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Taking Time to Stop and Smell the Blessings

It’s the mooooost wonderful tiiiiiime…of the year (sing it with me!) Unfortunately it can also be the most crazy, anxiety-inducing time of the year. We are all running around like overly-tightened (China-made) wind-up toys, beating down that path to Christmas day, but if we don’t take time to stop and chill a minute, we will soon bust a spring and just keel over and stop working. Seriously, what good are we going to be to anybody if we just flop over at the waist with our heads skimming the ground and our arms splayed out like the Y-M-C-A gone wrong?

NO GOOD!! No good, people!

So it’s time to quit! Quit running around. Finish your shopping online and pay for speedier shipping if need be. You’ll make it up in saved gas! Use the time you saved not walking the mall to read an extra story to your kiddos. Say “no” to that extra holiday party you really don’t have time (or have lost the will) to attend. Stay home. Be a family. Reeee-lax.

Lately I’ve just been feeling reallllllllllllllllly thankful. Thankful that God meets my family’s needs. Thankful I have a husband who works his butt off to provide for us. Thankful that I can be home with my kiddos every day. Thankful for Joshua’s funny phonics and Sophie’s tempestuous teething. (Still no teeth by the way. Zero. Zilch. Nada.)

I know Thanksgiving is past, but the time for thankfulness has not. I am so thankful for this season. I am so thankful for Christ’s birth, life, death, and resurrection. I am so thankful that God cares about me and my family. I am so thankful I can blog with my cousin, and I am so thankful that all three of you all read our musings.

Today my challenge to you is, stop being so busy being busy, and start getting busy hangin’ out with your peeps and being thankful. It’s way more fun and way less dangerous than getting into a fist fight over a parking space or clawing someone’s eyes out over that last $299 laptop at Best Buy. Do you want your kids’ Yuletide memories to be warm fuzzies of a happy, fun-to-be-with mama or therapy-session inducing tales of Stressy McSnappertons?

If you are picking up what I am laying down, slap down a comment full of gratitude. Tell me what you’re thankful for, or what you’re giving up to be happier at home this Christmas season.

Time for some kiddo cuddling! Blog atcha later!

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“Mother of the Year” award slips right through the cracks…

The other night, we took Kate to the high school girls’ basketball game. I thought it would be good for her to see female athletes in action (Jenny stop rolling your eyes!) and all.

When we arrived, Kate and I followed Andy about 3/4 of the way up the bleachers and took a seat. I didn’t think twice about where we were sitting… problem number one. For some reason, Kate was really worried about falling down… as opposed to the last time when we were in that gym, when we couldn’t get her to sit down. I kept telling her not to worry, that there was no way she was going to fall through the bleachers. (My internal dialogue “Famous last words, dummy. But really, who’s ever heard of someone falling through the bleachers?” I don’t think I want to google that and find out.)

So time went on and Kate got a little more comfortable.

A little too comfortable.

But not nearly as comfortable as her cracker-jack parents, who were watching a too much basketball and too little three-year-old.

It took a very calm, very matter-of-fact voice to get my attention.

“Bye, Mommy. Bye, Daddy. I’m falling.”

She was behind us, sitting on the part where feet are supposed to go, with her little legs dangling precariously through the crack, holding onto the row in front of her for dear life.

The next 15 seconds are a blur to me, but Andy and I both grabbed her and pulled her up. She didn’t understand why we were suddenly squeezing the breath out of her.

Andy turned to me and said, “Do not look down. I just did and it made me sick to my stomach.”

I kept thinking about Kate saying “Bye, Mommy. Bye, Daddy. I’m falling” and I was laughing hysterically. It was definitely one of those laugh-to-keep-from-crying moments.

The rest of the night, I kept thinking about what could have happened. I was so thankful to see my little girl sound asleep in her bed.

I also spent the rest of the night mad at myself and Andy… what kind of parents take their child so far up into the bleachers? DUH. Lesson learned, I suppose… but still. Ugh.

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Dirty Phonics on the Bathroom Wall

Joshua is almost four and his intelligence astounds me every day (’cause you know, Bobby and I are a couple of dummies). He’s known all his letters since before he was two, partially because we have a magnetic bathroom wall. Yesssss, the tiles on our bathroom wall are made of metal. I’m not sure what era this is from exactly but it’s both functional and aesthetically pleasing. Yay! Anyhoo, a couple of years ago we got a slew of magnetic alphabet letters for the bathroom wall to entertain educate him while I was in the shower. Recently, thanks to his super-genius and the PBS Kids show Word World, Joshua has begun spelling actual words with said letters, without even asking me how they are spelled! Yesterday when I got out of the shower, he said, “Look Mom, I’m going to spell the word bug.” He then proceeded to find the b,u, and g and put them in the correct order. I was amazed and of course rewarded him with MUCH praise. Then, he asked me how to spell the word “corn.” I helped him sound it out, he spelled it with the letters, and I cheered again. Yay genius boy!

Fast forward to that evening at bedtime. Bobby and Joshua are in the bathroom preparing to brush Joshua’s teeth, and I am in the bedroom putting my PJs on. All of a sudden I hear Bobby calling me so I run to the bathroom. There I see that Joshua has made a new word. I won’t write it here because I don’t want my blog traffic to get perved up, but let’s just say he took the c off of corn and replaced it with a p. “Mommy look!” he cried. “I made p*rn!”

Bobby was already cracking up, and I just collapsed on the floor laughing. Joshua was veeeeery pleased that he had made us laugh and started giggling too. “I made p*rn!” he exclaimed again proudly. (OF COURSE, he has no idea what that means, or that it’s even a real word. He just knows phonics!) I was laughing so hard I was crying. “What are we gonna do?” I asked Bobby, who was no better off than I was. “I don’t know!” he said. He was cracking up so badly I thought he was going to have an asthma attack. Joshua noticed that we were slightly distracted from his spelling efforts, so he took the p away from the orn and said, “Mommy, now I’m gonna build the word p*rn and you’re gonna laugh.” So off I went again, rolling on the floor laughing so hard my stomach hurt. I thought I might be able to distract him with other words. “You can make other words that rhyme with corn, honey. Like worn or born.”

“Or p*rn!” he exclaimed.

(More uncontrollable laughter from his mature, twelve thirty-year-old parents.)

“Forget it,” said Bobby, “I’m just gonna hide all the p’s. ”

“Stupid Word World. Teaching my kid phonics!” I grumbled.

Somehow we all got calmed down, Joshua’s teeth got brushed, and we all went to bed. Bobby and I giggled about Joshua’s new word a while longer, and Bobby took all the p’s off the wall and hid them! Joshua hasn’t mentioned it today at all, but I’m preeeety sure he’s going to remember just in time to tell the babysitter or anyone and everyone at church this weekend that he “made p*rn”. And then, we will really have some ‘splaining to do!

So, stay tuned for that.

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