Plumbing and Playing: Our summer so far

We're wrapping up the second week of summer around here.
Last week the kids had their last day of school, I worked two days, and we spent two days with our favorite plumbers.
We've had a slow draining shower, so Adam called Curly's Plumbing to snake it out. It turned out to be more than a slow drain; we had tree roots in the line.  So the plumbers jackhammered up the master bathroom floor and repaired the pipe.  This is the second time this year we've had to jackhammer up our foundation. We love these guys because they are good at what they do, but they are also so nice! They don't care if I take pictures of them every five minutes to send to Adam.  They also don't mind stopping countless times to explain to the kids what is going on.  I know when I'm working the last thing I want to do is stop to explain everything I'm doing.  But they do it!
The kids recently learned the term "plumber's butt" so they kept following the plumbers around the house to see if they had "plumber's butts." Both guys were wearing belts, though, so they were safe.

I had decided that this summer we will stay home at least one day a week. I say that every summer and then if an offer for something else comes by, we do it.  We never stay home for the entire day, so this year I mean it. It's easy to be at home, realize you need something and jump in the car and get it.  But every year that snowballs and I end up being gone the whole day instead of a few minutes. So last week with the plumbers we had to stay home, but I wandered through the house a little unsure of what I needed to do.  This week went much smoother.  The kids played the entire day and I worked on housework, taking intentional breaks.

Last weekend we travelled to Medieval Times to celebrate Paul's birthday. Luckily I was able to nab a teacher discount to make it more affordable.  The kids loved it and we even got to bring some friends.

Claire took her stuffed otter to the zoo to see a real river otter.

This week we've had a trip to the zoo and much birthday celebratoryness.  Adam and Paul's birthdays are only three days apart so that makes for a week of celebrations.  We went to Six Flags on Tuesday.

Yesterday was our stay-at-home day and it went much smoother. I worked on polishing the hard wood floors and baked Paul's birthday cake. The kids played nicely all day long. They didn't fight one time and I was amazed.

Today is Adam's birthday so we're not quite done celebrating. Even though I'm trying hard to slow down, summer is flying by!

Birthdays and Growing Up

Tomorrow is my birthday. Growing up, birthdays were always exciting. My mom would make me a yellow cake with rainbow chip frosting every year.  I haven't seen a can of rainbow chip frosting in years, but I can still remember the taste.  It was the taste of joy.

As I've gotten older, birthdays are just as big of a deal, but for different reasons.  When I was younger, the emphasis was the presents. Now the focus has shifted from presents, which are still exciting, to relationships and service. 

I have friends both near and far and my birthday is an excuse to connect with ones I don't get to keep up with often. Even something as simple as a Facebook greeting can be a conversation starter and a reminder to touch base with loved ones I don't see regularly.

I express my love for others through acts of service, and my birthday is a time when I stop and let others take care of me. I pause to remember that I am loved and that people are thankful for my service and presence in their lives.  It's also the time when I can get the kids motivated to help with chores all weekend long.  I have asked Paul to clean his bedroom as his gift to me.  Claire fed the dogs and everyone helped with laundry without complaint.

The past year has been one of great personal growth for me. At this time last year I had accepted that I would eventually enroll in seminary, but it was still far off in the distance and I wasn't brave enough to voice that dream to most people around me. Now I spend my free time studying and I am relishing every second in the classroom learning more about faith and church history. In the fall I'll stretch myself even more as I take two classes instead of just one.  I also know now what each class will require of me so I can prepare for the demands.

Today I am a better writer than I was last year. I know more about myself now than I did then. I've always been comfortable in my own skin, but self-discovery has led to even more self-acceptance.

My baby is in kindergarten, my daughter is blowing everyone away with her intelligence and perceptions, my husband has found he loves reading almost as much as me.

So while I'm not physically growing anymore, this past year has been one of great personal growth. I can't wait to see what my 36th year will hold.

Adam, my appendage

Today is Father's Day and Wednesday is Adam's birthday, so it's time for my annual ode to Adam, my husband and father two the two cutest, smartest, and sweetest kids I know.  (Just ask them and they will confirm that as a fact.)

Some families will be able to let their father relax for Father's Day, but it's impossible around here right now.  We've got floor laid in two rooms now and a bathroom, hallway, and den to go.  We also have baseboards, cabinets, and walls to paint, and all of this will need to happen before construction finishes, ideally next Saturday.

Tomorrow Adam's taken off work and we will take a family trip to Six Flags, but today will be church, painting, and reconfiguring of furniture.

Seemingly a lifetime ago, I fell in love with this skinny boy who was good at math.  Two kids and twelve years of marriage later, I still love that guy.  We became best friends before even thought about dating and I used to call him "Adam my Appendage."

He is like a part of me.  We always joke that I am completely right-brained and he is completely left-brained so together we make one brain.  Lately, he's been extremely busy, probably busier than me.  He's had some major projects at work so he hasn't been able to think about leaving the office before 8.  Each lunch time is taken up with a trip to Home Depot or a trip home to supervise the contractors. He also balances the checkbook, pays the bills, cleans the pool, and fixes anything that's broken.

The family is used to having him around, so it's difficult for all of us when he's pulled in so many different directions.  I get frustrated, but I know he's doing his best.  We hope and pray that once we get these floors in, that we won't be needing to do any more major home improvement for a long, long time.

So today I am thankful for Adam, my appendage.  He is such a part of me that when he's not around, I feel like I'm missing something.  I don't claim to know what it's like to be an actual amputee, but in my imagination, it's in small ways comparable to this.  I get used to having him around, and then when he's called other places, life functions differently.  Luckily his phases of busy-ness are just phases and not a way of life.

Here's a picture from 2008 when we were the Holy Family at church.  I was supposed to be Mary full of Grace but had just fallen off the donkey.  There Adam was, helping me up.  I love that guy!

Movie, Coin Show, and Birthdays: A weekend of fun!

This weekend was absolutely perfect.

On Friday night, we watched Herbie the Love Bug on the front lawn at our church. I packed a picnic dinner and we had fun!

On Saturday morning, Adam took the kids to a TNA show. That's right.  It's the Texas Numismatic Association.  The kids participated in an auction and won free coins. 

They were kind of  hyper toward the end apparently.  They had a lot of fun and Sarah enjoyed going to Kohl's by herself.

Saturday night was my maternal grandpa's 80th birthday party.  Here's my grandparents with all their kids.

The fab five.  My mom is on the end.

We tried to get Grandma and Grandpa to kiss, which was  hilarious.

We all had a good time laughing about their squished noses.

They are so cute!

In this photo, Grandma isn't mad.  She's in shock because my aunt got the group photo developed at Wal-Mart during the party.  She had a frame waiting and gave the framed photo to them.  Grandma couldn't wrap her brain around how it happened so fast.

On Sunday we celebrated Claire's birthday at Build a Bear Workshop.  This was a pretty good bargain.  For $171 each of our party guests took home a bear with a sound box inside and clothes.  Our party leader was awesome!  He also asked if I did stand-up comedy on the side which tells you about what level his humor was.

Claire, her best friends, and her brother with their new bears.

Group hug!

Paul's bear is named Batty.  Wonder why.

Claire's bear is named Blackie.


It was a weekend full of laughs and happiness.  I can't wait to see what this summer has in store!

Continuing the birthday list with my mother-in-law!

April is a birthday-heavy month around here.  It's also a happy month.  Today we celebrate the birth of my mother-in-law, Sarita.  She is a gifted and giving woman and we're all proud to be part of her family.

Sarita grew up in Chandler, a suburb of Tyler, Texas.  Her brother and his wife still live in the family house, which is called the farm, though we're not sure what they grow.  

East Texas was her stomping ground through college.  She met Stan Boyette in college and they were later married.  They moved to DFW and raised one son (Adam) and twin daughters.

Sarita taught special education at MacArthur high school for about 30 years.  She retired when I was pregnant with Claire.  She and Stan spend their days tinkering around the house and playing with their dogs, Britches and Pockets.  Sarita is a talented scrapbooker and handmade card creator.  Our home is adorned with both.  She's completed at least five scrapbooks for each of my children.

Sarita is both resourceful and thoughtful.  She always has her thinking cap on trying to find a way to reuse or recycle everything that comes in her house.  

You know you are a favorite of Sarita when you are elevated to bag status.  That means every time she sees you, she gives you a bag of random items you will find useful.  (Not to brag, but I usually get two bags.)  Inside your bag, you will find all sorts of surprises from canned goods to Campbell's soup labels, to pocket packs of kleenex, or a bag of dog treats she got free in the mail.  Every time she goes to Sonic she saves the mints to send to my kids.  She cuts the front of all her greeting cards off to use in scrapbooks or to give to the kids for art projects.  Calendars are treated the same way.

Sarita and I are both passionate coupon cutters, so when we cut the coupons out of our newspaper insert, we save them to swap.  She is also well-versed in the free giveaways on the web, so she often sends us something random and useful she won online.

I was surprised when I started dating Adam and realized that in his family, all the pets are taught to speak.  They always introduce themselves before speaking, and it is often Sarita who helps.  A conversation with the family dog often goes like this:

"This is Pockets.  I am madder than hell that Wesley Eugene got blessed at church and I had to stay here in Grapevine with these old folks.  I am sick of that dog trying to say I am condemned to hell.  How can I get baptized if these old folks never leave their house?  This is Pockets and I am furious!"

Or

"This is Britches.  That Pockets has overstepped his boundaries one too many times.  I was the first dog in this house and now everyone is all, 'Pockets, Pockets, Pockets.'  I am fed up and as soon as I can find a suitcase in this messy house, I am hitting the road.  Plus, I am sick of this dog food they make me eat!  Where's the Porterhouse steak?  This is Grapevine, and word on the street is that it's supposed to be hoity-toity."

The dogs are usually angry about something.  Sometimes they even send each other letters in the mail.

In honor of Sarita's birthday, our dogs Wesley Eugene and Cpt. Midnight Sugar Dot Express have something to say:

"Happy birthday to you, old woman!  This is Wesley Eugene and Sugar Dot.  Don't even come into the Fort Worth city limits today unless you come bearing treats for us!  Oh, and happy birthday."

Happy birthday to my granddad

Today is my grandfather's 88 birthday.  His name is Jerry, but everyone in the family calls him Mi.  He's old enough to know exactly what he wants and ask for it.  My cousin Jeff and I constantly are searching the entire DFW metroplex for said item.  Jeff actually drives into Oklahoma once a month or so to buy Mi's snuff. Apparently snuff isn't a hot seller in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, so Jeff contacted a friend in Oklahoma, who meets him halfway with a case whenever Mi is running low.
Currently my shopping list for Mi is to find Febreeze air freshener with Gain in it.  I bought him a substitute Febreeze last week, but it wasn't acceptable.  Mi admittedly can't smell it, but his visitors like the scent and he wants that particular one.
My grandfather is particular, and sometimes grouchy in his particularity.  But every bit of that has been earned and he deserves exactly what he wants.
He was born in Emhouse, Texas, a little town close to Corsicana.  His father died when he was a child, and my granddad was raised by his mother and grandfather in Corsicana.  He had 10 brothers and sisters, and he is the last one alive.
He contracted pneumonia when he was 18 months old, but lived through it.  He grew up picking cotton and working on the farm.  He still remembers the big snow of 1929 when Corsicana measured 19 inches on top of a hill.  His father would go squirrel hunting on Sundays and they had a delicious meal of squirrel gravy.
World War II started when he was a teenager, and my grandfather lied about his age so he could join the Navy.  He worked as a cook on a hospital ship through the end of the war.  Days after the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, my grandfather walked the beach there.
He met my grandmother in 1946.  I still wear the locket he gave her that Valentine's Day.  They were married in December of the same year.  They raised a family in Irving where my grandfather worked as a lineman for TU Electric.  To this day, there are line insulators in Irving that he installed.  When I drive to visit him, I always look at the power lines and wonder which ones he helped hang.
When my father was graduating high school, my granddad went back to school to finish his high school diploma.  They both graduated the same year.
He and my grandmother paid the hospital bill when I was born because my parents didn't have insurance then.
Mi loves to tell jokes again and again and again, and laughs harder than the listener at the punch line.
Mi favors my son Paul because Paul wears a costume every time to his retirement home and picks up lots of girlfriends.  Many eligible ladies are knocking on Mi's apartment door now to see when that cute little boy will come visit again.
I've been documenting his life for some time and have many snippets and stories of his 88 years.  This little blog just isn't quite enough to communicate Jerry Baker's goodness, generosity, and sense of humor.  He is a giant and I love him.

Adventures in Birthday

Yesterday was my birthday.  I turned 35, and I'm quite happy with that.  I'm not too young and I'm not too old.  Old enough to accept that I'm an adult but young enough not to act like one sometimes.

We have a friend who used to be a missionary and a pilot.  About nine months ago the kids started showing an interest in learning more about planes, so I asked him if he could possibly take us for a flight in his.  He agreed and we've been trying to schedule it since then.  With unpredictable weather and busy schedules, we finally decided  yesterday would be the day.

The kids and I were excited.  We'd be in the plane and Adam had plans to stand on the roof waving at us.  When our friend arrived at our house, he gave me several ziploc and shopping bags just in case we got sick in the air.  I laughed and on the plane, put them in back, almost out of reach.

Yesterday was a very windy day, and to sum up our 45 minutes in the air, it was bumpy, Paul got scared, and Claire and I had to reach for the bags.  We did get to see Adam on the roof, but I was nearly immobile with nausea and couldn't take photos in the air. Our pilot was so kind and generous, but we just couldn't take it. Luckily, I don't think the kids will be scarred for life from this.  For me, I am glad I am wearing the "adult" label now because I am adult enough to say, I don't need to do that again.  I am so grateful we had the experience, and now I can go on with life.

Besides that, I took a lovely nap, went to the grocery store by myself, and then we had friends over.  I decided that I didn't want to mess with a restaurant on a Saturday night and feeding people makes me happy, so that's what we did.  The boys manned the grill and the girls chopped vegetables and chatted while I made homemade tortillas.  We finished the night by playing the Awkward Family Photos game, which every time, makes me laugh so hard I can't breathe.

I received two birthday cakes.  My dear friend Stacy made one for me: (lemon poke cake)

And Adam bought the other:

You might wonder why my name isn't on that cake.  We have a friend named BettieCarol who instructed the kids on the proper North-Carolina way to say her name.  "BettieCarol" pronounced something like "BayCarl" is the kid's new catch phrase.  They run around the house saying, "Oh BettieCarol!"  Paul invented this knock knock joke and every time he tells me it I have to take a moment to stop laughing.  Adam wanted the cake to say something funny, and as he puts it, "What's funnier than this?"  I loved it!

It was a good birthday.

The first 35 years of my life

I turn 35 tomorrow.  Here's a short autobiography of my life so far:

I was born at Harris Hospital downtown.  Some could say I was born a Methodist.

My parents went to the Birdville ISD school board and petitioned for me to attend the elementary school of their choice because the one in our area was across from the high school.  As I remember, they said they were afraid high school kids would try to sell me drugs.  I attended Snow Heights Elementary.  In my day, Snow wasn't just the name of the school.  It was an all-white campus.

I received something of a culture shock in middle school when I switched to attend the correct school.  Haltom Middle was a cultural melting pot, and I loved that about it.  I didn't know anyone at first, though, so for my first year, my best friend was a book at lunch.

I caught my social stride at Haltom High where I was friends with everyone and usually succeeded in saying a personalized greeting to every single person that crossed my path.

During my senior year in high school, my father's job moved him to Austin.  I stayed in Fort Worth with my mother so I could graduate from Haltom and she could sell the house.

I went to Tarrant County Junior College and made great friends with a girl who was dating my future husband.  He was extremely skinny and I remember wondering about his nutrition.  We all hung out together for a bit.  I worked for the school newspaper and in my spare time, wrote features for two local branches of the Star-Telegram.

During college, I roomed with my uncle.  He's eight years older than me and a world record holder in wheelchair races.  He was an aerospace engineer starting his own business.  I pitched in on rent and made up the extra with cooking and cleaning.  He also was in a christian rock band and I was a huge groupie.  We had a lot of fun.

At the University of Texas at Arlington I wrote for the school newspaper and magazine, eventually becoming the last editor of the Tempo.  Adam and I became best friends and eventually we shared enough beers and laughs that we found out we were in love.

The week after college graduation, Adam and I married and moved to Fort Worth.  We visited many churches of various denominations but finally ended up in a pretty building on Camp Bowie.  We still attend Arlington Heights UMC.  For me at least, joining the Methodist church was like finding my home.  Although I was raised, saved, and baptized in a Southern Baptist Church, the more I learned about the Methodist doctrines and beliefs, I realized I had been a closet Methodist my whole life.

My final years at UTA, I worked at Half Price Books, but when we moved to Fort Worth, I decided to use my college degree and become a teacher.  The school I taught at was the cultural opposite of the one I attended growing up.  I learned just as much as my students when I worked there.

In 2005 I got my wisdom teeth removed, we had just bought a house, and I decided, while on painkillers, that it was time for us to start having children around the house.  I didn't change my mind when my gums healed.  Claire was born the next year.

Adam and I attended Love and Logic parenting classes, which set us on a parenting style we stick to together.  I continued to teach for a couple of years.

Paul William Boyette was born and I quit teaching for pay to be a stay-at-home mom and teach my own children.

The year before Claire started kindergarten, I began working at church.  Paul still attends preschool there.  Now I rotate between church work and tutoring elementary students on reading.

Tomorrow is my birthday.  I am mother to two kids, two dogs, two fish, and one hamster.  I am wife of Adam.  I am a Jesus lover, a writer, a church staffer, a teacher, a cook, a voracious reader, and a person constantly striving to improve myself.  I love to help others, give hugs, and talk to friends.  My house is a mess but my kids are smart.  I am part of a happy family.  I am content.

Paul and I at the Mother-Son Dance in Grapevine this year.

My Pinterest Birthday Garden

I have fallen prey to Pinterest, the online pin board system.  I love looking at new recipes and ideas to make life easier and prettier.  One idea I wanted to try was the pallet garden.  I've tried gardening a few times with containers or my flower beds, with limited success due to weeds or drought.  I liked this pallet garden idea because it was raised for better drainage and easier weeding.  My birthday was coming up, so I used that as an excuse to get help setting this up.  We picked up some pallets beside a gas station dumpster.  When we got the best looking one outside, Adam decided it needed a base.

So we pried boards off the other rejected pallets, as shown here.  The kids had recently attended a Sears how to workshop and each have their own personal hammer, which they were happy to put to use.

 After Adam slid boards in the bottom, we filled it with dirt and planted vegetables.  It's growing great!  Here the kids are with the finished project.  They looked a little worn out.

Happy Birthday Claire!

Happy birthday Claire!

Saturday was Claire's birthday, and we had parties all day. In the morning, we had all her kid friends over, and family came over with tons of food in the afternoon. We have countless pictures of family eating.
Claire is now five years old. With her birthday and the Mavs going to the playoffs, Adam and I have been reminiscing about the last time the Mavs were in the playoffs and I was birthing our first baby.
We are so proud of how smart and generous Claire is.
Two weeks ago, we were leaving a funeral and about to head out of town. We were on our way to Chick-fil-A for lunch when Claire spotted a homeless man with a sign on the side of the road. She asked what it said and I explained that the man was asking for food.
Claire: "I wish we had some food to give him."
Me: "I do, too, but we just cleaned all the snacks and toys out of the car."
Claire: "Well, why don't we buy him some food at Chick-fil-A?"
So we did. We drove back to give it to him. Claire rolled down her window and gave him the food and drink himself. As we made a u-turn and headed home, we spotted him under the bridge chowing down and drinking his lemonade as fast as he possibly could. Claire said it made her happy to see that. Me, too.
In the last two weeks, she's really started reading as well. We bought some Bob early readers from Half Price Books and she's been hard at work reading them. She'll be in kindergarten in just a couple of months, and she's ready.

Happy birthday to my favorite five year old!

Happy birthday to my MIL

April is my favorite month because of the weather, the flowers, the birthdays, and Easter. I missed noting that my Uncle Greg's birthday was the day after mine, and on April 25, my niece Morgan will turn 11. Today, however, is my mother-in-law's birthday. Sarita will have to tell you herself how old she is; I can't remember and it's not proper to ask a lady her age. When I was in high school and college, I enrolled in several Spanish classes. In each class, you have to choose a Spanish name, so my name was always Sarita. In fact, I still have a couple of friends that call me that. So it was pretty funny that not only are our birthdays so close together, so are our names. Sarita was raised in Chandler, Texas, a suburb of the metropolitan Tyler area. She's familiar with rural life, so last year when Claire's pet chicken pooped on her head, she didn't even get upset. She's got lots of crazy stories about animals around the house and yard. Until a few years ago, Sarita was a special education teacher for high schoolers. Not only was she dealing with all the angst that comes with that age group, she was teaching the emotionally disturbed students. That alone qualifies her for sainthood in my book. I admire Sarita for her thoughtfulness and generosity. She never lets anything go to waste and always thinks of who could use something she has. A stale roll is given to the kids to feed ducks with, and old sweaters are packed up for the homeless. She's a huge scrapbooker and saves all her little clippings and unused stickers for the kids to use with crafts. She also sends off for free samples and passes them around the family and gives the leftovers to the homeless. Even her magazine subscriptions don't go to waste. She and Adam's dad, Stan, live in Grapevine, and she used to drive all the way to John Peter Smith to take her already read magazines so the waiting room would always have current magazines. Now that her health isn't what it used to be, she saves all her magazines for me to take to church for homeless ladies to read. At my house, we have a special drawer we call "Grandma's drawer." After I cut my coupons, I put the leftovers in there and when Sarita and I see each other, we exchange bags of coupons and other items. She always has a bag going for each family member, and you never know what you're going to find inside. Mine always has coupons, duck bread, random canned goods, and whatever she got free in the mail she couldn't use. In the family I was raised in, holidays were strictly family time. So the first time I saw that Stan and Sarita had invited extra people to their Christmas celebration, I must be honest and say that I was a little taken aback. But then I realized that the cashier at Wal-Mart didn't have anywhere else to go on Christmas Eve and how kind and generous it is to invite strangers and casual friends to celebrate with your family. Now every year I look forward to whoever shows up because it always makes it interesting. Sarita is always thinking about others. I also love how down to earth she is. There is not a bone of pretension in her body, so many people easily relate to her. Last week, she and Stan celebrated 37 years of marriage and today she celebrates 25 years of life. Yeah, I know the math doesn't add up, but just go with it. Happy birthday, Sarita, my favorite mother-in-law!

Happy Birthday to Mi!

Today is my paternal grandfather's 86th birthday. In honor of his birthday, I thought I'd share some of his history with my readers. His name is Jerry McClellan Baker. McClellan is a family name, but I must ask again where it comes from. He was born in Emhouse, Texas, close to Corsicana (home of my grandmother). His father died when he was six and his mother moved him and all the kids to her parents house. They survived the Great Depression with a garden and lots of creativity. He dropped out of high school to join the Navy. He worked on a hospital ship in WWII and walked the streets of Hiroshima three days after the bomb hit. After the war, he met my grandmother, Margie, in Corsicana. When I asked him what he first liked about her, he said, "She was a girl." I asked him what she liked about him and he replied, "I imagine that she was glad I was a boy." He got his grandpa name when my cousin Jeff couldn't say the words "my granddad." Jeff could only come up with the word Mi, so from then on he was called that. I love my granddad because he's a saver. He saves all his beer cans for me to take to church to recycle. He has a little shelf in his hallway that he puts all his empty beer cans in, not because he can't put them in a bag himself, but because the kids love throwing them in the bag. He saves all his complimentary address labels for Claire to play with. Ensure bottles are repurposed as spittoons and a empty bottle of nosespray is filled with glass cleaner for his eyeglasses. Rather than buying new eyeglasses for himself, he wears my grandmother's old frames. He is also thoughtful. He makes sure he always has corndogs, steak fingers, and strawberries for each time we visit him. He make sure the garage door is lifted when we come to visit and often backs out his car so I can park in the garage to not overheat my car's interior. He listens to Rush Limbaugh every day and always has a political opinion to share with me. "Look at all that snow. How's that for global warming?" or "Michelle Obama took all the fat out of my gravy." These are entertaining to me and sometimes spark a thoughtful discussion. Sometimes I just listen. In his working days, he climbed electrical poles for TXU. He still wears his uniform daily, unless it's a special occasion. He broke his hip in the 1980s and walks with an elevated shoe and a cane or walker. His house is covered with pictures and he tells me often how satisfied with his life he is. I love to hear his old stories and actively try to record them. Whenever he would repeat a story, I used to stop him to let him know that I remember it and appreciate his stories, but I've stopped that. Now I just listen to them again and enjoy that he is telling them to me and that I don't have to remember them myself yet.

Happy Birthday, Paul!

Two years and one day ago I was huge pregnant and at the doctor's office. He heard a "hiccup" in my baby's heartbeat so he put me in a hospital room to be monitored for a couple of hours. Then he went home.
Although he claimed he didn't forget me, Adam and I are pretty sure he did. When he came to work the next day he said, "Okay, I guess we'll get this baby out since you're here!" I was excited and Adam was disappointed. He really wanted Paul to be born on his own birthday, June 20.
Today, June 17, is Paul's second birthday. Our lives have changed drastically since he was born.
I quit work; no more teaching, at least for now. I used my time nursing him to also hold Claire in my lap and read her books.
When he was little, I strapped him in the Baby Bjorn and put Claire on the monkey leash and took them both to the zoo. I started taking both kids to the library when Paul was about two months old and we still go every Wednesday at 10:30.
You can also find all three of us at the Museum of Science and History or Candleridge Park. It's hard to find us standing still, unless it's nap time.
Paul is just as sweet and compassionate as his sister, but he is also a completely different child. His favorite toys are balls. Every day he carries a different one around as a security blanket and a toy. "Ball! Foooootball! Pooooooooool ball!" he shouts.
The boy is also a shoe-lover. You will rarely see him barefoot. He even wears shoes to bed. I used to put him to bed barefoot, but then he fell a couple of times trying to reach a pair late at night, so now I make sure he has a pair on when he goes to sleep.
Pair of shoes is a relative term with Paul. Unlike Claire, who always wore hers on the wrong feet, Paul wears his correctly. He just doesn't wear matching shoes. Yesterday he walked to the library in one flip-flop and one tennis shoe. He often wears one galosh and one Croc. On Sunday morning I at least make sure he's wearing the same type of shoe, and it's usually one blue Croc and one orange one.
Paul is a climber. He often scales the changing table to get a new diaper. He also enjoys climbing on Adam and my bed so he can body-slam his father when Adam is asleep. One of his and Claire's favorite hobbies is jumping on the bed to wake Daddy. (Mama is always awake anyway, and I get out of danger's way when this happens.)
He is also immeasurably sweet. He is in love with my grandfather and runs up to him shouting and then laying his head on his lap to get a kiss from "Mi."
When Paul's friend Ella was crying the other day, he started rubbing her back and kissing her cheek. He is compassionate, too.
Happy birthday to my snuggly, wiggly, Paul-E-Wog!

Happy Birthday, Claire!

Claire is four years old today. Four years ago today, I was a college-educated, career-driven wife. Now I'm a stay-at-home mom with no regrets.
Toward the end of my pregnancy with Claire, the doctor only allowed me to work half-days. She was born the day after school let out.
Claire was a fat and happy baby. I remember being so proud of her fat and thanking God that my baby was sturdy because I am a klutz and was terrified I would hurt her. We all called her Baby Claire, but when she turned two, she informed us all that she wasn't a baby anymore. She became a big sister then.
Now she goes by Claire Bear and is the smartest four year old I know. I taught her to write her name on greeting cards. I taught her to count to 30 when I applied temporary tattoos on her. I've been teaching her to read with little readers I printed off the Internet.
When we're driving down the road, Claire enjoys identifying cars and can tell you many makes and models of vehicles as well as who drives them. She'll point one out on the road and say, "There's a Volvo SUV just like Alli drives! or There's a Honda CR-V just like Maya and Ella have!" I often have to teach myself the names of cars so I can keep up with her.
She went to daycare until she was two, and then I quit work to take care of her and Paul. Daycare taught her how to count to 10 and it nearly made me cry because I wanted to be the one to teach her all her exciting first concepts. Now, right after she wakes up every morning, she eats breakfast and I sit next to her while she completes lessons for the day. If she doesn't feel like it I don't make her, but she wants to do it more often than I do. She loves learning and is a sponge.
She likes to tell people that she doesn't go to school but she goes to Sunday School. At church recently she announced that she was 3 11/12 years old.
She makes me laugh, she makes me think, and she makes me proud. Happy fourth birthday, Claire Bear!