Timothy's New Friend

So, the weather this past month has been amazing!  I think last year was just really stinky so it seems like it's a lot nicer than normal, but I'll take it!  The best part is that the kids have been able to play outside pretty much every day this Spring. 

A few weeks ago, Timothy was out trying to perfect his two wheel bike-riding technique when he fell.  A little boy down the street came over and asked if he was OK and I remember thinking, "what a nice boy".  A little bit after that, we were taking a walk and the same little boy asked if he could walk with us.  I told him I thought he should probably ask his mommy or daddy if that was OK with them and he told me that they didn't care.  Timothy started riding his scooter around with him (we found out his name is Marcus) and ever since then, if the weather's nice, they've been outside together, riding bikes or scooters together.

Last Wednesday, Timothy had school in the morning and we happened to pull into the driveway right before the bus stopped in front of our house and Marcus got out.  Timothy ran out to say hi and Marcus asked if he could play.  I said he needed to eat lunch first so Timothy ate a couple of bites and ran out to play.  I got the girls down for naps and went to work out in the front yard (I'm still not totally comfortable with letting him out there to just play without being able to see him).  They spent most of the afternoon riding back and forth between houses.  I also got to meet his older brothers that day.  I've learned a lot about them since then (it's amazing how much kids will go into detail about a story, makes me worried some times to think about what my kids say)! 

I learned that Marcus has two older brothers.  They rent their house and live with their mom and dad.  Their mom doesn't like to have anyone come to their house because she says it's too dirty.  Their dad doesn't like to meet other parents, especially moms.  The older brother has anger management issues and when he gets mad he hurts people, one time he threw Marcus across the room and broke his arm.  The middle brother has had one kidney transplant and is on dialysis because his new kidney is failing and he needs another transplant.  Marcus doesn't like to be at home. 

Today they played most of the afternoon and when Caroline woke up from her nap I had to go to the store.  Since Brandon's not home, all the kids had to go with me.  Marcus asked if he could come, but I didn't think that would be appropriate so I told him I didn't have enough room in the car.  Timothy was acting up while we were out, so I told him when we got back that he needed to spend some time in his room.  We had barely been home 5 minutes when the doorbell rang and Marcus was asking if Timothy could come out to play.  I told him that Timothy wasn't allowed to come out right now but he would come find him later on.  It had seriously not been 10 minutes and the doorbell rang again and he was there asking if he could play again.  I told him that Timothy needed to stay home a little longer and he asked me what he had done to get in trouble.  I told him that Timothy had been disrespectful.  His reply was, "what did he call you?" which threw me off guard and I told him he didn't call me any names, he was just having some trouble obeying.  He said that that is what kids are supposed to do, to obey their parents and it's the parent's job to discipline the kids when they do something wrong.  I told him that in our house it's the parent's job to teach the kids how to do what's right but sometimes we have to take a time out to remember what's right. 

So he left and I went back upstairs.  The girls were playing in the play room so I sat down in there and looked out the window and Marcus was just sitting at the end of our driveway.  It really did make me cry a little.  So I told Timothy that he could go out and play as long as he came in when I told him it was time to come home.  They ended up swimming in the pool of another kid that lives right across the street which was perfect since I could watch from the play room window (and that kid's mom was out there with them). 

So at dinner, Timothy was asking why Marcus plays outside so much and I told him I wanted to tell him something but he didn't need to repeat it.  I told him that I didn't think Marcus enjoys being at home, that it sounds like his brother and his parents might not be very nice to be around and that maybe there's some fighting going on and he doesn't like to be there.  Timothy's response was "well you and Daddy fight, so it's OK."  I was thrown off at first, and tried to explain that what Brandon and I do isn't really fighting but he seemed confused but I explained that in our house, no one gets angry and hurts anyone or says mean things to anyone.  He seemed to understand after that. 

So they play and I pray and pray and pray for that boy and his family.  And then tonight when I was putting Timothy to bed it hit me, I am so glad that Timothy thinks that what Brandon and I do is fighting.  We don't argue much, but it's usually a conversation about whatever happened that upset one of us and some debate back and forth.  I'll even go so far as to admit that there's occasionally a raised voice or two...and that's pretty rare for us to argue in front of the kids anyway and if we do we always make sure to reconcile in front of them as well so that they see an example of how to treat someone you love...but from what it sounds like this little boy lives with...I will gladly have Timothy think that what Brandon and I do is fighting. 

So I guess this is an early lesson in teaching our kids what it means to be in the world but not of the world.  Timothy and I had a long chat about how he can be a good example to Marcus and his brothers.  And hopefully I will get to meet his parents soon and can try to build a relationship with them.  Please please pray for our family and please pray for Marcus's family.  I know we came back to Washington for a reason or reasons or whatever, and I can't shake the feeling that this sweet boy and his family are one of those reasons.  And pray for Timothy...this has potential to be hard on him, we will make decisions for our family based upon what's best for our children and that has potential to cause him some hurt...thankfully, our God is a powerful and compassionate God and if anyone can bring this family some hope and peace, it's Him!

My Big Boy

Well he's definitely not a baby anymore.  Timothy turned six this past month and I'm still trying to figure out how that all happened!  He's so big now I can barely pick him up!  A few days after his birthday he went for his 6 year check up (which, thankfully, did not include shots) and he was almost exactly 4 feet tall and right at 50 pounds. 
We celebrated his birthday all weekend long, his birthday was on Thursday so Wednesday night before church we went with my parents to eat at Red Robin and we made sure they sang to him and he got ice cream.  Thursday morning he wanted giant cinnamon rolls for breakfast, we got Happy Meals for lunch and that night we celebrated at home.  I made a cake and we had pizza (his favorite) and he opened his present from Brandon and I (a skateboard and a helmet with pads).  He also took cupcakes to school on Thursday, and of course, they had skateboards on them.  Friday night we went to my parent's house to celebrate there and had burgers and hot dogs and Dr. Pepper cake (yum!) and he opened presents from family (including a new real basketball goal, he was so excited).  Saturday we had his party with his friends from church and school and then, since the weather was SO NICE that day we went to the Spring Fair.  Charlotte actually wanted to ride the rides this time and they all did fine until the fireworks started and then the big two got scared and we had to leave.  Sunday for lunch he wanted to go to Applebees and get pancakes...this boy is all about food, he's eating so much lately I'm starting to worry about our food budget!!

He's grown up quite a bit in the last year as well.  He has learned so much at school, he's reading like crazy, doing all kinds of math and science, he loves to learn!  He is so smart he scares me sometimes!  He loves Bible class and can usually answer every question I give him about what he's learning in there, even when I try to trick him!  He's so helpful and it's amazing to think just a couple of years ago he was a crazy little toddler that was driving me crazy every day! 

The other big news of that weekend was that Caroline just up and decided on Friday that she didn't want to nurse anymore.  We had been slowly working our way toward weaning, but she was still nursing 4 or so times a day and then Friday night she just wouldn't do it...and then she wouldn't sleep...so it was a rough weekend!  I think she's cutting a whole lot of teeth at once and just for some reason didn't want to nurse anymore.  I was a little sad about it, I was hoping we could do it together and wean together, but I'm a little happy that it's over and I'm not so tied down anymore.  With my normal day to day work, children's ministry duties and PTA stuff it's nice to be able to leave her at night with Brandon if I need to get some work done or go to meetings. 

Not much else has been going on...Charlotte is loving preschool, I'm not really loving the commute back and forth to school every day (two back and forth trips a day), but only another month or so of school left...Brandon left today to go to his sister's graduation so the kids and I are on our own till Monday...and we might be getting a puppy this summer, more on that later!!  Cause, you know, I don't have enough going on without adding another mouth to feed and clean up after!!

Spring Update

Well March was probably the craziest month ever.  Brandon's parent's came to visit the first weekend of the month to celebrate Caroline's birthday, the next weekend was the Church Enrichment Conference at our church and we were in charge of childcare for the weekend, the next weekend I was coordinating the Parent's Night Out event for the PTA at Timothy's school (and let me just say, it was awesome!) and the next weekend was my birthday, the weekend after that we left for TX for Spring break and then came home the day before Easter and then Charlotte started preschool the day after Easter.  I could really use a vacation right about now and I'm actually looking forward to school being out in June!  Both kids love it, but now that Charlotte is in preschool, she goes in the morning and Timothy in the afternoon so it gets a little tiring driving back and forth, even if it is only a few minutes away, I'm so not ready for them to ride the bus though!

Anyway, so I turned the big 3-0 this year and Brandon did a great job planning a surprise party for me!  A bunch of friends from church and our family partied at my parent's house, Brittany got me a beautiful cake, mom and Heather had decorated everything and it was so much fun.  Not a bad way to start my 30's! 

We went to TX for Spring Break to visit Brandon's family.  We hadn't been there in a year and a half so it was nice to go back and introduce everyone to Caroline!  We spent a day at Galveston and had a little party for Timothy since it was close to his birthday.  We also got to see Aunt Larena and soon to be Uncle Blake so it was nice to catch up with them as well and hear all about the wedding plans!! 

We celebrated Easter at my parent's house for lunch after church.  We had a yummy brunch and then since the weather was so nice the kids got to hunt eggs outside!  That can be pretty rare around here, but it was gorgeous! 

Charlotte started preschool last Monday.  She goes 4 days a week from 8:20 to 11:03 (gotta love the times).  She qualified to go to the public school through their Child Find program and so far we love it!  She failed her testing for speech articulation (thanks to the thumb sucking) and gross and find motor skills so she's getting to do OT and speech therapy, not to mention the social skills that she's learning just by being there.  It has been so good for her so far!  There are only two other girls in her class so she's made friends quickly and only had one day so far that she's cried when I dropped her off.  It's so nice having her at the same school as Timothy and because her initial evaluation is good for 3 years, she'll qualify for (free) preschool until she starts Kindergarten! 

Tomorrow is Timothy's 6th birthday, so we're planning a big celebration for this weekend.  He gets to take cupcakes to school tomorrow, we're doing a special dinner and cake tomorrow night and then hopefully going to the Spring Fair if the weather holds out, Friday night we're doing a party with family and then Saturday is his first soccer practice and party with his friends from school and church.  So we'll be on a sugar high all weekend from eating so much cake!

I'm gearing up for the summer...Brandon will be gone for a couple of weeks in May and June and Timothy has camp in July and then VBS is at the end of July, so I'm starting to get the planning going on that.  It's one of those things that you look forward to and dread all at the same time!  Hopefully I'll find time to get pictures on here, now that the weather is nicer the kids are outside more, we're planting a garden in the backyard and planning lots of fun things to do so I should have lots of good pictures to share!

Hijacked

This is what happens when you leave the room and your almost 6 year old finds the camera :)

One Year in the Chair

Here it is...one year in the pink chair (minus the 6 month picture since I forgot that month, I'm sure I'll hear about that at some point later in her life)

Snow Days

I have been going back and looking through pictures from the past month and realized there was stuff going on that I didn't get to post about.  Things have been so busy here with church and PTA and kids and all that that I haven't had a lot of time to sit down and type much!

So about a month ago we had a pretty bad snowstorm.  To be fair, aside from the snowstorm and the past week or so, the weather this winter has been amazing for up here.  Timothy has only had to have "inside recess" a handful of times which is pretty crazy considering most years our winters are full of rain, rain and more rain!!  But the snow was pretty bad.  I love snow, I mostly grew up in Michigan so I have a lot of really great memories of playing in the snow...but this year it was rough.  The tires on our van were old and needed to be replaced so we couldn't get out at all so we were stuck in the house for a whole week, which, if you know me, is like torture!!

It started on a Saturday.  I had taken Charlotte to the movies to see Beauty and the Beast (I cried like a baby, she was so happy), and when we got home I needed to go to the library so I suggested that we all go together so we loaded everyone in the van.  It had just started to snow when we got in the car and by the time we got out of our garage, down our street and turned onto the main road in our neighborhood it was falling so thickly that Brandon decided we had to turn around and just go home.  We slipped and slid back into the driveway and let the kids play in the snow out front for a few minutes before heading back inside.  It snowed quite a bit that night and then stopped but the roads were covered so we were snowed in Sunday and Monday as well.  By Tuesday it was a little better so Brandon took Timothy to school in his car (since it has new tires) and later that day I went to Target just to get out of the house for a bit.  The big snow hit Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.  I think we got just under a foot total.  It was beautiful, and since we were stuck in the house we got a lot done that we had been needing to do and just didn't have time to do.  We painted Timothy's room, we painted a chalkboard in our kitchen, we baked a lot, we made a bunch of baby food, we did a lot of laundry...it was a busy few days.

Then Thursday came...all afternoon and night on Wednesday the weather had switched from snow to ice and Thursday morning our power decided to go out.  Thankfully we have a gas fireplace and a gas hot water heater so we had some heat downstairs and hot water but we still couldn't cook anything.  We ordered a lot of pizza over the next few days!  The kids were fine playing until it started getting dark and then we all had to hang out in the living room with flashlights and candles.  We made them wait till after dinner to play on the iPods and watch movies on the computer until the batteries all ran out.  Thankfully we thought ahead of time on Wednesday to blow up air mattresses and so Thursday night we all camped out in the living room together.  The kids did a lot better than I thought they would about all going to sleep in the same room.  They all slept great, Brandon and I, not so much! 

The next day we still didn't have power so Brandon decided around 10am to drive his car out to my parent's house (because they did have power) and he was supposed to drive back over here in their Suburban and pick us all up so that we could go over there for the night.  So we packed up suitcases, packed up all the kid's medicine, packed up all our flashlights and things in case the power went out at their house too...and he left.  He called me an hour or so later in a panic because he had gone over the Tacoma Narrows Bridge and was in Gig Harbor and they came on the radio and said the DOT had decided to close the bridge because ice was falling from the top beams onto the roadway and it was too dangerous.  He tried to turn around and get back over the bridge so that he could just come back here but they had already closed it...so he got to spend the afternoon and evening at my parent's house...in the warmth, with TV and power and a computer...and I was home with three kids...still with no power.  I had a little pity party and the kids and I made the best of it!  Finally our power came on around 5pm that night!! 

So we learned our lesson and got new tires for the van and are hoping and praying that we don't get anymore snow this year!  It's hard to keep three kids entertained in one room of the house with no power!  But the kids did have a lot of fun playing in the snow!  Brandon was great, he got out there with them and built snowmen and played while Caroline and I stayed nice and warm inside!  That is just one more thing I love about living here...we maybe get one good snow once a year and within a few days it warms up and rains and all the snow is gone...it's perfect!

The backyard...before the kids "destroyed" it!

I love this picture of them...they are such good friends, I hope that never changes!

Notice her boots have disappeared under the snow...it was pretty deep!

They thought it was pretty cool that they could sit on the snow on their swings!

He wanted to make a "face down" snow angel...

It was hard to climb up the rock wall when it was covered in snow!

And the day after the ice hit...you can see how thick the ice was on the branches

These trees all looked like they were just so heavy...so many trees broke in this storm, you can still see the damage and branches and trees down all over the place, even a month later!

See the icicles on the swing set?  Timothy thought they were pretty cool "swords"!

One Year Stats

Caroline had her one year old check up yesterday.  It actually turned into quite a marathon of a day.  Timothy had to be at school by 8:10 (he usually goes at noon), then we drove over to Tacoma and had to make a stop at Target before heading across the street to the doctor's office.  My mom met us there and took Charlotte back to her house for me and Caroline and I went into the office.  While we were in the waiting room I met a lady that had just moved here from Pangburn, Arkansas...small world!  Her visit went great, the doctor remarked on how nice it was to see that she hadn't been into the sick clinic at all in her one year of life so far.  Hopefully he didn't jinx us!  She checked in at 20 pounds and 11 ounces and measured 30.25 inches which put her at 50th % for weight and 90th % for height.  When we were leaving the doctor that is the head of the practice was out in the waiting room with a camera crew.  They were doing a story on the practice and he asked me if I would mind doing a parent testimonial for the camera so Caroline and I got to sit in front of the camera and talk about how much we love it there (and I meant it, I do love this doctor's office)...so we may be famous - haha!

We left the doctor and drove over to get some gas and pick up Timothy from school and then we met my mom and Charlotte at McDonalds for some lunch and then came back to our house so I could nurse Caroline, put her down for a nap and then I had to leave to go meet with some ladies from PTA to talk about an event we're doing next month.  I only planned to stay for an hour or so but ended up not getting home till 3pm and then had an hour to get things put back to normal before Brandon got home and by then it was time to get ready and go grab some dinner and get to church.  We pulled up in the church parking lot (and by this point I was exhausted) and Charlotte informed us that she had peed in her pants and I didn't have any extras for her so we basically walked in and then started to walk back out when I remembered that I still had an extra pair of Timothy's jeans in the van so she wore pants too big for her to class last night.  I really just needed my 45 minutes to sit in class and be around other adults!

Needless to say, we were both exhausted when we went to bed last night.  Caroline was up at 2:30 this morning (but went right back to sleep) and then Charlotte came down sometime between 4am and 5am and rolled around in our bed for a while before getting up at 5am.  She started telling me that her tummy hurt and over the next hour it turned into her unable to sit in a still position because she kept rolling around in pain from her tummy.  I had been worried that she was going to throw up but usually when that happens she just wants to sit very still so this was pretty different.  I decided we should go to urgent care when they opened at 7am so we packed up snacks and things and headed out.  Almost two hours, a finger prick blood test and a urine test later we left with a prescription for an antibiotic for what he thinks is a bladder infection (the urine culture will come back in a couple of days). 

So it's been a busy busy busy couple of days over here and I'm very badly needing a nap!  I promise I will take more pictures and be better at posting them once February and March are over!