Around Here: Week 32 2021

{August 1-7th}

Running... Logan to the hospital Sunday morning (which felt weird) for his scheduled MRI.  He has been having migraines that make him vomit and we want to make sure there's not a physical cause.  He has chiari malformation (where some of your brain stem extends down into your neck) and sometimes that can cause headaches.  Luckily his is mild, so it's not likely that. I tend to think it's hormonal migraines like my mom and me.  My little brother also had severe migraines in middle school and they would make him nauseous as well.  After he threw up he always felt better.  So we're assuming they are migraines, but with his unique history, I want to cover all my bases.  

Hitting... Burger King with the fam on our way to Wenatchee to shop at Costco and see my sister's new baby.  It was nice to go out just the six of us. 

Going... to Costco with Josh and the kids.  We had a good time, and I enjoyed (as I always do) walking behind Josh and our boys.  The looks people give them always crack me up.  They all look just like him.  It's breathtaking. 

Buying... the flowers at Costco because I always buy the flowers.  They make me so happy and they're so cheap there.  

Meeting... my sister's new baby.  BabyBrother is the sweetest, squishiest, cutest little babe I've ever seen.  He reminds me so much of baby Wyatt. I still can't believe she basically  has twins.  She's a saint. 

Sending... Josh back to work in his classroom Monday.  He took the twins with him and I laid low.  I wasn't feeling well.  I woke up from a nap in the afternoon though and we got to swim as a family since the smoke had cleared some.  We had a great time in the pool. 

Hosting... Grandma's Camp here at our house for Carol since the smoke has been too bad for Wyatt to hold it out at her land.  The cousins all seemed to have a great time, although I was gone for a sleep doctor appointment one day and the next day I had my writing class.  

Discovering... a water leak in our attic thanks to our (super tall) nephew.  He walked in from the backyard and saw a water bubble under the paint in our dining room ceiling.  We dug in a little and discovered that our furnace (which is in the attic) leaked down, through the wall between Carly's room and the hallway upstairs and ended up coming out just above the dining room downstairs.  What a nightmare.  We had to file an insurance claim and ServPro came to start the drying out process. 
$300 later we also had an AC guy out to take a look and he cleared the back-up that was causing the leak and told Josh what he would recommend going forward. Insurance will cover the water damage, but none of the work the AC unit/furnace needs.  That's all on us. 

Grateful... every week for my Mine To Tell membership.  On Tuesdays we get together to write and oh how I look forward to that time each week!  If you're interested, check out @thisisminetotell 
We'd love to have you!

Anxious... about Logan (and his migraines); the other kids and what back-to-school will look like; the smoke (so many wildfires that have Wyatt stuck in our house); and what my future as a stay-at-home mom will look like.  I do not feel ready to enter the workforce. I think our kids still need me home and I am in my happy place here.  But with Carly heading off to school, my days will surely look different than they have in the past. 

Contemplating... my value as a stay-at-home parent.  With the kids all off to school in a few weeks, I have wondered, "What do I even do here?"
Then they'll have a sick night, or a needy day and I remember that I'm right where I belong.  I am the glue that holds this family together, and that's important. It's amazing how quickly I can forget my worth as their mother and Josh's wife.  

Blogging... a lot this week, attempting to get caught up on the blog before the summer comes to a close.  I blogged about how the first month of summer was exactly what I needed after a year and a half of distance learning, and about Week 22 & Week 23.  

Learning... more about my church trauma (particularly from being raised in the Purity culture) and I have decided the message that I (and my many friends) needed to hear was "Your body is yours." So that is the message I will be sharing with my kids.  You get to say yes or no.  You have the right to get to know your body and do not need to be scared of it.  Your body is yours.  No one else's. 

Enjoying... summer time which means lots of podcasts and naps.  My favorite right now We Can Do Hard Things with Glennon Doyle & her sister Amanda.  It's so on point for current events, women's issues and motherhood. So, so good. 

Painting... Carly's fingernails black (at her insistence) and loving them. How cute is she?!? She's just so fun!

Playing... Play Doh with all the kids.  Screens have been the main activity as of late (especially with the smoke!) and I wanted to change things up.  So we played this little kid classic.  Wyatt made a pizza (so cute!) and Carly made donuts. 

Spending... time with Josh's sister and brother-in-law and their kids.  They came to swim and had a great time.  The little girls played "chicken" on their big siblings' shoulders and it was so gosh darn cute. 

Sharing... our garage cubbies with a friend who needs a similar solution. Josh and his brother Samuel built those for me, and they make keeping school backpacks, coats and shoes organized so much easier!!

Loving... this quote about time from Kelle at Enjoying The Small Things:
"The current is never going to stop flowing.  
You can cling to a rock to avoid it, but it's not going to stop moving. 
You'll die fighting the current. 
Your best chance of surviving is to let go and ride the current...
Swim with it, feel the water, let yourself have fun."
Gah. Love it. So hard, but so good. 

Putting... Carly in Wyatt's room for bedtime because her room was so pulled apart from the furnace leak and so loud from the ServPro fans that I knew she would sleep better in his (clean, quiet) room.  

Arranging... flowers from my yard in vases all over my house.  It's ridiculous how much joy flowers bring me, and when they are from our own yard it's even more joyful!

***

Inspired by this poem on Sea Glass:

I want to age like sea glass.

Smoothed by tides,

but not broken.

I want my hard edges to soften.

I want to ride the waves

and go with the flow.

I want to catch a wave

and let it carry me

to where I belong.

I want to be picked up

and held gently by

those who delight in my

well earned patina and 

appreciate the changes I went

through to achieve that beauty.

I want to enjoy the journey

and always remember that if

you give the ocean something

breakable it will turn it into

something beautiful.

I want to age like sea glass.

-Bernadette Noll

***

Around Here: Week 31 2021

 {July 25-31st}

Famous last words:
"I would LOVE to have twins"
hahahahahaha

The card Carly made for Uncle Samuel
I cannot even with the cuteness.

Heading... home from our small group get together early on Sunday and feeling so grateful for audiobooks and good music for the long drive home.  Also grateful for Panera, which is a restaurant I miss so much here at home and was so happy to get before heading out of town in Vancouver. 

Getting... together at Josh's sister Julie and her wife Erica's house to celebrate her baby Isaac graduating from HIGH SCHOOL! He was an infant at our wedding, and he is perpetually 8 years old in my mind.  Hah!  My favorite Isaac story is the day after the twins were born, he was getting his cast off at the hospital so they stopped by to visit and Isaac said, "You should name him (Jack) Jack-in-the-box. It rhymes." His little high pitched voice and big brown eyes were so sincere. It took all we had to not laugh at him.  Goodness he was a cutie! And now he's all grown up with the world at his fingertips. 
We had the best visit with Josh's brother and Julie's other son Ethan. I love our family so much and I am so grateful that they moved here. (In our neighborhood no less!) 

Laughing... at Carly wearing one ear of a pair of headphones and pretending she is a DJ. Her imagination is just wild and I hope it never changes. 

Wishing... that teachers (like many professionals) got more respect than they do. I hear a lot of "Must be nice to have three months off" when I tell people Josh is a teacher, and let me tell you, Yes it is nice.  It is, in fact, awesome.  But he did nearly six years of school for this and his everyday with 20+ students is NOT easy.  And the amount of time he puts in is surely over his contract hours.  I will tell you this, I couldn't do it. At least not with fourth graders.  That's tough!! But he is so patient and picks his battles and has amazing classroom management. 
I think that a lot of times we think work is only "hard" if it's physically demanding, but it can be "hard" if it's mentally or emotionally taxing as well. 
(steps off soap box.)
Carry on.

Finding...  notes about baby names and twins in my journal from 2007.  (Our own twins were born a year later, in 2008.) We knew we wanted to be surprised about the sex, but apparently, I also thought I wanted twins. I wrote at the bottom "I would LOVE to have twins." Hahah! Oh my goodness, the irony.  I loved looking back at what names I liked.  I don't remember liking Carly from so long ago, so that made me happy, and Jack and Sawyer are both on there as well. We changed the name from Landon to Logan when something tragic happened to a baby named Landon who was a friend of a friend.  I loved Logan because of Baby-Sitters club.

Remembering... when I saw the sticker in my old journal that I tried out for Nashville Star.  Gosh that feels like a million years ago.  Full disclosure: I screwed up the lyrics and was told to leave. Ha! Oh well.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Now I just use my singing voice to sing lullabies to Carly at bedtime. 

Organizing... my journals (I have over 100) and getting rid of any that were not full or not necessary.  I only got rid of a handful, but I am happy to have the collection simplified. It was also fun to find all my school ID's from junior high and high school.  Lots of dark lipstick and bangs. Oh my.

Grateful... for the backpacks my mom bought Wyatt & Carly for the new school year.  Wyatt's has a pocket for his chromebook and is a super cute denim material.  Carly's is so her- covered in butterflies- and has a matching lunch box which she loves. 

Trying... an experiment my sister told us about.  We put blue painters tape in the shape of a square on the floor and waited to see if Molly would go in it like it was a box.  She didn't and we were bummed.  

Giving... everyone haircuts on Tuesday.  The guys all look so fresh now!

Decorating... the hallway with encouragement (and all the help) from Josh.  I was overwhelmed to start the project (that I have now put off almost two years!) but he reminded me how happy I would be with the finished outcome and so I begrudgingly started sorting through frames and describing my vision for Josh.  He executed it perfectly, and I cannot believe how happy it makes me, and how it warms up the upstairs.  My favorite part is the kids' school pictures.  Eventually we will have all four kids photos from kinder through senior year, and it's going to be so fun to look and compare them. 

Enjoying... the movies with my guys while my friend's daughter Selah watched Carly.  I had a garage sale a few weeks ago and wanted to use the money I made to take the five of us to see Fast & Furious (F9) at the theater.  We went and there were only two other families there, and we got delicious snacks (hello popcorn and candy and slushees) and had the best time.  The Fast & Furious movies at this point are kind of cheesy, but I love the message about family (my kids all go around saying, "It's about family" like Vin Diesel and it makes me laugh and feel warm hearted at the same time) and the boys are super into cars, so it was great for them. 
And the bonus was that Carly had a great time playing with Selah, and Selah did great for her first time babysitting alone. I was so proud!

Laying... low when the kids got sick toward the end of the week.  Lots of runny noses and coughing and just feeling blah.  We started Wyatt on his neb right away, which was the right thing as we were able to avoid oral steroids, and Carly was up multiple nights coughing uncontrollably until we took her in our bathroom and ran the shower at full blast.  Between that, the honey, the humidifier in her room and the saline nose spray, we got through it without having to take her in. But when her coughing got really bad it was hard for me to stay in the moment because coughing is so traumatizing to me after all that Wyatt has been through. I had to remind myself that her coughing doesn't mean her throat is closing or her asthma is acting up. Because that's what Wyatt's coughing means. Thankfully Josh is very clear headed in those moments and he took the lead. 

Visiting... with Josh's brother Samuel when he came over Thursday.  He's super fun and Josh and I always enjoy when he stops by.  It was his birthday this week, so we celebrated a few days late with some cake and ice cream which thrilled the kids.  My kids adore Samuel, especially Carly, and they were happy to celebrate him.  As was I. He's a great uncle to the kids, brother to Josh and friend to me. We're all so glad he was born. 

Having... a breakthrough with my health anxiety this week.  One evening I popped a cherry tomato in my mouth after dinner (it was a fresh one from our garden) and I started having an itchy throat. I told Josh maybe I am allergic. I felt worried and started to panic, and I really (really!) wanted to medical google, but I didn't allow myself.  After standing in the kitchen for a minute and checking in with my body, I could tell it wasn't an allergic reaction but an anxiety thing. I told myself that I was fine, that I did NOT need to google anything and that I was just trying to deal with the stress of getting Wyatt on the nebulizer and Carly being up coughing so many nights in a row.  My nerves were fried, and medical anxiety is how I deal with that. I'm not sure why (my counselor says it could be that I am just trying to control what I can) but I know that's how I cope.  I talked to Josh, got myself distracted with a TV show and planned an early bedtime, as sleep is the best thing in my arsenal against anxiety. 
When it was all over, the next day, Josh told me he was so proud of me.  I said, "What for?" And he said, "Last night, you felt weird, then worried.  But in less than three minutes you knew it was anxiety and you shut it down.  That's really amazing.  You've come so far."
And he's right. I have.  When we lived in Alaska, any kind of health concern would send me spiraling for days.  And I truly believed I had: cancer, C Diff or whatever other strange malady I had convinced myself my body was showing symptoms of. Now I recognize the feelings and am better able to stay in the moment and talk myself down. 
It's huge progress. 

Talking... to my counselor on Friday and being reminded that worrying ahead is not helpful.  I am trying to stay in today and not borrow trouble.  She also said when I'm spending time with others, it might be good to turn off my "fix it" brain (with my kids, friends or family) and instead just be there to listen instead of help.  I swear it's like that idea never occurred to me. 
If something is wrong with my family and friends, I just want to FIX IT. NOW. Hah! Sometimes the best thing I can do is be supportive without getting all up in their business and solving their problems. 
She, like Josh, was really proud of my coping skills with my health anxiety.  That felt nice. 

Reading... Golden Girl by Elin Hilderbrand, but the main character is dead, so I am not really buying into it, as she's writing from heaven and it feels a bit mystical for me. We'll see if I finish it. 

Moving... the hutch and the art & crafts cubbies and feeling a lot better about the dining room area now.  It is so much less cluttered and it gives us way more room for Josh's easy chair in the family room.  I also organized the rest of the second pantry (which we use for odds and ends) and I am super pleased with how it turned out. (I'll be sharing a post soon that has our Primary Closet makeover, as well as our downstairs closet redo, the pantry before and afters and the laundry room before and afters. So fun!)

Hosting... Josh's cousin Nathan, his wife Dunnette and their cutie patootie sons Caleb and Gabriel for dinner.  Gosh it was fun to visit and let the kids play (Carly and Gabe especially had a good time, and were so CUTE together!) and catch up.  I'm grateful that we live closer now!

Wanting... to share here that Josh and I are both vaccinated (I got Pfizer and he got Moderna) and the twins are also vaccinated (they got Pfizer) and I want you know that if you have any questions about our vaccines and how we felt afterward, or anything at all, I am here.  I really do believe in the vaccine and am hoping more people get vaccinated so we can go back to school (and stay in school) through the fall. So if you're having doubts or questions about yourself or your kiddos, I would love to share our experience with you. Take care of yourselves! xoxo

***