New again

Selah Grace started crawling yesterday. Her left arm reaches wildly for her destination, and her body drags along behind her. Usually laughing as she goes somewhere she shouldn't, after something dangerously non-edible.

Flashing back, I see Zachariah crawling towards me. Same bald head. Same big eyes. Same little body.

Sometimes, when she lets me, I will sway in the darkness of Selah Grace's night-night routine... her sweet tiny body in my arms, my eyes blurry with love. And I will think that it is Zachariah's head resting on my shoulder. And sometimes the flashbacks aren't pleasant. It was a hard time, holding that little baby boy. Holding him tight. My eyes blurry with pain.

Selah Grace's precious milestones sometimes bring tough memories, even for just a fleeting second. Deep down, the wounds, hidden in my heart. Not to ruin her moment, I ask for peace to rise above it.

He carried me.

My broken mess. Laid before the Lord. An offering.

A reminder of God's redemption. His grace. All things old, made new again.

Phone Photo Ph-riday!

Yeah, I know... it's Sunday today. But that's the ph-un part!

Why have I gotten into such a habit of taking pics with my phone? Well, because it's an iPhone, of course. The best phone on the planet.

Did you know Brian used to have one? Then his work replaced the iPhone with another brand. It has been so sad. All the things that used to be so easy... now so frustratingly tedious and difficult.

Once you go iPhone, you never go back.

Want to know what cool apps I have?

Let's see, I have all free ones:
Prestonwood and Watermark (to listen to sermons),
USAA (we even deposit our checks with our iPhone app. no joke.),
Fox News, USA Today, and all the local nbc/cbs/abc news stations,
Groupon,
E! Online (I can watch Soup!),
My Fitness Pal (logs fitness, calories, etc),
Words Free (addicting scrabble game to play with other iPhone users),
Ebay,
Cheap Gas (finds the closest gas stations and lists them by price),
Blogger,
Redbox (can reserve online and pick up quickly),
RunKeeper and iMapMyRun (can calculate how far I've run by GPS),
Kayak and Southwest Airlines (great deals!!),
AccuTipFree (calculates how much to tip your waiter), and
WhiteNoise (for SG if we are somewhere when she needs to sleep)

iPhone, iLoveU.



Okay, back to Phone Photos...

This is when I took Selah Grace to Target. We are dangerous there. And when she saw these shoes, she just had to have them!







This is when we stopped at Daddy's office. She looks terribly busy.




This is when we bought her a new playpen. Can't you tell how much she loves it? (haha)




This is a little outfit I have been waiting for her to fit into! It's a one-piece shorts outfit, of which I have several - and this day, we matched! (minus the bow) Anyways, we are slowly working to move out of 3-6 month outfits and into 6-9 month. :) On a side note, I just want to kiss all over those chubby legs!!!




This is when we let Zachariah's frogs go. It was so sad with lots of tears. :( And then, OMG, a bird swooped down (I kid you not) and took one of the frogs. Zac looked horrified, but we assured him that birds don't eat frogs and that the frog was probably really enjoying his "plane" ride. Brian and I were dying. One of those parenting moments where you are truly on the spot and you cannot laugh.

We live really close to this cute park and pond, and often walk/run/bike with the kiddos. The ducks are so used to people, that they will walk right up to you ready for some bread!

Here's my root canal!! Just thought I'd document that. Nice hole in my tooth, eh?

A root canal is actually a very interesting procedure. I won't bore you, and I don't recommend actually getting one, but the process is pretty neat.

This is at the kids' doctor, re-checking SG because she had another UTI.

Notice the shoes keep re-appearing? It's because they match everything! :) I want a pair in every size! Er... I mean she wants a pair in every size... Plus they look like Lelly Kelly shoes, which I would LOVE to buy, but I think Brian would absolutely die of a heart attack on the spot if I spent that much on SG's shoes. *sigh*

This is when Zachariah and his buddy were racing around making skid marks on the street. They are crazy boys out there! (see his skid marks?!)

This is when we were waiting at Zac's preschool for his class to get out. I love this dress!

This is at Brian's softball game. Go Daddy!!!

This is when she found out Daddy's team lost. :(

This is our hungry little cheerio muncher!! She also eats bananas, avocados, and sweet potatoes.

This is Zac working out with me. He LOVES going to the gym with us. He uses every piece of equipment, including the treadmill, elliptical, bike, and all the weight training machines. Ha! (He takes his work out very seriously, too.)

This is when Zac and Selah Grace were playing in their "fort." Lots of giggling in there.

This is when Brian was on a cleaning spree. He does this when he is stressed. I may or may not have been the cause of the stress at this particular time. If so, then I am also responsible for a very sparkly shower.

This is Selah Grace's new church dress I made this morning before we left. It got wrinkly at church, but she was still so cute! Although, we are getting jealous of our little friends who are already doing pigtails, like Kiersten and Lyla. No fair!! ;)

That's all for this edition of Phone Photo Ph-friday. The pictures are happy to be off my phone and in cyberspace. Have a great day!

The end is near

The end of the WEEK, that is. I have two more photography sessions and a huge grocery store run before my self-imposed hiatus. Greatness.

In honor of that, I took on a new project of making a little gift for a baby shower next weekend. And my little, I mean 3 adorable dresses. Monogrammed. And reversible.

Why can't I just go shop the Target registry like normal people do?

So, SG and I went to the fabric store while ZZ was at preschool. That's my favorite time to go. When I can laugh at any other moms brave enough to bring a 5 year old boy.

After find the perfect coordinating fabric and ribbon, I see that the total comes to far more than I would have spent on a Target registry. So I guess I can't use that excuse after all.

We came home, and Zachariah has mastered the bike trick where he races up the sidewalk and off the curb.

And I added neosporin to the grocery list.

Midnight rambles

Today was Zachariah's last day of co-op. I made a cute bag for his teacher, then forgot to take a picture of it. Which is a bummer for me and my constant and annoying need for approval. I really wanted to show it off.

I had my fourth and last root canal appointment. The 3rd and 4th appointments (yesterday and today) went WAY better than the 2nd, when Nightmare Instructor wanted to show my student dentist how to get the needle "down to the bone."

For the record, my student dentist was awesome, and I would be a patient of his in real life when he graduates next year if he wasn't in the army. If anyone needs dental work for way less money - or you don't have dental insurance - let me know. He's got one more year in school. A cavity/filling is less than $100. Just never schedule it on Fridays. That's when Nightmare Instructor works. And you don't want him near you with a needle.


Selah Grace has done some funny things this week....

* She pulls her socks off now to eat them. But she still leaves her hairbows alone, my good girl!
* She sits in her high chair and when she wants more food, she says, "yayayayayayayaya!"
* She refuses the bottle. Flat out refusal. Will only nurse. Even if I'm gone for 6 hours at the dentist. Must be super fun to babysit her. (ha!)
* But she will try to drink from Zac's sippy cups.
* I have to nurse her in private most of the time now because she cannot focus when there is noise in the background - especially B or Z.
* Still no crawling. So we are being super lazy about baby proofing. Take your time SG! :)
* She's still an amazing napper - sometimes two 3-hour naps! We think her bed is her favorite place ever.


Zachariah told me this morning, "Mom? I knew I would love my sister from the first moment I saw her."

I mean, could I LOVE this kid any MORE? Oh, he is precious. He waits patiently by my side, while random strangers make huge big deals out of Selah Grace. He plays with her, holds her, loves on her, cuddles with her. She adores her big bubby!!

And you haven't felt goodness until you get a Zachariah massage. The kid is good. And so gracious - he offers all the time! He is so so kind. He often will give us the last of something - his last piece of candy, his last bite of dessert. He'll say, "Oh that's okay - I want you to have it."

Speaking of food, he eats so much. Yesterday for breakfast, he had two sausage biscuits and a pbj sandwich. Today, he wanted some strawberries, so he got the container and put it on the carpet to eat the berries. Needless to say, Brian had to work quickly to get the strawberry stain out of the carpet!

Tonight we took a family walk so Zac could ride his bike. Mark. My. Words. We are very quickly headed for a really big bike crash. He is crazy out there. His friend taught him how to jerk up the front wheel, and I know he is going to try jumping off the curb soon (his friend already does this). He rides looking backwards and loves to try to put his feet up near the handles. This all completely freaks me out. Brian's stance is that he is a boy, I need to let him be a boy, and a bike crash will probably be the only thing that will make a difference. So, I'm yelling "BE CAREFUL sweet baby!!" and then Brian will yell, "Have fun buddy!"

The other day, he looked back and yelled, "Don't worry Mom - I'm a professional!" Then he promptly hit the curb and flew into the grass. Then he laughed. *sigh*



So, I'm up at 11:30 (and rambling on here) because I have some photography client issues, thanks to the dumb hard drive crash. And I still don't have Microsoft Office ($$), so I had use Brian's work laptop to retype our lease. (21 pages... good times...) I won't go into the rest. It's depressing.

Summer break - where art thou?

My turkeys AND Happy Mother's Day!!!

My sweet boys went turkey hunting this weekend. Best Mother's Day gift!! I had so much to do and was so stressed. Selah Grace is an awesome sleeper, so I got pretty much everything DONE. Yay!!

Oh - and I got to sleep in thanks to my sweet little princess pea!! Love that girl!! I am looking forward to next Mother's Day when I paint her nails. She has awesome nail beds. :)


So, the boys get home and they didn't get a turkey. They tried for a coyote, too, but to no avail.

But they didn't come home empty handed!!



First, Zachariah came bounding up the stairs with this water bottle. Inside the bottle are two little froggies. And inside Zachariah's sweet heart are dreams of raising these frogs to be his pets.




He also had a water bottle with a huge caterpillar. At the current moment, I do not know where that caterpillar is. And, frankly, that scares me.







But not as much as Brian bounding up the stairs with a bread bag. Inside the bread bag? A rattlesnake!! Inside Brian's sweet heart? Dreams of the perfect rattlesnake recipe for Mother's Day dinner.





Apparently, they were leaving the ranch, and saw this guy in the road. Brian slowed down and he coiled up at them. Brian got his shotgun, Zac hid his eyes, and that scaly little thing never knew what he had coming.

Needless to say, his head remains in the road, and the boys brought his body home.

Brian and Zachariah cut him all up and he is marinading in soy sauce. We found a rattlesnake recipe and hopefully I can muster up the courage to eat a bite. :)


Here he is on the counter - STILL MOVING! I kid you not. I was totally freaked out. And Zachariah says, "Dad? Why are girls so scared of snakes? They are cool." He now has the rattler, and plans to bring it to preschool to show everyone. Hopefully they will think it's cooler than our waiter did at Uncle Julio's this afternoon. (not impressed.)




OH, the joys of boys. :) Good thing they're cute!!


(on a side note, I found it kind of funny that there are so many dishes in the sink. Hello? Can you tell Brian left for the weekend?! And in the 2nd picture, there he is washing the dishes. lol He cracks me up.)





And a HUGE HAPPY MOTHERS DAY to our awesome mamas!!!!

We have the best moms in the universe and we are SO incredibly blessed by you both. Such examples of wonderful, caring, gracious, and loving moms. And you continue to bless us by loving our children so well. We love you!!!!!!

Trying to crawl!!

You can do it Selah Grace!! :)

She's up on all fours... but keeps moving backwards instead of forwards. A tad bit frustrating for her.... but she'll get it soon enough! The three of us cheer for her like maniacs whenever she tries. It's too funny.


My root canal is half done. 2 appts down, 2 to go. Then the school goes on break for June, and I'll go back in July for a permanent crown. My last appointment didn't go so hot, unless bursting into tears in the dentist chair counts as a success. Hoping my next appointment (Monday) is better. In the meantime, I am taking my c-section pain pills to get me through the day today.

By the way, I am a flosser and I feel like this is totally unfair.


In other news, I got my sewing software to work and would like to thank the random people who put great advice out there online. I google for answers to things all the time, but just thought this week about the people who take the time to actually write the answers. How do they find the time to do that? They must not have kids.


And for fun, a little Selah Grace update:

She weighs 13.14 right now - waiting for the big 14lbs!! She is 7.5 months old. She still wears her 3-6 month clothing. She "talks" a lot with all sorts of consonants and noises. Lots to say. She inhales cheerios and sweet potatoes. She is not too sure about avocados, but as long as they are on sale, will continue to see them on her tray. She'd rather feed herself and doesn't like to be spoon fed. She had great hand-eye coordination and stays very clean while eating. She loves her brother's sippy cups. She hasn't eaten any legos. Yet. She also loves the sounds of the sewing machine, hair dryer, and vacuum. She hardly has any hair on top, but some very fine hair is growing out around her neck. Mommy wants her ears pierced and Dad is debating on it. She sleeps from about 6:30/7 all the way until 7am. When she wakes up, she plays in her crib happily until we go get her. (I never believed babies actually did that!) Zachariah loves to be the one to get her from her crib, and she loves to see him. She cries when we put her in the car if Zachariah is not next to her. She is ticklish under her arms and her neck. Her laugh is so yummy!! But when she sees a camera, nothing can break her poker face. She loves runs/walks in the stroller and picnics in the park. When we hold her, she never snuggles - she is always turned frontways and watching everything around her. When we lay her in her crib, she never fusses - she curls her knees under her, hold her paci into her mouth, and falls asleep. For hours! Her eyes are still the same gray color, and I had a moment when I realized my dad's are that color. (Daddy! Maybe she has YOUR eyes!) Or maybe they will change to brown someday. Who knows. She had some dry skin on her feet the other day, which gave me a panicked feeling for a split second. Brian had to take my shoulders and remind me that the tests were negative. She's fine. It's so hard to believe after all we went through with her. It's still surreal, and I still struggle with wrapping my mind around it. I'd love to have time to sort through those feelings. Maybe this summer. :)

As I type this, she is playing on the floor. She just found a paci and is happily playing with her ocean-aquarium toy, Zachariah's sunglasses, and an easter egg. And probably some of my hair, which is always on the carpet.


For more fun, here's a Zachariah update:

Zachariah is 52 pounds now and a ball of energy. He is 5.5 years old. He loves playing with legos and making ships. He draws tanks every single preschool class. So many, that I am making a little book. Sometimes the tanks shoot sausages, sometimes they shoot ketchup. They always have curtains in the windows. And that makes me save each drawing. His teachers adore him, and so do his classmates. He is kind to everyone and he is always out for a good time. I sometimes watch him in class or on the playground, and he is someone I'd like to hang out with, too! He is very honest. He tries to be humble, but that's hard at 5 years old. (haha) He loves to ride his bike and we are waiting for his first big bike accident.... with his confidence, it's coming sooner than later! He did so well in soccer and makes lots of goals during each game. He is blessed with great coordination. I've backed way off on any "teaching" this spring. We have continued to read our A-Z Mystery series, and are on the "L" book already. He reads sentences such as, "The characteristics of each species is different." with the ease of a 4th grader. We love to hear him read, although his preference is to be read to by one of us, while the other is giving him a massage. It's true. Each night, he gets "book and massage" before bed with his ice water. Such a lucky kiddo! He desperately wants a sleepover. At gymnastics, they advertise lock-ins, but they are girls only, and his feelings are very hurt over that. When we go places, he enjoys looking at the map on my phone and telling us where to turn next. He's not too bad at it! He loves science experiments, animals, and cooking. He loves friends and his sister. He absolutely loves to sing. I got several KidzBops CDs from the library and put them on his iPod. Brian went running with him the other day (Zac sat in the jogger stroller with his iPod), and Brian told me that Zac sang the entire run. He said passerbys were cracking up. He is still very much a cuddler, and continues to greet us each morning in bed with neck massages. He still loves to be held and snuggled and kissed. (not in front of his preschool friends). He doesn't like to play by himself. He loves to make tents in the living room and eat a snack inside with Mommy and Sissy. He'd rather eat fruit than chocolate. He can inhale strawberries and blueberries, but still has halloween candy in his pumpkin. He hates green veggies and allergy medication. He's a great big brother, and I call him my Assistant Daddy. He is an amazing child and we are so blessed by him every single day!!

As I type this, he is out turkey hunting with Daddy. Getting out the camo clothes is a HUGE deal around here. He always makes sure I pack his camo underwear, too. True story.

Simplify

Last night I finally had a meltdown.

This past week was the icing on the cake.

I've been so stressed lately. There is so much to do, and I keep feeling behind. Behind in Cares, photography, laundry, my time with my family. I haven't actually *made* dinner in weeks. Weeks. I leave the house in a total rush each morning and come home to chaos. Add onto that - stress about renters, SG napping, Zac's counseling, coordinating the class gifts for both of Zac's preschools, photo clients waiting for their pics, cost of computer, cost of dental... I've been wanting to get together with several different families and our schedule is too crammed. :(

We always have Cares stuff to keep us busy - between planning events, having events, visiting residents every single weekend, making dinners for people, visiting people in the hospital, coordinating weekly soccer games with the kiddos, as well as weekly accountability for it all. It's a LOT!

I broke down last night. Rare for me, as I can hold things in for an awfully long time. ;)

I am sooooo burned out.

And so we are simplifying.

Solution:
No summer committments (swimming lessons, gymnastics, etc)
No summer photography sessions
No gym membership
No more kids for us (we had been tossing around the idea of having a 3rd baby)

Less computer
Less television

More morning quiet time
More last-minute play dates
More spontaneous fun
More energy to invest into our residents


I think I have just enough to get me through the next couple weeks until summer officially starts.