Raising Adults

  I read a blogpost the other day where someone mentioned that we are raising our kids to be adults. I know that seems obvious, but it struck a chord with me. There is an end goal. We need our children to not just sit back and enjoy childhood or whine there way through it. We need to make them into amazing leaders, mother, brothers, fathers, sisters, cousins, friends, teachers, and the list goes on.

  Ty and I talked tonight about Emree and  how we want to instill more confidence in her. Confidence that she is loved that she is a daughter of God, that she can do amazing things, that she can help others. I want a child who looks outward and sees the good in others and the good in herself.

 In that same blog post it talked about hugging your children until they let go. I need to do that more for Jesse. I am always the first to let go and he just needs the extra love. It makes him feel safe and secure. It helps his day go better. He is my little snuggler and no matter how tall he gets I think he will always be.

Alligators, Butterflies, and Screaming

  Let me start off by saying that I love hearing what people have to say about things going on in their lives. I love to hear about their experiences and what they choose to do with their time or lack their of. I sometimes wonder if I have much to add, but to be honest I need to write it down for me. I use to be a fantastic journal writer. Writer of journals... not sure how I should even put that. But somewhere between becoming a sleep deprived mom who can't keep up with all the dishes and pillows on the floor and kid number three (no I have four) I stopped journaling. I use to think I was a fantastic writer too, but I tend to have poor grammar and the worst spelling (thank you spell check) and I no longer have the time to double check and double check everything I write. Sometimes that makes me think I shouldn't write it. Today I don't think that is true. I should write because I want to and you can read if you want to. Or not at all. This is really for me anyways. So, I can freeze this moment in my life. Each day I look at my kids and I don't want to forget how happy they make me and how funny they are. They are each so cute and so frustrating in their own ways. My oldest went to a Butterfly Garden today. I thought there would be butterflies, but apparently they are only there in March and April. She loves to tell us about everything she is learning and finds school exciting and fascinating. She loves fractions and stories. She loves to color - especially pictures of bees. She has also recently had to tell on a friend for looking up pornography at school and for using foul language. I wish she didn't have to learn so much in first grade. Jesse is my crazy happy kid who never and I mean never stops making noise. He make noise in between his noises...  Today we went to an Alligator Sanctuary. He loved to looks at the animals and to feed them and to play with his friends and to make noise the entire time. I don't think I saw him once with out a huge smile on his face. Even while his brother Brighton was hitting him. Brighton is two and crazy and loud and athletic. He could chuck the biscuits to feed the alligators right into the water (the other two year olds had a hard time getting it over the fence), but he gets angry easily. He yells when he is mad these days and he hits all the time. We are trying to enforce time out. I want to teach him to be kind. He does have a few kind bones hidden down in there. Baby Reid is so easy and adorable and smiley. He likes to get up every three hours still in the night, but he is such a pleasure all day. He slept through all of the Alligators, but he sure looked cute doing it. I can't believe he is almost three months old. I read a blog about Dads today and it talked about how Dads speak a different language than moms and we have to try not to change what they say because kids need us both for different reasons. This is so true. Ty came with us today and my boys just eat him up when he is around. They love me, I am their mom, but I am always here. They need their Dad time and I am so grateful Ty gave that time to them. Yes, today we didn't see any butterflies, saw lots of alligators and heard lots of screaming, but it was a good day. I can say that now because all of my littles are tucked into bed and I look at them and I want to freeze them in this moment.

Funny things they say...

Emree

"Mom, I just thought of this! If Jesus is in heaven then we won't have to say our prayers anymore."

"I hate everything about this. Being me is unbelievable."

"Jesse, I love you because you actually helped me pick up my toys tonight" 

Jesse:

"It is not a conversation!" (He meant competition)

"Baby Brighton, say tiger face!" (We were all suggestion small words like dada)

"I loved you mom because you play toys with me."

Baby B

 " dadadadadada"

:)

You're Brave...

Running errands with three little ones always makes for a spectacal. The funniest was a lady who saw me when I was babysitting an extra little one and so I was heading into the grocery store with four little ones five and under. She laughed and joked,"you're either brave or stupid." It made me chuckle. We usually make it through the store these days because there is a little mechanical horse at the end that you can ride for one penny. Worth it every time. In fact, they usually supply the pennies. Even better! 

  We have tried to instill in our kids the concept that you work for money and money buys things. I believe the next lesson will be... Things don't buy happiness. Haha they always want everything in the store, but I guess I can't blame them because so do I. Today Emree asked for some over priced tic tacso. Since when were to tic tacs over a dollar. I gave in and got to watch how much her and Jesse enjoyed every single one. It was pretty cute. He worships the ground em walks on and I know he is going to miss her next week when she starts kindergarten. 

  Anyways, we made it through the store today because I let my kids eat all the grapes and because they were just happy. It was a good day. Although I am always perplexed by how much we spend on groceries each month. I just have little kids I can not imagine how big our bill will be one day. Oh man!

Starting again...

 I use to keep a journal. In high school and while Ty and I were dating, I wrote almost every day. I loved the clarity I got from writing things down and the insight. I am a highly emotional person and taking the time to think through things really benefits me. I also love reading my thoughts back and remembering exactly what I was feeling in the moment. It makes me sad that one day I may forget how Emree fake laughs, how Jesse hates to be left behind or how Brighton lights up when a member of our little family enters the room. I want to remember the great space that Ty and I are in. How supportive we have been of each other and the love that has been extended. I want to remember our adjustment to Michigan and how exciting it is to be in our very own house. How even though sometimes we feel like we have everything we need, other times we are collecting pop cans to get a little extra. I just want to remember the good, the bad, the hard, the fun. I want to live in the now and enjoy our stage in life. 

  So here goes another stage of blogging.  We will see where this one leads. Hopefully somewhere...

Butterfly clips

I got my hair done today. I found the salon via groupon and decided to try it out. It appeared to be normal, but I felt slightly awkward as she highlighted my hair.  As my hair was processing, I tried to seem interested as she showed me all the ways in which one could use butterfly clips. The final touch was the hour she spent doing my hair with the butterfly clips she had just finished telling be about. She performed some scary up-do she called the Taylor swift fo a-line. I tried to hold back the giggles but kinda failed. Let's just say I am super glad I didn't let her cut my hair as well. This is honestly the worst my hair has ever been styled.  

Not a stone...

So now I am using my blog to vent about my health problems and not brag about my children or make fun of them haha. I am sort of just rambling and docummenting ... I went to a uralogists. He was suppose to set up an appointment to blast my kidney stone. Only one problem. He didn't think it was a kidney stone. Didn't really give me any idea of what else it could be. Now I only am suppose to live in Sacramento for two more weeks and I have to figure this all out before I leave. They are going to do an x-ray thinga ma jig (ty would love my medical terms) it will show whether or not the thing they think they are seeing in all the other tests is actually a kidney stone in my ureter or not. From there we scope to blast the stone or scope to figure out what it is. Either way it all sounds sort of terrible. However, my family is coming in one week from today and we find out where we match for residency and my dancers perform the King's game and we are blessing Brighton. Life is sort of crazy!