one of those days...

So I had one of those days where if you don't just force yourself to laugh about it all, then you'll just start crying.  So I thought I'd do a little blog post about it, to 1)write it down and then come back and hopefully laugh about it someday 2)make you all feel better about yourselves :)

My day started out rushed.  I needed to get my glucose test done and my plan was to get to the lab at 9 which meant getting the boys to my friend, Malinda's, house by 8:30.  Getting out of the house by 8:30 is a challenge and to say we left the place in a disastrous state would be an understatement.  But we made it there on time and the only good thing about the glucose test when your pregnant is the hour of quiet that I had to myself sitting in the waiting room.  Ahhhhh that was glorious.  On my way to pick up the boys I swung by the grocery store to pick up a few things (including 4 gallons of milk, yes it's a lot but all 3 of my boys LOVE milk).  So get that done, text my home health care nurse who I'm supposed to get my shot from at noon that I'm running late and will be home around 12:15.  She's so awesome, and was cool with that.  She lives right around the corner from me so it wasn't a big deal.

So I pull into my driveway right at 12:15 and she pulls in right behind me.  Which on a normal day would be totally fine and I'd love it because it was so efficient.  But the night before I was trying to take it easy and so of course the house fell apart and I had enough energy to clean just the front room (the only room she would see when she came, or so I thought at the time) and then add the fact that we had a super rushed morning, let me just paint you a picture of what my kitchen looked like.  Dirty dishes all over the counter because the dishwasher was full of clean ones that hadn't been unloaded that morning (which usually gets done right after breakfast.....obviously didn't happen), small toys all over the floor that Lincoln had spilled prior to leaving that morning, basically no clean spot on the kitchen counter at all.  Cheerios from breakfast thrown on the floor by the one and only Caedmon.

Now back to my garage.  I'm still in the car and remember I had just bought groceries, most of which needed to get in the fridge asap.  So I proceed to get the boys unbuckled and out of the van, open the trunk and my sweet, sweet nurse apologizes for catching me at the bad time and offers to help bring in the groceries.  In my mind I'm thankful that she offered but I'm panicking because that means that she is going to follow me in through the garage door to the kitchen and not in the through the front door.  {insert slight panic attack}  Deep breath, it'll be be ok.  Oh wait, I'm snapped back to reality by my 19 month old throwing himself on the ground right in the doorway between the garage and kitchen.  He won't move, my hands are full,  my nurse is waiting right behind me with her hands full.  I mean could this get any worse?  yes, yes it can.  I step over him, set down the bags and go pick him up.  My nurse follows me in and bless her heart, she starts putting away the items that need to be refrigerated.  So remember I bought 4 gallons of milk, well my fridge was still pretty full and I always have to shuffle things around to get them all to fit.  So imagine my nurse trying to do that, while I'm trying to calm down BOTH my boys now because they are both starving.  I'm trying to think of something QUICK I can give them to start lunch so my nurse can get started and not have to wait.  The didn't want a banana, grapes or an apple....so of course the healthiest option that quickly solved my problem?  a cookie.  hey, it's not the end of the world.  Ok problem fixed.  Moving on to the front room where my nurse is unloading her stuff and starts asking me the usual questions.  Hooks me up to take my blood pressure (I thought FOR SURE it would be super high but amazingly enough it wasn't)  In the meantime Lincoln decides he wants some yogurt, he asks if he can have some, I say yes and feel confident that he can get it himself.  Well remember all that shuffling around?  The yogurt got pushed behind the pitcher of water and the next thing I know, I hear a huge bang on the floor.  Water pitcher spilt.  I'm still waiting on my blood pressure reading so my nurse (have I mentioned how nice she is?!) jumps up to go clean it up.  My bp is done and I was able to keep calmer than I thought 108/58.  Not bad!  I switch places with my nurse and finish cleaning up the water.  Good thing it was just water.  No big deal, right?  Things surely can't get any worse.....

Lincoln grabs his yogurt and the biggest spoon he can find and in the process spills the yogurt all over.  This time I just yell from the front room for him to grab a towel quickly and wipe it up.  Ok, no big deal, it's just yogurt.  I'll clean up what he doesn't get as soon as my nurse leaves.  It can't get any worse can it?!?!

I move to the couch so we can listen to the baby's heart beat and usually both boys come running into the room at this point because they love hearing it.  When they didn't, I should've known something was up.  Caedmon came running but all I hear from Lincoln from the kitchen is, "mommy.....?" He peaks around the corner in embarrassment.  I instantly know what just happened.  He peed all over my kitchen floor.  He was extremely embarrassed.  This was the point where if I hadn't of laughed I would've broke down crying.  And I mainly laughed out of disbelief.  Is this seriously happening right now?  This was just too much.  Seriously.  I had him just run upstairs, clean up and change while my nurse quickly gave me my shot.  She left and I began the clean up of urine, yogurt and water.  Fed my famished boys and got them down for naps.


Wanna know what makes this even funnier worse?  Later that evening I went to go meet my sweet friend's new baby girl.  While there, with my boys, she was apologizing about her messy kitchen so I thought I'd make her feel better and tell her about my day.  I kid you not, I JUST get done telling her my nightmare of a story and I hear Lincoln from the other room, "mommy....?" yes my son had another accident all over their floor.  I wanted to crawl into a hole.  This time I was all laughed out and just wanted to cry.  A glass, or two, or three, of wine would've been needed that night if not for me growing another human inside me.  So chick-fil-a sufficed as comfort food.  Made me feel a little better.  :)

Today is a new day.

lotsa random going on over here

This poor neglected blog.  Don't worry I haven't fallen off the face of the earth, I've just been busy.  Busy and tired and my preggo brain just can't handle one more thing right now.  So since I'm all over the place I'll just type up a random blog post to update you all a bit and just to give you a little random for your day :)

**Thing 1 and Thing 2 are now sharing a room.  It is going beautifully but I probably just jinxed myself by saying that so ask me again in a week or so.  I've slowly started to mess their two rooms into one and am finally decorating what was originally Lincoln's room.  This is one instance where I'm glad I was indecisive with finishing his room.  Now it's a blank slate so I can do something that fits them both.  We bought a sturdy wooden bunk bed set that can convert to two twin beds off craigslist.  First we're gonna stain it a darker wood to match the room and then waiting until C is ready to move to a big boy bed.  Right now he's just in a pack n play because it was going to be too much work to take down the crib, move it, set it up, tear it down for baby and set it back up for baby.  So the pack n play works just fine :)

**I'm 29 weeks as of yesterday.  Sorry no post yet (because I haven't gotten around to taking a picture!)

**Pray this little guys stays put, having some minor (which could lead to major) issues.  Baby Weston needs to meet this world WAY before my baby.  You hear that little man?  Stay put and cook a little longer!

**I haven't talked much about it on here but my journey with Origami Owl is going really well!  July was a slow month but it was a nice break.  But now I'm up and ready to get going again!  I had a vender event today that went well and a couple parties booked for the month.  I love that I have this goal of at least $18,000 that I need to get to for our adoption.  It gets me super motivated.  So if you are thinking about booking a party with me or just ordering a necklace for yourself let me know and I can set something up! mariesdesigns.origamiowl.com.

**Speaking of adoption here's a super quick update:  We've chosen the Philippines to adopt from.  It's about $18,000.  We have saved/raised $2,000 so far which is great but still a long ways to go.  It's a little confusing but right now the Philippines is closed (at least with our agency, meaning they have too many dossiers (paperwork from families) to sort through but our agency said they should be opening again soon.  How the process works: Application, home study, dossier.  So we are close to submitting our application to our agency.  Then we do our home study.  Home study's are good for 1 year and then you have to pay more money to update it.  So once we do our home study we'll have a year to wait for the Philippines to open back up and then we have to make a decision whether to wait longer or change to a domestic adoption (which is MORE expenseive, can you believe it?!)  So that's why it's taking so long right now.  I have a baby to prepare for AND since we have to wait anyway we've just taken our time with the paperwork.

**parenting my 4 year old has been very difficult lately.  exhausting.

**I painted my nails.  For the first time.  In years.  This is huge people.

**I'm excited to try this latte recipe.

**The cooler temps this past week or so has gotten me in the mood for Fall!  I love summer and all that it brings but man I'm ready for crisp mornings, pumpkin spice lattes, and for this baby!

**I'm excited to start up MOMtourage again this year.  It's a once a month get together for mom's of preschoolers that my church is starting up.  We are on our second year and it's been so great!  Are you in my area and want more info?  here's the website.  Our theme this year is "No More Perfect Moms."  Based on the book by Jill Savage.  

**And this video of my boy singing the last verse of "Be Thou My Vision" brought tears to my eyes.  Something so sweet about listening to your child sing a beautiful hymn.  {we've been singing this song, a different verse each week or so and then repeating it since he was born and tonight he wanted to sing it to Caedmon before bed}

And some pictures, because what's a blog post without pictures?! :)

I'm gonna be sad the day this kiddo's hair stops sticking straight up.  Especially when he runs!

InstaFriday

Just a couple instagrams as of late...

Very blurry but the bump and I shopping at Target

kid-free no less (well at least the two that can run around

and make noise) :)

Lincoln's reaction when I told him Aunt Hope and Uncle Derek

were going to have a baby boy!

Yay for more boys!

Another Target trip (seriously, we may as well live there)

had to stop and get some popcorn.  Apparently we were supporting

Preferred Popcorn from my home state of Nebraska! sweet!

Grocery shopping trip turned Spiderman super secret rescue mission

I love my creative boy.

Feeling well enough to cook again.

Super easy Chicken Pot Pie.

Recipe here

Gorgeous 80 degree day called for a trip to the zoo.

Cute little couple they make.  

This will be shown at their wedding :)

and because it was the hottest day yet we HAD to stop

and get some ice cream on the way home!

caedmon {15 months}

oh my sweet 15 {seriously?!} month old boy.  it's so fun to watch you learning and growing by leaps and bounds each day lately.  you are such a little man.  and by that I mean you have no hair :)  it's slowly filling in but it's white blonde so you can't hardly tell.  at least we'll know what you will look like in about 80 years.

at about 14 1/2 months you started officially walking.  i love the first stages of walking when you haven't figured out the balance thing yet, and you walk with your arms up in the air.  it's so dang cute!  and of course you had to show up big brother by walking 2 weeks before he did.  you knew "how" to walk for so long and would tease us for months with a step here and a step there but you were too lazy to make anything of it.  As soon as we gave you any attention like, "go caedmon!  good job!" you immediately dropped down to your knees and crawled away.  stubborn little stinker!

you aren't talking a whole lot yet (again just like brother, totally normal, I just keep comparing you to girls your age, which I know I shouldn't.  Girls talk way earlier than boys so you are right on track) but that doesn't stop you from letting us know what you want.  You point to everything.  Just the other morning after you scarfed down your breakfast, I let you out of your high chair, you crawled right over to the counter and pointed right to the cookies sitting there.  And since it was the first time you had done that and it was pretty cute, you got one :)

We went to your 15 month check up this morning (bright and early!) and you are doing fabulous.  right on track.  lincoln didn't jump off the table this time so it was a little less chaotic :)  he is 50th percentile for height at 31 inches tall.  dr. van kuels informed me you will be well over 6 ft tall.  taking after grandma hunni huh? ;)  12th percentile for weight at 21 lbs.  no worries there because you eat everything under the sun, just have a super high metabolism.  wanna give some of that awesome metabolism to your momma.  i think you sucked it out of me when you were born!  and drum roll please............your head is in the 80th percentile! you got a big ole noggin.  lots of brains of course!

embrace the camera {jan. 3}

The first embrace the camera of the new year!  I'm not typing up a new years resolutions post but if I had a list, keeping up with embrace the camera every week would be on there.  I love that I've been doing it for almost 2 years now and I have so may pictures of my boys and I.  It's fun to look back already and I know I'll cherish those photos in years to come.  Maybe they will too.....or maybe not.  They might not "cherish" them like I do but I'm sure it'll be fun to look back at them when they are older.

Before heading out to our wild and crazy NYE party, Caed and I embraced the camera 

really quick. :)

This one is super blurry but I had to post it because as soon as I took out my phone and pointed it at us to take the picture.  Caed leaned in and smiled just before I snapped it.  I swear this kid knows exactly how to work the camera 

but then he wanted my phone.  

"I already posed for one picture mom!  do you really

think you're going to get 2 good pictures out of me?!"

But I got lucky and snapped this one next.  

He was all bright eyed and bushy tailed but was in bed 10 minutes after we got to our party.  

The party started at 6:30pm :)  Lincoln made it to midnight though, I was impressed!

Happy New Year to you all (a couple days late)!

Linking up with Emily!

Caedmon is ONE

My sweet little boy.  It has been one full year since you joined our family.  Longer than a year since I've known you but one year since you were placed in my arms.  My boy.  My second boy.  You surprised us all by coming a month early but have done beautifully and nothing about that has slowed you down.

God knew (of course he did) that we needed another little boy in our family and you fit that role

perfectly.  I pray you and Lincoln will grow up being best buds.  

We are so blessed by this year and will be extremely grateful for each day

we get with you, our son.  We know we are not promised tomorrow and will

cherish each day, each hour soaking in every bit of you that we can.

Being a second time mom has been so much easier.  Partly because you were/are a super easy 

and laid back baby.  I don't even have to entertain you like I had to Lincoln.  You have your own built in entertainer ie. Lincoln.  He's doesn't always appreciate his role or that you follow him everywhere and I foresee using my mom's line from my childhood to my sister and I "God made you sisters brothers for a reason" :)  I always hated it when she said that.  But after all that fighting we are now best friends.  

If you had it your way you would be attached to my hip 24/7.  Seriously kiddo you are 

a mama's boy (and I really secretly love it).  But lately you have finally realized you have a dad too.  He was the first one that you waved to.  You were so excited when he got home from work and waved excitedly to him from your high chair.  Sweetest sight.  

You are busy.  That's all there is to it.  This age is just a busy age.  Curiosity lends itself to constant

moving and exploring.  Something that wears me out but I know it's only for a season and then I'l be missing it (or not) haha.

As these pictures show you have this thing with you tongue.  You stick it out quite often and always to the side like that.  Silly boy I love your little quirks and seeing little bits of your personality shine through as you get older.

You will be walking before I know it and then running, going to school and graduating. 

Yes it will go that fast.  I'm bracing myself.  

You won't remember this but I'm doing something I swore I would NEVER do since you have

a december birthday.  I'm combining it with Christmas -gasp!- But there is a reason.  The reason is family.  Good enough reason?  You get two parties this way!  One with Daddy's side and one with mommy's side.  So really in the end you win :)

Grandma Hunni got to give you your first birthday present.  

what is the paper stuff?

I think your brother thinks it's his.  Don't worry I'll defend it for you.

He only pushed you off once.  Watching your brother get gifts for the first time and you 

don't get any is hard, but it'll get easier.  It was good for him.  

and just for my reference:
-you cruise everywhere and will stand alone occasionally.
-you are completely switched over to whole milk.  Thankfully that was an easy transition!  now to switch you from bottles to a sippy cup.....and the hunt continues for the perfect one :)
-you aren't afraid to surprise attack your brother.  It's quite fun to watch actually.  Lincoln doesn't find as much humor in it though.
-You stand on your own here and there and accidentally took one step yesterday :)
-you scarf down any kind of food that's put in front of you.
-you go to bed around 6pm every night.  No that's not a typo.  You seriously love your sleep.  And you usually wake up around 7-8am everyday.  Yes that's 13-14 hours STRAIGHT that you sleep every night.  It's a tough job trying to keep you awake long enough so daddy can see you each night, but it's worth it.
-{will update more after your 1 year check up on Tuesday}


and just because I love to look back...

Happy 1st Birthday Caedmon Jay.  I love you to the moon and back!

-mommy

embrace the camera {dec. 13}

It's Thursday again!  Dust off those cameras and jump in a picture

with one of your littles.  Or your hubby, dog, cat, horse, fish, or hamster! :) (trey)

Get IN those pictures.

I'm embracing with Caedmon this week because, well lets face it, he's turning ONE

on Saturday and I'm in denial.  I can't even stand it.  ONE?!  Already?  So I'm embracing these last 

few moments of my baby before he gets all "toddler" on me :)

{I love his little have smirk in this one}

I'm linking up with Emily today and you should too!!

tiring, overwhelming, daunting, exhausting, scary...

just a few of the ways I'm feeling right now about parenting as a whole.

some of them describe the current days of endless correction and discipline.

and the rest are how I feel about thinking of the end goal we have with raising our boys.

and the fact that what we want and pray they become is only partly in our hands.

we will do the best that we can to provide an environment full of love, truth and grace

and then hope what we've done sinks in.

right now we are in the middle of a parenting study with our small group on sunday evenings.  it's chip ingram's "effective parenting in a defective world."  and it's good.  so good.  it's not the first one we've done, but now that Lincoln's old enough for us to apply some of the things we're learning, it's different this time around for us.

Tyler and I have learned so much and I wanted to share some of the things that have really stood out to me. {that may mean this spills into a couple posts} :)

The main thing so far is that we as parents need to recognize that our child's primary responsibility is to learn obedience.
Ephesians 6:1-3
Children, it is your duty to obey your parents, for this is the right thing to do.  Respect your father and mother is the first commandment that has a promise added: so that all may go well with you and you may live a long time in the land.

Obedience is defined as teaching your child to come under the hearing of your voice.

The end goal of obedience to mom and dad, is for our children to learn to submit to the voice of God.
They learn to obey us (who they can see) so that they can learn to obey God (who they can't physically see).

No pressure huh?
So that they shift their dependence (eventually) from us to God.  We aren't teaching independence in a sense, just redirecting their dependence.
I can remember in my own growing up when that switch started to happen.  It was the whole situation when my dad was forced out of farming, we had to move and switch schools.  To my 15 year old self (who had unfortunate pressure from teachers and coaches at the time) it was earth shattering.  I know, I know, this was pud compared to what a lot of 15 year olds have had to endure in their already short lifetime but to me (in my very sheltered life so far) it was as if the earth was crumbling beneath me.  It didn't take long for me to realize that a lot of things in the world, my parents couldn't control.  Like this situation, it was out of their control and for me to see that as their child, really played a significant role in my relationship with Christ.  Until then I had a very surface level faith.  I grew up learning all about God, asked him into my heart at a young age and followed the rules because my parents taught me well.  We went to church every Sunday and I was a "good" little Christian girl :)  But I had never made my faith, my own.  It took these circumstances to really shift my dependence on my parents to dependence on God.  He got me/us through that terrible (to me) situation.

Wow, that was quite the tangent.  So back to teaching obedience... :)

But the main point that I've had to focus on as we figure out this whole parenting thing is that obedience is a process.  Ugh, seriously?!  I can't just snap my fingers and he automatically obeys right away, all the way and with a happy heart?!?!  Unfortunately, with a strong willed child it'll be a looooooooooong process.  And boy do we have a strong willed child.  Maybe it's a first born thing.  I don't know but I know I can be little stubborn at times....

There are good days and there are bad days.....like a couple days ago when I had to drag my kicking and screaming child out of the library because he was not obeying when I said it was time to go.  Oh my goodness I don't think he's ever thrown that bad of a tantrum before.  My blood was boiling to say the least.  We had a 30 minute ride home and over and over again we talked about why he is to obey the first time, that God wants him to obey his mommy, the consequences that will happen when he throws fits.  Over and over and over and over and over again.

A child's responsibility ties right in with their needs.  They NEED significance (love) and security (boundaries).  Children CRAVE boundaries.  They need them.  So we give them.

And as hard as some days are, they are all part of this whole thing called parenthood.  This wonderful, beautiful time of our lives :).

caedmon {11 months}

My sweet blue eyed little boy.
You are 11 months and I am in disbelief.
You can seriously be only 1 month away from being
a whole year old, can you?  Nah...
I'll just live in denial for the next four weeks...

So on to some of the things you are doing:

three teeth have made their presence known and even more
are trying really hard to show off their pearly white appearance.

besides those painful teeth, you are sleeping really well at night.
Most nights you are in bed between 6-7pm, wake up at 5am
to eat and then back to sleep until 7:30-8am.

You usually just take one nap a day

You are still having 4-5 bottles a day and you eat everything I give you.
Seriously don't know how to handle that after having the worst
eater on earth :)  Even as much as you eat, you still only weigh 18lbs with
all your clothes on.

You pull up on anything you can get your hands on and are "cruising" all
over the place.

You are wearing 12 month clothes and size 3 diapers.

Jabbering nonstop.  Bababababababababa.  :)

You waved to daddy when he got home a couple nights ago for the first time.
He really liked that.

Found out you have an asthmatic reaction to most colds like your brother does.
Which means you had your first breathing treatment last week.....and HATED it.

I didn't edit his eyes at all, they are really that pretty!

I love you to the moon and back precious boy!

Love, mommy.

"...you shall teach them diligently to your children..." - Deuteronomy 6:7

Deuteronomy 6:6-9 "And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates."
.

A couple weeks ago was Caedmon's dedication at church.  God chose us to be his parents and this was our promise to Him that we will raise Caedmon to know God.  We will talk about Him and tell Caedmon all about God's promises to us.  And we are so blessed to belong to a church community that love's our children well and also be examples of Christ's love to them.  

....and here come the tears...

ok so then I'll stop typing and just show you pictures from the dedication.

{I tried to upload the video for family who was unable to be there but

it was waaaaaay to long, like was going to take 900+minutes to upload to youtube!  So pictures are all I've got}

5 children were dedicated that day = lotso babies being born in our small church!  There's gotta be something in the water! :)

Tyler's face says it all, "second child and we STILL don't know what we're doing!" ha!

awww sweet Janie!

Caedmon got caught with his eyes open during prayer :)

I'm so happy we found Rockpoint 2 years ago when we moved here.  

We have been BEYOND blessed by the teaching, friendships, community and growth

in our own lives!  I can't say it enough, finding a good church community is 

one of the most important things.  I tell that to everyone who moves someone new.  And it's not enough to just go to church, you have to get involved.  

Find a good church and get plugged in!  Join a small group, help in the nursery,  in our case help with set up or tear down, offer your services, time, strength when there is need. 

You will never regret getting involved in your church.  God will bless you beyond what you

can even imagine.  :)

What's holding you back?