The House

The last weeks have gone by so quickly, I can't believe it's already May! Our house hunt is finally over, we moved two weeks ago from our apartment into a rental home about 10 minutes down the road. Being in a house with a garage, lawn responsibilities, and attic space has really brought out our grownup sides, I almost feel old enough to have children. 

Seriously, this house has made us better people somehow. Nic and I are in bed at a decent hour, the kids are sleeping through the night, I yell things like "Take your shoes off at the front door!" and "Don't mess with my Azalea bushes!!" Oh, and we've been on time to work and stuff... like I said, I think we've become adults.

Except I hate feeling like an adult so I did an "experiment" in the back yard with the kids today. I'm always telling them not to shake soda cans because they'll explode, but they never believe me. So today, at Conner's request, we shook a can of soda and shook it for a while, threw it up in the air, and watched it smash down on the driveway. IT. WAS. AWESOME! Soda went everywhere, the boys were shocked and awed, and I think they finally get the point about not shaking sodas. 

So, that's where we are now, busy, happy, blessed, and ready for summer.

how to pee like a boy

When Conner finally decided to allow us to house train him it was the best week of my life. Seriously, having one less butt to wipe is like as good as it gets for a mom with small children, well that and nap time. Of course he didn't learn standing up, the only person he was around during the day sits to pee, so he was a three year old sit-and-tucker. This is nice if you're really into clean bathrooms that aren't covered in urine... which I am... however it's pretty inconvenient to have a kid who relies on a potty to be able to pee. Our lives demand flexibility in all things, which means sometimes your potty is a bush, a curb, or an empty parking lot, and come on he's a BOY shouldn't he be psyched to be able to pee ANYWHERE.

Well he was not excited. We went months with Conner demanding a potty every time his bladder was full, and at least 15 minutes into any road trip. I decided that I was going to coach him, I could show him how to pee standing up, I was going to help him see the world in a whole new way... as a urinal. He resisted as long as he could until one day desperation forced a change.

We were driving around with the kids on a house hunt looking for a rental place, everyone was dressed up to go to a family dinner that night and of course it was pouring rain. The boys had fallen asleep in the car so I sent Nic into a leasing office while I waited with the boys outside in the down pour. Suddenly Conner woke up demanding a toilet, doing the peepee dance in his seat. There was no way we could get him inside in time to make it to a potty so I jumped out of the car, stood in the rain and had him come to the edge of the doorway to pee into the parking lot (Just for the record, this is not our "go to" stand up pee scenario, we are very much bush peeing people... like I said before, situation was desperate). I stood in front of him to hide him from anyone who might be watching, spread my arms out, and started cheering...

"Go Conner! Go Conner! You can pee standing up! Pee! Pee!!! Wooooo!"

Yeah, because I cheer for EVERYTHING now, from soccer games to first poops... whatever my kids love it... I think. Anyway it worked, he stepped up and launched a stream of urine high into the sky... higher than I had anticipated... it went up, arched, and as if in slow motion I watched in horror as it came down right into the open collar of my dress SHIRT! He was PEEING down my SHIRT!!! I started windmilling my arms and screaming,

"Conner!! AAAAHHHHH You're PEEEIIINNNNG on ME!!"

In a state of awe, shock, and panic he hastily tried to redirect his stream, and coated the inside of the car door with urine. Thank god, for that tiny bird bladder he has, because he was done quick. I buckled him back into his seat, and as Nic got back to the car Conner joyfully announced his accomplishment and I informed him that I needed a change of clothes.

That was the beginning of long list of things Conner has stood up to pee on, although none of them have been people. So if you're trying to teach your son to pee standing up too, here's my advice:

Kids really like it when you cheer for them and don't stand directly in front of a peeing child they have a shockingly long range.

Poppin Tags!

So, I'm kind of obsessed with vintage pyrex right now. I found some stuff at a thrift shop down the street and I've been dragging my kids to Goodwill every week since. You remember the post about why you should never go shopping with my family? Well if you're looking for excitement in your life go thrifting with me. Seriously. When I walk into a thrift store I feel like I'm a guest on The Price is Right, I can barely contain myself, and then I find some vintage treasure and seriously, shit hits the fan. 

See this vintage pyrex fridgee? I literally screamed when I found it. In the middle of the Goodwill I snatched it off the shelf like it was the first five minutes of a black Friday store opening and yelled "LOOK WHAT I FOUND!! I told you this was the lucky Goodwill!!!" My husband was flabbergasted and the other store patrons were staring over the shelves probably wondering what priceless antique treasure they had missed.  

This set of dishes right here, vintage Hazel-Atlas Crinoline in pink. PINK!! could you just die, because I about did. Right in the middle of the same lucky Goodwill, I mean I can just see a future of tea party birthdays for my baby girl, all served on this set of dishes. I love it!! 

Holding vintage dishes is like holding a piece of history in your hands, I think of the other women who owned these pieces. Maybe they bought Pyrex at a house party or were given this set of dishes as a wedding present, I wonder if they cherished it as much as I do.  So if you're looking for something fun, come treasure hunting with me. We can wear eye patches and pretend to be pirates, seriously it might make the screaming and carrying on when I find something slightly less weird. 

looking for a new place

So we've been touring different rental homes in our area looking for our next temporary home. Yesterday we did a walk through on a town home and I feel so bad for the poor mom who was home when I brought my children through her house. Let me give you an idea of what to expect if we showed up at your door for a tour,

On the way to check out the house all the kids feel asleep in the back of the car so we had to wake them up to go in. My kids are the WORST grumps when they've been woken from a car nap, Conner insists that his limbs no longer work, Beau is panicked trying to locate the action figures he fell asleep holding that are now MIA. Panic, confusion, and whining are the norm, but Tillie adds a small element of compliance (she can't walk so what does she have to complain about anyway). Eventually we get everyone out of the car and to the front door, the leasing agent looks a little scared as Conner scowls at her demanding to know if we live here now. She lets us in with a smile and lets us know that the tenent is home (soooo awkward cruising through someone else's place while they're still there but whatever).

The tenant is sitting on the living room couch feeding a tiny baby that looks only a few days old, she has a two year old in a highchair near her. The presence of someone else's small children makes Beau and Conner feel much more at home, and we go on a tour of the upstairs and marvel at the incredible World of Warcraft themed decor in EVERY room. At some point we have lost Beau, we return downstairs and find him in the living room with the mom who is still feeding her baby. Beau is using her leg to steady himself as he strips naked, because we're indoors so obviously it must be naked time. You can imagine the look on the lady's face, trying to feed/shield her child while my son patiently reassures her with some gibberish that probably translated to this,

 "Hi, do you come with the house? I like your baby. Can you help me get my pants off my shoes and is there a specific corner to poop in or this a free range household?"

I rescued the poor woman, clothed my child and we began backing towards the door. The leasing agent continued to go on and on about the amazing perks that come with the house, you know things like a dishwasher and washer/dryer hookups. Conner takes this as a sign to march into the kitchen and look for a snack, because you know since we were there why not demand a sandwich from poor couch lady.  He is put off by the fact that all the food does not come with the house and decides he doesn't want to live here. We scoot on out and let couch mom go back to enjoying her too-young-to-be-poorly-behaved children.

 I hope we find something soon, because touring other people's homes is weird.

Big Girl Panties

It's been one of those weeks, the kind you need a sense of humor to make it through.

 Conner brought us the flu Friday night and it has been a whirlwind week of vomit, diarrhea, and snot. I have cleaned discharge out of the carpet of every room of the apartment. I've caught puke in my hands. I haven't slept. I've been living mostly off girl scout cookies and oatmeal cream pies because I don't have the energy to cook. I smell. I'm really, reeeaaallly glad I got a flu shot last week, I'm also glad we're moving out of this stanky cave soon.

This morning at Target I ran over my own foot with a three seater shopping cart and the only thing holding my toenail together is last weekend's pedicure. I cried a little, because I'm a wimp, and assured the check out lady that no, I was not crying because this is the BAJILLIONTH time she has asked if I want a Red Card (and yes I want one, of course I want one!! I'm forgetful and I don't carry checks and for the love of RICE stop asking me!!)

To top it all off the round brown things I found on the carpet this afternoon weren't cocoa puffs, it was actually someone's POOP (BEAU AARON!!) and I touched it, WITH MY FINGER!!!! There's a small possibility Tillie ate some, I have no way of knowing, because holy crap it could be an infinite number of poopoo puffs that escaped his diaper!! Why are children so disgusting?!!

So it would seem I'm barely hanging on to sanity, but really this is every day, and let's be honest sanity is gone. This isn't so much out of the ordinary as it is just being mom. My morning vitamin is Tylenol because it's good for the aches and pains that have settled into my bones. Before I even get to that vitamin I lay in bed and wish I didn't have to get up, maybe I could sleep for ever. Sometimes I tell myself that I just can't do this anymore, it's too hard, I'm too tired, and this is not getting any easier. Then I suck it up. Because I don't know how to quit, actually I don't even think that's an option. I pull on my big girl panties and face the days that just keep coming because, despite how hard it is now it looks like people actually survive this.

Being a mom is hard. Being a parent is hard (OK it's also hilarious, especially the part about poop). When other parents tell me how many kids they have I mentally finish the sentence with "and lived to tell the tale". Because parenting is about the most bad ass thing you will ever do and survive to talk about.

new beginnings and fresh starts

You know how I've talked about being in school, well I graduate this May. For the last couple years I've scraped and hustled and pulled it together and even though it's an Associate's and not a Bachelor's I'm pretty damn proud. I started out in Dental Hygiene and now have some how ended up in Health IT and I love the field I'm heading into. I had my kids young but they've never held me back, I keep pictures of them in my notebooks and it reminds me why I keep coming back every semester. They make me stronger, they've taught me how to work hard and even though it was harder to do this with them I couldn't have done it without them.

I've spent all this time working towards this goal because even though I love my kids, I don't love being a stay at home mom. I've wrestled with the guilt because I know there are people who would love to be home with their kids and they can't be, so I should be appreciative of the opportunity and I do appreciate it, but I need something more. I've grown up with my kids, and I know more about myself now than I did when I had Conner at 21 or got married when I was 20.

So now I'm looking at the place all that hard work has brought me to. This week I landed a job with a great healthcare company as a Jr Clinical Analyst and I finally have my foot in the door doing what I want to do. After all the years we've struggled and barely survived I can see a light at the end of the tunnel. Now it's not a full time position, it's flexible and as needed and kind of perfect for where I am right now in my life. I even have great childcare for the kids, one of my best friends has offered to watch them three days a week so I can chase this experiment.

So why do I feel so guilty? I feel like no matter what I do as a parent I am consumed by guilt. I feel guilty for staying home with them and not doing more, I feel guilty for not staying home with them. I'm so sick and tired of feeling guilty all the time when I've worked so hard for this and I'm doing what makes me happy. So this is me letting go of all this stupid guilt, I'm going to feel proud of my hard work and enjoy the time I spend with my kids. I'm sick and tired of just surviving and it's time to let go and thrive.

just like that

So this morning started crappy. We came home last night to find that we had no power, and it had been out for a couple hours so no dry laundry. Power didn't come on until around 4am, and all the lights we didn't realize had been left on awakened us. Thanks to the darkness and lack of Netflix availability I did manage to get eight hours of sleep though, so it hurt a little less when the power went out again this morning before the coffee could finish brewing. Whatever, I'm over it. Although I did curse Tuesdays, until my husband reminded me that it's actually a Wednesday.

We got it together and were out the door, late, of course. On the way to the car Beau and I found a stranded worm destined to become bacon and I picked him and carried him to a little patch of wet dirt. As we stood over the worm proud of our good deed, a sparrow flew out of the nearby bushes right over our heads and snatched the worm from in front of us and was then gone. I screamed, of course, because seriously birds are freaky. Beau was traumatized, I was traumatized he cried over the worm all the way to car... and then for a little while longer just to make sure we got the point.

From there we went to Walmart, and days I haul my kids through Walmart alone are never good days. They're exhausting, sucky, hard work filled days. I pushed their whiney butts up and down aisles and through the check out then back out to the car to load a million groceries and three wild animals. Just as I was loading the baby in the woman who was parked next to me walked up and stood waiting to get in her car. I quickly cleared all my kids and stuff from her side so she could load her bags and leave. She commented on how tired I looked, and yep no coffee this morning so I look like death. She commented on how busy I looked, I juggled my two year old and four year old and diaper bag and answered yep, I was pretty busy. Then she did something unexpected...

This woman put her things in her car then came back around to my cart and asked what she could do to help me. I think my jaw hit the ground. People always comment on how exhausted I look, or how hard it must be to have three kids so young and so close together in age. I've never had someone stop and help. She loaded all my groceries while I strapped the kids into their seats and I thanked her over and over and then she left. You know what? Just like that my day was better and just a little easier and I'm thankful. I feel like I'm carrying a torch of kindness, or something cheesy like that, maybe I'll be out without my kids someday and can pay it forwarded to another stressed momma who just needs a little help.