Vacation

I’m in vacation mode already. I’ve been getting the house ready and packing for 2 days now and I am ready to be at the beach.

Prayers for safe travel for us and for all the other spring breakers that will be traveling this upcoming week.

I’ll be updating my blog after we return. I could lie and say that I’ll try to keep it updated while in Florida, but I doubt I’ll find the time between all the relaxing.

Happy Easter everyone!!

Panama City here we come…ready or not!

Powerful Prayers

We always say night prayers with Eliza. Most of the time either Brian or I will do most of the talking and then let Eliza add any special intentions she wants too. We always add an important rote prayer at the end such as the Hail Mary, Our Father, or the Glory Be. She has pretty much mastered the Hail Mary so lately we’ve been practicing the Our Father.

She received a rosary as a gift recently and we did part of it last night. (She’ll probably have to be 25 before she’ll sit through a whole Rosary!!) Anyway, we did a few Hail Mary’s and a couple Our Father’s followed by the Glory Be. She did a fantastic job and really seemed to enjoy the time together praying. Afterwards, it was almost magical.

As we sat on my bed she started talking to Brian and I about Emily. We’ve explained to her that her big sister is her guardian angel and that she’s in heaven watching down on her. We tell her she can always talk to her and ask her for help. She began telling us that Emily loves cookies. Of course, my first thought is that she is trying to get a cookie for herself before bed. However, as she continued her story I was awed. She told us that we need to turn the car into a plane so that we can bring some cookies to God and Emily because they will share with each other. She explained that God loves everyone and he can’t wait for us to come to heaven to play with him. Then she reached down put her hand on my belly leaned over and gave my belly a huge kiss and said “Mommy, God loves this baby too and so do I!”

The whole conversation was probably not more than 5 minutes, but it was tear jerking. Brian and I just looked at each other as she was talking with shocked faces. I believe that God was truly speaking through Eliza last night. Although her story was a bit odd I think it’s probably exactly how God would be with the little ones. I fell asleep last night picturing Emily, Eliza, and God sitting in a field of wild flowers eating cookies together. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Elephants and Easter Candy

Did you know that an Elephant is usually pregnant for 22 months? The average size of a baby elephant at birth is 230 lbs. Elephants spend around 16 hours a day eating consuming nearly 500 lbs. of food. They have very poor eyesight, can swim very well, and are the largest of all land mammals.

I had to look up some facts about elephants today because although I’m only 16 weeks along I’m already starting to feel quite hefty. Considering that we are headed to the beach next week for vacation maybe I should look up some facts about whales too??

It’s actually kind of amazing how similar pregnant women and elephants are. I don’t think I consume nearly 500 lbs. of food a day but it might be close some days. During pregnancy I always have issues with my sight and although I don’t eat as much as an elephant I sure have a stomach that thinks it’s hungry ALL the time.

I went shopping for Easter candy over the weekend. Seriously, who sends a pregnant woman shopping for Easter candy? I’m proud to say that although I went up and down the Easter candy aisles about 3 times each, and bought nearly $50 of candy and goodies I didn’t eat one piece. Don’t get me wrong, come Easter morning this pregnant lady will be enjoying all sorts of Easter candy. Unlike an elephant I like to think that I have a bit of control over eating everything in sight.

As I’m writing this I’m shaking my head and smirking at the thought of all you women out there reading this. No one should compare pregnant women to elephants! Oh well. I think it’s kind of funny to think about. Plus, it’s so reassuring to know that I we will never be pregnant for 22 months and I will never give birth to a 230 lb. baby. Phew!!! I guess some days you have to look at the little things.

Oh, one more side note. I’ve been feeling the baby move the past two days, and I heard the heartbeat today at my appointment. That’s some true reassurance. J

Somethings

Do you ever do something you know isn’t good for you? Or on the flip side, do something that is good for you but you know will hurt later?

I think everyone has those moments. No one is perfect all the time right? We just do our best and move on. But what about when we continue to do something that we know isn’t good for us? Maybe you have your own ideas of “something” running around your head. It could be that donut after church on Sunday, one too many beers on Friday night, just that little candy bar, or it could be something like stressing out over something little, whatever that something is we all KNOW we should say no but for some reason we don’t.

Don’t get me wrong, sometimes it’s good to “be bad”. We aren’t perfect and we will never be perfect, and once in a while we have to give ourselves a break. So I’m here to tell not to stress too much over that something.

However, if it’s something that you continuously do over and over and it yields terrible results…I think someone once called that insanity. I have two stories of insanity for you today.

The outcome of both stories I’m blaming on pregnancy. Yeah, call me weak. Whatever. I’m over it.

The first story is about one of those somethings that’s not good for you, really no matter how you look at it. A little background first. Before I became pregnant with this little one I was in pretty awesome shape. I had been eating Paleo for about 3 straight months and I was at my lowest weight since getting married. I felt great and I looked pretty darn good too. (probably one of the reasons I ended up Preggo…lol)

Anyway, I had given up guilty pleasures almost entirely. I had the occasional bite of chocolate, but really that was it. Before doing Paleo I lived for that break in the afternoon where my kids were napping and I could sit down with and ice cold Coke Zero. Now that I’m pregnant that is one of those cravings I still get. I think the craving is as much for the Coke Zero as it is for the harmony it seems to bring me when I drink one. Anyway, soda and this pregnancy don’t mix so well. I’m constantly telling myself “maybe this time I won’t get sick”. But so far, every time I have a coke zero I live to regret it later in the day. However, for some reason I keep on trying. I think I’m hoping that one day I’ll be able to really enjoy one again. Even though I know it’s not good for me I do it anyway.

My second story is about working out. Again, before this pregnancy, as I mentioned above, I was feeling great, and I’m one of those crazy people that look forward to working out. However, when I had complications at the beginning with blood clots and such the doctor restricted my activity level. He said I could pretty much take care of my kids and do my daily errands and that was it. Wonderful. I can honestly say that physically I didn’t suffer too much, but mentally I was really suffering. I was yearning for those endorphins you get from a good workout. Well, 2 days ago I decided I’d start doing some little workouts again. (Don’t worry I’m taking it easy) I did some simple body weight exercises that I’d done before but knocked them down a bit. I felt so good, I even broke a little sweat. They weren’t hard on me at all, in fact I didn’t even think they’d do much other than get me moving again. Boy was I wrong! I looked like a little old woman trying to walk around last night. My arms and legs were pretty sore and still are today. But if you think I’m stopping you’re crazy! The soreness just gives me even more motivation to keep going so I don’t feel like this anymore until that dreaded 6 week break after birth. So there’s my story about the good for you think that hurts later. And, ouch…it still hurts.

I think both stories are examples of how life goes. I could get all philosophical on you here and compare these to biblical stories and God and all that, but I think you are smart enough to connect the dots. We all have to remember that part of living is making mistakes and part of living is doing the right thing even if we know we’ll feel it later. It’d be so much easier to take that harmonious break every day with a Coke Zero, but for some reason my head keeps telling me that the pain from the working out is really going to take me somewhere in the end.

What are your somethings? Do you have enough of the good stuff that will hurt later in your life? If not, maybe it’s time you re-evaluate.

Ask, Just Ask

“No, Mom I can do it myself!”

Who hasn’t heard that from a toddler before?

As I read in the Magnificat last night the reflection really hit home. It was all about letting God help us. In the reflection the writer compares parents trying to help an “independent” toddler with God trying to help each one of us. For me it was the perfect analogy.

As a toddler learns by doing things themselves, they also learn by failing to do things themselves. Although, a spilled glass of water or mismatched clothes might not be THAT big of a deal to a 3 year old. When we as parents step back and look at it we see that it’s not THAT big of a deal either, however, it would be so much easier if only they’d ask for some help. Maybe they’d even learn the “right” way to do some of the things they seem to do over and over and over.

God looks at us in much the same way as we look at our children. He WANTS to help us, but we don’t always do a good job of asking for His help. So often we try to do something and fail over and over and it’s only after we’ve “given up” that we ask for God’s help. Why do we think we have to perform before God will help us? Don’t we have faith enough to believe that God will help just by us asking?

It’s time we start realizing that God loves us for no other reason than because we are ourselves. We need to be more willing to ask for help and healing. We need to open our hearts and truly listen to God. We must be open to receiving God’s help, because just like parents ache to help their children God yearns to help his children.

Basketball and Motherhood

March Madness is one of my favorite times of the year. As one fan put it “It’s like Christmas but for a whole month!” It’s always better when your team is in the middle of it all. The worst part of March Madness is when your team loses. It’s still an exciting time of year, but it loses a lot of it’s sparkle.

Purdue played Kansas last night and lost by 3 points. It was simply a heartbreaking loss. For any old fan it was just another wild NCAA playoff game. For us Boilermakers it was the end of an era, the end of a career that will forever be whispered about in the halls of Mackey arena. Robbie Hummel is perhaps the best Boilermaker ever to play the game. He’s not going to be a first round draft pick and he might not even play in the NBA (not b/c of lack of talent) but you will NEVER find a player with as much heart as Robbie Hummel. Hummel and I have a lot in common and I can relate with him better than most people, and I am not ashamed to say that I shed more than one tear for him last night. If you’ve never heard his story, it’s worth the google search.

How does all this tie in to motherhood? If you are a basketball fan and follow March Madness you understand the emotional ups and downs that come with an athletic competition. However, you don’t have to be a fan to understand that these college kids put their all into this sport and only one team comes out victorious in the end. Motherhood is so similar.

The emotional ups and downs that we go through in life are just like basketball. We have personal ups and downs and we have the ups and downs that we share with our children and our husband. One day everything can be going beautifully and the next day we might get some crushing news that changes our lives. But in motherhood, just as in basketball, you have to get up and keep going. One failure just leads us to become better and do it differently the next time.

Basketball players fight through injuries all the time. Do you have any idea what it’s like to tear your ACL and try to come back and play at a high level again? How about tearing an ACL twice and coming back a second time? I do. I’ve also gone through 38 hours of labor and 2 c-sections. Let me tell you that the ACL recovery was much more emotionally draining.

Although it might be a silly analogy motherhood and basketball are very similar. Really motherhood and any sport are very similar. It’s all about how you get up after you’ve been knocked down. Do you do it with complaints and whining or do you do it with grace and courage?

Holiness

“To uncover your unique brand of holiness, you have to sift your God-given quirks and talents from you sins.”

~Jennifer Fulwiler

I began reading a book last night called Style, Sex, and Substance: 10 Catholic Women Consider the Things That Really Matter. I’ve only made it through the first 2 chapters, but what I’ve read so far is absolutely amazing! The quote that I posted above is from the first chapter of the book and I think it is spot on.

After reading two chapters last night I can’t stop thinking about what it means to be holy in this day and age. How many of us haven’t gone to church and seen that perfect family that is dressed well, groomed well, and behaved well throughout all of mass? I am always looking at other Catholic moms who seem to have it all put together and I try to be more like them. If you’ve seen my family in mass it’s almost laughable to think that we’ll ever get through mass without something going wrong. We are the family that tends to entertain those around us. How do I become holy when I’m dealing with this every Sunday? I can’t even remember the last time I made it through all of mass and actually listened to a homily. How do I become a saint when making it through mass is more of a survival skill than a reflective time to better myself?

Have you ever stopped to think what all those saints were really like? All you have to do is pick up a book about saints and the stories are sometimes quite shocking. There are some saints like St. Margaret of Scotland who had wonderful marriages and others like St. Monica who had difficult marriages even some like St. Helena who was divorced. Our first thought when it comes to the saints is that they all lived these happy, quiet, prayerful lives. However, many saints had lives that were just as wild as some of our lives today. Some had large families like St. Jeanne de Lestonnac who not only raised her 5 children by herself, but took care of the entire estate by herself after her husband died. St Margaret of Scotland and St Bridget both had 8 children. I grew up in a household with 8 children and there weren’t very many moments where my mom got quiet time.

Holiness does not mean that you become more like Christ and less like yourself. Holy people are not just carbon copies of one another. In fact, there is not a one-size-fits-all template for being a good Catholic. Holy people do not try to be someone else. They simply try to be the holiest they can be. We are all called to be Christ-like. God did not give us the impossible task of being exactly like Christ. He created us to be just who we are. So quit looking at all those people who you see as “holy” and start looking at how you can discover your unique type of holiness. As Jennifer so eloquently puts it “Embrace the one-of-a-kind brand of holiness that God has chosen for YOU. Reject your sins, but love your quirks.”
　

The Crazy Mom's Club

　

Well, I’ve officially joined the crazy moms group. Yesterday and today included a trip to the store. Anyone who knows Eliza knows how well she does sitting still, but I thought I had figured out a way for her to “enjoy” shopping. Our store has one of those “car” carts. You know the ones that are annoyingly large and hard to steer. Well, she loves riding in it and it seems to keep her entertained so I just go with it. Just as I started figuring a way to keep her entertained during shopping my adorable little man decides he doesn’t want to sit still anymore either. Let me tell you that looks can be deceiving. He might seem all sweet and innocent, but he can put up a good fight! He is small enough to wiggle out of the seat strap and stand up backwards in any cart I put him in, and he’s too small to sit in the back of the cart.

So there is a great picture for you. One wild little girl honking her horn and sticking her head out of the car talking to everyone we pass. (Well more like yelling at) Then a sweet little boy standing up with me holding on to his shirt so he doesn’t jump out of the cart. Hilarious isn’t it?

Today at Target I wanted to get the kids some new spring clothes since it’s going to be near 80 all week and they have next to nothing to wear. Eliza “sits” in the back of the cart and Jackson “sits” in the front. Our trip today included trying on sandals for both the kids and Eliza taking the sticker off of every single piece of clothing I put in the cart. By the checkout line she had 3T, 4T, and 18month stickers all over herself and Jackson, it was actually pretty funny. The clerks face was even funnier when Eliza asked for a Target sticker. I don’t think she had a free spot to put it. By the end of the trip I was so worn out.

I think maybe I should bring a camera to the store with me from now on. The looks we get are priceless. They vary from the pity look to the can’t you control your kids look. Today I even had one sympathetic older woman say “Oh yeah, been there” with a huge smile on her face. I’m sure she’s thinking thank God they grow up!

Most of the time this craziness doesn’t really bother me. It’s just another fun thing I get to do with my kids during the day. I enjoy seeing them laugh and enjoy themselves during a time that I find no fun either. We don’t bother any other shoppers normally and most of the time we are bringing smiles to the faces of all the passer-bys. I like to think that my kids bring joy to random strangers faces. Of course I have my days as well, where I just want to get in and out without wrestling like we’re on Monday Night Raw. (I think that’s the name of that fake wrestling show??)

I keep telling myself to let the kids be kids. It’s a hard balancing act though. I want them to love life and enjoy every single day, but I want them to be well-behaved and good kids too. Most days I feel like all I’m doing is saying no and spanking bottoms trying to teach them lessons. I love the fun days though, even when it wears me out. I figure if Jesus Christ was walking through the store and saw us he’d be smiling too. So maybe all those strangers’ smiles are a sign from God that I’m doing something right? Or maybe that’s God’s way of laughing at the crazy mom too?

Any other mom's out there a part of the Crazy Mom Club? Is there any hope to one day get out of this club or is it a lifetime membership?

Sometimes Life’s Just Shitty

So I could start this post out by saying we had a GREAT time at home, it was so nice to see family, blah, blah, blah. However, I was informed at home that I should “tell it like it is” more. For family to say that to me is something, because I never have a hard time “telling it like it is”. So instead of being all positive and optimistic and happy-go-lucky like some of these posts are, today is like it is.

DRAMA. That pretty much describes our trip back home this weekend. Don’t get me wrong, in my eyes any time with family is wonderful, and I truly did enjoy visiting and catching up with everyone. Eliza and Jackson thoroughly enjoyed spending time with cousins, aunts and uncles, and especially their grandparents. It’s kind of like a holiday for them and everyone is always excited to see them, so they just go go go the whole time we’re home.

As for the DRAMA…where do I begin? This drama is not the petty little drama that goes on between siblings or that look that mom gave you for the comment you shouldn’t have made. This drama is the kind of drama that one hopes never happens in their life and we had our fill of it this weekend. I don’t want to go into too much detail because there are a lot of people who are involved and I want to try to respect privacy as much as possible, but I’ll try to sum it up. We have one family member that is a drug addict that has relapsed yet again and is basically on the run right now. Another family member decided to turn their back on God, get pregnant out of wedlock, get married without telling a soul, and is now maybe starting to figure some things out, maybe. Then there is the relationship drama. If only we could all get married and live happily ever after with no craziness in the middle, life would be wonderful. (Maybe that’s why there is so much singing in those Disney movies, they don’t have any real drama to deal with so they have to do something else instead) And that was just some of the fun we got to have this weekend.

It would be so nice if I could put my “Mrs. Fix-it hat” (this is a reference to Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus…great book) on and just give everyone an answer. I used to believe life was so black and white. It didn’t make sense to me how people didn’t just choose the right way and do that. Now I get it. It’s that perspective crap jumping back up and biting me in the ass. There aren’t always quick fixes, sometimes there aren’t fixes at all. For control freaks like me and for someone that just wants to see her family happy and loving life it’s hard to be around the drama when you can’t fix it. Not only that I can’t stand to see family in pain, and there is a whole lot of that right now. I know it’s part of life, but sometimes I wish I could take all the pain from everyone.

As for my own personal drama. We drove 24 hours over the weekend on our trip to and from Indiana. The kids were pretty good and we only had one or two total episodes of “oh my gosh I want to shoot myself in the head”. However the first day in Indiana included Jackson having a high fever for about 24 hours and Eliza pooping about 24 times. Ok, so it wasn’t 24, but it was probably at least 10 (I’m not exaggerating!!). And it wasn’t your little girl poop, it was massive amounts of poop and I have no idea where it all came from. It had everyone running the opposite direction. So that was fun.

On the flip-side the return trip always takes a bit longer, but we actually made pretty good time yesterday. Just as I thought we were getting back to normalcy (haha!!) my baby nausea started up again. So pulling into the driveway turned into me sprinting inside to the toilet to puke my guts out (it’s the only running I’ve been doing lately, maybe I should be thankful?).

Oh wait--it gets better. While puking my guts out I proceed to pee all over myself (because I’d been holding it in the car until we got home). That’s the 2^nd time this pregnancy that I’ve had this joyful experience. I plopped myself on my bed (after cleaning up and changing) turned on some mind-numbing TV and fell asleep as fast as I could.

So that’s that. Today I’m counting my little blessings of a dirty house and a million chores to get done after the long weekend. At least I can let my kids play in the beautiful weather outside and get the craziness out by cleaning everything. But let’s be honest sh*t will be everywhere yet again tomorrow.

A Spontaneous Trip Home

I’m not a very spontaneous person. Usually I do TONS of planning even for the simplest thing. It’s the control freak in me. However, when Brian came home the other night and said “How about we go to Indiana for the weekend?” I was all in. I never pass up a chance to get home and see family.

Especially right now. I don’t know if it’s the pregnancy sickness, the weather starting to turn towards spring, or the fact that I haven’t seen family since Christmas, but I sure am homesick. I’d say my homesickness gets really bad about twice a year. This time of year is always tough. We go home so much in the fall because there are always good excuses and holidays to make the drive, but in the spring it seems like we rarely make it home. It’s a funny thing to think about home. I know I have it all romanticized in my head, but it really is always wonderful when we visit.

I think the most comforting thing when we talk about home is listening to Eliza talk about all the people she loves that live in Indiana. She gets more excited about going back to Indiana for a visit than she does about anything else in the world. You’d think that it was Christmas by the way she talks about spending time with all her aunts and uncles. I can’t blame her, she yells out loud the exact things that I am thinking in my head.

There really is no place like home and we are all looking forward to a very exciting and family filled weekend ahead!!

Doing Whatever I Want All Day...Motherhood

So last night as we were sitting in bed Brian begins to tell me that some days he wishes he could just do whatever he wants like I can. I looked at him with that “what did you just say look”. He again repeated his sentiment of “you can wake up and do whatever you want every day”.

We proceeded in having a conversation about how wonderful my life is and how I wake up every morning and do whatever I want. Right!

Instead our conversation was me on the defensive trying to explain to my wonderful husband why it is that I don’t’ get to do “whatever I want all the time”. Unfortunately, at the end of the conversation I’m not sure that I made my point. I’m thinking about just waking up really early one day and leaving without telling anyone--just to see how he does doing “whatever he wants all day”.

Our conversation got me to thinking about husbands and wives. We “know” what each other does all the day, but not REALLY. I certainly couldn’t go to Brian’s job and pick up where he left off the day before just like he couldn’t do what I do all day. Sure he could take care of the kids all day, but the house would take me a week to clean up after a day of him being Mr. Mom.

I suppose I could have gotten upset about his lack of knowledge of what a mom really does, but honestly at that point I was too tired!! Taking care of two little kids and growing another one in my womb all day and night kinda wears you down. So instead I just slept on it, and I’m glad I did. It really doesn’t matter what he “thinks” I do all day, and it really doesn’t matter what he does all day. God put us together and we have our little family and the way we do things, and it works. Any other way would be a little wild.

Motherhood might be the most underappreciated job in the universe, aside from Son of God. However, I didn’t get into the gig to be appreciated. I got into motherhood because God blessed me with these little souls to help form and educate to be positive examples of love in the world. I’m going to continue doing the best I can each and every day, because that’s all I can do.