Where you go, I will go.

Wow. A lot has happened since May 7th.

Two days after, I got engaged to the love of my life. Yep - Paul asked me to marry him and I couldn't be happier! Madi is excited as well and we can't wait to tell Addison.

A few days after he proposed, I was offered a job in Norfolk, VA. Talk about good timing!! I accepted and will start this coming Monday. I'm very excited about the new job and about Paul and I no longer having to do this long distance thing. It is not easy!! We will certainly not take our time together for granted after spending a year apart!

Madi is coping well with the move. She is five years old so to her it's about how she will get to spend more time with "the dogs," as she calls them (Jeff & Pam's dogs). I'm thankful that I found a job before she starts school in the fall - this way, she can start school in VA and we won't have to worry about that transition.

Everything is truly falling into place! It's amazing what a little faith and prayer can do.

I will try to blog more now that we will have many new adventures in VA!

Xoxo!

The 'Ol Rivalry

I guess when I say I'm not going to post anymore it's actually code for I'm going to post all the time now.

It's no secret that in the South we take our football rivalries seriously. I mean as serious as Canadians take their hockey.

Clemson vs Carolina is the rivalry in my state. My dad was a die-hard Carolina fan. My mom is a Carolina fan by default (she went there) and I have never really payed much attention to football.

Since Paul and Morgan went to Clemson, I've been leaning in that direction. Madi has pretty much fallen in that direction. :) So yesterday when I saw a Clemson cheerleader outfit for $4.50, I snatched it up!

She wore it to school today - oh so proudly! (Her teachers are both Clemson fans. And I must point out that it's interesting that I know that. Thinking about Anchorage - I would have had no clue what sports team people liked. Football is just that big of a deal around here.)

Well, I knew there would be some talk - and she did too - about who does and doesn't like her outfit. She told me right away that her friend BJ would love it and that Patrick would not. I told her just to take it with a grain of salt basically. But of course, it's not that easy, especially since she's five years old!

She told me tonight that one of her good friends would not stand next to her all day today (aka wouldn't play with her), because of her Clemson outfit. Madi even said "she finally let me stand behind her in car line." This just made me so sad! I know it's just kids being kids, but to what degree? Some parents put so much emphasis on school teams being better or worse, that their young children pick up on it and relate that to others. 

I am not saying we shouldn't be passionate about sports, but I just want parents to be aware that how we act about that Carolina fan next to us is going to be mocked by our children. Breaking that orange crayon (ahem, Marty! haha, kidding!) or refusing to wear garnet may be a bit overboard … at least in front of your kids.

Just some food for thought when I can't make my mind turn off.

Go Tigers! ;)

Nights like tonight.

Nights like tonight make crying in the bathroom completely worth the pain.

Madi & I were both feeling lethargic and just not all that well this evening. As soon as we got home, I fixed her dinner and let her eat it in my bed while we watched a Barbie Mermaid movie. After she ate, we played Disney Guess Who and then she spent some time alone in her room while I ate dinner. Later, she joined me on the couch to watch Love It or List It (yes, the HGTV show!) and then I cuddled in her bed with her to put her to sleep.

She cried when I didn't let her sleep in my room but it was such an innocent, sweet cry. She just wanted her mama. I held her close and just assured her I'd be here. I told her how much I love her. That is the most important thing, I've found, to do - tell your children you love them all the time. Even if you think they know - say it anyway.

Those moments of feeling her chest go up and down on mine are what motherhood feels like. She makes my life so much more and I thank God for her every night.

No one told me...

When I decided to have children, no one told me there would be times that I would lock myself in the bathroom and cry.

I've done that today. Quite a bit today actually. This whole single parent thing is TOUGH. Any one who has the option to share this task of raising a kid should totally succumb to that. 

I'm used to having my mom around to help me but she's been gone all weekend. I really can't imagine how moms with truly no one else to help handle it. And with more than one kid? Oh my gosh I'd just die. 

Of course there are plenty of good times with M but days like today make me get on my knees and pray. I prayed for patience. I prayed to be a better mother. I mean good moms don't have kids who sass them or pull on their legs and bang on their bedroom door even though mommy said 5 times that MOMMY needs a time out, right?? Right?

So. Today is a struggle. It's a struggle that I don't have someone to pass the parenting off to so that I can cool down. It's a struggle that I don't always know exactly what to do in these situations. It's a struggle that I'm fuming mad but at the same time I'm worried that my child is going to bed with an empty stomach.

First and foremost, I'm her mother. Good days and bad days, I love her to the moon and back and would do ANYTHING on this earth to protect her. But right now, she has to hurt in order to learn a lesson and I have to hurt because I'm teaching her a lesson.

Tomorrow is another day. Tomorrow may have tears and it may not. But it will have love because we always forgive each other…after all, I'm the meanest mom in the world remember?

Expectations

Expectations.

 

What a weighted word.

I have learned a lot about myself lately. One thing being that I have extremely high expectations.

High expectations for myself: I expect myself to weigh a certain amount. I expect myself to act a certain way. I expect myself to have zero negative emotions in public because well, that’s what is expected from society. I expect myself to never yell at my child. I expect myself to keep a perfect “pinterest” house.

I do not achieve these things. I just expect it. And when it’s not met, I’m extremely hard on myself. Really, really hard on myself.

I also have expectations for others. I expect certain reactions from people and when I don’t get what I’m expecting, I’m disappointed or frustrated.

This is a big problem. It’s a problem for Madi. I expected her to jump up and down and squeal with excitement over the Disney show last night but she didn’t. I compared her to the three year old next to us who was doing just that and then I ASSUMED Madi wasn’t enjoying the show.

The kids were asked to stand up and interact with the cast but she just sat in her seat. I said why don’t you get up and dance? She looked at me and matter of factly (is that a word?) said “not that kind of person.” Well. She told me.

I know it's sideways but I can't get it to rotate!

 

At the time I didn’t understand. I wanted her to be as excited as I was. I wanted her to EXPRESS her excitement the exact same way that I was and other kids were. But now, looking back, just because she didn’t jump up and down doesn’t mean she didn’t have fun. She told me herself – she’s just not that kind of person. She DID have a good time. After the show she said she couldn’t wait to tell people about it.

I allowed my preconceived notions of how she would react to alter my mood.

This is just one example of the many, many times I have allowed my expectations to discourage and disappointment me.

Lesson learned. It’s not going to be easy to change my way of thinking. It won’t be an overnight change. But I’m going to work on it. And I’m going to try to remember that she’s not me. Madi has her own personality and so does everyone else I interact with.

I’m the kind of person who waves her hands in the air while riding on a roller coaster.

 

What kind of person are you?

 

 

Meet the newest member of our family...

If you follow me on Instagram or Twitter then you have been anxiously awaiting the introduction of this little guy. I apologize if you have lost sleep over this. Truly. 

Please meet Weezy, the newest addition to our family:

Yes, I did say his name was Mr. Flappy (on insta & twitter) but Madi changed it. He reminds her of Weezy from Toy Story and hey, the name fits!

Last Thursday I took Madi to the doctor. She has had a deep, loud! cough for about 3 months now. Don't freak out … I did take her to the doctor two-three times during that three months. Each time the dr said she had a sinus infection. FALSE. I know sinus infections and she did not have one, or three.

This time the dr did not say sinus infection. First thing she said was that Madi sounded like an asthma patient when listening to her breathe. She had her do a breathing treatment while in the office, listened to her again and then said she had walking pneumonia. Personally I was glad we finally had a name to this so it could be treated. Madi has been exhausted lately - going to bed by 7:30 at the latest for the past two weeks and missing gymnastics, which she never wants to miss. Doc gave her steroids, an antibiotic, and Weezy - the nebulizer. We meet with Weezy 3-4 times a day for the next week and then go back to the doc.

Hopefully Madi will be all better by Thursday, when we see her doctor again. She had an allergic reaction to her antibiotic last night so she's on a new one for the next 10 days. I think the breathing treatments are helping though - at least I hope so!

She really doesn't act sick except being tired and a bit grumpy. The cough sounds awful but I know it could be way worse. We really are blessed with our health!

Glad we got Weezy out of this too. He's super cute and fun to look at!

How was y'alls weekend? Did you hear we may get S N O W again!?!! ECKKKK! I hope so!!

I like candy.

Just some random thoughts going through my mind at the moment...

• I keep socks under my pillow. You see, my feet are always cold at night but in the middle of the night they get hot. I take them off but they aren't really dirty so I just keep them under my pillow to put on the next night. Don't worry - I only do this 3 nights tops and then I get a new pair. 
• Drinking tap water grosses me out a bit. I recently threw away a filter from my Brita pitcher but the new filters I bought don't fit. Now I have a pitcher but no filter. I still run the tap water through the filterless pitcher before I drink it. It some how makes me feel better.
• I have candy around me almost constantly. I keep it in my nightstand and on my desk at work. I keep it in my car too. If I don't have candy or chapstick around I'm not a very pleasant person. Confession: I'm eating candy as I type this.
• Winter sucks. I gain weight (no, it's not due to the candy. I eat it in the summertime too), the clothes are frumpy, can't wear flip flops, and it rains a lot. Bring on summer.
• My neck itches like a bia. I've had this bump on my throat for like 2 weeks now. It's almost gone, healing I assume, and that's why it itches. Grrrrr.
• Madi was flipping hilarious the other night. She thinks she's Mulan. (I've posted the video below for your amusement.) I really love how active her imagination has been lately. She plays mermaid teacher in the tub, Mulan recently, gave me a "bedtime ticket" to get into her room to put her to bed, and had pet mice the other day. 
• My fan makes this obnoxious sound. I think it's about to break. I should have taken the sound machine from Carrie's house. Darnit. … (I just threw something at it to see if that would help, it didn't.)

I guess that's enough. I could keep going but I've gotta save some randomness for twitter.

Apples in the trashcan.

Something very monumental in Madi's timeline of life happened yesterday.

She lied.

Yep, it was the first time. At least the first time that I know of and the first time she looked me directly in my face and told me a lie.

I had a hard time not laughing actually.

I told her she had to eat her apples before getting something else to eat. She told me they tasted better if she walked around while eating them. Ummm okay Madi. So every time she grabbed an apple she walked down the hall, where I could not see her. I knew she was lying right away but gave her the benefit of the doubt. I played into a bit too. What mom wouldn't?

I told her I was proud of her for eating them. I was really surprised when she just said okay and smiled.

Since I'm new at all of this, I called Paul for some advice before addressing it with her. He gave me some good suggestions on how to handle it. First things first - I had to find the proof. Sure enough, when I checked the bathroom trash can there were the apples. That's just how innocent she is and kids in general are. She didn't try to hide them in the trash. She just put them in there and didn't think I would notice.

So I sat her down and told her I saw the apples in the trash. I didn't really have to do much after that. She immediately started crying. It was very sad!! I wasn't too hard on her because well, we all did that as kids. It's just part of growing up. But I did pull out the whole "you really disappointed me" thing. I also said "didn't you learn it's not okay to lie from church?" She said "no, we haven't learned that yet." Haha! Well darn!

I don't think she'll be doing that again. It was a shock to me though that she's already old enough to do stuff like that!

Had to document for her to read later and laugh. :)