The Quiet Before the Storm?

There is something strange going on in our home at the moment. It’s a phenomenon that I would have to describe as having somewhat of a calming effect, but not the kind that washes over you after a soothing hour long massage and sticks with you for the rest of the day. No, it’s more of a, Golly, George is telling me that swell story about the rabbits again. “Tell me about the rabbits, Geor...,” BOOM! I am in constant fear of what is going to happen next.


So what could possibly induce such a strange combination of hopeful serenity and overwhelming dread all at the same time? The kids, of course. More specifically, it’s Aaron and his sudden desire to help and be useful and even eat. You heard me…EAT. He even made us stop at McDonalds for chicken nuggets on the way home from the zoo today because he said that he, “needed to eat meat.” I know, I know, chicken nuggets aren’t really meat, but for a kid who once thought that a cow shaped animal cracker was all the protein that he needed in a day, this is huge.

It’s been going on for a few weeks off and on now. We will have a few days of absolute horror where he is so difficult that I keep looking outside to see if a couple of hell hounds have shown up to guard the son of darkness. Then, out of no where, he will barricade himself in the tornado of the family room until every last toy has been picked up and put in its place. I’m talking up to my standards kind of clean here people which, ok, have gone down hill a bit since becoming a mom, but nevertheless, they are still pretty high. He doesn’t even have to be asked which is the spookiest part about it. It’s like, I don’t know, he is growing up or something and all of the begging and pleading to help mommy or holy hell I am going to unleash a world of hurt, is finally sinking in. Weird.

The eating thing has me completely baffled because the last time that he was a good eater I was still pouring his meals out of a jar labeled Gerber. We have fought with him for years to “just try it” with no success. Then yesterday he spied some corn on the cob left on the dinner table and asked if he could eat some. I was like, “Uh, yeah,” but thinking, “Yeah, right.” And then …..he…. ATE IT! He ate the whole freaking thing.

I am guardedly optimistic that he is turning over a new leaf and becoming a little man rather than a fussy preschooler. Maybe it’s the fact that he is five and a half and well on his way to being six years old. I’ve heard that something magical happens at six and your tiny little multiple personality maniac becomes a rational little human child thing. If this is about as likely as having pixies and fairy diddles peacefully gathering daisies every spring in your backyard, please don’t tell me. Holding on to this little shred of hope is just about all I have left.

A Tale of Two Reactions

Kids are different, it’s a given. They have their own personalities and quirks, and they are their own little people. Even brothers and sisters who seem so much alike in so many ways are actually very different when you take the time to observe them in action. Never has this been more obvious to Mike and I than last night.


A little background information to help this all make sense; I have been sick with a stomach flu since Sunday and only started feeling human again this past Thursday. My appetite has been hit or miss and I haven’t really been eating much. Friday, my sister Angie came up to hang out and we took the kids out on a very stressful, challenging, “I swear I will leave you here in this parking lot if you don’t hold my freaking hand,” kind of shopping trip. That evening, I didn’t eat dinner, but I ran a fast 5K on the treadmill.

When I went into the family room to stretch, I found that the cats had been locked in there without their litter box and in protest Hailey crapped a load in the corner and heaved two landing strips of disgusting cat vomit in front of the rocking chair.

What I’m saying is, yesterday was stressful dude.

So after I finally disinfected the family room and went to get a shower, I felt a little dizzy and my ears were ringing. After the shower, I went to the kitchen to clean up some dishes and I really started to not feel well. Long story short; too late, right? I started having a panic attack. Mike had been putting Elyse to bed, but he came out of her room to get something and noticed that I wasn’t feeling well and immediately swung into action. Even though I was having trouble breathing and my heart was racing like it was competing in its own 5K, I was still able to observe how the kids reacted.

Elyse very quietly and calmly walked over to where I was sitting and grabbed my arm. She was talking to me, but in a very low little voice. She didn’t move from my side until I started feeling better and went to sit in the recliner. After I was sitting down, she brought me a piece of the cereal bar that I had been eating and again took up position next to me until she was sure that her mommy was just fine.

Aaron handled things a teensy bit different. As soon as he was aware that something was amiss, he kept asking from across the room, “What’s wrong? What’s happening? Is Mommy going to throw up? Hey Mommy, are you going to throw up? What’s wrong? She’s gonna throw up Dad, right?” He heard Mike ask if he should call my Mom, and Aaron was all, “Let’s call Grandma! Maybe we should call Grandma! Let’s call the police. Hey Mom, are you gonna throw up?” While Mike was getting me a cold cloth for my head, Aaron was pacing in front of the phone saying, “We need a plan. I’m gonna go draw a plan.” Once I was in the recliner, Aaron started to relax, but still kept his distance and sat across the room on the couch. Before he settled back in to watch Little Bear he looked over at me and was like, “You thought you were gonna throw up, right?”

So for future reference, if you are going to have some kind of an emergency, it’s Elyse that you are going to want by your side. Otherwise, Aaron will call the police after he draws up a plan, and is confident in the odds of whether or not you may vomit.

Bibbidi, Bobbidi, Boo! Elyse's Party, Take Two. (Wow is that Lame)

So, you know how you have an idea and you visualize it and it’s all great and wonderful until Mother Nature decides to take an enormous leak all over your well laid plans in the form of never ending thunderstorms that would inspire some very skilled arc building? That is what happened to Elyse’s super fantastic outdoor birthday party that was going to have an evening campfire and everything.


When we planned our baby girl’s second birthday party, I wanted to have it at home just like last year with all of her friends running around the yard and all of the other guests hanging out on our back porch chatting about this and that and other relevant stuff. But as we closely watched the weather all this week it seemed that we had no hope of actually pulling off an outdoor party. Friday morning I decided to wave my little white flag and switch into full-on panic mode to transform my beautiful vision of an outdoor party into an acceptable version that could be held indoors. Thank goodness we booked my Mom’s church hall just in case of such a tragedy or else we would have been screwed with a capital screw.

Elyse loves Cinderella and that was the theme of this party. It had nothing to do with the fact that I also love me some Cinderella. Really! Nothing! Ok, maybe a little, but she does like Cinderella and I decided to capitalize on that for all it was worth. When we had to move the party inside though, it meant that the kids who were supposed to be running a muck all around our yard with chalk, and bubbles, and all things of the outdoor persuasion, would have nothing to do but sit around in a church hall and stare at each other. There had to be an activity. Well, maybe there didn’t HAVE to be one, but I’ll take just about any excuse to devise some super cute craft that I’ll, um, I mean the kids will totally love. But after a little Googling I realized that Cinderella is just about the worst Disney princess to have if you are trying to make a craft. She had two things that I found over and over again; mice and a magic wand. If it was fall I could have done some cute stuff with pumpkins, but it’s not fall. It’s June and holy crap what am I going to do with these kids?

I’ll tell you what I did. I did this…

That my friends is Fairy Godmother Dust; magic powder that will turn any mouse into a horse, any pumpkin into a carriage, and any sad, worn out gown into the hottest little number at the ball.

I was so in love with this idea that I made an extra one for myself to keep. Each kid got a jar and filled it with two scoops of “magic powder,” two scoops of “sparkle sand,” and one scoop of “pixie dust.”

A little glue on the lid and a pretty purple bow, and viola, Fairy Godmother Dust!

Awesome craft idea or not, the kids had a blast chasing each other all around the hall and that was even before they had a load of cake and ice cream in their little bellies.

Elyse had a fantastic time opening all of her gifts and she yelled, “Surprise,” before opening every single one. It didn’t matter that things had to be inside, she was just happy to see her buddies and her family.

I still can’t believe that she is two. I don’t know where the time goes. Happy Birthday Princess! I hope you had a great party.

Aaron's Preschool Graduation

Well, it’s official; Aaron is a preschool graduate! I have been so emotional about this day for so many reasons, but more than anything I am just so proud of how this little guy turned things around throughout the year. If you remember, when we first started the school year, things were rough to say the least. To say a little more, they were emotionally draining, soul-crushing, mind-numbing, second guessing, pulling my hair out kind of ridiculous, make me want to take a nap with my head in the microwave difficult. Yeah, it was like that. But today was such a wonderful celebration of how far Aaron has come and just how much he has grown up over the last nine months.

When we first walked into the gym, they had a slide show playing of all of the kids through out the year and Only Time by Enya was playing in the background. That song is so hauntingly beautiful that I would have sobbed if that was the only thing playing. Add the pictures of the kids and forget about it.

Then, the curtains on the stage pulled back and all of the kids were standing there in their caps and gowns and they starting singing their own graduation version of Here Comes the Sun. They did one more song and the curtains closed for another slide show. There were several songs that played in the background of this show, but the one that got me the most was You’re Gonna Miss This by Trace Adkins. Up until then I thought that I was holding it together pretty well, but when that song started, I was done.   Thank gooness I remembered the tissues.

Next it was diploma time and all of the kids got to walk across the stage to receive their diplomas.

After everyone received their diplomas there was one more little slide show that was called When I Grow Up. This was such a sweet video. Each kid had their pictures taken in their cap and gown and one at a time, a child’s picture would come up and an audio clip would play of the child saying what he or she wanted to be when they grow up. Aaron said he wants to be a baseball player.

They closed with one more graduation song and then we were free to take our little graduate home.

Aaron, I can’t even begin to tell you how proud we are of you. At the beginning of this year when things were so difficult, I wasn’t sure that you were ready to take this step. You seemed so little and I hated leaving you everyday when you seemed so unsure. But watching you over the last nine months and seeing you on that stage today I have no doubt that you were ready. You have done such an amazing job and you have learned so much. Congratulations my little graduate! Next stop…kindergarten.

The Day That Elyse was Born

In October of 2007, at roughly 4:00 AM I found out that Mike and I were expecting another baby. Aaron was just a few months shy of his third birthday and we had wanted to make him a big brother for quite some time. To say that I was elated would be putting it mildly.

I had known that Aaron was a boy from the minute that I found out that I was pregnant, and this time around was no different; this was a girl, no question. I was completely confident in that conclusion until Aaron started telling everyone that I was carrying a boy. He was so sure that I actually started thinking that maybe he was right. So when we went in for the twenty-week ultrasound, I had decided that I was going to be the mother of two boys and may God help me. But when the technician started moving the wand over my belly, looking around for what would have made this a little boy, she found nothing, and announced that I was in fact carrying a little baby girl. I was so shocked, and happy, and excited that I saw everything in hues of pink for the rest of the day.

The months that followed went smoothly, except for the fact that I had some contractions off and on at least a few times a week. When people asked how far along I was, they always seemed surprised that I wasn’t closer to my due date, and everyone was always commenting that I would never make it to June 9th which was when my c-section was scheduled. I had even spent the night in the hospital one weekend around thirty-five weeks with contractions that didn’t want to stop.

By the end I was completely miserable. I was huge, I never slept, and I was chasing a three and a half year old all day long. I almost always ended up sleeping on the couch at night because it was the only place that was remotely comfortable for my whale-like frame. Then one early Sunday morning at 3:45 AM, I was nearly thrown off of the couch with an unbelievable contraction. I sat straight up and thought, “Well that one was different.” It was as strong as the contractions that are seared into my brain on the day that I was induced with Aaron, but this was all natural.

I sat in the dark in shock for a few seconds and when nothing seemed to happen, I tried to lie back down. As soon as I did, I was slammed with another one and every time after that if I tried to lie down, I was bombarded again. I turned on the lights and started watching the clock. I knew that if it was false labor moving around could sometimes get things to calm down, so I started pacing, but things just kept getting more regular and more painful. I did this until just after 5:00 AM with both cats starring at me like I was insane and very rude for disturbing their peaceful slumber. I decided that I better just hop in the shower and get ready since I was almost positive that we would be meeting our baby girl soon.

Mike heard the shower running and came in to see if I had lost my mind. Every time that I tried to fill him in on the details of the last hour an a half, I was hit with another contraction which told him everything that he needed to know. At 6:15AM we called my mom to come watch Aaron while we went to the hospital. It was a gorgeous morning. The sun was shining so bright and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Just two days before, we had lost my grandmother and I believe without a doubt that she was watching over us and requested that this be a spectacular day for her new great-granddaughter to come into this world.

I can see us walking down the side walk into the hospital like I am still living the moment; I was wearing a red maternity top and grey pants. There was something noticeably different about that day. Something amazing was going to happen; I could feel it.

We got situated in a room and when the nurse examined me, she said that I was three centimeters dilated. Now remember, this was supposed to be a scheduled c-section a week from now. I wasn’t supposed to be in labor and I definitely wasn’t supposed to be huffing and puffing through mind numbing contractions. Not even born yet and this girl was trouble.

No one seemed quite sure what to do. I was just a day shy of thirty-eight weeks, my doctor wasn’t on call, and I wasn’t supposed to be in labor. They decided that they would just watch me to see what the contractions did and if things progressed any farther. I was finally given some pain meds and I tried to rest.

Around lunch time, Mike went back home to check in on Aaron, and it was just about then that the medication started to wear off. I wasn’t dilating any more, but the contractions were not letting up either. I was crying through the pain, completely alone, when the nurse came in and asked if I wanted to go ahead with the c-section. She needed to know what I wanted to do because the on-call doctor was on the phone and she said that she would come back in to do the surgery if I wanted to go through with it. I was panicked. What was I supposed to say? I couldn’t decide this on my own, and Mike had just stepped out. Plus, everyone from the nurse, to the doctor, to the janitor reminded me that there was a chance that the baby’s lungs weren’t ready yet which would mean that she could have complications when she was born. This wasn’t even my doctor, and I wanted the advice of the woman who had seen me through the last nine months. I told the nurse no and then sobbed after she left. Not long after that, though, she came back in with a beautiful vile of pain meds and a cold cloth for my head; I asked her to be my new BFF. A few minutes later, I was feeling some relief and started to drift off to sleep.

Mike got back about an hour later and we started to discuss what we should do. We didn’t want to go through with the c-section if the baby wasn’t ready, but every fiber in my body told me that she was going to be fine. We still just weren’t sure. A few hours later, when the meds were wearing off again, the on-call doctor showed up in my room to see if we had changed our minds. She explained that it was completely up to us and that if we wanted to wait for my regular doctor, she would be in first thing in the morning. However, there was one little catch. It was just before 6:00 PM and the nurse would only be able to give me one more shot of pain medication for the rest of the night. Once that wore off, I was on my own until my doctor came in the next morning. For a baby that was supposed to be a scheduled c-section, I had labored for fourteen hours with only mild pain relief and I was exhausted. So we gave her the go ahead to get things set up and we prepared ourselves to become parents for the second time.

Our nurse explained that there was a surgery ahead of us that would take a while and that it was probably going to be close to 11:00 PM before we saw the OR. So Mike decided to run down to the cafeteria to grab some dinner. Less than twenty minutes later, the doctor and two nurses showed up to get me prepped and said that we would be getting started in twenty minutes. Um, excuse me? WHAT?!?! You said 11:00 PM; it’s only 6:30 PM. My husband is MIA and I am freaking out! Luckily, my friend Wendy had stopped by earlier that evening and she ran out on the mission to find Mike and bring him back.

Not long after that, Mike was back and I was being wheeled into the OR. They placed the epidural, got Mike all comfy and cozy in the daddy seat, and got things started. I had developed a lot of scar tissue after Aaron's c-section, and it took the doctor a long time to get through it to the baby. All I wanted was to see my baby girl. I wanted to know that she was healthy, and that we hadn’t made a mistake by going through with the c-section.

Then, at 7:10 PM, just like three and a half years before, the room was filled with the amazing sound of my daughter’s first cries which were so strong that there was no question that she was ready to be born.. Elyse Rose was here and she was unbelievably gorgeous; 8 lbs, 5 oz, and 20 inches long.

Seeing her for the first time, I couldn’t believe that we were blessed again with another perfect, healthy baby. She had a full head of jet black hair with tiny little curls, and she looked like a perfect little bundle wrapped up in her daddy’s arms.

It seems impossible that that has been two years ago already. I am really not sure where the time went. In two short years she has gone from a tiny little bundle of baby, to a beautiful, brilliant, energetic little girl. My heart melts every time I look into her big, blue eyes, and when she calls me mommy, my heart feels like it could burst.

Happy second birthday baby girl! I hope that you have a wonderful day and that you always know what an incredible gift you are to our little family. We love you!

Now I Feel All Warm and Fuzzy Inside

This morning I was updating my blog and catching up on the work of my favorite bloggers when I got a wonderfully, fantastic surprise; I got my first ever blog award! Ta Da! My good friend Dave from My Grimm Reality gave me this:

The rules state that I am to nominate ten other bloggers and share this cute, squishy little bear with them. My blog list is a bit small, but here are the people that I follow religiously:

My Mommy's Place, My Grimm Reality, Life and More, Lots More, and Wiping Up Snot.

Leslie from My Mommy's Place and Dave from My Grimm Reality already have the award, but they are both a part of the reason that I started blogging and I adore their writing so much that I would create my own fluffy, adorable, but seriously prestigious award just for them. I think that it would have a unicorn on it.

Anyway…

Grab your bear and nominate ten people that you love to read. Let's share the love, shall we?

Monster Mutt, Part 2

Last Thursday morning I found myself in the van, on the way to school, heavily counseling Aaron on how to handle the Monster Mutt situation. About two miles down the road I was starting to feel more like his therapist than his mother and I even started channeling Dr. Phil, complete with long Texas drawl and everything; only I didn’t give away anything to my studio audience.

It seemed that this whole ordeal had been weighing on him since he hopped out of bed and every other sentence that came out of his mouth had some Mutt overtones. It was starting to get to the point that I wondered if I shouldn’t mention it to his teacher. I wasn’t going to demand that the kid be tarred and feathered or anything, but maybe if she could just keep an extra eye out for any aggressive, monster-like behavior, that’d be great, Mmmm Kay.

By the time we hit the parking lot, I had covered pretty much every possible plan of action that Aaron could take regarding this child; ask him to stop, try being friends, blah, blah, blah. Finally, when nothing seemed to satisfy him, as a last resort I threw out that he could always tell the teacher. I did NOT want to suggest that he tattle because tattling isn’t nice and other kids don’t like tattle tails. I really wanted him to handle it himself, but good God I had been selling him my best line of crap all morning long and the boy was not buying it. Apparently he was not in the market for my brand of bull. My brain was exhausted and I was out of suggestions.

So, he went to school and the day progressed until it was time to pick him up. I was almost afraid to hear what he had to say, but before we could even get to the van, he explode with an exuberant, “Mom, it was all a BIG misunderstanding!” He went on to say that he talked to Mutt and asked him not to be mean to him or his friends and now they are all best buds. Aaron also said, “Oh yeah, and his name isn’t really Monster Mutt. It’s Mick.” Well thanks for clearing that one up Buddy.

So Aaron and Monster, errr Mick, are the best of friends and he took care of it all on his own. I am incredibly proud of him that he not only defended himself, but looked out for his other friends too. He has grown up so much in this first year of school and seems to be developing into quite a little man. I am sure that he will encounter similar situations throughout his school years, and I know that they won’t all be as easily settled as this, but I hope that if nothing else, he continues to be a boy that stands up for himself and the people he cares about.