I don’t share a lot of personal stuff, but sometimes it’s helpful to remind you that I’m a real person too. Although I could easily be mistaken for a robot on occasion. But truly, we’re just like you – we have highs and lows, reasons to be joyful and to cry, good days and not-so-good days. At the end of it all, we feel extremely blessed, and while life isn’t perfect, there’s not much that we would trade. Maybe one of the dogs for something a little quieter. Anyway, I hope you feel equally blessed, and remember, we’re all trying to get through this thing together!

I know that we’re now well into 2018, so this comes a little late, but that’s kinda how we roll around here. We tend to show up five or ten (or thirty, who am I kidding?) minutes after the party has started. Especially with an extra kid in tow… Yeah, speaking of that, we added another to the mix in 2017.

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And just like that, C is four already. Where does the time go?

We had his party at Squire’s Castle again, and like last year, it was an absolutely beautiful day. Games, pizza, and a Thomas (and friends) cake extravaganza. What more could a little boy want?

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Never a dull moment around here. We’ve been planting, building, weeding, visiting Thomas, adding new chickens to the flock, and generally trying to stay just a step ahead of falling into complete chaos. Sometimes it’s a struggle. And time-consuming. And draining. Which is part of the reason that I haven’t said much on here lately. It’s all about finding a rhythm, and when you lose the tempo or get stuck on another beat, it can be hard to get back.

Over the Memorial Day weekend, we spent five days in North Carolina, which is good for recharging. Only to a certain degree, of course, since the kids were with us, and kids ≠ peace/silence/tranquility. But still nice to get away from everything. And we got to see snakes, lizards, giant millipedes, and a good variety of other fun wildlife.

The next weekend was comprised mostly of my younger (x3) brother’s wedding. As far as weddings go, it was a nice affair, the weather was great, and the kids were great too, even though we kept them up until after midnight. Home is a completely different matter, but I love how great they are in public.

 

 

Over the past few weeks, we’ve seen lots of cold and snow, as many snow days for C as I likely had in my entire elementary school career, frozen eggs (when we get any), dance parties, popcorn, blanket forts, the start of the Olympics, and lots of messes.

The only constant is a lot of messes. Just varying states of messiness.

E has discovered how to open all drawers and cupboards at her level, meaning a whole new world of potential messiness is at her fingertips. She also takes a few too many cues from her older brother, whom she wants to keep up with, but can’t quite seem to find the coordination to do so. And she definitely has the gardening gene. The force is strong with this one.

I think C’s motto is something along the lines of “Let’s see what new way I can find to create chaos and disorder today.” Or pretty close.

About the only way we can keep him from making a mess of everything is to keep things out of reach (which is hard to do, because he can reach almost all the cupboards now with his stool-on-chair stacking) or screwing the lids onto all the jars really tightly (which is a pain, but worth the trouble for saving me from full bottles of peanut butter, apple sauce, and maple syrup all over the coffee table).

Sometimes we slip up and leave tempting items within reach, which he never fails to take full advantage of. All it takes is sixty seconds. It really is amazing how quickly kids can get into stuff.

Never a dull moment. Keeps us young, I guess.