Blank Day

Today is one of those "blank" days. You know, where you look on your calendar for the day and see nothing...it's blank. And it just feels so ... good.

One thing about being a mom and staying at home with my kids, is that there are a lot of "appointments" and errands to run. And truth be told, I do have errands to run, but I don't have to do them today.

Today, I could do nothing, or anything, or everything. But I decide. It's 10am, and I decide what I'll do today. Oh how I love that feeling. The world is my oyster, so to speak.

What would you do with a "free" day?

I have a list a mile long of things I'd love to do.

I'd love to bake some fresh bread. The smell of baked bread is so intoxicating.

Going outside sounds wonderful. Especially in the morning when the air still smells cool and dewy. Sitting on the deck with a cup of tea, watching my babies play. Now that's the life.

Cleaning up my kitchen until it sparkled would be great. I love the look of a freshly cleaned kitchen, waiting for its cook.

Or that great feeling of "cleanliness" you get after sweeping and mopping your floor. Smelling the orange citrus of my mop, and see the floor shine as it gets wet. Yeah, that's nice too.

Reading an inspirational book would be great. Not silly drama, but something that really stirs the soul.

I'm trying to embrace the concept of "Never complaining about anything - not even the weather". For those of you who haven't read "Calm my Anxious Heart", I'd highly recommend it. And man, is this hard. Everyone complains about the weather! When it rains, we wish sun. When it's hot, we wish for cold. When cold, we want hot. The weather can just not win.

I read something yesterday that really stuck with me, in a sad way. It was from a stay at home mom who was debating over whether to go back to work (where she said she felt appreciated) or stay at home (where she felt purposeless).

I've got no comment on the work/no work stuff - but purposeless? That's sad to read. Because it can have such a great purpose. Caring for children, instilling values, teaching life's lessons, showing them God and His love, creating an inviting home - all these things seem to have no value in our culture. If you don't get paid to do it, it is deemed worthless, purposeless.

There are purposeful jobs out there, but they aren't all that way. Just because someone tells me "good job" and I finish X, Y, Z project doesn't mean there was a purpose (other than to make the CEO and company more money). At the end of my life, when I looked back, what are the things that mattered? I'm thinking my job wouldn't have been one of them.

That's not to say you can't have purpose at your job, or that working is bad or whatever. I just wouldn't devalue staying at home while looking at the other side saying the grass is greener.

I grew up a day care kid, then a latch key kid - it was hard. It wasn't horrible, and I didn't turn out bad, but it was hard. I'd like to try it differently with my kids, that's all. And I'd like to think that my life is purposeful, even if no one hands me a check at the end of the day.

So on that note, I'm going to enjoy the fact that I'm not in the rat race today. There is no rushing around getting kids ready, no annoying coworkers, no sitting cooped up in my office wishing I was outside - just me, the kids, and the day to enjoy. So yeah the pay is horrible, the hours suck, but the perks - oh man, the perks make it so worth it.

Derby Day

I happened to be in Kentucky during the Kentucky Derby. It's hilarious that my family has lived in KY so long, yet never been to a derby. We always just watch it on TV - better view.

This year was no different. Locally, they show all the races before - not just the Derby like they do here. So we got the morning paper and made our selections on who we thought would Win, Place, or Show. I'm the kind of girl who picks a horse by it's name, my Mom looks at odds, jockeys, and then the actual horse when they do the walk down to the gates, my Dad is a bit of both.

My Dad is gifted at picking horses, he won most of the ones he picked - it was crazy! Of course, he "Bet it all" on the Derby horse and lost! Hahaha. My mom did pretty well and came out on top in the end. And my pick em by name approach actually had me winning something most of the time.

While we were watching we started getting jealous that we didn't have our own crazy Derby hats (for those that never watch, it's quite the thing to go to the Derby in some huge, stylish hat), so we made our own.

I think ours were just as elegant as the celebs. HA!

Small World

Today was Hayden's first appointment with the school district to see if he qualifies for their free preschool when he turns 3. I was a bit nervous about the whole thing and not really sure what to expect.

I walked in, and who did I see? My neighbor!! I knew she worked at the school, but I had no idea what she did exactly. She was the one who watched Hayden while he played. It was so awesome to see her there and it put me at ease immediately.

They had an enormous playroom with just about any toy you could imagine. Cars, trucks, planes, helicopters, imaginary play centers (grocery store, etc), sensory toys, doll houses, you name it. Obviously, Hayden went wild! He loved it. In fact, I had to drag him out kicking and screaming "No Go!"

They joked that all the 2-3 year olds leave that way. HA! They said it gets better when they are 4-5.

This meeting was mostly informational. His actual evaluation is not until October!! And then there will be another meeting with speech therapists, evaluators, and the school district to vote on whether he qualifies. I have a feeling that by October, he will have mostly caught up and therefore not qualify. But we'll see. It was nice to see how great they are with the kids, and any fears or apprehension I had about the program was put to rest.

If he qualifies, that would be great. But if not, that's good to, because it means he's no longer delayed!!

Toddler Activity

Hours of fun for any toddler who loves trains...

I drew a railroad with chalk on our porch, gave Hayden a train and let his imagination come alive.

Super Woman No Longer

I've come to realize, I'm no longer a super woman. What do I mean by that? I can no longer go for a run, clean up the house, take a shower, fix my hair, make a delicious breakfast, and dress to the 9s all by 8am. Heck, I can't even write a blog post in one sitting. HA!

I am a super woman no longer, and that's ok.

It's quite a process these days, just to go in the backyard. Both kids need diaper changes first thing in the morning. Hayden gets his 2 bananas and milk, Corbin a bottle.

Hayden wanders by again and I can smell that it's time for another diaper change.

Kids need new clothes for the day. I wrestle with both to accomplish that.

Hayden decides to spread his legos all over the living room floor. Of course these need to be cleaned up (by him) before he can go play outside. I know he'd rather be outside than in, but somehow cleaning up legos takes him 30 minutes and me saying "Clean up your legos and we can go outside" about 100 times.

During all this, I realize that I'll need a cup of coffee to survive this day (which started earlier than usual with the pitter patter of Hayden's little feet and sweet giggles after he'd climbed over his baby gate to come wake up Momma). While Hayden is dragging his feet on cleanup I sneak in a quick cup of coffee. Okay, well half a cup. It gets cold before I get to the last half.

By 10:30 I finally get both kids outside to enjoy the last bits of the cooler morning. Luckily, this week it is slow to get hot and we had plenty of time. Come July, this routine will not work, as it will probably be 90 before I get us all outside.

Sometimes I wonder what the point of all this is. But somehow it feels right. And maybe life is just in the doing. Loving, Helping, Creating, Caring. I think that might be worth more than all the Mt Everest climbs, or worldly success. Something deep down inside me quietly says, yes, it is.

I know that Mark and I decided to have children. But God gave them to us. As many find out, just because you want children, doesn't always mean you get them. And if you are given the blessing, you (I) should never forget what a precious gift the really are. And we are really just caretakers of God's children for a short time.

So let's go enjoy that time.

Hayden at the moment is sitting at his picnic table drumming his fingers waiting for a "snack". I have a sneaking suspicion that he doesn't know what a snack is, as every time I bring him something (apple, pretzels) he smiles and then says "Snack?"

A....mazing

The new developments with the kiddos?

Corbin is army crawling (i.e. crawling with his arms/elbows and pushing forward with his feet.) He's now mobile!!! And everywhere. He started this about 2 weeks ago at my parents house.

Hayden is now saying 2 word phrases - which is a big milestone we've been waiting for. He even said a 5 word phrase, although mentally it was really 3.

We were pulling out of the garage and he said:

"Bye bye kitties, gotta go." (My parents have cats that live outside but stay in the garage at night.)

Bye-bye and "gotta go" are single words to Hayden, so that's why I call it a 3 word phrase.

So he is regularly saying phrases like:

"Bye bye" person's name
"More" *word
"Drop" *word
"Fall" *word
"Please" *word

The boys are even playing together. Hayden likes to lead Corbin around by dangling a desirable item in front of him and continuously moving it. This way he can get Corbin to go anywhere he wants. Occasionally, I even find both boys playing "cars" or "trains" together. Of course, this is assuming Corbin doesn't touch anything Hayden deems as "his".

It's now starting to hit me that I have two children...haha.

Empty House...Empty Fridge

Despite giving my hubby the bulk of the grocery money over the last few weeks, we came home to a house devoid of food. We did have a few "necessities" I had requested he buy in advance, but nothing much else. The only dinner I could think to throw together was chicken fajitas, rice, and a can of beans I refried.

We had the makings of spaghetti, but not enough noodles and no side or salad.

We had frozen chicken breasts, but no veggies or yummy items to cook it with.

We had milk but no cereal.

And thanks to Amanda's wonderful post on homemade popcorn, we had popcorn.

I made steel cut oats with yogurt, honey, sliced peaches (canned) and nuts for breakfast. It was the only thing we had. It was yummy though. I think I'll eat that this week for breakfast.

Lunch today (before I went shopping) was PB&J sandwich for me, and leftover spaghetti for Mark and Hayden. Apparently, Mark decided to just make a HUGE pot of spaghetti and eat that for a week.

Which made me laugh when he told me because I had planned on making spaghetti tonight for dinner. HA!

So I decided instead to run to HEB (in the rain) to grab some groceries for the week. This week's total: 54.74!! Mark spent around $19 bucks for milk, yogurt, baby food and some other items before we got back.

What's for dinner?

Saturday: Easy Chicken Bake (a new recipe)
Sunday: Whole Roasted Chicken with mash potatoes
Monday: Beans & Rice (and leftover chicken)
Tuesday: Stovies
Wednesday: Left overs
Thursday: Chicken Enchiladas
Friday: BBQ Chicken, green pepper, and artichoke pizza
Saturday: Cook's day off!! Eat out.

Hayden also has a new love of apples. I just have to bite a piece of to get him started and he'll eat the whole apple without cutting it. So I got a bag of organic apples - they were only 2.99 which is not bad at all.

When I picked up Mark's prescription, the cash register spit out a coupon for a FREE bottle of Perrier water!

I think I'll do my homemade mac n cheese this week for some lunches. I'm started to prefer it over store bought. It just has so much more flavor!! I debated whether to buy whole grain pasta this time, but I decided not to - I thought it might turn Hayden off!

And man are sodas getting expensive. $4 for Diet Rite???!! I decided to go with the cheap HEB soda for $2.50.

Other prices that are insane right now - milk! Organic (and the central market version, not the more expensive brand) was $5.39 I think. What??!!! Makes a girl want to go buy a dairy cow, but I have a feeling my neighbors might have objections to that.

It feels good to open the fridge and pantry and actually see FOOD in there and not just empty shelves staring back at me. I tried to use up all our food before we left so it wouldn't go bad, but I think I should have left a "stocking" grocery list for Mark before we got back. HA!

Oh well.

I am glad to be back home and doing my own cooking. I really am getting anal about cooking and choosing my meals, and I didn't necessarily like having someone decide what I ate every night. Nice thing about being the cook, is that YOU decide what to make every day. I basically cook all MY favorite meals (that everyone else happens to like as well) and enjoy each meal!

Oh and my kitchen is 99.999% done. Right now I'm cooking dinner and enjoying having my laptop in my kitchen!