merry post christmas.

i hope you all had a merry christmas

sweater song

while in attendance at Whitney and Sam's ugly sweater party, a friend asked us if we would like her to take our picture as a family...here are 3 of the 10 pictures that were taken, these are the best ones...

 nice, huh? but i cant complain, as you can see i was participating in the wackiness.

Natalie won the ugliest sweater contest, here she is with her "trophy" a coffee mug that Sam picked out at Goodwill.

Hilary and Laura show off their ugly sweaters, personally, i think Laura's is pretty cute, i would wear that. Hilary worked the hardest on making her ugly sweater, but since there was no second prize, she walked away empty handed  but jingling all the way.

the early birds

early does not begin to describe when my day started, in fact , most days i would consider right now (5:31 am) early.

i woke up at 3. i could hear dominic moving around in his room. he had to go to the bathroom...he had turned on 3 lights.
after being blinded by the light, i went back to bed...and laid there...and laid there.
finally 4am decided to get up, dominic had all the living room lights on and was finishing up The Wonderful Wizard of OZ on his Kindle.

we ate breakfast and decided that there was no time like the present to start lessons for the day, also that there was no sense in changing out of our PJs, it is 4:45am.

with any luck we will be done with school lessons by time everyone else wakes up.

so i guess we are early birds this morning.

O' tannenbaum.

this is what christmas would look like at my house if i had my way

this is the tree this year, the kids decorated it.

my way: a color scheme
Their way : COLORS

my way: a single color of lights
Their way: COLOR

my way: a nice shiny bead garland
Their way: COLOR

you get the idea, its not that i dont like color...its that i like controlled color. and they like COLORS!!!!!!!

side note: i started this blog as a personal life journal that i agreed to share with everyone. i stopped blogging when life wasnt as "pretty" as it had been, im going to try to start blogging again, because even when life isnt pretty, it is a story, and whats a great story without some not so pretty parts.

pajama day

these photos pretty much sum up my afternoon

 now you see him

now you dont, at least that is what he thinks.


Dominic earned a pajama day by getting his sticker card filled, apparently pajama day = crazy good times. when lessons were done a game of solitary balloon baseball was had while i tried to keep the baby's attention away from the balloon, not easy when big brother is leaping around the living room in hot pursuit of said balloon.

my baby viking

When we first started sitting Miles in his high chair and feeding him pureed veggies, i noticed quickly how voracious his appetite was. i was not prepared for the "eating style" that would follow when he started self feeding. a few weeks ago i started giving him canned green beans to feed to himself, he had green beans before but i fed them to him. he showed his true viking nature right off the bat by squealing , grabbing a fistful of food and SHOVING it toward his mouth, allowing green bean shrapnel to fall where it may.
in addition Miles will not tolerate cheerios when the rest of the family is enjoying chicken, or waffles, or chili or anything really, he would love to dive in and feed himself but unfortunately for him i learned my lesson when he crammed a half of a yeast roll in his mouth and therefore couldnt breathe, facilitating the prompt removal of said yeast roll. theres nothing like a wet soggy, chewed up yeast roll to rouse my appetite. my dinner was over at that point as i spent the rest of "dinner time" feeding my baby viking bits of food from my plate, which has become a running theme, he eats at least half of my dinner on any given night. i tell people that this is how i got back into my pre baby jeans.

Dominic's new school adventure

this picture is by now about 3 weeks old but the last month has gone SUPER fast.
this was Dominic's last week at EO Muncie. during his parent teacher conference it became VERY clear to us that despite his teacher's best efforts,  dominic was not doing well in the area of classroom behavior  so after much deliberation we decided that an on line charter school recomended by his former principal would be a good alternative to the traditional class room.

i have to say that in the last 3 weeks i have learned SO much about why Dominic was not doing well in school behavior wise.

i learned that he hates review, he gets it, he wants to move on.
i learned that he gets hungry at about 10 am, lunch isnt until 11:15.
i learned that the reason he refused for three months to willingly make a journal entry is because he is not good at handwriting.

three key things that directly contributed to his less than stellar behavior.

my goal is to teach him to better discipline himself and control his impulses.
become more comfortable asking for help and communicating.
and of course help him become more comfortable with his handwriting, because school is going to be rough if he refuses to do his work due to bad handwriting.

i know that there are those who disagree with our decision to remove him from a traditional class room for a year and who subtly criticize by asking us about his social development but at this time we believe that this is the best option available to maintain a love of learning and avoid ending up with a kid who hates going to school.

three months

yeah? so? its been 3 months since my last blog post, what?!

heres a few of the things i did in my busy life while i was abandoning my blog 

 october-pumpkin patch

 september-John and Rachels engagement pictures and subsequent wedding

 august-cubs game

 september-allowing Kate to start a fire in my fire pit with a propane torch

september-kids playing in diaper boxes.
there was a lot more stuff some serious stuff, some fun stuff, we went through a lot of teething (bummer) and losing of baby teeth (yay) a lot of playing softball, learning to crawl, and pull up on furniture and play patty cake and peek a boo, there was Ken in the hospital for 3 days for exhaustion, then finally there was the announcement that due to the exhaustion he would no longer be able to pastor Kent Baptist Church. so blogging was probably the furthest thing from my mind.

maybe i will blog more often, maybe i wont, we will see.

3 years of first days

second grade

first grade

kindergarten

i LOVE it!

i love that God has allowed me to be a stay at home mom.
i love that my job is to take care of these guys all the time.
i love that i got to walk Dominic to school this morning and then stay there until he went to his class room instead of having to drop him off and head off to work.
 i know that not everyone gets this awesome opportunity. on paper...it doesnt look like its possible budget wise for us, things are tight, but God is good. and i know that when these guys are grown, i will be so, so glad that i bargain/thrift store shopped and ate out less and stretched every dollar for the opportunity to be with them every day.

bedtime, Buddy!

pj's-check
grey elephant toy-check
crinkly block-check
tired baby-check

although it doesnt show in this picture, i guarantee that he was quite tired. i did not put him to bed just so that i could enjoy Pizza Rolls and mens 100M dash finals.  really.

a surprise

this is the special lady that i drove a cumulative 18.5 hours with a 6 year old a 6 month old and no other adults to see.

my mom didnt tell her that i was coming.
 mom told me to that she would be at Grammy's at 6 pm friday night, mom didnt show until 20 after so she missed me surprising Grammy.
she first looked extremely confused, then really really happy. her facial expressions confused the baby and he started crying when she tried to touch him.
he got over that by the next day though and we were able to snap this picture.
there was SO much family there for the party on saturday and i got to see my mom's cousins form  minnesota and wisconsin. i love their northern accents, its the only accent i can copy impeccably.

yep, thats a sin

 this Chic-fil-a thinghas gotten blown so far out of proprotion. sadly, most of the people on the side of "get this guy, he hates gays" have not even read Chic-fil-a's statement of the sanctity of marriage, it seems most folks just heard that the guy hates gays and now refuse to eat his chicken. oh, and want to get as many other people as possible enraged enough to not eat his chicken.

Kids, this isnt post about chicken, its about my personal grief in knowing that a lot of people that i love are on the Jesus hating band wagon. i have heard statements like "i dont want to be part of a religion that doesnt allow you to love who ever you want"

you can love who ever you want!! in fact you SHOULD love everyone, just not in the way that God intended for a man and a woman within the bonds of marriage to love each other.

heres the part where you get to start hating me, hating my Lord and slamming me for my convictions.

it is a sin for two people who are not married to each other to have sexual relations.
man-woman
man-man
woman-woman

if they are not married, to each other,  in the biblical view of marriage then they are sinning.

now, many, many, many of us have committed this sin, i have committed this sin, i have also committed many other sins and so have you, i have gossiped, i have lied, i have been greedy, i have drank alcohol to excess, i have made my self image my idol, i have chased things that i thought would make me more happy, only to find myself less happy. whether or not you believe in God, whether or not you believe that Jesus Christ died to save you from you sins, you have still sinned

but in Christ i am a new creation, i no longer have to be a slave to my sin, i no longer have to join the gossiping crowd (although sometimes i still fall into that, and then i ask forgiveness and repent) i no longer want to drink to excess so that i can forget life for a short time (let me clarify, i like to have a drink or two, drinking is not the sin, drunkeness is the sin).

in posting this blog post, i can think of at the least 5 people who may not wish to speak to me any more, these 5 people are people that i love, people that i have eaten with, people that love my kids.

i cant take any more FB posts about hating people who "hate gays" Jesus doesnt hate gays, he hates sin. ALL SIN. the end

high anxiety

no, not the mel brooks classic.
real high anxiety.
you may have heard about the 2 girls, Lyric cook, age10 and Elizabeth collins age 8, who were abducted from  a small town park/lake area. Those girls lived down the street and around the corner from my mom and dad.
it has caused my anxiety level to go sky high, not just about child abduction, about a lot of other terrible things that COULD happen (but most likely wont)
especially as i prepared on wednesday night to visit my parents.
we could get a flat tire on the side of the highway.
we could get robbed while stopping at a gas station. the car could get stolen with the kids in it. the baby could choke in his sleep. dominic could fall off the swings, hit his head just right and die on impact.

well. you get the picture, im NOT that person, i dont prepare for the worst! i dont think of all the calamities that could befall me and my family.

the only solution is prayer, praying for God to protect us and also prayer that The Enemy will have no foot hold in my mind, he is really, really good at getting in and telling me all of the worst things that could happen. the more time i spend worrying, the less im depending on God, the less faith im having that he will protect me, that he has good plans for me and that he will give me rest.

also, i vow to NOT watch the news or read peoples FB links to news stories that are about crime and the decline of the human condition. the news is like food for my anxieties, was reminded of that last night, it meant tossing and turning all night contemplating how humans could be so disgusting and broken.

but lets conclude this with God is Good and will make all things new in his time. i cant wait

wood floors and the olympics.

busy day yesterday!! my friend Lori and her two teens helped me pull up our old ratty, dirty, juice stained, cat hair ridden carpet. this is what had been covered up for the last 25 years or so.

we pulled out carpet, padding, staples and tack strips from 9am until 6pm, swept up, dust mopped, and applied orange cleaner.

i wont go into the details of the dirt, dust and allergens we discovered under the carpet, suffice to say, i will not be someone who advocates carpeting anything, i would say for the rest of my life, but ...ya never know what the future will bring.

the less one makes declarative statements, the less one looks like a fool in the long run.

also big news. Ken bought me a digital antenna to hook up to my vintage 1990's tv so that i can watch the olympics and the world series.....i never knew i was a sports fan.

whatcha doin?

oh, not much just making pulled chicken and watching my sweet baby boy try to get his legs up underneath himself so he can learn to crawl.

she's alive (sub title, a few things i thought about while looking at pinterest)

quilts- i like them, but i know i dont have the patience to make a big nice on like the ones i see one pinterest with nice herring bone patchwork patterns and if i did make one, i would keep it all to myself and not let anyone else, especially not the cat, use it.  since it isnt Christlike to be that selfish, i think i will just save myself the whole forgiveness and repentance thing and not make a quilt.

fonts-im a font geek...there i said it, are you happy now?

home organization- i love the idea of home organization, i impliment and idea here and there but lets face it, that looks like a lot of work, i would rather just search all around the kitchen for the scissors, open the junk drawer only to have it explode its contents all over the floor and then end up using a knife to cut whatever it was that i needed the scissors for because the scissors never surfaced.

knee length skirts- they work on everyone. look classy and protect your modesty at the same time!

back yard bowling alley- do i even have to comment on why this would be awesome?

Chic fil a- yes i pinned a recipe of how to make chic fil a chicky nuggets, theyre Dominic's favorite fast food nuggets, he loves going to Clarksville to the dentist because we get to stop at Chic Fil A.

hula hoop tent- now heres one i might actually do!! i have a hula hoop and i have a lightly used king size sheet, i may do this today...seriously.

on another note, im hoping to pick up a more regular blogging schedule when school starts the baby will sleep and i can get some blogging time in...heres hoping.

change the world tour

These are our friends in AllBecameNew

let me tell you about these guys.
theyre pretty rad.
they are a hard core punk/metal band.
they love Jesus.
they love Jesus so much that they live it.

Right now they are on tour, they all quit their regular jobs as carpenters, roofers, cooks, employees at the video store, Etc. and took off in a van to go as far as the Dakotas (that is about a 2 day drive from here) to play shows and infiltrate the bars and punk rock shows for the glory of God. theyre eating with the sinners and the tax collectors.

they all have comfortable beds here at home, some have wives, at home they eat well.
on tour, they have no steady income, they crash on couches or in the van, they probably eat a lot of Taco Bell, if i had to guess i would say they probably have friendly competition on whose gas is the most eye-wateringly smelly.

I personally know 2 members of this band, we support them financially as well as  with our prayers.


 they remind me of the early church, people who will drop anything and everything when the opportunity to serve God and spread the Gospel arises, who will give all they have for His glory.
yesterday they showed Gospel centered love to a group of homeless, last week they helped a fellow rocker to come to know Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior.

im not saying this because i want you to think Sam and Danny and the rest of the guys are super cool (although i think they are), im telling you because it is encouraging to me, to see that in this pseudo-christian society, there are people who will do whatever they have to to further the Kingdom of The One True God.
it is encouraging to see people loving other people, people who are lost, people who are hopeless, people who know pain and suffering, people that a lot of  "church people" wont go near.

you can find All Became New on Facebook if you want to see what theyre up to day by day.
i would encourage you to pray for them.

you can also support them by buying their album from ITunes.

free fun!

what you need:

a water bottle with the bottom cut off

a piece of a terry cloth rag

a rubber band

dish soap

water

a stick

attatch the rag to the bottom of the bottle with the rubber band

 dip the bottle in the dish soap solution

 blow the bubbles

hit the bubbles with a stick

repeat

whats in a name? (fat baby in a little diaper, part 2)

we call him Pudge, Paunch, Chancho, Chubaroo, Chunk, Butterball Turkey, This Little Piggy, Ham Thighs, Big Boy, Strong Boy, Biggie Smalls, and any number of spur of the moment pet names that convey his growing girth.

the point im trying to make is this a big boy!
 he is 4 and a half months old, he weighs 18 lbs, he is 27 inches tall!

he has grown out of size 2 diapers and is on to size 3, he has grown out of many of his size 6 month summer clothes.

looking back at Dominic's charts he was this size at 9 months!!

let me just say, i did not expect this, i thought he would be about the same size as Dominic. boy was i wrong.

but who doesnt love a roly poly baby? i know i love him.

first flight and free advertisment for Heitz Sign Company

our visit to the Outer Banks, NC  could not have passed without a visit to a historic site, because i love history.

 this visit to NC allowed us an opportunity to visit a historic site that was not located in the midwest. Kittyhawk. go visit the web site for more picture of the actual location. these are my family photos of the trip.

 i could not pass up this opportunity to show off my little "genius".
this is at the top of the hill that the memorial sits on...quite a walk, i must say, especially when carrying my 18 LB butterball in the Moby.

 Dominic stands here  reading the marker in the spot where the first flight commenced.

 ya like his choice of wardrobe? swimming trunks, sandals,  a fedora and free Heitz Sign Company tee shirt. we joke in our family that we have a contract with Mr. Patrick Heitz, owner and my former boss,  that if we go out as a family at least one person in the group must wear a Heitz Sign Company tee shirt. so far Miles is the only one who does not have one. what!? theyre comfortable...and they were free.

clean and dry

the heating element went out on our dryer (again) so while we are waiting for the part to come in alternate drying methods are necessary. monday i hung out clothes, but yesterday there was a chance of rain so i took one load to the laundromat.

 dominic found ways to entertain himself.
"we are at a drive in movie"

 "the name of the movie is 'Spin'" he told me

and now more pictures of my baby

 one of my favorite things about his personality is how much he LOVES the bath.
look at those chubby baby legs!!

i know this one is a little out of foucs, but i couldnt resist this adorable little face.

growing!

as in growing my hair back. so here a few pictures of my hair, pay no attention to whats happening in the picture...just focus on me, on my hair.

ready?

this is a few weeks ago, with my hair just entering the ackward stage. fortunately, i have my friend whitney, who is a wonderful stylist and loves cutting curly hair, on my side.

this is about where i had been keeping it lengthwise, for about the last 2 years, sadly, this head band died and went to headband heaven, i still miss it. it was the best headband ever.
this one was taken about 4 months before they stopped making my favorite hair product, prompting me to start cutting (sure showed them, didnt i?).

in my plan, by this time next year, i should be well on my way to this length again.

but its so hard NOT to cut!!!!!

patience is a virtue, right?

i mean...seriously

is there a more beautiful baby anywhere?

my goals

theyre not lofty goals, but they are a start.

every day i pick one thing to accomplish. thats it, just one thing.

the fact that i havent done a good clean, cleaning on the house in about a year (ever since the morning sickness started) was really bumming me out and i was so overwhelmed that i didnt know where to start.

so this week i have picked just one easy task per day and done it

Monday: sort through and pack up out grown baby clothes

Tuesday: vacuum all of the cob webs out of the corners (i didnt make it to my bedroom, the baby woke up)

Wednesday: dust the book shelves (which included taking all books off. i left Kens book shelf alone), piano, entertainment center and all picture frames on the walls.

today: clean out the refrigerator.

tomorrow: clean, dust, vacuum, behind and under all of my bedroom furniture.

it may be slow going but it will eventually get done. and i wont feel like i sat on mu bum all day and done nothing.

Fat baby in a little diaper

singing this classic to my sweet baby as i try to squeeze the last of the size 1 diapers around his pudgy belly.

for the record, although the diaper will not split up the back like david spade's jacket did....the front, back and sides of the baby's shirt and pants will be soaked through about 3 minutes after putting the too small diaper on him. just make life easier for all by putting that size 2 on him and giving the handful of 1's to a friend who can use them, because NO parent will turn down free diapers, even if theyre out of the package and slightly banged up from traveling around in your purse.

out in the backyard

this is what we like to do on Dad's day off.

our spring break so far

Monday: cleaned a little, hung out clothes, lunch at wendys, playDoh, picked up our family fun quest scavenger hunt booklet which D and i looked through and wrote in all the answers we knew. made home made personal pizzas.

Tuesday: Ken and i surprised D with a trip to the newport aquarium, near cincinatti.

we treated this day like a real vacation, it may be the only one ken gets this year. since he used up all his vacation days when Miles was born.
we let Dominic pick out something from the gift shop, he chose a stuffed otter, so that his stuffed beaver toy will have a friend he said.

lunch was excellent, an irish pub, i had fish and chips and a pint of Killians. it was quite good.

then we went to coldstone creamery, yay! cheese cake ice cream with strawberries and blueberries.

wednesday: D had a dentist appt (boo)

but after that we took advantage of the "free adult with paid child" offer at the lanier mansion behind the scenes tour.

Today: sand art at the hanover branch of the library. then later in the afternoon, walking tour of madison, the most interesting part being the tour of the old jail, circa 1870, let me just say that if jail was like that, people would try harder to stay out of it...the toilet was a stone block with a hole in it, um...eww. the cells were solid limestone with no windows, and would have been pitch black if the solid metal door was closed.

so thats our week so far.

some things (8 to be exact)

1. a picture of my baby. to placate all the grandmas, especially the ones who say "i havent seen a new picture of Miles in a week"

2.i just gave in to the peer pressure and started watching Downton Abbey, for 5 minutes until Miles needed attention and i missed 10 minutes before turning it off to be resumed at a later naptime.

3. my dryer has a terrible squeak, its like banshees living in my laundry room....it makes me not want to dry clothes.

4. our Sonic is closed for "remodeling" its been a really long time and i never see anyone working on it, i hope its not closed forever. i would consider moving to a place that had a Sonic.

5. im loving the new sale calendar they have at JC Penneys, the first and third friday of the month they put out all the lowest priced clearance items... boys jeans, 2 bucks!!

6. im hoping that Dominic is over The Pirates Who Dont Do Anything movie, he has watched it every day for the last week...its getting a little old.

7. im considering having a garage sale this spring. i have never had one before i normally just give my stuff away.

8. im trying to give up soda...its not going so well. i love Dr. Pepper.

so exciting...

an exciting trip indeed (insert subtle sarcasm here)

i took my unhappy baby
put on my rain boots
and went to drop off a card and a picture of Miles bound for Texas.

the most exciting part of this trip was the boots, this was the first time i had worn them since getting them for christmas (i bought them for myself).

they look ridiculous with stretchy pants, finally im able to pair them with skinny jeans to which Dominic says "your boots look pretty on you, mommy!"