Happiness

My sister, Amanda, just read The Happiness Project (I haven't read it but I like her insights). She says, "It's an encouraging little book with practical tips that really do work. One of the things I see myself constantly failing at is her practice of 'act the way you want to feel.' Apparently, if you feel irritated and then you express that irritation, it doesn't relieve your irritated-ness. Looking back over motherhood, I see how true that is. But, oh the strength one must have to push that irritated feeling down into yourself, just absorb it, and gush out some sweetness and exercise patience and love. The outcome is that you will feel more patience and love and your irritation will lessen. So that's my happiness project for the week. Not so much for the purpose of me being happier, but I see the gospel in it, and my goodness gracious, it would just be really nice of me to be Christ to my kids, absorb their stuff, swallow my angry words, and decide to act gently and graciously towards them. But the motivation of, "so I can feel happier" isn't the best motivation, but happiness is nice." :)

Well, I just love my sister and her precious, crazy girls. I relate so well to her experience with my own children. Amanda and I took turns having babies. We shared maternity clothes and after-pregnancy clothes and, between the two of us, my parents have eight grandchildren under the age of 7! We love and discipline and train our children, but every mother knows there are those moments. They usually happen when dinner is on the stove, I'm on the phone, Adelle is climbing on the table, Hudson is trying to get her down while she screams, Pierce is kung-fooing Alayna while she's trying to twirl and sing. I hang up the phone, scream for everyone to just stop, and turn on a movie. (But Amanda's kids play "cooking" and mix cereal with dominoes and beads. Ah, such creativity!). There are those moments.

I don't think this is a fake-it-til-you-make-it mentality. I think it's grace, self-control, living TRUTH, and being Christ for my kids. Don't worry, be happy :) Here's some happy things ...

Little bitty piggy-tails! She looks like such a big girl, and her cheeks look extra chubby with her hair back. What mommy doesn't love smoochin' on some chubby baby cheeks?!

A little sister love. Adelle calls Alayna, "Nuh," just the end of her name. It's cute.

Guitar banana, singing the states and capitals song as loud as possible. I believe this shot was, "Baton Rouge, LouisianAAAAAAAH!"

Hudson was drumming, Pierce was strumming - Homeschooling at it's best!

Let me tell you a story. I get up every morning at 4:30 to have a cup of coffee and do my Bible study before I go train at 5:15. This morning I was extra tired. I got the coffee maker ready and started. Got dressed and tied my shoes and came back in the kitchen to coffee grounds and brown water dripping off the counter and running everywhere. I didn't get the pot pushed back in all the way. So I cleaned up the mess and went out the door without any coffee. When I came back in at 6:20 I made a fresh pot and now I have a smile on my face - happy things. :)

One more happy thing. One of my other sisters, Amanda's twin - Angela, got engaged to Bob this week! We're so excited for her! I'm corny and love saying, Bob's your uncle. Anyway, Yea Ange!!!

Fabulous Fort Fun and a recipe

Cushion forts are fabulous Saturday morning fun. If we did these every day I might go crazy because my front room would be a complete and disastrously noisy mess. I'm in constant pick-up mode as it is, without complete destruction. Anyway, they have a blast and I get the kitchen clean ... at least for a little while. :)

She rules the roost.

Alayna is doing "school" in her newly fashioned t-shirt sleeve head band.

Here's me in mine and, drum roll please ....... I made homemade graham crackers this week! We've been trying to stick with the 100 days of real food plan. Check out THIS LINK for some great recipes! Anyway, kid snacks were my hardest thing. Goldfish and other processed food snacks don't qualify as edible under this plan. We'd been snacking on fruit and nuts and cheese sticks, etc., but we were missing the cracker variety. :) When I found the graham cracker recipe I had to give it a shot.

Graham Crackers

3 c whole grain white flour (I bought Hogson Mill brand)

1/2 t salt

1/2 t baking powder

1/4 t cinnamon

8 T butter

1/2 cup raw honey (or agave nectar)

1 egg (my addition)

1. Stir together first 4 ingredients in bowl.

2. Melt the honey and butter together and pour over dry ingredients, adding enough extra butter to make the dough workable (I added 2 more T of butter and 1 egg at this point).

3. Lightly grease your cookie sheet and roll out dough to 1/8" thickness. Cut rectangles with a knife and prick with a fork. (You could sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar at this point too) :)

4. Bake 10 minutes at 375.

They are a little bit fluffier and grainier than the packaged variety, and I may be partial, but I thought they were wonderful and the kids think so too!

Your muscles get bigger while you're sleeping.

Three years ago, Hudson was 3 1/2 and Pierce was almost 2; Alayna was on the way and we needed to make room in the crib, so we put them in a queen size bed together. This summer we were able to get bunk beds for them, yet they still manage to sleep together some nights. Every day they're getting bigger, smarter, stronger. I love watching my babies become toddlers, then big boys. I love teaching them and seeing the fruit of it. I love marking the notch on the door frame that shows they've grown another two inches and seeing the excitement on their faces. Yet, something sweet hurts inside.

Mother's Day 2011

For my mom this year we surprised her with a mother-daughter photo shoot by my friend, Katie. Shannon was able to come into town for the weekend. So, we all headed over to a lovely loading dock outside of our little town and got so many great shots. I'll post a few more later on. We have a brother too, but he lives in New York. He towers over us at 6'4", and weighs less than us - yeah, we don't like him too much (I'm kidding, of course).

Shannon 22, Alyson 30, MOM, Amanda 29, Angela 29 (Zach 26, not pictured).

We had so much FUN!

Then, we my family got back from Georgia we got the cousins together and REALLY surprised mom on Mother's Day with a grand-baby slide show by Sweeter Still Photography! So much fun!

Adelle (almost 1!), Kate 3, Alayna 2, Lola 1, Riley 7, Pierce 4, Hudson 6, Claire 5

It's a cousin pizza!

The Freddys!

Hudson

Pierce

Alayna

Adelle

Cousins!

What a blessed and happy Mother's Day!

Eastery kid pictures

Since we were out of town on Eater weekend, the kids wore their Easter clothes yesterday to church. Snapping pictures right before church is stressful. I promise myself every year that I'm not going to do that - I'll just dress them up some other time. Then I think, ah they're already dressed. I might as well snap a few shots. And we get these ...

I don't even remember what she was initially upset about. Neither does she.

But she recovered and we did get all four children in one frame. And we were late for church. I'll never do that again. ;)

To be terrific you gotta be specific

One of my 2011 goals is to keep up better with this blog. I have lots of blogger friends who do such a fantastic job posting links and pictures and updates and fun stories or recipes or whatever. I'm usually doing good to put a few pictures up for my far-away family members. This year is busier with more kids in school and a baby underfoot, however, I have high hopes of doing a little bit better. I have a friend who always posts Thankful Thursdays. She has eight children - if she can do it, I should be able to do it. Well, hey, there's a great idea! Maybe I should just have a day of the week that I ALWAYS post. Not that I wouldn't post something on other days too, if time allowed, but I would for sure plan that at least one post would go up on that specific day of the week. I evaluated what this blog is really about - my beautiful, wonderful children and our endeavors to raise them and keep the family and friends updated on what's going on with us - then I began to mull over appropriate titles for a weekly post. I was going for something original, but my thought process was interrupted when emergency mommy situations struck all four children at the same time requiring super glue, wipies, more wipies, some deep breathing and nose blowing.

But that was Monday, and this is Tuesday. Tuesday's are terrific. On Monday we do double schoolwork, I try to catch up on all necessary housework and bake a few batches of muffins or cookies or whatever for the rest of the week. I teach pilates on Monday night (that really is the best way to end a Monday). I come home and put the kids to bed and read for a little while until I can't possibly keep my eyes open another second. On Tuesdays, terrific Tuesday!!! I hustle the kids off for their day out and my day with just Adelle. I usually get a lot done and have a great nap before the kids come home in the afternoon. Seems like the best day to blog. All that to say, you may now look forward to Terrific Tuesday posts with links and pictures and recipes and funny stories. Doesn't that sound terrific?! :) And now for some pictures ...

The ninja-knight and the princess-cowgirl.

Alayna working with pattern blocks.

My girls love playing together.

Mommy and the princess.

Pierce counting and lining up the counting bears in A-B pattern formation.

Cheese stick mustache - lovely.

Pumpkin muffins & Christmas Carols

I often wonder if other people's lives are like mine. I'm sure all mommies suffer/enjoy the same things. Adelle enjoys a good poop around midnight these days. (I must be doing something wrong). So after I've been asleep for two hours, I'm up to get her changed and back to bed. She's happy as a lark while she's up and she goes right back to sleep - I can't complain too much. Every mommy suffers a little interrupted sleep. I secretly enjoy the time alone with her. Last night I changed her diaper in the glowing light of the Christmas tree while she babbled and clapped. It should be a commercial for something.

6 am rolls around and Alayna comes in with her morning greeting, "Mom, I waked up!!!" I would love to tell you I've already been up for an hour by then and had a great run on the treadmill and done my quiet time and showered. Someday. This morning that was not the case. I rolled out of bed and let her drag me by the hand to the couch. Soon enough Hudson came in to snuggle. Pierce is usually the straggler. This morning we made chocolate chip pumpkin muffins while the Christmas carols played. I went a little crazy buying cans of pumpkin this year. Glad we like it. The kids, especially Hudson, are way into decorating and Christmas carols this year. They think they're going to get Hot Chocolate and pop corn during every little Christmas special that comes on TV and they want to take all the decorations off of the tree and do it again. Yesterday I had some orchestral Christmas music playing in the kitchen. Hudson grabbed his pillow and blanket and laid down in the kitchen floor to listen to it.

Hudson keeps pretending to evaporate Alayna and she's having none of it. Refereeing is not so sweet, but it can be humorous. Alayna came in yesterday morning sobbing, "Mom, Hudson keeps zaporating me!" They have their moments of provoking/reacting. But there are also moments like this morning where the muffins are baking and they're all dancing around and laughing to the Christmas music and I wish I could freeze them right there. Tis the season to soak it all in and make some memories.

Try this link for a little Sufjan Stevens Christmas Love :)

Fall Photo Shoot

While most of our all-together shots turned out like this ...

Katie did manage to get a few good shots that really capture the kids and their personalities.

ADELLE

THE BOYS

ALAYNA

They were all looking, sort of, and all smiling, almost :)

I like this one. I don't know why.

I can almost see what they're going to look like when they're older. I love their expressions, wind-blown hair and chubby little hands.

(I probably should have put Alayna in jeans - the concept of modesty is a little lost on two-year-olds).

A picture takin' adventure

Got the kids pictures taken today by one of my friends. You can see some of her handiwork here. I'll post our picture soon.

It was a super-windy, great adventure through a lovely little-bitty old downtown. So much for combed hair. The old buildings made a perfect backdrop for some cute shots. The kids did great for the most part. On her mission to find pretty rocks, Alayna picked up dog poop. The boys freaked out. Later, she needed to go potty and there were no accessible potty-chairs. Thankfully we were off the beaten path and she has brothers so she was not afraid to mark some territory in the grass. We got to see and climb around on an old boxcar that the boys would like to live in just like the Boxcar Children stories.

On the way home I remembered that I was out of bread and all of the sudden felt very tired. This time change has my children waking up at the crack of dawn and CRANKY way before bedtime. I know, we'll adjust. We always do. Anyway, we drove through Chick-fil-a for lunch. What a treat!

We're going to get the rest of our school work done and clean the house. We're planning on enjoying the last of this 70 degree weather. Our FAVORITE days are the days that we can play outside! I am so NOT ready for the cold, dark days of winter.

Smiling Kids

The battery in my van was dead yesterday morning when I tried to start it (I needed to go get some fancy, expensive coffee). Devastated and "trapped" I made a pot of coffee and rearranged the living room. Once I did that I had to do the playroom and got rid of a big bag of toys (you wouldn't even know by looking into the play room though!). Anyway, David bought a new battery for the van, I didn't spend $5 on a cup of coffee, my house looks all fresh and wonderful and I snapped some super cute pictures of my kiddos. Enjoy :)

Adelle jumping

Alana posing

Oh my goodness! Did I mention we've been practicing his smile?! Love those eyes.

HUGE smile to show off the missing tooth and two more loose ones!

Everyday for part of our spelling/handwriting, Hudson has to finish the sentence. Todays' was: I can keep from quarreling by ...

First he said, "Isn't quarrel something in the ocean?" Once he understood what "quarrel" meant he wrote, ... overcoming evil with good. A soft answer turns away wrath.

I love that my kids are hiding God's Word in their hearts and know how to apply it. I can't even tell you how rewarding it was for me to see his answer.

Halloween

We went trick-or-treating last year and the boys got scared at a couple of houses. The houses looked fine but the adults came to the door in scary costumes and my 3 & 4 year-old boys were not into scary...and still aren't. So, they didn't want to trick-or-treat this year. We did dress up and went to visit Gigi and a few of her neighbors, then we went to Wendy's to use our free frosty coupons. Now that was a treat!

The fairy princess, a couple of cowboys and a pretty little flower - I just love it!

Close up - I put a little bit of makeup on her and she definitely felt beautiful! She twirled and flitted everywhere she went.

My mighty men were cowboys. At the three houses we went to (my Grandma's neighbors who are all about her age) the boy took off their hats and said, "yippee-ky-a" instead of trick-or-treat, and gave hugs after they got their candy. It was pretty sweet.

My happy little flower chewed on her petals and showed off her pretty smile all night.

Three big kids practicing their smiles.

Enjoying a sucker and Veggie Tales after a fun night. When we left Wendy's we decided to go for a drive. Once we got out about 10 minutes from town (or bathrooms) Alayna said, "My belly hurts." A few seconds later Hudson said, "I don't think my frosty is digesting very well." We all made it home in time to get everyone taken care of. Those drive will have to be reserved for date night. :)

My living room this morning. Alayna and Pierce are under the other blanket.

My sweet girl.