How Old Am I?

There are some things that I know my family loves, but I just don’t ever buy them. Its not because I don’t want to make the people in my family happy, things just have to be “cost effective” for me to buy them (unless its something I want). An example of this is yummy, delicious pop-tarts. My kids & my husband love pop-tarts but I never buy them. Seriously, never. Now rewind to a few weeks ago.

I was feeling very stupid brave & I decided to take the kids to Costco with me because I needed to restock our snack supply (the bottomless pits have been eating us out of house & home this summer). It actually wasn’t too bad (I mean people who have been tortured to give up top secret information have endured worse). We were navigating our way down the cereal isle & that’s when it happened. You guessed it…one of the kids spotted pop-tarts, the yummy, delicious treat that mom never, ever buys. Well, because I was feeling tired generous & because I would be buying in bulk (so they would be more “cost effective”) I told them we could get some. Now fast forward to today.

The last of our pop-tarts have been eaten, they’re all gone, the last pack has been toasted and washed down with a cold glass of milk….and I’m sad about it. As it turns out I too love yummy delicious pop-tarts. I keep telling myself that it’s for the best that they're gone. They’re certainly not the healthiest breakfast I’ve ever offered my family. After all I’m a grown woman not a 5 year old. I don’t need pop-tarts, but unfortunately it looks like I am really going to miss them.

The End of the Hiatus is Finally Here!

Well, blogger friends (if there are any of you out there) I am officially ending the hiatus I took from blogging. It was never planned or intentional, but days turned into weeks & weeks turned into months. It hasn't helped that my darling little Sony Vaio has decided it no longer wants to let me on the internet, or that my kids have kept me unnaturally busy this summer (apparently there are countless camps & activities that we have been missing out on in summers past), oh and who can forget the ever present job search that I have embarked on this summer (along with about 2,000 other prospective teachers!)

Who am I kidding...these are just excuses. My laptop is not my only access to the internet, my kids always keep me busy, & it's not like I'm the only busy person out there. There are millions of people way busier than me, who manage to get much more than me done everyday & they all probably still manage to blog on a regular basis!

The reason for the break isn't what’s important anyway, what’s important is that its over & I am back with a renewed enthusiasm for blogging! I know you're all giddy with excitement (all one of you...hi mom) for what's to come & I am too, but I'll be honest--I have no idea what’s to come, but I vow to do my best to stay committed & to entertain (or more probably bore) you with the excitement (more truthfully nothingness) of my days!

By the way, I hope everyone is having a fantastic summer!! Here's a little something for you to enjoy just in case you're not...

Let me Clarify

I may need to clear something up. My dear friend told me yesterday that after “scanning” my latest post she was under the impression that I had been sitting at home pondering how Los Angeles got its name. Am I the only one that is cracking up over the image of me sitting around worried about how Los Angeles got its name to the point that I would blog about it!! I’m still laughing about this. So in case there was any confusion for anyone else that read it, here’s the whole story.

I was on the computer (working on something very, very important & definitely not just wasting my time) when my six year old comes up to me and says, “Why did they name Lost Angeles, Lost Angeles? Could they not find it or something, was it lost?” Until he finished the entire question, I didn’t realize that he was saying Lost Angeles so I was wondering how in the world was I supposed to know why that city was given that name (and what was I going to make up to make myself seem super smart). Of course once I figured out what he was saying, I explained that it was actually named Los Angeles, and I even wrote it down for him to see the difference (because I’m that good of a mother).

I hope this has cleared up any confusion there might have been. I’m sure all of you have been thinking about this & only this since you first read that post so I wanted to get things straightened out asap so you could all get back to your lives.

The funniest part of all of this is that I have now posted twice about a city I have no connection to, have never been to, & really don't care that much about.

Lost Angeles?

Why did they name Los Angeles, Los Angeles? Could they really not find it or something…was it lost?

Has anyone else answered any questions like this today? :)

Dream Job

Do any of you ever consider what your dream job would be? If you could just say the words and it would happen, what would you choose to do? I have spent a fair (okay a ridiculous) amount of time lately thinking about getting a job and it’s made me consider what my dream job would be. In all honesty, I have been so very blessed because I have had my dream job for last 11years. Unfortunately, my dream job had an expiration date. I’m stating that with a tear in my eye, but its true…life goes on. I know that some people continue to stay at home after their kids are in school, but for me its just not the same without little ones running around driving me crazy, so its time for me to move on.

Of course I’m hoping to get a teaching job and I am really looking forward to having a classroom and working children. That being said, I can’t help but consider, if I could do anything, absolutely anything, what would I choose.

Teaching would definitely still be on my list. I really do think that I’ll love teaching, and after being a mom, it is what I always thought I would do. However, if I wasn’t limited in any way there are some other things that I think I would enjoy as well.

I would love to be an author & write books: I love books in general, they just make me happy. I love reading, I always have. Honestly, I am very attached to several fictional characters. To me it would be incredibly fulfilling to create characters and their world that they live in. To just be able to create something from nothing, and find out where it goes & what happens. Take Harry Potter for example (whether or not you’re a fan is irrelevant I’m just using this as an example because HP is so popular). Before J.K. Rowling wrote that first book Harry Potter didn’t exist, she created him and made him come alive. There is a whole Harry Potter world that exists now because of her. I just think being able to do something like that would be amazing.

I also think I would enjoy being a photographer. Not the kind of photographer that takes portraits of our kids & families. I would want to be the kind that captures life and the world around us. I would want to take those pictures that seem more like works of art than photographs.

I would also love (brace yourselves, this is definitely the most far-fetched) to be on Broadway. I really, really love musicals and plays. When Chris & I went to New York a couple of years ago we saw 4 shows while we were there if that gives you any indication of how much I love, love, love these shows. This too, would be amazing. To take a character and make it come to life, to actually become that character for a short time, oooohhh, I love it!

Well, there you have it. A few of the things I would do with myself if ability, training, and talent were optional! However, since I live in the real world, and those things do matter, I will just be content with enjoying the talent of others.

Now, what would you do? If the possibilities were limitless, and little things like talent and ability couldn’t stand in your way. What would your dream job be?

Spring Break Surprise

I have to preface this post by saying that I really think my kids have the best grandparents in the world. I know the world is filled with wonderful grandparents, but I happened to be pretty partial to the ones that love my kids so very much! They are always willing to do anything they can for my kids, they love being with them, & would honestly do anything for them. All 4 of them have spent countless hours playing with & spoiling each of them (as the parent I have at times taken issue with the spoiling aspect & tried my best to keep it at a minimum, but to be honest I am fighting a losing battle). That being said, onto the spring break surprise.

A couple of weeks ago Chris' parents kept the kids so that we could go out of town overnight. It happened to be a really pretty day, so they were all playing outside. One of my kids' favorite things to do outside is to ride their bikes, however, while they were outside my father-in-law noticed a few things going on with the bike situation. I won't go into all the details, but all 3 kids really needed new bikes. They were outgrowing the ones they had & one bike had been run over & the tire was warped. At the time no one said anything to me about it, but fast forward to yesterday morning & Chris' dad showed up wanting to get 3 new bikes for the kids! I was definitely surprised to say the least & the kids were sooo excited. This was such a sweet thing for him to do. The kids got to pick out what they wanted (with some stipulations from me), and bring them home to start having fun with them. They rode their bikes all yesterday afternoon & would have continued riding them all evening, but I had to drag them off the bikes to get to T-ball practice :0)

Thanks Daj!! We love our new bikes!

The First Sign of Spring

For me, this is one of the first signs of spring. To you it may just look like a bunch of weeds, but not to me. Some variation of this will be sitting on the corner of my kitchen sink until the end of summer, and a variation of this sat on the corner of my kitchen sink all last spring & summer and the ones before that and the ones before that...you get the point. My sweet boys surprise me all spring and summer long by bringing me flowers, and I received my first bouquet of the season today! They are always so proud & excited to give them to me because they know I love flowers. They also have a song that is sometimes sung while presenting the flowers. It goes a little something like this, "Flowers for mommy, flowers for mommy, flowers for mommy"...once again, you get the point. The flowers aren't always the same, as I said earlier there will be different variations. Sometimes I get the purple flowers that grow out of monkey grass, sometimes they are the small white flowers (I'm not sure what they are, but they are another kind of weed), and sometimes I get the purple weed flowers that are growing like crazy right now (at least around here), and last year they started getting brave and picking roses off a rose bush I have in the backyard. Even though I have asked them not to pick the flowers off that bush, it’s hard to get upset when their response is that they just wanted me to have something beautiful :) I'm not sure how many more springs & summers I have of my sweet boys seeing flowers & wanting me to have them, but I'm so excited to see that I'll still be getting them this year!

Yeah!!!

Spring Break is finally here!! I am so excited about Spring Break this year. Just the name is exciting for me--Spring Break--its screaming winter is on its way out & spring is here. I can remember way back when before I had kids in school & spring break meant nothing to me, but ever since I've had a child in school I always look forward to spring break (and fall break, christmas break, and summer...basically anytime they don't have to go to school!). I think for whatever reason I'm even more excited this year. Even though I don't have an exciting trip planned, I just love not having to get up, get everyone ready, & get out the door. We can stay in our pjs all day if we want to, play, and just be together. I'm not exactly sure what we have planned or what we will end up doing, but regardless of what we do I'm just excited to have some family time.

I hope everyone has a great spring break...even if spring break doesn't really mean anything to you :)

Is it just me?

Okay, I have to know. Is it just me or does anyone else sometimes think this whole blogging thing is kinda creepy? It's not the blogging about life & sharing it with friends & family that I find creepy. It's the part about anyone from anywhere (that has access to the internet) can find my blog & see pictures of us & read tidbits about our life. People could know things that I forget to tell my own husband. After I posted the story about the "drinking games" incident I forgot to tell Chris & he didn't know about it until he read it on my blog. I realize that isn't the most important information, and there's probably a million of these stories that I forget to tell people that are close to us. My point is that someone I don't even know could have known that my boys were playing "drinking games" at breakfast that morning & their own father didn't even know. Isn't that creepy? In some ways blogs are really good, and a great way to connect with people, but in other ways they make me a little crazy. I know that blogs can be made private, and before I created my blog I went back & forth on this (actually I'm still going back & forth on this issue). However, (and this is where I'm going to sound like a seventh grader) I just kept thinking about how many people I know who have blogs that are not private & these are reasonable people whose judgment I trust. So my thinking was that if "they" don't see the need for their blogs to be private why should I (basically the everyone else is doing it justification, & yes I'm familiar with the jumping off the bridge analogy). I also sorta felt like no one was really even going to be looking at my blog anyway because who really cares about boring old us. I'm really curious to know how people feel about this. Is it just me? Because it probably could be. I'll admit I'm a slight control freak, and part of the problem is that I can't control (and don't know) who's looking at my blog. I'm also a bit on the overprotective side when it comes to parenting, and it feels weird just putting my kids out into the world wide web for anyone to see. I'm probably over thinking it, and its all fine. But just so I know....is it just me?

Happy Birthday Baby Boy!

I can't believe it has been six years since your big brother sang Hot Cross Buns to you in a hospital bed to get you to stop crying. I have had so much fun with you over the last six years. You have kept us on our toes with your various antics (like flooding the house at your 3rd birthday party), but we can't ever resist your sweet smile or the sparkle in your eye. I love that you want to give me every detail from your day when you get home, and I love that everyone is your friend. You have the sweetest spirit, and you make me laugh out loud everyday! I love seeing the world through your eyes & hearing your perspective on things. You are one of a kind, and I am grateful everyday that I get to be your mom. I love you baby boy...happy sixth birthday!

Did I really just say that

I'm sure that we have all, at some point said something and then thought to ourselves, "did I really just say that?" Well I had one of those moments this morning and it was pretty random & kinda funny so I thought I'd share. The story begins like this...The boys were sitting at the table eating breakfast before school, just like they do every morning. As usual I was running around trying to get things done & keep everyone on task so that we could leave on time. This morning I was especially distracted because the kids have their Valentine's parties today so that meant there were lots of "extras" that needed to be done this morning. So I'm in the kitchen trying to get the Valentine's gifts for the kids' teachers ready while listening to my 11 year old have a semi-breakdown due to her inability to wrap a box the way she thinks it should be wrapped, the boys are eating, and time is ticking away. I'm only half listening to the boys talk as they eat, but I hear them laughing while they engage in various contests that involve drinking the milk out of their cereal bowls. I believe it started with who could drink the milk from the bowl the fastest, and escalated from there into many variations of the same kind of game. As I stated earlier, I was distracted & time was ticking away, but I'm thinking that we have got to get moving. Well, the next thing I know I hear myself say to my boys, "Boys, you're going to have to take a break from your drinking games & go get dressed for school." What???? Did I just tell my 8 & 6 year old to "take a break from their DRINKING GAMES!" As a parent that is just not a phrase I thought I would ever say to my young children (or any at any age for that matter). I didn't even tell them to stop, I just said "take a break." Obviously their drinking games were the G rated version, and it was all completely innocent and lighthearted but ever since it happened I can't stop asking myself, did I really just say that...

A Glorious Existence

This past weekend was one of the busiest weekends that we have had in a while. It was definitely fun filled, but I might be too old for that much fun because today I am exhausted! There was all the usual stuff like basketball games, friends, & church, but we had some extras thrown in too. We also went to a play, a super bowl party, and a concert. All weekend we were literally just going from one activity to the next. The highlight of the weekend for me was on Saturday. Chris & I had the chance to go to The Killers concert, and we had a really great time. Chris has actually been to one of their concerts before in Chicago when they were touring with their last album, but I haven’t had an opportunity to see them so I was VERY excited. This is actually one of the things I love about Chris. I would never on my own think to even look for, much less buy tickets to go to a concert. He, however, is always doing stuff like that and we always have the best time. We went with a friend and a friend of that friend (wow, there’s got to be a better way to say that) and I was laughing nonstop. Chris is really funny and always making me laugh and the friend that went with us is funny too. Now add in the friend of our friend who also happened to be pretty funny…I was seriously laughing the whole time! Anyway, all the laughing was great, but not my point, the point is that the concert was really fun. They had a great show, I love their music, and I love Brandon (the lead singer of the band). Now I think everyone realizes that there is just something about musicians that is really cool, otherwise there wouldn’t be all those groupies running around following bands everywhere they go. Although I’m definitely not ready to sign up to be a groupie, I will admit that when Brandon (in case you’re wondering, yes, Brandon & I are on a first name basis, I just happen to call him by his first name more than he calls me by mine) anyway, as he walked off the stage I wanted to yell for him to come back…don’t go Brandon, don’t go!!!! Much to my disappointment he did go, and now the fun filled weekend is over and I’m left trying to drink enough coffee to get me through the day. I can’t complain though, I truly don’t mind the exhaustion, all the fun was absolutely worth it!

I have to say thanks to Nana & Daj for coming and keeping the kids for us so that we could run off to a concert like a couple of kids ourselves. The kids loved having you here & we really appreciate you for always being willing to keep them! You’re the best :)

Also, the title of this post is a line from one of their (The Killers) songs in case you were wondering where that came from. It wasn't me...I'm certainly not that poetic.

Lately I've been thinking...

It seems like all I can think about lately is going on a vacation. I'm constantly thinking about vacations we've been on in the past, and places I want to go. It has taken every bit of willpower I have not to book a disney vacation for us over spring break. I keep trying to justify spending the money on a vacation by telling myself that our kids will only be this age once, and we've got to take advantage of this time. I've even been checking the internet for information about various vacation spots. I've also found myself wandering over to my photo albums and looking through pictures of places we've been (I'm pretty sure I have a sickness but instead of putting my money toward therapy to fix this problem I am going to put it towards a vacation). I'm sure this dreary January weather has something to do with it. I also just really LOVE traveling and going on vacations (basically I am always ready to go somewhere). Anyway, since I am trying to be strong and fight against this sickness I'm just going to continue dreaming of where I want to go, and trying to save my money like a responsible person should do. Although I'm not sure how long past vacation memories and pictures will hold me off because lets face it, how responsible do I really want to be :)

In case you're (and by you I mean Chris this is where I want to go) interested here are some of my top vacation spots:
Disneyworld: I love it. We always have so much fun here. I could live in disneyworld and not get tired of it
New York: Chris & I went here almost two years ago and we had the best time. I really love it & I would love to take the kids
The Beach: I always love the beach. What's not to love; sun, sand, & pools. We always have a great time here too.
Lake Tahoe: I've never been but I bet its beautiful
Colorado or Utah for snow skiing: We went to Colorado about 8 yrs. ago & had a great time. I would love to take all the kids skiing.
Washington D.C.: This is somewhere that I haven't been since I was a kid. I would love to go and take my kids.
Chicago: we've been several times & it is a really fun city
Hawaii: I haven't ever been here, but I would love to see it
There are so many other places on my list but I just realized that this is getting ridiculously long. I have only gone through places in the US, I haven't even gotten to other countries I want to see. I'll save that for another blog, another day.

Hello Blogging World

Well, I have decided to begin a blog. I decided to jump on the blogging bandwagon for a few different reasons. The main reason being that I seem to have a lot more time on my hands than I'm used to having. Because of this I think I'll have more time to devote to a blog than I would have had in the past. However, I'm not sure if I am going to do all this blogging stuff correctly. I feel pretty sure that I should be doing something differently even as I type this. I will figure it out eventually, but if my first few (or hundred) posts are wrong, or bizarre, just bear with me...I simply don't know what I'm doing (I know its not hard, but trust me if anyone can mess this up I will!).

I decided to name, or call (or whatever) my blog The Blessings of an Ordinary Life because of a woman that I go to church with. Recently this woman was getting ready to lead the closing prayer of a ladies class, and she talked for just a few minutes about how blessed she was to have had an ordinary day. She had been able to wake up, enjoy her coffee, go to work like she always does, and basically just have an ordinary day. She then went into several things she didn't have to face that day (none of which were pleasant) and listening her describe the blessing of an ordinary day really struck a chord with me, and everyday since then when I am doing all the ordinary things that I do everyday I have taken the time to think about how blessed I am to be able to enjoy the blessings that come with just having an ordinary day.

This is probably more for me than for anyone else because I can't imagine that anyone else (other than a few grandparents that come to mind) would really care that much about what is going on with us. That being said, o'well. It seems like fun, and even if no one else out there is interested I think that my kids are pretty fantastic, and this will give me an excuse to go through pictures (which I love to do) and think about all the wonderfully ordinary (yet extraordinary to me) things they do each day!