Hello, March, I'll See You Next Week

Gearing up for a busy week this week.  I'll be working either 4 or 5 ER shifts this week, so the blog may take a backseat for the next few days.  But I'm very thankful for the opportunity to work a bit extra and save a little more for the adoption.  Here's a little glimpse of a couple of things I have been doing:

--I've been plugging right along in my reading the Bible in 90 Days.  I'm about a day and a half behind right now, which is not too shabby if you ask me.  I would like to be reading a bit more "attentively", but I'm doing my best.

--Harper's walking.  Ugh.  How is she big enough to be walking?  Didn't I just bring her home from the hospital?  We finally bought a gate for the bottom of the stairs, Brandon spent the better part of 3 hours installing it, and it lasted for almost 7 days.  That's right:  my children have destroyed the stair gate already.  Harper put the nail in the coffin tonight when she ripped the gate from its' last remaining hinge and threw it on the floor.  Good greif.

--I'm embarrassingly excited that the Olympics is over so I can get back to watching The Office and Law and Order, which have been usurped by curling these last three weeks.  Really, people?  Curling?  How is that even a sport?

--Hot Brandon preached last week and knocked it out of the park, if I do say so myself.  And I say so.  I'm too tired (yes, it's only 8:52 pm) to link to his actual sermon right now, but you can follow the Northside Christian Church link on my sidebar to find it.

Have a great week!

At the Dinner Table

***I wasn't going to post yet until my brother finishes helping me with my blog mini-makeover, but I had to record this conversation before I forgot it.

Mommy: What do you guys want to drink with your pizza? (Don't judge me--we ate Little Ceaser's tonight).
Dane: I want water, with no ice.
Aidan: I want milk, with no ice. Hey, I've never tried milk with ice before.
Dane: Aidan, milk with ice is disgusting. The ice melts and becomes water, and water with milk is disgusting. It tastes like beer.
Aidan: I like beer!
Dane: No, you don't Aidan. It's so gross. It tastes like drain water.

(Sidenote: Brandon and I don't drink beer. We think it tastes gross, and honestly, if we feel like something stronger than diet coke with splenda, it's going to be something sissy like a wine cooler or one of those hard lemonade things. But I don't ever recall comparing the taste of beer to DRAIN WATER. So crack open a cold one and try not to think about the drain water or water-milk.)

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

February has been a big month at our house.

The month when only the children celebrated Valentine's Day.

The month when I watched the Super Bowl and actually cared about the game more than the commercials. (And maybe cried a little for my Peyton.)

And it's also Girl Scout cookie time.

Harper met Thin Mints for the first time yesterday. To be honest, she enjoyed her fair share of Thin Mints last year, albeit more indirectly.

Before the destruction:

I can actually hear the Thin Mint crying a little. As if it knows its' fate.

Do my brothers know about Girl Scout cookies?

No, Harper, they don't make birthday cakes out of Thin Mints.

Anyone have a pressure washer I can borrow?

Oh, waitress! I'm gonna need another cookie over here!

Seriously. Pressure washer? Anyone?

My Thoughts Exactly

Missy hit the nail on the head. Go read it. I have nothing more to add.

My thoughts exactly...

The Latest in Home Fashions

Our ottoman has a new home. It no longer resides in front of the big comfy chair, perfect for propping tired feet upon while their owner watches NCIS.

Thanks to this little troublemaker, it has moved to a much less convenient spot.

About a month ago, when Harper started getting really interested in the stairs, we moved the ottoman in front of them to keep Harper off. (The side railing is rounded, and short of installing a permanent gate, which we still might do, the rounded rail won't hold a baby gate).
Then she started shoving the ottoman out of the way to get to the stairs.

Yes, my 10 month old is strong enough to move furniture.
So we had to rig a folding chair between the front door and the ottoman, wedging it in place.
How proud of herself does she look in this picture?

Please don't ask me why Aidan is wearing a sleeveless shirt smack dab in the middle of the coldest winter ever.

We think the folding chair-ottoman-stair thing is going to catch on. It's a very fancy look. And it gives you a convenient place to prop you feet for all of those times when you find yourself sitting on the stairs. Not to mention, the boys have loved having it there to catch them when they catapult themselves from halfway up.

Unfortunately, Harper has now figured out how to use the folding chair as a ramp to climb to the top of the ottoman and onto the stairs. What am I going to do with this girl??

All That's Missing is a Bedazzler...

Dane and Aidan both have Valentine's Day parties tomorrow at school. Dane came home with an assignment to make a box for cards, with suggestions for decorating the box "with wrapping paper, stickers, or markers". A quick trip to the WalMart later (minus V-Day wrapping paper at $4 a roll. Can anyone say rip off?), all the supplies were assembled for the box.

I put Brandon in charge of the project last week while I was at work one day, ensuring that Dane would have the most pimped out box in Ms. G's class. (Remember the boot?)

Well, the boys did not disappoint.

If Liberace had a Valentine's box, I imagine it would look something like this.

I'm not sure if Star Wars wrapping paper, word bubbles, and feathers were what Ms. G had in mind to celebrate the holiday of Love.

I think I'll get Brandon a Bedazzler for his birthday. That way next year's box can have that extra bit of tacky.

And, of course, after Dane's box was finished, Aidan insisted on one of his own:

Hope your Valentine's Day is filled with foam glitter hearts, R2D2, and multicolored feathers.

Because if it is, that's definitely a story I want to hear about.

Mother of the Year

Last year at the pediatrician's office, Dane failed his vision screening. Hot Brandon hasn't seen the big "E" on the vision chart for several years now, so learning that the child might need glasses was not earth-shattering news to us. We took him into the eye doctor, and he got his first pair of glasses.

But he didn't always like to wear the glasses. We noticed him frequently taking them off and leaving them places, like the floor and the pantry. So we got him one of those "cool-kid" straps to wear around his head, holding his glasses into place.

Then a couple of months ago, Harper broke the frames. The kindergartner-proof frames that were supposed to be indestructible. Snapped them right in two. Thankfully, we discovered that the frames had a warranty, and they were replaced for free. Dane didn't seem to have any trouble seeing to read or watch TV in the week that his glasses were at the Glasses Hospital, and frankly we were beginning to wonder if he even needed them at all.

So when he came home from school not two weeks later with one lens instead of two, we considered just waiting until his next appointment with the eye doctor to get new glasses.

I e-mailed Ms. G, Dane's teacher, and she confirmed that he wasn't squinting, and seemed to have no trouble seeing in the classroom. He was doing fine at home, reading to his brother, playing Leapster, and watching TV without difficulty.

Fast forward a couple more weeks...

Thursday of last week was Dane's "100th day of school", which apparently is celebrated by participating in various 100-themed activities. Including, but not limited to this telling activity:

"If I had $100 I would buy _____"

Yup. Glasses.

Not Wii games. Not Legos, or Star Wars guys, or soccer stuff. Glasses for my poor near-sighted eldest son. Needless to say, they will be going back to the Glasses Hospital on Monday.

Just one more thing to explain to his therapist someday.

DTC!

We are...

Today our dossier is being sent from our adoption agency to China, where it will be "logged in" by the CCAA (please don't ask me what that stands for). Our "log in date" (LID...there's lots of acronyms involved in the adoption process) is the official start time of our wait for a referral for a child to adopt. We have been told that the referral time for the type of child that we have requested is anywhere from "1 to 12 months or longer". So basically, we have no idea.

By the way, this picture looked a lot different in my head.

It didn't look like this

And it really didn't look like this

(Sidenote: Aidan picked this shirt out to wear to school yesterday. It's a Nike underarmor-type shirt that I probably picked up at a garage sale. I told him he looked nice today, and he rubbed his shirt and said, "I look a little bit cool, too." So true, A-man, so true.)

Mom Speak

Over the last several years, I have found myself saying things that I never in a million years dreamed I would ever say. Words that just don't belong in the same sentence together. Things I never thought I would EVER have to say to my kids. Here's a few:

--Get the deoderant out of your mouth. We don't eat deoderant.
--If you just leave it alone, it will go back to its' normal size.
--No, when Harper grows up she is not going to be a boy. Sorry.
--What does your hand smell like?
--Who peed in the trash can?
--Because I'm not the one who peed in the trash can, that's why.
--Did you just eat an ENTIRE cantelope?

--Because people don't eat donuts for dinner.

--Please stop licking your baby sister.
--I don't care if she likes it. Please stop licking her.

What have you said lately?

Not Me Monday!

I'm playing along today with MckMama for some Not Me Monday! fun...

Last Wednesday, I did not let my boys eat peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for dinner while watching a movie, while I watched American Idol downstairs. They were not super excited about their "movie party" on a school night. Not me! I always prepare a healthy, made from scratch dinner consisting of all major food groups which we then eat while all sitting at the dinner table and discussing Jesus.

Last weekend, while Hot Brandon was out of town, I did not hear a weird buzzing sound coming from under his bathroom sink. I did not immediately call the kids into the bathroom, convinced they had broken something. I did not open the cabinet door and convince myself that the weird buzzing sound meant that the pipe was going to burst and flood my entire house and how do I turn the water off, which direction do I turn the little knob, and kids! Get out of the bathroom before we all drown! Now! I did not open the adjoining drawer and discover that one of the boys had turned on Brandon's electric toothbrush and left it to buzz inside the drawer, leading their mother to the brink of insanity. The electric toothbrush that did not come free with purchase of a Touch-n-Brush that Brandon ordered during an episode of insomnia. Nope, not me!

I did not invite Dane and Aidan to have a slumber party in my bed Friday night while Brandon was gone just so I could have someone warm to put my cold feet on. I did not fall asleep before my 4 year old and then proceed to get kicked in the kidneys all night by the kung-fu 6 year old. Not me! We all got a great night's sleep and were well rested the next morning. I did not let the boys have another Movie Party the next day because it was really cold and wet outside and I was too tired from the night of all the kidney kicking to think of something fun and creative to do inside instead. Not me!

So, what did you not do last weekend?