Vacation Without Kids

I have to take a minute to say there is no underestimating the value of a little vacation without the kids. Or atleast without most of them. ;) We had a great time in Vacationland with only one baby. I have always tried to slip away by myself for an hour or two on a Saturday but I have noticed that when I come back, it doesn't take long (about ten minutes) before I'm angry mommy again. Now that I had a week with my husband, without three of the girls, I can honestly say I did not become angry mommy again until Saturday night. That meant a week vacation equaled about two weeks of niceness from me. Hmm, perhaps I should work on making that last longer. Or perhaps I should take more vacations.

Cousin visit!

For the last few days, I have had little Blossom, Buttercup and Bubbles at MY house! We are loving being knee deep in little girls. They have been so funny and cute. On Friday morning, I took the cuties to my scrapbook group where one of the moms shared her stickers. Two of the girls came up to me with stickers all over their faces and asked, "Do you know us, Aunt Maren??" I pretended to think about it while they giggled, supposedly incognito behind Christmas stickers. Finally I identified them and they ran off laughing at the good joke. On Saturday, after their baths, we were dressing them when the littlest started yelling, "I know a dance!" So I said, "What dance?" She and her sisters yelled in unison, "THE BUM-BUM DANCE!" Then they proceeded to dance all over the living room doing the funniest dance moves. We were all laughing hysterically. The next night, we were trying to talk them into jammies when the middle girl escaped. It was so hilarious watching my girls trying to wrestle this little 4 year old into footed jammies. These people are better than television:) And thank you to my dear sister for trusting me with her little chicks while she is off galavanting....(actually at a wedding, but if you don't have 3 of your little kids with you, can't it be a little like galavanting?)

Update

It has been a while since I've written, and I'm hopefully turning over a new leaf. Although I will confess that the garbage is full of them! Since I last wrote, Timothy finally has his leg braces. It was a huge sigh of relief for me and I'm so happy to finally have them. How satisfying it was to velcro those straps to his little legs and how glad I was to be shopping for shoes to fit them. It was  a proud moment putting him on the bus to school with DAFOs (Dynamic Ankle Foot Orthosis) on his floppy little feet. He seems happy too, and was cheerfully licking the new plastic contraption.

I have a long list of big jobs to do...projects I don't want to start, and people I don't want to call, but it sure was nice to cross this big one off of my list. And, it made me feel like a good mom. The kind of mom who makes sure her babies are loved and well taken care of. The kind of mom who can get things done, and make things happen. Do I dare say...a MOTY (Mother Of The Year) mom?? Maybe not this year, but in my heart, I felt it, and my eyes welled when I saw the little boy staggering up to the front door wearing his DAFOs and smiling at me.  I felt like a good mom.

I have always believed that it is good for kids to believe in Santa. It plants the seeds of faith, it's like a little practice for later, deeper, real faith. Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but that's what I think.
Anyway, the other day Buttercup and I were talking about what she wants Santa to bring her for Christmas. I was saying, tell mommy what you want Santa to bring you. She thought about it for awhile and she said, Do I have to tell you so you can pray to Santa to bring it?
(ummm, long pause.)
Then I just blew the whole thing and said, We pray to Heavenly Father honey, Santa is just for fun. Oh well.

Okay, apparently the real price of friendship was never blogging again. That advent calendar, while beautiful and fun, is a time sucker! In my spare time when I used to blog I am sewing little pockets like crazy. That is if little Gem is asleep and not crying to be held. ahem. Yes, I do know that December has already begun and I have also realized that we are going to be out of town for bro-in-law's wedding for about a week, so an advent calendar might not be the greatest project for this year. But at this point, I just want to finish it before Christmas Day, so I can hang it on the wall and admire my handiwork. We'll get to it's actual function another year. :)

Speaking of bro-in-law's wedding, I can't believe how crazy it feels to plan a trip right before Christmas. We won't get back until Christmas Eve, so we have to have everything done by next week. The Professor is swamped and panicked at work, and I am swamped and panicked at home! That is not to say that I am not enjoying the Christmas Season. I love it. I'm bleeding money, I'm speeding recklessly toward Christmas without brakes or steering, a kid under each arm and strapped to each leg, but by golly I've got my Santa hat on and a smile on my face!

The Price of Making Friends

I am always thinking in terms of what things cost- sorry but true. So yesterday at church they were having a little get-together to make Advent Calendars. I wasn't sure if I was going to go or not but decided that since I'm trying to make friends in this new city where we live I'd better give it a try.
Of course there was a list of materials I needed to get if I was going to make the calendar so I headed off to the trusty Wal-mart an hour and a half before I was supposed to be there. Should be enough time right? Well, trusty Wal-mart was untrustworthy and they did not have the things I needed. Rats. (Not to mention that when I got there I realized that Gem was buckled into her carseat but her carseat was not buckled into the van. EEK!)
I fixed that and then I had to go across town to Jo-Anns, stopping for gas on the way. I calculated that by the time I got to Jo-Anns I would have five minutes to get the kidlets out of the van and into the store, ten to look for the stuff, and five to get back out of the store and into the van-leaving time to get to the church in a punctual fashion.
When we got to store #2 we were hurrying across the parking lot- trying to get into the store in the allotted five minutes but poor Buttercup could not go as fast as I was trying to make her go and she fell down. Of course she was wearing a dress so her knee was really really skinned up. I packed her into the cart with her sisters, amidst her tears and headed for the store restroom. Washed the knee, wiped the tears, checked the watch- now I had 5 minutes to find the stuff and 5 to get back to the van and on the road. Maybe I sound heartless for not giving up at this point, but I was on a mission to make friends (and an advent calendar).

Well, as you can imagine that was basically impossible, but we did make it to the class, only about 15 minutes late. (I even found a band-aid in the van and fixed up the knee.) Buttercup was very subdued, Gem screamed her head off, and Bubbles was trying to hold my hand while I was cutting fabric with the scissors I had to borrow because I forgot mine in my mad rush to have a social life.
The price of making friends? A tank of gas, a bloody knee, the guilt of being the inadvertant cause of the bloody knee, and an all around stressful morning.

The best part of the day? One of the women called me later just to chat about making the tree. Sounds downright friendly doesn't it? :) :) :)

Kitchen Painting

Now that I finally finished the curtains, I moved onto the next step- painting. I sure like painting a lot more than I like sewing!
Special thanks to the Professor who took care of Gem all day while I worked on this. She has been non-stop crying but that is a whole different story. . . . .