My first giveway!

I recently had the opportunity to review a children's book by author Saragine Francois, and was also provided a copy of the book to give away to one of my readers :)

"Diamond's Lucky Penny" encourages children to find the "lucky" in every day mishaps. Although Diamond gets himself into a few dilemmas, with the help of a special penny he is able to see the positive out of each situation. This is a good read for young children, and reminds them that things aren't always as bad as they seem. 


Simply leave the comment "Lucky" in the comments section of this post and you will be entered to win a copy of this book!

Good luck!

Ends 10/26/12

A laughing matter

Yesterday was one of those days...you know "those" days.

Sometimes when my life is so unbelievably hectic, as in could not possibly be real, I MUST be dreaming, kind of unbelievably hectic, I can't help but just embrace it.

At the end of almost every day, when its quiet and all of my children have made it safely through the day, I think to my self "gee-golly today was busy"...yesterday I thought "HOLY HELL today was IN-FRIGGIN-SANE"

The morning started with one of the girls "getting sick" in the bathroom.  Which immediately makes me sick, because when you have multiple children, sharing bedrooms, a bathroom, clothes, most likely toothbrushes and other things that they will regret sharing later, you are bound to spread germs...its inevitable, when one gets sick, the rest always follow.

I kept sicky home from school, and sent the others off.

After some medicine, bananas, toast, gatorade and TV, my little one was stable enough to run errands with me...the errands were planned well before she was sick and I kept her in the air conditioned car most of the time.  The only person I exposed her "ickies" to was her 2 year old brother who decided to be overally affectionate that day, despite my pleads of "stop kissing your sick sister" and will likely be the first of the siblings to catch her bug.

I thought for sure a day of playing "nurse" and cleaning up messes (apparently when you are sick, you have no control over your extremities, therefor spilling or knocking down anything within 5 feet of you...this happened all day.) while packing for our move would be hectic enough of a day.

It was just the beginning. 

I picked up the others from school, all of whom slept on the car ride home, if you don't know..their school is almost an hour away.

After getting home, the littlest girl stumbled from our van directly to the couch.  I woke her up to do homework, but her response was mostly just high pitched whining...I couldn't deal, so I sent her up to her room.  When I went to check on her 10 minutes later, she was out like a light.  When I felt her, she was burning up.  Bad mom.  Sick kid #2 for the day.  I gave her some Tylonol and let her be.

Recap: 2 sick kids, 2 kids with a lot of homework, 1 kid who needs a lot of attention and has found a blue marker and is beginning to look like wild smurf, boxes EVERYWHERE, and a dog...my poor, forgotten dog (if anyone has middle child syndrome its him)

It gets better, the girls have cheerleading practice at 6...by their school...almost an hour away,

The babysitter comes to watch the sick ones and the smurf.

I take the two healthy girls to cheerleading...and get stuck in traffic, it took us an hour and 15 minutes to get there.

During practice I received a very stressful call regarding our new home, the closing date, and a bunch of "what ifs."  I already started packing...I'm moving...somewhere...lock your doors, if I know where you live, I may be coming for an extended stay.

The car ride home is where the hectic starts.

I actually could of handled everything else up until this point.

I hear "mommy the brush is stuck in my hair" coming from the back seat.  I look in my rearview.  "Stuck" is an understatement.  A hairbrush is growing out of my child's head.  I laugh..hard.  She cries.  I tell her I will get it out when we get home...in an hour.

I laugh a few more times when I catch a glmpse of her in the mirror...she laughs too, her sister laughs harder.. "brush-head" cries again.

On the ride home I realize that the baby (who is now home with daddy) is wearing his last diaper...almost immediately I recieve this text:

"Jacob is peeing everywhere!!!!"

OK, so he was wearing his last diaper...

I stop at the store to grab diapers, while in the parking lot I attempt to remove the brush from my daughters hair.  It is not happening.

We finally get home.  As soon as I walk through the door, I see my son standing at the top of the stairs, naked, with tears running down his face, he frantically says to me "Sowwy mommy, I peed on your shoes!!"

 I laughed...he cried more...I hugged him.

"Brush head" is now hysterically crying.  I perform emergency surgery and remove the object, she survives and is left with a slightly horrible haircut.

I sit down in the kitchen, by myself,  and laugh.  One of my daughters walks in the room and asks why I am laughing.  Her face lights up, as if to say "tell me the joke...I want in!"

I look at her and say "Some day, when you are a grown up, you will get it...you will laugh too sometimes"

She looks at me like I'm crazy (which I may be).

I could of cried, complained or been angry yesterday but I chose laughter, sometimes you just HAVE to :)


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Just going with the flow

Children rely on their parents to tell them what to do.  Their days are planned by us, and may change without them ever knowing.  They sometimes only know which day it is by their schedule of events, if they have soccer practice, a birthday party or school to attend.   Children don't have anywhere to be except where we bring them, or tell them they have to be.

Their lives are completely out of their hands.

As parents, we decide when, where and how.  Where we will live, when we will do things and how we will work out all the details.  Our children may affect our decisions, but really they just wait to be told what to do.  

Our family is moving, and going through many changes right now.  My boyfriend and I are the ones who are struggling to keep up, and having a hard time dealing with the chaos.  Our children are just going with the flow.

Attempting to pack is leaving our current home looking like an episode of hoarders and my 2 year old is forced to stay inside so I can get things done.  My daughters have had to make all new friends, again, this is the 4th school for my 9 year old and the 3rd for my 8 year old. 

I can only imagine that they are as equally exhausted as we, the adults, are.  Waking up early, going to bed late.  We have to drive almost an hour each way to the school that is close to our new home, factor in hours of homework, late night dinners, cheerleading practice 3 times a week, and football games that last all day on Saturdays and you've got a very hectic life for any child.

My patience is shorter than usual, and I feel as though I yell more than I talk.

This would be an excuse for any child to act out, do poorly in school, or just have a bad attitude.  This is also life...and my kids, if any, know this.

When I met my boyfriend, he had 3 little girls, and had lost his wife tragically a year before, and I was a single mother, with a fabulous family but never a "father" for my daughter. 

Since then we have merged into a family of 7, adding a baby boy that has helped form an even stronger bond between us.

Our children have gone from having less to more, built new relationships, attended new schools and were given new homes.

You never hear them complain.  They don't ask why often, or use the things that have happened as an excuse.  They just go with the flow.  They are happy, healthy, beautiful children.

I on the other hand do ask why, and I am sure my boyfriend does as well.  We both feel guilty sometimes, but always have the best of intentions.  We strive to give our children more, and can only hope that our hard work is providing that.

In a few weeks we will be in our new house, and my children will continue to do the things that they are "supposed to", because that is all they know.  They will have friends over to play in their new backyard, and sleep in later because their school will be just down the street.

I wish I could always take the burden of life off of my children, even into adulthood, but for now I am thankful that all they have to do is just go with the flow.


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