Happy Birthday Charlotte! And other update things I want to remember...

TODAY is Charlotte's 15 Birthday. She is one of the most fantastically awesome kids you could ever meet! She's helpful, kind, sweet, SUPER witty, and funny. She's very clever too. When she was about 11 years old we got stranded on the side of the highway in a blinding Midwest rainstorm because our wipers broke suddenly. Totally on her own she took the laces off her shoes tied them together and then tied them to the passengers wiper blade. She pulled the strings up and down and exhausted her arms while I drove peering over on her side to get off the highway. She saved the day. We were actually pulled over at a really bad spot on the highway too. One of my favorite memories of her!

Another favorite...
We were driving along and I said a bad word. I don't remember why. Seven year old Charlotte asked if she could say one bad word given the situation. I thought it was cute. I said sure. Charlotte has always been the child that chooses right from wrong and has always been nice and polite. I was anxiously waiting to hear what she might say. Perhaps damn? Whatever it was it had to be fairly mild. I thought "shit" would be BAD in her book so she'd say that. She suddenly yelled, "MOTHER FUCKER!"

I almost ran off the road! Then I couldn't stop laughing. Actually I was on a dirt road and I pulled over and laughed so hard I cried. I didn't say anything or make a big deal out of it other than my laughter and telling her I did not see that one coming. To be honest I've never heard her say another bad word again either. :)

A favorite quote from when she was about 6 years old and her brother Sage was bothering her...

"Mom, Sage is getting on my last nerd!!!"

Happy Birthday my Charlotte!

Charlotte 10 years ago

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Yesterday my really great husband took a half day off work and hustled home after he heard his wife on the phone stressed out and ranting about the ceiling leaking (leak in upstairs bath) and kids crying in the background. I was totally surprised when he walked in with a bottle of wine at noon. :) He told me he didn't have any meetings and it sounded like I could use him at home today. Then we played and tickled the little kids and tried to do a little homeschool. We laughed and laughed, too. Our kids keep us so entertained. Mostly we just took the opportunity to just live in the moment. A 20 minute nap with each other and the baby, a chance to sit outside and enjoy the weather and kids playing. Then last night after the kids were finally asleep we just sat on the couch and talked. Such a great afternoon and evening. I am so, so happily married.


Other things the home front:
Besides a coldish sickness, runny noses and mild sore throats we've been really busy. We are in the process of making a big volcano out of chicken wire and paper mache. We are doing a super mish-mash unit study on quilting, the American flag, the history of the telephone and communication. In an attempt to get my kids to write more they are developing fictional characters, I'm hoping they will be inspired to write a story...

This week the kids and I went and bought 40lbs of red grapes to freeze and 25+ lbs of tomatoes to make and can more salsa. Why in the middle of a busy week do we decide to do such a thing...because I'm me and they go along with my love of food storage. lol. We are like little squirrels getting ready for winter. I really missed having a huge tomato garden this year, next year it's going to be massive. In about a week we are going to can apple pie filling. Gotta get rid of these tomatoes and grapes first...

The husband and I are embarking on another project too. It might throw everything off for a while. We are cutting a hole in our bedroom ceiling and trying to fix a bathroom leak ourselves. So adventurous. Our life may look boring to some, it's perfectly zany and fulfilling to us.

Seriously this dang leak looks bad! I hope we can fix it, we have 9 people sharing 1 bathroom now! LOL.

The Googly Eye

We have lots of these jumbo googly eyes for crafts. Layla came into the kitchen a couple days ago while I was cooking, her hands were over her eyes and she said, "Mom I can see you..." she then stuck out her tongue and a giant googly eye was there. I told her she was very funny. A few minutes had passed and I'm in my cooking groove stirring my food and thinking about what to do next, suddenly I was hit hard with a whapppp sound across my back and side. It really hurt! I spun around and started to say, "WHAT the..." And there she was wide eyed, scared, pointing to her face, and waving her arms frantically. No sound and no air. She was choking. I spun her around and as I got ready to do the Heimlich maneuver I heard a little air slip through her throat, there was a slight wheezing now. She gasped what air she could, she started choking with a small amount of sound. I reassured her, "You are getting it up, I can hear it, keep coughing, I hear sound now, it's ok. Keep doing that..." She started making gagging sounds and I continued to reassure her she was getting it up. "Good! Throw up," I cheered on. She spit up some chocolaty saliva (chocolate covered pretzels was snack that day) and then finally *SPLAT* a big googly eye hit the kitchen floor. My eyes teared up in relief and my sense of humor laughed at the ridiculousness of a googly eye staring back at me in a pile of chocolate drool. Layla's first gasping words were, "I want and rag and drink of water." As we wiped her off and she took a drink I hugged her and told her that was the scariest funniest thing I'd ever seen at one time. We looked over at the googly eye and the puppies had licked up all the chocolate drool and were now sliding the googly eye around the floor with their tongues. We laughed and laughed in a heap of relief.

Stages of getting sick baby back to sleep in the middle of the night

Stages of baby sickness in the wee early morning hours. Usually applies to colds and/or  fever, not stomach bugs.

Stage 1: restless, flops around in bed, needs changed, wide awake, rosy cheeks

Stage 2: happy to get out of bed, talkative, finds a toy

Stage 3: gets bored, throws toys, starts fussing, may need changed

Stage 4:real tears, settles down to nurse, starts kicking legs and gets bored and fussy.

Stage 5: gets bored, sits up, throws toys, looks sad with watery eyes, cries and/or whines a whole bunch

Stage 6: pace around, rocking, singing, more fussing, may need to be in baby carrier/sling

Stage 7: starts to yawn, settles down usually because baby is ready to really nurse, sleep

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It's 2:45 am and we are at stage 6

Dear Everett,

I'm nursing Everett and checking email as I just sang in my sweetest soft voice, "Happpy birthday tooo youuu." And my little Everett closed his droopy little eyes the second I finished. <3 It was a busy fun day. I told him happy birthday and kissed him a million times, he loved the attention. He loves singing, so that was fun for him to get sung to all day long.

~HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY~

Daycare?

The lady that checked out my giant click 'n pull order at Sam's Club yesterday asked me if I ran a daycare. LOL. I had stuff like 8 bags of bagels, 1 case of cream cheese, 3 boxes of cinnamon rolls, 3 packages yogurt, 3 bags of dinner rolls, pizza rolls, tons of cheese and lunch meat, pretzels, goldfish crackers, crackers, individual chip bags for lunches, 3 huge cans of pineapple tidbits, noodles, salad stuff, frozen fruits and veggies. All the stuff you'd need to feed a whole army of kids!