For My Husband...

Dearest Husband,

I love you so much.

How much?

Enough to post this.






"If you don't believe in love, what's the point of living?"

XOXO,

Wife

PS: Remember how I took all three kids with me grocery shopping today? Target, Costco and Walmart! I deserve a trophy... Well, we did all accidentally drink tea, so maybe just a medal.

Hurry!

Sometimes I feel like everyone in Utah has a mini-freak-out when the weather gets warm.

"Hurry Up! Play! The weather is warm and it's only going to last for a minute!"

I know that's what we've been doing. 

Lots of playing outside, park visits, drink-runs with friends (love you Nicole), eating cookies, staying up past bedtime and lovely farmer's tans.

Oh Happy Day.

Someone got a new camera for Mother's Day.

:)

Liebster?

My friend Lindsay was nice enough to recognize my blog for this little award. Liebster (apparently) is German for "up and coming". I'm not sure if my blog is necessarily as "up and coming" as is it "sad and shocking", but I'm still flattered. ;)

There are a couple of rules you have to abide by upon receiving the award. I now get to pick 5 of my favorite blogs (they have to have less then 100 followers) and give them the award also. Then I get to divulge 5 personal things about myself (Aren't you all lucky!?).

Sidenote: I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do about private blogs. So, sadly, I decided to leave some of my favorite private bloggers out of the running.

1. My friend Brie. Brie is a super cool mama. She and her wonderful husband are just trying to figure out this parenting thing the best they can too. I love her blog because she isn't afraid to blog when things get tough. She's also really funny and her baby Scarlet is adorable.

2. My friend Alex. She's also a very fun mommy. Plus, how can you not love someone who's husband is raising goats in their backyard?!? (Alex, do you have new chickens yet? Yes? No?)

3.  My friend Mandie. I love her blog because she's kicking butt at raising two of the cutest little boys. I love when she posts pictures of her little boys covered in mud because I know that someday Maddox will be covered in mud too. ;) (Mandie, I couldn't' remember if your blog was private or not....)

4. Follow blogger Stephanie also gets this award. I'm pretty sure Lindsay already gave her the award, but I'm giving it to her again. She's been living in CA and is relocating to Boston. BOSTON! Yes, clear across the country. I can't wait to read about her adventures in the East.

5. And finally, Megan. Megan doesn't blog very often, but I still love pretty much every post that she writes. You can really feel how much she loves being a wife and mom. Whenever I start to feel discouraged, I know I can go to her blog for a little blog "pep talk".

Ok, now I get to scar you all with 5 random facts about me.

1. I'm pigeoned-toed. Have we already discussed this? When Holynd was being monitored for all her complications, the perinatalogist told us that they believe being pigeoned-toed can be hereditary. I always watch my kids closely to see if they will be, but haven't really noticed. (It has to be really obvious to be the "real" thing. Sometimes kids walk funny when they're little, that's normal.) There were a few times where I was made fun of, but I've always secretly loved this little quirk of mine.

2. Matt bought me a hand-vac a few weeks ago and I'm addicted to it. Every house with little kids should have one.

3. I hate scary movies. Well, anything scary in general. I can't even watch previews for scary movies without having a tiny freak out. The Twilight movies were almost too much for me and there's no way I'll ever be able to see the Hunger Games. Speaking of the Hunger Games, no I have not read the books and I don't know if I ever will. I'm just too big of a wuss.

4. Since we are on the topic of books, right now I'm reading a biography on J. Edgar Hoover. It's really interesting. Biographies are my favorite kind of book to read. I just finished one about a woman who was held in a concentration camp for helping Jews escape out of German-occupied Holland. I really do love to read and I really like my Kindle.

5. I'm one of the few women who hate the hospital stay after having a baby. It seems like every one I talk to loves to stay in the hospital. I guess I can understand why, they wait on you and you can have them take the baby whenever you need a nap. I'm just a homebody. I like to be in my own bed. I really don't love to travel, but I try to be a good sport and travel with my husband every once- in-awhile.

So there you go. My Leibster Award.  

Motherhood is not Math

My babies minutes before bedtime.

When I was working on my degree, one of my favorite classes was Econometrics. It was a math class and basically what we were taught to do was take society's unpredictable patterns and use math to (somehow) force a regression and make the solution predictable.

Following?

I loved it. Taking something that was crazy, un-uniform and making it come out organized and predictable.

Sounds like my kind of fun.

One thing that I've always loved about math was how easy it was to fix. If the solution came out wrong, I'd just look back, find my mistake, fix it and then move on. There wasn't any room for anything creative, just straight, immovable answers.

Enter Motherhood.

For me, this is where I lack as a mother. When something goes wrong; when someone refuses to use the potty, hates everything I cook, doesn't want to nurse, cries whenever I put them down, throws tantrums in public, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc! I look back and try to figure out where I went wrong. Did we miss nap time? Was the child hungry? Is their tummy upset? Are they sick? Do their feet hurt? Are they going through a growth spurt?

Sometimes I find the mistake and I learn how to fix it.

But sometimes, the mistake can't be found.

Sometimes things just go amiss and I can't explain why. I don't know how to fix it and I find myself more frustrated then ever. A lot of the time I try to let these experiences slide by without a moments thought. Sometimes I suppress my anguish and frustrations and just hope that they'll go away.

My mom used to tell me that I just like to go and go and go until I finally hit a wall. I shut down. I can't keep my emotions in-check, I'm distracted, I'm frustrated, nothing fixes the situation. I just have to have my come-apart. I basically have to throw my own little temper tantrum.

Yesterday I hit the wall.

So many times the solution to my problem came out wrong and the mistake couldn't be found. So many times, I couldn't figure out why I wasn't able to be Super-mom. I pushed the emotions farther and farther down until it all erupted and I hit the wall. Hard.

I basically spent the night sobbing to my husband. (Poor guy).

I'm writing this all down because I think (and hope) that other moms sometimes hit the wall too. Sometimes, even though we are doing our best, we come up short. Sometimes there just aren't enough hours in a day or patience in the world to make things work out the way we want to.

I've tried to figure out many times what this blog is to me. A way to keep my family updated? A journal? What is it?

It all boils down to the fact that this blog is my place to record my experiences as a mother. I know there have been so many times where I look at other moms and just can't figure out how they constantly keep it all together! I hate that feeling of being a less then perfect mom and so I keep this blog, mainly for my kids, to realize that it's ok. It's ok to hit the wall.

It's ok to not have the math come out right.

Dearest Lindsay, I saw your comment. I'm very flattered at your little shout-out to my humble blog. I'm definitely going to fulfill all the requirements of the award, but since having the above mentioned meltdown I'm going to need one more day to meet said requirements. PS: Your family is just so cute.