I'm definitely up to something...at 15 months!

I know this smile convinces you all that this precious boy NEVER gets into trouble.....ha ha..:)

He has since figured out how to open the bottom oven door, pull the cap off of markers, play in the toliet, pull ALL of the magnets off of the frig., bite my shoulder when he is excited, and throw objects at great distances!

BUT...he is also the sweetest little boy I have ever known! He is content, happy, smiley, and the truest delight of my heart!

(who still has hardly any hair....)

Other milestones:

*Standing by himself for about 5-10 seconds

*Learning to communicate without grunting like an ape (this can go quickly as far as I'm concerned!)

*Words: ball, Liza, cracker, hot (he says this to every food item!), papa, mama, dada, pretty, uh-oh, mehmo(Elmo), hoobadegobbschme (subject to interpretation!), up, socks, bye-bye, car

*Recognize body parts such as eyes, nose, feet, and teeth

*Walking while holding on to only one of our hands

*Blowing kisses, waving, playing peek-a-boo, and so big

*Eats mostly table food (baby food is SO yesterday)

*Climbing stairs

Love Languages

I am finally getting around to posting about our Valentine's Day!

For a few weeks before the grand event I was trying to decide what exactly I wanted to do to lavish love on my family. I love giving gifts but I didn't want the sole focus of the holiday to be about the gifts. In past years we have written notes to each other on the days leading up to Feb. 14th. So, I had these 2 ideas in mind but it just didn't seem complete. As I began to get frustrated, the Lord gave me an idea to focus on! He told me to do the 5 love languages. Hmmm...Valentine's Day is about love..duh....do the 5 love languages!

For those of you not familiar with them, here they are:

1. Quality Time

2. Acts of Service

3. Words of Affirmation

4. Physical Touch

5. Giving Gifts.

I believe Gary Chapman was the originator of this idea and it is said that each person has one of these languages that is the primary way they receive and give love. The way you give love, such as giving gifts, could be different than the way you like to receive it, such as quality time. You could even have 2 primary ones that make up who you are. I think all of us like some form of these 5 in some way or another but usually 1 sticks out more.

If you want to know more, read Gary Chapman's book "The 5 Love Languages"!

So, the first thing we did was the gift giving love language. I bought each one of my kids, and Shawn:) a Valentine's gift bag. Each morning, they woke up to a small little gift in their bag. Some fun things I put in there were chapstick, candy, books, matchbox cars (for Caleb!), and notepads. They loved it! I woke up every morning to "Mommy, can we look in our bags?!". It was great fun!

Words of Affirmation: I had lots of leftover Valentine cards from previous years so I put them all in a basket and encouraged everyone to write a note to someone else in the family. I found these cute little boxes at the dollar store that we put the cards in when they were done. We kept it very simple by just writing one word on the card to describe the person we love. Adrianna really got into it and did many cards for everyone. Eliza can't write yet so she just colored a few lines on a card. Caleb was just a receiver this year! On Valentine's Day we read our cards from each other and it was a really sweet time.

Acts of Service: Shawn and I tried hard to point this one out to the kids. Adrianna is such a helper and always asks "Can I help you mom?". We told her that this is one of the ways she can show love to mommy. And this is one of the ways Daddy shows love to others.

Physical Touch: Lots of hugs and kisses were given this week!

Quality Time: The culmination of our week was the movie with Adrianna's school and the dinner Shawn and my dad planned. We really try to instill the importance of this one with our kids.

About that dinner Shawn and my Dad planned...:) It was somewhat of a surprise! We went to my parents house and my dad had this really yummy meal almost ready when we got there. It was Chicken Cordon Blu (my favorite), red-skinned mashed potatoes, veggies, bread, and salad. Shawn even cut the cucumbers into heart shapes! My dad bought a pink tablecloth, candles, candy hearts, and pink pop. They had all the little details planned out! It was nice to not have to cook first of all and to feel loved and cherished by having someone plan something with us girls in mind. My brother and sister-in-law came too. We had chocolate covered strawberries for dessert and they even sang "My Girl" karaoke style! It was an amazing evening and one of the best Valentine's celebrations that I can remember! Thank you Dad and Shawn! Love you!

It had been fun introducing these 5 ways to our kids this week. I think it is so important to figure out what your love language is so that you can convey to others how they can show love to you. It is also important to know how the other people in your life receive love so that you can bestow that upon them! Sometimes we have to speak a different language to convey our love to others!

I'm interested to hear what your love language is! Leave a comment for me!

I would say that my primary love language is quality time. If someone wants to spend time with me, even if it's for an hour, I really feel like I'm worth something and they love me.

My primary way to show love is acts of service and gift-giving. The only problem with this is that my dear hubby's primary way to receive love is physical touch and words of affirmation. I have had to change my language a little! So even if you have a specific way you like to show love, the person receiving it might not feel it because their way of feeling loved is different than what you are giving.

There is also the book "The 5 love languages of Children" by Gary Chapman that is great for finding out how your kids receive love.

I asked Adrianna how she knows that we love her. Her response was " When you let me watch a movie, have my own quiet time, and stay the night at people's houses".

Hmmm...is there a love language called "Being able to do what I want"?:):)

Cloudy with a Chance of Cookies!

It's Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs! We had a chance to see this movie today. It was so funny and very well done! Adrianna's school, Gladiola, plus a church in the area sponsored the event. We were able to see the movie, have a pizza lunch, get a token for the carousel, get a free book, and free coloring book all for $1 per kid and $2 per adult!! We also were able to buy popcorn at a discounted rate! We figured to do all of these things on our own would be close to or above $60!

It was really cool to see the church talk about how God created us all special and we shouldn't try to be like someone else. They took some of the moral lessons from the movie and briefly talked about them. They even prayed before our pizza! What a great outreach!

We left Caleb at home with a babysitter! This was the first time we have ever had to pay for a babysitter in 6 years! I think that's pretty good! We always have family watch our kids but everyone was busy today! My parents came with us because we wanted them to do something fun with us instead of always having to babysit! Caleb did great and slept most of the time we were gone. I probably had a harder time than he did!

My favorite part of the morning was the free book! Each kid that came got to choose either a chapter book or a picture book! Adrianna picked out a chapter book of the movie and Eliza picked out the original story book with pictures. So cool!

After we got home, I rolled out our sugar cookies so they would be cool to decorate after dinner, ran to Aldi for some groceries, came back and made dinner, decorated cookies with the girls, gave baths, updated our finances, and tried not to collapse!

We are also in the middle of watching Mulan. I forgot how much I love that one! We started it last night and when we got about halfway through, it started skipping scenes. Grrrr!! Shawn took it back and they cleaned it. They also told him that they knew it was skipping somewhere around the middle of the movie but they didn't want to throw it away since the rest of the movie was fine! WHY WOULD YOU EVEN RENT IT OUT! Anyway...we tried finishing it tonight and it still was not working. Fortunately there were not too many tears about having to stop without watching ALL of it! It was really hard not yelling out how frustrating it was that the movie wasn't working because I didn't want the girls picking up on it! It did slip out that I wanted a free movie out of this!:)

So, our cookies are done and it actually was a lot of fun! I had found this cool decorating pen that squirts out frosting with the press of a button! Adrianna really liked that! As you can tell by the pictures, the girls LOVE to put as many sprinkles and decorations on their cookies as possible!!! I had to try really hard not to tell them how much to put on and how to do it. Because of that, it was a really nice time!

This has been a fun preparation for Valentine's Day, but more on that tomorrow!

Taking a Break

As the few people who read this blog have noticed,(all 2 of you!), I have been taking a break. I honestly was feeling pressure to do it. Not from anyone else, just from myself. It just seemed like another thing to do. And because I had started it, I committed to it and I wanted to finish it. It actually filled me with dread thinking about updated but I felt I "had" to do it!
I do like that fact that it is a journal of our life. It is something I will always have to look back on and read and see how God is working.

I just felt like I didn't know how I wanted this blog to look. Did I want it to just be about my kids? Did I want it to be an encouragement to other mom's? Did I want it to be a journal of my spiritual journey? I'm still exploring answers to those questions so I haven't decided yet.

I think a lot of times just the good stuff gets posted on blogs. It gives the illusion that our quaint little life is perfect and not a lot goes wrong. BOY is that ever false! I want to be real. I want people who read this to be encouraged. I don't to feel like I have to be an eloquent writer to have a blog. And I definitely am NOT by the way! I don't want to come across as having it all together or having the answers to everything. I am learning daily what it means to walk with God. What it means to listen to His voice. And what it means to live my life focused on the One who gave me life.

I also think that sometimes because I have this blog, it prevents people from personally asking me how my life is going. They assume they know what is going on because they read a few sentences on this blog or facebook describing a particular event that happened. I think that is one of the drawbacks of blogs, facebook, or whatever. It is a great want to stay connected with people but we also need to remember to make an extra effort to go face to face with someone. Make a phone call, send an extra e-mail or whatever. I am working on these things too!

So this blog comes from a girl who is trudging along on this journey called life, making mistakes, and living with the end in mind. The "end" being we will be with Jesus forever! It's a daily, step-by-step process. It takes a lot of prayer, listening, and learning. I hope I can encourage you in your walk with God and you can see from what I write how much my heart yearns to be like HIM!

Eliza's Version

Eliza wanted to tell our Bible story before bed tonight so she got her Bible story book out that has really great pictures of each story.
I told her to pick one out but she ended up flipping through the book and chiming in her version of the pictures she saw. Here is her very philosophical view on things....

She got to the plagues that the Egyptians endured and saw a picture of the frogs:
"That lady is saying 'Get these frogs out of my bed!' "
Then she saw a picture of the fish laying dead in the blood:
"Oh those poor fish"

Then there was a picture of Pharoh in agony over what was happening in Egypt:
"He is crying because he didn't obey God"

"There has to be the story of Adam and Eve in here somewhere!"

"There is a chicken on the table and it barfed. (this was a picture of the abundance in Egypt) HEY, I had chicken at Grandma Sylvia's wast time and I really wiked it!"

"Oh, there is Jesus and that's what he looked like"

The End

Rant and Rave

I have realized that I don't rant and rave much on my blog! It is mostly a scrapbook of the fun things we do as a family. But please allow me to rant and rave!

I am having a hard time with establishing a consistent rest time with the girls. Eliza still needs to sleep and Adrianna doesn't. Most days Adrianna wants to watch a movie but I usually try and mix that up with reading time, craft time, or quiet play time.
I have wondered if I should just make it the same. Lately, Eliza has been wanting to watch a movie during rest time. I tell her that she needs to sleep first and then she can watch one with Adrianna when she gets up. Well, the anticipation of watching a movie is too much for her and she ends up not sleeping. She stays in her room about 3o minutes and then she comes out wanting to watch something.

Well, today I lost it....completely lost it...

Silly me for thinking that my almost 6 year old could do something quietly while I practiced the piano for rehearsal tonight. Meanwhile Caleb's long nap was from 10-1:30 today so he was up.
I put Adrianna on our couch downstairs for some reading time and then when I brought Caleb down, she wanted to play with him. In theory, my mind was thinking that she could play with him while I practiced. Well...he got bored with that idea and decided it was more fun to open up all the cupboards in our office, try and eat chalk, and try and play the piano himself. Adrianna would not be quiet for even a minute. Then Eliza comes down....
Meanwhile I had also been printing out some Princess coloring pages for the girls to color. I made these cute little books only to have Eliza rip out the pages and destroy the book. Why do I do these things I ask? Then Adrianna came over to the piano to tell me something AGAIN and she ripped out the cord from my earphones. Thus disrupting the song I was practicing that I was half way through. The song was already 4 pages into it!
Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh! I was so frustrated at that point that I lost it...
Please tell me some of you other moms have lost it at some point! I yelled....
Oh and before this Adrianna said I was the best mom ever when I gave her the Barbie coloring pages. After I yelled, She started crying, ran over to the couch and said "Now You are NOT the best mom ever!". Okay, so I guess I'm only the best when she gets something she wants!

Anyway, I do admit this was not a good way to handle things. But do you ever just snap and have not control over it until after the act is done?
I am trying to evaluate how I could do things differently. How can I make rest time more restful?
I do admit, I need quiet time to function. I guess it is just one of the ways God made me. I need to rest my brain. Too much talking causes me to go into sensory overload and I just can't handle any more until I have some quiet. I have realized that the rest time I used to have of about 2 1/2 hours has been widdled down to about an hour. I'm okay with that as long as I get it!
Sometimes I wish I didn't need it!

So, the little urchins are in their beds. I threatened them with spanks and no movies ever again if they got down from their beds! Well, maybe not the no movies thing!
So, Adrianna is barking like a dog and Eliza is singing at the top of her lungs.

Any suggestions would be most appreciated!
I guess I'm just going to have to put the smack down more during that time!:)

And now rehearsal is cancelled for tonight and I didn't need to be so focused on practicing!!
So much for my out..:)

Happy New Year!

We had to make some adjustments to our New Year's Celebration this year! Our intention was to get together with the Howells starting in the afternoon. We had planned on a movie/popcorn day at our house with the kids and we were going to have Chinese for dinner. Well...the Howells boys are sick! So....they still came over but it wasn't until about 7:15 and the boys went right to bed! It was still an amazing evening though!
Before the Howells got to our house, we had our own little New Year's countdown!
Around 7pm we gave the kids some blowers and balloons and counted down from 10 to our New Year! They had a blast and had no idea it wasn't midnight!


























































The girls LOVE the Barbie movies. They are actually pretty cute because they usually have a good story and they use actual classical music! There always seems to be one line from each movie that the girls latch on to. The last one was "You're ruining my life!". Yep..not so great!
Eliza received "The 3 Musketeers" for Christmas from Rose and Bob.
They have watched it at least 3 times already! The line that they remember is.......


"Don't mess with the dress!"





















It was fun to have some adult time with our best friends!
We decided to have fruit fondue and since I didn't have a fondue pot, I made up my own version! It was FABULOUS!
















HAPPY NEW YEAR!





(Don't worry, it's sparkling juice!)