Wow, He Is Good

Monday was a tough morning all around. I was exhausted from sleeping 3 hours a night for 4 days in a row due to work and everything that could go wrong was. I knew I was yelling every other minute at the little ones to "Hurry up please!" and "Listen to me!", but couldn't seem to stop myself. Once in the car and nearing preschool Ashton, my three-year-old who had been quiet in the backseat, suddenly said "Mommy, it's a beautiful day outside...". I grumbled in agreement but really had to strain to hold the tears back when he followed in a softer voice with "...but you are having a bad day today. Can you please stop yelling at me?" I sent myself to time out after that and man, I deserved it. He is so perceptive for such a young soul and can humble me with one sentence. He is going to be a great man someday.

Hush My Little Babies, Hush

After the party today (more on that later) we had to pack up two exhausted children and ride over to Paul's friend's house to get our newly brake-padded Corolla. On the way, the sleepy birthday princess was crying and carrying on while fighting sleep. Frustrated and tired myself, I began to ignore her when all of a sudden I hear a very soft voice out of the back seat quietly singing "Lollipop, lollipop, oh lollipop". When I turned my head to see the source of this sweet song , it was Ashton singing Kate to sleep with her favorite song. My heart just melted and I was so...I don't even know the word to describe it. But when times are tough with him, and oh yes, he is a tough one, this moment will carry me through. I love my children.

Words of Wisdom

Don't focus on what you don't have, focus on what you do.

Amended 8.18.08 after watching Micheal Phelps, previously disgnosed with ADHD and as a "hyper kid" set Olympic history with 8 gold medals -

More to the point, I think, is the moral of her story, which offers hope for parents of any child with a challenge like A.D.H.D.: Too many adults looked at Ms. Phelps’s boy and saw what he couldn’t do. This week, the world will be tuned to the Beijing Olympics to see what he can do

Not Perfect, But Wonderful All the Same

After waking to a dreary rain-filled morning following a late night of Tornado look out duty( http://www.charlotte.com/breaking_news/story/567061.html ) (Ashton & I took the job of monitoring all weather channels until at 10pm), I expected to have a TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD VERY BAD DAY. (Read the full short text of the story here: http://www.fromtheheartpostcards.com/ICQ/alexander.html )

I was instead surprised to find a clean house with happy diaper-changed children running around with the sweet, buttery smell of something baking in the air. (Did I mention half the laundry was done too!) I wandered past the five or six "Hi Mama!"'s from Kate and the "Mommy! You're awake!!!" from Ashton to find my darling husband had made breakfast! After rubbing my eyes to make sure I was indeed awake and seeing clearly, I looked closer to see that the rolls had surly come from Paul, as evidenced by the photo below. (Click to enlarge). Now Paul would say I was complaining the rolls were not the perfect moon shaped they were supposed to be, then hastily explaining the expanding can had not expanded, but had opened only after scissors and maybe a knife had gotten involved - justifying the final designs of his baked goods.

I would like to say that I did not notice the imperfections in the oblongs and mismatched sizes to be mean or judgemental. I noticed the uniqueness in the hard to duplicate shapes that would not be let anywhere near a bakery, but are perfectly welcome in homemade goods. These red-headed stepchildren of the Pilsbury doughboy could only come from the heart, not the store. I noticed that these were made, not bought, for me and that there had to be at least 12-14 minutes of premeditated thought to produce them and at our house, this is VERY advanced thought. I noticed they were not perfect, but were wonderful all the same! :)

Thank you Paul for a wonderful morning, especially considering this was your first day off in 10 days!