The Week in Pictures

Sam took his first sick day off of school this week. He had a fever all day and looked like this picture above most of the day. He woke up the next morning just fine. It was good for him to have a day to lay on the couch, even if he felt bad. Gabe got it soon after. The lack of pictures of him sick should just tell you that I was never able to get free of him to take a picture of him, because he was always next to me, on me or following me. They are both all better now. I'm holding my breath that Luke doesn't get it.

Here is a picture of Luke. He sure is cute. He is getting both of his eye teeth in right now, which is kinda weird, since the only other teeth he has are his two bottom teeth. He is a weird teether. He got his two bottoms when he was 4 months. Now, at 8 months, he is working on the eye teeth, not the two top middle teeth that usually come next. He likes to mix things up a little bit. He is learning to clap right now and it is absolutely adorable. He just flails his arms around and sometimes his hands get close together. I got some video of it this morning that I'll try to post soon.

Gabe, eating Oreos (the "blonde" ones) like everyone should eat an Oreo - licking the icing off first. This boys bleeds sugar, he got my sweet tooth. He is quite the little chatterbox lately, this is what I hear constantly from him, "um, hey Mommy why do Batmans wear capes and Star Wurs guys don't?", "um, hey Mommy why does KK make cakes?", "um, hey Mommy, tell me again where ambulances go?". Um, hey Mommy...um, hey Mommy...um, hey Mommy...um, hey Mommy...every day.

This is Sam and me in his classroom. I volunteered for a few hours yesterday for "Apple Day", hence the apple in the picture. My sweet friend Stacey was so nice to watch Gabe and Luke for me so I could go spend an hour in Sam's class and then have lunch with him. It was so cute to experience his little world with him. He loved having me there and filled me in on all the scoop, from the class rules, the cafeteria rules, where the Library was and how the lunch line worked. I was expecting mayhem in his classroom, but the kids were so calm and laid back, they all knew what they were supposed to be doing and were very well behaved, from what I could see. His teachers are great. I'm also sporting a new "do" in this picture. I got my hair cut really short (more in the back than the front) and, after almost 6 years, went blonde (ish) again. I was blonde up until I got pg with Sam when my hair got a lot darker, thicker and wavy. I finally bit the bullet and went back to blonde, it's fun to change things up a bit.

Feeling

Since we've moved, my whole life seems so discombobulated (is that really a word?), I'm having to re-figure out how to do stuff in this new house. For example, when I walk in the door, where do I put my keys, diaper bag or purse? Where does the mail go? Where does all the soccer stuff go? I end up dropping these things here or there and then, when it's time to go, can't find anything. I've become horribly forgetful...so much so, that when Neal came home from being out of town for two days, he asked if I knew the back door wasn't closed all the way, much less locked. Nope, didn't know that, and that means that it had been that way the whole time he was gone, since we hadn't gone out the back door in two days. Nice. Now I check the back door a million times a day. I know it will take time to get it all figured out, and I've gotten a lot more done than I thought I would, I just didn't expect to feel so out of sorts.

I feel like the floor has been ripped out from under me and I'm trying to find solid ground again. I jump around becoming completely obsessed with something until its done, then onto the next thing. For awhile, I was obsessed with new bedding for our bed. I probably bought every pillow sham in Marshalls and TJ Maxx, trying to decide what combination looked the best. It looked like TJ Maxx threw up on my bed. I was making so many returns it was ridiculous. Once I got that figured out, I moved on to curtains. I wanted every window in the house to have curtains, because I realized how much warmer curtains made each room feel. Then I went from curtains to lamps, lamps to the game room and on and on.

I tend to make things so complicated. When I finally stop, tell myself to relax, simplify and ask myself how I'm really feeling, I often find that all of that obsessing is me running away from myself. From what is really going on inside of me, from what I'm really feeling and why. We talk a lot about feelings in a group I'm doing at church. Most everything you feel comes back to one of these 8 feelings...Fear, Anger, Shame, Guilt, Sad, Glad, Hurt and Lonely. They encourage us, on a daily basis, to have a "feelings check-in". It's been so great for me to do this small exercise because I have such a tendency to put myself on auto pilot and charge through my life, hiding from myself and from really dealing with what is going on inside of me. Why am I over reacting to my kids and husband and obsessing about pillows? Because I'm feeling fear, living in a new place, my oldest at school, meeting new people - will they like me? Will they think I'm an idiot because I talk too much? What if we can't pay all our new bills? What if one of the boys gets hit by a car when they are outside playing? What if Luke eats something off the ground and I didn't see him and he chokes on it? What if this never feels like home? What if someone makes fun of Sam and school and I can't be there to say that's not nice? What if he doesn't know what he is supposed to do? Is someone going to help him, because he might not ask for help? Luke is acting funny, what if his heart isn't okay anymore? Sam and Gabe both have fevers and say their heads hurt, what if they have meningitis? I know some of those are irrational fears, but I still feel them.

Some days, I'm feeling everyone of those feelings, others just a few. I've noticed lately that I carry fear and sadness with me as constant companions. The sadness from my miscarriages is still there, little things here and there have triggered those memories and I'm just sad. It's been good for me to recognize these things and to allow myself to feel them. It hurts and it isn't really how I want to spend my time, but it's good. It's good because it brings me back to my precious Heavenly Father. I hand all those fears and the sadness to HIM to take care of in His strong, gentle, capable hands. It reminds me that HE is sovereign and full of mercy for me, I don't have to carry these burdens, I don't have to figure it all out. It doesn't have to be so complicated. I just have to trust HIM.

A Saturday Evening

Neal and I are sitting on the front porch. The boys are out riding their bikes with all the neighborhood kids. It's about 75 degrees. I'm going to go out tomorrow and buy some Mums and Pumpkins to put out here. Fall is in the air, just around the corner. The pumpkin patch/farm opens next week, we will be spending a lot of time out there this month. There will be pictures. Lots of pictures.

We enjoyed spending the afternoon with our friends Bill and Leigh Anne, the are moving back to Nashville and we couldn't be more excited to have them back.

The morning started off a little rocky, with a 7am wake up time, to get to soccer early for pictures and then both boys games at 9. Gabe threw a little fit. Didn't want to have his picture taken. Didn't want to play in the game. It was fun.

A School Bus Mishap

Every afternoon, Gabe, Luke and I take a little walk down to the bus stop to wait for Sam to come home. Two times this week, as we were walking out the front door to go to the stop, Sam was already walking up to the house. The bus has been dropping them off a few minutes earlier and he was very proud of the fact that he walked home without me. Well, yesterday, I thought I'd just wait on the front porch for him (where I can see the bus stop), I figured he'd think it was cool that I knew that he didn't need me to walk him home. Gabe was playing in the front yard, Luke was in his excersaucer in the living room and I was on the porch. I heard the bus, then saw it stop at our stop. I saw B get out...then S...then R...then a few others...then...the bus drove off...no Sam...PANIC. I yelled at Gabe to get in the car, grabbed Luke and drove off (with Luke in my lap, forget car seats...where was my baby???) chasing after that bus. I knew that he had to be on it, if he wasn't, I would have heard from the school. I tracked the bus down to the back of the neighborhood, pulled up behind it and waited for it to make another stop. When it did, I jumped out of the car, with Luke, and ran onto the bus. There was Sam, sitting in the front seat, looking at me like I was crazy! He didn't even know anything was wrong. The bus driver felt terrible and apologized profusely. I was so freaked out, I really had to tone down my reaction with Sam, especially when I realized he didn't even know what the heck was going on. In the mornings, we are one of the first stops, then he goes through the whole neighborhood and back out to school, so as we were driving back to the house, Sam says "Oh, this is the way I go to school on the bus in the mornings, huh." Yeah. Huh.

I realized later that the girls next door weren't on the bus that afternoon, so I think that's what threw him off. He's got a little crush on one of them, so he always watches for her and basically follows her wherever she goes. She wasn't on the bus, so he didn't know what to do with himself. Huh.

This afternoon, when I asked him how he knew to get off the bus, he told me Bus Driver Mike told him "Sam this is your stop". I think Bus Driver Mike will say that to him every day from now on!

I tell you what, I never expected my little Kindergartner to grow up and learn so much in a matter of 3 weeks. He is different...older...a kid. He can write stuff...on paper...words and stuff. He can even spell stuff. He knows stuff. I mean, I knew they would be teaching him, but to witness first hand, him learning, is such a privilege. It's so exciting, to see him excited that he knows stuff. He is so sweet. He has such a sweet little spirit. He is smart, observant. He is turning into a rule follower (not really my rules, but school rules). He is quiet, yet he loves talking. He is brave. He faces new challenges head on with such calmness and confidence.

He still hold my hand when we walk to the bus stop.

"I don't wanna go to school"

Gabe woke up with his bottom lip sticking out, pouting, and repeating this sentence every 5 seconds (or so it seemed) from 7:30am to 9:30am. There was quite a bit of whining and pouting, but thankfully, he went into his room happily, with no tears. I'm happy to say that the bottom lip had been replaced with a smile when I picked him up at 2:30 from his first day of Preschool this year. Poor thing has felt a little lost with his best friend in school all day long for the past few weeks. It was so good for him to get to go do his own thing with kids his age.

Luke and I enjoyed the day together running some errands and having lunch with Kandice and Eli. I think I've found curtains for my bedroom, but I'll have to live with them for a few days before I commit.

Here are some pictures of Gabe this morning...

My little pouty subject turned on the smiles pretty quickly when I promised to buy him Marshmallows for an after school treat...

This is a rare picture of Gabe not goofing off, this is typically what he does when I pull out the camera...

He melts my heart a million times a day.

Soccer Games

Sam and Gabe had their first soccer games Saturday morning. We are in a new league this year and are really enjoying it. Their coaches are great - they have them doing drills, running laps and warming up. It's pretty cute watching them do jumping jacks! Sam will get out there and play, but he doesn't seem to love it. We are going to play T-ball in the Spring, maybe he will like that a little better. Gabe really seems to love it, as you can tell from the pictures, he was right in the middle of all the action. There was a little boy on the other team that was really good, but, every time the ball got taken away from him or when he scored a goal, he would start crying and throw himself on the grass - it was so funny and quite entertaining!

Luke's latest

Other than being really cute...

this is his new favorite thing to do...