Kicks and Giggles

The last few days have been about 12 degrees here and it’s been great!  I think about 12 is the perfect temperature.  It is warm enough you can be outside for long periods of time in just a t-shirt yet not be uncomfortable in jeans.  It is not too hot so as to be gross either.  I love spring.  I love wearing flip flops, with fun toe rings and painted and decaled toes.  I love not having to wear a jacket or worry about the kids jackets.  I love being able to easily strap my kids into their car seats not worrying about bulky jackets.  I love being able to spend the majority of the day outside, and so do the kids.  I love how great the kids sleep when they have spent the majority of the day outside!  I love frequent BBQ’s.  We’ve recently started going for walks in the evening once Brian’s home from work and I love that!  Chloe has started asking to go for a walk with Daddy!  She loves it too.  I love how Jacob points in the air and says “aipane”  whenever and airplane flies over.  I love that running inside to take Jacob pee only takes seconds, and that Chloe can run in by herself, since we don’t have to worry about boots, or snowpants.  These last few days, we have gone to the park, for multiple walks, played outside, gone to the zoo with friends, and came inside dirty and happy tired from a day of sun and fun!

Brian teaching the kids how to blow bubbles

The kids riding a dinosaur at the park

Filling the dump truck with snow

exploring at the zoo

Chloe pulling the wagon while Jacob pushes

Chloe and Jacob looking at flowers.  Jacob also killed a butterfly in the butterfly exhibit at the zoo.  Oops

This is what Jacob looks like when he eats ice cream.

For some, this is old news, but I’ve withdrawn from my Biology class.  I did a few weeks ago and feel nothing but positive about that decision.  It was stressing me out, and stealing time from my family.  I also had very little patience for anything, which is not good as a mom of young children.  My house was constantly a mess and I was always on edge.  My house is still often a mess, but I can get it presentable in about 20 minutes if necessary, due to the fact that I don’t just wanna collapse into a ball and not worry about anything.  I now enjoy most days instead of impatiently wait for them to be over.  I am able to play with my kids and do fun things with them.  We were going outside on a regular basis when the weather was nice, and I also picked up a bunch of art supplies for the kids and we’ve been enjoying those, Jacob especially (see earlier story about the beads).  I am also able to read a book for a bit, while the kids play on the floor, which is a wonderful change.  I no longer feel guilty if I have some spare time in my day, thinking that I really should be doing Biology, but all I want to do is take a nap, or sit and read a book for a while.  I am also more willing to clean, since I know that I will probably have more than 5 minutes of time for myself and no longer feel like I don’t want to waste it cleaning!  While I know that many moms raise their children while working, going to school, or heading numerous volunteer committees, I feel that at this point in my life, God has given me these two beautiful children and He wants me to make them my priority.  There will be time for all those things later.  For now, I’m going to enjoy being the mom of my two amazing children, and maybe get in a few good books!

Duplo!!

Playing Outside!

Playing with mommy’s phone!

Recently I purchased some art supplies for Chloe to use while Jacob is napping.  She really enjoys them.  Among these art supplies are some beads.  Yesterday, Jacob woke up and we still had them out, so I let him play with the art supplies as well.  Despite the fact that I was sitting right next to him, he somehow managed to get a bead up his nose.  I couldn’t get it out and was calling Brian to come home so I could take him to the doctor when Jacob managed to get it out himself.  He then proceeded to swallow the bead.  Great.  I thought I had cleaned them all up, but Jacob managed to find one that had hidden under the couch or something.  They were playing nicely, just before nap time when Jacob comes up to me and says “nose.”  I looked, but didn’t see anything.  He continued to cry, and I tried to wipe his nose, and he cried even harder, so I broke out a flashlight, and sure enough, there was a lovely red bead way up there.  Brian couldn’t come home from work, so I dropped Chloe off at a friends house and took Jacob to the walk-in clinic.  They weren’t taking walk-ins, so we went to a different one where they used a very skinny pair of tweezers and pulled the bead out of his nose!  I’m hoping we don’t have to deal with this again.

I know these aren’t relevant, but they’re cute.

Wearing my hat.  I think he looks like a train engineer

He sleeps with his arms behind his head like this quite frequently.  I think it’s really cute.

Brian and I have been debating getting rid of our land line for quite a while now.  The biggest problem was that we call a lot of long distance, which is not cheap on a cell.  However, on Thursday, Brian stopped at our local cell store and they had a plan that lets us pick a certain amount of numbers.  We get free unlimited talk, text, and picture to all these numbers.  So, we just chose the numbers of the people we needed, and we should be fine.  I did all long distance, since we have a pretty good amount of anytime minutes, as well as free after six for local numbers, and free between each others phones.  And, I now have an iPhone4!  It’s fun!  I found the greatest app ever for meal planning.  It lets me enter all my recipes in, and then I pick them when planning my menu for the week.  Then I hit Sync and it generates my grocery list, which I can then delete things that I already have (I probably don’t need to but new olive oil every time that I make a recipe that uses it) or add things that I need that aren’t in recipes, such as snacks for the kids and toiletries.  It’s great.  It also functions as an iPod for me, which is great!  Now if only the snow would melt, I could go roller blading, although I am debating buying a pair of good shoes and taking up running, but we’ll see.

Jacob has been doing okay with potty training.  Slowly, but surely, we are making progress.  Today, he stood in the middle of the hallway, pulled his underwear down, just enough and peed, all over the hallway floor.  He knows what he’s doing, so I’ll just keep being stubborn and I WILL outlast him!  Oh, and underwear bums are cute.