Being a Mom – Page 3

She Hijacked Herself

November 14, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom, Life 1 Comment

Oh…Eliza Jane.

Twice this year she’s hijacked us. And this time, she hijacked herself.

It was a lovely Monday afternoon. Just the yesterday in fact. We were looking at a house for sale and first Emory had a dirty diaper…and as fate would have it I had ONE wipe in his bag. ONE. Andrew and I raided both our glove compartments for any and all napkins to help in our time of need. I was more thankful for Subway, Bojangles and Dunkin’ Donuts than ever before…

As I was cleaning up the poor baby who was extremely unhappy about his current situation, Andrew was aiding me as best he could. And as I recall it, I saw out of the corner of my eye, the other door closing shut. Silence was broken by what I have called the ‘Mariah Carey scream’. It’s this high-pitched shrill of a sound, that if you aren’t in a safe enough distance away, you could lose your hearing entirely.

“What the…” Andrew said as he threw down the other napkins he held to run over to the other side of my van {side note: yes, I drive a minivan now…}. The screaming somehow got louder and as I shook Emory into his pants {bless his sweet heart}, I got over to the other side just in time to see her smashed up and crooked finger.

Andrew was trying to talk to the screaming child and in my “Ican’tbelievethisishappeningrightnow” annoyed, moment self, I said, “It’s broken, just get her in the car.”

Of course it’s broken. It can’t NOT be broken. I have never seen a finger look like THAT before.

Bless my sweet husband. He got her in the back of the van despite the screaming and crying. And wouldn’t you know. She didn’t care one bit about her jacked-up finger. She was screaming now at the potential that she would miss gymnastics.

Punch me in the face, would you?

She’s nuts.

“My want to go to ‘nastics!!!” she was hollering from the back seat as tears poured out of her eyeballs.

“Momma…?” Reynolds said quietly. “Are we going to miss gymnastics now?”

Poor kid. Originally, I was going to be a single mom for the night so I had decided to be brave and take all three to gymnastics. I even called ahead Monday afternoon and asked if Reynolds could participate in Eliza Jane’s class and had gotten that okay’d. Now… Now all their dreams of doing flips and swinging and rolling around had been dashed.

“What were y’all doing? Who closed the door?” these were the senseless questions I was asking them of course. Reynolds stared at me like I had 10 heads. Mum was the word. No one was fessing up to this fiasco.

I called the doctor’s office and told them what happened…”What do I do? Where do I take her?” I asked. They told me to take her to the “Black and Blue clinic”. And of course as I was retelling this to Andrew his response was, “oh yeah, I’ve been there many times.” Y’all recall that I have an accident insurance policy 1. because of him and 2. because of Reynolds, who is much like his father. And now, apparently Eliza Jane is as well. So far now…2 out of 3 children are following in their father’s footsteps. I am doomed.

Anyway, back to the story. We got to the clinic and by then the screaming and crying had stopped…but she was still sniffling about missing gymnastics. Logic was in no way a part of any of our conversation, obviously. Andrew was trying to explain to her that she couldn’t tumble and do flips if her finger was hurt. “My not want to go to the doctor! My want to go to ‘nastics!” She was adamant.

Bless it all, y’all.

Long story cut short…I called ‘nastics and told them we weren’t going to make it after all, but thanks for letting us know that Reynolds could participate in her class in the future.
Emory and I left the clinic to get home and cook the supper my tummy was rumbling for and as I finished up my dinner I got the text that everything was okay.
“She didn’t even cry when they did the x-rays.” Andrew’s text came thru and I shook my head thinking, “of course she didn’t.”

No major damage, just a cut on the backside of the joint that we are trying to keep a bandage on, to be sure it doesn’t get infected.

What a Monday. Here’s to the rest of the week and hoping that there are no more hijackings in our immediate future. And yes, I hope I didn’t just jinx myself.

Meanwhile…here she is in all her silly from today.

Have a great night!

Our Saturday

October 21, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom Leave a Comment

Way back when I started this blog, my vision/hope/desire/idea was to share my life with y’all, my family, friends and readers.

We went to a party tonight with our Sunday school friends and families and as we drove home {with kids screaming in the back of the van…bless their hearts, they were so tired}, I looked thru all the pictures I took today…and I thought, when did I stop sharing stuff on my blog? When did it get so hard to take 30 minutes to sit down and write a few words and dump a bunch of photos in a post? I won’t bore you with all the excuses :)

There’s so much to catch you up on – like Reynolds is 4.5 years old {what.in.the.world.} and smarter than smart. Eliza Jane is such a mixture of sweet and sass at the fierce young age of 3. And Emory..the sweet babe, is 11 months old now. And he’s such the 3rd child in all his laid-back ways {that didn’t come from me at.all}.

Instead of writing a bunch of words tonight, I just want to share some of my favorite photos from the day.

Much love to you…and good night.

Eliza Jane and Her 3rd Birthday

September 6, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom 1 Comment

Our ‘Sweet Eliza Jane’ turned three last Wednesday and I decided earlier this year that I was going to make a point of really celebrating our children on their birthdays.

It’s my personal belief that your birthday is for celebrating YOU.

I made her chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast – that she wasn’t thrilled about so I’ll spare you that photo.

At school she was VERY shy and didn’t want her picture taken

Until we got inside and she saw her sweet friend, Reagan. Then she was all smiles and giggles

Much like I did for Reynolds’ birthday, I took off the afternoon to spend with my sweet baby girl. I hadn’t planned out all the details of our afternoon together, but I had a few ideas up my sleeve.

I think now I will also tell you that the afternoon before Eliza Jane’s birthday, her younger brother got sick. As in, phone call an hour before pick-up to tell me he’d had three yucky diapers, and that he had to be out for 24 hours, meaning he couldn’t come back until Thursday.

……………………..

I will be completely honest with you and tell you that I was really sad about this. Her afternoon was supposed to be with and for her. But alas, we rolled with the punches!

I picked up my sweet girl a little after noon…she was lying on her cot, fast asleep.

I picked up her little limp self and put her in the car. Confused, she just stared at me asking what we were doing and where we were going. I kept telling her that it was her birthday and we were going to have an afternoon of fun!

After talking to daddy and confirming that he was still at home, we made our way to the house to pick up little brother so daddy could go to work.

Thankfully, Emory fell asleep in the car on the way to our first destination.

The Mad Platter. Our little girl loves to color and draw. She is one who will come home from a long day at school, just to sit down at her little table and start coloring. Or some days it’s the first thing she does when she gets up in the morning.

So as I contemplated the Zoo {it was a million degrees outside so that was NOT happening}, the children’s museum… and other places, I decided that the Mad Platter was the best fit for her!

We strolled around the store trying to find something small enough, but yet still big enough that she would enjoy painting…and we settled on a little octagon dish.

Ms. Margaret {I think that was her name!} helped us pick out some colors and we got started. I love the concentration in this photo… Tadaaaaaa! Oh, but wait. I wanted to keep painting she said… Guess who woke up… We got more paint colors…and painted the same thing over {and over…} and over again.

She really had a great time painting her little dish! Now I have to remember to go pick it up from the store!

Next up, she wanted to go to gymnastics, but a class for smaller kids was about to start and I knew she wouldn’t be able to participate so I convinced her to come down from the ledge {it was nearly a break-down moment} and asked where else she might want to go.

“PUBLIX!”

“You want to go to PUBLIX?!” I asked?

“Yes m’am.”

“What do you want to get at Publix?”

“STRAWBERRIES!!!!”

“We have strawberries at home already…”

“Ummmm. BLACKBERRIES!!!!”

“You want to go to Publix to get blackberries?”

“YES!”

“Then what?”

“Go home and eat my blackberries!”

Duh. So. We went to Publix, got blackberries and then went home for her to eat them.

Next up was getting her ears pierced.

Let me just say this: SHE ASKED FOR THIS FOR 6 MONTHS. She’d been talking about getting her ears pierced for a very long time. Very.LONG.time.

So I confirmed once again, “You want to get your ears pierced?” “Yes m’am.”

We were planning to meet her friend Reagan, and her parents at the spot at 5:15.

I was nervous. I knew it was either going to go great, or it was going to be a complete disaster.

Traffic was horrible trying to get to the place we went. I could feel my palms getting sweaty.

We got there and Reagan was already checked in so they took her back. She cried for all of 30 seconds I think. Great! I thought. This is going to be good. Eliza Jane hadn’t even noticed her friend’s cries as we took our selfie

Now it was our turn.

We got into the room and like a little turtle, she pulled into her shell.

She tucked her head and put her hands up at her face.

I talked to her about how she’d wanted to get her ears pierced and how Reagan had just done it, and weren’t her earrings so pretty and don’t you want to do this?

She made noises and shrugged her shoulders.

The ladies who were waiting to punch holes in her ears were so sweet. One gently said, “I don’t think she’s ready, mom.”

So as I picked her up to leave, she said “You sit next to me, momma.” As if I was just going to lean against the wall and leave her there by herself.

I hugged her and said I would be right there with her. She held her head up and let them mark the spots where her new little earrings would go. Then I moved us down to the end of the table.

All set and ready, they did a count down.

SCREAMING.

Thrashing of the head.

TEARS.

My heart was beating out of my chest. Not good! NOT GOOD!

She was scared and angry. And I was shocked by what had just happened.

“We have to get the backs on; we didn’t get the backs on” the ladies were saying to me.

I looked at them like ‘what am I supposed to do about that? my child is now screaming her head off’.

Literally 15 minutes of screaming and crying. My ears were numb. I wanted to crawl into a dark corner. I wanted her to know how sorry I was because she clearly believed that I chose to do this to her.

She wouldn’t let anyone touch her ears. I put on gloves to put the backs on but she just jerked her head around.

“You’re going to lose your earrings if you don’t let us put the backs on.”

She didn’t care.

She even said, “my not want these earrings”.

Again, I wanted to crawl into a dark cave.

After trying to reason with her {I must have been insane}, I gave up. They put the backs into a little bag and I took them with us as we left the store.

I’m thankful to Reagan’s mom and dad who entertained Emory while I dealt with the birthday girl…

Bless her heart.

After all that all she wanted was to go to Chick-Fil-A, play on the playground and eat icecream.

She deserved a full gallon of icecream for going thru with the ear-piercing.

I, however, needed two gallons.

At the CFA, she wouldn’t let anyone touch her ears. We tried to see if she would let Grandma or Aunt Cissy put the backs on, but she would have nothing of it.

“Fine” I think I said. “If the earrings fall out, that’s it.” {I’m not doing THAT again. EVER.}

Her sweet Aunt Cissy got her a Belle dress for her birthday – the princess she most adores. Thank you, Aunt Cissy!

I’m just glad she was smiling here. Y’all, it was just so awful. I felt like the worst mom ever. After I had tried to make her birthday so fun and memorable. I hope it was for her.

Back home and after bath time and in bed, the earrings were still in. As I was on the verge of panicking over the dang earrings Andrew said, let’s just put the backs on after she falls asleep.

You’re thinking it can’t get any worse than it was, right?

Hope you’re still sitting down.

So around 9 p.m. we grabbed that little baggie of earring backs and crept into her quiet little room. She was sleeping so soundly. And praise Jesus, the earrings were still in. I pulled out one back and wrestled the stupid thing onto her right earring. I’d forgotten that the darn things had notches in them so that little hands couldn’t take the earrings out before it was time. I think it took me four tries before it finally snapped onto the post.

We took a deep breath and said together that we needed to roll her over to get to the left ear.

Andrew rolled her onto her other side.

I brushed her hair away from the ear and she slapped my hand away.

I waited to be sure she was still sleeping.

I found the post and was trying so hard to get the second back onto it’s earring.

My hands were shaking I was so nervous. I’m sure I was sweating.

She swatted my hand again, and as she did the EARRING FELL OUT OF HER EAR!

“SH*T!!!!” I whispered loudly {I don’t normally curse…} to which Andrew replied, “GET THE STUPID THING IN HER EAR!”

I tried to push it back into the hole, that was now BLEEDING, and couldn’t get it to do anything.

“GET IT IN THERE!” he said again.

“YOU DO IT!!!!!” I retorted.

As she started to cry and scream, he grabbed the earring, shoved it back into the hole and pushed the back on as hard as he could.

By this point she really was crying and screaming.

I leaped from the bed and ran downstairs to get her some Tylenol.

By that point Andrew had rocked her back to a half-sleep so he laid her back down in the bed. And then he said to me, “is her ear supposed to bleed like that?”

“We just punched holes in her ears today, of course they’re going to BLEED!!!”

Back in the hallway, I think we high-fived each other with a job somewhat well done…

The next morning she walked up to me, and in her sleepy voice said, “Momma. You put my backs on last night?”

I laughed and said, “I sure did baby girl!”

She likes her earrings today. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I’m thankful I only have one little girl that I have to do that with because I would never survive another.

many hugs to you tonight!

Needing Jesus

July 2, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom, Faith, Life, Marriage Leave a Comment

(Reader’s note: this was written originally last Monday, 6/26…but this is how long it takes me to finish things these days… ☹)

I always think it’s funny when something happens by “coincidence”.
I just happened to forget I wasn’t supposed to take a lunch today, and ran an errand to Trader Joe’s. Then I happened to run home to drop off all my goods, etc. and strolled around my house to see what the cleaning lady did while she was there this morning (it’s always fun to see how she reorganizes things!!).
Then I happened to get a notification that a sweet girl, that I’ve known from way-back-when, Jess Connolly, was doing a live video on Instagram.
And I happened to turn on my car’s blue tooth so I could listen in on her little video.

Jess’ husband worked in my office, what seems like, a million years ago. Back when he was this sweet guy dreaming of marrying this gorgeous gal named Jess.
Dreams do come true.

They have an amazing ministry…she’s killing it all over the place – praise be to Jesus alone, I know she would say.

So here I was in my car listening to her pouring out her heart about being “Expectant” about all things Jesus…which includes us as fallen humans and how we can be expectant to still need him and she said this one thing that I repeated over and over in my head until I got to a stop light and could email it to myself so I didn’t forget!
“What if..you still needed Jesus?”
She was recalling a conversation she had with a dear friend of hers from the other day, about all these things we plan out and set out as goals etc. And she said something like, But what if, at the end of all the planning and goal-setting that we still needed Jesus.
I sat there thinking, that’s mind-boggling to me. We DO need Jesus. But do we admit that in the every minute – every day?

What if, in your every day, everything, you still needed Jesus.
Instead of thinking, I’ve got this. I’ve got all these things to do in XXX time, or whatever, what if you still needed Jesus.
What about this moment, this day, this week…would be different?
What if you acknowledged that you still NEEDED Jesus. Needed Him like you need breath. Every moment of every hour.
“As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.” The Psalmist says (Ps. 42:1).
What if that were true.
How would your thoughts be different.
How would your words be different.
How would your heart be different.

How would your hopes be different.
How would your perspective change.
Would you have more peace?
Would you have more joy?
Would you lay all the burdens down at the Savior’s feet and leave them there?
Would you, like Mary, sit. Still and quiet and wait to hear from Him?
Would you keep rushing around like Martha, trying to get all the things done, while harboring an attitude against those you love?
Would you still be holding that grudge against that friend that hurt you so many years ago?

I think it’s so easy for us to just get up every morning and get going that we forget we need him. I need him to be joyful. I need him to have grace and strength and patience with my kids, my husband and myself even. I need him to be KIND. I am a sinner. I am not even remotely in the same solar system as perfect, and therefore, I need Jesus. To be more like him so that others might slightly like me.

What if, you and I went to bed tonight resting in Jesus. Needing him.
What if, tomorrow morning, when we woke up, instead of grabbing the phone to see how many likes or messages we got during the middle of the night, or doing whatever thing you do when you first wake up…we said, “Hey Jesus. I need you. I NEED.You.”
And then we waited to hear from him.

What if we did that? I wonder how tomorrow might be different.

Something to think about on a Sunday night. Hugs for a sweet bedtime…hopefully the fireworks where you are aren’t too loud tonight…

A Mom Moment…

June 13, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom 1 Comment

Kids know just how to punch you in the gut, don’t they?

I’m not talking about the “I hate you, get out of my life” drama that I PRAY hard we never deal with…

I’m talking about the bedtime, “No, MOMMA, I didn’t want YOU to put me to bed. I want DADDY!” drama.

It’s often Reynolds who gives me the boot out of his bed {and seemingly out of his heart…}. And I’m sort of okay with it, some nights. Whatever, he wants his dad. It’s a guy thing, sure. Okay. I can get on board with that.

But Eliza Jane…seriously. The girls need to stick together here. We’re outnumbered….she’s supposed to be on MY team right?!

Tonight was going along great, she got in her nightgown, hopped into the bed and {flip! the switch}, she lost it. She screamed that Mariah Carey scream {that makes my ears start to bleed}, shoved her face into the bed and burst into tears. I sat there completely unaware of anything that had just happened…. Bewildered beyond anything.

“MY NOT WANT YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MY WANT MY DALLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Seriously.

She punched me in the gut. The heart. I was shattered. She was so completely distraught that I was the one to sing her songs, pray her prayer and wipe those sweet curls out of her face to kiss her goodnight.

HE didn’t push you out of the smallest hole in his body and provide your sole nourishment the first four months of your life, but whatever. Fine. You can have him.

I’ll go sit on my favorite couch and drink a straw-berrita while eating a half-pint of icecream. I’m not hurt. I’ll be fine.

sniff.

I walked out of the banshee’s room and into Reynolds’ where the boys where having a lovely story time and recounted to “Dally” what had just happened.

“She wanted YOU, she just said it!” he stated, confused as I was. I’m pretty sure Reynolds laughed at the drama I had acted out for them.

“Well. She no longer wants ME, she wants YOU.” and I stood there with my pout-pout face on. And then I walked out.

And back into her room. I had debated going back in. She was still crying over Dally…

Somehow I got her pulled back from the proverbial cliff. She smiled and laughed at me…she told me she loved me with her tiny hands holding my face. She kissed me and said “night night momma, lus you” as I walked out the door and blew her a kiss.

I guess I did something right. My gut feels better…my heart no longer shattered. Maybe she does love me after all.

This was taken last week at the beach…the night we got caught in the rain!

Praying you feel loved by the crazy people in your life tonight…Sweet dreams friends…

The Blue Apron Meal…

May 22, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom, Cooking, Food & Drink Leave a Comment

Finally! I am getting to this post! We are on week three of our Blue Apron meals (what?!?) and man, that time went by fast! I really wanted to share with y’all about Blue Apron because I know I was really curious so I figured if I was, someone else must be too…right?

Here’s some background info for you. We cook at least three, if not four nights a week and frankly, I have been getting bored with the same.ol.food and needed new options. Options that we like {read: flavor] and that my kids will eat {read: not be afraid to try}. We try not to eat out a lot because it really is so expensive and a lot less healthy… So when I finally bit the bullet to do Blue Apron, the cost was calculated out to be less than $9/portion {I purchase the 4-portion option}. For us a portion actually equals dinner for all of us plus at least one additional meal, be it lunch or supper for another day. With that in mind, the cost really comes out to be just under $7/portion, which isn’t so terrible.

Our first box arrived three Saturdays ago…and here’s how it went down…mostly in pictures.

You get this really great box

That tells you that cooking is happy…and in the process you get really happy/excited.

Then, you unload all the goods and get even more excited.

The first meal I chose to make, out of the two that came in our box, was the Crispy Catfish and Sweet Potato Fries. Now, I’m a Georgia girl and my PawPaw had a catfish pond in South Georgia so I grew up eating catfish. I grew up FISHING for catfish on hot Saturday afternoons…where you had to sit perfectly still and quiet. Do you know how hard it is to sit still and quiet as a child…? I have sweet memories of sitting on the bank of that pond fishing for what seemed like an eternity…to catch just enough fish so that we could fry them for supper.
So here I was taking my stroll down memory lane, and thinking that the only true, proper way to eat catfish is with honey… That’s how I grew up eating it!

There was no honey included in this recipe. We were trying something new. And I was still very excited.

I followed the instructions to a “T”, even using the same bowls that my pictures showed!

These sweet potato fries…man, was that a workout! I took a selfie that I will spare you, but it was of my “angry face” because these dang potatoes were so hard to cut through! That was not included in my recipe notes! Let it be known to you out there, who may be novices to cooking, sweet potatoes are hard…so get yourself a really sharp knife, and be careful in the cutting!

Along with the sweet potato fries was sauteed spinach that I had to mash out all of the liquid {which was kind of sinky…}.

But Y’all. This was SUCH a good meal. Simply delicious.

One Eliza Jane was so excited she could barely stand it!

A few things I learned:

My kids LOVED this meal.
You need to flip the sweet potato fries mid-way as they cook {else they’ll be charred a wee bit like mine}.
The 35-ish minutes they said it would take to cook the whole meal was slightly under the almost hour it took me…and I’m not sure if that was due to my lack of experience as a cook or the fact that maybe I wasn’t as organized as they were when they hit their start button.

Nonetheless….this meal really was delicious. The catfish was better than I thought it would be considering there was no honey involved at all. The sweet potato fries were simply amazing and yes, I’ll certainly make those again!

Has anyone tried Blue Apron and had success? What about any of the other food/meal delivery services? I’d love to know your favorites!

Oh, and if you’re interested in trying Blue Apron, shoot me a message and I’ll give you a code that gets you a free delivery! Woot!

Much love!

May 2017…so far

May 17, 2017 by Michelle Filed Under: Being a Mom, Life 1 Comment

Y’all…I have so much to write about. So many things I haven’t had a half-second to put down on paper {or type in a blank box} and I truly fear that I never will!!! So much I want to say and tell y’all!

But…tonight I’m just going to give some updates because it’s been a couple of months. In my favorite kind of fashion…here’s the latest with our Lucas clan.

Reading: Magnolia. It’s seriously the greatest magazine {in my little opinion} since Real Simple came out. It doesn’t help that I, along with the rest of the ship-lap-loving-world, am completely infatuated with Chip and Jo.

Playing: What all of my motherly dreams were made of…playing baseball in the front yard with my kids. Y’all! I remember so very fondly playing ball in the yard with my mom and my dad that I have just been waiting {patiently?!} for this day. And it happened just a week or so ago and has been a recurring thing since…and it’s just bliss.

Watching: Oh I could just watch these sweet babies for days and days, but apparently I’m not in reality! If I take my eyes of Emory for a millisecond, he’s rolled himself under a chair! But seriously…I love watching all three of these sweet kids. They absolutely adore each other and it’s the best seat to the most wonderful show…

Trying: I’m really trying to run. I don’t like running. I will walk for miles…and that’s just how I want to do it. In running there’s too much bouncing. My ponytail whacks me in the face. I get WAY too sweaty and I feel so gross afterwards. But I’m trying. I’m supposed to run a 5k on Saturday…we’ll see how that goes.

Cooking: OH! This is fun. And a future blog post to come…I have done a couple of Blue Apron meal orders! So I have a lot to say about that…and will leave you hanging here on this little cliff!

Eating: {see above comment…and I will leave you waiting to hear all the yummy details!}

Drinking: Straw-Ber-Ritas!!! The perfect little something at the end of a hot day.

Texting: My friend Meredith and I both got our new Ban.do agendas today (YAY!!) so we were texting each other about how great they are and how fabulous we are for getting the same amazing stuff!

Pinning: I feel like I’ve been pinning a lot of plants and flowers recently. I have been working on the shade bed in our back yard {it’s coming along quite lovely} and we recently had two trees and several dead azaleas taken out of the front yard so there’s a lot happening in the gardening department.

Tweeting: I think I like the idea of tweeting better than I do actually tweeting. I’m not one to share my every thought like the Donald… so as much as I’d like to be a hip tweeter, I just don’t think I am…?

Going: I love to go. I love to pack a bag and GO. We are going…in just a couple of weeks. We are going to the BEACH for a WEEK with ALL the KIDS. Y’all. Pray for us. haha. I’m kidding. It will be great. It will be fabulous. I seriously cannot wait.

Loving: So much. My husband. My kids. Amazing people who are just so incredibly self-less. I want to be more like them.

Hating: I hate spiders. I don’t like bugs. And I loathe mosquitoes. I’m starting to feel like I don’t really like summer because with warm weather comes all the things I don’t like. I don’t like sweating either…oh I think I already said that…

Discovering: I can’t really say that I am discovering anything new… But Emory is and it is SO fun to see and hear him figuring out these new things!!

Thinking: You know…it can be dangerous when you think…ha.

Hoping: I am hoping my husband reads this tonight and sees my hint about a quiet date night Friday night… yes, we have a sitter.

Listening: It’s actually quiet right now as I write this. The dishwasher is running, the monitor echos the white noise playing in Emory’s room… There’s nothing else causing a stir. Now…just five minutes ago Eliza Jane was screaming like a banshee because “my want you” for the 37th time tonight… But I guess she’s finally given up.

Celebrating: There’s always something worthy of celebrating, right? Last Friday Reynolds got his trophy for t-ball and last night Eliza Jane got her medal for completing a season of gymnastics!

And yes! We just celebrated Mother’s Day…and all the moms and being a mom. And I celebrated my sweet Momma in Heaven. I miss her something terrible, but I trust she’s having a blast up there with Jesus.

Smelling: Have you stopped to smell the roses recently? I did a walking meeting with a co-worker a few weeks ago and we found this amazing rose along our path…and of course we stopped and smelled it! I wish I could have bottled up the scent and passed it out with this photo!

Ordering: I need to order a swimsuit! Did you see the post I wrote for the Columbia SC Moms Blog? So many options! I’ve narrowed my choices and now I just need to swipe the card! I also need to check to see if the kids need new suits…

Starting: Oh there’s nothing to start…and no time to start anything!

Finishing: There’s a lot to be finished. Flower beds, laundry, ironing…all the things I’ve already shared including writing more blog posts!

I’ll save all of that for another day. I’m off to bed while the littles are sleeping.

I hope you have had a joyful May so far. If you haven’t celebrated anything today…look around and find something to be excited about. I trust you won’t have to look very far…