Week in an Insta(gram)

Peach has really been enjoying this year.  She's finally in preschool, a dream of her since Gigi went two years ago.  Sorry kiddo one kid in preschool year is kind of our limit.  She is the cutest when I pick her up.  She always greets me with a huge "Momma".  Then she proceeds to give me the run down of her day.  I should video tape it.  Her voice is so tiny it's like being with a living breathing sesame street segment.  My favorite is when she narrates her life.  "To put my shirt on I start with this arm, then this one, then my head."  It makes cooking with her super fun.  This week we made banana bread.  She put in all the ingredients in after periodically checking the recipe, and then started the mixer herself.  She added sprinkles on the top and the kids loved it.  She then started in on the dishes.  Love this kid!

So our garden this year was sort of a flop.  Things took to long to get started and then stumped out for a few weeks until I figured out that fish emulsion was the way to go.  Then our garden took off.  We've been reaping the goods in way of carrots...which is awesome because Gigi loves them.  I found nubs in her closet this week.  Wish I loved carrots this much!

We've had kids in our bed everyday this week.  EVERYDAY!  Why is it our two youngest are the two least likely to sleep?  I looked at our kids yesterday and said to Dr. J, "in just a few years when they are big enough to do the chores without a lot of help we're going to have a good thing here"....until then we'll just have to enjoy these cuddle times.  

Gigi put these pjs on.  When I asked her why she was wearing Peaches' pajamas she said, "Wait, what do you mean these aren't mine?"

Cheetah is just getting crazier and crazier.  The girls is a climber.  She likes to get up on everything.  She likes to pull items off all our shelves. She loves to stand.  Today she took a step toward Captain E.  Then she did it again.  I was so bummed out that I missed it.  Then she took a step toward me.  She's such a cutie!

Peach loves her olives.

And her sister.  She ask Gigi if she can sleep in her bed almost every night.  Sometimes Gigi lets her, sometimes she says, "No, you are too noisy and you play too long."  These little girls crack me up.

This week the weather has really started to change.  Fall is coming.  It's been cloudy a lot and we even had a hail storm.  The kids wanted to run out and play in the rain.  I convinced them to stay on the porch so they didn't get knocked by any ice but they still grabbed a few pieces to eat.  It was a little intense.  

Lost My Stride

I grew up in a family with six kids.  My mom was single.  She worked almost my entire childhood.  I look back now and wonder, how did she do it?  I have only four kids now.  I have a husband.  He might not be home often but he is home occasionally.  I'm not going to lie, this four kid thing is kicking me in the trash.  My blog is months behind.  I haven't done a single thing in Cheetahs baby book.  I'm always behind on laundry.  I'm always behind on housework.  Captain E takes so much work when it comes to homework.  He swamps me with his demands.  I'm squeaking by to keep Gigi caught up and half the time I realize I forgot show and tell or something new that had to be turned in.  The only time I go to school is to pick up a puking kid.  I let Peach watch too many movies.  Cheetah demands to eat right around the time I'm making dinner.  I want to do some projects but I haven't caught up on the ones I started.  I feel like I'm threading water with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back, and three kids holding on...oh wait I did do that at the pool this summer :)  Motherhood is a strange business.  It is wonderful and horrible all wrapped up into one. Each new child takes a little bit of adjusting to work into the rotation but this time I just can't manage to get it right.  It's been a year and I'm still carrying my baby weight, still haven't figured out how to get my life together.  I'm left wondering will I ever find my rhythm again, my stride.  I'm a stay at home mom.  I want to be involved in my children's lives.  I want to be a great mom.  I want to teach my children.  I want my house to be clean.  I want my jeans to fit.  Instead I find myself overwhelmed and eating to many sweets.  My mom was amazing.  How did she keep this together?

Grandparent's Visit

We had grandparents come into town this summer for Captain E's baptism.  One of the nice things about living by an airport is people are more likely to come out to see you.  Grandpa Bob, Grandma Linda, and Nana were all here.  It was fun for the kids to see extended family.  I tell Dr. J, I'm 80% happy here, but 20% of me wishes we were closer to family.  

Peach has always loved Grandpa Bob.  There are a couple of guys that she just really feels attached to and he is one of them.  She is his little cuddly bug and ever since she was a little baby she's had him wrapped around her finger.

We took the kids goofy golfing for the first time.  I am definitely the inconsistent hitter.  Sometimes it would take me 10 stokes, 3 times I got a hole in one.  The kids had a good time even if they didn't completely understand the rules.  Peach picked up a lot of balls and Gigi would kick things in when she got bored.

 The Grandma's and I took turns golfing and holding Sweetie Petite.  I'm sure it's not so hard to imagine but golfing and holding a baby are hard to do at the same time :)

 Watch out for Gigi when she has the club.  That thing was swinging all over the place.  I was sure someone was going to get hit!

 Three generations of competitive goofy golfers :)

 Why is it impossible to get three kids to look the same direction at once?  Einstein answer me that from beyond the grave won't you!

 It was a fun day and in the end we wore grandpa out!

Sometimes You Just Need a Change

When women get that major itch to change something in their lives it usually means they are either going to rearrange furniture or cut their hair.  This week it was the hair.  My hair was driving me nuts this month, I mean just absolutely bonkers.  I had a constant list going through my head.

-Sick of seeing the clumps of it in the shower.
-Sick of cleaning the mountain of it out of the vacuum (The picture on the left is actually just a small bit of what I found in that thing...seriously yuck!)
-Sick of Cheetah trying to rip it out of my head.
-Sick of the way the weight was dragging the curl out of the top.
-Sick of never doing a bloody thing with it.  I mean hello ponytail city!
-Sick, just sick to death of my hair.

Sunday I woke up at midnight and went into the bathroom.  I looked at my hair and seriously contemplated taking the bathroom scissors to it.  I mean the bathroom scissors, had I lost my mind?  I got myself back into bed and the next morning messaged my friend  Jessica who always has her hair together, "Who cuts your hair again and how can I contact her?"  She quickly responded and I e-mailed Whitney immediately.  "This is a hair emergency," I told her, "I almost cut my own hair last night."  She set me up with an appointment for Thursday and I had an unbearable three days waiting it out.  I spent hours pouring over short hairstyles with word searches like.

- "short hair styles"
-"curly short hair styles"
- "curly short hair styles for round faces"
- "curly short hair stylesfor fat girls"

I read an article where some blogging idiot said that even movie stars who look good with short hair look even more "bang-able" with long hair, "so all you ugly regular ladies out there keep your hair long", and I had to again resist the urge to take scissors immediately to my hair.

I didn't say a word about the appointment to Dr. J.  I didn't want to discuss it or be wishie washy on the issue. I didn't want to feel unduly influenced one way or the other.  I didn't want to torture him by making him looking at five thousand picture of my hypothetical cut.  I just sat it out, kept hiding those bathroom scissors, and did a lot of teeth grinding.

Today I drove out to Whitney's salon.  She was adorable, peppy and cheerful, like an old friend from high school you haven't seen in years.  Her salon is attached to her house and while fully, and I do mean fully stocked it also has room for toys, a video area, and a kids lounge area, which was pretty darn convenient considering I had Cheetah and Peach with me.  Look, I have to save my friend babysitting for real emergencies, like dentist appoints, which speaking of ladies I have one next week.  Anyone want to take Peach for an hour, anyone?  But back to Whitney.  I showed her a few pictures online and then after she asked me a few questions to make sure I was of sound mind before chopping all my hair all off she asked me if I wanted to donate to "Locks of Love".  I said, "Heck yeah!"  So she made a braid and chopped off a good foot of hair before you could even say the world "bang-able".  She then got to the business of giving me back some curls and at this point what I can only describe as mom dignity, because when you hair is in a pony every day of your life you do not feel pretty.  When she was done, I was so happy.  No regret here!

I then drove out to the hospital to get some papers from Dr. J that needed to be at the post office yesterday.  He was meeting us downstairs. I saw him first and then saw his face when he saw me.  Definitely surprise there! "Oh my, you cut your hair."  He gave me a good PDA kiss and told me he thought it looked great and he loved that I donated the rest.  I was definitely feeling the waves of nostalgia and I wonder if he was to.  You see eleven years ago when he first saw me sitting a row ahead of him in a 100 person plus organic chemistry class it was the desire to touch sassy little curls just like these that made him first decide he needed to talk to me.

Summer

Summer is this weird thing for moms.  At first you are super excited to have all the kids home again.  Hello sleeping in, pj's until ten, hello late movie nights in the middle of the week, hello not having to argue about getting dressed or homework, hello not packing lunches, hello reading for fun.  Then the kids start to fight. They bicker in the backseat over whose arm is where.  They argue over who gets which Popsicle and who gets to check the mail.  They argue over which TV programs to watch and who was first in line.  Shopping with all four with a holy nightmare.  I ended up in this uneasy limbo.  Giddy at having them home, wishing for them to be back in school.  I think a visit to the grandparents would have made the summer easier but because of finances and lack of days off we spent the whole summer at home.   Luckily we did find a few cool things to do.  

I got these tattoos at the dollar store.  The kids loved them.

 We did a ton of coloring.  I mean a ton.  Captain E still isn't a fan but with two girls over three we colored at least a half hour everyday.  Thank goodness for back to school deals where you can stock up on $.25 crayons.

 Fruit was the main staple of the summer.  We are pretty much free with the snacks here, evidenced by my ever growing bum and belly, so the kids were always chopping on something but I feel better about the fact that it was a piece of fruit.

 When the kids would get really rowdy, I stole an idea from a friend and would let them have a book listening party.  Some pillows, blankets, snacks, and they were happy little clams.

 Cheetah pretty much spent her summer laying around.  Well until she was crawling around and then she spent her summer looking for things to put in her mouth.  She shocked herself twice with cellphone charger...yikes it was sad and scary!

 We did the summer reading program at the library.  The kids earned points that they could use to buy books or prizes.  I wanted to "force" them to buy books.  I mean I can't help it, I'm a teachers daughter who loves books and as a mom the last thing I want is more little nicknacks coming into the house, but I resisted the urge and instead let them choose how they wanted to spend their points.  We ended up with a few books and lots of prizes.  Their favorite was these finger flashlights.  Sometimes I catch all three of them in the bathroom with the lights off having a dance party.  My least favorite was this gooey stuff that Peach decided to dump all over Cheetahs hair.  It was a complete pain to get out.  All the goo was covertly confiscated and thrown out.  Shush, don't tell the children.

 Finally momma managed to get one girls night out this summer.  It felt so good to eat a meal without having to worry about kids climbing under the table or throwing food!  Yeah for mommy time!!!!  Oh and my friend Jamie sitting to the right of me, the week after this picture was taken she delivered a 10lb 2oz daughter.  Who knows where she was hiding her!

July 4th

 What was I doing all summer?  Seems like I got really behind on blogging.  Maybe four kids is a little harder than I originally realized.  Anyway forgive me now for taking the blog back four months back but I never got a chance to post our 4th of July pics!  Do you like my flag cake.  I've wanted to make one for years but never got around to it.  This year we got invited to a friend potluck and I thought who doesn't love cake!  If I do say so myself it was a beaut.

Then there was the watermelon stars.  I saw this pinned and thought, "WHY THE HECK NOT!"  They were mainly for the kids, although truth be told they were snatched up mostly by the adults.

 Dr. J spends his time trying to instill lots of different talents and occupational skills in our children.  Circus performer is the first one he likes to introduce after I teach them about competitive eating :)

Sweetie Petite is up to snuff.  Keep in mind she was 8 months here or 5 1/2 adjusted :)  Speaking of Dr. J I have no idea how he managed to make this event?  Did he have a day off, was it a holiday at work, was he just coming off night shift.  I honestly can't remember, but it was nice to have him around at an event!

 After almost everyone had left we engaged in some illegal sparkler fun.  Under normal circumstances our city has very liberal rules about fireworks and last year we'd often heard people setting off what I would consider professional grade stuff well into the month of August, but this year the Midwest had one of the most severe droughts in recorded US history, so everything, EVERYTHING was banned.  These were done in our friend's backyard and by then our law school friends had left.  So it was just the two doctor families quietly breaking the law behind a six foot privacy fence.  Shhh, don't turn us in :)