Marriage

I've mentioned before about my prayers for my future children-in-law.

Tonight I prayed for safety for Caitlin's future husband since I'd prayed for Caitlin to be safer tomorrow. She fell and busted up her chin pretty bad this evening.

She didn't say anything until I'd almost reached the door.

"Matthew"

"What?"

"It's Matthew, Mom. You can say his name. You don't have to say future husband."

Sleeping Late

This morning when Jon woke me up (he leaves really early so he can ride his bicycle to work) I asked him to call me when he got to work. I was extremely tired and knew I'd fall back asleep. Quite a bit later I wake up and glance at the clock - 7:38. We leave the house at 7:40 every morning to get Dominic to school in time.

I ran into the living room to find out that Dominic had just woken up himself. We both panicked and ran around trying to throw on clothes and get stuff together. 

Thankfully we make lunches, pick out clothes, and get the back pack ready the night before. So Dominic and I got dressed and I handed Dominic an apple/oatmeal trail mix to eat in the car on the way there. We made it with time to spare. But my heart had a bit of exercise.

When we got back home, Caitlin asked if she could have the same trail mix. I got one out of the cabinet and handed it to her. I knew I'd handed her the smores one when she started getting really excited about the chocolate. Oh well!

Dominic gets back into the car after school and grabs the leftovers out of the cup holder to finish. Caitlin, in a very excited voice, asks him -

"Is that the ones with the enema in them and the tiny dried marshmallows?"

Dominic was clueless and I about died laughing.

We finally got her to pronounce M&Ms properly.

I LOVE hearing Dominic's version of school every day on the ride home. Today I told the kids we needed to pray for Ms. Beth-Anne because she might be getting a cold. 

Dominic - "No. She's fine. She would have told me if she was getting sick."

Me - "Uhm. I'm pretty sure she's not feeling 100% so we can still pray for her."

Dominic - "No. She tells me EVERYTHING about her, well almost everything. So I would know this stuff."

We still prayed for her!

Heart strings

My sister sent me this picture today. From the very first glance I knew it was a keeper.

I was up visiting Kami and the kids were being a bit wild in the store. We warned them of impending doom if they kept it up, but it continued. So we picked them up and deposited them in the cart.

And promptly started laughing. All three of them are impossibly big to be in the cart - but all together, it was hilarious.

My camera died before getting anything decent, so Kami rescued me and took this picture.

The second I saw it two words to describe my children came to mind - Cuddly and Crazy!*

Let me tell you about how crazy can wrap its little arms around you and melt you into an impossible puddle.

Crazy can heal your grieving heart and love you back to laughter.

Crazy makes me crazy, but happy.

I love this child!

Full of confidence and courage.

Talkative and inquisitive.

Full of energy and grossness.

Goofy and wild.

The most amazing hugs.

He melts my heart and I love my little boy!

We have a saying in our family about making someone else feel good about themselves.

We are "making their heart happy."

Dominic makes my heart happy every single day!

*I love my daughter more than life itself. But somehow this picture just stirred my heart and made me think again about how much I love my son. I'm sure some mushy post will come along about her soon enough. =)

Just saying. . .

Dominic was trying to describe a new student to me. He wasn't being descriptive enough and so I was trying to help.

"Is it the girl ahead of us in drop off today."

"No mom! That girl is a big huge teenager or something. I'm talking about a normal kid like me."

This "huge" teenager looked all of 10 or 12 and wasn't even a foot taller than Dominic.

What must he think of me?!

********

Every night Jon or I go into the kids bedrooms and tuck them in. We say a little prayer and then it's lights out. I've been praying for their future spouses. I'll often make it relevant to what they are experiencing. So tonight I prayed that Dominic's future wife was having a great school year.

Dominic's response - "What if she isn't in school yet?"

"Do you mean if she might be starting later in the month?"

"No. What if I marry a much younger woman?"

He was dead serious.

Heaven help me! This child is going to be the death of me!

********

Caitlin is so sweet and cuddly at this age. Well actually she's always been a cuddle bug. So when we are cuddling I'll tell her that I like her so much that I've decided to keep her forever.

Usually she'll giggle and say ok.

Not this last time.

"Well you are going to have to share me with Ms. Julie."

"What?!"

"Well I really like her and I want you and Daddy to share me with her. Okay?"

There are two people that Caitlin thinks hung the moon.

Ms. Julie and Ms. Beth-Anne.

Notice it isn't Jon or I?

But since I like them too, I'll share my cuddle bug with them.

********

Dominic's teacher told me a story about him. In case you haven't noticed, he has a very high self-esteem. Just ask him - he's awesome!

So today the teacher pulled each student up to the front and had the other students say nice things about them. She wrote those things on the board and then took a picture of the student with their board.

She showed me Dominic's picture. On the board were some nice and cute things. And then there was this - "He's as awesome as he thinks he is."

I died laughing. I expected it was one of the older students. But no, it was a new student. 

His reputation has spread fast. Today was only the third day of school.

Homework

We have a set routine that after the past two years is pretty set in stone.

1. Arrive home from school and empty back pack. Take care of the things in the back pack.

2. Do any homework.

3. Practice piano.

4. Do chores (including getting ready for school tomorrow).

5. Go play.

I've mentioned quite often that I'm not cut out to homeschool. Today reiterated this very well.

Dominic gave me his red folder (full of info for parents, take home papers, and homework).

I pulled out a sheet of homework. It was only a couple of questions that I knew he could answer. So I didn't even bother to offer my assistance.

He began whining. 

"I can't do this. It's impossible."

Seriously?!

When I asked him what the problem was, he explained that his failure to even start was due to his lack of a pencil.

"Please don't tell me you say this to your teachers?"

"Uhm, no. I just answer the questions."

Sigh!

And THIS is why I don't homeschool. I am perfectly willing to pay educated and qualified teachers to wrestle teach my sweet little boy. =)

Caitlin and school

Caitlin wanted to start school so badly this year. But her birthday isn't until December so she wouldn't be old enough. She begged me to have the teachers start a pre-k. She asked if she could pretend to be 7 yrs old, like Dominic. She asked if she could do K twice, instead of once.

I felt sorry for her, but rules are rules. And she's not really ready yet. I still would have held her back another year regardless of the rules. So I told her we'd do homeschool. I bought one of those little workbooks and had her pick out some supplies. She picked out her 1st day of school outfit.

But being at home with mom also means lots of fun times. It just means those times are alone.

Because I don't work well as a princess (or so I was told by a tiny princess).

And the water was just too cold for me to join her. I was perfectly content to sit and watch.

 

We will have a fun school year just the two of us. 

And I will savor every moment. Because next year there will be no holding this girl back.

She's more than willing to abandon me. =)

2nd Grade

Little man was super excited this morning. 

School started today.

He's so precious. And I couldn't let him go if I didn't have such faith in our amazing teachers. 

This is one blessed kid! All three of his teachers are outstanding.

 This face just melts me.

 I forgot my good camera so pardon the rest of the blurry pictures.

Waiting impatiently for me to finish taking pictures.

 Dominic asked Jon if he would stay and go to school with him on the first day.

 Sitting at his desk with newly sharpened pencils.

We are looking forward to hearing all about his day when he gets home.

Rain!

Yesterday was one of those days that failed on several accounts.

We were supposed to go swimming, followed by the fair in the evening.

But it poured for most of the day. This didn't stop the kids from enjoying it though!

 Dancing in the rain!

 

 Apparently it is also fun to ride in the rain.

 

We took them to Mae Pearl's for yogurt to compensate for missing the fair.

It's a date!

Dominic has been begging to go on a date with me. Jon and I take the kids on dates frequently during the school year. But somehow we fail during the summer. So I promised Dominic that we would have a really long date when Caitlin started back in gymnastics. So yesterday we dropped her off and headed out on our date. It had some picture taking for me and some skateboard shopping for Dominic. Then we headed to Cream City for ice cream.

Little man is so focused when he is eating sugar. =)

We had a great time on our date and hope we can get back into the routine of scheduling them more often. I have a precious son and really enjoy spending time with him.

Birthday Fun!

Yesterday was Dominic's 7th birthday. He woke up incredibly excited. You would have thought we'd promised him the world the way he bounced and smiled the entire day. During the children's story at church he heard the word thankful and raised his hand. Poor boy wasn't paying a bit of attention to the question. He was just so thankful that it was his birthday that he had to tell someone. So his answer to a question about dogs was that he was "thankful that today is my 7th birthday". The entire church had a great laugh. Then about half way through the sermon it dawned on him that he was going to receive a present when he got home. The rest of the morning was lost. He could barely sit still and couldn't stop asking me questions about it. He tried so hard, but his enthusiasm just spilled out everywhere.

He was under the impression that he should choose the meal and dessert, even though he was having a party the next day. So we had macaroni & cheese with green beans. 

And we had manna* for dessert.

Playing outside with the neighbor kids.

He chose IHOP as his restaurant of choice for supper.

He ordered a stack of chocolate pancakes and attacked it. He rolled up those pancakes and ate them plain like a piece of bread. When finished he started in on my eggs. Guess he's growing again.

(Can you see the food in his hair? I love this boy!)

Caitlin was happy about his choice of restaurant too.

Today was his party. 

It was incredibly low key and stress free (well, almost).

We filled up the pools, put down the slip-n-slide, and turned on the sprinklers. We also had water guns and water balloons. The kids played for hours, while the adults just sat and talked. 

It was nice to take a break and relax with friends.

"diving" into the pool

 Some sort of water balloon game they made up

 Getting ready to cut the cake

 The wind kept blowing out the candles. So one of the kids held up his towel so Jon could get them lit. Then we sang really fast while Dominic blew them out.

 Opening presents. His friends know him well. Every single present sent him into orbit. He was having a really hard time trying to decide what to play with first.

He has thanked Jon and I multiple times for giving him such a great party.

Just goes to show that it isn't the looks and money that go into a party, it's the fun that they really care about. And these kids had tons of fun. When we put them to bed they fell asleep almost immediately.

*the name our family has given a heavenly dessert.

Happy 7th Birthday Dominic!

I can't believe I'm writing this. It seems like just a little bit ago that Jon and I were driving home with a tiny little bundle in the back seat, wondering what we'd gotten ourselves into.

Perhaps it's a good thing we had no idea. =)

Dominic has brought tons of fun to our family and we are so thankful for our smart, enthusiastic, crazy wild boy. He's incredibly hungry for knowledge, protective of his baby sister, affectionate (on his terms), full of life and ideas, talkative, and loyal.

Last week we had some time to kill and decided to head down to the depot to take some pictures and climb around on the train.

We had a lot of fun and took tons of pictures.

 

 Caitlin was feeling a bit left out.

SO thankful for the blessing I received 7 years ago when this baby boy was born.