Forever

Ever really think about what that term means?

I think of forever and I think of 'til death do us part, and how my love for my children will never end. But, other than that, I really don't think about it.

Today, our family had the honor of attending an open house for a precious little boy and parents, who were celebrating his long awaited adoption. L. is a little boy, almost 5 years old, who was a ward of the state and child of the foster system. He was born, premature, addicted to multiple drugs, and his life has been no picnic. His first foster family was, to say the least, not a good match. His second foster family welcomed him with open arms and with tons of love. They have struggled to adopt him since he came into their home. His birth mother, a woman ordered to have no contact with him, refused to relinquish rights. His biological father decided he wanted him, but little L. ended up suspiciously hurt under his care.

The adoption process was started and stopped so many times, because of the system. In the end, the father volunteered to relinquish custody/rights, the mother was ordered to give up her rights by the court, and L.'s foster parents were allowed to adopt him.

I was chatting with his grandmother today, and she told me something touching.

After the court proceedings were over and the adoption finalized, the family asked for a picture with the judge. L. gave the judge a high five and then, the following conversation took place:

L- This is my Daddy. This is my Mommy. This is my Sissy. Forever?

Judge- Forever.

L- I am L. [insert adoptive last name]?

Judge- Yes.

L-Forever?

Judge-Forever

L- No more [insert birth name]?

Judge- You are [insert full adoptive name] forever and ever.

L.- K. Good. I like forever.

I'm so happy that L. and his family have found a happily ever after, and that their never ending love for him has given him a forever.

Can I start over?

Let's try this week again. I'd like to skip Xavian's trip to the ER for splitting open the back of his head. I'd like to skip Xavian cutting Korra's hair this morning. I'd like to skip Saxton's bad case of thrush that I discovered this afternoon. I'd like 4 more hours of sleep than I got last night.

Please?

Boy + Iron Post = Day In ER

Me-fine. Saxton-fine. Korra-fine. Hubby-fine. Xavian-not so much.

Xavian went outside to play a little after 12:30 today, and w/in about 20 minutes, I heard this horrible scream. I flew out the front door (the direction I thought the scream came from), Korra met me and said Xavian fell down and is bleeding. K. Fine. Skinned knee, right? No.

I go in the back door, notice a trail of bloody door knobs and a splattered trail on the floor. Xavian is standing in the middle of the kitchen, sobbing and clutching at the back of his head, which is literally gushing blood. The back of his shirt is soaked, ect. I grabbed a handful of paper towels, stuck them to the back of his head, ran upstairs, and woke up Hubby.

While DH attended to Xavian, I put Saxton's carseat back together (I had it tore apart to wash), pulled the car up to the front door, loaded Saxton, and then Hubby loaded a shaking Xavian.

Long story short, we spent almost 4 hours in the waiting room because of a never ending trail of ambulances, a nurse ended up comming to the waiting room and bandaging Xavian's head so that we could quit holding a hand towel on it, then she gave him a hospital gown to put on. We finally saw the doctor who decided staples would be best, and the nurse measured and cleaned the still bleeding gash. To quote the dr, he "busted a fat one". Since it was still bleeding excessively (so many hours after the fact), he changed his mind to stitches.

5 hours after we arrived at the ER, we left w/ 3 stitches on the 2.5 cm gash, and strict instructions to wake him every 2 hours and how to keep the area clean.

It doesn't look like he fractured his skull or has any brain swelling, but the dr said it can take up to 72 hours before we're in the clear. We have to see the pedi on Wednesday, and he'll determine when to remove stitches.

Now, he's catching some sleep. Poor guy.

Whew!

Found the tooth. It was under the edge of the couch. Tooth Fairy came, but Xavian didn't seem to notice! Dang it.

About Scout Camp

Xavian had a blast! The theme was prehisroric, and they had the cutest wooden dinosaurs posted around camp. Here's one:




And here's the happy camper!




Notice the front tooth barely hanging in there? It disappeared sometime between Friday night and 11 am on Saturday. Still haven't found it! Guess we'll have to write the tooth fairy a note. Hmmmmmmmm...

A "Powerful" road trip

Yesterday morning, Hubby indicated that maybe we could take a road trip. Xavian had Cub Scout day camp all week, and because of the cost of gas, I stayed in the area all day (except Thursday), so the idea of a road trip (and being gone all day, again) wasn't super appealing to me. But, I sat down and searched the web for any festivals or events within a reasonable drive. I found an expo and flea market at the Coolsprings Power Museum. The what museum? Well, appearently it's the largest collection of stationary steam engines in the world. And, that in itself is cool. Even cooler? It's just an hour and a half down the highway from us. I bought into the roadtrip, packed us up, and we escaped!

Hubby started the trip off with milkshakes (yes, my children LOVE their daddy). We knew we were going the right direction, when we started meeting antique steam engines and tractors (obviously leaving the expo!) We arrived just in time for a thunderstorm. Most of the expo participants were gone, as well as many of the flea market vendors, but the museum was open until 8pm, so we stayed to check things out.

It's a REALLY neat museum. Lots to see! It's really neat to see these big, old engines, still opperating. Here's a few we saw:







Here's the kids & I checking things out, while enjoying ourselves:





Pretty cool, huh?

But Mom, the laundry might eat me

It just might!

Seriously, I have 5 loads of laundry, washed & dried, ready to be folded; 1 load of laundry to hang on the clothesline first thing in the morning; 2 loads waiting to be washed; and I'm certain there is at least one more load hiding under my children's beds. Ugh.

I also will have the bedding to wash on Saturday, plus all the clothing worn before then, towels from the bathroom & kitchen, and the ironing.

Wait! What's that sound?

Oh. Just my washing machine begging for mercy.

Sigh, why are stay-at-home moms not paid?! (I'm refering to cash)

In case you didn't know

I do custom painted jeans for children and big hairbows.

I saw some custom jeans on eBay selling for INSANE amounts of money, and thought, I can do that! So I went out and bought some professional fabric paints, sat down, and painted my first pair. They turned out gloriously! I received oodles of complements everywhere Korra wore them. I've since sold several pairs on eBay. And every pair has been my own unique design.

Well, last summer, I was working full time, and stopped painting jeans and making hairbows. Then, I decided to redecorate most of the house during the cooler months. But as of this week, I'm back!

I'm going to paint some Dr Seuss themed jeans for Xavian and Korra to wear to school for Dr Seuss' birthday week. The kids and I are so excited! We've been looking at their Seuss books, picking out exactly what they want on their jeans. No exact replicas of any particular picture (that would be infringing on copyrighted material), but, definately the Seuss characters, using the Seuss style!

Here's the first pair of jeans I ever painted, Korra modeling:

Look what we did, today

The kids were in the mood, so, we had an impromptu photo session!

Another beautiful smile:

My 3 angels:

Brothers:

Directions are not a back-up plan

My FIL installed the new garbage disposal yesterday-just as promised. BUT, he didn't read the directions, and missed removing a plastic plug before attatching the dishwasher's drain hose. And, so my dishwasher got backed up and flooded my kitchen this afternoon.

Now, I love my FIL. He's a great guy. But he's a man. Haven't met one yet who thinks they need directions.

So, for all you guys out there: Read the directions! Please?

I caught it!

Here's a peek at one of Saxton's many smiles!

Please Pray

There were 4 boyscouts killed in a tornado while attending leadership camp. As a mother of a cubscout, and having been a member & camp staff for another youth organization, I can only imagine the pain these parents and the surviving scouts are going through. As a mother, I just can't imagine never again seeing my son's smiling face or hearing his chatter.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25107608?GT1=43001

Success!

Well, my annual yard sale was a success. My MIL came down (is this the 4th or 5th year?), and we nickled and dimed our way to more than $800! When I was packing things up, I couldn't believe how much was gone! I have like 4 plastic totes left (2 full of fall and winter maternity & kids' clothes). My share of the sale money is going towards our trip to Kansas & Oklahoma & my MIL is saving for a new pond.

I think that I'm going to have a Labor Day Weekend sale to move the fall/winter clothes & a couple of ceramic heaters. We're going to be school clothes & shoe shopping for 2 kiddos this year, so the extra money from a fall sale would be nice.

I scored a ton of beautiful, name-brand clothes for Korra at a couple sales this weekend too. (I love being part of a community sale). Saxton got quite a bit of very nice clothes too. This was a dry weekend for Xavian, but I'm certain I'll come across a couple good sales for him later this summer.

The seller at one of the sales where I got Korra a lot of clothes has a little girl who went to school with Xavian. She has a couple tubs of designer clothes she didn't get out for her sale, but after his sister goes through them, she's bringing them over for me to go through! If I can keep dressing my babies cheap (but in VERY nice stuff-I have standards), it'll make it easier for me to stay home!

School's Out!

Xavian graduated from kindergarten today!


I just sat down to look thru the paper package his teacher sent home today, and inside I found my budding artist's self portrait- from September AND May.


September:






And May:

What an incredible difference 9 months makes! I'm so excited to see how he has evolved and started picking up the small details, like his shoe laces.


I gave him a "grown-up" sketch pad for his birthday. He since since completely filled every page of it. Dinosaurs, planes, cars, legos, images of his friends, trains, and his artistic rendentions of us as a family have covered the pages. Designs have clung to my fridge, on my walls, backs of doors and filled envelopes sent to family and friends. I'm constantly finding nubs of pencils and broken crayons on his floor and under my kitchen island. I have lovely cards he's made me for various holidays. Such is life with a budding artist!

Rhubarb and designer shoes & bags

I L.O.V.E. rhubarb. I like the tart fruits, and technically rhubarb is a root, which makes it a member of the vegetable family, BUT, I love it non-the-less.

Today, I scored about 20 lbs of rhubard for $4. That's right: $4. Awsome, huh? Especially considering it's $7/lb at the grocery store. So I saved $136! It's locally grown, too. I need to plant my root this summer and get my patch started, so that in 4 years, I will have rhubarb all my own.

Tonight, I'll make a rhubarb pie, maybe make some cherry-rhubarb jelly on Sunday, and I'll chop up the rest, measure it out for pies & crisps, and freeze it. I think I might need another freezer, maybe?

It's funny to me. I enjoy owning designer clothes, bags, and shoes (Steve Maddon, anyone?), but I also like growing my own food and canning. I give friends and family homemade salsa for Christmas every year. We eat our own green beans all winter long. And what tastes better than a homegrown tomatoe at dinner time? Not to mention the herendious price of fresh produce right now. I can't believe what we're being charged!

So glad to look out my window right now and admire the green spouts rising out of recently tilled soil. Not so happy about the weeds that have sprouted up with this weeks rain, but they'll be easy to yank. Everything is comming up, except for the okra. It likes warmer weather, though. Xavian spotted the carrots yesterday. I recently was joking with J. about it being our victory garden!

Treasure?

I'm getting ready for my yardsale this weekend. It's a lot of work, but such a big payoff. It is hard to sell certain things. It's all stuff, but there are so many memories attatched to so many things.

Like the tablecloth my grandmother made me when I was little. Last year, I saw it and thought, "clutter!" Today, I see it and remember how excited I was when she gave it to me. It's nothing fancy, just polyester cut in a circle w/ red lace sewn around the edge. I'm pretty sure she made it w/ some cheap fabric she found and meant nothing major about it. And, I highly doubt she thought of it as heirloom quality. But seeing it today made me stop. I miss her. And it's something that reminds me of her, of who she was. She adored all of us grandkids. She delighted in making us things, like this tablecloth.

So, I put the tablecloth to the side. Maybe I'll give it to Korra to play with. Or, maybe I'll put it away, just to keep. Today, I don't think I want to sell it or give it away. On the other hand, Xavian's sandals from last summer, despite the places we went while he wore them, will be going.

Look what I found!

I'm cleanning off the digital card so that we can capture more fantastic moments!

I came accross this photo of Korra and Aunt K. at Xavian's birthday party back in April. Don't you just love it?!

(Thanks K. for being such a good sport)

It's a beautiful, I promise

Saxton has this amazing smile. His whole face lights up with glee. Until you pick up the camera. Suddenly, his eyes get big and his mouth turns into an "o" shape. Everyday, I try to capture his toothless grin, but time after time, Saxton becomes camera shy. Sighhhhhhhhhhhhh...

I wanted to post something great

You know, the kind of post that makes you think I'm clever and witty? So I've been thinking for 2 weeks of what I want to post, and while I came up with something close to my heart, it's better suited for posting around the fourth of July. So, instead, my first blog post is about how I'm not all that clever and witty. Instead, I'll just tell it like it is:

My 1 month old has an upset tummy and is crying, my 4 yr old is putting her jammies on, my 6 yr old is admiring the vacancy left by his lost left front tooth, the puppy is napping, the cat is meowing at the basement door, and my hubby, J, is taking a nap in Manland (I think). I fed my kids leftovers (for the 2nd night in a row), the floor needs swept, and dishes need put away. And I lack total and complete motivation.

So, there you have it.