Kindergarten Crying

So, I survived the first day of Kindergarten and, so far, half way through the 2nd. 

As expected, Noisy Man was very excited to go and not hesitant in the least to enter into his Kindergarten classroom, even though mommy wanted to hold on to him just a bit longer.  I did great all morning.  We drove him to school the first day, so that allowed us to sleep in just a bit.  Got him up and ate a good breakfast, got dressed and then he sat and watched about 20 minutes of a cartoons while the rest of us got ready.  We headed down the road to Kindergarten (I totally just about typed preschool). 

Noisy Man and his teacher

Mommy made it all the way up to giving him a hug and a kiss goodbye until I started crying.  I tried so hard to hold it back so that he wouldn't see me, but I just couldn't do it.  He looked at me kinda funny, like "Why in the world are you crying, mother?"  But then just walked on into his classroom.

I stood at the door and watched, crying of course.   His classroom para came walking in and I asked her, "You said you would handle their tears if they cried, but who will handle mine?"  She gave me a sweet hug and stood and talked with us for a bit.  I was surprised daddy didn't out right laugh at me, although he did have a smirky little smile on his face, he just kept saying, "He'll be just fine, Mommy."  His teacher, Mrs. L, came over and chatted with us and reassured me for a short while as well until I figured I  had better move on and not blubber at his door all day.

Mommy and her big boy on his first day

Walking out of the school I got a few sympathetic looks from other teachers and such and his old preschool teacher saw us coming and said, "Most of the time I would give Miss Firecracker a hug hello, but it looks like Mommy could use a hug more today."  So, I got another sweet hug from Miss L. and a couple of tissues and finally made it out the door of the school, no longer weeping.  That lasted until daddy started telling me I would be OK and he would have fun and I cried all over again.

We were home all of 15 minutes before Miss Thumb Sucker is wandering the house saying, "Where Noisy Man?  Where he go?"  And the tears came again.

2nd day of Kindergarten, first day riding the bus there

I made it through, and was very thankful his day ended at 1:20.  We went and picked him up with a huge smile on every one's faces.  He had a very fun day, loved the lunch and everything they had done.  We sat and colored together while his sister's slept.

Today I sent him off on the bus and got all teary-eyed again as he waved good bye to me through his bus seat window.  He won't be home until after 4 today.  Man, I miss that kid!

Yesterday was also Mommy and Daddy's 8 year anniversary

Word of the Year

I am not one to set resolutions. Why? They only last a couple of weeks or a couple of months as best. I come up with some lame excuse as to why I failed or re-route my original intention. I definitely am not dependable in this area and it really disappoints me. So, I have learned in the last couple of years to not set myself up for disappointment and have gone another route. This year, I have decided to have a word to go off of instead of an actual resolution. I must admit this is not an original idea.  They have been talking about it on KLOVE radio and I know another friend and blogger who does much the same thing (read hers here).  These two things inspired my thinking
My word comes from Ephesians 4:22-24 "You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness."  Attitude!  That is what it is all about.  If your attitude is right it is hard to go wrong.  And when your attitude is modeled after that of Christ Jesus you're bound to be even better.  Attitude of the heart, attitude of the mind, attitude of life.
This will take some help from the One and Only for me, as many times I need to set myself in the corner along with my children for attitude checks, as we often call them in this house.  But even memorizing these verses myself along with my children will help me 'take every thought (and attitude) captive" and make for a better year.  I know I will need to turn to Him many times for guidance and 'attitude checks' but isn't that what He wants?  He wants us to depend on Him.  He wants us to turn to Him and realize we can't do it on our own.  I am ready for that.
How about you?  Do you have a 'word' you can work on this year?  If so, what is it?  You know my 'word' and can help keep me accountable. 
My other (a little less meaningful) word is run.  I am planning to run the 1/2 marathon again this year, so training will start soon!  But God has words for me in that too "And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith" Hebrews 12: 1b-2a

Weary Wednesday

Truthfully, it should be weary first part of the week. Miss Thumb Sucker is throwing me for a loop again. Waking up at 5:30 every morning which is just enough time for me NOT to be able to go to back to sleep after I am done feeding her before my alarm goes off at 6:15. She is genuinely hungry most times though. I have found that if she isn't hungry I can lay her back down and she will go back to sleep, but if she wants to eat. . . there is no going back to sleep. And letting her cry it out is not an option at 5:30 am because it wakes the whole house up and there is no going back to sleep for anyone. Believe me. That is what started this whole weary week!

My other weariness is nursing. I have absolutely loved nursing all of my kids until they were a year old. Noisy Man I even did morning and night feedings until he was 14 months. Miss Firecracker 13 months and with Miss Thumb Sucker I am SO ready to be done! Perhaps it is because I have either been nursing or pregnant for the last 5 years and 3 months! Perhaps it is because she is a mean and restless nurser. She pinches me and pushes and pulls and wiggles and even bites every now and then. Why do I feel so guilty about wanting to be done? I think, honestly, part of it is a fear on my part as well about the fact that I won't have a bodily need for 300-500 extra calories per day any more and might blow up like a balloon!! YIKES!

Loathing Laundry

Is there anything worse than laundry? I suppose whichever housewife you were to ask, she would have her specific household duty that she loathes to do. Mine is laundry. It is never ending and the entire process takes entirely way too long. Yes, I realize that if I had one of those awesome new washers and dryers that do your laundry in 20 minutes I would be singing a different tune. But, we are on the "Dave Plan" and a set of those just are not in our budget. I first need a new pick-up for my husband and a treadmill . . . but I digress. I have realized that if I just fold it and refuse to put it back in a laundry basket after it is folded it gets put away much more quickly. If I do, however, fold (lol, sorry I am terrible with the cheesy jokes) and put it in a basket, it seems to stay in the basket until I need the basket to haul another load of laundry out of the dryer. Laundry baskets just seem to be my rival. If I put unfolded clothes in, they seem to sit in my laundry room unfolded until I get tired of tripping over them. And believe me, when it comes to laundry it takes me a little while to get sick enough of it to fold it. If I put folded clothes in, well, I already covered the time it takes for those to get put away. Long story short, I avoid laundry at whatever costs I can. Anyone want to come help with the 4 loads I am trying to tackle today on top of baking cookies, drying apples, making applesauce, cleaning my bathrooms and killing time on the computer cuz I really don't want to get back to work? OK, I better get back to work, another batch of cookies is beeping at me.

Pleading

Sleep. . . must get sleep. . . Really. I'm not even in the least bit joking. I sit here at my computer while my youngest one (the main reason for the sleeplessness) cries in her crib and my older two play with their TAG readers. She cries in her crib because I can't deal with her right now and I only sit here at my computer because I am sick of tagging garage sale stuff and I don't have enough energy to do anything else. I have not gotten more than 3 hours of sleep at a time in over 6 weeks. . . do I have a newborn or a 7-month-old? I don't think she even slept this bad when she was a newborn. And what makes it even worse is the fact that I know she CAN sleep through the night because she did it for 2 weeks. Is there a way to get her to go back? Can I teach her how to sleep?
I also sit here at my computer because I am a bit sore. I started my 2nd session of Boot Camp yesterday at the Y. I must say, day 1 of session 2 was not near as bad as day 1 of session 1, but I am still sore nontheless. Why do we do this to ourselves? Is it really that important?
Anyway, I have ranted enough and let my baby girl cry long enough that I must go get her and try and convince her that sleep really is a good thing and she needs to try it out.

Craziness

So, I was so excited to finish my first 10K with a 10:19 average mile pace. . . until I looked online at the line up places for the 1/2 marathon and discovered that my 11 min mile pace is the LAST category on the line up map. Way to burst my bubble. I just need to keep reminding myself that it is OK to be slow, at least I am doing it! I am just so darn competitive that I feel like a loser going so slow. I need to get over that. There are plenty of people at my same pace and I don't view them as losers, just me. Why is that? Craziness.

A really bad picture posted online of me running the Novartis 10K. . . are my thighs really that big? Wow! I have some work to do! At least the Cadburys are gone now.

I also just cleaned out my fridge yesterday. . . YUCK! All the containers of leftovers that never got eaten could feed a starving nation. I feel terrible when I throw out so much food. Thankfully, none of it was to the "just sacrifice the container so you don't have to open it and smell it" stage yet. I always feel like a super mom when I find containers like that in the back of my fridge. Check all these out - is this not pathetic?

The just emptied milk jug made the picture too. . . look it has a lid!! ;)

Lastly, I cleaned my carpets (well the main section that gets filthy in my living room) yesterday as well. Wow, I had a productive day! I have my own cleaner thingy, which is a must with small children, an in home day care and ivory carpets (yes, I now realize how STUPID I was to pick out this carpet color). I just did this about 5 weeks ago before Miss Firecracker's Birthday party. This is how dirty the water is just after 5 weeks!! Craziness. .

Now, can I have a maid please?

Don't worry, these got taken care of as well. My sink is now sparkling clean. . . well it was before lunch today anyway.

An Attempt

So, currently I am attempting many new things in my life. . . one being this blog. Not sure what prompted me to start this in the first place. Maybe it was reading all of my friends' blogs and thinking it would be fun, maybe it was reading all the Pioneer Woman's blogs and wishing just a little bit that I could be that cool and funny (yeah right :), but I am hoping that it will accomplish one new thing I am trying in my life as well: to talk about myself less and listen more. I thought maybe if I talked about myself on here, when in conversation with others I would do it less. I am hoping this is the case. You see, one of my Proverbs 31 Ministries email devotionals this week was one of the authors telling her story about how she became so dependent on gaining the approval of others that she lost sight of the only approval that matters - God's. I felt much in her same shoes, so I am going to give it a try myself. So, if you want to hear things about me, you can read them here. I am going to try and talk less and listen more, which will be a challenge cuz I am a talker! There, you have just been made responsible for keeping me accountable to this! ;)
Another new thing is long distance running. In High School all I ever ran were the 100 M dash, 100 M hurdles, 4x1 relay and long jump. . . nothing more than 100 meters! So, now I am training for the 1/2 marathon in Lincoln. That is 13.something miles!! I think I am nuts! Have you seen my legs? Short and stalky, definitely not distance runner legs. But, I'll give it a shot. My goal is to finish, not win! I did start doing quite a big of running after Jeff and I first got married, before kiddos arrived. I never ran more than 5 miles, but I enjoyed it. So, in attempt to get back into shape and lose this disgusting 'stuff' that seems to be hanging out around my midsection after baby #3 I decided to finally start training for the 1/2 Marathon that I had wanted to do for the last 4 years. Tomorrow, however, is my first attempt at "racing" where I will be running the 10 Mile at the State Farm run in Lincoln. It is supposed to RAIN all morning. . . yikes! This could be interesting. Please say a prayer for me. . . I will need it!
And not last and definitely not least (but the last thing I'll drone on about in this post) is the fact that I am attempting to yell at my children less. You see, I have been getting up at 445 am 3 days a week to go run for my training, which means I am tired. This is on top of the fact that my little thumb sucker still gets up usually at least 2 times in the night for a feeding before this time. This means I am even more tired. . . and when I am tired, I am crabby. I was telling a friend that I am glad my kids are too young to be able to have a good memory of this time in the future. Cuz if they did it would surely be the memory that they started with, "Remember that time that mom was training for the 1/2 marathon? Man, she was always so crabby." Thus, I am trying to control my crabbiness and temper that seems to flare when I am sleep deprived. Pray for me about this too! This week has gone well, with the exception of Tuesday. Tuesdays seem to be the worst for me for some reason.
OK that's enough for today. . . have a good one!