I should have known from the grouchy wake-ups.

It was the first day in a while that had both a bit of warmth and some sunshine though.

Two outta three prerequisites isn’t bad right?

Wrong.

Oh, and I figured I’d go without Brad who usually does the placing and entertaining using his nimble skills to jump out of the way just in time for the click of the camera.  (You didn’t think the good shots were easy shots, did you?)

Here we go:

{testing the waters}

{don’t throw them at her, throw them up}

{apparently big brother has too many cooties to sit next to}

{hey guys!  over here!  look at momma!  hey!  remember me?!?  LOOK AT ME!!}

{I give this idea a thumbs down, mom.}

{hey, you mind checking my diaper?}

So it’s taken me a few days to settle down after this total flop of a favorite photo session each fall.  I was totally infuriated and might have overreacted just a tad to things not going how I wanted.  After looking through thing a few times, here are three that considering the rest, turned out okay.  (Although I’d still love a re-do session.)

Ugh.

We got the proofs back today for Nate’s school pictures.

Ugh.  He’s beyond adorable.

Ugh.  They cost what?!?!?

I’m having a bit of sticker shock.  Nate’s never had pictures taken before.

When I want a posed shot, I pose him and take the picture.  I have a nice camera so I figure why not.

Honestly I was hoping they’d turn out poorly.  Then I wouldn’t feel torn between wanting to order his first school pictures ever and not wanting to pay way too much for them.  What’s a parent to do?

And if we do order any, we have to decide what pose/color.

Ugh.

I’m thinking about heading here this afternoon.

(same as here.)

Pending a happy waking of my children from nap time and cloud cover staying away.

Don’t worry. As long as you hit that wire with the connecting hook at precisely 88mph the instant the lightning strikes the tower… everything will be fine.

-Dr. Emmett Brown (Back to the Future)

Time travel.

For a moment today I thought we’d traveled back in time.

Back to our St. Louis days.

Suddenly from my living room, I was hearing a commercial phrase which took years to get un-etched from my brain.

“Cheap, cheap, fun, fun.”

Noooooooooo!

One of the things Brad and I talked about as we left St. Louis in 2006 was how we were not going to miss the commercials for “the last refuge of the persecuted smoker”.  The.  Most.  Annoying.  Commercials.  Ever.  Ever!  (Highly rivaled by the radio jingle that went something along the lines of “rattle, rattle, clank clank”.  I can’t remember who it was for though or any more of how it went.)

Apparently the Husker game broadcast we got was showing St. Louis commercials for some reason.  Luckily, we only caught the commercial once since Brad does so much flipping between games during breaks.

There are so many aspects of St. Louis I’d love to relive (living on The Hill, Sunday afternoon walks at the Zoo, Galleria, Bandana’s BBQ, teaching at Hope); I had no desire to travel back to our “cheap, cheap, fun, fun” days though.

gray day, rainy day, rainy day, gray day.

this has kinda been the norm in the recent days/weeks.  it can be wearing from the point of view of a stay at home mom.  some days this past week were.  thursday it rained non-stop.  (seriously, non-stop.)  we didn’t go anywhere, but somehow it ended up being a great day.  i even gave you a glimpse of our fun.

as we waited for daddy to get home from work, the three of us cuddled up on the  couch with good old curious george.  (what we would do without that monkey and his daily visits to our house?)  it was so much fun for me to lie there with the kids enjoying some cuddle time.

after a while though, i could take it.  i had to take a picture of how cute they were.  they just so happened to look up to see what i was doing one right after the other.  it looks like i called their names to get them to look, but i didn’t.  they’re just that cute.

love them.  (and nate’s dragon toes.)

It’s like they know it’s cold, rainy, and momma ain’t taking ‘em anywhere today.

Our day so far?

A battle for the goldfish which I think the crumb covered couch was the big loser of that battle.

A child found sitting upon the coffee table.  (Not going to say if this was following watching a parental figure do a similar thing.)

Missing child.

A dragon shaking his booty.

A tiger trying to escape.

Underwear/Diaper-only children running through my house.

Bath-water soaked underwear thanks to “helpful” little sister.

A stool hiding in the sink from a certain little miss who thought it might help her get in on brother’s bath time.

I think I’d better stop documenting this day, and let it be one of those “don’t tell daddy” days.

Who knew.

I’ve never thought of myself as an overly sentimental/emotional-in-that-way person, but apparently I must have gained a tinge of it with motherhood.  When I learned Brad’s parents were not going to be bringing the kids back to me until late in the day, my mind began to race with all I could get done.  I immediately knew though how I could best use my time.

See, when we put the house on the market, we thought we’d need to paint Jill’s room before it went up.  We were told to hold out though and see what happened.  Just in case we ended up with a buyer who also loved her room.  Unfortunately we didn’t so we were taken up on our offer to paint it for the buyers.  (Plus, we also were asked to paint over the stripe in Nate’s room which I’m still kicking myself for saying yes to.  I should have just offered them the rest of the paint can.)

Anyways, a day without the kids was the perfect day to get some painting done.  With less than 2 weeks before closing, it’s time to be accomplishing our list of tasks that haven’t been crossed off yet.

Who knew I’d get teary eyed over silly stripes.  Yes, we knew when painting them they’d probably only appeal to us, but we loved them.  It was such a fun looking nursery.  It took 2 coats of primer over the entire room and a third coat over the red stripes.  We’re hoping to paint it the same dark tan as Nate’s room on Saturday.

One good thing that’s come of it though is good practice.  I’m not the best wall painter, and I’d rather practice at this house than our new one! 

{it took a lot of taping, measuring, and leveling to make this room happen back in june of 2006}

{completed room}

{valence made and added a couple months later}

{in the middle of the first coat of primer}

{after 2 full coats of primer}

It just made me sadder than I realized I would be. . .

Are there stripes in store for the nursery at the new house????

hmmm,

not sure what’s worse:

a – unknowingly walking around with a cheerio stuck to your butt

or

b – having your mom post a picture of it on the internet

three and a half?!?!?!?

i was a bit shocked when i noticed nate’s birthday ticker the other day said 3 years 6 months.  my baby big boy is 3 1/2 already!

he’s an absolutely amazing kid.  (crazy to think he’s more of a kid than a toddler now!)

he continues to ask questions non-stop.  he’s a lover of learning!!  in the past 3 days he’s started asking me things like, “mommy, what letter does ______ start with?” and “what does (insert letter) say?”  seriously, we’re ready for phonics???  i was caught a bit off guard, but excited all at the same time.  i’m totally open to any ideas any of you fellow parents have found successful.  i googled “beginning letter sounds games” this evening after dinner, and we ended up picking the site starfall.  i recognized the name from my teaching days, but i had never had experience with it.  we went with step 1 and did the letters Aa, Bb, Cc, Tt, Nn, and Ee.  I loved it for so many reasons.  One it was on the perfect level for him.  It was introducing him more-so to lower case (didn’t call them “little”, a teacher pet peeve of mine) letters which I’ve never pushed.  He was also getting more practice using the mouse.

He’s a huge helper!  When we were filling out his All About Me sheet for preschool and one box said “What are you best at?”  His sweet reply said with all seriousness was, “helping”.  Have I mentioned how much I love that boy???

We’re having what I hope are normal trying threes issues with obeying.  He always has an excuse to stall or is flat out disrespectful in his responses to us asking him to do something.  Bedtime has become a real challenge.  We’re doing our best to put an end to the 1, 2, 3 counting.  Whereas it was super effective, why should it take until 3 to get things done?  Shouldn’t he move on 1?  Now we are reminding him to “listen and obey” or and then state the consequence.  You should have heard the boy scream for 15 minutes over riding in the van without shoes because he didn’t want to put them on when we said it was time.

He continues to be obsessed with trucks, tractors, and all such things.  He loves the Q construction, and I’m sure he’ll miss it when we move next month.  He also got to witness harvest from the inside of a combine at Grandma and Grandpa’s house.   This has led to only playing combines for over a week now.  He knows so much about them it’s just plain scary!

Another thing I’d love some insight into are fears.  We seem to be afraid of just about any and everything currently.  What has worked for you in battling them?

Last thing.  We are finally getting allergy answers.  He went for allergy testing last Tuesday, and he’s highly allergic to mold.  We are still waiting to receive the full report in the mail.  They also did an xray, and we are headed to an ent later this week to discuss his adenoids.  They are quite enlarged, and we’ll share more when we know more.  The enlargement though is most likely a contributing factor to all of his sinus issues.

One more time, I love that boy!!!

(i totally switched from all lower case to lower and upper case as I wrote this post, but I’m too lazy to fix it.  Just wanted you to know, that yes, i noticed!) 

if you’re on facebook, you’ve seen this picture already.  if not, i just had to share it.  look at that cute little hair-do.  true, it only lasted about 5 minutes before she had accidentally knocked it out.  but it was cute while it lasted.  next i’ll have to try pigtails.