Inflicting Cruel and Unusual Punishment ?

I consider myself to be a kind person most of the time. I enjoy sacrificing for the happiness of others. It makes me happy. But there is one thing that I admit I have a hard time sacrificing . . . and that is my Saturday morning garage sales.

I try to make it very clear to Lamon that any morning in the warm months of the year that he does not have a scouting trip . . . I must insist on garage saleing. But there are some Saturdays that my wishes are unable to be granted and . . . I just have to bring the kids. Not too bad right?

But I admit that I am a bit disturbed. I knowingly drag my children along sometimes even though I know that there is an extremely high chance that one of the children will throw up during the outing. They were all given weak stomachs from their dear father. I found out about this condition after we got married. I love Amusement parks and one time at Lagoon Lamon wouldn't go on any rides because they made him "sick." I was quite annoyed and kept calling him a party pooper. After that he vowed never to go to an amusement park with me, and even worse he has given this curse to all the children. Almost every time we have gone on long trips, and especially on our garage saleing trips . . . one of them has thrown up. But what do I do? I bring them anyways because I am addicted to garage sales! Aren't I a terrible and deeply disturbed mother? But in my defense I am always prepared with a bucket, and I just pass it back when one of them needs to puke, and then when I am sure they are okay and happy, we continue on to the next sale. Today . . . Hayden was the one making use of the bucket. He wasn't complaining or anything. They are all pretty used to it.
Terrible I know . . . but boy did we find some great stuff this morning! I can't wait until next week :) Hopefully I won't have to drag the kiddies along. Although, I do tend to buy a few more toys when they come. Drew got some pretty sweet fisherprice roller skates today and he hasn't taken them off since we bought them. He cracks me up.

Seeing the Sunny Side of Life

Sometimes you just need a crazy day to appreciate how great life is.

The craziness started when I was supposed to take Ada to the doctors office yesterday, and I couldn't get my key in the ignition. The ignition has been on it's way out for awhile, but we have been able to get the keys in after some manipulation, but not anymore. I tried for about an hour, and ended up having to cancel the appointment and reschedule.

Later while playing outside Drew was riding Ada's bigwheel. He got going really fast and somehow got that bigwheel to turn on it's side and he skinned his knee really bad. He was sad for a few moments but was back to playing after a good cleaning and a bandaid. Then later in the day the kids decided to put up their Cars tent and were playing in it. Ada and Hayden were being a little too rambunctious in the tent so I made them get out, and Ada wasn't too happy about that. She went over to the tent and pushed the side of it. It didn't seem like anything too serious, but suddenly Drew started screaming, "Ouch! Ada hurt me! I'm bleeding, I'm bleeding!" I was like, "Drew she didn't hurt you that bad. You're okay." But he continued, "I'm bleeding. I'm bleeding." "Okay, okay Drew let me unzip this and I can see." I was clearly expecting to see nothing which is often what I find when a kid is saying I'm bleeding. But when I opened the tent up Drew had blood all over his hands and his t-shirt, and it was dripping down the back of his head. He must have fallen back and hit his head on the fireplace. I was like, "Oh boy." I grabbed him up and ran him upstairs and did the only thing I know to do and that was put a towel on the wound and hold it there. I had Drew hold it and went next door. One of the greatest things about where we live is that we have a NICU nurse that lives right next to us. So I went and got him and he came over to inspect it. When he got to our house the bleeding had totally stopped, and he couldn't even get the wound to open up. Lamon has told me how head wounds can always seem worse than they are because they bleed so easily. I am very glad that we didn't have to run to the hospital . . . because the car wouldn't have been able to start anyway.

Later at the dinner table I asked the kids to tell me the good things and the bad things that had happened during the day. Drew responded, "Everything that happened today was good." I said, "Really Drew? What about when you bonked your head? Did you like that?" To this inquiry he shook his head up and down. "Yes." What? He went on, "Well, it was some bad, but mostly good." I was intrigued at this point. Then he said, "It was good because that man came over to help me."

I was pretty proud of Drew for having such a positive outlook on life.

The crazy day ended with the power going out. I always think it's kind of exciting when the power goes out, and it always reminds me how blessed we are to have electricity!!!!

Improving and Fortifying our Armor

A couple of days ago during the Saturday sessions of conference, the kids were running around playing swords with each other. Drew came up to me with some paper and some rubber bands and asked me if I would help him make some armor. It sounded like an interesting idea to me, so I helped him and it was a lot of fun. We started with what you see in these pictures, but at the end of our playing, the kids were pretty much covered with paper from head to toe. Unfortunately as time wore on, their armor didn't last and it all ended up scattered around the family room. I told the kids that we should make their armor out of something a little stronger than paper like cardboard. They liked this idea quite a lot, and they have been looking forward to their new and much stronger armor.
Well could tonight's Family Home Evening lesson have been any easier for me to figure out? We had a blast making some armor together, and then I asked them why people use armor, and Hayden said, "To protect our bodies." I was pretty impressed by his answer. I then told them that I was going to read about a different kind of armor, a kind of armor that protects our spirits. And then I read from Ephesians 6:11-17. I'd like to say that they all sat down like angels the whole time for this . . . but um . . . not so much. Hayden was playing a drum and climbing on the bookshelf, Ada was screaming because she wanted to wear the helmet of Salvation and there were only two. So amidst the chaos I am reading the scriptures to them and there might of been a few intermittent yells from me like, "Hayden! Get down. Get over here! Ada stop whining or you're going in your bed!" And of course times those threats by like maybe 1o. I was like, "Don't you know that this is supposed to be fun?" Besides Hayden and Ada's moments of craziness It really was fun. The kids had a blast and were begging me tonight to play with their armor again in the morning. And I can at least say that Drew might even be able to tell you what some of the armor of God includes.

Ada Update!!!

So three weeks ago, I would have told you that I have an almost mute daughter. Her vocabulary was very limited, and she mostly only pointed and grunted. But in the last three weeks she has just decided that she would talk all of a sudden. And it's not just a couple of words, she is talking in sentences a lot of the time! It has been the craziest thing to watch. It is like she had all the vocabulary just sitting there in her brain, and she finally decided that she would use it!!So I am not so concerned anymore about her development, I think she is going to be just fine!!!

And I now know that a child can pretty much potty train themselves. Ada's been doing a great job at it. I am just there to assist her at times! She is quite the independant little girl! :)

Ada has continued to be very motherly with her dolls. I find her on the stairs all of the time just sitting on a step with all of her babies sitting in a row with bibs from the kitchen drawer sprawled across their laps. That drawer is just within Ada's reach, and she loves to use the bibs as blankets for her babies. It is so fun to watch her with them. She will hold one of the dolls cradled up against her, and she will bounce just like a mommy trying to calm her little one. It is so cute. I am constantly finding a doll sitting in a swing, or a chair, or lying on a pillow. At night time Ada likes to sleep with all of her favorite dolls. There is usually four dolls in bed with her, and if one of them is missing she will cry out, "Baby!!" I can't fool her! She knows if one is not there. I think that she is going to be a great big sister someday, and a great mommy a long time after that! :) I love my little girl.

Is Ada trying to tell me something?

For the last week it has been quite frustrating because Ada will ditch her diaper whenever she goes to the bathroom. It doesn't matter where she is in the house or what she is doing, but she just takes it off and continues her activities. It's been driving me nuts. She doesn't talk, and so I haven't really wanted to try to potty train her.

Well today I found a diaper on the floor, and was like, "Oh great!" And I started to look for the little two year old without her pants on. And where did I find my little Angel? Sitting on the toilet! I thought, "Oh, that is pretty funny!" And I let her sit for a second, and then I said, "Okay Ada, good job! Let's put your diaper on now." So I kept trying to get her to get off the toilet, but she kept on insisting to sit on it. And then finally . . . yep . . . she did it. She pooped!

So now I have three choices. I can either start:
1. Duck taping her diaper shut
2. Attempt potty training her by teaching her to sign potty . . . or
3. Just let her continue potty training herself . . . and see how she does! :)

"Beans" It's what's for dinner!!

On Tuesday we had my brother John over for dinner. I made some Chicken Parmesan with Spaghetti and beans. It wasn't extremely fancy, but it was a good rounded meal. John came over, and I had all the kids sit down as I put all of the food on the table. I set the beans in front of Drews plate, and I turned around to get the Beverage. Suddenly I hear, "Drew!" I turned around and Drew had a big smirk on his face and Lamon said as I put the drink on the table, "Hold on, I think Drew just spit in the beans." What? "Drew, did you just spit in the beans?" Drew said nothing and just kept smiling. "Oh ya, he spit in them." Then Lamon immediately removed Drew from the table and sat him on the stairs for a 5 minute time out.

Meanwhile I was apologizing to John saying, "I'm sorry. Why in the world would he spit in the beans?"John responded, "That's okay. I don't really like beans anyway."

When Lamon got back to the table he suggested, "I have a great idea! What if Drew had beans for dinner?" I agreed that that sounded like a fabulous idea!

Drew returned to the table saying, "Mmmmn, I'm hungry." To which we responded, "Great, because you get to have beans for dinner!" Drew did not so much like that idea. He let us know throughout the entire meal how he didn't want the plate of beans in front of him, he wanted spaghetti! His whines didn't really sway us though, but we decided we would be kind and let him sprinkle cheese on his beans. There were many pleas of, "Mom . . . I'm starving! I don't like beans!" And we continued to tell him that he could have as many beans as he wanted because since he spit in them none of us could eat them and they were all his! They would certainly fill him up. It was a long night of whining for food. Each time Drew said he was hungry, I offered him more beans. And he did reluctantly eat them. It was funny because while this punishment of forcing Drew to just eat beans the entire night was going on, Hayden kept on begging to be able to eat beans like Drew had. Funny little Hayden!

Needless to say, Drew has assured us that his spitting in food days are done! And you know what? . . . I kind of believe him! . . .