Highlights From My Last Three Months

2015 is well underway now, and I thought I'd take a moment during yet another snow/gray/blah day to highlight things I've done the past few months. 

My birthday was in January. On my birthday we took the boys to see Wild Kratts Live! It was a great day and I'm glad to have spent my birthday in that way. Before we went though, my boys spoiled me with some sweet gifts.

Pretty much nothing exciting happened in February, so here's a "valentine" I found in my tea cup one morning. The extra sugar from the night before's tea made a little heart on the bottom of my mug.

This month, two lady friends and I went down to Atlantic City to a Beth Moore conference. She is amazing and I had such a wonderful time listening to Beth in person, and hanging out with two amazing ladies. The only pictures I took are of the sunrise Saturday morning. So that's what I'll close with.

Molly Pitcher Me

Back in June of 2013 I was presented with the Molly Pitcher Award at the All Saints Ball.  I don't know how to put this but, I'm kind of a big deal. People know me. I'm very important. I have many leather-bound books and my apartment smells of rich mahogany. (That's for you, babe. Bonus points to anyone else who recognizes the quote.) Anyway! Copied right from Wikipedia, "The Honorable Order of Molly Pitcher is bestowed by the U.S. Field Artillery Association (USFAA) and the Air Defense Artillery Association (ADAA) to recognize women who have voluntarily contributed in a significant way to the improvement of the U.S. Field Artillery or Air Defense Artillery communities. The award is named after Molly Pitcher who distinguished herself during the American Revolutionary War." Here's mine:

I was going to apologize for the size of that picture, but if I make it smaller you can't really see it that well. Not that this is ideal, but it is much better. However, it is a cool thing, I was excited to get it, and I'm not sure why it took me so long to blog about it, but here I am doing it now.

Here are some other pictures from the evening, like the two of us looking fancy:

Col. Turner presenting me with the award: 

Josh having a really hard time with the medal's clasp:

Eventually I Told him to just tie it in a knot so we could all move on. I think the colonel told Josh he needs to buy me more jewelry because clearly he needs practice. I like that man.

And here is me pretending to drink the field artillery punch because a)I don't drink and 2)it is nasty, potent stuff:

And there you have it. Way to go me!

Run30

Back in August, Josh got it into his head that he wanted to run every day for 30 days in a row. Since September has exactly 30 days in it, he decided September would be the perfect time to do this. He named it Run30 and went about asking people if they'd like to join him in the Run30 Challenge he made up. Apparently quite a few people were interested and so, on Septeber 1, 2014 it began.

Every day Josh would get up, go for a run, come home, eat something, then post his run to facebook. Along with his run Josh also put up some sort of running tip and an encouraging quote about running. Some people dropped out after a few days, some lasted longer, most made it the whole month.

Of course, because Josh is a bit of an over-achiever, the initial goal to just run every day for 30 days wasn't enough. Half way through the first week he decided that he wanted to hit 3 more goals over the 30 days. One, run at least a marathon a week (so 26.2 miles or so every week). Two, run 100 miles in total over the 30 days. Three, run 1 mile in under 6 minutes at some point before the 30 days were over. He totally achieved all of his goals.

Josh ran all 30 days. He covered over 26 miles every week, with a grand total of 110 miles for the month. He even ran a mile in 5 minutes and 50 seconds once (and I'm sure that once was enough). I'm so proud of my running nerd.

As this challenge was so near and dear to his heart, Josh asked me to participate too. Now, if you know me, you know I'm not a runner. Not wanting to disappoint my man though I agreed to walk every day for the month. I did a Walk30, if you will. I did miss one day, but that was the fishing day, so I made up for it by walking twice as much the next day. I made a second goal for myself too, to get at least 50 miles over the 30 days and I got to 51! It was a lot of fun, even on the days I had to take all 3 boys with me because Josh was out of town and I had stuff happening in the morning (when I'd go with just Finn). I also managed to get out there every day during that week I was sick. I didn't go as far those days, but at least I got out there.

To make the challenge even more fun, Josh and I decided to donate a dollar a mile to World Vision. At the end of the month, as if to congratulate us and what we did that month, God put a most beautiful double rainbow in the sky as I was making my way home on my last walk. Well, my last outside walk. I had one more day and knew I'd be walking the mall with Finn to make it easier on myself, and to make sure I did it. But it's with that rainbow that I'll leave you now.

We All Got Older

Since it's been awhile that I've been diligently blogging here, we have all had a birthday come and go. I'm almost embarrassed by that. Looking back, the last birthday I posted about was Deacon's 6th birthday. I never posted how big he weighed in at his physical that year, and now I can't find my numbers anywhere. I think he was 47" tall because that put him at 1 inch too short to ride the big slides at Frog Falls last summer. As for his weight, I don't know. Moving on.

After Deacon comes Josh in the birthday order of things.  Josh shares a birthday with his mom, so the weekend before we went down to visit his parents, making a short visit to the beach.

On his actual birthday, I had PWOC. Before I left for the evening though we had a nice dinner and some cupcakes (Katherine joined us for those), a little celebration for the birthday boy.

Following Josh is Zeke, with Me being right behind. I actually did post about our birthdays here. See? I'm such a mess. What I didn't post then was Ezekiel's height/weight numbers. Those I do actually have and will post here for any future time when I may need them - assuming I can remember where I posted them, that is. So, at 8 years old, Zeke came in at 52 1/2" (85ish%) and 56lbs (50%). This means, once again, Zeke is tall and skinny just like his dad.

This brings us now to Finn, who turned FOUR in May of this year. Finn's birthday was celebrated in the usual style - family over for dinner, cake and presents (not necessarily in that order).

Finn weighed in at a lot of pounds for who still insists on being carried around almost everywhere (42lbs [90%]) and measured 42" (90%). He's a big kid. When we pick up the boys from school, most days I just look at how Finn is either as tall as or taller than quite a few of the kids in kindergarten and first grade. I get that he's trying to keep up with his brothers, but this is a bit ridiculous.

Now we come full circle back to Deacon who turned SEVEN (what?!) this summer. Another birthday, another family party (this time some friends came too - hello Davis and Aguerra families!).

This birthday was a little extra special because a new member was added to our family. I wrote a post about The Turtle Stark (what I've been referring to him as recently), but here's a pic from the day he arrived.

On Deacon's actual birthday we had cinnamon rolls in lieu of cake. Yum!

Deacon, at his most recent physical, weighed in at 56 1/2lbs (about 80%) - he now weighs more than Zeke does, and measured 49" tall (about 70%) - which means he grew 2 full inches in the past year. Sheesh.

Well, now that this is finished, I feel better. I also managed to get this done before Josh's birthday came around again. Of course, this year he'll be in Florida on his birthday, so there probably won't be a post about the amazing party we had for him. Yes, that is why there won't be a post - he will be out of town...

Sniffles and Laughs

Oh my gosh you guys (*Drama Queen alert*).  I had such a terrible head cold last week, and it lasted pretty much all week.  It started on Monday and really, I'm still sniffling a bit today. All of that is to say, I didn't blog for the past 2 weeks because I was sick all of last week.  I'm not sure how that math works out, but in my stuffed up mind, it does.  SO, since I pretty much missed a week of doing things like blogging, emailing, cleaning the house and what's it, this post is going to be short and sweet so I can get to some of those other things too.

We watched "Frozen" for the first time on Friday (and for the second time last night). There's a Mickey Mouse short on the DVD in the bonus features that we also watched. For whatever reason, this particular short tickled Finn to no end. Here's a clip of his natural reaction to this video:

He's too much right? Josh and I were cracking up watching him crack up, and I hope you did too a little. Now, the laundry is calling out to me, and I must answer, so that's all for now.

Birthday Bonanza!

Hello Everybody! I'm back and I'm just jumping right in.  There will be no rhyme or reason to the posting here for the time being.  I'll be posting about things currently happening as well as things that have happened in the past 2 1/2 months-ish that I've been away from here.  Who knows? I may even post some things that happened a WAY long time ago that I've been meaning to write about but never got around to.  That being said, let's jump right in!

Last month Ezekiel and I both celebrated our birthdays! On the 3rd, Zeke turned 8. I can't believe it, I have an 8-year-old, how did this happen? I feel like I say that every year.  I probably do say it every year, but every year I mean it. How did this happen? We had a really good time celebrating his birthday this year.  Not that we don't every year, but you know what I'm saying. This year his birthday was on a Friday, and sadly for him it snowed like, an inch, and they closed the school so he didn't get to go on his birthday like he had really been hoping to do. He cried a little. It was sad. But he quickly recovered and it was a good day all the same. He got up and immediately opened his presents - a new Skylander from his brothers and a Giants cap from his parents. He was pretty excited.

Then we hung out and enjoyed the snow day. That night we had some ninja cupcakes.

The next day was the big day though. Saturday we went bowling! It wasn't just the 5 of us though.  It was us, all 6 of his grandparents, his Uncle Bobby and UB's girlfriend, Sam, Tante, Tia, and Tia's boyfriend, Ivan. Then, as a special thing he invited one of the boys from his class, so Mikey and his mom, Dania were there. Sadly, Deacon got sick that morning, so he and Josh stayed home, but the rest of us had a really good time! After bowling most of us came back to our house for cake (and more amazing cookies made by Heather) and presents and to hang out for a bit. 

Sadly, I didn't take any pictures all day.  I know my mom did and she emailed them to me, but I put them in a folder or something and now I'm having a hard time locating them. I'll keep looking. But all in all, it was a really good day, and he had a really great time.  He's already talking about doing it again for his next birthday!

My birthday was on the 11th, which was a Saturday.  The Wednesday before some of my friends surprised me at Bible study with a gorgeous Doctor Who cake that my friend, Nicole, made and some ice cream. Seriously you guys, the cake was amazing. It also tasted amazing.

Right?! On Saturday, I opened my presents from my guys, and took Zeke to Mikey's birthday party at the same bowling alley Zeke had his party at.  That's right, Mikey is cool because he and I share a birthday. Woot! However, since it was my birthday also, we left as soon as the bowling was finished because I had to get home to get ready to go out to dinner. My mom and stepdad volunteered to babysit and we took them up on the offer. They showed up, we had cake (the bottom tier from Wednesday's cake), then Josh and I went to the New Orleans Steakhouse for dinner.  We'd never been and I wanted to go, so we did.  And it was good. We were both so stuffed by the time we left.

And that's about it.  (I think this might be how I close all of my blog posts from now on so I don't have to think of eloquently worded closing lines and things.)

So, Back in April...Part 1

So, back in April, Josh and I celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary.  I know! I can hardly believe it's been 10 years - feels more like 30 or so.  Just kidding! I love you, babe.

 

To celebrate our anniversary, Josh took me into New York City.  He hired a car to drive us in (because I get terrible motion sickness on anything other than a car, and I'm only good in cars if I'm driving or in the passenger seat) to our hotel, The New York Marriott Marquis (swanky!).

 

 

After we checked in and what's it, we walked around the city for a bit. We did some shopping, stopping at the Lego store (of course), got some lunch and enjoyed the afternoon.

 

For dinner we ate at the hotel's rooftop rotating restaurant, and that was pretty cool. After dinner Josh had tickets for us to see The Lion King. It was pretty cool as well.  The play was essentially the Disney movie almost word for word, with some extra bits and songs thrown in for length I guess, but the way they did some of the bigger animals was really neat. I'm also very interesting in backdrops and scene changes on stages, and that was probably the best part of the whole thing.  Whoever figured it all out for this play is a genius.  It was really fun to watch.

 

Then it was off to bed, then up at gone in the morning. A wonderful weekend spent with my wonderful husband (my mom and stepdad came and stayed with the boys). I love you, Josh, and I am looking forward to the next 10 years, and then the 10 after that, and the 10 after that, and so forth and so on.

Fill-Ins, Flowers, and Fun!

I must say, I had a pretty good Mother's Day.  Sure, Josh left around 2 in the afternoon to go to Sweden for the week, but after he left the boys and I went to my mom's for dinner, and it was a really nice day.

 

Fun:
As soon as I got out of bed, and went downstairs the boys bombarded me with the things they made at school.  Besides these hilarious fill-ins they each did (pictures below), Deacon made me a flower that came with flower seeds, and some "cards", and Zeke made me a "kissing hand" pot holder, some cards, and a book.  The book is If You Give A Mom a Muffin, and the illustrations Zeke made for each page are fantastic - I had so much fun reading it and maybe some day I'll post it here for you.  Until then, here are pics of the other goodies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Flowers:

Friday morning, Zeke came into my room all excited and said, "Mom! I'm going to bring my wallet to school today so I can buy you flowers for Mother's Day!" Not entirely confident he'd be able to get a flower with the $2 he had in his wallet, I gave him $10 just in case.  And because Deacon couldn't be left out, I gave him $10 as well, and told the both of them NOT to spend the entire $10.  I told them to buy me ONE flower, and to bring back the change.

 

Deacon straight up didn't listen at all.  However, the huge smile on his face when he walked out of school on Friday with a little pallet of 10 flowers for me, made it impossible to be upset with him for not listening.  He was so proud of himself too when he and Josh planted them that afternoon.

 

 

Zeke, on the other hand, taught me a lesson on semantics.  When he got off the bus with 10 flowers I said, "How many flowers did I tell you to buy?"  He looked right at me and said, "You said to buy you one flower.  The rest are for other moms I know."  Well played. He actually sold one of the flowers to his friend on the bus, so he came home with 9 flowers and a dollar. 

 

 

He and Josh wound up planting 4 of them for me, and the rest he gave to other moms.  Originally, one was for each of his grandmoms (1-3), one was for his Sunday school teacher (4), and one was for my cousin Candice (5).  When I explained that we wouldn't be seeing 2 of his grandmas, or Candice he reconsidered and gave 2 to his Sunday school teacher, 2 to my mom and 1 to Ms. Ryan.  He's such a sweet boy, and I pray so often that he stays that way.  Oh, and Karen and Mom and Candice, sorry you couldn't actually have your flowers.  But he was thinking about you and loving you and wishing you Happy Mother's Day all the same.

 

Also, while we were at my mom's yesterday Zeke and my mom planted the flowers he gave her together.

 

 

Fill-ins:

I don't know why these made me (and Josh) laugh so hard, but they did.

 

Deacon's:

 

 

Zeke's:

 

 

It really was a good Mother's Day. I'm blessed to have 3 wonderful boys, whom I love with all my heart.  I'm so happy to be their mother, every day of every year.

Shoulder Time

Back when we were stationed in Alaska (I was pregnant with Finn at the time), the Bible study group I was going to did a 3 week thing on marriage.  I only made it to the first one before morning sickness really started kicking my butt, but I learned something that morning that I'm going to share here.

 

A local pastor and his wife came in to talk to us about marriage.  They had a lot of good things to say, but the one thing that has stuck with me 3 years later is the notion of "shoulder time".  Basically, they said how for most women (and some men) quality time is hanging out, talking, face to face, etc.  For most men (and some women) quality time is simply just being there.  For example, if Josh was sitting on the couch playing video games, he would be perfectly content if I were to sit next to him on the couch and knit.  We don't have to interact much, but sitting shoulder to shoulder (hence "shoulder time") is enough to make him happy.

 

Having 3 sons, I've noticed this in them as well.  Many times they've wanted me to sit on the floor with them while they play.  They do NOT want me playing too, or interfering in any way, they just want me to be right there with them.  Here's a picture I took this morning to illustrate:

Finn and I had spent a good half hour or so building castles together with our giant "LEGOs".  I got up to take the banana bread out of the oven, and when I came back Finn had moved on to something else.  As I sat down on the couch, he looked up at me from across the floor and asked me for help.  So, I got up, sat on the floor next to him to help, whereupon he promptly turned and ignored me. I tried once or twice to get up, each time resulted in him asking me for help that he didn't need.  Therefore I got my current crochet project and sat on the floor working on that while Finn sat 3 inches away playing and doing his own thing.  Shoulder time.  All of them have wanted it, all of them will continue to want it, and I am happy that I know about it, as it makes so many things make so much more sense.

Just What I Needed

I woke up at 3:30 this morning feeling terrible.  My throat was on fire, and burned any time I swallowed.  My nose was stuffed up and running like a river at the same time.  I had a difficult time falling back asleep, so when 7am finally rolled around, I felt pretty crummy.  My shower helped a little, but not enough - I'm sick.

 

Even though I felt rotten all day long, little things happened here and there throughout the day to help me feel better and not throw a "woe is me" party, probably making it all worse (mind over matter, right?).  First, was Finn telling me, of his own accord, "I love you, Mommy" as I carried him down the stairs this morning.  Sweet boy.

 

Since I wasn't feeling well I decided it would be best for me to stay home this morning instead of going to PWOC (Bible study).  So I called my friend Cindy and asked if she would stop by on her way over and pick up the video and things as I wouldn't be there myself.  Not only did she pick the stuff up, but she dropped off some super delicious chicken and rice soup! (Seriously, Cindy, I want that recipe.)

 

Finn and I spent a really nice morning at home, just the 2 of us.  We ate yogurt, did a whole mess of puzzles, played with my phone, went and got Deacon from school (which is probably a post for another day), came home and had some lunch, then the boys went down for naps while I ate my soup and watched some TV.  After the program I dvr'd was over, I took a wee nap myself and felt a bit better after it.

 

Then it was time to get Zeke from the bus.  When I went downstairs to put my shoes on I saw that some packages had been dropped off.  When Zeke and I got back from the bus I opened them.  One was Josh's birthday present (better late than never) and the other was a box from Linda.  Inside the box from Linda was a big, warm, BEAUTIFUL shawl that she'd been working on for me for the past 4 or so years.  OH, it is so wonderful.  Thank you again Lin!

 

 

After opening my shawl it was business as usual.  Help the boys with their homework, make dinner, wrap Josh's presents, feed everyone dinner, bathe and shower the boys, have Josh open his presents, etc.  I was starting to feel run down again by this point, so it was really nice that Finn let me hold him while he watched Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.  In fact, thanks to my new shawl, he sat there and snuggled with me for a solid 40 minutes before deciding he'd had enough.  It was great.

 

Then it was time for bed for the boys.  Zeke chose me to pray with him, so the 2 of us wrapped ourselves up in the shawl and had a sweet prayer time.  After the boys were in bed I went downstairs and made myself some of the hot chocolate my "Secret Santa Sister" got me (we're doing a Secret Santa/Sister thing at PWOC and even though I didn't get to go today my neighbor brought my gift to me after study was over, and what a sweet gift it was - hot chocolate, a new mug, candy canes, and purple gloves).

 

So, now that I've recapped my day of little blessings, I'm going to go and wrap myself up in my shawl, finish my hot chocolate, and watch my husband shoot up aliens (his birthday gift was HALO 4).

Uninspired

Some days I sit down to write something here and I feel uninspired.  There's nothing I feel like/want to talk about.  Now that the boys are a bit older and every day is pretty much the same here, it gets harder to find things to write about that I think would be interesting for me to write about and for you to read about.  Which I guess is why the blog has been neglected the past few months.  That, and with Josh coming and going so much, I'm either too tired to write because he's gone, or I'm "busy" (actually cooking, cleaning, etc) because he's home (not that I don't do those things when he isn't home, but you know).

 

Today is one of those days.  I did think about doing a week of the things I am thankful for as Thanksgiving is on Thursday, but I then I thought that might be sort of a cop-out.  Oh, I'm thankful for God (day 1), Josh (day 2), Zeke (day 3), Deacon (day 4), Finn (day 5), a post about Thanksgiving (day 6) and a flashback Thanksgiving photo on Sunday (day 7).  Then I thought about picking non-obvious things, like Amazon Prime and it's free 2 day shipping, but that felt sort of...silly.

 

So, now I've sat here for however long, writing this pointless blog entry about pointless blog entries.  Still not entirely inspired for tomorrow (or the rest of the month), but you never know when or where inspiration will hit.  I guess.

I'm a Little Out of Control

It's been a longish, busy day and I as I am just getting around to blogging now, I figured I'd just share a quick story from tonight before I go to bed (yes, it's 9:30 and I'm already ready to go to bed).

 

Tonight was the monthly book club meeting at the library.  I went to September's meeting and enjoyed it, last month's was cancelled because of the hurricane, and so tonight was the next one on the schedule. I didn't really enjoy the book but I wanted to hear others' takes on it, and apparently I was the only one who didn't like it.  Go figure.  Not only that, but the one character that I did like, no one else liked.  Anyhoo, that's not why I'm a little out of control. 

 

See, the book club meeting ended a little early, and as we were leaving, we had to walk past another room that had some people in it.  As I walked past I saw that it was a group of ladies who were knitting!  SO excited to find fellow knitters, I poked my head in, got some info (sadly, tonight was their last meeting for the year), gave my name and number, and was then invited to sit and hang out.  So I did.  For almost another hour.

 

What a fun group of ladies!  We chatted and ate cookies and chocolate covered pretzels.  We drank sparkling cider.  I had such a good time I almost can't wait for January to come and the group starts up again.  So basically, instead of spending an hour at the library for book club, I spent almost 2 hours at the library partying with a group of knitters. I'm so happy now Josh made it home a day early from his trip to DC so I could go.

First World "Problems"

Two Saturday evenings ago we were getting the boys ready for bath/shower time. Josh had the younger 2 in the tub, and I had Zeke in my room, waiting to take a shower. While Zeke and I were hanging out, Josh came in and asked me to turn off the shower because he was having a hard time getting the water in the tub warm. I told him I hadn't turned on the shower yet as I usually wait until he turns off the tub water since Zeke's showers take 1/3 of the time the other boys' bath takes. So I then sat in the bathroom with the boys in the tub while Josh went down to check on the water heater. Which, looked like this:

Oh yeah! So we got the boys out I the tub, told Zeke to just put on his pajamas (which he just could not understand), and then Josh called housing. One of the maintenance guys came by, took a look, and said he'd be back in the morning with a new water heater for us.  However, this meant no showers before church in the morning.

 

Now, rather than using this opportunity to focus on and pray for those in other places who don't have clean water to drink, let alone bathe with, I grumbled about dirty I was and how there was NO WAY I was going to go chapel without having showered (of course, my last shower had been Friday morning, so I was feeling a little extra dirty).  I was thankful it happened before Josh left so he was home to help deal with it, but I was cranky that it happened at all.

 

I did go to chapel that Sunday though.  We all did, except for Josh, who stayed home to help the maintenance guy remove the old heater and install the new one.  It took the whole morning, and a small portion of the afternoon, but by the time nap time was over Sunday afternoon, we had hot water again!

 

There's just one thing.  The water isn't getting "hot enough".  It's hot, don't get me wrong, but here I go again with my first world problems - it's not hot enough.  I turn the shower knob all the way up and it's not enough.  I like my showers HOT.  We keep the house kind of chilly at night and so I like to get in a shower that is going to warm me up right to my bones.  This new heater isn't doing that.  So now I have to call housing again to have them come out and adjust the thermostat by the new heater.  But I sort of feel like a brat because, hey, at least I have hot water, right?  Sigh.  Me and my first world "problems".

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

A Letter. To a Bird.

To the Bird who thinks he's Justin Bieber (you know who you are),

First, let me say that I am super impressed with the myriad of chirps that you know.  It's like listening to one of those car alarms that goes through 6 or 7 alarm sounds before it repeats.  This leads me to believe you are a mockingbird.  Now, I have no problem with your melodies.  As I said, I'm impressed with your range and your variety. Also impressive? Your volume.  You actually managed to wake up my husband from a sound sleep.  There aren't many things that can do that.

However, what I do have a problem with is the hour at which you decide to serenade me (or your lady bird friend - whichever).  While I love listening to your songs, but I don't love listening to them at 2 o'clock in the morning.  I mean, seriously? Who does that? Who starts singing at 2 o'clock in the morning, at the top of their little lungs, and continues singing for 3. WHOLE. HOURS?!?  Sigh.

Now, if you were to start at 2am and go for 15 minutes or so, fine.  Whatever.  I can get back to sleep after that.  If you were to start at 6 and go for 3 hours, fine. Whatever - it could be a nice way to wake up.  But when you start at 2am and just go on and on like you're performing a full on concert with the Biebs, that's when I take umbrage with you sir.  Do you really have to sing so loudly?  I have the window closed, the fan on, and you STILL sound like you're singing from the top of the pillow I've placed over my head to try to drown out your songs.  Seriously.

I'm sure you think you're doing me some sort of service, providing music for my nighttime slumber, but let me assure you sir, you are not.  You are hindering my slumber. Let me rephrase that.  You aren't hindering it so much as you are completely destroying it.  Here's how it goes.  I fall asleep around 11.  At 2am I'm having some sort of dream which is ended when I'm woken up by "Chirp! Chirp! CHIRP!! Chirp-ity-chirp-chirp-CHIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRPPPPP!!! chirpchirpchirpchirp. Like baby baby baby OOOOOHHHHH! Chirpity-chirpity-CHIRRUP!!" I get up, I shut the window.  It doesn't help (because you're so loud). I lie there listening for a few minutes, trying to re-appreciate the talent you have, until appreciation turns into annoyance.  Then I put my pillow over my head, which helps a little, but only until all the heat that usually escapes from head gets caught in the pillow and warms my head back up.  Then I have to remove the pillow from my head until I cool off again, but by this point I'm emotionally heated as well.  And so it goes for 3 hours until you make your final encore performance, leaving me an hour to regain my sanity enough to try and get SOME sleep before I have to get up.  Not cool, Bird.  Not cool at all.

Last night I think you moved to a different venue (tree on my street) as you weren't as loud as usual when I heard you singing this morning, and that I do appreciate.  However, I'm sure that whoever's house you were outside of didn't appreciate it.  Maybe over by the gym, or down by the main gate where no one lives would be a better place to be?  Actually I think the gate is the perfect place for you.  The guards there have nothing better to do at 2am than to listen to you sing.  You'll have a captive audience as they aren't allowed to leave the gate!

All joking aside, Bird, you've gotta go sing your way-too-early-in-the-morning songs somewhere else.  Otherwise, I might be forced to do something drastic.  Like run up and down the street in my pajamas, shaking all of the trees until I figure out which one you're in then throw things at you until you leave.  Or, I'll send my cat out.  Don't be fooled by his apparent uselessness.  He'll cut a bird.  Don't let it come to that.

Sincerely,

The Girl You're Keeping Up All Night



I'm Going to Show Off a Little

As most of you know, Mother's Day was this past Sunday.  My Mother's Day was very nice.  I woke up, opened my gifts from my boys, went to chapel, did some shopping (ALONE!), and the rest of the day was like any other Sunday.  So, it was great.  Since I don't have much to say about my day, I wanted to share some pictures of the sweet loot I got.

Each of the boys made me a card at school (I'll spare you those pictures, but they were very sweet), and they each made something with their pictures in it.  Zeke made a flower and Deacon made a frame.

I like the hands as leaves idea in Zeke's flower, but sadly, they didn't trace his whole hand (or he cut off part of the bottom), so it's not exactly accurate.  But it's very sweet and I love it all the same.

Deacon also made me a decoupage candle holder.  It has a neat little paper on the one side that says, "You Light Up My Life" then it has his name, then "Happy Mother's Day 2012".

Now, for the stuff Josh bought.  He did really well y'all.  These last 2 gifts were both bought in Korea, while he was there last week. The first, from him, was this beautiful jewelry box.

The design is done in mother-of-pearls.  Fancy, right?

The other gift, "from the boys", is a necklace.  I LOVE this thing.  It is purple on one side (amethyst):

and green on the other (peridot):

BUT, that's not all.  Besides being double sided, the necklace OPENS so you can wear it as teardrops:

Pretty sweet, right?!:

So yeah, I had a pretty good Mother's Day.  It was nice spending it with my boys (all 4 of them), as well as getting out on my own for an hour or so.  I love my 3 little men, and am truly blessed to have them call me "Mom".

Testing, Testing

So I'm here trying out this new layout, seeing how it goes.  This won't really be a post about anything, just me, here, figuring out how to work this new layout that I REALLY don't like so far.  It's weird.

Also weird is this kid:

Yes, that is his Handy Manny tool box that he made me buckle in next to him. Hey, you gotta keep those tools safe, right?

Blah, blah, blah.  Words, words, words.  Still not feeling it.  But I guess I'm stuck since I don't feel up to figuring out moving to somewhere else - yet.

Of course, it'll all look the same to you guys, it's just writing/setting up/etc that's different, so this really only affects me.  Sigh.





There's Not Enough O's in Groooooooss

Yesterday morning our main floor toiler overflowed for probably the 6th time in the last 3 or so months. Water went everywhere, Josh just happened to come home for a minute as it happened, so he plunged the toilet and told me to call housing, which I did. They sent someone out right away. He flushed the toilet a few times and it was working perfectly. "Your husband did a great job plunging" he said. Then he snaked the toilet anyway while he was there, and said if it happens again to call again and next time they'll take the toilet off and snake it the other way. Yay.

A wee bit later I heard what sounded like the cat peeing in his litter box, only a little bit weird. And loud because I can't usually hear him peeing when I'm upstairs. Thinking that maybe I should check on him, but not really wanting to get off the couch (I was tired from cleaning my bathroom floor, mopping up all of that gross water), I ignored him. A few minutes later though I went downstairs to put my towels into the dryer. And that's when I saw this:

A puddle of pee ON MY WASHING MACHINE! Of course, I immediately blamed the cat because how else would a pubble of pee wind up ON MY WASHING MACHINE! Sigh. I ran back upstairs for my camer (well, my phone) and for some cleaning supplies. When I got back down I stood there for a moment in disbelief. I mean really, WHY would he do that, it didn't make any sense. His litter box is literally 3 feet away from the washing machine and on the floor. Why would Peavey walk past his box, jump onto the washing machine and then pee? Figuring he wouldn't, and then remembering that our toilet overflowed and flooded our bathroom, I wondered if maybe it leaked through the ceiling?

>I looked up, directly over the washing machine, but the ceiling was perfectly dry. My eyes wandered over the rest of the ceiling to where I saw this:

That is the paint bulging out after being filled with gross toilet water. My guess now is that when the toilet overflowed and filled the bathroom with its nasty water, the water seeped through the floor into the ceiling of the laundry room, where it collected behind the paint, forming this bulge. It then must have sprung a leak and squirted out of the paint bulge onto my washing machine. I know, I know, WHAT?!

Peavey, I owe you an apology. I'm terribly sorry, and will put my "Jump to Conclusions" mat out with the trash this week. And maybe give you a belly rub to make up for blaming you for something you didn't do. But we'll see about that, I am still pretty annoyed with you for crying all night the other night, keeping me awake for WAY too long.

So, after cleaning my machine and what's it, I called housing (again) and got their answering service. As I was trying to explain my situation the guy on the phone I saw one of the housing men outside talking to a neighbor. Praise God! I quickly ran downstairs and as he was about to get into his van I said, "Could you come look at something for me REAL quick please?" He did and confirmed that it must have been from when the toilet overflowed. He then cut away the buldge and all the surrounding area:

Now I have to let this dry over the weekend, and then call housing once more to have them come back to repaint and fix up that portion of my wall/ceiling. Good times y'all. Good. times.