Terrific Tuesday!

Mike is home.

What more can I say?

Let's see...

I slept in this morning.

I didn't drive kids to school.

I didn't make lunches.

I went to the grocery store alone while Kira napped.

I didn't change her poopy diaper this morning.

Life is as it should be again. :)

Not that Mike should do these things every day, but man, oh man, it was nice to get some sleep and a break from the responsibility this morning.

Grrrr....

This was sooo close to the perfect picture... just a tad fuzzy.

Moody Monday

Moody isn't really the right word here, but the mood in the house changed a lot today from yesterday.

First off, Kira actually slept pretty well last night. That's a big change from the past few nights. And secondly, I didn't wake up with my head swimming all over the place. I just couldn't get my inner ear to balance out yesterday. The swirlies lasted for a few hours. It was weird and concerning.

But today was better.

I got the kids off to school with no trouble. Kira took a two hour nap mid morning and I got a lot accomplished.

Of course, now that the kids are home, the baby is down for her afternoon nap, and I've got dinner cooking, I'm ready to crash.

I probably did too much today, but while Kira was down for her long two hour nap, it just felt so good to clean the kitchen, do laundry, sweep, and just get things orderly.

Our FHE tonight will have to be a movie that hopefully I can veg through. Maybe Kira will be happy after her nap and comply with my needs. :)

And I had a mini photo shoot with her today that yielded a couple of really nice pictures, so I'll put those up later.

She just fussed... she's only been down for thirty minutes. Ahhhh... my evening isn't looking good!

Get home fast, Mike!

Swirly Sunday

So I hit my wall. My head is swimming.

Mike?

Mike? You there, Mike?

Please come home soon.

Can I make it another 40 hours? I don't see that I have much choice...

Good thing she's freaking cute.

Freaky Friday

Okay... so no one around here switched identities with a parent, but man, it was a freaky Friday.

Going back to Thursday night, I had gotten back from taking my mom to the airport. Mike made some quesadillas for dinner and then I went to the grocery store. While I was walking in the store, the missionaries called me and said, "Hi, Sister South? We show that you signed up for tomorrow night." I did NOT remember doing this. They stood me up last time I signed up to feed them, so I wasn't going to sign up again until I had talked to them... Anyway, I said, "Um, okay... Oh, wait, my husband is going to be out of town." Which means that the missionaries can't come in the house because I would be alone and that's a missionary no-no. And then I guess I was feeling guilty, so I said, "I can pack up some dinners for you and you can come pick them up." He said, "Oh, are you sure? That would be great. And did you know there are four of us now?" WHAT!?! There's usually only two missionaries. Why on earth do we have FOUR? "Fine." I knew I had the stuff at home for lasagna, so I would just make that. I picked up some corn and figured that would do.

Then Mike calls and says, "Hey, did you remember that Zach has a campout tomorrow? And he needs a foil dinner."

Ugh.

So Friday morning I started on the lasagna right away. Then I started cooking the chicken for Zach's foil dinner. I could have just sent him with lasagna, but he wanted the foil dinner and I figured we might be tight on lasagna, so I did the foil dinner.

And I was doing laundry, too, because Mike needed to pack for his trip this weekend. Yep. Mike's gone. He left at 3:15 on Friday to get to his flight. I had to leave at 3:25 to pick Reid up from school. Kira had just gone down for a nap, so I left her home with Zach, Jacob, and Cole. She was awake when I came home with Reid.

Then the missionaries came for their food. Then I took Zach up to church (with Kira) for his campout. Kira fell asleep on the way home and slept for a little while, but not too long.

Then I got home and decided I would ignore the kitchen for a while, so I sat on the floor with Kira and watched Super Nanny. I love her.

Then around 10pm, I took Kira to bed. She screamed her head off for a long time. Then she woke up every two hours on the nose to eat.

So now it's Saturday and I'm cleaning the kitchen that I left yesterday, doing more laundry, and trying to get the house decently clean for when an old friend stops by on his way home from a conference he's been attending in Austin.

Whew.

Mike gets back LATE Monday night. So I've got three days of me and the kids.... I'm sure I'll survive, but it would be better if he were here for me to bring him Kira when she wakes up at 5:45 happy and ready to play. Given, though, that Jacob is carrying her around like a little dad, I think I'll try to enjoy this time. :)

Pictures

Here's a picture I took while we were waiting in line to go into the Alamo. It's a great tree just outside the wall that surrounds the Alamo grounds.


I love how it's all twisted, but huge. Makes me think of the question: "Would you go back in time and change something you did or said." I might not like a lot of the decisions I made or things that happened in my life, but I like where I am, so even if it's a little twisted, it's beautiful and should be appreciated. (Deep stuff, man.)

And here's the three generations of girls:


You should have seen what Mike was doing to make Kira smile like that. It was priceless. I wish I could have videotaped him trying to get her to smile. He's a funny guy. And we're three cuties. Although one of us is cuter than the rest.

And speaking of that cutie, she's staring at me with puppy dog eyes, sucking her bottom lip, and reminding me that it's been 4 (!!!) hours since she ate.

San Antonio, Cereal, and Mom

We went to San Antonio last Saturday. I am in love with the River Walk.

My goodness.

It was so nice.

We enjoyed walking through the Alamo, too, but the River Walk just stole my heart. I want to go back sometime sans kids and just spend the whole day walking on the river, enjoying good food, and pretending I'm all fancy and cultured.

And Kira has started having a little rice cereal. She had gotten to the point where several times during the day, she would nurse and then nurse again 45 minutes later. I decided that 5 months was good enough for exclusive nursing (and I weigh about 15 pounds less than I did when I got pregnant) and so we have started the cereal. She seems to enjoy it. She has been watching us eat for the past couple of weeks and has been very interested in the whole eating thing, so it seems like a good time for everyone involved.

My mom has been here for the past five days. We actually picked her up from the airport in San Antonio and went to the Alamo and Riverwalk with her. She just spent the week hanging out with our family. She and I went to IKEA, the Round Rock Outlets, Anthropologie, and we drove by the State Capitol building downtown. It was a good week. And she did my dishes all week and my laundry. Waking up each morning to a clean kitchen (that you didn't clean) is heaven.

And, like a good granddaughter, Kira started crawling while Mom was here. It's so fun to watch her in the beginning stages of crawling. And she'll also sit up unassisted for a good little while, too. Of course, now Mike and I are looking around the house thinking, "Great... we've got to baby proof things." I think we thought we'd get away without it in this house and just deal with it when we move in to the other place... ha! She's got too much to do to wait for us to move.

Sea World

Here's Mike's funny version of our Sea World trip:

big old fat orca
jumps up very high and flips
everybody claps

pushing the stroller
people pointing and smiling
kira noms her toe

big roller coaster
gave dad some pause on first ride
cole rode it five times

mike wonders if all
know the internet "nom" meme
provides helpful links

http://assets.sbnation.com/imported_assets/24138/nom-nom-nom_medium.jpg

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=om%20nom

He was quite proud of himself for his fancy haikus.

He was right, though. :) We had a good time. Cole enjoyed the roller coaster a lot! I rode it once and it was alright. I'm not a big fan of being jostled around. This one wasn't as bad as a wooden roller coaster would have been, but it was still a little too much for me. I think I'm getting old.

I took Kira to see the Sea Lion show. That was kind of cute. The boys were in line for a roller coaster (The Steel Eel). Then I took the three bigger boys to ride The Great White roller coaster. It was pretty good. The line was short, so that was nice. Then everyone except Reid watched the Beluga whale show (which mostly had the dolphins doing tricks). Reid waited in a much too long line for a pitiful log ride. He wasn't too happy about it. Oh well... live and learn.

We went out to the car for lunch and Reid took a little nap. It was cute to see him just fall asleep amid all of the activity. Kira needed a nap, so I stayed there to nurse her and see if she would sleep for a while. And she might have, but an airplane flew over so low that we felt the sonic boom and about 50 car alarms went off in the parking lot. I'm sure the pilot was very proud of himself.

So I met up with the guys again and Reid and I headed over to a big splash ride. We got sufficiently wet and then headed over to the Shamu show. Mike was with the other kids and watched the show, but we weren't all together. Reid and I found seats pretty low in the audience, so we were in the "splash zone". We did indeed get splashed by the whales. Reid and I both thought that the famous splashing would have come from them flipping around in the water. We didn't know that they actually went under and used their tales to splash the audience.

After that, we pretty much went over to the Steel Eel roller coaster and Kira and I hung out while the boys rode it over and over and over again. Then we hit the gift shop.

No doubt about it: That's a kid who went to Sea World!

And this is a kid who went to Sea World, but who's a little more nonchalant about it.

It was nice to spend a fun day together. We'll probably go back on a weekday during April or May when the water park will be open.

A Bear of Very Little Brain

This morning I was feeling fairly on top of things. Life wasn't feeling completely overwhelming to me. It was a good feeling. I decided to tackle something that's been on my to do list for a few months: take the Sienna in to get the driver's window fixed.

It's covered under our warranty, so it's not like it's going to cost us much. I just have had other things to do, I suppose. :)

Anyway, back to my story...

I had some paperwork to sign and I noted that it was Friday the 13th. I always like Friday the 13ths.

And last night was Survivor. Which means today is Friday.

And I was making plans to drop Reid off at church for a campout. Which means today is Friday.

And I picked up the younger kids from school at 12:45. Which means...

You guessed it: it's Friday.

So when I showed up at the library to pick up a book I had requested and the sign said they were closed, I was like, "WHAT?"

I looked at their schedule and saw:

Mon - Thurs 10am - 9pm
Friday - Closed

I thought, "Today's Monday... is it a holiday that I don't know about?"

Then Zach said, "Oh, they're closed on Fridays."

It's sad really. Knowing that your brain doesn't function properly. Makes me wonder how many other things that I think don't make sense are a result of my sad little brain. And how long would I have stood there wondering what was going on if I hadn't had Zach there? Sad.

15 Years!

Mike and I have been married for 15 years today. It seems so hard to believe that it's been 15 years. And yet, our wedding day seems like another lifetime ago.

So much has happened over these years. Five children, 6 homes, 6 jobs, unemployment, home improvements, miscarriages, homeschool, public school... a life full of joy and difficulty.

I'm grateful for the institution of marriage. How inspired it is. Knowing that someone else wants your children to be good, honest people just as much as you do, knowing that someone else feels the same anguish when a pregnancy ends suddenly, knowing that someone else thinks you are beautiful, knowing that someone else truly loves you. That's pretty amazing. When I think of all of the good times and hard times, I can't imagine wanting to go through them with anyone else. To quote our wedding rings:

Ruth 1:16 - Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.

Mike and I feel extremely blessed to have each other. We often say to each other, "I'm glad I'm going through this with you." There's no where else we'd rather be.

So tonight we will celebrate with our kids. We celebrate our anniversary as our "Family Birthday".

Happy 15th Birthday, South Family

And rest assured, there will be many more.

Video

Here's a video of Kira talking to me. She's pretty cute.

Kira had a Doctor's Appointment

I took her in today for the first time since she came home from the hospital. She weighed 14lb 12oz. That's the 65th percentile for weight. Most of the boys were right at 16 lbs by 6 months, so I think she's right on track. She was 25 inches long. They didn't say the percentile for that...

And she amazed the doctor with her alertness and physical strength. I'm surprised by how unusual they think it is. All my boys were pretty much like Kira... maybe they're trained to tell you your kid is special.

And now if she'll figure out that 3:30am is not an appropriate waking time, she'll be the apple of my eye once again. But the past two nights have caused me to miss much sleep. Last night in particular. I'm super tired today. Hopefully she'll get her nights figured out again soon.

In the meantime, here's a fun little story with accompanying pictures:

Mike took Kira out for a walk in the Ergo carrier. He put her on his back and headed out the door. She was pretty fussy when he left and Mike figured she might fall asleep on the walk. A while later, he came back in the house with a quiet baby. He walked past me and this is what I saw:

She had sunk down into the carrier. We were all being very quiet while Mike and I made signals to each other with our eyes about how to get her out of the pack without waking her.

Then

Mike

turned

around

and

this

is

what

I

saw:

It doesn't get much sweeter than that.

Floor Plan

This post may make you think that I'm totally ignoring what I said about learning patience and contentment, but I promise I'm not obsessing over the house.

Really.

In fact, I rearranged my living room furniture yesterday to optimize space and make it more friendly for Kira when she starts to crawl. I wouldn't have thought of doing that last week because I knew we were just going to be moving soon. So there.

Back to the house... I downloaded the floor plan from the builder's website. When you see it, you have to flip it horizontally to get the direction of the layout of our house. (Our house is backwards... suits us, right?)

Several changes were made at the request of the family who had the home built:

The Dining Room is a bedroom. The room was shortened a little bit along the powder room wall so they could add a closet and put a shower in the bathroom. There's a door from the bedroom into the bathroom, so it's a guest master. There is no walkway from the kitchen into the bedroom, so the pantry was enlarged to fill that space.

They moved the wall that is between the master bedroom and the kitchen back (into the bedroom) by about two feet. It opens the space up in the living room/kitchen area a lot. And the master is still huge.

If there's one problem with the floor plan downstairs it's that I don't know how well our washer and dryer will fit in the laundry room. The front loaders are deeper than the standard w/d and this utility room is a tad small... we'll see. The realtor asked me if I would consider getting a standard washer and dryer. I was like, "Uh, NO way, man!" I'll figure something out. I'm fancy like that.

They didn't really do anything fancy to the upstairs. They have the Opt Bedroom 4 and Bath 3. That bathroom has a really big shower instead of a tub. I like that. Oh... and they did add a door from Bedroom 2 into Bath 2. So that makes another semi-master.

So that's the house. Pretty fantastic, huh?

And now I'm going to go clean the kitchen that is in the house that I currently live in where I am perfectly content to be... at least for a while...