Thankful

We thanksgivinged (yep, I'm sure that's a real word) over two days this year. On the actual day with Steve's side and yesterday with mine. Drawing it out had several effects on me - one is that I was actually able to move at the end of Thursday after having eaten just one large meal instead of two. Secondly, it gave me and my sister the opportunity to repay our mom for 30+ years of fixing the Thanksgiving meal by preparing it ourselves. Lastly, it gave me two days to reflect on what I'm truly thankful for.

So I'll bore everyone now with a list of my big ones....

I am thankful for and to my God first and foremost. That I have a loving, gentle God who has a plan for me and for my family. That I can trust in Him always and lay my burdens at His feet. It is through Him that all my other blessings are possible. I try my best to remember that every single day.


I am thankful for my wonderful husband -my partner in life and my friend. I could not dream of a better dad for my kids or a better companion with whom to spend the rest of my life.


I am thankful for my beautiful children. Without them, my life would not be what it is. They have changed me in more ways than I ever could have imagined. I did not know love until I held them in my arms. They are the joy in my heart and the light in my eyes (most days anyway...ha ha).


I am thankful for my family. For two wonderful families who have become my family. One I was born into and the other I married into and I love them both. Very much.

I am thankful for the fact that my husband has a job and that we have a roof over our heads, a home filled with love, two (mostly) wonderful dogs, and a life filled with the warmth of friends and community.

Lastly, I'm thankful for the fact that the turkey turned out yesterday and that we got almost everything on the table at the temperature it was meant to be served.

He keeps!!

Tattling is pretty commonplace in our house these days. LOTS of tattling. It's annoying. It's old. It's absolutely WEARING some days. But in the midst of it, there is humor. It's "he keeps."

"Moommmmmmm, Colby is playing on the stairs!"
"Colby, get down, please."
"He keeps!"

What she means is that he's continuing to do it. But "he keeps!" is what she says. And it makes me laugh. Every time. A related statement is "he's still!" which means anything but that her brother is actually physically unmoving. Ha ha ha.

This picture has nothing to do with this post, but it makes me laugh - even more than "he keeps!"

The word of the day...

Colby's vocabulary is finally starting to take off. Most of the things he says are still only intelligible by Steve or me although Kailin often makes a diligent attempt ("Mom, I fink he's saying he wants....") if we can't figure things out. But the thing is he's trying - and quite pleased with himself I might add.

He seems to have a word of the day sort of approach. He masters a new word early in the day and then it becomes his mantra and his mission in life to find each instance of the word and point it out to someone (usually me).

Words of the day have included:

SEE!!!! (seat) That one caused us to traipse all over the house to find each and every seat in the place at least once. Several (the couch) were "discovered" at least a dozen times.

Fee!! (oddly, fan) He insistent and emphatic that fan is "fee". I wish I could paint a good picture of how he says it. It's whispy - almost the way some people say white more like it's hwite, but it's with his f sound. He makes the same gentle sound when he says....

Foo!! (phone) No idea why it's foo, but it's consistently so.

Ya-ya (Kailin) Not sure where he decided that Ya-ya was the way to go, but it's what he calls her and he loves to roam around looking for something that belongs to Ya-ya so that he can declare it so. He also knows she's Bubbee and he can say Bubbee entirely correctly and distinguishably, but chooses Ya-ya anyway. It's cute!

Yo-yo (Dakota) He is a little yo-yo at times, and it fits!

He's still into shuuuues. Another one I wish I could accurately portray - it's almost she-you, but again, gentle. His favorites are his sister's - on the wrong feet. That boy...

I think those are the biggies right now. I can't wait for his language to blossom and make it easier for us to understand him - and to better meet his (increasingly demanding) needs.

He's grown so much in these past 8 months. It's amazing. Just amazing. --As is the amount he's been eating lately - must be going to grow some more!

Blog-a-palooza!

All good intentions aside, last week was crazy and blogging time was - well, nil. So I'm going to do my darndest to blog it up today and not only catch up on this week's events, but also get the bog posts that I've been meaning to get done written and posted and release my blogging guilt once and for the time being. Ha ha. I'm not optimistic enough to believe that it will be once and for all. So as my son slumbers and my daughter sucks away on her overly sticky candy cane, I'll pound the keys until my fingers bleed (or until my interruptions exceed my ability to maintain my train of thought).

Memory

Kailin has, in my opinion, an amazing memory.

Last week we were playing with Mega Bloks and she said, "Mom, member when Colby got these? It was when he was Baftized." She's right. They are his and he did get them as a Baptism gift. That was only 6 mos ago, so it's not really really remarkable, but I still think it's pretty impressive.

The next day we were getting ready to take the dog for a walk and Steve was looking for mittens for Kailin. The ones he grabbed were ones she got last year but hardly ever wore because they are thick and not conducive to movement. She took one look and said, "Daddy! That's the one I lost at the farm! You had to go back, get it." She did lose it at the farm - the CHRISTMAS TREE FARM. Last year. And he did have to go back and get it.

The things she remembers amaze me and the things that catch her eye or make an impression often times make me think twice about how I handle myself around her. I'm SURE that the day will come when she'll remember something out loud that I hoped she'd forgotten. But for now, I'm going to continue to be impressed with her memory skills and I wanted to write it down before I forget - hers may be sharp as a knife, but mine are lacking these past few years.... ha ha ha.

Ho costumes and hooker trucks...

I figured I'd better make my first post a doozy to make up for my neglectfulness. Intriguing title, isn't it? It's really two stories...

Kailin and I were playing pretend recently when she said, "Here's a costume for you, Mom." I "put it on". The remainder of the conversation went like this:

"What kind of costume is this?"
"It's a Ho costume!"

"A HO costume?!"

"Yes."

Much silence while I pondered how to approach this.

"Kailin, what does a Ho costume look like?"

"You know, like a Ho...like a monkey..."

"OH! You mean a HoHo costume - like HoHo on Kailan?"

"Yeah, like HoHo, but it's short - it's a Ho costume!"

"Let's not call it that, okay?"

Then last week while my friend Julie was over I heard the following come from the living room:

"Juwee, will you help me with my hooker truck?"

I knew immediately that she was talking about her tow truck (which she has always previously called a tow truck) and I also knew I was darn glad I was in the kitchen where she couldn't see me laughing my butt off!

Woefully neglected

I know this blog has been woefully neglected lately. I've been working like a crazy woman to utilize my free books from Snapfish and I thought I had until tomorrow night to finish them. I'm spending the weekend at my mom's (without the kids!!) and figured it would be a great chance to do some work on them without interruption. Then I remembered that I can't connect to the internet at her house and the deadline is tomorrow (the books were free). So I had to up the ante and ramp up my efforts. The one that was the hardest work (I digiscrapped it) and that was supposed to be a surprise for Steve for our anniversary (it's a book of his pictures from his backpacking trip this fall) until Snapfish said that due to overwhelming demand (that'll teach 'em to put a free book on Oprah's site and think it'll be a small response!!) they won't ship it for three weeks. Oh well.... I'll still surprise him on our anniversary, he just won't have the actual article. Anyway.... I have a bunch of posts stored up in my head (and admittedly I emailed the ideas to myself so I wouldn't forget) and I promise to be back on track starting next week. I'll be well rested and ready to go!

I caved!!!

I was driving to the grocery store on Sunday by myself. There were flurries in the air and it was bone chilling cold. And I caved. I listened to the Christmas music stations. What is this world coming to? I'm just as bad as the rest of them now... ha ha. It was one slip. I'm back on the wagon now, though. And I feel better for having gotten that off my chest. ;o)

Inertia

I seem to be battling a whole lot of inertia lately. I am battling forces beyond my control that are preventing me from doing anything - everything. Stuff I don't enjoy doing is even less enjoyable and even more put-offable. Stuff I do enjoy is somehow too much effort. Maybe it's the change of seasons and the natural slowdown at this time of year and the lack of sunny days and daylight in general. .

I am very much looking forward to the Holiday Season when the world remembers to be kind to one another (for the most part) and when my energy is revitalized. Until then I guess my house will be dirty, my laundry unwashed, and the meals simple. Maybe that's not all bad - maybe appreciating a clean house (and the will to clean it) and clean clothes, and nice meals is important and maybe going awhile without them will make it clear. Or maybe we'll just live in squalor and be none the wiser for it. ha ha. Probably not.

Why not downside up?

Another mystery of the world that revealed itself to me in the 30 minutes I would've preferred to have been sleeping this morning.... why is it upside down and not downside up?