How???

So many times when I click on a Pinterest link, it takes me to someones blog. OK, that's fine, nothing wrong with blogging. ;) However, you read the "About me" piece, and these women have full time jobs AND their own business, 20 kids, a blog they write in (with lots of pictures of their projects), volunteer positions, are the room mom for their children's classes, the coach of their kids sports team, AND have miraculously spotless houses, and seemingly endless amounts of time for everything else like entertain, going to the gym, baking and cooking amazing things, making their hair and makeup perfect everyday, making their kids hair perfect every day, day trips, weekend trips, weekly trips, etc, etc, etc. Oh, and they still have time to sit at the end of the day to catch up on their favorite reality shows, and then do their yoga before they go to bed, where they then get a full 8 hours of UNINTERRUPTED sleep, and then they wake up happy and peaceful at 5am, go for a run, and are ready to start the day all over again.  I'd like to know: HOW DO THEY DO THAT? Are they being honest in that they really do all of those things... daily? Do they really have 40 hour days, or so it seems? Or perhaps they keep their kids chained up all day while they do everything, then let the kids out for the last hour or so of the day. I just don't understand how people can do that? I barely have time to blog, although i've been trying REALLY hard this month in case you hadn't noticed. 

My house will not stay clean no matter how hard I try, its messed up within 5 minutes. My kids do not behave all the time. We have extracurricular activities that take up every single evening.

So i'd like to know if these women are for real? Most of the moms I know do not have time for all those things. Their kids are not perfect angels. They have to take time out daily (multiple times daily) to discipline their kids and deal with unruliness. Their houses never stay clean. They don't have time or money to do all the things these "supermoms" do. Do the Supermom's kids never get sick??? Do THEY never get sick? (I say that now since i'm sitting here unable to breath with a pile of used kleenex next to me and a box of unused kleenex just waiting for me.) ;)

So in conclusion, I am no supermom, and I think the women who claim to be supermom's are all fakes. 

There. I'm done. 

practices

Jadon began basketball this week. He had 2 practices, and so far he really likes it. We also so a good improvement between the two practices!  Its his first time playing any "real" basketball, aside from our Little Tykes basketball hoop and ball at home. At his age, at his games, they will not be doing any stealing, fouls, or even keeping score. I'm looking forward to watching!

In this video, his coach was "blocking" him and he was supposed to move forward with the ball. Most of the other kids struggled with that a little, I was really shocked when Jadon did it so well.

Avery started a tumbling class through the parks and rec this week, and she had a lot of fun as well! 

this video is Avery doing a backwards sommersault... she is in the green polka dot shirt.

We've all had this darn cough thing that's going around. Pretty much its only a cough. Then yesterday Derek and I both came down with a head cold on top of the cough. I spent all night coughing so I feel pretty horrible today. I took a "nap" (an on and off doze) for an hour and a half and I am looking forward to going to bed tonight!

Thank you Grandmas!

Thank you to Grandmother, Grandma Debbie and Grandma Karla for all your Boxtops and Labels for Education! With the Boxtops that were turned in by all the students between Sept and early Dec, the school earned almost $600, and with the Labels for Education points earned will go towards playground equipment. Yay!
So thank you for your help and keep 'em coming! :)

Yard

Looking out at our backyard right now.... its a big huge mud pit. At least the french drain is working well! With all the rain we had over the last few days, we discovered 5 little.... springs.... or something, coming out of the side of the hill... not down the top of it, but literally out the side of it. That will have to be dealt with at some point. But the good thing is, its all draining into the french drain. My hubby did such a great job on that!
I feel overwhelmed by all the things that need to be done. If we get nothing else done this summer with the backyard, we at least need to get grass put in. Top priority.

I was just telling Derek that I laugh now at how we were overwhelmed with having to do our yard at our old house. That seems like a PIECE OF CAKE now compared to what we have now!

One things for sure.... I can't wait for spring to come, and summer, to dry out the yard so we can move forward and have a nice backyard to play in! Hurry up warmer weather! Hurry up sunshine!

Hey did you all know that the sun is setting later now? Its getting close to half an hour later than it was. Yes, i'm a weirdo and I keep track of that because I NEED to see that the days are getting longer and there's hope in the dead of this "favorite" season of mine! I'm dreaming of that sun!!

Life

Its my favorite time of year!! No its not. I hate this time of year. In fact, I'm without a doubt certain that January and February are my least favorite months of the year. I hate the weather, I hate the long days, I hate the additional pounds gained from December, I hate the illnesses, I hate that the kids are stuck inside most of the time and can't burn off extra energy.
November and December are at least filled with holiday gatherings and holiday events that help with the above. And March daylight savings starts so we get more daylight time, and Jadon's birthday is in March, as well as half of our extended family.
But i'm not here to complain and whine. Although its pretty easy to this time of year! ;)

The kids started swimming again tonight after a month off. We always take December off from all extracurricular activities because December is already a busy month without all the extras. We started on private lessons today though. Previously we'd just done normal group lessons, which we felt were not as productive. Why? Well, the classes are 30 minutes long, and with 6 kids in the class, they just weren't getting enough time with actual swimming. A good portion was always spent waiting for the teacher to work with other kids. However, the last 2 sessions we had the same teacher and we really like her, Jadon has actually showed some improvement with her, and she is really good with both the kids, and knowing when to push them. Which is exactly what Jadon needs, since he's very tentative in the water. If you push him too much, he freaks out and ends up back at square one again. So, she noticed that and slowly builds him up to do things. We lucked out and were able to get her for private lessons, so we are thrilled with that. And the kids had a LOT more actual swimming time with just the 2 of them. Not to mention, the pool was basically empty so they weren't distracted by all the other children in the pool around them. They both said they had more fun than in the normal class.

Jadon starts basketball next week. It will be his first time playing basketball. As always, he's a little tentative. For some reason, he got it in his head that he's going to be playing in a college-like coliseum with tons of people there. I explained to him that its not that way, I found YouTube videos of 1st graders playing basketball-practice and games and showed him those. But until he actually goes, his mind is set on how it will be, and there's usually no convincing him otherwise.
I'm excited for him to try this new adventure!

Avery starts a tumbling class next week also. I went to sign her up for gymnastics at the college like we do every winter, but the class was full. So we're doing a tumbling class through the parks and rec instead. Hopefully she'll participate this time!

I dont know if i mentioned that I was going to be going through ALL of our stuff this month and purging and organizing it all. Its been pretty fun.... you know me, I love organizing! I love decluttering too! So it feels good to go through all our stuff and get rid of whats collecting dust, and then organize whats left. Its also hard to get rid of things sometimes for sentimental reasons. However, I read an article that reminded me that its all just STUFF. And the more STUFF you save, the less value it actually has to you. So I try to keep that in mind when I'm going through things. The hardest things for me to get rid of are things that pertain to the kids when they were little. Their clothes, their toys, their artwork, etc. Its all so precious to me.
But regardless, our office is growing a large pile of  "Stuff" in it to give to Goodwill.
Another problem I have is thinking that I might some day use or have a need for things. Like clothes.... I have kept this little cropped cardigan thing for years. Have I worn it even one time? Nope. But I always thought that I might someday have something to wear it with, or have a use for it. Needless to say, those things are hard to get rid of too, just because i'm afraid i'm going to get rid of it, and then a week later find something I could have used it for.
Or keeping clothes that are too small for you, but you'll be able to wear again when you lose all that weight you gained. I'm not so bad at that anymore, but I used to be. Turns out when i'd finally lost all the weight and could fit into the clothes, I didn't like them anymore.  Also, if there's anything I learned from What Not To Wear, its that you dress the body you have NOW....not the body you hope to have someday.
So, i'm having a lot of fun getting organized and decluttered :)

I did pretty good controlling my portion sizes this week, most of the time. So changes are slowly happening there.... in my mind that is. I'm trying to retrain myself to that mindset that I don't need to eat so much, that food is not my best friend, and that I actually feel better when I don't stuff myself and eat slower. Eventually i'd like to start walking (outside) when both the kids are at school, but its going to have to stop raining and warm up a little for that.

Its already been almost a year since we moved into our new house! Its so hard to believe! I truly truly feel blessed here. Very rarely do I feel irritated with something about our house. Our old house I was always bent about something....... mostly not having enough storage space for anything. Here it feels like everything has a place, and we dont have 20 different storage shelves inside to hold things, or a pantry in our garage. Everyday I love my laundry room, and i'm so thankful to have it be inside now instead of in the garage, especially in the winter months! I'm so grateful to have a 4th bedroom that we can use as an office/sewing/craft room. I'm so grateful for our large living room where we can all sit and play games together, or where we can have company without everyone being crammed into the room. I'm grateful to only have 2 toilets instead of 3 to clean, even though once in awhile a 3rd toilet is sometimes needed (amazing how all 4 of us can have a need to use the bathroom at the same time!) ;)  I'm super super grateful for our huge backyard and i'm sooooooo looking forward to getting it to a usable state this spring and summer! And i'm very grateful for our neighbors. What are the odds that we'd end up with such amazing neighbors who are very tolerant of our kids and even seem to be quite fond of them.
As hard as it was to leave our old house and memories behind, God provided a new home for us in a big way. And what about the fact that Jadon's bff moved in just a few streets away? or that there's a little girl 2 houses away who is the same age as Avery, and also named Avery? Or that a house behind us lives a boy who is also a first grader where Jadon goes to school (different class though.) Or that the "older" kids in the neighborhood are super good with kids and are really good role models for Jadon and Avery. I could go on and on, but it was definitely not luck that brought us here. God had all this planned before we even knew it.

See, I told you my blog post wasn't going to be all whining and complaining ;)

Goals

What a year we just finished! The big highlights of our year were: moving into our new house, Derek and I celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary, Avery starting preschool and Jadon starting 1st grade (full day school.)
I hope you all enjoyed our picture year in review. I make those mostly for the kids because they love to look back at the pictures of themselves and what they did during the year. We go back and watch the past years occasionally, and its a great reminder of how blessed we are.

I hate new years resolutions. I think they are dumb, and no one ever keeps them. I quit setting new years resolutions a long time ago. However, I think its always good to have goals, and a fresh start. So I have plenty of goals for this year, including: lose 15 lbs before our big trip, get active again (because i've gotten lazy... thank you migraines), complete our backyard (or at least get the grass put in!), put down my ipod and instead spend that time with my kids, get back to my menu board and get back to my cleaning schedule, work on the kids manners, get rid of these migraines! etc. All of these are very doable, and if I get rid of the migraines it will make it 100% easier to do and stick with these goals. Before I get a migraine I usually get reeaaalllly tired. Its like my warning sign. And after the migraine is over, I feel very drained as well. And since I get several migraines a week, I feel tired and drained A LOT. Its hard to get anything accomplished feeling that way, not to mention having a pounding head.

We got the kids a cheap little microphone for Christmas. I knew Avery would enjoy that, and she actually said that was her favorite gift! Anyways, she gets bashful about singing in it, so I was going about my business one day and she was in the living room singing and I happened to get a video of her really getting into it. She's singing a song from her favorite cartoon show Strawberry Shortcake's Berry Bitty Adventures....There's a character on the show named Cherry Jam who is a famous singer and so sometimes she sings on the show, so she's probably imitating Cherry Jam. Its amusing ;) Excuse the mess, it was the day after Christmas and anyone with kids will understand how much of a mess Christmas makes when you have kids!

This is the start of my 7th year blogging. I noticed that my blogging has been on a steady decline since the year I started. Every year i've blogged less and less. I can tell you exactly why! First year I had just one child..... correction, I had just one child who still NAPPED! Second year was mainly the same thing until October when Avery was born. The next year, I had a busy toddler and a demanding infant. The next year, busy preschooler and busy toddler. The same the next year. Then last year we were moving and good golly its hard to blog when the kids are trying to talk into one of my ears and i'm trying to think at the same time. Takes me over an hour to post anything at all with all the of the interruptions! And Jadon sits over my shoulder reading it out loud as i'm typing..... I finally just stopped trying to do it when the kids were up, and at night when they are sleeping i am not motivated to do it. I tried doing it on saturday mornings but like I said, distractions abound all over the place so it was taking me hours just to do 1 blog entry. On top of that, I have run out of things to talk about that might be of any interest to anyone, (other than griping about annoying irritating people in this world.)  So for those of you faithful who still read it, and are not bored to death with my ramblings about nothing, i'll try to be better this year, but I really can't make any guarantees! ;)

So Jadon is signed up for basketball, and starts that in a couple weeks, and Avery is signed up for a tumbling class and starts in a couple weeks as well. We had been trying to get them signed up for semi-private swim lessons, but our favorite instructor is not available when we are, so now i'm not sure what we will do. Because of other things going on during the week, we have limited options of when to do lessons, and the pool doesn't offer normal lessons during those times. 

So that's where we are!