And we thought he was lying.

A few days ago, Jacob came excitedly down the stairs exclaiming, "Mommy, I pooped in the potty". Mike and I looked at each other a little sceptical, yet hopeful as we follow him upstairs to the bathroom. He points to the potty, but as we peer in we only see a bowl still refilling with water after being flushed. "Did you really poop in the potty, buddy?" I ask. "Ya, I did, I pooped in the potty." Not wanting to assume he's lying and discourage him from doing it again if he is telling the truth, we congratulate him, do a happy dance and reward him, but tell him we want to see next time he does it, and not to flush. The next day, same thing happens, and he takes me by the hand to show me the potty, but all I find is a freshly flushed toilet. "Jacob, I can't see it if you flush. Next time come get me before you flush." Pointing to the tank he tells me, "just look in there." I laugh and explain to him, "that's not where it goes". I decide to check his bum for "residue" and find nothing. At this point I'm having serious doubts, but he's so earnest about it, and he's usually very honest, Mike and I just don't know what to think. The next morning when I go to change him out of his night pull up, I find he's pooped in it. I finally draw the conclusion that he's lying about pooping in the potty. I make him clean himself up and stick him in the shower for a rinse (which he hates) and walk away convinced he's never going to be potty trained.

That was a couple days ago. Today while I was getting ready to bathe Lizzie, Jacob comes into the bathroom and tells me he is going to poop in the potty. He sits and pees and waits a minute, and when nothing happens he gives up and leaves the bathroom. Fast forward a couple hours, he once again come to me and says, "Momma, come see, I pooped in the potty." I follow him to the bathroom, praying he really did it, but having serious doubts. I walk into the bathroom half expecting to see he'd flushed, but nope. Sure enough, there was poop in there!!! I had him flush and we did a happy dance. I've been doing random happy dances ever since. Oh happy, happy day. I guess he wasn't lying after all!

Perfect Parent Syndrom vs. Hands-off Parenting

And then there’s me. The paranoid one.

While eating at Chick Fil-A this afternoon with the family (and my sister and SIL) we witnessed a very interesting interaction between two very strong-willed parents. In case you’ve never let your kids play there, the play area is completely enclosed in a glass room, so parents can peacefully eat, and still see their children play without having to actually be in the play area themselves. I rather like the set up myself. Anyhoo…

We were sitting there peacefully eating while the kids played in the play area, when I hear the mother at the table next to me say something to the effect of, “that kid is beating my kid up. I’m gonna kick his butt. Honey, go get him.” I look over to see my son, playfully rough housing with two other boys. They, ALL THREE, are hitting and pushing each other with smiles on their faces. However, I don’t like to encourage my kid to hit or push no matter how much fun they are all having. So, as the man with the oxygen tank is dutifully obeying his wife’s request to go kick my kids butt, I immediately stand up and announce, “I’m sorry, that is my kid. I’ll take care of it!“ and proceed to pull Jacob out of the play area. I then make him sit at the table with us as punishment for hitting and pushing. I sit down and continue to eat my chicken ceasar cool wrap, and soon hear another mother approach us saying, “it’s not just that kid, (referring to Jacob) that other kid is now hitting my daughter”. When no one gets up to go stop the kid, she directly confronts the offending parents (who, you will remember, were just about to kick my kids butt, for “beating up” her innocent and helpless child.) “Is that your son in the maroon shirt?” she asks. “Yes”, is all she says. “Well, he’s hitting my daughter!” No response. The woman just sat there, staring at whatever game device she was playing and ignored the concerned mother. Just then, the victimized child comes out, complaining that said “innocent child” had spit on her. She again confronts the couple. "Your son just spit on my child!" No response. So she takes her daughter back to her table and doesn't let her go back in. At that point, Lizzie was the only other child left in there with the two boys and I decided I better keep a close eye on her. The parents of these boys are sitting almost directly in my line of vision, and seeing I’m keeping a close eye on things in there, start making comments about the other mother. “I’m sorry lady, but sticking out his tongue is hardly considered spitting.” AKA, “I can’t believe you are accusing my perfect child of doing anything wrong!” As I’m watching these two boys slowly take over the play area and not let Lizzie do anything I decide to let Jacob go back in and I quickly finish my chicken ceasar cool wrap so I can go sit inside the play area to supervise. Things seemed to be going pretty well after that, other than a heated argument between the two parents, that I didn’t hear cause I was inside the play area, but was told it involved something to the effect of, “I’m sorry you have perfect parent syndrome” And “Well, maybe you should discipline your child.” A few minutes later all the kids were up inside the slide area where I don’t have a clear view of them and I hear one of the boys say, “hey that hurt, that was my peanuts”. At that point I wasted no time immediately ordering my children out of the play area, and announcing that it was time to leave, NOW!! Jacob came down the slide immediately, but I was getting no response from Lizzie, even after counting to three. Shocking, I know! So, I climbed in there and dragged her out myself. (If you know me, that's pretty surprising. I'm a little claustophobic. I've been known to make other mothers, who may or may not have been pregnant, go up in there after my kid before. Sorry about that.) I was not letting her stay in there with these bullying, child molesters. (Okay, I doubt there was any molesting going on in there, but I wasn’t taking any chances!) As we are leaving the restaurant we notice the offended parent had dragged management over to talk to the offending parents, and the argument continued.

We planned to do some shopping after we ate, so, when we got back to the van we got the stroller out for the youngest kiddos, got them buckled in, and I decide I need to go potty. I go back into the restaurant to find “offended parent” talking to management about getting “offending parents” kicked out for letting their children be bullies. I glanced over at the "offending parents" and sure enough, there they continued to sit. The wife, still playing her game, and I’m sure sticking around purely to annoy the other parent. It was quite the stand off. I can’t say I’m sad I didn’t get to stick around to see how it ended.

We did our shopping and it took us a bit longer than expected. So instead of heading to a park where our antsy kids could play in the dark, we decided to take them back to Chick Fil-A to play some more before heading back to our hotel. This time the restaurant is a lot busier. As we are sitting there, a mother walks up to the couple sitting at the table next to us and says, “is that your child? He just hit my child”. We all cringe. But to our relief, the mother stands up, apologizes and goes in and gets her son and makes him come sit with her. We all look at each other, relieved that we didn’t have to witness another cat fight. I don't thing restaurant play areas will ever be the same again. In the words of Mike, “I think we’ve all got PTSD.”

Would you like a foot rub as well?

As I was reading down my facebook wall, I came across this article from babycenter.com about having "kid free" flights and having "kid only" flights. I have kind of mixed feelings about this. While I would LOVE to see more kid friendly flights, to completely not let kids on a flight seems totally ridiculous. If you choose to be out in public or on any sort of public transportation, then you need to suck it up and deal with the fact that situations are not going to be in your control and you are going to have to actually deal with other human beings (and occasionally slightly unpleasant situations). That includes children. I think if you want special treatment, fly first class. I doubt many families are flying in that section. That being said, I don't think its a bad idea to have more kid friendly amenities on flights. It would be nice to have a section in an airplane geared more towards people with children. Maybe not for short flights, but for sure any flight over 3 hours. Maybe a small area for kids to be able to get up and walk around, and a bathroom slightly bigger so you can actually change a child's diaper in it. (have you ever tried to change a toddler's diaper in an airplane bathroom? It's difficult to change an infant's diaper in there, but any child over the age of one is physically impossible.) I also think it would be great to have juice boxes as apposed to giving my fidgety 4 year old an open top cup with a straw. Especially when he is sitting by a stranger that could possible end up with that drink in their lap. I would totally be willing to pay a little extra for that sort of stuff. (Not a lot more, since airfare is over priced already.)

I just don't understand why some average Joes feel the world revolves around them and that we should all bend over backwards to make them more comfortable. It's one thing if you're willing to pay for that special treatment, but if you are sitting next to me or my 2 year old, you didn't. You entered the lottery and got stuck with me, just like I got stuck with you. That's the chance you took. So, deal with it, buddy. It's one thing if a child is acting out and a parent is choosing to ignore it, which does happen at times, but that's not typically the case. If you can't peacefully coexist with all sorts of people, (including little ones) then maybe you should stay home.

What kid friendly (or not kid friendly) things would you be willing to pay for on your next flight?

What's the big deal???

I guess I just don't get it. For the last few years it has hit the news and every year I am baffled as to why it's even an issue. What am I talking about, you are wondering? The Merry Christmas vs. Happy Holidays debate, or "the war on Christmas" as I've frequently heard it called. I just don't understand why people have such an issue saying "happy holidays". People have been saying it for YEARS and all of the sudden people see it as not recognizing Christmas?!? Last I checked, Christmas is a holiday. What is so wrong with including all holidays? Not everyone shopping at Walmart (or wherever) is celebrating Christmas. True, Christmas is in December, but it's not the only holiday. Some people are celebrating Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. What's wrong with wishing them happy holidays? I don't feel like Christianity is being attacked by saying it. I don't feel personally offended because my religious views aren't being singled out. Okay, I had an issue when they wanted to change it to a "holiday tree" instead of a Christmas tree. Because the tree is specific to Christmas, but so far that is the ONLY thing I've had a problem with.

I know what some of you are thinking (because I've heard this before as well), "but Michelle, if a sign has Christmas trees on it, it should say 'Merry Christmas', because otherwise you are not acknowledging Christmas". Here's what I say to that. Just putting a Christmas tree on a sign, is acknowledging Christmas. And again...CHRISTMAS IS A HOLIDAY!! I see nothing wrong with a "Happy Holidays" sign that has Christmas trees and stockings on it. So, I'm sorry, but I won't be boycotting any stores over this. And, I'd like to wish you all...

Happy Halloween!

How did you celebrate? Let me tell you what WE did. Friday we had a trunk or treat at the church. The kids dressed up, (although, Lulu demanded that I take her costume off before we left.) and we went and loaded up on candy and saw some really fun costumes. Saturday we had some friends over and we ate pizza, made sticker haunted houses and frosted sugar cookies. We had a lot of fun. I thought about taking the kids to another county to trick or treat at a few houses, since our county did it on Sunday, but I decided that I just didn't want to. I figured the kids had plenty of candy and I really didn't want to get costumes out again. I know, I'm a party pooper. Sunday I let the scarecrow handle handing out candy...

and let the kids pick out a movie to watch. Would you believe, they picked out Polar Express. Actually, it's not that surprising, since "the train movie" is actually a year round movie for us. Still, I bet people who came to the door though it was strange to hear Christmas music coming from inside. haha.

I'm not gonna lie, though. I'm glad it's over. Normally I get really excited for Halloween, but once again, Mike was not here. I guess doing Halloween without him is just getting old. I'm really grateful for such good friends who have been willing to help me make it fun over the last few years. :) While I had a lot of fun, I'm really looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas. Bring on the turkey dinner and gingerbread houses. Woohoo!

Possible Book Titles

I've been contemplating writing a series of children's books based on my children for quite some time now. I've done a lot of brain storming but I seem to have severe writers block in this area. My kids like books that rhyme or repeat phrases. Like, "...but bear went right on snoring." in Wake Up Bear, or, "THERE'S A SHARK IN THE PARK", in Shark in the Park. So, I started thinking about things I hear myself repeating on a regular basis. Here is a list of possible book titles I have come up with.


Don’t Hit
Don’t Tease, or Leave Your Sister Alone
Don’t Sit on the Baby
You're Driving Me Crazy!
Don’t Poop on the Floor
Screaming Miss Lulu
Don’t touch!
Crawl Jimmy, crawl
Don’t Eat That

Or, here are some titles based on things I hear from my children or see my children do on a regular basis.

I’m sorry
"Raaar"
Dance, Dance, Dance
Personal space
"NO!"
Mama, Can I Have A Puppy?

I think I may be on to something. What do you think?

Run chubby, run!

And you thought I was joking about that new treadmill. Well, I wasn't. This isn't actually the treadmill we got...at least I don't think. To be honest, I neither know nor care. It's a treadmill, I can turn it on and it works. That's all I care about. I was just going to get a used one off craigslist for a couple hundred bucks, but Mike is a little more picky than me. He did some research and evidently no one on craigslist had one he liked. He ended up finding one at Sam's Club for a pretty stinking good deal. He kept asking me, "what do you think of this one or that one?" I don't know why he bothered asking me. I thought, "does it have a power button? Does it have a motor? Okay then."

I have been wanting one forever. Why, because I can put it in a room, put up a safety gate so the kids can't get in and run to my hearts content without kids underfoot. Seriously, have you EVER tried to work out with toddlers around. I have several good workout videos, Wii fit, and Wii active. All great tools. Unfortunately, my TV is in the living room and there is no way to keep kids out. They seem to think it's hilarious when mom works out. They see me start to jump and dance around the room like a crazy lady and think it's hilarious. Next thing you know they are trying to join in, which is cute and all, but then I start tripping over them and they think it's hilarious to try and run between my legs. It turns into a game for them that ends with me getting a sprained ankle...or landing on my face. So, I give up and consign myself to being a fatty forever...which leads to me consoling myself with a carton of ice cream. Good times.

Sure I could run outside...in the heat, with 2 kids in a jogging stroller and one...well...I don't know what I'd do with the other one. For a while I was running outside after Mike got home. It worked out pretty well, until my paranoia started kicking in. We all know my feelings about wooded areas and there are LOTS of wooded areas around here. I start thinking, "how many dead bodies are hidden in there. Someone could be watching and waiting for the slow fatty to bounce by, knowing I'd never be able to outrun them, drag me into the trees and well...who knows." So then I started making Mike follow me in the van. I just felt stupid doing that. And did I mention the heat? And the HUMIDITY?? Have you ever tried running when it's hot and humid? You can't even poor water on your head to cool off. It does nothing. So, again, I would just give up and eat more ice cream. (Go ahead, call me a wimp. I'm okay with it.)

The treadmill in the separate room is the perfect solution. I can work out in one room, watch the kids playing in the other room, have a fan blowing directly on me, watch a movie (because the computer is in that room) or read a book...it's perfect.

Mike finished putting it together last night and I made him try it out to make sure it wasn't going to eat me or anything. This morning I got to try it out for myself. It. was. awesome! I got a 30 minute workout and only had to stop a few times to put kids in time out for fighting. Happy, happy, HAPPY DAY!!! Now back to my 5k training. It's been 3 months since I gave up training for it. I was almost to 3 miles. Today I barely made it 1.5. So I have some catching back up to do. So excited.

Now you will all excuse me while I go eat some ice cream...you know, to celebrate. :)

Newest Jacobisms

Today after Jake got out of the tub he was crawling around in his nothings pretending to be a puppy (despite my telling him multiple times to go get dressed).

Jacob: (On all fours looking towards his nether lands) "Look mom, I gots a tail!"

Yaaa...we had a little anatomy talk.



A short time later we were talking about what each of the kids were going to be for Halloween.

Me: "Jakers is gonna be a lion, Lulu is going to be a tiger and Jimmy is going to be a Monkey."

Jacob: "And you are going to be a HIPPO! Look Lulu, momma is a hippo!"

*sigh* You know that treadmill I've been planning to buy for a while now? Ya, I'm buying it TOMORROW!! :)

That Uneasy Feeling

You know that feeling? It's kind of like that feeling you get when you feel like someone is watching you, only...different. haha. I was sleeping just fine tonight. In fact, when I woke up, Jacob was snuggled up next to me and I have no recollection of him waking up and climbing in bed with me. Which is weird. I normally wake up at the slightest movement from the kids, even when I'm in my own room. (I was sleeping on a mattress in the kids room.) It was Jimmy who woke me up. He was fussy, so I tried to nurse him, but he wouldn't eat. He just kept grunting and squirming. So I got up and changed his diaper. After that he just laid there awake cooing and blowing raspberries for about 20 minutes. By the time he finally went back to sleep, I was awake and my mind was wondering. This is when I started feeling uneasy about something, I couldn't put my finger on it. Then I started remembering things from when I'd felt like that before. One memory came to mind of one year, waaaaaay back when I was at girls camp. It was my last year. For the first 2 nights, there were 4 of us in our tent. By the last night we were down to 2. For one reason or another, the other two girls had gone home early. So it was just Noelle and I. That evening everyone was gathered around the campfire just talking. One by one, everyone slowly dispersed and went to bed. Noelle and I were the last two at the fire, so it was up to us to put it out, which we did. I remember we dumped quite a bit of water on it and I even ran my hand over the coals to make sure there was no heat coming from them. Then we went to bed. But neither of us could sleep. We both felt uneasy about something but we didn't know what. Neither of us said anything to the other. Instead we started goofing off and doing silly things like shadow puppets on the roof of the tent. This went one for probably an hour or so, then one of us spoke up. "I think we should go see if we can sleep in the tent with the leaders." And we did. We went to the tent where our 2 (or 3, I can't remember) camp leaders were sleeping and told them we were scared but didn't know why, so they let us sleep in the tent with them. We laid there awake for a while, and then just as we were about to drift off to sleep, we started hearing animals walk though our campsite. "It's just deer" they told us. "There is nothing to worry about." Then, suddenly, we saw a flash of light and when we peaked out the window of the tent we saw that the campfire had come back to life, like it had never been put out. By that point we were totally and completely freaked out. So were our leaders. They wouldn't tell us they were, but we could see it on their faces. The next morning they told us that it was possible that the remaining half burnt log in the fire pit could have still been hot in the middle and started back on fire. That log was cold I tell you! I felt it myself. I agree it's possible that the very center could have been hot, but really, what are the chances of it randomly starting on fire in the middle of the night. I still think it was divine intervention. I am fairly certain that whatever was out there walking around our campsite needed to be scared away. I think the Lord was watching out for us.

This is a memory that has stuck with me ever since. As I thought about it tonight, I decided to get up and check the doors, which I knew would all be locked, because I checked them twice before I went to bed. (Like I do every night because I'm paranoid.) Then a small thought crept into my brain. If the Lord saw fit to protect me then, why not now. There is no need to feel uneasy. There is a plan for all of us and we need not fear. I just need to have a little more faith because, after all, fear is just the absence of faith.

And on that note...I'm going back to bed.

Weeping, Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth

These are the words that came to my mind yesterday after Jacob wet his pants and was not able to play with is new "potty toy" aka his new Lego set that he is only allowed to play with after he pees in the potty. Actually, this is how I would describe his whole potty training process. There is a lot of weeping and wailing on both our parts. I feel like pulling my hair out most days, because I just can't figure out what to do with the kid. We've been training him for about 8 months now. He was trained for about a week at the beginning, then he just decided that peeing in the potty wasn't for him and it has been like pulling teeth to get him to do it ever since then. I recently got sick of everything getting peed on, so I decided to start putting him in pull ups again, which made things worse, because then he figured it was okay to wet himself. We have now discovered a method that seems to be working (for now anyways) and it has relieved some of my stress, but up until this point I have gone through several emotional ups and downs. I've had all sorts of feelings of despair. It's amazing how potty training can do that, but it really can be traumatizing. I've felt like a bad mom. Sure, everyone has moments like that, I know, but I feel like this on a regular basis. For a while there I felt like I was totally failing as a parent. After all, everyone else I know has been able to successfully potty train their child before they start kindergarten. (Okay, he hasn't started kindergarten, but he's not far off.) I keep having thoughts like, maybe it wasn't fair of me to have kids. I'm obviously not that great at parenting. I'm sure they would have been better off with someone else who wouldn't totally screw them up. What am I doing wrong? Am I just stupid? I know these thoughts are just coming from the adversary who is trying to get me down, but it has kinda been working.

Out of curiosity one day I decided to google "delayed potty training" just to see if anyone else out there had the same problem. Turns out, I'm not alone. lol. Turns out, he's just strong willed and doesn't like being told what to do. Imagine that. So, we've basically been in a power struggle/war this whole time and he was winning! So, we've had to change our tactics a little bit. We set some of his favorite toys aside and bought him a new special toy that he gets to play with ONLY for after he goes potty. He also has a sticker chart. Each time he pees in the potty he gets a sticker and he gets to pick a toy to play with for 30-60 minutes. After his time is up, the toy is put away until the next time he goes potty. And when he fills in his whole chart with stickers, he gets to go to the store to pick out a new potty toy. He almost has his chart filled out and he is pretty excited. He fell asleep tonight telling me all the new toys he wanted to get. (He was even nice enough to consider a new stroller for Jimmy.) But the key in this whole method is not telling him he has to go potty. In fact, I can't even remind him. I simply let the toys do the work. I leave them in a spot where he can always see them. When he asks to play with one, I simply ask him if he will go potty while I get it down for him. Sometimes, I see him stop what he is doing and say, "I'm gonna go potty so I can play with my toy." So, it seems to be going pretty good, although he does try to pull one over on me occasionally. Typically, before I give him his toy I go see if there is any pee in the potty. Then I have him flush and wash up. I noticed there have been a few times where I've heard the toilet flush seconds after he's gone in there and he comes running out saying how he can play with his toy now. Um...I don't think so dude. There is no way he had time to pull down his undies, climb up on the potty, pee, and pull his undies back up in a matter of 3 seconds. I often underestimate how smart he is.

One of the things that scares me the most is that, I am sure this is not just going to be a potty training issue. I am really going to have to work as he grows up, to find a way to avoid power struggles and not get walked all over in the process. I'm glad he has a strong personality, I think it will take him far, but I hope it takes him in the right direction. The fact that as a parent I can push him in the wrong direction is pretty scary. *sigh* What a kid. Pray for me. :)

Funny story. As I was looking for an image for this post, I came across this blog post that she wrote exactly a year ago today. haha. I could have written this post word for word.

Things like this make it difficult to curb my spending.

(How's that for a ridiculously long title. haha.) I am a HUGE fan of baby wraps, but I always thought it was ridiculous for people to charge $50 for a single piece of fabric that I could make myself for a fraction of the price. I made mine for about 50 cents with fabric I found at a garage sale. I've made others from fabric I found at walmart in the dollar a yard fabric section. I was determined never to spend such a ridiculous amount on something that is sooooo easy to make for so cheap. Then I saw these wraps, and for the first time ever, I felt like $45 was a fair price and could see myself paying that much for one. I LOVE the design! Seriously, I am in love with these wraps and I MUST HAVE ONE!!! The orange and green ones are my favorite!

(Oh, and my SIL Sarah took the pictures and my adorable nephew Liam was the baby model for many of them. So cute!)

Sunday Confessions/The Itsy Bitsy Spider

I am not a fan of spiders. (Who is, really, besides my 4 year old son?) Typically if they are outside I leave them alone, unless I know they are poisonous, then they must DIE! I feel that way about most bugs. Although, I don't take chances with ants anymore. I feel the need to exterminate any and all that I find in my back yard. We have ginormous wolf spiders here that ALWAYS make their way into my house. When I sprayed the garage, I killed about 15 JUST next to the door! Totally creepy.

Anyhoo...A while ago I noticed a weird looking bug on the side of my house, near my front door. I could see it from my kitchen window. I didn't think anything of it, there are all sorts of weird bugs out there. Then, the sun went down and it got dark out there. I turned on the porch light and looked out the window and I saw that that weird looking bug had transformed into a huge, ugly spider. As soon as I saw it I decided it needed to die before it could make its way into my house. I don't smash bugs unless I have no other choice. I cannot handle the crunch, squish sound it makes. I want to gag just thinking about it. So, I got out the big bottle of ortho and cracked the door just enough to stick the nozzle out, aimed and fired. I hit it, it started to fall and I slammed the door shut. I pulled aside the curtain of the side window and watched to make sure it died. I watched it struggle to stay on the side of the house. It struggled for a while and I finally had to stop watching because...I FELT GUILTY! I have never felt guilty about killing a bug before. But I felt guilty watching this particular spider die. I hated watching it suffer but couldn't bring myself to go finish it off and Mike wouldn't do it for me! Rude. I came back occasionally for the next 20 minutes or so to see if it had died yet and every time I looked out it was still trying its hardest to climb back up it's string of web to its original spot, but couldn't. I thought it was never gonna die. Finally, I had to go get the kids to bed and didn't get a chance to go back and look, but I found it dead on the ground the next day. I decided to get a better look at. After seeing it up close I saw that it was just a harmless Orb Weaving Spider (and a relatively small one compared to others I've seen around my house) that had just come to eat all the annoying bugs that breed in my over grown garden. It was helping me and I had tortured it! Get out the cuffs people, I'm an innocent spider killer! I couldn't feel worse if I'd killed a ladybug or a butterfly. Now, if I'd found it in my house, I wouldn't feel guilty at all. But it was just minding it's own business out there and probably would never have come into my house. Now the annoying moths, beetles and mosquitos (that grequently follow me into my house every time I use the front door) have free reign of my front porch. Way to go Michelle! Good job.

Wanna read another confession of a spider killer? Funny stuff. haha.

Bookmark Anyone?

Every once in a while I come across a craft that I fall absolutely in love with. This one is soooooo cute and so simple! How can you not love it?!?! I found it through The Crafty Crow, one of my favorite blogs, who found it through WhiMSy love. It's a simple origami book mark that can be done with any paper really, but she used bubble paper that they made, which is a project I already planned to do with the kids. PERFECT!! All the bookmarks she made were totally cute, but the corner one was my favorite. I've never seen a corner bookmark before. I love it!

Here is the link for how to fold it.

Baby Gate Theory

I have two baby gates set up in my house. One at the office door and one at my bedroom door. (There's just a lot of craziness going on in both of those rooms.) Tonight was our babysitting night (We are part of a babysitting co-op) and we had a full house. It was a lot of craziness, but good times nonetheless. The second to youngest in the group was little one year old Parker. Who, is just adorable. Can't get enough of that kid. I wish we could have him over every day. Today was the first time we've had him in several months. The last time he was here was when he was about Jimmy's age. It's cute to see him toddling around, but we noticed something interesting tonight. We watched him as he picked up some blocks, walked over to the baby gate and drop them over to the other side. We watched and laughed, because he isn't the first toddler we've seen do this. In fact, any time there is a toddler in the house, things get thrown over the gate. Jacob and Lizzie both did this when they were about that age, and the little girl I babysat in MO used to do it as well. (Of course, they would also frequently walk up to the gate and start shaking it as they screamed in anger for not being let in the room that was off limits. I call that baby gate rage, but that's for another post.) I've come up with a little bit of a theory for why toddlers do this. There comes a time when kids start wanting to be in control. This is usually about the time temper tantrums rear their ugly heads. And the baby gate is just one more thing to thwart their efforts to be in control. "What's this? Why is this stinking thing blocking my way. I didn't really want to go in that room, but now that I see I can't, I am determined to get in there some how. *shakes gate* Dang, it's not coming down. *Looks around, sees blocks or toys or really anything lying around* Hmmm, well, if I can't go in there, then by golly, I will get SOMETHING passed this gate. I will show them. Maybe I can't get in there, but my toys sure can!!" So there ya have it. It's all part of the power struggle. Their way of showing us who's REALLY in charge.

Jimmy Neutron

I know it's Sunday, but I've got nothin' as far as confessions go. But I do have some pretty cute pictures of Jimmy, so I thought I'd do a post about him instead. He changes so fast and it's been a while since I last posted pictures for my family.


The kids in our babysitting co-op have decided to nickname him Jimmy Neutron. It cracks me up. I can totally see the resemblance. Whattaya think? :)
He had his 4 month well check-up a couple days ago and at 4 1/2 months he weighs in at just over 17lbs and he's 25 inches long. He's got some fun chub. :) He and Lizzie wear the same size of diapers. It's very convenient. lol. His favorite thing to do is jump in his jumperoo. He can jump and jump forever. He occasionally falls asleep in there as well. I was planning to post a video of him in it, but watching the video was making me motion sick, so I opted for pictures instead.

Poor kiddo is losing his hair. I'm pretty sad about it. His head looks more and more like Mike's everyday. haaaahaha. (Don't tell him I said that.)

This kid is a lot of fun. He's so happy and giggly. Unless he has been on his tummy for more that 2 minutes. (see above picture.) He coos and babbles in his adorable, raspy little voice. Sounds a lot like his aunt Kacey did when she was little. I guess maybe you have to hear it for yourself to understand the cuteness of it. :)

I noticed the other day that he has 3 or 4 eyebrow hairs that are growing in the opposite direction than all the others, which makes the other hairs stand up right there. I am constantly trying to get them to lay flat. I've become one of those moms that licks their fingers and rubs spit in their kids hair to get it to lay down. Only in my case it's his eyebrow. I don't know why I keep trying, it never works. I just need to learn to accept it as part of his cuteness I guess. haha.

He sure is a cute kiddo and we love him to pieces. :)

Why a WOODEN spoon?

I recently bought a new cookbook. I like it a lot. It's got some good stuff in it. (If anyone wants a good recipe for brownies with spinach in it, or any other recipes with hidden veggies, let me know, I'll happily share with you.) But I've noticed a reoccurring theme in it. Throughout this cookbook, I frequently see, "mix ingredients together with a wooden spoon", and it got me to thinking. (scary, I know) Why specifically a wooden spoon??? Is there some scientific explanation as to why it is better to use a wooden spoon over, say, a plastic spoon, or a metal spoon? I've heard that some metal spoons have been known to kill yeast, but I'm not making bread here. We're talking muffins, or brownies. If it is a metal thing, then I'm in trouble, because my beaters are metal and I frequently use metal spoons. In fact for the longest time I didn't even OWN a wooden spoon. *gasps* I finally bought one, lone, wooden spoon from Goodwill one day because I needed one for a singing time activity in primary. I used it occasionally for cooking, but my kids found it and took off with it and I haven't seen it since. (Either that or my dishwasher ate it. It does things like that occasionally.) But I've used metal and plastic utensils for my cooking and baking for quite sometime with no ill effects on the outcome of my food (including breads). Which makes me wonder. Would my food turn out BETTER if I used a wooden spoon? What have I been missing out on due to the absence of a wooden spoon in my kitchen? Is my foods nutritional value being compromised because it comes in contact with metal??? Would a wooden spoon make my food healthier? Have I been stunting my children's growth and brain development because I DON'T HAVE A WOODEN SPOON?????? *deep breath* OR, is it simply because it's more comfortable to hold than other type of spoon?

Heck, why tell me specifically what kind of spoon to use at all? Why not simply say, "mix ingredients until smooth" or whatever, like many other recipes I've seen and let ME decide what type of utensil to use? Are you prejudice against metal or plastic spoons?!?!?! Did you have a bad experience with a metal spoon which has led you to believe that everyone should now use ONLY wooden spoons? Someone please explain this to me. Cause I just. don't. get it!

FHE

Family Home Evening is always interesting with toddlers. Tonight's topic was on baptism. Mike gave the lesson. Here is the basic gist of what he taught.

-Jesus was baptized by John the baptist.
-When we are baptized we are following Jesus.
-When we are baptized we are forgiven of our sins and we receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

Now for Jacobs interpretation of FHE.

"We got to follow Jesus. We get to get in the water and find the Ghost."

Mike also talked a little about temples and he showed them some pictures of a few different temples.

This is was Lulu's reaction.

"Ooooooooh. It's a BIG CASTLE."

Good, good. I think they got a lot from the lesson. lol.

Sunday confessions/Late Night TV

Sometimes, after the kids have gone to bed I stay up and watch kids shows. I will admit, the majority of kids shows are totally obnoxious, but there are one or two I actually get a kick out of. My favorite is Olivia. I think that show is hilarious. I couldn't find a clip from that show, though, so I am posting a clip from my second favorite show, The Upside Down Show. Udder Chaos is not so great, but The Happy Fly Ditty cracked me up.

Sunday Confessions/My Inner Self

Friday night was date night, so Mike and I went out to dinner and then afterwards we hit walmart. Romantic, I know. I am sure he would rather have gone to a movie since there are several really good ones out, but we always go to the movies and I wanted to do something together that required more than sitting next to each other staring at a large screen. So, dinner and walmart it was. My main reason for going was to look at the dishes I am wanting to get, to see if they would really go well in my dining room. (They are gonna look awesome by the way...when I eventually get them. haha.) But while we were there we decided we better get diapers, oh and we should probably look at some clothes for the kids since they are growing out of the ones they have. Oh, and we should probably get some bananas while we are here too...and on and on. You know how it goes when you are in walmart. Anyhoo...we were passing the sock isle and I remembered I needed some more socks. I just bought some not too long ago, but for some reason I've lost one of each, so now I just have a bunch of mismatched socks. (Stupid sock monster. GIVE THEM BACK!!) Well, I grabbed a package of white socks, thinking "this way, it doesn't matter if one goes missing. I can still match it with another plain white sock. Makes life much simpler. Not as cute, but oh well." So, I'm about to put them in my cart when Mike sees them and pipes in. "White socks?!?!" He says in surprise. "You are actually going to get PLAIN WHITE socks?!" Shocking I know, but I explained to him my reasoning and figured he'd let it go, but no. He tells me, "Michelle, that's just not you. If you buy the white socks you will be denying your inner self", or something like that, "I think you should be true to yourself and go find the socks you REALLY want." So, I put the socks back and went and found me a variety pack of some super cute socks in blue with different fun designs on them. He knows me so well. I sure do love him a lot.

It got me thinking though, I've been denying my inner self a lot lately. I seem to have redirected my attention to making my kids look cute and forgot I still need to make myself look cute. I wonder if that's why some women just let themselves go eventually after they get married. Part of it is just convenience, but I also feel like a large part of it is because we start to lose our identity. At least that's how I feel. I almost don't know who I am anymore. And I find myself wondering if Mike wonders what happened to the girl he married. I'm glad he's there for me though, to remind me who I am. To remind me of the things that I enjoy and make sure I stay true to myself. I am also grateful he is smart and hasn't tried to remind me that I do own make-up...somewhere.

It's All About The Timing

You've all heard the advice of not going grocery shopping while hungry, but I've decided that it's just as bad to shop when you're full. Why? Because, when your full, all the sudden NOTHING sounds good. I guess it's all about the balance of being not hungry but not full. But come on. Who has the time to actually time shopping like that. "Okay, Lunch was 2 hours ago and dinner is in 4. If I make the kids skip nap time, I can go shopping now and and get back just in time to start dinner and not worry about buying too much or not enough."

I went shopping a couple nights ago a few hours after dinner and I was just the right amount of hungry. It was the perfect shopping trip. I got everything on my list. There was no "Ugh, yogurt does NOT sound good right now. I'll skip it this time. Also, lasagna doesn't sound good either, so I'll skip all the ingredients to that as well" or "Oh my goodness that double fudge, chocolate, brownie ice cream and cookies, and doughnuts, and chips, sounds soooooo good right now". No, I walked away with everything I needed and ONLY what I needed. BUT, I HATE shopping at night. At the end of the day, all I want to do is relax. So, I've decided that if I have to choose between shopping while I'm hungry or shopping when I'm full, I choose hungry. Because I'd rather have too much food than not enough. If I gain a few extra pounds, I'll deal with it. At least I won't have to deal with loading the kids up and going BACK to the dreaded grocery store mid week, because the kids ran out of snack foods or I skipped ingredients to a meal that didn't sound good at the time.

Mmmmm...double fudge, chocolate, brownie ice cream sound really good right now.

Sunday Confessions/The Boy Next Door

Yes, those of you who have known me for a long time know exactly where I'm going with this. When I was about 14 years old, my friend's Dad (next door neighbor) got remarried. This new wife had a few children. One in particular was a boy about a year older than me who I immediately became infatuated with. That poor guy. Looking back I feel so bad for him. I had this idea of what I thought he was like and I was in love with him. One day I was sitting out on my front porch and I prayed for a sign that God would tell me if I was going to marry him or not. I asked to see a shooting star in a specific part of the sky. And you know what...I saw that shooting star. That settled that. I was going to marry him. God said so. I stalked and tormented this guy for about 4 years. The few times that I actually spent time with him, I didn't really feel that our personalities meshed well. But that didn't matter. I knew he was the one for me. Thinking back on my teenage years I can now see that I was just...weird. Seriously. Why didn't anyone tell me what an weirdo I was?! And now I am dealing with the humiliation of it all. I was ALWAYS staring it at him and he was probably always thinking "STOP STARING AT ME PSYCHO CHICK!!! I remember once at a church dance, I waited and waited for him to come. When he FINALLY walked through the door I worked up my nerve and asked him to dance. I was so frazzled and nervous that when , as a joke, one of my friends older sisters walked up and asked to cut in, my knee jerk reaction was to shout, "NO" and kick her in the shin. Oh...yes I did. It was pretty humiliating.

I came home from my mission and I was a little less weird, but was still obsessed with the guy. I saw more of him because we ended up working at the same place. Everyone I worked with directly knew who he was and how much I liked him.

I finally fell in love with someone else and got over him but now I just feel stupid. To this day I cannot talk to this guy. He is (or was, not sure if he still is) in my parents home ward (church congregation for those of you unfamiliar with mormon lingo) and has a cute little family. I saw him a few times at church when I was home last year and couldn't bring myself to even look at him. Even though I have moved on and am no longer in love with the guy, (good thing since I'm now married with a family of my own. haha) I'm now just too embarrassed to face him. I'm pretty sure he will forever see me as the weird girl next door who stalked him and who now completely ignores him, which is probably relief to him. haahaha.

So, boy who used to live next door, I apologize for my teenage psychosis and hope you are not dealing with permanent scars from the fear of being stalked and tormented by me and all my friends.

The End.

Happy Sunday all! :)

Decisions, Decisions

With Thanksgiving being only 4 months away (hehe) I have been trying to decide on a new dinnerware set to grace my table this year. I have narrowed it down to these affordable options. Compliments of Walmart. Option #1 would be this 2 toned taupe set. I think it is super classy but I'm not sure the colors would go with the gold curtains and painting I have in there.



Option #2 would be one set each of these. But, again, the whole gold thing. I'm not worried about the yellow, just the green. But I like the green, both colors go well with the place mats I have...hmmm. Option #3 would be 2 sets of just the yellow. I particularly like the yellow because it is bright and cheery.

Ahhhh, these ever so important life decisions. I simply cannot decide by myself. If I do, I will have no one to blame but myself if my table looks bad this holiday season. And we can't have that. Can we.

ROFL

But not at the same time. First he was rolling on the floor...

And then he was laughing...and laughing...and LAUGHING!


He started rolling a few days ago. I didn't actually see him do it at first. I laid him on his back on the floor in the living room and left the room for a few minutes. When I came back he was on his tummy. Kacey was in the room when it happened but she didn't see it either. So I turned him back over and got out the camera to try a video. Of course he stubbornly refused to do it again...until I put the camera away and turned my back. The turkey. But he has done it several times today for me. So he's forgiven. :)

When he gets on his belly he scoots around with his feet. Like he's climbing a ladder. It's pretty funny to watch. I have it on video and if it didn't take so long to upload I'd show it to you. But after waiting for the previous 2 videos I have no more patience to wait for a third. So, maybe another day.

Sunday Confessions/Going up?

Forgive me. It's been a while since my last confession. I know it's not a great excuse but, I just forgot okay! :) Monday always comes around and it hits me, "doh, I forgot my Sunday confession. Oh well, next week, next week". Then next week comes and it's a repeat of the previous week, yadda, yadda, yadda. Anyhoo, today's confession:

I am totally scared of elevators. I've come a long way though. I used to be completely terrified of them and as soon as I would step into one I would immediately start fervently praying that we would make it to our floor without plummeting to our death. I just have this horrible fear that a cable is gonna snap or something and the whole thing is gonna free fall to the basement and we will all be found in a crumpled pile of broken bones and blood oozing from our ears and noses. Pretty gruesome picture isn't it? I would rather take the stairs ANY day. However, in many places the stairs are reserved only for emergencies and they have signs warning you that if you open the door an alarm will sound. So I am forced to face my fear and ride the horrid things. But like I said, I have come a long way and there have been a few times in the recent past when I WILLINGLY took the elevator instead of the stairs.

I also have a fear of flying for the same reason. What if an engine explodes and we fall out of the sky like on Madagascar 2. Minus the parachute that gives them a nice gentle landing at the last minute. Whenever I plan to fly somewhere I have anxiety for weeks thinking about all the awful possibilities. No, the closer I can stay to firm ground, the better. Thank you very much.

Flying vs Driving

So, now that I've done both, I can honestly say that I would much rather drive across the country than fly. Why you ask? Well, first of all, I've never been a fan of flying anyways. I pretty much hate it even when I'm by myself. But when I have my kids with me, it's just one horrific nightmare. As Kacey and I were driving back, by about day 4 the kids were getting pretty crabby. We stopped for lunch somewhere and Jacob and Lulu were both having a melt down and Jimmy was crying because of all the screaming. Kacey sat in the passenger seat and just chuckled at the madness of it all. I looked at her and said in all honesty, "I would still rather be here than on a plane". In a car, I don't have to worry about my kids kicking the back of someones seat. Or have to worry about the guy in front of me turning around all annoyed and ask my son to stop doing what he's doing when all he's doing is LOOKING OUT THE WINDOW. I hate spending all day trying to force my kids to hold still so they don't disturb other people. It doesn't matter how many things I bring to entertain my kids, Jacob will always be a seat kicker. In my car they can scream and kick the seat all they want and all I have to do is turn of the radio and tune them out. Not to mention you have a lot more leg room in a car. And besides, you will never see things like this on a plane.

Sunday Confessions/Hi, My name is Michelle...

And I am a shopaholic. No, I wouldn't say that exactly. I would say I have a disorder that I diagnosed and named myself. It's called split shopping personality disorder. Some days, I have this overwhelming URGE to spend money. Usually I end up going on line and buying something for either me or the kids. It's usually the kids. Still, whether it's for me or not, I get a certain buzz from it. I have to get my fix every now and then. I often find myself spending impulsively. I was thinking the other day that half the time things are delivered and I don't remember ordering anything. Then I open it and go, "Oh yea. I remember now." Then there is the other part of me that knows we need certain things. So I will think about it decide exactly what I'm going to get, research, compare prices and finally find the cheapest place to get it from, but when I go to click the "place order" button I just can't bring myself to do it. I have been known do take 3 or 4 days to finally place my order. And when I do actually do it I sit there and feel guilty for spending money. I think that's the part of me that's used to being poor. I wish I could find a happy medium. I wonder if there is a medication for that. Oh wait. There is. It's called chocolate!

Sunday Confessions/Starring Chef Michelle

Confession: When I cook I often find myself pretending I'm on a cooking show in my head. "...and now for the cheese. I'm using a stronger, extra sharp, great value brand, cheddar cheese. Compliments of Walmart. We're just going to sprinkle it over the top like so. Go ahead, pile it on." I also love to watch cooking shows on TV. The food network is one of my favorite channels. (HGTV is my other favorite.)

Kind of ironic considering I typically don't like to cook. In fact, unless I'm really in the mood, I LOATH it. It's one of those duties you do for survival and some days you just can't bring yourself to do it so you grab a frozen pizza from the freezer and throw it in the oven. It's not that I'm bad at it, in fact I've gotten pretty good at it over the last few years and can make some pretty good stuff, but it's just not fun for me. I'm also good at folding laundry, but I hate doing that too. I can't wait to teach my kids to cook so I can hand the responsibility off to them occasionally. Hey, then I will have a REAL audience and not have to pretend in my head any more.

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What's Done is Done

Background. For some reason Jacob has major anxiety about pooping in the potty. So rather than dealing with cleaning poopy underwear I let him poop in a diaper. He usually tries to get away with staying in the diaper for as long as possible because he doesn't like stopping what he's doing to go to the bathroom. Today he slipped up though.

Jacob: Mom, I pooped!!!!
Me: Good. That means you can go back into undies.
Jacob: *head down, sigh* Mama, I can't change my past.

I think he watches to many Disney movies.

My Little Budding Chef

This kid LOVES to help me in the kitchen. Yesterday I made soup. He helped me chop the veggies with my little chopper thingy. Then he added the noodles to the water and made sure to stir them every 5 seconds. I let him add most of the ingredients.

Stirring the noodles.

A little pepper

A LOT of Tabasco.

Stir some more.

Voiole'! (think Little Mermaid) You've got an aesthetically pleasing configuration of soup that humans go NUTS over.

And because HE made it, I told him he had to try it to make sure it was good and he ate a whole bowl of it. Hmmm...maybe that is the secret to getting him to eat dinner.

Kickin' Back in the Kiddy Pool

Best $5 I ever spent. I think Jacob had the right idea with the chairs. Smart kid. Too bad I forgot to put sunscreen on Lizzie. She's got some nice pink shoulders today.

I have never seen our lawn look so green. The rain has really done it some good! In fact, this year grass is even starting to grow in the corner of the yard that has been just dirt and weeds since we moved in. Yay for soft green grass. :)

Blessing Day

Today was Jimmy's blessing day. We were running late for church and I didn't have much time to get pictures (basically, I threw them all kicking and screaming in the chair and snapped a picture), so this is what ya get. haha. I have a really cute picture of him on my phone that I snapped at church. I just can't remember how to get the picture off my phone. :-S Steph gave him this cute, cute blessing outfit. I love it. The pants were a little long, but the rest of it fit perfectly.

Mike gave him a beautiful blessing. I wish I could remember to bring my journal to jot down notes from the blessing so I could show them to the kids when they get older. It's always an after thought and by the time I get home I can't remember most of the details. doh.

Mike said he was smiling and cooing through the whole blessing almost to the point of giggling. I wish I could have seen. :)

"You HAVE to blog about this."

"And the title should be, 'kids are disgusting'."

This is what Mike just said to me as he was giving Lizzie a bath after the most recent poop mess she made. It's been a while since she pooped on the floor last. She was doing so good. But I can't really blame her this time. In her defence, her diaper was falling off because it was pretty soggy and I was feeding the baby and couldn't change it right away and Mike was outside slaughtering ants, so I had her take it off and throw it in the garbage. I figured she'd be fine until I finished and I'd put a new diaper on her then. But, then of course, I got side tracked. She came to me a while later asking for a diaper and I told her I would do it in "just a minute". A few minutes later I hear Mike in the other room. "AAAAAAAAAH, MICHELLE WE HAVE AN EMERGENCY!!" I knew right away what it was. He was totally freaking out, but I was thinking it was the the smallest poop mess she'd ever made. There were a few smudges on the carpet and on a bean bag chair, but according to Mike it was ALL over the living room. (He never saw her previous messes that really were all over the living room.) haahaha. The part he found most disgusting though, and I happen to agree with him on this one, was that she had it on her face and around her mouth. I don't think she ate it, but she had it on her hands and probably just ended up wiping it on her face. He had the task of cleaned her up, which was the worst part. It's not easy to clean that girl up while she's squirming and trying to put her hands in it and smear it around even more. I had the easy part of cleaning up the mess in the living room. I'm glad he was here today to experience it first hand instead of just hearing me rant about it when he got home. And he's probably now regretting telling me, "You HAVE to blog about this".

Shots All Around

There were several babies born right round the time Jimmy was born and they are all at that point where it's time to start immunizations. So I've seen a lot of posts on fb about sad sad babies. Jimmy was no exception. I hate shots. Jacob is just now over the trauma of shots and will actually happily go into the dr. office without freaking out that he's gonna get stuck. Good thing he doesn't have any more shots until he starts kindergarten. I hate taking my kids in there to get stuck. They always look at you like you've betrayed them. But at least the older ones recover quicker, since they move around a lot, it works the pain out quicker. lol. But I HATE that very first round of shots when they are babies. They are totally unsuspecting. In fact, Jimmy was smiling and cooing as they were giving him his oral immunization. Then they stuck him. I hate that look in their eyes as they are looking at you after that first stick that says, "what the heck!! That hurt!" Then the second stick comes and they start crying and looking at you like, "what is going ON?!? Why are you hurting me?" Then by the third one they are just ticked off and screaming. lol. But it doesn't end there. Then their little legs hurt for the rest of the day and they cry and sometimes get a fever and feel icky. It's so sad. My kids always take the first round the worst. The second round is still sad but they usually handle it better. The whole first year of dr. visits sucks because most of them involve shots. I do get excited to see their stats though. Speaking of stats, Jimmy is over 13 lbs now. He is a chunky little monkey. I love it.

Chop, Chop!

Ahhhhh...so nice to have manageable hair again. :) I wish I had a before picture. It was getting pretty long. But it had no style and just looked bad. Also, I can't stand the feel of hair on my shoulders and neck. Which is one reason I ALWAYS kept it in a pony tail. This feels so nice.

I was hoping to transition back to this length slowly, but it didn't work out that way. But I'm okay with it.

When I showed her the picture of the cut I wanted she suggested I do a longer version and see how I liked it before she cut it exactly like the picture. I'm glad I had her do the "longer version"...cause it looked just like the picture. Imagine if she hadn't done the "longer version". Eeek.

Sunday Confessions/Worst Fears

I thought it might be fun to start a series of Sunday posts called "Sunday Confessions". Today's post was prompted by the slightly terrifying experience I had today after church. I'm feeling brave and I hope I don't regret these posts later. I'm kind of hoping that everyone else is just as crazy as I am and not judge me. :) Here goes my first confession.

I've always been a pretty calm, laid back person. But since having children my anxiety levels have shot through the roof. Actually, that started before Jacob was even born. I used to LOVE scary movies. But something happened not long after my first born was conceived. All the sudden I couldn't handle it any more. I had to start leaving the room when the movie got to suspenseful or scary. Once he was born it got worse and I developed all sorts of unrealistic fears. I won't get into what they all were, because I am sure you would all think I was nutso. I am pretty sure there was a time when I needed medication and counseling. I was to a point where I was scared to leave the house for fear that I would die and my children would be left motherless. Every morning when Mike left the house to go to school I was afraid he might not come back. I had a hard time letting him take Jacob with him even to the store for fear they would get into an accident or something. I had to psych myself up just to go to the grocery store or to church or anything that involved leaving the house. Many of those fears have gone away for the most part, (although I do still sometimes find myself scared to go anywhere) and I am left with the normal fears associated with having children. At least I THINK my fears are pretty common. I am constantly reminding myself of the scripture, "be still and know that I am God". It brings me a lot of comfort. But still...

Topping the charts of my worst fears is one of my children being abducted or dying. In my book abduction would be worse than death, because you wouldn't know what was happening to them but pretty sure it's not good. I can't stand the thought of my child being scared or suffering.

Today I briefly thought one of my worst fears may have become reality. I went to pick up Jacob from Sunday school only to find him not there. I assumed Mike had picked him up and went to get Lizzie from nursery. I picked her up and went looking for Mike. When I saw him walking towards us without Jacob I began to panic. I asked him if he had seen Jacob and he said no. We walked back towards his classroom and ran into his teachers. They said they thought for sure he had been picked up. That's when I really began to panic. I may have looked calm on the outside, but on the inside I was FREAKING OUT!! Visions of a random person walking into the church and posing as a family member there to pick up a kid flashed through my head. Mike started searching the building while I walked the halls with the other two kids, asking around if anyone had seen him. A few seconds later Mike came back holding a terrified and sobbing Jacob. He found him in one of the classrooms crying his little eyes out. He cried all the way out to the van didn't want to let go of Mike to get in his car seat. It was pretty sad. I'm pretty sure what happened was that when another parent came to pick up their kid, he slipped out behind them. He is a pretty sneaky kid. Then decided to go looking for me but couldn't find the primary room. The room Mike found him in was a bigger one like the primary room. So, I think he just got scared and confused. Poor kid.

I'm sure glad he is safe, but I think this experience may have just made me a tad bit more paranoid. *sigh*

Incase you were confused...

The triathlon post was posted by Mike. Cause we all know how likely it would be for ME to do a triathlon....... haaaaaaaahahahahahahahahaha.

Woodlake Triathlon

Quick overview: Finished in 1hr 41min (<20min for swim, ~56min for bike, and 22min for run). The swim was 600m, bike was 17.2mi, and run was 3.1mi. The weather surrounding the event was very touch-and-go, involving severe thunderstorms, but the weather during the event decided to behave in the end. It was very exciting wearing a wetsuit for the first time, biking competitively for the first time, and trail running involving dodging quite a few mud puddles many of which taking up almost the entire width of the trail. Quite an accomplishment for me, this being my first tri. I plan for this to be the first of many, next one possibly being in October and twice the distance.

Now, for those of you that appreciate the details and have a moment to read:

I was very excited for this event, yet slightly nervous wondering if I would be able to do it in a respectable time (for me, that would be <2hr). Also, the weather forcast kept going back and forth about nasty weather that weekend. I looked two weeks ago and it was supposed to be clear as a bell and sunny. Then, one week before, clouds and possible thunderstorms entered the equation. Two days before, it was supposed to storm all of friday afternoon until sat AM but clear up with cloud cover before the race. Friday came and the storms blew in as expected with heavy rain/wind/lightening, and the forcast changed to include likely rain throughout the entire race (BUMMER!!!, I thought to myself). Luckily the storms finished by early sat AM and the rain cleared up in time for the race (but this helps explain the huge mud puddles on the trail). I breathed a huge sigh of relief because I was fearing not being able to dry off after the swim (while on the bike) and have issues keeping my stuff dry in the transition area (which I will now refer to as the TA) yet accessible as not to slow my transition time down too much.

Unfortunately, I was late leaving home and got there with <1/2hr to spare before I needed to be suited up in the water. What makes things worse is that all of the bike racks in the TA were taken, so I had to find a spare tree or pole to lean my bike up against. Then, I got marked and got my chip and thought it would be nice to use the facilities prior to starting only to find that for a race count of 300+ people, there were 6 portajohns...6, and a line of about 30 people that didn't seem to be moving. I thought about this for a couple of minutes in frustration, then realized that it was a great day to be a guy and found the "express-line" at another location (wink-wink, nudge-nudge). At which point, I noticed several other guys walking off inconspicuously to "find their own." So, two major dings against the organization of this race, but all was well.

I got suited up and prepped my stuff in the TA, and I headed down to the water. The water in the lake was much colder than the pool that I had been practicing in. I was in wave #2. The whistle blew and we were off. I had learned from other's experience to get to the far outside in the back to allow plenty of room to swim and not get kicked or struggle with inefficient strokes. This seemed to work well, I never once got kicked in the head or arms, and I found my groove (although, admittedly I did kick a couple of people). However, I had never trained other than a pool. The nice thing about a pool is that you can track your progress (destination and speed) much easier due to clear water and convenient markings. While the buoys and the anti-fog on the googles helped, but the water was murky and impossible to see any distance, so at times I wondered if I was moving at all or very slowly, and I found myself redirecting to stay on target and not add too much distance to the swim. In any case, the wetsuit helped my glide through the water a little quicker and to be more buoyant, and I feel like I finished in a respectable time, came running out of the water amidst the generic cheers, ran to the TA while unzipping the wetsuit, ripping off the googles and swim cap. This first transition went okay. Able to get off the wetsuit the rest of the way, dry off the feet and head, slip on the shirt, socks, and bike shoes.

Jogged with bike beside to the bike start area of the TA and was able to clip-in no problem even though the TA was very sandy and wet and others complained later of having problems with sand jamming their cleats. First stretch was nice and flat and I was able to maintain a good speed and stay on the aerobars to cut the wind better. Then, the rolling hills started which became taxing at times causing lots of thigh burning and the feeling of barely moving in almost the lowest gear possible. Then, it evened back out near the end (out&back route). While I felt like quite a few people were passing me on the up-portions of the hills, I was able to pass almost as many on the down-stretches and flats with the help of the aerobars helping me cut the wind better and not have to work as hard on the pedals. Also, the whole bike course was nicely paved with only a couple of pot-holes which were clearly marked and therefore easy to avoid.

I finished off back at the TA unclipping easily, sucking down an energy gel pack chased with some water, and changing into my running shoes fairly quickly (thank you quick-laces). T2 was definitely quicker than T1. However, my legs were DEAD from all those hills on the bike. I knew from training that this would happen and it would eventually go away after a 1/2 mi but it made for some slow going at first as well as misery and pain. Those of you that have run immediately following an decent bike ride would understand the feeling. The first part was paved which I was expecting the whole thing to be, but this ended quickly when I saw an arrow pointing into the woods followed by a wet, sandy path with copious large mud puddles that took some finagling on my part to avoid (MAJOR BUMMER). The wet sand was really starting to take it's toll because it was mostly giving with each step and offering little bounce-back in my step. So, I ran as close to the edge of the trail as possible which was nearest the grassy part as well as firmer ground and this worked better with the occasional bush or branch to avoid. Then, we got near the dam, and the humidity set in full force which added to my misery. Then, my inner quads decided that this would be a good time to start cramping up (painfully so), but I sucked it up and kept going. By this point, the jelly-legs feeling was long-gone and I was starting to pass quite a few people, plus the trail-portion of the race had transitioned back to the road. The cramps were still there but my joy of being off of that miserable trail and humidity was helping me block it out. The road kept bending and I kept hoping that the next bend would hold the finish-line, but my false hopes were mildly shattered a few times, but the finish line finally approached and I had just enough in me for one last sprint. I passed the finish line showing 1:41, but could not find michelle at first so went back towards the TA, picked up a free hotdog and banana, and slowly downed a water bottle. I eventually found michelle who so graciously came to cheer me into the finish line. My most memorable thought of the morning was: what a miserably-wild ride that was, but how happy I felt at the end looking back at what I accomplished.

Looking forward, I really enjoyed participating in this tri and plan to do many more while I'm able. I plan on signing up for the Pinehurst Triathlon in October. It is an olympic distance race (woodlake is considered a sprint) consisting of 1500m swim, 30mi bike, and 6.2mi run. We'll see how I go. Worst case scenario, I may end up only doing a relay portion of it (the swim, the bike, OR the run). Thanks for taking the the to read my rant, and for michelle loaning me her blog!
-Mike