The great pumpkin fail

My mind has been running a thousand and one miles an hour for the past few weeks.  My next post will certainly be written with all my heart but this one has been in the works for weeks so for now, lighthearted fall fun.

Not exactly the fall I had envisioned.  The weather has been cold, bitter even at times.  We've had more rain this fall then I remember getting all summer so with that said we didn't go out and do everything I had wanted but we managed to make the best of what we did and here's just a few of the highlights.

1. Fall leaf hunts.  We did this multiple times but our favorite was when Daddy came and the colors were at there best.  We walked along the skinny deer trails and some of my absolute favorite pictures came out of this "hunt".  We gathered up all kinds of leaves and when we got home Riley sorted first by color then by size.  Great and easy little lesson and one you can only do for a short time here in MN!

2. Trunk or treating.  Church always does the best trunk or treating and this year was especially fun since the times changed a bit so it wasn't in the dark.  Riley wasn't nearly as scared as he was in the dark the last few years and our little Lu even dressed up and came along.  She didn't really understand not eating everything as she got it but eventually we persuaded her to keep moving along.  Our faves include yet again the glow sticks...nothing betta than a glow stick for Moms and kids!  No sugar but all the fun!

3.  The farm.  Oh we love this farm.  It's so serene and peaceful.  The peacocks and a few pigs, goats and chickens just roam around and the pumpkins are always in perfect display patterns with varying colors from orange, white, green and yellow.  We enjoyed the peaceful hay ride and we stalked the peacocks pleading with them to spread their tail feathers.  It didn't happen but we did take two of those pretty feathers home with us!

4.  Trick or treating.  Riley was all ready to go this year.  He was the seasoned pro to Alyssa's fumbling always a few steps behind.  The kids did great and in the 10-15 houses we hit we have more than enough candy to carry us well into 2013!  Eek, 2013!  The weather was mild and we made it home by 7:15 so we could pass out candy too!  It was kind of cute when we decided to dress up Alyssa as a chicken for warmth and debated about having her use her Toto basket.  Riley suggested putting her kitchen eggs in the basket since she was a chicken and we went with it.  Later on FB someone hilariously pointed out whether or not there was a CR shortage on halloween buckets.  Haha, a little redneck trick or treating with a target bag and an Easter style basket! ; )

5.  Snuggles, lots and lots of snuggles since I haven't worked a full week for the past 3 weeks we have been enjoying eachother, a lot!

What happened to my baby boy?  And this was last years school picture!  

Both kids surprised me in bed at 5 a.m. and started fighting about touching eachother, I came back from the bathroom and discovered this.  They decided holding hands would solve the problem.  So much for a california king being big enough for 2 littles and a mama smooshed against the edge!  

It was a great fall but with us being gone for the Light up the Night parade and then missing the Grand Day parade (Anoka is the halloween capitol! ; ) I feel a bit disappointed in our activity check list but we made the best of it and I think our kids will be happy to look back and see a few pictures of 2012.

Life as of late

Life, sweet, exhausting, never a dull moment.  I have so many thoughts swirling around in my brain that I don't really know where to start.

We've been good.  Real good.

We have been celebrating my birthday for a week straight now and tomorrow shall be the culmination into 30.  Oh dear, 30.  I'm not scared or sad, just a little awestruck.  My 20's were pretty magical.  I fell deeply in love with my D, was engaged the night before my 21st, got married at 22, had a baby at 25, another one at 28 and now I look back and just see love.  Tonight I am wearing glasses that only see the good.  The last 10 years have been a whirlwind.  The next 10 will be a whirlwind.

I remember feeling so young when I had Riley like I had no business having a baby let alone walking him out of the hospital and taking him home with me.  That's the amazing thing about children.  They can make you feel impossibly small and huge at any given moment.  It never will be about just me and my wants, it will always be about what is best for our family and this is not only easy to swallow but a pill I have wanted to swallow since I was a young girl.

I have everything I have ever wanted.  My family is close.  My children are loved.  I have a boy and a girl.  One the spitting image of me, the other a spitting image of my husband.  We have jobs, a house, two vehicles and food in the fridge.  I feel so content.

Friday my parents had to put down Tuckie.  He would have been 12 in December and it was alot harder on me than I expected.  My kids loved him and it reminded us of Deuce.  So we spent the evening drinking down marg's at our favorite Mexican joint with my parents and we laughed, ate and were generally merry.  Saturday we started packing things up, organizing, cleaning, purging everything out.  Our house will be up on the market soon and just the thought of leaving this house broke my heart.  I have spent the last 10  years in the house.  Both of our children were brought home to this house.  It's not a huge house but it has huge pieces of our lives and hearts in it.  Maybe it won't sell, maybe it will.  The journey will be interesting but whatever happens, well just happens.  I have zero expectations but you have to start somewhere.

My needs did matter alot this last week.  It was odd and felt a little out of order and selfish but I was able to pretty much do whatever I wanted for the most part.  We jet-setted to Vegas and enjoyed 82 degree weather, quiet hotel quarters, lots of adult conversation over dinners and coffee at whatever hour I wanted.  It was pretty chill.  We partied like we were rockstars, took in a Cirque show (The Reve, WOW),  walked and walked and walked and finally came home to a dreary MN day.  My heart felt right, it felt at peace, our kids, our own little house with all the little quirks you would expect from a 60 year old house were together and it was just right.  I took an extra day off to spend with my little ones and we drank eachother up.  Lyssi didn't stop smiling once all day.  She kept touching my face all gently and repeating, "my mommy, my mommy."  Riley was his usual ball of high energy and he once again beat me in our nightly Sorry game.  I went back to work and my new hours 6 to 2:30 were a breeze added to the fact that 2 day work weeks are a piece of cake.  We pulled the trigger on going out again to celebrate more birthdays coupled with mine Saturday, regrettably dropped off our children again and partied once more like rockstars.  We slept late on Sunday and here I am.  Dreaming about how much fun the next three PTO days will be.  Thinking about what is in hold for me over the next 10 years.

My life is reigning in the wild "all boy" and soaking up the thoughtfulness and gentle touch of our baby girl.  It's a good balance and to look into the future seems futile.  I can't bring myself to imagine Riley or Alyssa any differently than they are today.  I had my selfish week and now I am excited as all get-up about our family together on Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas .  This year is going to be epic.  Thirty makes me feel certifiably adult.  I feel like I am going to take this year by the reigns.  This last week has reminded me how important one on one time with my husband is.  No more, we do absolutely everything, everyday, every weekend with our kids.  We will carve out snippets of time for us.  Adult conversation about unimportant things that make us laugh.

I hope my 30's will be less about comparisons and more about what genuinely and authentically makes me happy.  I hope to be less hard on myself and learn to look past my really negative self-image.  D has pointed out to me how very hard I am on myself and I started noted how many times I criticize the way I look or feel.  It's a bad example for our children and I hope to learn in my 30's that it doesn't really matter.  I hope to take a compliment and not immediately reject it.  I hope to sing at the top of my lungs in church when a song moves me and throw my palms up to the ceiling because up to now, I haven't had the guts.  I hope to be silly and embrace myself at any given moment.  I hope the melasma around my eyes won't make me cringe to the point of avoiding looking in any mirrors all day long.  I hope I take a healthier approach to working out that doesn't include the guilt I throw on myself for missing one day.  I hope to eat the good chocolate when I need it and I vouch to shop for myself once in awhile cause the feel and fit of new jeans is incredible! I hope to pull out my big camera more for the everyday moments.  I hope to pull out the camcorder more so we can remember that Riley can't pronounce certain letters and has the cutest little voice still and that Alyssa is a little dictionary of knowledge pronouncing and speaking full sentences at her tender age.  I want to hug my children everyday and make them look me in the eye when I tell them how much I love them.  I want them to feel my attention and love.  I want to be more vocal with my love for my family.  I want to tell my parents more often how much I love them.  How important they are to me and how very, deeply, grateful I am for everything they do for us.  I want to tell my sister more often how funny she is and how much I miss her when I don't see her for a few days.  I want to tell my brother more often that he is the kindest, most giving and loving person I know.

I have hopes, dreams, visions of what the future might hold.  But mostly, I just want to live everyday as it comes to me.  There will be rough moments and shiny ones.

Cheers to 30.  Cheers to life.  Cheers to it all.  It should be noted that I can't get "Good Life" out of my head.  It really is a good life isn't it!?

Balance

Four weeks out from vacation and things are really starting to fall into place.  Getting up at 4, taking my nap at 1 and picking up the kids at 3:15 have started to become easier and easier.  Getting little chunkets  (made up word!) of sleep is finally working and I have more energy than ever.  A little patience and a lot of stamina go a long way with little ones in the household.

Case in point.  This past Saturday we had to drop Daddy off at work at 10:00 and then we were on our own the rest of the day. Normally this would have been fine but we have seen this man for maybe 30 minutes each day the last few weeks so we were all missing him.

But I digress.

So we dropped him off and hit Caribou because I completely understand and listen to that little voice that says "a vanilla white mocha will make it all roses and gumdrops."  You don't want to tempt that little voice so Caribou it was.  With the liquid strength we proceeded to hit up Jared's for a much needed ring cleaning. We trekked over to Ulta which on an unrelated note Lyssi Lu loved.  She is all girl.  We walked to Pottery Barn cause big girl will need big girl sheets and a bed soon.  Unrelated news...oh my gah, the cuteness in that store makes your ovaries flip.  Luckily each one of my children was firmly holding onto either side of my shirt just close enough to each ovary in turn keeping them in check.  I kinda kid.  No pun intended.  Anyways, Riley really, really, really wanted a lamp for his room.  That whole store and my child was begging for a lamp.  Practical?  Check!  We managed to completely pick out Lyssi's new big girl room and catalogued it for later when Daddy was in tow.  We slid on down to Baby Gap and managed to eat up the next hour very quickly.  Riley asked which size he needed I told him to hunt down 3's and he was off.  He picked out 8 pairs before he came hobbling over to me looking like he was going to fall over from the weight.  We headed over to the changing room and proceeded to try everything on.  Baby Gap is for us notoriously bigger than the listed sizes so and unfortunate side effect is trying everything, everything on.  When Riley stripped down Lyssi wanted to strip down, okay, whatev.  We tried a few pairs on, tried a new dress on for girlfriend and kept moving through the pile.  Someone had pushed the assistance button which worked because we needed a different size in a few pairs anyways.  Nice lady comes to the door, both kids got excited and started squealing with joy a little bit.  Squealing made them realize it echoed and they rightly squealed for the entire rest of our changing room visit.  Now when nice lady came back to the door (and I am pretty sure Alyssa had this planned out the whole time) little lady escaped in nothing but a diaper and sister is fast and was free from any clothes slowing her down so the crazy lady in the tiny changing room with 2 kids squealing for the last 10 minutes has now let one of her children out on the loose, in just a diaper because well, she is crazy and has clearly no control over her kids.  So I finally grab her slippery little self we get everyone dressed again and we make our way over to check out.  Both of our kids like to "pay" by signing their name so more chaos broke out for a short time over who got to "sign" first but I don't even pay "those" people eye contact back.  Clearly no one remembers what it can be like with two younger children who have a zest for life.  It was lunch time and so be it that signing was the most important thing in their little lives for those five minutes.  The moral of the story is that Riley was made for skinny jeans (no, not the ridic skinny kind) and sometimes the circus life is in any given moment is quite funny and calls for a cupcake shop visit pre-lunch.

Nadia cakes?  Cute shop, fun decor, pretty cupcakes.  Way too heavy, too much sugar and just not good.  Womp, womp, womp.

Our last stop was a carwash which the kids had been begging for all day long.  Of course there was a wait but the tri-color foam makes everything worth it so wait we did.  We finally dragged ourselves in the door at 1:45 had PB&J and hit the sack.

I kept thinking how could it only have been 3.5 hours since we dropped Daddy off?  It felt like 8.5!  A lot more work with 2 but the rewards are greater.  We had fun.  We had a big bag of new clothes and even Lyssi scored a few things.  Her big fall/winter shopping trip will come another day.  I can only handle one big score at a time!  : )  We had a fun night, capped off with the bebes going to bed and a workout for me.

This is the perfect time to interject that I have the nicest brother ever.  He got off work ran to the grocery store for me cause after all those errands I forgot milk and the ingredients for the taco dip I promised my husband and he then sat at our house so I could pick up a slightly inebriated D.  It was a trip in pj's, no bra, no makeup and sweaty hair.  I assumed a quick call would get D off the bar stool and into the truck.  Turns out an almost 30 year old, sweaty, tired mama of 2 was the most happenin thing going on in New Brighton that night.  I was there in the truck for over 30 minutes as each person had to tell me how much they either loved me or D.  I had multiple people on my truck.  On the roof or the hood.  I had to spray multiple people with washer fluid numerous times and finally we were able to exit.

I finally flopped in bed around 12:30 set my alarm to 7:30 and slept, soundly and peacefully.

Sunday routine was a nice change of pace after a sporadic summer.  It was good and all kinds of needed.  Sunday School for Riley, nursery for Alyssa, adult bible study for Mommy and a quick pick up for Riley, a quick spy on Lyssi and then church for us.  It was a great sermon and combined with my Jesus Calling devo and I feel balanced, content, happy, secure.

Real quick I want to share with you September 8th from Jesus Calling...this has gotten me through everyday.

"Accept each day exactly as it comes to you, by that I mean not only the circumstances of your day but also the condition of your body.  Your assignment is to trust Me absolutely, resting in My sovereignty and faithfulness.  

On some days your circumstances and physical condition may feel out of balance.  The demands on you seem far greater than your strength.  Days like this present a choice-giving up or relying on Me.  Even if you wrongly chose the first, I will not reject you.  You can turn to Me at any point and I will help you crawl out of the mire of discouragement.  I will infuse my strength into you moment by moment, giving you all you need for this day.  Trust Me."

Powerful.

He is so "a little me", sickness comes fast and easy.  

Church cuties, does she look all grown up or what!?

sick cutie

Alyssa's first ponytail!  Can you see the disgust on her face from me pulling at her hair and then making her sit still for pictures?  Haha, love her!

fall lyssi lu must haves!

Kids bowl free rules, a celebratory hug!  

Ain't she purdy?

Totally random Lu lu shots but her thighs are too cute!

tackle box saturday morning show and tell, these sweet things slay me

keeping it real, tears and a total brain dump

These last few weeks have been hard.  Work has been emotionally and physically draining.  What's that you ask?  What exactly do I have to do going in at such an obscene hour?

Basically I am an air traffic controller for phlebotomists around the cities.  I go in at four and get the routes set for the morning runs.  We outreach to nursing homes and in order to be efficient it is required of us to beat the nursing home staff getting residents up and about so we stalk them early and get most of our work done before they are at breakfast or bingo.  The state requires us to draw blood in a private area and our insurance company requires us to not transport patients so as soon as they have left their room we are at the mercy of the staff to transport them back to their room which is alot easier than it sounds.  Every nursing home we serve has a "lab day" where they try to get the majority of the tests for the patients done that morning.  PT/INR's and fasting labs are always given morning priority and then there is timed draws for medication administration and the obligatory STAT's that come in when the NH staff forgets to put in an order for the morning.  It's dispatching 15-17 phleb's and another 5-6 couriers who deliver medication to hospice patients and pick up samples and making sure everything comes in before it goes "bad".  It's training all the new staff and going out with the current staff to make times faster and help with hard sticks.  It's making sure that everything is tight procedurally speaking and that we are upholding and keeping with the Hippa, CLIA and CAP regulations.  It's researching the numerous problems that come up everyday and catering to the picky customers while listening to them eat our people alive and then giving into their demands.  We have homes everywhere including the notable Buffalo, Waconia, Woodbury, Forest Lake and my personal favorites Anoka and CR.  Most of our staff run 5-9 a.m. so we cram alot into those early hours and hope for the best.  It's alot of knowing who you have on and making everyone happy.  It's starting at 4 and hoping to get a break at 10:30.  Lately we have been running on empty between not having a supervisor present for the last 11 weeks to having a manager "resign" because of budget cuts.  Our team lead was stepped up to interim supervisor and I was stepped up to team lead.  It doesn't mean much except that I appreciate the token and have always cared passionately about the office running smoothly and in turn appreciate that they have noticed.  I don't do anything with half my heart and this office is no exception.  To make the staff happy we granted one too many vacays over the last 3 weeks so our 17 routes has been manned by like 10-11 people.  In layman terms: STRESSFUL.  Add in the nearly everyday sick call and you have yourself a scheduling nightmare, every.single.morning.  Bored yet?  haha, I wish it was boring!

I haven't taken a break in more than 2 weeks.  I run on a Mt. Dew and granola bar everyday.  The upside?  I only have to pack my lunch for Monday and it's still sitting there waiting for me to someday actually eat it.  The downside?  One can only run on a Mt. Dew for so long before the proverbial $h!% hits the fan.

I have a sidekick.  Her name is TJ.  We don't even have to speak, mostly because who wants to speak at 4 a.m. but anyways we work insync without words spoken to get the work done.  We run, we don't walk.  We laugh and pick eachother up.  She has become a dear friend and we may or may not consider ourselves the "A" team.  She has been gone for 10 days and her ying to my yang finally gave way Thursday when I opened my inbox only to discover once again that everyone asks everything of TJ and I and I could simply not do it all on my own.  I cried, big fat alligator tears and I slowed down to a crawl.  I dropped a few unflattering words and when one of my phlebs walked in whining over the fact that she only slept for 4 hours the night before I might have started giggling.  Giggling in a way that only crazy people who never get more than 4-5 hours every.single.night. do.  Eventually I collected myself and by Thursday I finally got a break.  I love it when my co-workers say "just take a break" unfortunately I am not wired like that.  I cannot leave things hanging or people waiting.  I am always striving to do more, work faster, be more efficient and on top of everything.  It's always been like that.  In school I was always the first the one to put their pencils down 10 minutes into a 70 minute exam.  I would rather push through and be done than sit down and have anything staring at me.  I also might have a touch of OCD but nothing has been diagnosed.  : )

This last week or so we have watched both the RNC and some of the DNC...we are equal opportunity in this house ; )  Mostly we watched the DNC just for Michelle Obama.  You can't not like her.  She seems so nice and so perfect.  Futhermore, after hearing Mitt praise his wife for staying home all those years with 5 boys while he was away and then seeing Michelle and how much she does for her own kids I realized that I am a complete and utter failure.

We are so hard on ourselves aren't we?!  I wished and wanted more for my kids in those moments and then I went to work to the next day and just got pounded on again.

It was also a combination of Daddy being gone so much and me being the everything at home.  I done good but I tired.  Nice English eh?  I like rising to the challenge and being successful as the "single" mom but every "super" mom has an event that within seconds can break them.  Mine was, once again, feeling like a failure of a mom.  I served pizza for the second time this week and after an emotional day of dropping Riley off for yet another first day in turn catapulting him toward leaving the house for college I lost mine marbles.  I had a good, old fashioned, soul cleansing, ugly cry.  It was crying over how big my baby is (she is saying new words everyday, today was "jump" and "cup") to crying over how big my other baby is ("mommy I loved everything about today") to missing my husband so much to dreading the weekend because honestly it's way too busy.  It was remembering Aeon and how pitiful my own problems are.  So we put on pj's at 5:24, snuggled up and sat together on couch cushions awaiting Daddy.  I vowed to be a better mommy tomorrow.  I started a checklist in my head of what we needed to do before the snow flies.  I started a list of things we can sign up for this winter to keep us busy and then I lost my marbles again.

We spend so much time pinning and googling new and cool ideas to make us the ideal, picture perfect mom and for what?  Cause all I see when I look at my Pinterest page is a whole bunch of super cool stuff that I have never even come close to attempting.  My husband sighs when I explain and yet he still doesn't understand "pinning" and I gawf at his ignorance.   But tomorrow I promise to be gawf at myself for being as ignorant as thinking pinning will make me a better mom.  I will gawf at thinking signing Riley up for swimming and Awana will make me a better mom.  Once again, tomorrow I will be better...I swear we just can't win.

So I throw up my hands and admit that we eat pizza alot and when I am too lazy to cut up fruit I hand my kids gogo squeezes.  It's how we roll.

As much as I/you can pick apart everything we/others do, deep down we must know we are good mommies who love our children dearly and even in those moments where we just want to scream.  All of this is so much easier said than done but eventually, maybe, someday it will sink in.

If there is one thing that is good about Pinterest it is finding little gems like this...

Love today, put away yesterday and forget about tomorrow.  

(someone remind me about this the next time I have a "the kids are so big, I am a failure" moment.  k-kthanks!)