The Toddler Years

I was around a friend's toddler son recently and he was so cute and reminded me so much of my boys when they were smaller.

I almost said out loud that I missed those toddler years, and in many ways I do miss it, but I have photographic evidence of what it's REALLY like living with a toddler:

And also evidence of the joys of that THIRD child! 

For anyone still in the throws of parenting a toddler, it does pass.

That adorable, mischievous little guy of mine is now 7 years old!  (And he never colors on the wall any more!) 

And the Mr. Clean Eraser?  Is your friend!!

Where in the World?

In the past few weeks we've been firming up plans for our summer mission trip.

We went to the Dominican Republic last year with our two oldest children.  

Where will we go this year?

I can tell you, I am over the moon excited about this trip!

There is no place else I'd rather go!! 

Malaria meds will be required.

Only our oldest child will go with us this time as this place will be our most remote trip yet.

We've been to this particular country before, but never the southern region of it.

This country?  Holds a huge piece of my heart!

 More to come on why we are going and what we'll be doing there.

Somebody . . .

Somebody had a visit to the beauty shop this week for a much needed haircut and it wasn't me!   Actually, now that I think about it, I'm not sure what it says about my life that I pay THREE TIMES the amount to get the dog's haircut as I do when I get my own haircut.

The bows were a nice surprise when we picked her up from the groomer, they've never done more than a bandana, but they bows went about as well as we expected they would.  They lasted all of 3 hours before she managed to scratch them out!

Bows are just not really her thing.

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Somebody needs to convince my 8 year old to free the silverfish!  Yes, it is still alive after over a week!  

It survived a near drowning by my 5 year old daughter who decided it needed "some water" while her big sister was at school and dumped water from her water bottle into the bug habitat.  I didn't realize what had happened until a few hours later when we noticed the silverfish didn't look so good and was submerged under water.  We emptied the water, but there were a tense few hours where we weren't sure if "Unknown" the Silverfish was going to make it and there were some dramatic, "YOU killed my silverfish!!!!" exclamations from big sister to little sister that I had to mediate.  BUT that silverfish rallied and survived!

However, in my opinion, not only is the silverfish gross, it just seems to be living a sad existence stuck there in the bug habitat.  Hence the need for somebody to convince my daughter to LET IT GO!

The bug girl at work:

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Speaking of LET IT GO, somebody (sadly it was me) got assigned to the FACE PAINTING table when I volunteered at the preschool Outdoor Day last Friday.  Y'all, I cannot draw well on paper, much less the cheek of a small, squirming child!  It was not pretty.  AT ALL!  

And it didn't help that EVERY! SINGLE! little girl wanted something Frozen Movie related on their cheek!

I finally lost any shame and just told the kids I could do a snake, a rainbow, or a flower and if they wanted anything else they'd have to wait on one of the other 3 moms who were totally rocking the face painting -- seriously they were like professionals!  I was like, "How exactly did you get so good at face painting?  Is this a craft that you practice regularly?"  "Did I miss a training class or something?"

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 Somebody tried out and made it onto the swim team this week:

Little Girl is SO EXCITED to be swimming on the team like her big brothers and sister!  

I was totally over-confident about the try-outs because of my 4 kids she is BY FAR my best swimmer as a 5 year old and the rest of them all made the team when they were 5 years old.  But it was kinda dicey in the tryouts, and I had a moment of panic!  They asked Little Girl to swim "Freestyle", she jumped in and began wildly doggy-paddling.  I have seen her swim really well, so I knew something was up.  It dawned on me that she didn't know what the term "Freestyle" meant.  So I yelled, "Do your big arms and big kicks!"  And then she swam a beautiful freestyle complete with side breathing the entire length of the pool without stopping!  And was then able to do a lap of backstroke, too!

I asked her later if she knew what they meant when they said, "Freestyle" and she said, "No".  But, I'm not at all sure why doggy-paddling was what she decided to try!

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Happy Mother's Day to all the mamas out there!  May you be richly blessed with breakfast in bed, a clean house, and homemade cards!

Remebering the Phone Call of a Lifetime

It's crazy to know that it was 3 years ago on April 29th when we received the phone call of a lifetime with the referral for the little girl we'd adopt!  Life is flying by so fast now, that Little Girl is 5 years old now and has been home almost 2 and a half years, but I do want to always remember what God has done in our lives.  In many ways I'm still in awe of it all! 

From May 2, 2011:
 
More of the story of The Call. . .

When the phone rang last Friday at 3:45 pm, no way did I expect it to be The Call (and yes, I do believe you have to capitalize that term) we'd been waiting on for nearly 13 months!! In fact, by about 1PM I was like, "Okay, so today's obviously not going to be the day and that means this week has not been the week and now we have to wait out the weekend."

I was busy with my kids and when the phone rang I had to scramble to get it, I saw the number was from our adoption agency's area code and I answered it but still I didn't really think it was The Call! After initial hellos, our caseworker said, "I hear you guys are coming for the training next week and I wanted to make sure I got to see you while you were here." I made small talk with her about the training while opening a snack for one child and cutting a "too scratchy" tag out of the swimsuit of another child (I really think I was babbling incoherently) when in my head all I could think was, "Please don't let that be the only reason you're calling!!!"

Then she finally got to, "There's another reason I'm calling . . ."

And I just about fainted thinking, is this really it are we finally going to know who the little girl is we're going to adopt?!!

When she told me she had our referral ready, I didn't ask her anything about the child, yet, because my husband and I had already decided if at all possible we wanted to find out her age together. Since my husband was at work, I asked if we could call her back and would she be in the office. She gave me the direct number to call her back and I'm so glad I repeated it back to her because I'd written it down wrong my hand was shaking so much!

I called my husband and he agreed to come home so we could be together to get the news and see the pictures. I began flying around my house like a crazy person saying random things to my kids and wildly rubbing sunscreen on them. I dropped my older two kids off at swim team practice and then came back home, started a movie for my little one, then my husband drove up and we called our caseworker back.

She said, "Okay I'm hitting send."

And my email in-box churned for what felt like at least 90 minutes but in reality was about 1 minute. I have no doubt I hit refresh about 120 times during that 1 minute!! And then it was there! The first email introducing our new daughter with about 12 photos attached! Then there was another email with many attachments with medical info, etc., etc. We talked through all the attachments with our caseworker for about 30 minutes. And I have to say, the whole experience is just about as surreal as anything I can imagine! But yet, my husband and I both had complete peace at saying "yes" right away without taking any time to think about it or discuss amongst ourselves, even though we were told we could have several days!

It may sound crazy, but it was instantly there, this bond we feel with our new little girl. I told my husband later that night before we went to bed and were staring at the pictures we'd printed out, "She looks really familiar to me for some reason, like she reminds me of someone, but I can't think of who." I still haven't thought of anyone she reminds me of, I really just believe she looks familiar to me because God intended us to be together all along.

My mind is a whirlwind of crazy, so I'm sure this blog post is incoherent at best, but I'll wrap up with telling the kids. It was late evening before we could tell them because my husband had some key work stuff he had to finish, so he went back up to work and ended up staying late to make up for the time he was home in the afternoon, and we wanted to both be there when the kids heard the news (they knew we'd gotten our referral, but just didn't know her age, yet and hadn't seen the pics.).

We hooked up the computer to the TV to show the pictures really big and the three kids gathered in front of the screen. I'll never forget my oldest son's reaction, upon seeing the very first picture he smiled huge, raised both his arms, and cheered, "Yay!!!!"

Makes me cry just writing about it!

My 3 year old (who is now 4 -- it's been a busy last few days!) said, "She's as cute as Madeline!" Madeline is our new puppy. We may or may not tell the little sister someday what he said. But for the record, our puppy is pretty cute!!

My 5 year old daughter was rather quiet so I asked what she thought, and she asked, "Is she a baby?" and I said, "Well, more of a toddler, but she'll always be your baby sister because she'll always be younger than you. And, this way maybe she can share a room with you right away, she may not even be sleeping in a crib when she comes home." My 5 year old was very pleased with the idea of sharing a room with the new sister (she's always wanted someone to share her room with, like the boys share a room)!

Then all then kids began asking about how we'd teach her English so we talked a bit about how someone learns a language. I said, "Just like you guys learned, you can help her learn. Like you can pick up a ball, show her and say, "ball" and that's how she'll learn. Then my 5 year old, being too smart for me, said, "Well how will she ever learn to say 'hi' and 'bye'?" You know because "hi" is not a thing you can show someone! Thank you kindergarten for teaching the concept of a noun!

Anyway, the kids are very excited to help her learn English and I'm afraid she's going to be bombarded by too many eager teachers when she comes home! The 30 children she's living with in her specific house of the care center may seem quiet compared to her 3 siblings!

17 More Days Until Summer Break, but who's counting?

I'm counting!  17 more days.  I'm ready for a break from the logistics of the school year, for a slower schedule and mostly, more time with my Fab four, just hanging out!

Washing Like It's 1989!

We HAD the new-fangled washer and dryer.  You know, the HE which really means your clothes get washed with nearly no water (anyone else wonder about the science behind how that works?) and the steam dryer that at just a few years old started leaving mysterious brown, rust-like marks on clothes?  It was all VERY FANCY.

But, we got annoyed with all the new and improved.

And decided to go back to the old and reliable (hopefully?!).  No more HE or energy saver or really anything over just a few hundred dollars because if we are going to have to buy a new washer and dryer every 6 years, they might as well be cheap to start with rather than close to $1,000 a piece!!

Oh yeah, Baby!!

I'm washing like it's 1989!  And I have to say it is pretty awesome!

Y'all the washer actually fills ALL THE WAY up with water!

I love the earth God created for us as much as the next guy, but really I don't think washing clothes is the right avenue to conserve water, not if you actually want them to you know, GET CLEAN!!

'Course my poor 11 year old son is so confused trying to decipher the knobs (Mom, you mean there is no digital read-out?!) and determine if his load of clothes is a "large, medium or small load".  Our old washer just SENSED the load size and chose the setting itself.  I'm convinced technology is making our kids weak -- I just taught my academically gifted 11 year old the difference between small, medium and large!!

Now to find him one of those cell phones that you have to carry in a shoulder bag to take with him to middle school!!!

The Pet of the Week

When I wrote last week about the death of our pet roly-polys, I had no idea the pet that was in store for me this week!

Wait for it . . .

A silverfish!

I know!!  Cuddly, right?

The sad thing is that the kids found that gross thing INSIDE the house, lovely!

I caught it to get it out of the house and then they insisted that I help them put it in their bug hotel.  It was quite a process getting it in their bug habitat (that guy is fast!) and I definitely had the thought numerous times of, "Why am I doing this?"

The kids thought it was so unusual looking and named it "Unknown Species".  They were a little disappointed when I told them it was a Silverfish and actually pretty common.

I did put my foot down and say "Unknown Species" was not welcome inside my house, he needed to live in the bug habitat on the patio table.  Of course one of my kids had to point out the irony that the bug was living in our house running FREE before but now that it was trapped safely in the bug habitat I would not let it come inside!  "Good point, but, still, no.  It stays on the patio."

The kids had me research what silverfish eat and as it turns out, this may be the perfect pet for us.  They can go up to a year without eating anything!!!

And for all her cuteness, our dog Madeline

just may not be the favorite pet anymore judging by the time the kids spent with the silverfish this week!

And at least I'll never have to take the silverfish to the groomer!

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I totally took the easy way out as far as the contribution I whipped up tonight for the 5th grade bake sale that is tomorrow, but considering I made a from-scratch chocolate cake today for my 7 year old's birthday, I gave myself full freedom to use frozen pre-portioned cookie dough for the bake sale items!  I baked up those babies, slapped some frosting (FROM A CAN) on and sandwiched two of them together.  They fit perfectly into some cellophane treat bags I had left over from a different craft (sometimes I'm glad I'm a pack-rat) and came out pretty cute tied with some red and white bakers twine!

The best part is DONE!  One less thing on my to-do list!

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Speaking of DONE, my 11 year old finishes his safety patrol job tomorrow.  He's been training a 4th grader all week to take over his post and tomorrow the 5th graders officially roll-off and the next crop of safety patrols takes over.  I am excited about this!  This week I was talking to a mom I know who has a 4th grade son who is a new safety patrol when she was lamenting the earlier mornings to have the kids at school by 7:20am and it was all I could do to stop myself from dancing right there in front of her with glee that we were almost done with our year!  'Course she'd get the last laugh because she only has 2 kids to go through this 5th grade safety patrol duty and I have a potential 4 years of safety patrol!

There is an end of the year party for the safety patrols but I've found myself saying, "Really, I feel like the parents should get a party, too!"

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My son, does not really share my glee about his safety patrol commitment ending.  He's a little sad.  I'm glad he's enjoyed the job and proud of the responsibility he's shown.  We've had some good conversations about how we can be simultaneously sad about one phase ending while also being excited about the new phase we are entering here in his last days of elementary school before middle school.

This week we left the New Student Night at his new middle school and immediately had to go to the elementary school to watch my 1st grader's musical.  As we were walking into the elementary school my 11 year old son said, "I need to go to the restroom.  I didn't want to go at the middle school because I didn't know where it was and figured I'd just go here."  I laughed and told him I understood.  Then I asked if he'd ever heard the term, "comfort zone", I told him, "This elementary school is your comfort zone.  You know everything about it.  All the classrooms, teachers, rules.  It's scary to leave your comfort zone, but that's how you grow as a person.  And before you know it, your new school will feel comfortable, too."

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He's a lot more ready for middle school than I am, though.  The principal mentioned a school dance for 6th graders that would be the 2nd week of the new school year and I hyperventilated just a little.  My baby boy going to a school dance?!!!  But, life doesn't slow down, does it?

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I got to have a little date with my 8 year old daughter after our haircuts last Saturday.  

We had a great time and I was delighted at the end when we passed someone in high heels and she asked me, "HOW does anyone walk in those shoes?  It looks so funny!  I don't think I'll every wear shoes like that!"   

In about 8 more years, I'm totally holding her to her no high heels declaration!

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Happy Friday, y'all!