying is pointless and a waste of time but...don't judge me, this is something I really struggle with. I know that pulling Jackson from daycare is what is best for Cooper but I can't help but be concerned that it will make things harder for Jax when it is time to return.

BEFORE 7a.m.

FIRST THING
So I wake up between 4:30 and 4:45-I like the snooze button what can I say.
Pray I do not wake the boys, get a shower, pray I do not wake the boys, start a load of laundry, pray I do not wake the boys, clean the kitchen/dishes/bottles/sweep/boil water/whatever did not get done before I passed out the night before, pray I do not wake the boys.

5:30ish
hear Cooper stirring around, pray he doesn’t wake Jackson, fix Cooper a bottle, change his diaper and get him dressed while he takes his bottle, pray he doesn’t wake Jackson , put Cooper down to play and “talk” while I put on make up and dry my hair and wait for Jackson to hear all this commotion and wake up on his own,

6:00ish
take Jackson to the potty, fix Jackson a cup of “chocolate no milk,” PRAY ALL THIS NOISE WILL WAKE TRAVIS UP, wash Jackson’s face, move Cooper out of the way, get Jackson dressed, explain to Cooper that it is Jackson’s turn and move him out of the way again, give Jackson his vitamins and explain to him that he can not eat the entire bottle at once and that it is not candy or prizes, help Jackson brush his teeth while Cooper sneaks into my bedroom and smacks Travis in the face and screams da da, quietly laugh and listen to Travis fuss about all the noise

6:30ish
Hear Travis start the shower and pray that all that I have done this morning has not used up all the hot water, listen for him to start screaming, finish getting myself ready, get everyone’s things together, check Cooper’s bag to make sure it has everything, give Jackson stars for his behavior chart, find something to entertain them in their room so I can load the car and make sure all the car seats are in the right place. Find Travis’ wallet, keys, sunglasses, etc. and put them all on the kitchen counter so he can find them. Fix myself a cup of coffee and throw a yogurt in my purse to have at work.

HOPEFULLY BY 7:00
Load every one up and leave the house! Drop everyone off.

7:30ish
In the car alone!! LIE and tell myself tomorrow will be better b/c tonight I will do everything before I go to bed no matter how tired I am and I will not feel as rushed as I did this morning.

Patience

Proverbs 14:1 “The wise woman builds her house, But the foolish tears it down with her own hands.”

In an effort to “build” up and gain a little order and peace in my home I have decided to look at myself and see what I need to work on personally. I have been really studying up on patience because I have none therefore, I need to do my homework in order to fully understand what it is I seek and how to capture it. Patience takes faith and practice. I’m not much on biting my tongue or taking a deep breath and counting to ten before reacting but I am working on it. This is one of my new favorite quotes and it is really helping me embrace this character flaw of mine “few of us do patience well and none of us do it naturally.” SO I am not alone with this – WHEW!! It takes work but as all things that do take work it will be worth it. BECAUSE:

1. Patience stops problems in their tracks--praying it will stop or at least slow down my 2 year old;

2. Patience fosters peace and quiet--I love quiet;

3. Patience demonstrates love-one can never show too much love;

4. Patience brings an internal calm during an external storm (a/k/a temper tantrums);

5. Patience brings rewards-we call rewards prizes in my house-we like prizes; AND

6. Practicing patience teaches patience.

What I’ve learned is we aren’t born with patience we work for patience and we are rewarded. I am trying to raise good boys who will one day be great men, loving husbands & wonderful fathers. In my quest for patience my biggest hope is that they will learn from my patience and be slow to respond with love, peace, knowledge and wisdom rather than to quickly react and later regret it.

1 WEEK

Only 1 more week full time and I am overwhelmed. I have so much to do at work in order to get ready to be there fewer hours and so much to do at home in order to get ready to be there more. Just thinking of what all I have to do makes me want to put my head down for a bit but that is not very productive.

A few new pics of the boys playing outside.

A couple of Saturdays ago we spent some time with Madi and Dana (first time in FOREVER) we exchanged Christmas gifts – that is how long it has been. We had a blast. The kids were C-R-A-Z-Y but that is not unusual. Here are few of the pics I managed to get. Hopefully we can do it again VERY SOON!!

Notice the slobber on Jackson’s shirt-yes he still drools and should probably still be wearing a bib!!

Time changes this next weekend and I am so excited. I love the longer days, I am sure I will change my mind once I trapped home with two balls of energy all day.

REALLY???

I day dream/worry A LOT especially at night after my children go to sleep and I have finished with the daily chores (ha! Who am I kidding when are the daily chores ever finished)!! I like to blame it on my self diagnosed ADHD. Anything my husband says after 9:00 p.m. I do not hear. I have gotten pretty good over the years in making him believe I am always listening but in reality I only hear about half of what he has said. This gets me in trouble from time to time. Since I never heard what he said he may as well have not said it. Later when I am questioned about what I think or if I remember what “we” talked about last night-I’m clueless. This brings me to the Lexus and the Play Station 3. Apparently, in my nodding and smiling and responding with uh huh, yeah, we’ll see, I’ll thinking about, I unknowingly agreed to consider purchasing these two items. Yes we are thinking of trading in my car for a “new to me” vehicle but a LEXUS. Please-new or used I don’t want to spend that kind of money right now. End of discussion. Now to the Play Station, REALLY?? As if there isn’t enough SEC, Nascar and UFC interrupting what little peace and quiet my house sees he wants to bring in a game console. This might would fly if the boys were old enough to participate and play with this but I just can’t wrap my head around this purchase--especially since the majority of my time is spent scrubbing, folding, sweeping, mopping, washing, NOT sitting, watching, playing, screaming at the television, asking “why aren’t the jeans I want to wear clean?”, “are you ever gonna finish with the dishes?” followed up with “why don’t you sit down and watch t.v. with me??”

Please, don’t get me wrong, my husband is wonderful to me, he is my best friend and is the BEST father/daddy to our boys and I am blessed to have such an amazing man in my life BUT COME ON NOW!!

MOMMY NEEDS A PLAY DATE

FEELING NOSTALGIC

This morning I bundled up in my husband’s northface (after leaving the house I notice it is covered in snot and what appears to be bananas) run back inside for a cup of water to “defrost” my frozen windshield and make the commute to take Coop to granny’s. As I am scanning the radio and hear the announcer say that today is March whatever we are expected to have sunshine I remember a time when my weeks were spent living for the weekends. Not that I do not live for the weekends now but the weekends are much different. Weekends once consisted of waking up early to finish laundry so I could be sitting in my plastic lawn chair in the creek or river by 9:30 a.m. where I would sit with my besties for hours upon hours talking about everything and absolutely nothing. Some of my best memories are sitting in those chairs in early march freezing my butt off “working on my tan.” The conversation was unstoppable, we all spoke at the same time b/c we couldn’t wait for the other one to shut up before we chimed in, yet we all seemed to know exactly verbatim what the other had said. We wouldn’t budge from these chairs until we were burnt to a crisp and famished some 6 or so hours later. Many a plans for the future were made, we fussed about our men (now our husbands) either b/c they didn’t want to join us or b/c they wouldn’t leave (just depended on the day and the direction of the conversation) and swore we would spend every spring/summer right where we were with kids in tow no matter what. WELL, as we’ve gotten older and gotten married and had babies I honestly can’t remember the last time I saw my plastic lawn chair much less loaded it up for a day out. I find myself longing for the smell of tanning oil and making a run for Chinese food with crispy wet hair, reeking of sweat and tanning oil with beach towels wrapped around our wastes.

Our conversations now are often (who am I kidding) always interrupted by screaming children and are so few and far between that we can’t remember what we’ve caught one another up on. This makes me sad and DETERMINED. Determined to keep the promises we made. We will be back in our plastic lawn chairs at the creek/river/next to the plastic yard pool/WHATEVER this spring/summer kids in tow NO MATTER WHAT!! No matter how many times we find ourselves jumping up to pull apart the children fighting, how many snack breaks they need, how many times we have to wipe away their tears or how ill they get from lack of naps I WILL be digging out my lawn chair and tanning oil and praying it fits in the trunk along with the double stroller, floaties, extra box of diapers, changes of clothes and box of toys because MOMMY NEEDS PLAY DATES TOO!!

I am super excited about being home with the boys more and some what TERRIFIED!! I work, always have, it is what I do, it is all i know. Since having children, that means my house is a disaster most days. There just aren't enough hours in the day to get everything done and I try my best to spend as much time with them as I can each day-which doesn't seem like much at all. THEN the weekend comes. Travis works on Saturdays so I am home alone with these two little people (I LOVE THEM MORE THAN YOU WILL EVER KNOW) they absolutely wear me out! Jackson has decided that his sole purpose in life for the time being is to torture Cooper so every 4.5 seconds I am having to either pry Jackson's hands from Coopers face/head/neck/etc. or peal him off of Cooper-He jumps on him like a UFC wrestler. Cooper, who is a mommas boy, screams like a girl until he is safely propped on my hip like a spider monkey, with his right hand clenching my arm and his left hand clenching the neck of my shirt-this is where he would stay at all times if i allowed it. So needless to say nothing much gets done on Saturdays unless the two of them happen to nap at the same time. When this happens I race around the house like a psychotic OCD maid getting as much done in what little time I have and THEN the second they wake up both toy bins and every basket is then dumped into the middle of the living room making it appear as though i have sat on the couch, ignoring the children, letting them run amuck, eating bon bons and watching lifetime movie network all day. Travis gets home a little after 5 and I hide in the bathroom and try not to cry b/c I know that he is thinking "what in the world did she let them do and why did she not stop them." SO in an attempt to fool myself and my husband, I have really big plans and lists and am knowingly setting myself up for major disappointment by thinking that these extra days home will allow me to get more done, be more patient, have more "me time", master potty training, start weaning Cooper from the bottle, finish unpacking, spend more time on my bible study, read some books, etc, the list goes on and on and on. If you see me in the next couple of weeks walking around blissfully unaware of what is about to take place, please let me be, I enjoy it here in la la land, it makes me happy and makes me feel as though i may gain some control of the chaos of my life sooner rather than later. Give me a couple of weeks of being home with them more and then please offer suggestions to help save my sanity!!