Not a good mix.  Just for the record. 

 

I sat completely helpless as one child drooled on her shirt, numbly staring as Pocahontas played on the big tv in the pediatric dentist's kid-friendly waiting room, and the other child clung to me with her very being, fighting the prospect of walking back to that room where they had just "pinched" 3 times to numb her right gumline.  Seriously, what's a mom to do?  I pried her tentacle-like fingers from my arms only to find her grasping once again for my shirt or my arms or my back, reattaching themselves with a grip I can only imagine belongs to an octopus much larger than she.  Who would have known that a 55 pound child could hold on tighter than her much bigger mommy could pull?  Panic will do that to you, I suppose.  Interestingly, the younger of the two gave me absolutely no issues about being carried away...I'm sure the Versed helped with that whole process...and when the stuff kicked in (and it only took about 5 minutes), I have seriously never seen her so silly.  This is Lainie we're talking about here.  If you know Lainie, well, you know just how silly that is.  Reasa never did get in to get her tooth filled.  We have rescheduled her to have the same medicine Lainie took today so that when she goes in to have those teeth filled all at once, rather than in three separate visits (argh!!), she won't care if they "pinch" or not either.  And Lainie has more work to be done, so we'll get it taken care of all in one visit.  I'm going to laugh hysterically when they're both drugged and silly together--I couldn't stop laughing with just one of them!  On the other hand, since it can affect each child differently, I wouldn't be surprised if Reasa winds up getting angry or hostile with this medication.  She and Lainie have very different little personalities.  We'll see.  I'm taking my dad with me so I don't have more than I can handle with both of them.  Pray for us June 13!!

 

Now I'm just hoping that Reasa and Bryson are upstairs sleeping off some of their crazy morning (Bryson played with his buddy Lukas this morning, thanks to my sweet friend Kim who let me leave him with her while I took care of the girls), and not playing with toys in their beds (Bryson has begun to do this occasionally when he really, really needs to sleep).  I know Lainie is out cold...and right before she fell asleep, she lapsed back into that spinning head/rolling eyes/giddy laughing/slurred speech from earlier (she started laughing at herself at one point because she couldn't get out the words she was trying to say with her half-numb lips and tongue, then she started crying because she tried to say it 3 times and got frustrated when it wouldn't come out at all...sheesh!  This is what I have to look forward to when she reaches adolesence hopefully minus the slurred speech)...I know this, and I dread it!!).  I hope she wakes up rested and happy and not in a lot of pain.  Ah, the joys of childhood.

 

Now, I'm off to get something done while the house is completely silent...this is a rare occasion.  I'm thinking of napping. 

 

HA!!!  That's a good one. 

OK, so for those of you who have been whining at me for new pictures (I know, it's been a really long time, which is why when I downloaded pictures today, there were 331 on my camera), new pictures have been added--two albums very full.  Sorry.  Please feel free to look at them a little bit at a time.  :)  Thanks for reading...

 

mindy

OK, seriously should be in bed right now, but didn't want to forget to write about this...my brain is on overload at this point and I can't settle down.  Probably doesn't help that as I cleaned up from the wedding cake I just finished (holy cow), I ate 6 leftover white roses (no, Amy, they weren't the blue ones that make my tongue blue...) and I'm in sugar shock.  Anyway, speaking of rotting my teeth out of my head...

 

Bryson lost another tooth today.  He's killing me.  Really.  And this one was so loose, he literally couldn't talk if it meant putting his teeth together.  So, he just stopped putting his teeth together and tried to make himself understood without actually closing his mouth at all.  That was a fun little game.  For about 3 minutes.  It got old quick. That and the slurping...because he didn't want to push his tongue against his front teeth to swallow.  I never really thought about the mechanics involved in swallowing, but it truly does include pushing your tongue against your front teeth, and this hurt the child.  So, every 30 seconds, he was slurping down the spit that had accumulated in his mouth.  Lovely.  I finally got sick of it and started telling him I wasn't going to listen to it any more and the tooth needed to come out.  Period.  He flipped out.  It seriously took him 3 hours to be convinced that he needed to let me pull the dumb thing out (three hours of whining, not eating, crying that it was "bothering him," and SLURPING!  Meanwhile, this tooth sits in the middle of the space where the two bottom front teeth are supposed to go, it's so loose.  When I actually pulled it out, honestly all I had to do was put my fingers on it. It was already out.  He just wouldn't touch it.  Why is my son freaking out about losing teeth?  The girls think it's a game!!  "Is it ready to pull yet, Mommy?" Lainie asks as she's already yanking on the tooth she just discovered was loose yesterday (well, not literally...though she lost one yesterday as well).  She and Reasa have this running competition to see who can get theirs to come out first (which, go figure, Reasa is winning...though not by much).

 

Yes, Lainie lost her 8th tooth yesterday, which ties her with Reasa for "most teeth lost."  Interestingly, she's running about 6 months ahead of the time frame Reasa ran with losing her teeth, which is funny.  Bryson is running about 6 months ahead of Lainie!!  At this rate, he'll lose all his baby teeth by the time Reasa loses all of hers!!  OK, slight exageration (how do you spell that silly word??), but you get my point.  Crazy to think that my babies are losing all their teeth. 

 

And let's not talk about next week's trip to the dentist.

 

OK, enough about teeth.  Hopefully this saga is over for a while (though he informed me after losing this one and drawing his picture for the tooth fairy that he already found another loose tooth.  go figure).  Back to the normal, boring, non-teeth part of our lives.  :)

 

Hope all is well wherever you are...thanks for reading my nonsense.  You really are a tolerant bunch.  Many blessings!

Today marks my eighth Mother's Day.  Eight years ago today, we chose to dedicate Reasa to the Lord, and we committed ourselves to bring her up in the knowledge of Him.  She was exactly two months old.  Tonight, I sit here in my family room, the mother of three, with a little one in heaven, and the evidence of children all around me.  I am a Mom.  It is nearly my whole identity.  It's who I am, and truly who I always wanted to be.  Literally every single decision I make comes back around to them somehow...how my choice will directly affect them, or affect them in some roundabout manner. 

 

I am a mom.  As a kid, that was truly my only goal in life...to be a wife and a mom.  And here I am, a wife and a mom.  Amazing.  I am blessed.

 

 

My baby lost his first tooth today.  I'm sitting at my computer in front of my dvr recorded ER episode with tears streaming down my cheeks.  My baby.  His first tooth.  My best friend, Kara, after I got married a year to the day (the Saturday, that is) after her wedding day told me that I had to have a baby first.  That I had to go through it first so that I could walk her through the whole thing.  And you know, interestingly, I got pregnant four months before she did.  Had my first baby three months before she had hers (Wesley came a month early).  Before any of my other friends were even thinking of their second baby, Lainie came along.  And by the time their second babies made their appearances, I was pregnant for Bryson.  So, at the end of the day...or a very short three years, anyway...I had my three, and we were done.  Kara's baby--her fourth--is 16 months old.  My baby is five.  And today, while biting into an apple while I was driving past my parents' house on the way to the girls' dentist appointment, he lost his first tooth. 

 

When did all of this start moving so fast?  When did Reasa suddenly learn how to brush her hair perfectly by herself?  When did Lainie start learning the lyrics to my Chris Rice CD?  How much longer are they going to ask me to carry them up to bed?  How many more times will Reasa come into my room in the middle of the night to ask me to take her to the bathroom?  How much longer will Lainie insist upon not getting up in the morning unless I pull her out of bed and carry her down to the family room?  How long to do I have left before Bryson doesn't stand in front of me and hold his arms up to me with that, "Pick me up, Mommy!" look on his face anymore?  When Reasa was born, not long enough ago, not long ago at all, not long enough, too few times, not much longer, and not long enough.  Those are the answers to those questions. 

 

And every single day, I am reminded of those answers.  I may not take long enough to think about them every single day, but there they are, staring me in the face.  My kids are turning into something else before my very eyes.  It's slipping by.  If I'm not careful, I'm going to miss it. 

 

Somebody hit pause.  Forever.  Let life continue, but freeze-frame my kids in the perfect, precious present.  Please.     

I hate housework. 

 

No, honestly, that's not true.  I don't mind doing housework.  It's actually a soothing part of my job.  I hate re-doing housework over and over and over in the same day.  When I leave this computer in about 10 minutes (because that is the time limit I have given myself to finish this entry), and clean off the kitchen table from the six children who ate lunch there, it will be the third time today I have done that very task.  When I wash the breakfast and lunch dishes, I do so with the understanding that I will be washing the very same dishes (plus several others) in another 3 hours when dinner is over.  When I walk in and swipe the toothpaste off the bathroom counter it will be the second time today I have cleaned the counter/sink area.  As I pick up the toys scattered about the playroom, not only have I already picked up the same toys before all the children came this morning, I admit that I will pick them up once again after everyone has gone home and my children have gone to bed.  The counter where my computer sits is totally cluttered with papers and stuff.  I will clean it off, only to find it completely covered again by tomorrow morning when I come down for my shower.  It is a natural breeding ground for clutter.  We kick off our shoes at the front door, toss our coats into the closet, and set our things down on the counter, and that's where they stay.  Period.  I hate cleaning this countertop.

 

So, here I sit, typing, completely avoiding anything that resembles cleaning my house.  Knowing full well that if I leave it, I will be mad at myself when it's bedtime and I think about waking up to my house looking like it looks.  At some point it's going to be enough to kick me into flylady mode again, pulling out my control journal to wipe the inch of dust from the cover to examine those routines that I had so neatly in place before we moved to this house.  That was the point when I suddenly realized that when you double your living space, you also double your responsibility to it and time to clean it.  Nearly four years later, you would think I would have my act together. 

 

Yeah, not so much. 

 

There's something about having three kids, homeschooling them, scheduling extra activities and church stuff, keeping up with two dogs and a husband, preparing meals, doing laundry, running around, and taking in 3 other kids part time...I literally don't know where the hours go.

 

And again, here I sit.  Maybe I do know where the hours go.  ARGH!