Embracing Life

Yesterday morning, Connor's kindergarten teacher sent out her electronic newsletter. In it, she mentioned that on Tuesday (today) the kids could wear jeans and their favorite sports team shirt. Well we don't watch sports.   In fact, we really don't even pay attention to them. Needless to say, someone had to stop at the store last night after working 10 hours at her job to make sure Connor had a shirt for school.....  But isn't he cute?

When Keith and I got married, we rented a house from my parents. It was where my grandma grew up and was about 100 years old.  We knew we'd be moving in a year or two, so we didn't buy any furniture, just borrowed from family or shopped some resale shops.  Our house was cute, eclectic and fun. When I was 5 months pregnant with Connor, we moved into the house where we now live. As a house-warming gift, we were given a brand new beautiful sectional for our family room, and took to furnishing that living space since that's where the tv was.  Over the years, we re-did the kitchen (cabinets, paint, etc), new living room furniture (to replace the sleeper sofa that didn't match anything), Keith added a second (full) bath off the family room (complete with a stone-tiled shower), and of course, furnished two nurseries, and then (sniff, sniff) big kid rooms....  Our bedroom, however, took a backseat. Two years ago, I had had enough of the mismatched dressers (one from Keith...

We had a green Christmas. There was no snow here in the midwest... until Thursday. The kids had been begging to go outside, but I had to work this morning, so we told them after lunch. They loved it. Keith made a sledding hill and everything. Tonight, at bed time, Connor told me his favorite parts of today were: One, sledding in the sled. Two, drinking hot cocoa, and three, when you lay with me in my bed, Mommy.

I had big plans to post today about Connor's new bed that Daddy built. Unfortunately, those pictures are still at home, on the camera. When we moved into our house, we were on the five year plan: live here until Connor turns 5, then move to a bigger house.  Well life (and recessions) happen, and the move did not occur.  Since we were undecided for awhile, we kept Connor in his extremely slightly outgrown toddler bed.  Keith built Connor a new twin bed to match his dresser over Christmas, and it was ready this past weekend.  Of course, you won't get to see those pictures until someone gets her stuff together and uploads the camera. Instead, you can see the twinkles showing each other some love in Connor's old bed before we took it apart: Don't let them fool you. They are just pretending it's nap time.  They don't nap time.  (Sigh. I miss nap time...) But this picture does make me happy.

This morning on the way to Nana's, I saw a large bird flying above the river. When I realized I was lucky enough to see it was an eagle, I exclaimed: Keira, look! It's an eagle flying above the river! Keira responded with, I see it! Hey let's get our swim things and go swim down there . (We were crossing the bridge.) I mentioned that you really don't swim in that river since it's dirty. She said matter-of-factly, That's right. And there are alligators. And sharks. We can't swim with them. But we can go with the seals because they are so nice and warm.

Keira has a tendency to collect random crap.  Sometimes, it's Little People, sometimes it's scraps of paper. I caught her on Christmas, under Gigi's Christmas tree, hoarding herding sheep. Seriously, this girl cracks me up. I love my boys, but I'm so blessed that God gave me this little girl because she makes me so happy. 

I have a health issue that was discovered last summer.  Apparently stress makes it worse. And with my life, stress is abundant.  I've been on a search to de-stress as much as I can.  Unfortunately the kids keep getting sick, and not one of them believes in sleeping through the night (seriously people - you are 3 and 5!) My husband also suffers from a disease called "as soon as my wife cleans/organizies something, I find a way to dirty/clutter it back up again".  I received a free sample of some face cloths recently, and just tried them over the break. Ponds Evening Soothe  towelettes are simply awesome! They are made with white tea and chamomile flower extract.  I had been using a different cleanser at night, which always left my face dry.  These towelettes are quite moisturizing, and leave my skin feeling soft and smooth.  I swear my skin actually looks brighter!  (And they remove make-up, including mascara, which is a plus.) ...