I am Thankful!

I know it's not Thanksgiving, but right now I feel like I should express my thankfulness for all that is good in my life. And I have a lot to be thankful for.

I am thankful that another year has gone by that I can truly say that my boys are amazing! My day may come when I have sleepless nights over the trouble they might get into, but that day is not today. My boys do well in school, are well liked, have terrific senses of humor and are a joy to be around. They are not embarrassed to be seen with me... yet! I may not always take the most conventional methods in raising Clayton and Koby, but so far they are growing into two amazing boys.

I am thankful to all of the moms that are still willing to sit next to me at my kids sporting events, despite the fact that I am "that" crazy mom in the stands. They have probably learned the necessity in wearing extra layers of clothing to avoid bruising from my flying arms and even legs in stressful games. I may have to consider taking some sort of anxiety medicine to keep from fully making a fool out of myself and embarrassing my kids. Either that or set up some sort of pre-funk in the parking lot before their games that includes alcohol to settle my nerves. This option has been mentioned by other parents as a bit of a joke, but in all reality I am considering this as a realistic solution!

I am thankful for that girl in town who bears a strong resemblance to me, so much so that on a weekly basis I am mistaken for her. You may wonder why this is a blessing, well, it's simple, she's 10 years younger than me and after doing some research/facebook stalking, I have come to the conclusion that she is prettier than me. Hence the compliment. Although she may not find it a compliment if she ever gets mistaken for me, I still get to put it on my list of things to be thankful for. The other day when I was purchasing a gift at the mall, the cashier looked at me and said, "I know you, what's your name again?" After telling the man my name he responded, "No, that's not it. Don't you live in Lynden?" Thought going through my head... um yeah, that is my name I'm pretty sure I wouldn't mess up on that... words that actually came out... "Yeah, I have a look alike running around, but there's no relation." He looked at me like he wasn't sure if I was pulling his leg or being serious. These can be kinda awkward situations, however I still like to put them in my list of blessings to be thankful for.

I am thankful to all of you who have read this blog and been so complimentary on my postings. I was hesitant in starting to blog and putting my thoughts and life "out there". When I was going to college I was never able to let anyone read my papers because I was afraid that people would judge me or criticize my thoughts. Silly, I know, but that's just the way my brain works. So I am thankful for all who have encouraged me and pushed me to share my life and stories.

So many things to be thankful for this year. My husband is a terrific dad, my boys are healthy and smart, I have a job that I am good at, my body hasn't fallen apart yet despite the strain I have put on it through my running endeavours etc. Thank you to all my friends and family that are in my life and make each day a true blessing! Here's to another year of being grateful and loving life!

Lessons Learned

My boys can be extremely forgetful. Whenever I visit their school to help out I make a stop at the lost and found to check for any lost possessions. I'm pretty much guaranteed to find at least one article of clothing per visit. The constant reminders don't seem to work for my precious duo so I have had to take creative measures to get them to be mindful of their property.

The first situation that comes to mind was from last school year. Every day when the boys come home from school I go through their school folders to see if there is anything that pertains to me. Quite often when I would open up Clayton's folder, his homework would still be there unchecked because he forgot to turn it in when he arrived in class. After this happened numerous times I became pretty annoyed. Every night I would come home from work, they'd be fast asleep and I would take the time to check their homework and make notes on a separate paper of what needed to be fixed. Upon waking in the morning and getting through breakfast we would then tackle making corrections to the homework. I was tired of putting in the time with Clayton just to have him forget to turn it in! One afternoon I had finally had it. Reminding him as he walked out the door was not working, so I told him the next time he forgot to turn in his homework I was going to put a big dot on his forehead. This way his friends would ask him what the dot was for on his head and he would have to admit his forgetfulness. No, I do not consider this public humiliation, more like "tough love". Later that week he came home from school and I discovered his unchecked homework in his folder. I didn't say a thing. The following morning as he was about to walk out the door for school I called him back into the house. I told him he had something on his face and to let me check what it was. His mistake here was that he trusted me... in one swift movement I dabbed his forehead with a red permanent marker. I'll admit I felt a little guilty and cruel when the waterworks came on and he didn't want to go to school after examining his "dot". However, it worked! For the rest of the school year he no longer forgot to turn in his homework.

The most recent situation came this last week when I went to make the Clayton's lunch. We couldn't find his lunch bag, but since Koby was having hot lunch we borrowed his lunch bag. Parting words before heading for the bus included a reminder about bringing home his lunch bag from school. The next morning when I went to make both the boys their lunch Clayton confessed that he forgot Koby's lunch bag at school and never looked for his. Instead of putting the lunches in a plastic grocery bag I decided it was once again time to show a little "tough love". I found an old gift bag to put Koby's lunch in but for Clayton I decided he needed a little extra reminder of caring for his possessions. So for my eldest I decided a Victoria's Secret bag was appropriate. He protested, but I told him once he got to school he could switch it over to his lunch bag. He came home from school proudly holding Koby's lunch bag but complaining he didn't know what happened to his bag. Funny thing is, it was under the couch the whole time, I found it that night when I went to vacuum. Oops. But lesson learned, right? The VS bag sits on top of the fridge awaiting the next time one of the boys forgets to bring their lunch bag home. Time will tell on this one, but it was fun coming up with creative way of teaching them responsibility. Again, not public humiliation, it's called tough love.

Clayton's idea of dessert... scary

Last night Marty told Clayton he was in charge of figuring out dessert. After checking out the contents of the cupboards and fridge, he came up with the following:
Poke a hole in a large marshmallow, fill it with frosting and put that on top of a chocolate chunk cookie. YUM! Actually I didn't let him make one, he had to settle for just the cookie.

Christmas Card time...

One of the main reason's I love Christmas is because I love receiving Christmas cards. The part that I'm not so much in love with is getting all the Christmas cards out. First of all, I should be more organized with my address list but I'm not. Instead, I have some addresses on little scraps of paper, some in e-mails, some in facebook messages and "oddly", some in an address book that hasn't been updated for 5 years. Despite this amazing organization on my part, I find myself with a small stack at the end of the Christmas season that are ready to go, but missing current addresses. Here's to being more organized next year! Anyhow, last night I sat down to put stamps on all the cards that do have addresses on them. I had stopped in at the post office on my way home from work and felt like I hit the jackpot when I didn't have to wait in a line at all! Woo hoo! Small victory for this lady right here. I bought 60 stamps which was an estimate but I figured it would at least get me started. Once in front of the cards I counted them and realized I was just short by 3 stamps! Not bad! Koby wanted to help me out and I didn't argue since I was multi-tasking by talking to Marty's mom on the phone at the same time. I soon used up my sheet of stamps and Koby was insistant on doing the remainder. While trying not to lose a step in my conversation with my mom-in-law, Koby held up his sheets and said he was all done... the problem was I noticed there were still way too many cards left to be stamped. I grabbed his pile and started going through them and checking the backs to figure out where the missing stamps had gone. I looked up at Koby as he's shrugging his shoulders trying to figure out what I'm looking for. He then picks up his stamp sheets and begins to tear them into little pieces. I am still amazed that I was able to hold my conversation considering while watching Koby tear up the sheets, I noticed he had only used up the stamps on one side! He was tearing up the stamps that were still on the other side. Lovely! I was able to salvage the torn stamps, I think. Hopefully the post office is cool with my puzzle-piece-like stamps. Tis' the season!

Sleep Pee-er

I've been asked to share an amusing story about my sleepwalking pee-er.

So we've all heard about sleepwalking... when Marty was younger his mom found him sitting on the steps outside of their house. That's enough to scare any mom. However I have a different problem on my hands. Fortunately it's been almost a year since the last "incident".

The first of the incidents started one day when we were getting ready for Clayton's soccer game. We couldn't find one of his shin guards. After exhausting all possible hiding spots we ended up going with only one of his precious little shins protected. You may wonder what this has to do with sleep-peeing... be patient, it will all come into play soon enough. Later that evening I was busying myself in the kitchen and Clayton and Marty were watching TV in our bonus room. Koby had fallen asleep on the couch some time ago. The next thing I heard was Clayton screaming and Marty yelling, "Koby! What the h-e-double hockey sticks?!" I ran into the bonus room and found Clayton crying with a look of horror, Marty perched on the edge of the couch with a dumbfounded look on his face, and Koby whimpering and standing in front of the opposite couch, half dazed, crying with his pants around his knees. I quickly realized after decifering Marty and Clayton's hysteric explanations that Koby had gotten up from his spot next to Marty and walked over to the other couch, dropped his pants, and started peeing on Clayton's backpack. All the while, Marty and Clayton watched in disbelief. Koby was still half asleep even with all the yelling and crying surrounding him. It took some effort to get him to awake and realize what had just happened. I was trying to assure Clayton that we wouldn't have to throw away his backpack and that it could simply be washed and be as good as new (but really, do you want to use a backpack that's been peed on?)... at the same time trying to get Koby calmed down. When I went to empty out Clayton's backpack to examine anything that might have been damaged, we found Clayton's missing shin guard. Thankfully this lightened the mood and everyone was able to get a good laugh in. Nothing important was damaged and we were able to wash the bag and shin guard and borrow my mom's carpet cleaner to clean the couch. I do apologize if this makes anyone hesitant to sit on one of our couches.

The second incident happened shortly after Christmas last year. We had gone pretty light on Christmas giving as funds were pretty tight, but I had "splurged" on getting the boys electric toothbrushes. That night everyone had gone to bed and Marty and I were laying in bed watching TV when I heard little footsteps. My "mom" ears perked up and I listened as I heard a drawer open in the bathroom. I sat up in bed and paused, still listening to decide if I should jump into action. I heard another strange sound and so I got out of bed and slowly walked to the bathroom and turned on the light. Koby was standing in front of the sink with the toothbrush drawer open and his pj's down around his ankles. He looked up at me with a groggy look in his eyes and I couldn't help myself. I just started laughing. He had peed right into the drawer, all over the brand-spanking-new toothbrushes. Fortunately I am a slob and I had not put my toothbrush in the drawer after I last used it so I was safe in laughing at the situation. However, Koby started to realize what had just happened and began going into hysterics. After getting him calmed down and back to bed, out came the disinfectant and the toothbrushes went into the garbage.

My ears have now been trained to wake up from a dead-sleep to the warning sounds of little footsteps and I quickly jump into action to make sure Koby is standing in front of the toilet when the pants drop. There have been a few close calls since the toothbrush incident, one night I found him standing dazed in front of his toy drawers... one night it was standing in the corner of his room, but thankfully I was able to re-direct him to the bathroom and avoid any additional damage.

Nobody ever warned me that this could be an issue with young children, so to all you parents, consider this your PSA.

As I am about to post this, Koby has discovered what I am writing about and is now protesting.

Bathroom Nazi

We live in a house where we have two bathrooms which you would think would be more than enough for a household of four. However, our downstairs bathroom is officially reserved for boys. Sounds good in theory. The problem is that the "boys" bathroom is theirs because of the reality that it won't flush toilet paper so boys can only use it to go #1. When you have more than one person in the house that needs to go #2 there is a real problem. This morning I was giggling listening to the following argument.
Koby, "Brother! I have to go to the bathroom! You can't use 9 pieces of toilet paper. I'm watching you! You can only use one or two pieces! Dad said!"
Clayton, "Koby, why do you care?"
Koby, "Because I have to go to the bathroom! You're wasting all the toilet paper!"
Clayton, "You're so annoying! I'm almost done."
Koby, "I saw that! You just used more toilet paper! I'm telling mom!"
Clayton, "Koby, you're so annoying! Leave me alone!"
Koby, "Brother! You can't say that. It hurts my feelings! Stop calling me annoying."
Shortly after this Clayton exits the bathroom and Koby runs in and drops his shorts for all of two seconds before pulling them up and yelling, "Brother! It stinks in here! Now I can't go to the bathroom! It smells bad!"
Clayton decides to ignore him which only escalates the tantrum. Koby runs into his room and starts yelling and crying saying it's not fair that brother gets to use the bathroom first. All of a sudden he's able to hold his digestive exiting system and is now getting dressed and stomping around pouting out loud.
Eventually I look up the stairway and see Koby sitting on the "pot" with a half smirk, half pout as he does his deed.
I make the mistake of laughing out loud and it sends him back into tears and muttering at me to stop laughing at him because it's not nice. "Brother made it smell like little boy farts in here!"

Here we go....

So I won't claim to be the world's best mom because we all know there are a million fabulous momma's out there and I'm happy doing the best I can to raise 2 boys that will go out and make a beautiful mark in this world. So far, 10 years into this parenting journey, I've already exceeded my expectations of what I thought could and would be. So why the number 11? Well, it goes back to some silly little saying a couple of my friends made up when we were in high school. "11 is a game, either you get it or you don't. You'll always wonder if you would have. Maybe next time." My life is a game.. I am competitive to the core and am always striving to do bigger and better but not sure what exactly the end goal is. I don't "get" life but, I'm enjoying trying to figure it out. There is always a next time. I'm not always content with the first attempt, but usually there's a pretty interesting and sometimes amusing story to go along with it. I am amazed each day that I have been blessed with the responsibility of raising Clayton and Koby. They make rolling out of bed each morning a joy and an adventure. So here's to capturing my journey and summing it up in a blog.