And the Journey Continues....

Well, March is over as of tomorrow, and I would like to tell you that I am now the perfect mother.....but that would be a lie. Do I still get frustrated by about 4:30pm...yes....do I still find my self snapping and loosing patience....yes. But on the positive note I have learned to take little moments to truly enjoy my children. For example, today Reagan and I played "lets run away from mommy, and then run back again" for about a half an hour. I loved listening to her laugh, she really thought it was the funniest thing. And yesterday I took the time to sit on the floor and play dinosaurs with Cameron. He has such an active imagination,that sometimes I truly believe that "his brain is bigger than his head".
So my lessons in motherhood will continue on in April, as the focus for this month is "have fun".
It sounds silly, but this is something that I truly struggle with, just letting go and having fun. I somehow got an extra large dose of the "responsibility gene". I feel like I can't let go and have fun unless all my work is done. And being a wife and a mother the work is never done! There are always dishes to wash, laundry to do and messes to clean up. But I have to ask myself, as my husband does on a regular basis, "why don't I like fun?"
I guess it is hard for me to see the value in fun...I have seen it as something that I can do without. I also see the "practical" side of fun, the mess that will have to be cleaned up afterwards, or the craziness of trying to catch up on the work that didn't get done while the fun was being had.
So this month, I am determined to cut loose and have fun. I want to get the feeling back that I had when I went sledding with Cameron a few months ago.
My plan of attack is to take a day a week and plan a fun activity for myself and the kids. I want to take Cameron to the Museum of Natural History, because I know he would love it and have at least 5000 questions! Depending on the weather I want to take the kids to a petting zoo.
I also want to take time to have fun myself, to do the things that I really enjoy, even if my house isn't perfect. I love scrapping, and am so far behind it isn't funny. I plan on taking my camera out and figuring out the new lenses I got for Christmas that I haven't used yet.
We shall see how this goes, I will be honest this is kind of a daunting task!

Week 3

Well after the excitement of week two, I kinda had to take some time to recover. However, this week I am instituting a new project.
My weeks tend to get really busy, really quickly. Before I know it we are running around each and every day. So I have decided to devote Tuesdays and Thursdays to my kids. On Tuesdays Cameron will be in charge of picking our activities. On Thursday we will do things that are more geared to Reagan. I want my kids to feel special, and I really believe that taking this time with them will do that. They need to understand that they are more to me than just "baggage" that I carry as I go about my day to day life. They need to realize that they are my life, the time I have with them is so short! Next year Cameron will be in school, so each day I have with him is a treasure.
I did realize this week that I still have a long way to go when it comes to becoming that mom I want to be. On Tuesday Cameron came into my room at 7:00 to wake me up. Usually I am up way before him, but my husband didn't have to be at work till later, so we both used the time to catch up on sleep. Instead of waking up with a song, I was grumpy and sluggish and kinda snapped at him. The minute I saw the hurt look on his face I felt so guilty! So I got out of bed...acted more cheerful than I felt and started over. We sang and laughed our way through the morning. I really need to work on not letting what I am feeling affect how I interact with my children.
The wonderful thing is that children are very forgiving. I asked for Cameron's forgiveness and he gave it without hesitation. That is another lesson I can learn from my children.


Matthew 19: 14
But Jesus said, Let the little ones come to me, and do not keep them away: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.

Week Two

So my plans yesterday was to sit down and write this blog. I had written it in my head, and had the whole thing planned out.
But then we had an incident that changed my plans for the day. After Reagan ate her lunch she decided to go on a rampage of doing everything she is not supposed to do. When I took her brothers shoe away from her, declining to let her chew on it, she threw a tantrum.
Now this is not a new thing, she has gotten into the habit of throwing tantrums and not breathing, and then passing out, and she is fine again. I checked with the doctor and she said this is normal behavior.
Yesterday, however, after she passed out,she did not come to right away. I picked her up and her eyes opened but she wasn't breathing. I finally had to blow in her mouth a couple of times to get her breathing again, and then I called 911.
To make a long story short, she is fine now. They don't know why she didn't come to right away, but she is fine and running amuck as usual.
I have never been so scared as when I was holding her and she was turning blue. I have never prayed so hard!
I was a wreck the rest of the day. The whole incident renewed my resolve to spend more time with my kids, enjoying them and this time where they still want to play and spend time with me!

Month 3: Motherhood

“Motherhood has a very humanizing effect. Everything gets reduced to essentials.”
Meryl Streep quotes

March is the month where I really want to work on my mothering skills. I also want to take time to learn things from my kids.

"When our inner child is not nurtured and nourished, our minds gradually close to new ideas, unprofitable commitments and the surprises of the Spirit."
— Brennan Manning



Before I became a mom I had , what I realize now, was a delusional picture of motherhood. Much to my dismay no heavenly light shone down on me while I rocked my sleepy baby and no birds chirped sweetly in the morning to wake me after a restful night sleep. Instead there was poopy diapers, spit up, crying, dishes to be washed, and a house to keep clean. Life didn't stop just because there was a new member of our family. The other members still needed attention.

With this being said, I am the happiest I have ever been in my role of wife and mom. But there are still hard days, days where I have answered 500 questions , changed 10 diapers,said no 5,000 times and cleaned up 20 messes....all before 9am.

I know that I will still have the hard days, but I really want to work on an action plan so that I don't completely go insane during those times. I am going to take some of the ideas in Gretchen Rubin's "Happiness Project". One of the ones I am going to work on is waking up my kids every morning with a song. She noted that when they started the morning with a silly song the morning went better. So that is my goal for this first week.

As for learning things from my children, both Cameron, Reagan and Patience are unique in there own ways, so here are the attributes that I would like to incorporate into my life from them.

Cameron (age 4 1/2): His desire to know "EVERYTHING". I love to study, but don't make time for it. I have a couple of subjects I would like to know more about, so this month I am going to make that a priority.
Regan (age 1): Her ability to ask for what she needs. One of my characteristics that I would like to change is my need to do everything myself. I very rarely ask for help, and when I do, I feel like I am letting everyone down. Pride doesn't keep Reagan from making her needs known, I need to do the same.
Patience (age 9 1/2): I don't get to see Patience as often as I would like, but one of her qualities that I most admire is that she hands out compliments all the time. She always has an encouraging word, and I would really like to develop that in my life.