Short and Sweet

I feel like this weather is cooking my brain. I felt very blah today. It didn't help that I feel like I spend every day cleaning up the same 2-3 messes. It's discouraging.

I did work out today. I also got an amazing massage. It is a rare treat, but I'm hoping to make it a more regular occurrence.

I've had a low-level headache for most of the week, most likely because of the weather.

I feel like I accomplished a lot this week, though. I managed to (finally) drop off some stuff for Goodwill, a bag of plastic bags, food at the food pantry, I straightened up even more after the big switcharoo last weekend.

I am spending my Friday night the way I most love, watching reruns of Modern Family. I watched Brooklyn fall asleep on the couch. The kids played in the pool until like 7:30. Doug ate four hot dogs for dinner. (I'm not sure I'll be able to afford to feed him soon--be on the lookout for a commercial where, for 50 cents a day, you can provide a nutritious meal for him.)

I'm not much for being out late, so I'm really quite happy to be on my couch, in comfy clothes, on a Friday night.

I'm not sure, though, why people persist in setting off fireworks. Enough already.

Soupy, Droopy Weather

I slept in today until 8 AM, which was actually quite glorious. It helped that it was raining quite heavily and therefore, the sun was not blaring through my window. I also took a very short nap around noon. I remember that I napped (had to nap) every single day, at least two hours a day. Now, it's rare for me to nap at all. If I do nap, I try to keep it under and hour. (The exception is when I give blood--that earns me a longer nap.)

Today was a much different day than yesterday. I over scheduled my morning. A generous friend was able to pick Jeremy up from band class and bring him home. (This is even more special to me because Jeremy plays the tuba, which he has to haul back and forth from the school.)

I had a walk today with a new client. It went well. I was glad to get a walk in before the extreme heat settles in tomorrow. I have two 1-hour walks scheduled for Saturday with a regular client, a giant schnauzer named Tony. I am already preparing myself for those to be cancelled. I tried to walk him a couple of weeks ago on a Saturday morning. The sun was blazing and the humidity was quite high.

This has been a quiet week for walking dogs, which has not bothered me that much. It has been too beastly hot (as my maternal grandmother used to say). It's not worth putting my health (or the dogs' health) in jeopardy.

Today, the kids were in the pool while I was prepping for dinner. This made for a much smoother meal prep. I managed *not* to burn the hamburgers, thanks to Brian manning the grill. I even managed to make homemade bread and hamburger buns.

I met with a friend this morning and had a really good chat. The older I get, the more I cherish the opportunity to have 1-on-1 chats versus being in a crowded room of people. It was nice to get to know her a little better. I shared with her about Doug's mishap on Monday and the crazy trip to the museum yesterday.

Blogging is, for me, a way to debrief my day. It's tough sometimes to unravel all the things that happen during the day. It gives me a chance to watch the tapes, so to speak, and see where I fell short, where I excelled, and what things need to just be left behind.

Right now, I am listening to Bekah read me a book about Misty Copeland. I love hearing my fierce little dancer critique things. There is a picture of Misty dancing en pointe. Bekah mused that Misty could be doing a grande battement, but then the skirt isn't in the right spot. According to Bekah, the skirt wouldn't be away from Misty's leg. Additionally, Bekah asserts that the shoes depicted are not actually point shoes but rather ballet shoes.

These kinds of observations are what amaze me about Bekah. I enjoy that she notices things like that. She has a very sharp eye for things and, like her dad, has very good judgement. She calls things like she sees them, which can be tough to do sometimes. Also, the fact that she notices things like this means that she is growing as a reader.

My dad used to read out loud to my brother and me well into high school. It's not always possible to do this with four kids, so I relish the opportunity whenever it arises. (It helps that Brooklyn fell asleep a while ago. Having her chattering around me is like being pecked to death by a chicken.)

Tomorrow should be an interesting day. I have no walks scheduled. My parents are heading out of town, so I'll be watching their dogs for a day or so. I'm hoping to finish shawl number two and progress further with shawl number three. I'll be sure to post pics as I finish. Hopefully, the warm weather this weekend will mean I have more time to sit and crochet. We shall see.

A Hard Day's Night

I missed two days. Monday went sideways in the evening. Doug, my younger son, stepped on a roofing nail. It missed his heel bone by centimeters. It threw us into all sorts of upheaval.

Tuesday was Tuesday, but more so because my parents weren't available to help me and Brian was working. I got home at 8, exhausted and hungry. I didn't start eating dinner until close to 9.

We went to the Discovery Museum in Rockford today. My kids love it there.

Prepping for the trip is akin to preparing for a military operation.

I have to pack lunch and snacks for four kids. I have to remember what each child does and doesn't like. Do we have bread to make sandwiches? Nope, it's moldy, so I have to improvise. That equalled peanut butter sandwiches out of hamburger buns.

Cut up some questionable red bell pepper, had to be okay with Bekah tossing it out.

Remember to bring the boys' doses of Ritalin.

Pack enough water for everyone for the ride home.

Repack the diaper bag (thanks, Bekah, for helping me with that, and also for cleaning out the van).

Make sure everyone has used the potty.

Make sure I have a charging cord for my phone.

Make sure I have the transponder for IPass. (I didn't.)

We arrive at the museum.

Two people want to eat. The rest, overwhelmed by the input, find my mom, dad, brother, sister-in-law and nephew.

I am already exhausted and we have just arrived.

Over the next 2.5-3 hours, I attempt to corral the children, thankfully with the help of the other adults. I do my best to sit still and eat some lunch myself, but I am always thinking about the kids.

Are they okay? Does someone have eyes on Doug? Is Brookie okay, does she need to go potty (this is our first major trip away from home post-potty training)? Have the boys taken their noon doses of Ritalin?

I played Wizards Unite, but I was always concerned about something.

Then, it's time to go home.

Do we have all the lunchboxes? Has everyone pottied? I went to get the van and pulled up to the entrance to get the kids.

Who wants a water? Who wants an apple? Do the people who didn't eat their lunch want their lunch? Are we sure no one needs to potty?

Start driving, tentatively, to make sure I'm going the right way. Realize, because Brookie points it out, that I forgot to buckle her in her carseat. Pull over, put on my hazards, hope there isn't a cop nearby. Jump out, buckle her in.

Make it to Culver's but miss the turn, so I have to sit at two stoplights. Get everyone a milkshake (it's a tradition). Almost get to the expressway and hear from Brookie, "mommy, I have to go potty."

Silently curse, then try to figure out where I can stop to take her to the bathroom. Spot a gas station, but miss the turn. Same drill, two extra stoplights.

Lock everyone in the van, take Brookie potty. It takes a lot longer than I thought it would.

Get back on the road. Pull onto the expressway, hear her say again, "mommy, I have to go potty."

I figured it was a false alarm, so I ignored it. Next thing I know, she's sleeping.

We drove through a brief but powerful rainstorm. It was cute to hear my daughter's friend relay a bad travel experience she had last year.

Get home. Brooklyn is sleeping. Have to roust her to take her to Walmart. Realize she did, in fact, have to go to the bathroom. Dig around to find clean underwear and shorts.

Go to Walmart, where she insists she can't walk (her legs are broken). She immediately needs to go to the bathroom. Again.

Basically, have a trip to Walmart that is anything but quick.

Get home, realize it's already past dinnertime.

The night devolved from there.

I haven't quite figured out our grill. I made it too hot and put too many of the steaks on it. This succeeded in charring the steak, but leaving it basically raw. I did my best to make adjustments, but I was worried for a minute that I was going to start my house on fire.

It ends up taking me an hour of fiddling to cook the steaks enough to serve them to my kids.

In the interim, Jeremy and Bekah have kept up a steady stream of sniping at each other. It is exhausting. I am a constant mediator between them. She did something he didn't like and vice versa. They know how best to needle each other and have gotten very good at doing so.

I lost my temper with them. I lost my temper with Doug. I tried, in a very exasperated way, to explain to them how tired I am and how much I just want to sit on the couch and relax.

I felt too defeated to write, but I didn't want to skip three days in a row.

I recently read something on Facebook about how vacationing with kids is really just taking care of your kids in a different location.

I know my kids had fun today, the Discovery Museum is one of their favorite places to be. I hope that, when they get older, they will forget that I burned dinner (again, it's an alarming trend lately), that I yelled at them, that I wasn't the best version of myself.

(Brooklyn is still awake. I am not sure I'll make it until Brian gets home.)

The Old Switcharoo

Bekah and Jeremy, my two older kids, are 16 months apart in age. The phrase we have used is "Irish twins." Oddly enough, I had more people than I could count ask if they were *actually* twins.

Jeremy stayed in his crib until he was almost three. He had no earthly desire to climb out. We used to joke because at bedtime, he would ask us to put all of his toys in his crib with him. We would oblige and say goodnight. Minutes later, we would start to hear small thuds as he tossed the items back out, one by one.

Bekah, on the other hand, was a ninja. She started crawling out of her crib very early. She was the reason we had to put child locks on our cabinets. We didn't have baby gates up until Bekah. She was a one-woman wrecking ball.

When we found out we were expecting Doug, we figured it would be easiest to combine Bekah and Jeremy into one room. That was back in 2007.

We always knew there would be a point that the arrangement would stop working. We kept putting off switching things around. Something would come up, or we wouldn't have the energy, or we would all get sick.

It all came to a head this past week. Brooklyn got potty trained and that was the last piece of the puzzle. We didn't want to put her in a big-girl bed (a twin-sized bed) until we knew she was potty-trained. We jumped that last hurdle. A couple of generous friends donated two twin mattresses and we were in business.

We started moving smaller things on Friday night. Yesterday, Brian worked in the evening. I wanted to keep the momentum going, so I buckled down and took on a big task, moving the boys' bunk beds. That was a huge undertaking. As it turns out, the only way to move them is to deconstruct them and then reconstruct them.

Today, Bekah and I served in childcare at church for the first time. Once we got home, we resumed the project.

By the end (we still have some minor projects to complete, but the vast majority is complete), we had 5-6 kitchen-sized garbage bags full, 4-5 garbage bags full for donation, we gave away the crib, the toddler bed and the crib mattress. I vacuumed every one of the rooms. I must've gathered up at least five pounds of dust and dog hair. It was crazy.

I was a little sad to say goodbye to the crib, but honestly, it was time. I didn't feel like we went beyond the expiration date. I was honestly sadder about Jeremy and Bekah not rooming together anymore. It feels like the end of an era.

I am excited for this next chapter. I am also excited to get some rest.

Insomnia Won't Win

It's been a long five months of waiting. I don't do patience very well. I tend to go a bit batty.

Today, I dealt with insomnia. I was up from 2-5 AM for no real stated purpose. I did managed to throw a load of laundry in the dryer and start a load of dishes.

Aside from that, I've had a nagging headache.

But today, I embraced action.

We are working to switch the kids' rooms around. It's time for the kids to be separated on the basis of gender.

Bekah has been lobbying for the change for quite some time. We have had to wait for Brooklyn to potty train, which I mentioned she finally has.

We started in earnest yesterday, cleaning up and dismantling the crib. It's really the end of an era, to not have someone in a crib.

Even though I didn't get very much sleep, I pushed through today. I wanted to get things done. After five months of being in a permanent limbo, there is something empowering about having and executing a plan of action.

I vacuumed corners of rooms today that I've not cleaned in months and/or years.

Tomorrow, I will set the kids on their room to clean up all the flotsam and jetsam that's accumulated over the past several years.

But forgive me, I'm exhausted and need to get some rest. I will share more tomorrow.

Fri-yay

My time to write this evening is incredibly limited. Brooklyn is tired. If she was child number one, I would tell her to go up and lie in her bed.

She is not child number one. She is child number four.

Truthfully, we had hoped that she'd basically be raising herself at this point. We claim no credit in the fact that she is able to hold her pencil the correct way. She knows some letters. That also has nothing to do with us.

Happily, she is potty-trained. That, I will say, is on us. We had to be a bit firm, but she caught onto it quite quickly.

In any case, she is number four. That means we have lost the ability and energy to be as firm with her as we were with Jeremy. She has developed the bad habit of falling asleep next to either Brian or me. We are in the process of switching around the rooms so that she shares a room with Bekah. It's going to be a lot easier to tell her to go get in her bed. Up to now, she's been in a crib.

She crawled in and out of her crib at will, but the funniest thing was that she would wake up in the morning and cry for someone to get her. She is the consummate youngest child.

So right now, she is sitting on the couch. She wants me to sit next to her. I know the deal, I know she's exhausted. Right now, her crib mattress is on the floor of the kids' room (which will soon be her and Bekah's room). I'm almost positive she will end up sleeping with us tonight.

I am tired myself, having been up since 6 AM this morning. I had a productive day. Worked out with Kate. Learned that I really don't like goblet squats. I used a 20-pound weighted ball. It was bearable, but they went by much more slowly than I thought they would. I'm grateful I wasn't hobbling out of there.

I went on two Wag! walks today, which is good. This week has been much slower than last. I haven't wanted to go out of my way to take a walk, but I had hoped to get a few more.

As I write this, I'm fairly convinced that Brooklyn is asleep. She hasn't been calling out for me since I started writing.

I love my kids and I love my life with them. It's busy and my hands are full, but my heart is even fuller.

Thankful Thursday

Mercy. 

It is almost 10 PM. 

It was a quiet day today. I felt oddly unsettled all day. It was like I was carrying around my umbrella, expecting it to rain. 

And then it didn’t. 

But I still felt like I needed to carry the umbrella. 

Maybe not the best analogy, but I’m pretty exhausted. 

Grateful for so much. Bekah is sleeping comfortably on her new (to her) mattress. I consider that a win. 

I don’t like all the “hurry up and wait” we’re experiencing during this season, but even in the midst of it, I know God is providing for us abundantly. 

If you’re so inclined, please send up a prayer for our little family. We’d surely appreciate it. 

Love and peace.