Life on 3rd Street

Life In This Moment...

is full of a naked little girl who despises the idea of having to lay still long enough for a diaper to be placed on her little backside.

is blooming with a spunky little personality that already has us in stitches (and completely, utterly in love) Forgive the crusty nose. I blame it on teething, and a lack of face washing.

involves a lot of pulling up. And a lot of falling down.

is being discovered on hands and knees

has two little boys pretty excited about their first experience seeing a movie on the big screen. (Grayson kept yelling out during the movie, "What is Mater doing???)

is pretty safe spent next to Daddy

has interesting stories to tell:

Ethanosaurus: "My name is Ethanosaurus. I like to swim in the swimming pool at Uncle Michael's house. I like to walk. I'm a nice dinosaur."

Graysonosaurus: "My name is Graysonosaurus. I like to eat cheese and pineapple pizza. I am very short. I have friends."

involves lazy afternoons at the park with sunhats and bubbles.

It's Friday

and...

The sun is shining today after three days of solid rain.

My husband comes home this evening after being away for the past six days.

Ethan is on medicine after discovering this morning that he has a double ear infection.

Grayson does not have a urinary tract infection like I was concerned that he might.

A dear friend that I have reconnected with since we have moved back, offered to come over this morning and watch Adelyn while I took the boys to the doctor. Her and her daughter came over and spent about two hours here with her. This was such a huge blessing to me, because the logistics of taking Adelyn along between her nursing schedule, eating schedule, and the lack of arms on my body is a lot to coordinate!

I got a really, really thoughtful text from my husband this morning and I will probably never forget the words that were in it. He comes home today. (Did I mention that already?)

It's sunny outside (did I mention that already too?)

We are also walking through our first home tomorrow so I am excited about that!

A Gentle Reminder

Giving up what you cannot keep does not mean giving up your home, or your job so you can go serve somewhere else. It is giving up yourself. Lay yourself down. Sacrifice yourself here, now. Cheerfully wipe the nose for the fiftieth time today. Make dinner again for the people who don’t like the green beans. Laugh when your plans are thwarted by a vomiting child. Lay yourself down for the people here with you, the people who annoy you, the people who get in your way, the people who take up so much of your time that you can’t read anymore. Rejoice in them. Sacrifice for them. Gain that which you cannot lose in them.

taken from MOTHERHOOD AS A MISSION FIELD by:Rachel Jankovic

It's not always easy being a Mom.

There are moments when I just want to go incognito and slip away unnoticed, unneeded for just a short period of time.

I have times where I whine and pout (acting much like some certain two year olds I know), mourning the life I used to have. The freedom. The career. The time to myself. The ability to shower on a regular basis...

It's true. It's pathetic. It's completely and utterly selfish. And yet, it happens. I am a selfish person. Even though I love my children truly more than my own life, even though I would do anything I could for them, I still have moments where I think "Is this really the reality of my life? Am I sure this isn't some kind of bad dream I'll wake up from at any moment?"

Now it's not all that bad. I'm sure any mother can relate to the type of bi-polar behavior I seem to demonstrate on any given day. One minute I can be oohing and ahhing over how spectacularly sweet and adorable my children are being, and the next minute I am walking out of the room to breathe before I blow my lid!

Yesterday was one of those days that left me scouring the internet looking for possible job openings this upcoming fall. I had decided that I was going back to work and wasn't cut out for this stay-at-home-mom gig!

Today was a different day. A friend told me it might be. It was.

It wasn't perfect. Grayson still threw his shoe at his sister and hit her in the face while driving in the car. Ethan choked on his sandwich at the restaurant and I had to do some Jackie Chan moves to hurdle myself out of the table, around Adelyn, and over the stroller to get to him. Ethan woke up an hour ago crying that he was sick, even though I'm praying that he is just overtired. Adelyn ate something off the dining room floor and I have no idea what it was, except that she made a fairly disgusted face while gumming it.

But in the midst of all those imperfections that come with every day, I also have a list of things from today that lifted me up...

- Adelyn crawled four big steps (strides, maneuvers, rotations?) across the living room. (My baby is growing up!)

- Ethan stopped his playing on our outing this afternoon, just to approach me saying "Hug my Mommy." After a quick grab he ran off again.

-Ethan had me fix the wheels on a truck of theirs, only to turn around, hold it out to his brother, and say "Here Grayson!"

-Grayson serenaded me while I made dinner tonight with Jesus Loves Me, Eenie Meenie Miney Moe (I really need to take the time to look up the spelling on that!), the ABC song, and Twinkle Twinkle.

-The way that Adelyn squeals when she sees me enter her room after a nap or in the morning. She kicks her feet in to her mattress, her entire face lights up, and she just giggles and shrieks. Melts my heart.

-The way the boys wanted to hold my hand as we walked up the stairs to head to bed tonight.

- Talking to my husband on the phone and having a really nice conversation about our day. Just the thought of knowing that he is there. My partner.

- The fact that my parents celebrated 37 years of marriage today. What a milestone! How thankful and blessed I am to have them together and more in love than ever after all these years.

Overworked and Underpaid

This morning the boys and I were cleaning up after breakfast. I found two puffs of Adelyns on the floor and asked Grayson to please put them in the garbage for me. His little shoulders sagged, he looked at me, took the puffs to the garbage can, and then he said, "Grayson is working SO hard!"

Oh my. It's rough being two and a half!

Thankful

I just want to say first that I am SO thankful tonight for friends who take the time to listen. I am truly, truly, blessed to have the kind of friends I do who listen to me when I need them most. They take me for who I am, love me for who I am, and encourage me where I am at. THANK YOU! Their calls tonight were exactly what I needed to get my head out of the sand.

In potty news, Ethan Douglas ACTUALLY pooped in the toilet yesterday!! Can you believe it? Neither could I! I did the craziest looking diaper dance you ever did see! I don't know if it was some kind of crazy fluke or what, but my little boy did it! He was SO proud of himself! He stood up and started doing the diaper dance himself! Grayson also clapped and cheered for him and said, "Good job Ethan!" All day long it was all either of them could talk about! Grayson on the other hand had a freak out moment yesterday and did not want to go without a diaper. We put diapers back on and I decided we would wait a couple days before tackling the topic again. Baby steps. :)

Speaking of baby steps...Adelyn is DAYS from crawling. That girl is pulling up on everything and getting SO close to figuring out how these knees and arms can work together to get her to where she needs to go!

She is also breaking out her first tooth. I truly believe she is getting a molar first. There is a little white dot there, she is chewing her fingers on that side all the time, and I can feel something poking through.

Never a dull moment in this household I tell ya.

Madison

Update: Thank you for your prayers and thoughts for Madison! The surgery yesterday went perfect! Please continue to pray for her though as she begins the healing process. She has been dealing with a lot of pain and had a really rough night sleep last night. Pray for rest for her and healing for her body. Also pray for her mom, Kristy, to get some rest as well and feel peace as she has to see her daughter go through this ordeal.

Dear Blog Readers,

I ask for your prayers today for a precious friend's dear little girl who is in surgery this morning. She was wheeled in to the O.R. about 1 1/2 hours ago. She will be in surgery until this afternoon. She is having open heart surgery today to repair a hole in the atrium of her heart that she was born with.

Her name is Madison and she is eight years old.

Her two main concerns are whether or not she will be grumpy to the nurses when she wakes up from surgery, and what her scar is going to look like. :)

I have been praying for the doctors, nurses, and anesthesiologist - that they would be on their game, skilled and steady, smiling and gracious...

For the peace of the entire family as they wait out this long surgery today.

For the healing process for Madison, that she would be able to be completely and totally healed and get back on her feet quickly.

We love you Madison!

Tired

There are so many things I want to say.

Want to write.

Want to share.

But I am tired.

Too tired to make the effort to put the words together to make sense enough for you to read. (Did you catch all that?)

Beside me are three books. I can't decide which one I want to start with, therefore they have just been sitting there staring at me until I can decide. Perhaps a round of eenie meenie miney moe is in order. (How in the name of Georgia's grape juice do you spell that?)

Tomorrow is also Operation Potty Day 1 so I really do need my rest. What shall I wear for such an occasion?

I love my Dad.
I love my husband and the father that he is and is becoming.

I did want to write an entire post on those two sentences alone.

Goodnight!

Two and a Half

Two and a half years ago today both of you came in to our family.

My goodness, how our world has changed! :)

You two keep us laughing every.single.day.

A few stories from this past week:

- Yesterday morning I walked back in to the kitchen and saw Ethan's milk cup on the floor. I asked him "Ethan, how did your cup end up on the floor?" He looked at me, then looked at his spoon in his hand and said, "The spoon did it! No, no spoon!"

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- This morning I walked in to the boy's bedroom. The first thing I heard was Grayson say to me, "Grayson did it!" I turned and saw that Grayson was completely naked from the waist down. He then told me as he pointed to a lump on the floor, "There's the diaper! It's wet!"

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- The other morning we were having muffins for breakfast. I gave the boys an entire muffin with the paper on, because that is what they asked for. I explained to them, and they've seen before, that you must take the paper off before you eat the muffin. I got busy putting away dishes or bathing Adelyn or drinking coffee or something and didn't pay much attention to them until I heard Grayson coughing. I look over at him and he is pulling out a huge chunk of paper from his mouth! I rescued what I could of his, but there was only a little bit remaining. I look over at Ethan's plate and it is completely CLEAN! Entire paper gone. Oh vey.

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- When we are driving in a car one boy will ask the other, "What song is this Ethan/Grayson?" The other brother will then tell him the title of the song. The first brother will then say "Yep!" I love it!

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- The other morning the boys were in their room waking up. I could hear them singing "No more monkey's jumping on the bed!" The next thing I hear is two little monkeys jumping off their bed and on to the floor.

I love my little monkeys!

In the above pics Grayson is in green / Ethan gray

North Shore

The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.

-Bertrand Russell

What a treat it was to sneak away with the man I love for a couple of days of completely selfish us time. Thank you again to my Father and Mother-In-Law for watching all three kids for us while we were away!

We toured.

We hiked.

We ate (often).

We drank and enjoyed a fire.

We swam.

We talked.

We hugged.

We laughed.

We sang really badly with the radio.

We kissed.


(Chris thought this was pretty cheezy! Ha!)

We reminisced.

We planned. (You know how those five year plans go Kristy!)

We slept (in!)

We talked about our children.

We listened to waves hitting the shore.





We didn't argue even a teeny weeny bit!

:)