Turning Four

L's birthday was on the 19th. Because of my husband being out of town until Saturday we decided to postpone the birthday party celebration until Sunday. I think it worked out great because L had a week worth of special activities and with being the middle child, she was in need of some special attention.

The Monday before her birthday her father took her out to eat for lunch and then to a movie. She was also able to open one of her presents(a Tinkerbell tea set) on her birthday day, which she played with extensively for a couple days before her Grandma M gave her a baby doll that was played with for the next couple days.

We celebrated her birthday with a party on Sunday. We picked up an ice cream cake from Baskin Robbins and some $5 pizzas from Little Caesars. K and her three children came over and my parents had come down from Michigan. It was a great, low key, party.
I love this time of year. For the next three weeks both girls will be four, they are my little Irish twins.

Happy Birthday Baby Girl!

To Assume

Taking care of three kiddos is not a piece of cake. But when I am out shopping with them, strangers feel the need to say, "Wow, you must have your hands full!". I have a list of sarcastic responses that are dying to flow smoothly from my mouth that sadly never do.
The other day this lady felt the need to tell me
"I remember that stage of life- You might not know that this is the best time of your life, your children are blessings"
Really lady? I don't know you. You really have to nerve to tell me that I don't know how good my life is? You don't know anything about me and you are
#1-Telling me my hands are full and
#2 Telling me that I am most likely not appreciating the blessings that I have been given
Ok, maybe I am getting offended too easily, I'm sure the lady meant to be nice about it. To save a young mom from not appreciating her children and regretting it later. I know I look at least 4 years younger than I do, making me a teenage mother in the eyes of many.
I hope and pray that I am never like that. That I never assume in my old age that I know and understand what a younger mom might be going through. That I know how she feels because she must be feeling the same way I did when I was her age. I hope that I ask questions. Find out about her and how she feels, before assuming. Because we all know that to assume only makes an ass out of u and me.

A Bigger Bed?

I guess you say I stand on the fence when it comes to co-sleeping or sharing your bedroom with your children. I have known those who would never let their children sleep in their bed or on their floor and also those who willing share their bed with their children and have a toddler bed in their room for their child to sleep on.
We have a very comfortable queen size bed. Comfortable until you throw a large one year old and a three year old in it with you and then it is quite cozy-is that the right word? Cozy, sometimes, if I am too asleep to notice the children who have climbed into the bed. Then I wake up, sore, and unable to stretch my legs because a child is sleeping across them.
What is the solution? A king size bed maybe? But then when there are more children and we find ourselves with three or four children climbing in to sleep with us, well I not be just as sore and unable to stretch my legs because of the children that are sleeping on them?
Kick them out? Create rules and regulations regarding bedtime and sleeping in our bed? This seems cruel and unnecessary to me.
I love snuggling with my babies in the morning. Even when they decided to sleep with their stinky diaper butts in my face or across my legs so I can't sleep well.
I also love having space to myself to stretch out.
So, someday we will buy a bigger bed.

Back Seat Drivers

On the way to visit my best friend, K, for a much needed talk/play-date I missed the turn onto I-75 and decided to take the road that runs parallel to the highway instead of turning around to get back on. My girls, who can now recognize land marks and know that we always take the highway to get to K's house, were taken aback by my choice to take the unfamiliar road.
"Mom, I think you need to turn around. This is not the right way."
"Mom, it's taking a long time to get to K's house. I think you should go back" They cried, every two minutes or so.
"Do you really think I don't know where I'm going?" I told them.
Obviously they thought I had no sense of direction whatsoever.
As I was turned onto K's street they grew quiet and when I turned into her driveway I said "Do you think I need to turn around now"
"No, I think this looks like her house" They said soberly.
"So, do you know think I know where I am going?"
"Yes"

Lessons learned:
Don't drive on unfamiliar roads to familiar places unless you are prepared to defend your choice of course with your children.
Mom always knows where she is going

The Best Mother's Day

My Mother's Day started off at 5:00a.m., not because any of my children woke me up but because I had to be at work at 6:30a.m. I didn't mind working on Mother's Day. I actually don't mind working any of the holidays. The money is 100% worth it. I was at work from 6:30-3:30.
When I arrived home I was welcomed at the door by my two little girls yelling "Happy Mother's Day!" at the top of their lungs. Right away they started telling me to come into the living room and to "close my eyes". I did what I was told. Taped to the top of our entertainment center were three signs declaring "Happy Mother's Day". Above those were a piggy bank in the shape of a fish, a digital picture frame and a Starbucks gift card. The frame was scrolling through pictures of my children and I and pictures of the children holding the "Happy Mother's Day" signs. I also learned that I had a ice cream pie in the freezer.
My husband then cooked me up some food and told me a little about their day. I knew that they had to go into at least two stores.(a fact that was confirmed later). So on top of going shopping for all my gifts they had put away all the laundry, fixed a problem we were having with our television, wrote "Happy Mother's Day" signs, took pictures of the children with the signs, transferred the pictures to the frame, and reloaded my Starbucks gift card. Whew! All in less than 9 hours( I am pretty sure they all didn't jump out of bed when I left for work at 6:00a.m.) I am utterly in awe.
I then threw in a movie to watch otherwise I am sure I would have passed out. I was so exhausted from working. Jake volunteered to go out and get me a Dark Cherry Frappuccino from Starbucks. While he was gone we ate some of the pie.
Then, only a few minutes after he arrived home, I received a text message from K asking if we wanted to bring the children over so that we could go out. My response: "Are you serious?" It was 8:00p.m., the girls were in their p.j.s already, I was about ready to put them all in bed. But I have learned to never, ever, pass up a free date. So we found a movie to go to, dropped the children off and went out. We saw the movie "Babies" so very cute!
That was the end to my Mother's Day, which was the best Mother's Day I have had.

Playdate at the Park

We just returned home from a much needed and long planned play-date in the park with my best-friend, K and her three kiddos(ages 4yrs., 1 1/2yrs. and 2 months) We've been planning to go walk or play in the park for at least a month(really the last time all of us went to a park to walk was last fall I think) and finally everything worked out so that we could actually go.
We went to this cute little park on the river. It is absolutely perfect. The play area is not too big and not too small, just the right size for our older kids to enjoy themselves without feeling like they are "too big" to play on the "baby" size slides and still small enough that if the smaller kids, ages 1 and 1 1/2 climb and get stuck high up, us mothers can easily reach them from the ground.
We let the children play for awhile while we chatted and then we decided to take a stroll. The park is located right by a bridge(for vehicles) and another bridge(for pedestrians). We walked across the bridge then back again. As we were taking a stop to look at a snake skin that had been shed under the bridge I saw my husband coming our way. He was on his lunch break and decided to come find us.
Then we all went out for lunch at McDonalds. I was amazed at how well behaved the six children were as we stood in line and then all sat down to eat.
It was a great morning. We will plan to do it again next week.

In Between

A year ago I would have told you our future plans, 99.9% sure that they were going to happen. Now I am waiting, not sure where we will be or what we will be doing in our future. It's like that bible verse says:

"Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city,
and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit."
Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.
You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.

Instead, you ought to say,
"If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that."
James 4:13-15

So here I am. I feel like we are in between lives. J is finishing both his degrees in a little more than a year. I am working nights and weekends. Sunday mornings, when the majority of the Christian world is attending church, I am serving people breakfast. J and I see each other less often than we probably should but I think that knowing that this phase in our life is temporary makes it all bearable.
I am still unsure of where we might be in the next year. Even the possibilities that have surfaced we have shared only with a few select people. It's not that I am worried, not at all. I KNOW that God has something good planned for us. He would not let all the talents he has given J go to waste. I am just not so keen to declare our possible plans to the world(Like I did before the rug got pulled out from under us). So for now, if the Lord wills, we will be living in Michigan somewhere building a campus ministry and church out of thoughts and dreams. One thing is for sure. We plan to dream.

Gum Stuck In Hair

My husband, J, took the children to church this morning.. which is quite a feat in itself. Sometimes the girls get gum during their Sunday School class(I don't know why... I think children don't ever need to have gum)
On their way home from church, L complained about having gum stuck in hair and soon after M complained about gum stuck in her hair. Both girls, after chewing their gum, decided that it would be fun to stick their chewed up gum behind their ears. They both have seen Charlie And The Chocolate Factory and obviously got the idea from Violet sticking her gum behind her ear to "save" it for later. M has tried this before, successfully, without any hair damage. That is a whole other story but long story short she said "Mom, I have gum behind my ear like the girl in Willy Wonka"
Well, when the party arrived at home the first thing my husband did was reach into his pocket, bring out his trusty itouch, and search for "how to get gum out of hair" on the Google app.
How do you get gum out of hair?
There are many ways.
Peanut Butter
Ice(put on for 15 min)
Cold Cream
Hand Lotion and Mouth Wash
Husbands method of choice: Vegetable Oil
Soak hair in oil, getting most of the large wads out and then wash the rest out with bath water.
Did it work? Yes! Success!