My New Hostage

Last night I found out how I can use Emanuel's obsession with Lightning McQueen to my advantage.

Having 3 kids share a room is very tough at bedtime. They all want to keep playing with each other. No matter how much they bicker and dislike each other during the day, when bedtime comes around they are the best of friends. The shrieks of laughter and the camaraderie would be enduring if it wasn't bedtime. By bedtime, I am ready for some time off. I NEED that time. Therefore, I do not find their sudden best-friendship amusing.

I have tried everything... laying the baby down first, laying the baby down last, keeping Ben up longer. Putting them down separately doesn't work. Unless its been a huge day and they are exhausted, they wait for each other. I can't win! Time outs haven't been working either. While in the time out they are sooo tired and sorry and "we'll go to sleep right away, Mama." As soon as I let them go, it starts up again.

Finally, last night I had a revelation. Emanuel is really the one who causes the most problems. The baby would go to right sleep if the boys would let her, and Ben is usually content to look at a book quietly. But Emanuel is the one who comes up with the irresistible imaginative scenarios that none of them can resist joining. He's also the ones whose toys make the most and loudest sound effects. He is only 3- silence is still a concept being grasped. So I took just Emanuel out of his room to stand in timeout. It really wasn't working- he was trying to turn it into conversation time- when I spotted Lightning McQueen in his hand. McQueen goes everywhere with him. Everywhere. That little die cast car has traveled, let me tell you! It's even been to several different states.

"Emanuel," I said, "bring me McQueen, please."

He makes his way over to me and reluctantly holds out his hand. I take the car, and the tears are instant.

"Oh Mama, I'll be good. I'll go right to sleep. Please, I'll be so sad without McQueen!" His entreaties are slightly pathetic, but I stand strong.

"You will get McQueen back in the morning, if you go straight to sleep and stay in your bed until morning."

He manages to stifle his sobs somewhat and nods his head before heading into bed. A couple of minutes later I checked on him. He was sound asleep!

I hope this tactic continues to work!

It's All About Attitude

“A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.” Hugh Downs
I have been having one of those years. I’ve been having one of those years for years. My whole life has been spent planning what I’ll do when things get better. I have been waiting for the ideal circumstances in order to begin living my life for as long as I can remember. Oh, have I been praying for God to change things! He has finally answered my prayer, but not in the way I thought He would, of course. After many subtle (and some not-so-subtle) hints, I can see that life isn’t ideal. It really won’t ever be ideal. By nature we are sinful and this really puts a damper on living a perfect life. But it’s also what makes great saints- people who take what they are given and do their absolute best with it in less than ideal circumstances. I strongly believe in free will, but I also strongly believe that God always puts people in certain times, places and/or circumstances for a purpose. It’s then up to the person to choose to do what he or she was meant to do.
That is what I plan to do from now on. God has so much He wants me to do now. Not later. Now. Also, lately I have become quite pessimistic, and I fear, somewhat bitter. That’s not who I am. Usually I am the incurable optimist- nothing gets me down! So I have decided to really put my life into God’s hands this time, and leave it there. (I tend to take it back a lot.) I will learn to be content with ALL of my life and circumstances and live each day to the fullest. To the best of my ability I will do God’s will each day, even with the small stuff.

He's Growing Up: A Dialogue

Today I told Ben how cute he is. Because he is. He's got such an adorable round head with beautiful hazel eyes and long, thick black lashes. I gave him a buzz cut on Monday (long story) and it reminds me of his baby days in Florida when he always wore his hair that way. *sigh* Memory lane...
However, memory lane is not the point of this post. After I told Ben how cute he is, this is the conversation that followed.

Ben: Mom, I'm not cute. Don't call me cute.

[Emanuel (wrinkling his nose): He's not cute! I'm cute.]

Me: So what should I call you, Ben? Handsome, like your dad?

Ben: No. I'm not cute, I'm not handsome. I'm just cool. I only want to be cool.

Me: O.K. Ben, you are cool.

Small Successes

1. I exercised today!

2. I fed my kids. Now, I know that children must be fed every day, no matter what. And mine do remind me every 15 minutes or so how hungry they are (I mean geez, 15 minutes is a long time to go without food). Today though, I reallllly didn't feel like doing anything. At all. I would have been completely fine with them just snacking away on string cheese, apples, and crackers. I mean, those are all healthy foods. I could've just thrown in some carrot sticks and called it a square, but I didn't. I fed them Happy Meals from the drive through. Go me! (I know, I know- the self-serve snacks would've been healthier, but that's not the point.)

3. I stayed calm and collected when I found the boys making clay creations on top of their library books.

Some stuff about a TV show and a house

The boys like to watch a T.V. show called, "How Clean is Your House?" Two British ladies go to various very dirty homes and clean them, along with a "cleaning crew" because two people could not clean these alone. These aren't "I-haven't-done-last-night's-dinner-dishes-yet-or-picked-up-the-toys" dirty. These are "unlivable-haven't-been-cleaned-in-years-why-aren't-these-people-very-sick-or-dying" dirty. Cobwebs and evidence of pests are everywhere. Strange things are growing in the fridge. It's really quite gross; like watching a horror movie. You want to turn your eyes away, but you just can't. My 3 year old, perpetually hungry son Emanuel- the one who begs food off complete strangers because he is always starving (humility is a virtue my kids have done a great job of forcing into me)- anyway, always-hungry-Emanuel was eating a snack while watching this show, and he couldn't finish it. He was so grossed out, he set his peanut butter toast down and refused to eat again until dinner time, which was 4 whole hours away. That's a record.
Well, we've been house hunting off and on for the last few months. After several "off" weeks, the last few days have been "on" days. The most recent house that we looked at was a good house, but had been unlived in for a very long time and was DIRTY. I have a feeling it wasn't all that clean even when it was lived in. There were cobwebs, mouse poop, old food splattered around the kitchen ceiling- it was yucky! Ben and Emanuel were walking all around the house, taking it all in, occasionally making comments like, "Wow, this room is dirty too!"
Finally Ben came up to me and said, "Mom, this house is dirty like on that show." No, it really wasn't that dirty, but he wasn't too far off. "I think," he continued, "that we need to call in a cleaning crew to take care of this mess!"
Meanwhile, Emanuel, who has lately been fascinated by the word "poop" and tries to say it as many times a day as he can was dancing around the house chanting, "Mouse poop! MOUSE POOP! I see mouse poop!" to his little heart's content. I do hope he gets over this stage soon.

Our Funny Girl

We think she's going to be a bit of a clown. Little things here and there have been cluing us in...

Fun Times

The Big Slides

I am sure most citizens of my city have fond memories of time spent downtown on these slides with a roll of waxed paper. I do! They're just too fun! (The one on the right is the fastest, btw.)

On Saturday, I took the kids there to play. We had lots of fun, and it was even better since a couple of their aunts and uncle came along to slide, too.

Benedict's Colorado

I thought I'd share some of the pictures Benedict took while we were in Colorado. He fell in love with the place almost instantly, and I am not surprised. He loves rocks and has been talking about "the mountains" since he was a very little guy. His week in the mountains was a dream come true and just as wonderful as he always thought it would be!
The first 7 pictures are of a six mile hike we took along the Cub Lake and Fern Lake trails in Rocky Mountain National Park. He and Em were champs about hiking that far! They were having so much fun I don't think they even noticed the distance. When we returned to our camp site, Tito and I were ready to stop moving, but the boys ran off to keep playing with their friends. I wish I had that much energy!
The final pics are of our fishing adventure at Trout Haven in Estes Park. Fishing is fun when someone else does all the yucky parts for you! This place even cleaned the fish for us, so all we had to do was cook it. The very last picture is Ben sleeping on the drive home. All of them were worn out! It was a great vacation and we are looking forward to returning.

A (theological?) Dialogue

Emanuel: When we get to Grandma's house, I am going to sit on Daniel and stink on him!

Ben: Emanuel, you can't do those kinds of things. It makes Jesus so sad when you stink people.

Emanuel: But God will laugh!