Mommy Life part 2

I'm behind in blogging again and I have 10 different posts whirling around in my head that I haven't had time to sit down and type so let's see if I can stay on one topic...

I feel like I'm entering a new phase in Mommy Life.

Sawyer is rapidly changing from my baby to a wannabe big kid and his latest feat is dropping his morning feeding.  He is my only baby that I have been able to solely nurse (bottle fed Ashlyn, pumped to feed P and M) and I have cherished every minute of it.

Okay maybe not every minute, a few of those nursing-every-hour nights, in my delusional state, I think I may have been willing my husband to lactate so he could take over.  But for the most part I have loved nursing this time around and am very sad to say that I dropped his morning feeding AND HE DID NOT EVEN NOTICE.

I kept waiting for him to climb on my lap and try to cuddle or whine for me or SOMETHING but nothing.  He was completely fine and toddled around as usual after the Crazies, not needing me a bit.  Of course I'm thrilled that he is weaning easily and am not so nervous about taking out his nighttime feeding some time soon but he is my baby.  Could he just pretend like he needs me a little?

So to counteract my weaning weepiness I decided to do the fitness test for P.90X with my husband, assuming I would fail miserably due to years of sacrificing my body to fertility treatments, pregnancy, bedrest, hospitalizations, surgeries, etc.

I figured I would do the test, prove I was beyond out of shape, and continue on my road of beginners yoga whenever I could manage to stay awake to get a session in.  BUT something crazy happened.

I passed the fitness test.

The further we got into the test the more excited I got that I might truly be a living, breathing, fulling functioning person.  Mark and I had fun pushing each other through the challenges and spent the rest of naptime plotting our path to looking like the people on the video.

Now, I am two days into the program and regardless of the fact that I could barely lift my children, tie my shoes or get my sports bra on today I feel great.  For the first time in YEARS I am doing something for me.  I'm actually feeling a little weird blogging about it because I'm not sure that I have ever spent five minutes here talking completely about myself.

I have heard people talk about this thing called "taking time for yourself" but I have sort of laughed it off and buried myself in taking care of my kids vowing to not miss a second of anything because I have learned the painful reality of how quickly those moments can be taken away.

I think taking a step to do something for me made me realize how much I need to do this and how much I have needed to do this for a long time.  I'm sure the whole exercise/serotonin boost is not hurting me either :)

So this was a lot of serious change for one weekend.  I can now have a margarita after Sawyers bedtime feed AND I found something to do just for me.  I actually worked out yesterday morning while Mark got the kids up instead of feeling I had to be crazy super mom getting them up myself AND I even bought workout clothes AND went shoe shopping for me yesterday.  Who in the world am I??

"Moooooommmmmmmyyyyyyyyy" (Parker)


"Moooom" (Ashlyn)


Nevermind, I remember.

"Mooooom" (Ashlyn again)


"MOOOOOOMMMMMMMMYYYYYYY" (and Parker again)


Naptime is over, Ashlyn can't find something, the dryer just buzzed and I have no idea what I am cooking for dinner.

But I AM looking forward to my "me" hour tomorrow.

I may update my P.90 status on here every once in a while just incase anyone is interested in whether or not I actually stick with it.  Don't expect to see any before and after photos though.  We took the "befores" on Saturday and they were not pretty.   Seeing them made me want to try that spray tan stuff, oh and teeth whitening too.   Okay I'll stop now, I will never have that much free time and naptime is way past over.

Me time is going to my head.

Here are some pics of Parker and McKenna so I don't feel guilty blogging about myself (I think they may become a trapeze act in the circus someday because they spend their whole time swinging trying to hold hands)...

 

Mutiny

You know those days where you feel totally on top of everything?  

You get to shower and brush your teeth before noon, come up with enough activities to keep your children from tearing apart the house and each other and even have dinner in the oven?

This is NOT one of those days.  

The kids have declared mutiny on their mother.  

There has been more trouble caused, messes made and kids crying than I could possibly tend to, clean up and settle down in one day.  I was wondering how exactly it got to this point today and then I remembered.

Here is just a small piece of the morning drama...

Sawyer woke up from his morning nap covered in a gag-worthy mess.

While mopping him up McKenna sauntered by stirring a glass full of water with the television remote. (spot clean the baby with wipes, leave the rest in pursuit of the glass and remote)

As McKenna cried over the loss of her concoction I heard the toilet flushing and found Parker "cleaning" the floor with a toilet brush. (grab the brush, throw it in the sink, make mental note to clean the floor and the sink)

By now it was lunch time, I herded everyone downstairs, Parker tripped on the gait (crying) so I put  Sawyer down (2 crying) and consoled Parker while McKenna's declared she was getting a freeze pop.  "No freeze pops, McKenna" (and 3 crying).

In desperation I gave them each an empty two liter and a stack of plastic cups and tried to find something to feed them before the next disaster hit.  The two liters were not a hit. (couch cushions flew, the baby tried to get outside, McKenna found a new outfit from the dirty clothes)

We made it to lunch and while everyone was strapped in and eating massaging their food into the table McKenna's doctor called and as I moved further and further from my screeching, squealing, whining children so that I could decipher a portion of the doctor's instructions I was fully aware that the fate of my kitchen worsened the further I got from my children.  

I ended the call as quickly as I could and returned to find that no one had broken out of their chairs because they were too busy launching chewed up food onto the floor.  I let everyone free and began to assess the damage.

Without too much more destruction we made it to nap time and just as I shut their door, in my deep breathe of relief I took in an eye-watering smell and remembered Sawyer's naptime mess that for some reason I had never been able to clean up.

Before I get them after nap I may give them a little while to chat, hopefully they will decide that the morning mutiny was enough and they will go easy on me for the afternoon.

Funnies

The kids are growing like crazy.
Sawyer is walking like a champ,

Ashlyn is starting high school in one week (my heart is beating faster just typing those words) and Parker and McKenna are changing from my little toddlers into miniature little adults squished into almost 3 year-old bodies.

I know everyone thinks that their children are hilarious so I will just join the club and share a few recent quotes from the Crazies.

Me- Parker, tell Sawyer sorry for hitting him in the head
Parker (looking at me very seriously and whispering)- I am not talking right now.

Me- Please be quiet Parker
Parker- That's no way to talk to your sweetie.

Parker- Kenna come get in your chair
McKenna- I do not like Kenna, it is McKenna for you Parker.

Potty quotes:

This morning after going way past his threshold for holding it, I made Parker go sit on the potty.
He jumped up after a second, said he didn't have to go and headed on his way.
I explained that he needed to go on the potty or he would wet his big kid pants and he explained back-
In two minutes I will pee in my pants.


Me- Parker, did you wet your pants?
Parker- Not yet.


Me- If you go poop on the potty I will give you a BIG treat, what do you what?
Parker- An elephant.

That's all I've got for now.
I know there are a million more but I have not been writing them down which I'm sure I will regret forever especially since I am still waiting for the day when I regain all of those brain cells I seem to have lost after childbirth.

Everyone

We braved our first weekend away with the little ones and I'm here, not as sleep deprived as I thought I would be, to blog about it.  The kids had a great time and aside from the car ride there, okay, and the car ride home, things went incredibly smooth.  Oh and as an extra little thank you to the people who allowed us to use their cottage Mark spent part of our last day there tightening all of their cabinet fixtures, door knobs, window latches and towel racks.  Of course none of them were loose before we Parker got there.

The weekend was the first time in years that my entire extended family was together in one place.  It was so good to see everyone but bittersweet for me as so much of life is these days.  The last time we attended a family reunion I was happily pregnant with triplets and had found out we were having two girls and a boy.  We announced what we were having to the whole family and were greeted with lots of cheers and I think you should name one after me's.  It was a great time in our lives and returning to the same place reminds me of what different people we are now and how much life has changed.  We have five amazing children but one will never be at the famous family reunion, or go kayaking in the lake with her Daddy and uncles, or climb from bed to bed to bed with her siblings, talking her Mommy's ears off because sleeping in a cabin is just beyond exciting when you are two.

And hardest of all?  I will never hear "my whole family" with out feeling a twinge of pain because Hadley will always be missing and, for me, our family will never be whole.  Words like "everyone" and "all of us" carry so much more significance for me now because I long for the completeness they bring.

When I see the latest version of our huge family picture I will laugh with everyone else at the amazing feat of getting our crazy bunch in one shot but my eyes will find a spot where my little daughter should be standing and then the picture will blur with tears.  I will remind myself though, that she was there because I brought her.  

Her memory was packed carefully for the trip, right inside my heart.

Next to Hadley's tree that Nana and Papa planted at the cottage

Just one of those days

Clean up in aisle 3

These little shopping carts are a great idea,

for someone else's children.

In a moment of temporary insanity I decided not only to take all of the kids to the grocery store but to let Parker and McKenna push their own carts instead of strapping everyone down like any clear-headed mom would have done.

I took the picture above after about 30 seconds in the store (notice the empty carts and the fact that I had a hand to snap a picture).  About 5 seconds later Parker took a quick right and decided we need a lime from the bottom of a fruit display.
Clean up in produce


Once I got them untangled from the limes and somewhat facing the same direction I made a beeline for the few items we needed but could not, for some reason, get us all moving in a straight line. (This, of course, was what I pictured when I decided to let them push carts.  Me, pushing Sawyer with Ashlyn helping to get the groceries while the Crazies followed happily behind us in a single file line, happily giggling every time we set something in their cart.  Delusional, I know.)

Anyway, I quickly gave up on getting in front of them and just did damage control from behind.  Before I could blink or actually shop, Parker was helping himself to a box of macaroni and cheese
clean up in aisle 3
and McKenna was turning down the next aisle carrying a foot long pre-wrapped sausage and a can of spray cheese.

My next strategy was just to get out.  I sent Ashlyn ahead of us to look for an empty aisle for us to go down so we did not continue to hold up traffic and just kept repeating "follow Sissy, follow Sissy, follow Sissy" until I was blue in the face.  Eventually I spotted a basket of suckers near the checkout, told Ashlyn to go pick a few up and wave them at us (she looked at me like I was insane but nothing could make more of a scene than we already had so she obliged).

With Ashlyn waving us to the finish line, the kids followed the sugar bribe and we made it to the checkout.  Parker unloaded launched the items from his cart onto the conveyor
clean up at check out
McKenna chanted "open the sucker, open the sucker," Ashlyn asked for every snack within view, I payed and we got out of there.

I swear I heard a cheer break out as the automatic doors shut behind us.

Back to grocery shopping at midnight I guess.  Now that they had a taste of grocery store freedom I will never be able to strap them in a cart again.

And we're off

See those little two little diaper-butt kids?  

They are both well on their way to potty training.

Parker is doing GREAT but Ms. McKenna is giving us a run for our money as usual.  

I swear she can hold it for longer than humanly possible.  

Usually after she has been dry for about 5 hours or so Mark or I will relent and sit with her in the bathroom where she will stay, on her potty, just staring at us as we wait for her to go.  Sooner or later we will give up, or feel the need to do something other than sit on a slate floor eye-to-eye with the poster child for stubborn, and head out of the bathroom.  About five minutes after the face-off is over she will either pee on the floor or ask for a diaper, pee in it then take it off.  Smart, isn't she??

Today, for the first time, she ran to the bathroom yelling "Kenna's going pee-pee" and came out proudly carrying the potty seat with about two drops of pee in it.  Just as I was explaining to her that she needed to sit back down and finish going I saw her shorts and realized that she sat on the potty while wearing her shorts and underwear.  At least she headed there on her own though, right??

Parker seems to be well on his way but I think McKenna is going to need the 3 day intensive program that I have heard such great things about.  Either way the diaper days are coming to an end for my little preemies.  As much as I am happy about this I have a few scenarios that I am dreading and would love some tips from anyone who has/had more little ones than arms at one time...

1. Shopping anywhere.  How in the world am I going to manage a public restroom when I am lucky to find a place that has a cart to fit them all in?

2. Driving anywhere.  Again, I can't imagine stopping to schlep them all inside a fast food place/gas station/anywhere yucky to use a bathroom.  I can bring the potty seat with us everywhere but what do I do with whatever ends up inside it?

I'm hoping for some good tips so we are not stuck inside until all of my kids are big enough to not fall through the seat of a big potty.

Thanks in advance and sorry for all of the potty talk for anyone who is not remotely interested.  I promise, even though this is all very exciting, it will not be my only blog topic for the next few weeks.

Once upon a time

I met the most amazing man...

and he asked me to marry him.

We had three beautiful babies

and then one more

and we sailed floated off into the sunset to live our happily ever after.

Happy Anniversary Mark,
I love you more than the day we said I do and can't wait for the rest of our story.

We're baack

Mark is back to work.
The kids are back to my schedule.
And I am back to blogging.

I hope I didn't lose too many readers due to my slacking off during the month of July.

Since I know Mark is missing the kids like crazy and I have lots of family going through picture withdrawals I though I would post our day in pictures today.

Breakfast time

As soon as I made a move for the camera Sawyer decided he was feeding himself and yes, McKenna is wearing a pajama shirt AND a dress on backwards with her head and arm both through the same hole.  Under that she is wearing a ruffly skirt, pajama shorts and a pair of skorts.  I had to adjust the straps in her booster chair to fit it all in.

Parker showing off his latest boo boo, a centimeter long scratch that he is obsessed with 

Playtime

Parker and McKenna taking "Penny" and "Hippy" to school via the fish.

And that's it, 9 a.m. and my dream of a day in pictures is over.

This is as far as I got before the novelty of being home with just Mommy again wore off and I remembered just how busy I am when Mark is at work.  

Soon after this shot Parker broke into the corner cupboard for McKenna who promptly served them both  sprinkles with a dash of paprika and Sawyer decided his only method of transportation today would be walking... which is really great, just really dangerous since the top half of his body moves much faster than the bottom half and there are two crazy toddlers circling him every 30 seconds making his path an ever-changing obstacle course.

I really do LOVE being home with the kids though and as Mark had to return to work I reminded myself for the millionth time how lucky I am to be able to stay home with them each and every day.  

Stick

I should start out by saying we have a new toy, a big climby thing for the backyard that is tall enough to have a McKenna-approved slide but not too tall to give the kids one more way to climb out of our yard.

So with the addition of a new toy usually comes the addition of a new game.  My kids seem to make up a lot of their own games, if you could call them that.  They are more like words they say over and over to go with some strange activity that their two and a half year-old little minds think is fun.

The latest game is called "Stick."

Now you could guess the rules of "Stick" all day long and I promise that you would never figure out this one.  Only children as strange creative as mine could come up with this one.

The first day we got our new climbing toy the kids had a blast on it, climbing in and out of the tunnels and going down the slides and eventually, they ended up flinging off their diapers from the top of the slide and continuing on their way.  They were saying something and giggling on the slide but we were just laughing with them, not realizing this was the beginning of the game.

Day two of the new toy the kids are playing on it for maybe two minutes before the diapers come off again and they start saying the same thing they were saying the day before.  We decipher between giggles that they are saying "stick."

"Stick, stick, stick, stick." More giggles.

So after watching this strange new activity our adult brains put it all together and discover the rules of the game.  Very simple, yet VERY original.

1. Go to the top of the tall slide
2. Take off your diaper
3. Make sure your butt is firmly against the slide.
4. Yell "stick" the whole way down the slide as you try to peel your butt cheeks off the plastic and make it all the way to the bottom.

Little geniuses aren't they?

They have a blast playing their new game and the giggles are contagious.  We just can't have any company over that does not have an extremely good sense of humor.
Not everyone appreciates a good game of sticking your bare butt to plastic.

Oh and last but not least Sawyer is walking.  Not, completely, independent walking yet but he is getting braver by the day and will take about ten steps on his own before resorting back to crawling.

My baby days are quickly coming to an end :(

In my head

I have realized that I talk to myself.
Not out loud, just in my head.
All the time.

Mark has been off for a few weeks and I have had zero inspiration for blog posts.  Nothing has come to mind that has made me want to sit down and blog away and then today, Mark left for a few hours, I had all of the kids, and within 5 minutes my mind was spinning with blog-worthy ideas.

Apparently, in the absence of adult conversation, I am able to do all kinds of mindless child related activities while thinking of a million other things.  And a few of the million things turn into blog posts.

Is this normal?  I hope so.  I'm assuming that it is.  There is a limit to the depth of conversation that you can have with a two year old, a one year old and even a teenager so you are bound to talk to yourself, right?

Now that I write this though I am starting to feel guilty that I am not 100% focused on whatever the activity of the moment is.  I'm not just sitting back in my own world though, I'm always playing something.  I'm usually the cashier or the doctor or the Barb.ie dresser or the one who pulls them off the top of the kitchen table once things get out of hand, I just happen to be daydreaming a little bit while it is all going on.

Mark will be off for a few more weeks so I will probably either have a few uninspiring posts (heavy on pictures, light on words) or just not even attempt creativity until the month in over and I'm back in my old little stay-at-home-mommy world.  If you don't tune back in until August I completely understand!

A few more years home with the kids and I will have written a book all in my head.

Oh and I would appreciate it if someone could comment with a "this is all normal, you are not neglecting your children" comment very soon, thanks :)

Me, very much in the moment with my little ones because that hose could turn on me at any
second.

Staycation

I haven't been blogging lately because we have been spending all of our time doing this...

Mark is off for a few weeks and we have more kids than pack-n-plays so we are spending our time at home in the water.  Oh and don't worry, my toddlers are not tubing, Daddy attached the "inkertube" to our dock and they are floating around while the lake is quiet.... exciting bunch aren't we :) ??

I'm off to put on my suit, put in a load of laundry, load the dishwasher, get the baby up from nap, cover him with sunscreen, make lunch then head out on the water.

Reality is the only disadvantage to a staycation.

Happy Independence Day

Strawberry Jam

How to Make Strawberry Jam with your Nana:

First find a good taste tester to check the strawberries

Then find some girls to mash them up

Bring them more strawberries whenever they ask (girls do not have much patience)

Put on your cheesiest grin, grab a masher and help them

Stir, stir, stir (have Nana hold the bowl because this could get a little wild)

Carefully put the jelly in the jars (can you believe they are letting us do this part?)

Give your brother your extra tools to keep him happy

Grab a quick taste

Then show off your finished product.

And the next day when it is time to try it on your toast?  Go ahead and slide your whole body into the back of the chair and eat just like that.

Tastes much better that way.

Tiny Dancers

Parker and McKenna had their first dance class this week.
I took years and years of ballet and would be lying if I didn't say that was hoping this would be the beginning of McKenna's career as a ballerina.
As for Parker, I enrolled him in hopes that it would help us get his sister to actually walk in the door and to  burn off a fraction of his never ending energy.
Plus my kids REALLY need to socialize, they both cling to me the minute we meet new kids and I'm trying to avoid being that mom who is peeling my children off of my legs their first day of school.  

After I registered them I kept thinking about what it would be like to get McKenna ready for dance... the tutu, the shoes, the hair.
I had to keep pushing the thought out of my head because, as much as I am excited to do it with her, every ounce of me wishes I had two beautiful little girls to wriggle into ballet slippers.
Dance classes seem to be next on the list of bittersweet events in my ever-evolving life as a loss mom.  (quick break in my story to say that rainbows always remind me of Hadley)

So the evening of dance class I was trying to keep myself together while I got McKenna ready and showed off her complete cuteness to her daddy.

I eventually managed to get them into class without a trail of mascara running down my face.

So the kids barely moved through the door of their classroom, and I spent the first half hour of their dance career sort of dragging them around the room moving their arms and legs in hopes that one of them would snap out of their shy stupor and join in.  

Parker slowly warmed up a little bit.  

Actually little is too strong of a word.  

Parker moved once in a while without me lifting his limbs for him.  

McKenna continued to master her "I am not going to let on that I like a moment of this" face and I continued to pull them along as my ballerina dreams fluttered out the window.  

The last class exercise started with piano lullabye music which left me blinking back tears while the teacher began blowing bubbles for the kids to catch.  The bubbles seemed to cast some miracle spell on my children because they let go of me and started running around the room catching them.  I was thrilled with the fact that they were actually moving and smiling and just as I was feeling the all-familiar if-only-Hadley-were-here ache Parker ran up to me, pointed at the bubbles circling my tiny dancers and said...

Look Mommy, there is a rainbow in all of them.

Wordless Wednesday

I know this is supposed to be Wordless Wednesday but I have to explain this one before my husband sees it and I have to take it down... I was trying to get a better picture of McKenna's new braces, which she is doing GREAT with by the way, and ended up getting this cute shot.  It wasn't until I was editing it that I realized Parker was wearing my heels.  He has been wearing them ALL the time. In his defense, I don't think it is so much the heels he likes it is the obnoxious sound they make each and every time they hit the wood floor.

For sale

Has anyone out there sold a house with three small children??
At least if someone responds I will know that I will live to tell about it.

We have had our house up for sale for a while now and trying to clean it for showings, get all of the kids out of the house while they walk through AND maintain some sort of a nap schedule is going to do me in.  I actually got a slap-on-the-hand call from our realty because I think I have said "no" one too many times to showing requests so I sucked it up and let them show the house yesterday.
At dinnertime.
When Mark was working late.

They came early.
Right after naptime, no diapers changed or snacks handed out, early.
No time to stuff the rest of our crap in every inconspicuous place and load the kids in the car early.

The realtor said she had twins so she understood but she didn't look like she understood and as the showing went on it was very clear that her nanny keeps very long hours.

So they are in the house for two minutes and someone stinks.
I'm trying to casually sniff behinds and once I figure out the offender I am then debating on what is better, changing a stinky toddler in a room they may pop into or letting him walk the house and hope that our potential buyers have no sense of smell.  McKenna solved that debate for me by feeding the baby a price tag so I moved on to fishing it out of his mouth and Twin Mommy realtor starts asking me to come open doors that have child proof handles (more evidence of the amount of overtime her nanny must work).
So I'm carrying the baby, McKenna is hanging onto the back of my leg for dear life and Parker is following with what I assumed was a trail of flies at his diaper by this point.
By now we are pushing dinner time and since the price tag didn't fill Sawyer up I had to feed him.  While feeding Sawyer, Ashlyn began a mini meltdown over mexican dip and Parker and McKenna began screeching and beating each other over a bubble wand, while standing on the chair that I was sitting on to feed the baby.  Oh, and did I mention at this time they are taking pictures of the main floor from our loft, capturing this whole lovely scene??

At this point I tell them the kids come with the house.  They barely smile because I'm assuming they are horrified by this whole scene and telling themselves they will never have children that act like this and all Twin Mommy can say is that this age is so fun.  That is just what I was thinking.

They thanked me for my time and left quickly so they could get to their car and shake their heads over the insane asylum they just visited.  I continued to feed Sawyer, untangled a bubble wand from my hair and calmed two toddlers with toys and a teenager with mexican dip and prayed that these people buy our home because we are never showing it to anyone again.

The Proposal

I had to do "Show Us Your Life" from Kelly's Korner this week because I love the topic--- Proposal Stories.

So here is how our fairytale :) began...

After we had been dating for about a year, Mark took me to Chicago for Valentine's weekend.  Our second night there, Valentine's Day, we went out to dinner at a great seafood place and then ended up in a really neat, jazz bar with amazing live music.  There was a piano player and singer who sounded just like Frank Sinatra and we were having a great time dancing.

I have to stop here to brag for a second... among all of the other things he is good at, my husband is a phenomenal dancer.  He has amazing rhythm and can swing, salsa, waltz, you name it and is that guy who everyone is asking to dance with.  Me, not so much. I'm not bad (I don't think) it is just not my favorite thing to do.  I think I have always been a little too self conscious to let it all go and just dance.  We always laugh about how I, one of the few women who doesn't like to dance, ended up with Mark, one of the few men in the world who actually can.

Anyway, back to the Chicago... so we were dancing and "The Way You Look Tonight" came on and before I knew it he was down on one knee and we were the only two people in the world.  To this day I still have no idea what he said because the music was so loud (and he won't tell me!) but I'm sure it was amazing and I do know it ended with "Will you marry me?"  I said yes of course, and the whole bar cheered and clapped for us.  Everyone came by our table to congratulate us and see my ring and since we didn't have a camera, one of the waitresses took our picture with a camera they had behind the counter.

We called my parents to tell them and then headed to the top of the Sears tower.  When we got back to our hotel room it was filled with dozens of roses and champagne.  I still have no idea how he pulled all of this off without me suspecting a thing but it was an amazing night.

The next morning I sat at breakfast with a phonebook on my lap trying to find a jeweler in the area who could size my ring immediately.  I was determined to wear it, fitting perfectly on my finger, home.

We were married August 5, 2005 and it has been a whirlwind ever since... some may say more like a tornado or a hurricane but the one constant has always been how much we love each other.  We never could have imagined in our wildest dreams, where we would be today and the five years we have to look back on but I absolutely love him more this minute than I did the day we said "I do."

Oh, and months went by after our engagement and we never did receive that picture the waitress took of us after we were engaged.  I was so disappointed.
Two years later, pregnant with the triplets, I received this in the mail...

Mark and I right after I said yes

and waltzing to "The Way You Look Tonight" at our wedding.

Love you Mark!

Dreams

I hope your dreams take you to the corners of your smiles, 
to the highest of your hopes, 
to the windows of your opportunities, 
and to the most special places your heart has ever known.
-- Author Unknown

Ashlyn completing 8th grade with honors

These Two

Someone tell me that 3 is easier than 2.  

I always feel guilty for complaining about our days, especially since they should be one more little person busier than they already are but these two are running me ragged. 

I am just hoping that the minute they turn 3 all will be calm and there will be no more squealing, fighting, climbing the walls, squeezing out the toothpaste, telling me no, dumping their food, throwing their diapers, refusing to get dressed/come inside/get in the car/clean up, etc., etc., etc.  

I'm sure the age of 3 is not going to be the miracle cure but for my sanity I'm going to pretend it is.   

In the meantime I will just try to keep playing the lyrics to "You're Gonna Miss This" over and over in my head.

That is if I can hear myself think through all the noise.

Craziness

To call the last week wild is an understatement.  

Wednesday morning, Mark called bright and early on his way to work (he never does this, in fear that he might wake us on a day that the kids decide to sleep later than the crack of dawn).  What is it that causes them to wake so early as soon as warm weather hits?  In the winter they will sleep until 7:30 or so but the minute it starts getting warmer the whole house is up by 6.  

Anyway, back to Mark's call... apparently, while he was driving he heard an extremely loud noise and his entire sunroof shattered and came crashing down on him.

He was not hurt, or so we thought, so he came home, changed out of his glass-filled clothing and took the van to work.  By mid-afternoon he noticed he was losing vision in one eye.  He headed to the ER, while I stayed home with the kids freaking out that he had some sort of head trauma.  

To make a long story short, after a night in the ER and two long days with an eye specialist, they finally found that he has a form of retinopathy caused by the pressure of the explosion of his sunroof.  Thank goodness he is fine and that laser surgery will hopefully correct the damage to his vision but can I just say that we are very tired of hearing "I have never heard of such a thing before" when it comes to things that happen to our little family.  Seriously, we have had one medical mystery after another for YEARS now and wouldn't mind just a few, normal, run-of-the-mill months.

Speaking of medical mysteries, I realize it has been ages since I have updated on McKenna.  She is doing better than she was after her initial illness in March but still has poor coordination and strength in her lower body.  She was fit for braces on her legs last week which I thought was going to be a hugely traumatic event but ultimately turned out to be an "everyone is fussing over my feet and showing me new shoes and I love it" appointment.  So her braces should be in this week and my fingers are crossed that she continues to enjoy them as much as she did when she tried them on.  Most likely I will be posting next week about the fights that have ensued over her new shoes since these days ANYTHING that someone has someone else wants.  At least if they fight I know a timeout will be had since punishing her siblings is McKenna's new talent.  I have caught her twice this week disciplining Parker and Ashlyn.  Here is her strategy in case anyone is looking for a new one:

McKenna (in a long drawn out tone) "No, you do not say that.  You have three seconds or you will go to time out.  ONE, TWO, THREE.  Now you go to time out until you are ready to say sorry."

We have used counting to three, time outs and sorries but not all together, I think I like her technique :)

Of course, this sweet little boy will never need a single time out...

Especially with such an innocent brother to look up to...

(He may look like he is part of some sort of strange toddler tribe but it's just the combination of fixing his own hair, lots of sunscreen and one of Daddy's tools.)

Sawyer's first year

Happy Birthday Baby

My sweet little Sawyer is one today.  

I can hardly stand it.  

It has already been a year since I first laid eyes on this little guy.

The year has gone by so quickly and I can't believe that we are already celebrating his first birthday.  

I love him so much and am constantly reminded how lucky we are to have him.

Happy Birthday baby boy!!

An Autism Story

Yesterday, Ashlyn and I had a great car talk.  We had a long ride home, the little ones where falling asleep and I can't remember how it came up but we started talking about what she feels people do not understand about her.  She amazed me, not for the first time, with how well she is able to articulate how it feels to be her.  Here was her list...

1) I just want to be like everyone else 

2) I listen the best when I don't have to look at you

This is the one that blew me away...

3) My art teacher says "Draw what you know not what you think.  Don't draw what you think a tree looks like, draw what you see when you look at a tree." That is how I am, don't tell me something if it is what you think, only tell me it if it is a fact.  It is too hard for me to figure out the other stuff.  

There have been a million times when Ashlyn has gotten upset over something not happening like it was supposed to and I always thought it was just the change in schedule and never thought about the deeper meaning of why.  The more we talked about #3, she helped me to understand that it has so much more to do with needing things to be concrete and factual.  So telling her "I think we might go to the park" is like nails on a chalkboard.  Either we are going or we are not, she does not need the fluffy stuff in between and I can appreciate that.

The list continued with things like "I don't like cleaning my room" and "I want to be on the honor roll" and other less philosophical statements but I thought that what she started with was amazing.  I wish there was someone like her for me to talk to when she was younger and could not articulate what it was like to live in her world.  Teenage Ashlyn could have helped me out immensely with little Ashlyn.

I have been thinking about our conversation all day and about the journey we have been on that has gotten us to where we are today, a few weeks shy of her 8th grade graduation.  Ashlyn and autism have taught me so much.

So I am adding this to my long list of things that Ashlyn has taught me...

There is no perfect road to follow and no matter what path you take it is a long, bumpy, exhausting ride.  But there will be a day like this, when you feel the rewards of all of your travel and you can look at the only tour guide you've ever had and thank God that they are able to read you part of the map.