I've been collecting cute and entertaining stories to blog about, but it turns out keeping them tucked away in my brain is about as safe a place as the backseat of any vehicle I've ever owned (i.e. many a thing have entered that danger zone never to be seen again).  So, needless to say, I pretty much don't remember anything I was going to blog about for the past five-ish days.  But I do have one story that survived the craziness in my brain, and I'm throwing in a few pictures for good measure.

sToRy:

I spent a fabulously relaxing (well, minus a super stubborn migraine) weekend with some wonderful women at a cabin in Wisconsin to celebrate the upcoming wedding of a good friend (shout out to Becky!).  Of course I missed my family, but I also definitely thoroughly enjoyed only having myself to take care of for 48 hours.  Anyway, when I approached Brian about going in the beginning stages of planning the event, he immediately was 100% wonderful and genuinely expressed that he didn't mind parenting solo for the weekend.  So I got home on Sunday evening and the house was in a good state, the kids were happy, and all appeared to have gone super smoothly.  Which it did.  And then we were eating dinner two nights ago, and Ivy blurted out, "Dad!  Can we pull your finger again and see what happens?!"  And both kids burst out laughing while Brian looked at me half sheepishly, half proud (why again are men so proud of their gas?).  Apparently Brian has a few tricks of his own up his sleeve for entertaining when I'm away.  :)

pIcTuReS:

Milo the Smilo (creative, huh?...we came up with that all on our own):

My family room, mid project to go through all of the kids' clothes.  Except that it took me twice as long as anticipated.  And this is what it looked like on Day 1 when it was time to go pick Max up from school (i.e. when I thought I'd be completely done; so our house looked like this for about 12 more hours before I completed the task):

My Mini Me.  And I can't figure out how to rotate pics in blogger, so turn your head sideways for the full effect:  :)

my family (shockingly) likes to read!

 Brian reading to the lil' two...

Ivy reading to Milo...

Max brought this home from school yesterday and I *for real* almost cried (out of happiness)...

And this one I threw in for fun.  Max brought this home from school last week.  He's VERY into Mario Bros stuff lately (which is a total understatement in itself), and he told me this said Luigi (which he pronounces "Wuh-lee-gee"), and he was going to spell Mario, but messed up and changed it to "Me".  

So, there I was, cleaning my floors, mid-way through checking off one of the five items on my to-do list for the day.  Milo, God bless him, was in the middle of a marathon nap, and Ivy was right there with me asking to help clean (yes, I'm cherishing that, because I know it's probably going to be short-lived).  I was feeling so on top of it.  So organized.  So "I-am-Super-Woman-Hear-Me-Roar".

And then the phone rang.  It was the dentist office.  We were supposed to be there.  Fifteen minutes ago.  For the appointment that I had already rescheduled once, with less than 24 hours notice, due to a conflict.

The receptionist was super nice.  (And, to be fair, she probably wasn't shocked since I've been going to this office for a few years now, and she's probably picked up on my uber obvious lack of organizational skills.)  But I still felt rude, and sheepish.  And it totally burst my bubble.

I've moved on though.  I'm determined to not only remember Ivy's dentist appointment next week, but to arrive early (or at least on time...).  *And*, I totally have completed 2 of my to-do list tasks for the day.  (**And** one of them was 'make scotcharoos'....for my girls' weekend/Bekcy's bachelorette party for this weekend that promises to be fun, relaxing, and a break from my beautiful but exhausting children.)

And, while I'm typing this, I'm watching Ivy play with grapes in ways that I've never seen (putting one between  her chin and chest without smashing it, "accidentally" dropping it on the (clean!!) floor seven million times, etc.), and while it sounds uninteresting, it's totally adorable.  And I can hear Milo cooing contently in his room, which is so much nicer to listen to than his typical screaming fits immediately following waking up.  So, I'm going to go feed my baby.  And give Ivy the pudding she was promised if she ate two grapes (I know...parenting at it's finest).

big day

It was shaping up to be a kind of rough morning, until this arrived...

I didn't even care that it took me over a half an hour to make a mocha (because I couldn't get the grind right on my old espresso machine and Milo woke up multiple times from his nap and Ivy went to the bathroom on the floor...).  I'm not sure that an iced white mocha has ever tasted so good.  Ever.

And, because I clearly have jacked up priorities, I also definitely need to mention that Max started Kindergarten today!!  Because he went to summer school, it didn't feel quite as momentous as I think it could have, but still, everyone was pretty excited about it.  He was adamant that I drop him off and not walk him inside.  I'm not going to lie, I've had multiple brief visions of me picking him up from school (p.s. I need to figure out what time school is over) and the teacher saying, "Max??  He never made it to the classroom today."  But the rational part of me, albeit small, knows that he found his way just fine.

Ivy, Milo, and I have a lunch date with Brian.  (Ivy actually requested Buffalo Wild Wings, which is an equal amount of adorable and mind-boggling.)  And now that my espresso machine is here and taking up 1/4 of my already ridiculously small (and horrifyingly ugly) counter top, I need to at some point today de-clutter the kitchen.  And maybe do some laundry.  I'll just have to see where the day takes my *two* little people and me.

Look out Richard Simmons.

I got up at 5:00 this morning to go running (I joined a running class at the Campus, and fyi, after the first day, I *love* it!), and I was home by 7:00 am.  At first, that was the only planned outing of the day.  But about ten minutes after Brian left, I decided it would be best for everyone if we scheduled something else to at least get us out of the house for a little bit.  Target was the clear choice.

It actually didn't go as horribly as it could have.  In fact, I'd say on a scale of one to ten (one being "I think we were just actually banned for a lifetime from all Targets" and ten being "that was more relaxing than a glass of Moscato"), I'd give it a nice, ol' 7.  Milo screamed off and on during the first part of it (it's his new "thing") until he pretty much cried himself into a deep slumber, and even though the Altoona Target only has three aisles of schools supplies, I think we went up and down each one twenty-six times and still someone managed to not get four things on our list.  BUT, we all survived.  And I had dangled the carrot of slushees for anyone with good behavior, and Max and Ivy not only acheived the award, but the super nice lady at the counter gave them both swirly straws (which she probably gives to everyone, but I like to think that she gave them to my kids because they're so darn cute).

Of note from the Target trip:

*This is what Ivy's hair looked like during the entire thing.  (She tackled the chore of "doing" her hair herself this morning, and I pick and choose my battles with her, so I decided to just go with this one.)  Also, it's very "Sweatin' to the Oldies" and we all know how much I love me some 80's.

           

*A hilarious snippet of conversation between Max and me:
Max: "Can I get a toy the next time we come to Target??"
Me: "I don't know Max.  Possibly."
Max: "What does possibly mean?"
Me: "Um, I guess it's just a fancy way of saying 'maybe'."
Max: "Ohh...so, it's like French."

*After trying (or attempting to try) on the majority of the shoes in the girls' shoe section on Ivy, I've come to the conclusion that she has ginormously wide feet.  We finally found a pair that would fit over them, but the poor thing had to settle for her fifth choice.

Oh, and before I forget to post the pictures, Max has been working on writing books again.  For all the obvious reasons, I love-love-love this!  He has a ways to go on plot development, but for a five year old, I think it's pretty impressive all around.

Day ? (I've lost count already)

The before-mentioned-honeymoon period might be over.  I think the first moment where I really wanted to quit ("quit" = go back to work...anywhere) was shortly after getting back from working out at the Campus this morning.  I had shamelessly called my mom on the way home from the gym to ask if she would sit in my car while I went inside Hy-Vee to get a mocha from Caribou (which is terrible because I really, really, really need to learn to take three children places on my own, which, fyi, I *do* do, but the thought of doing it for a three minute trip for a Campfire Mocha seemed too exhausting).  So, I had my iced mocha, I'd had my workout, and life should have been good, right?  But really I was sweaty, smelly, and showerless for the day, and Max and Ivy were bickering (which they do from sun-up to sun-down) and Milo was screaming at the top of his lungs.  And I thought to myself, "So this is my life now."

But, never fear!  I snapped out of my lil' pity party fairly quickly.  Because eventually Milo stopped crying (after I held him, walked with him, changed his diaper, held him some more, and finally got him to sleep), and the older two kids didn't kill each other, or even draw blood, which is all I can really hope for at this point.

Shoot...I had lots of other positive, reflective thoughts for this blog, but apparently Milo could sense my fingers typing about him crying, and not wanting to disappoint his fans, he is crying again.  In hopes of keeping Ivy asleep for a decent nap, I need to go get him.  More soon about all those optimistic, good trains of thought that I've had.  I pinky swear!

Day 3

This was what I woke up to this morning.  I feel as if these are the moments that will make everything okay.  (As opposed to now, when I'm trying to type this blog, and the peaceful looking baby pictured above is sitting next to me in his Bumbo chair, wailing at the top of his lungs for, as far as I can tell, no particular reason.)

Things are going well for everyone involved in my recent stay-at-home decision.  Spirits remain high, there are plenty of laughter, smiles, and kisses, and I've managed to at least make coffee every morning in my sad, little home coffee pot.  I'm not even remotely implying that things are perfect though.  I think it's just too new, and there's still a little bit of a honeymoon period that I'm definitely trying to embrace.

So far, here are a list of things that I've realized about staying at home with small children:

*there are a lot (actually, too many) encounters with poop.
*the gym becomes a place that, even if you already enjoyed it on some level, you now look forward to with eager anticipation.
*finding time to shower is extremely difficult.
*a drive-thru coffee shop that serves a good drink is something you might actually murder for (well, or maybe just drive an extra 15 miles....I don't know because I haven't found one yet).

Right now the bar is set at "is this (*insert given scenario*) worse than dealing with Coupon Lady (my arch enemy)?"  So far, nothing has remotely compared to that, so I continue to be 100% confident in my decision to close the biz and stay home with my children.

Day One

I've tried numerous blogs over the years.  We'll see if I can stick with this one.  Mostly right now I just want something that will help me to:

a) document the adorable things that my children say and do (because we all know there aren't enough of "those" blogs out there already...).  ;)

b) help me work through my emotional/physical/psychological/anything-else-ical drama associated with my new decision to close the coffee shop and stay at home with my above-mentioned adorable children.

c) fill time that I should be spending cleaning and organizing my house with something more appealing.

Disclaimer: I can only imagine that these posts will range from light-hearted to overly personal to rambling to entertaining over the course of time.  And that's assuming that I maintain the blog thing.  I just felt the need to address my lack of focus and direction with this new project.

In honor of my first official new blog post and my first official day as a stay-at-home mom, I'm sharing a picture of what I encountered within the first 10 minutes of my morning today.  The scene and the emotions that accompanied it above and beyond cancelled out everything associated with: the lack of a good iced mocha, the blow out diaper that Milo had two minutes before we had to leave to take Max to school when we were already running late, the discomfort of being "the new girl" at the gym in a body that I still maintain isn't mine (even though it's a good three months too late to be using the post baby card), and the frustration with myself for not getting a moment of cleaning accomplished by 3:22 pm.  Because despite all the circumstances that led up to this day, I know that it's all worth it.  Waking up to three smiling and giggling faces is something that I wouldn't trade for the world.  Or a really good iced white mocha.