Days like these

Sometimes I feel like I'm going crazy. Deisha, for obvious reasons, keeps me extremely busy when she's awake. It's not that I can't put her on the floor in another room while I work in the kitchen or clean the bathroom. The thing is, when she's awake, I have am constantly aware that at any moment I could be pulled away from what I'm doing and have to tend to her needs, whatever they may be, immediately. It makes getting anything done difficult. So why is it that when she's asleep, I'll start a project, and then maybe another in the middle of that one, and then start a list, and then come in here and sit down in front of this blasted screen and just veg until she wakes up and is needy again? Then I'm frustrated because I can't get anything done. Even though I just blew an hour in cruising who knows what right here. I just don't know. Maybe it's a self-control issue. Maybe I really am just losing it and looking for something to blame. Mostly I think it's a matter of unravelling my tightly coiled mind. Having a baby is all-inclusive. There's no getting around the constant demand. Now add five more children that have their own set of needs and WHAM-O I'm empty by six o'clock, only at six o'clock I still have a list of things that have to get done before morning, what is what I am thinking about when I'm sitting in front of this blasted screen. I could get up and have it all done so that at six o'clock I could be done for the day and just hang with my crew. However, that's just not the way I roll, not yet anyway. Someday that will change and I'll master the disease of procrastination. For now, here I sit until the baby cries...

Thought you might enjoy this.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

This is what ours looks like. Jasmine decorated everyone's glass with a candy cane... so cute. Kennedy baked a cake and peeled potatoes for me. I love having helpers! This year's prep was so much better than last year's. Gotta love national holidays!
Little man is way too cute for his own good!

Gobble, gobble, gobble. I forgot this Nana tradition and Kennedy said, "MOM! Apple turkeys! We forgot to make apple turkeys!" This was last night at Wal-Mart after we'd already been to the grocery store and all of it's chaotic bliss. So I said, "Alright, let's get the marshmellows and we'll use the apples I bought for the apple crisp." Which they used and then almost immediately removed the candy and marshmellows from after these shots were taken.

I mean, it's a tradition. We take them very seriously, which I am SO thankful for this year because our little traditions kept us busy while we were so far from home.

I love that there's noise. I keep flashing back to what must be happening at my mom's house right now where all of my other siblings and their families are, eating turkey and chasing kids up and down the stairs, and passing babies from arms to arms, and napping in front of a football game. My house is busy with excitement. And even though it's not snowing, it's cold today, which feels right.

AAAH!!! She makes me want to have six more. I mean looking at this picture does. Not real life. Not when she's screaming because I took something out of her hand or because she's bored or because she likes the sound of her screech. That doesn't. But this picture does!!!

Maybe once a month

See, what had happened was... I found Facebook, see.

And when I'm uploading pictures like this, I can chat with my friends, all my thousands of wonderful friends online, you know?

Instead of just staring at that doggone bar and hoping it will go faster now since everyone else is at work, right?

So for more photos, you can find me on facebook.

And by the way, this is what California does to people like me.

And all that jazz...

Let's just be real honest here, I don't have time to keep this thing up. I mean, I think about it every day; I think about how I'd love to share all my new recipes with you, the perfect bread recipes, how to get the graham crackers to stay crunchy, the homemade laundry soap that is saving me fat cash each month, not to mention the brilliant and hysterical antics of my crew. I could write for hours every day. More than that, and what I really would like to do, is sit down here and spill my guts about how unsteady I feel about our country's future, and how I've never felt more unsure of my children's well-being as US citizens. I'd love to share my heart about how the mercy of God sustains me far beyond what I am capable of doing on my own. I want you to know about how I get up every morning at the crack of dawn and work from sun-up until sun-down without stopping and without ever accomplishing everything I set out to do. It's a real mystery. I want to tell you about Deisha's cough and the wild goose hunt we've been on trying to clear it all up. Today I was thinking about the DJ on the radio and how when she introduced her show it was focused, her tag was "from ballet to Broadway" and how I think if I had a more narrow tag to this, I'd be a lot more prepared to write everyday, barring the time deficit. But also how if I did narrow my focus, I'd need to start another blog so that I could include all the things that I'd be missing out on by focusing. Fortunately for me I know you're a die-hard. I know you'll keep checking just to see if I showed up and it will surprise you to pieces to know that I'm still hanging on. So for you, my loyal reader, here's what's going on in the sweet countryside of the central west coast. Seriously, I am so in love with this guy, I can't even fully express it. How hysterical is this: he was taking a picture of himself in front of the Hollywood sign and his head blocked the whole thing! I am cracking up every time I look at this picture! And what a great picture of that handsome lug!!

This is the new trend in the Sutton house, and it's not just the boys; everyone gets in on the MMA, no gender preference. Everyone that is except for me. I find it necessary to draw very clear lines for my sons in their physical play toward me. Momma don't play 'dat way. Everyone else does: all the siblings, including Leila, the neighborhood kids, random children on the playground at soccer practice. It's a common thread; boys love to fight. They make it look so fun that the girls can't stand to not have a turn. So far no one has come out bloody or broken so I allow it and secretly enjoy it. If you haven't talked to me, I've become a pretty avid UFC fanatic. Watching my sons get their aggression out in this manor thrills me to no end because it curbs real fights in the neighborhood which had become more common than I like to admit.
Our little sweetness sits in this marvelous invention, the Jenny Jump-Up, suspended in the middle of the door frame in the office during school hours and in the kitchen most other hours of the day because it turns out, I spend a good majority of my time in the kitchen. She is content as long as she is in motion so I give her a little push every time I am close to her, which she loves. I have to watch Leila though, because she starts out really sweetly swinging her straight, but if I turn my back for more than a minute, she gives her a yank and sends her spinning. I'm sure in Leila's mind it looks really fun, but I have to chase her away every time. No matter how hard she tries to do it right, she just can't help herself. I can't say I blame her. She's only three... look at the little darlin'. This is her first outfit of the morning every morning. I don't think it's going to make it to Halloween considering how often I have to wash it. On the flip side, she usually only wears it for the first thirty minutes and then hurries off for her next wardrobe change. About the fourth or fifth change of the day she is back in it for another twenty minutes to an hour. It may be her most consistent outfit next to her jammies. The kid loves pajamas. After every bath, no matter what time of day it is, she wants her jammies. I have to give her a landmark in the schedule for when she can put them on. It used to be exasperating, but I am learning to enjoy the quirks of these years.
She held this pose for three of four minutes before I realized she wanted me to take her picture. Everyone else had such an enthusiastic audience in the octagon, well, the hotel room, that she had to find a way to turn the attention her way. I'm usually game.
Yipes! They're huge!!! This is sweet cousin Alexa.
She is the spittin' image of Sarah at this age. It freaks me out every time I see her. Jasmine and Alexa were fast friends, toting around their Webkins and whatever else they could find to nurture. We met up with my brother and his bunch in Anaheim a few weeks ago and I have ached to be closer to them ever since. Same song, second verse. What can I say? I'm a family kinda' gal.

This is my giant nephew Zane holding Deisha. The way he and Micah played, you'd think they saw each other every day, which thrills me to no end because I was always close to my cousins and would be heartbroken if my kids didn't have that with theirs. This is my brother, Uncle Jon, and our newest sweet cousin Stephanie. The night before we left to see them, Leila came in with a picture for "Jon" that she wanted me to save for him. She also wanted to bring her Cinderella dress because she "wan get married to him!" It was so sweet. I thought she'd get shy once we got there, but as soon as we got out of the pool to clean up she said, "Now I can wear my princess dress, get married to Unja Jon?"
We didn't really think about snapping pictures until just before we were ready to leave and we were all hanging out in one room. We should've just ordered out and hung out in the room the whole time because there was so much action, it could've entertained us for hours. We might've gotten the stink eye from our neighbors though, so I guess it was good to get all this energy out into the open air. Stephanie kept leaning over to give Deisha kisses while they were sitting like this, but I didn't catch it. Aren't they precious? I wish we were all going to be together for Christmas... it would be so much fun!

In the past week, my kids have told me on several occasions that they love it when I'm in a good mood. It's been pretty rare for the past-- year and two months. I always forget how much I really do love life when I'm not raging with childbearing hormones. It's great because the further I get away from that miserableness, the more my kids appreciate the good days, so even on my worst days, it's better than it was. Thank You, Lord, for glimpses of the new season ahead!

The Crew

My girls...
Look at this kid. Bless his pea-pickin heart.
My camera shoots out an orange beam that always distracts her from smiling. Somehow we got past the beam, but her eyes still shot open on the first flast. Hahaha! She loves kisses!
Yikes. Kennedy is standing on the brink of being a teenager. She still carries a doll around the house and shops the baby clearance stuff every time we get close to it.

Jasmine is a a real-deal Baby Whisperer. I feel totally confident putting her on the job when the screaming begins.
We had a costume birthday party last weekend and this is how we went. Aren't they something?

A Peek

There is no sound like the sound of new laughter...

Budding Bloggers

If you have children that know my kids, you may be interested in checking out these little sweethearts. They are updated WAY more often than mine. And they're nuts. And I adore them!

http://www.thediariesofkennedysutton.blogspot.com/

http://micahsfireblog.blogspot.com/

You are always on my mind...

I think about you, my faithful readers, everyday. I thought about you last weekend when I was baking all day, and I thought about you all day long while I chased my kids back and forth across town to and from soccer games. There are so many things rattling around in my head that I want to write about, but I don't have time to load pictures, and I even if I just sit down to write, I rarely have time to complete a thought without interruption or total diversion. While I have a few minutes, I thought I'd unload some of my random thoughts.

I have a lot to do. Right now, at 10:19pm, the pressing thing is the kitchen floor. It's a mess. I mean, it's bad. The dishes are done, the groceries are put away, and the trash is out, but the floor: yikes. Instead of tending to the pressing things, you know what I do with my time? I cruise Facebook. Here is a lovely opportunity to catch up on all your long lost friends, look at their lives, see how they interact with their friends, see what they look like after all these years, who they married, how their lives turned out; it's all that and a bag of chips. But why is it so important to me to spend hours of my life just cruising? It's like back in high school when we would drive up and down the street just to see what else is going on. It blows my mind. There are so many things that I would much rather be doing, and so many more other things that I SHOULD be doing. But just like the old days, I'm waiting for the weekend to cruise! (this is our weekend because Dale's off.)

I've been cooking as much as I can from scratch lately. Maybe you remember I posted about the plan? Well, it's in full effect. I've baked bread, graham crackers, air-popped popcorn in the microwave, made sweetened condensed milk, cooked Cajun food, and used three bags of rice in the past week. I'm making good progess in the progression to whole and organic foods. It's so much fun.

Every time I figure out how to make something new, I want to write all about it. Like the other night when I was stirring the roux for my Cajun stew, I was thinking about how fun it would be to do a post about how to make it. While I was cooking, the neighborhood kids were all coming in and saying, "It sure smells good!" Most of them have gotten impromptu invitations to dinner via my children so I knew they were fishing. Unfortunately, when I cut up the chicken, (first time ever!) I pulled out the breasts because I thought I could use them for something else. I mean, I was using a whole chicken, why would I need all that meat? And then I decided I would add it later because I realized that I only had two legs, two thighs, and two wings to feed seven people. Well, while I was stirring the roux, I melted my spatula into the oil and had to start over. But I had already cooked the chicken, so I had to pull the rest of the bones, the neck and the back out of the fridge, (I was saving them to make stock), and fry them up so they would flavor the grease. Well, it takes twenty minutes to achieve a dark roux and by that time I had forgotten all about the boneless breasts I had set aside. Much to their dismay, I turned down all the requests for company for dinner because I realized the meat wasn't going to go far. Obviously, I have not used a whole chicken often enough to know that it's not really worth it's weight raw. One of our neighbor girls went home and no one was there, so she had to come back. I couldn't leave her in the living room while we all ate, so I gave up my spot at the table, picked as much of the meat off the backbone to split with Leila, and sat on the couch to feed the baby and wait for a seat to open up. The stew was really good; more like smothered chicken in gravy than what I would call stew, but really savory, nonetheless. It gave me a real sense of accomplishment when it was all said and done. Because it took so long to make and I managed to salvage it even after the spatula catastrophe, I felt like I had really done something remarkable. You can imagine the response when I had to tell the kids they could only have one piece, and Dale was getting the biggest piece- a leg. HAHA! Poor kids. Good thing Tre is picky and opted for salad instead of chicken.

Something else I think about a lot is how lucky I am. There's this song called "The Luckiest" that I feel like is my theme song. I didn't choose him, he chose me, which makes me even luckier. And we have these amazing kids. Today in the store this woman had been shopping in the same area we were in for several minutes without saying much more than "excuse me" to any of us. When we left, she checked out behind us and caught Kennedy and Jasmine while I was paying to say, "You have been a real pleasure to be around." It just melted my heart when they told me. I can't tell you how gratifying it is to have their good behavior lauded by complete strangers. They're not perfect, by any stretch. And we are hardly perfect parents, far from it actually, but we all love each other and at the end of the day we're all on the same team. I know these blessings come directly from the hand of God and have nothing to do with luck, but I feel so, so lucky.

Even if I'm not present here, you are on my mind in the day to day things that we do. Hopefully someday soon, I'll be present in real life instead of this virtual world, and you can watch our progress in real time rather than in fast forward!

Reasons

When I lived in Chicago, I discovered this cool little book that inspired me everyday. I'm sure you've heard of it, it's called "Life's Little Instruction Book". There are a bunch of 'em now, but back then it was pretty new and I loved reading it because it always gave me one more tool for my life tool belt. I read years later that it was written by a man who wrote it for his child before he left for college. It had all the information he could possibly pass on for this little bird leaving the nest.


It never occurred to me until this minute how lucky we are. Right now Dale is teaching his class to the kids. Every Wednesday, Dale fills their heads with all kinds of valuable teaching that he would never, in any other situation, have the time or opportunity to give them without serious discipline in scheduling. But, because they are home, he is able to think through the things he wants them to learn and the seeds he wants to plant, and then spend this few hours cultivating thought. What a rich, rich blessing from our home schooling opportunity. It's just awesome.


This little number thrilled me too.
It was our first day of school journal entry. For those that don't read phonetically, it says, "I love school because my mom rocks!" WOOHOO!

Leila's Birthday

It was a few weeks ago, but these pictures were so cute, I had to share them. She pranced around the house like a princess all day. Now if you ask her, "Are you the big sister?" she says, "No, I da pwincess."

This is the little Cinderella cake the we bought at Albertson's to commemorate the occasion. She fell in love with this cake and Dale and I were trying to avoid a real cake, so I decided this was a good fit for the little princess. We all got a little sliver of the dress. It was so good (I love grocery store bakery frosting) that I was tempted with the giant cheeseburger cake that I saw there last night. Here I'm skimping on groceries, saving $.40 here and $.67 there, and I had to talk myself out of a five dollar indulgence. What can I say. I heart cake.
Leila loves the part when we all sing happy birthday to her. It's the best part of the whole day. She adores it. You can see it on her face.
Here she is with the tiara and earrings. So cute.
And this little necessity was added to her wardrobe just a few days later. She only takes it off to bathe and go to Wal-Mart- if I make her. Her little friend saw her prancing up and down the street and ran right in to get her dress on. They were bestest, bestest friends for the first hour they were twins, then Leila, after she brought her in the house to play, must've gotten tired of the pressure to perform as a princess because I heard her yelling, "Go home!" Sometimes she's really naughty.

Happy birthday, little one. Live it up; you only get to be three once.

The Plan, Part Two

I have this great friend that apparently knows me very well, which is rare because my life is like a locked diary and I don't ever share it with anyone. Ever. No details; it's all classified, if you know what I'm saying. She called me about a week ago and after listening to me moan about my troubles for awhile, she said, "So what's the plan? I keep waiting for you to blog some new plan, and I'll know that you're OK." And that was all I really needed to hear, a reminder to live deliberately. Honestly, for the past few months I have been just trying to get by hoping something would change and the blues would clear up on their own. Well they're not. So I decided to devise a plan that would: a. save us money, b. help us to eat healthy foods again, and c. get me organized.

After some hunting, I found this awesome website that was just what I needed to kick myself into gear. This gal lives on $50 a week and tries to eat organic as much as possible and also buy local produce. She doesn't calculate her spending in the week, but only using supplies equal to that amount. For example, if she uses a tortilla, she charges herself two cents, etc. It was perfect. She has healthy recipes, ideas for minimal meals like lentils and rice, and because of her organic tendencies, she is very resourceful in her cooking.

Now, coming off of vacation, which I hope to write about someday, and a week of eating convenience and fast foods, lentils and rice doesn't look too good to the masses, so I have to improvise a little. And we're big meat eaters; everyone panics when there's no meat. But the idea was all I needed, with a little bit of instruction.

First, I wanted to try to use everything in the cabinets before creating a menu or going to the grocery store. I made flour tortillas, for pennies, and used up the leftover refried beans. I cut all the meat off the leftover pork chops and used the bones for the broth of my soup. We had quesadillas and canned soup with the leftover tortillas, cornbread from scratch with the soup, and tonight we're having pizza, if we don't go to Applebees, which is what Dale is pulling for. Also we made slushies last night for family movie night with KoolAid and ice and a little bit of extra sugar. They were yummy, just like Sonic!

It's exciting to see how far I can stretch what we have because I tell myself how much we're saving every meal that we don't have to buy from the grocery store. Yesterday I wanted to make sloppy joes and didn't have any onion or green pepper, but instead of going to the store, I used onion powder and put a few pepperoncinis in it and it was good.

If you know me at all, you know my dream is to make everything I possibly can from scratch eventually, even having a few chickens and a cow on the ranch someday. But for now, I'm picking up what I can here and there so that the kids are conditioned for life without pre-packaged foods.

The Plan

Alright, the reality is that I'm not depressed, I am severely overwhelmed. Today I received four of the twenty-some boxes that I'm waiting for so we can proceed with a successful school year.
I have cardboard boxes and plastic bubbles full of air that I need to find a place for so that I'll have the supplies in the event that we don't finish the school year here in California. (I know, it's a long shot, but I'm an optimist. And my mom is a woman of faith.) I don't have a place for it. My shed is full of other stuff that I'm saving for who knows what reason. I can barely keep up with my regular housework on top of shuffling our storage space to accomodate these things, and trying to meet the needs of all these little lives around me. I haven't cooked in a couple of weeks. (Hey guess what! Chicken nuggets tomorrow too!) I get overwhelmed with the guilt of not being a competent teacher, not praying for each one of them everyday, not meeting my husband on a grown-up level, and the baby's crying again. I can't do it all, but I want to believe that somehow I can. I don't rest well when the housework isn't done, but if I don't go to bed without finishing, I won't ever sleep. There's always more to do.

I'd really love to give the impression that I am capable of raising all these kids in a cracker jack box, home school them, have another baby, cook all our meals, get to soccer practice on time, still wear the same size jeans I wore in high school, and not skip a beat. But I can't. I feel like I'm drowning sometimes. So you know what I do? I eat. I drink soda instead of water. I spend money we don't have. I don't know why these things make me feel better, but somehow they get me past the fact that I have neglected cleaning the kids' bathroom long enough to grow mold under the sink. Gag. And clearly, I cannot keep up with my avid blogging passion, because it's been like twenty days since my last blog.

But I will tell you this, I do love my life, even when I don't want to get out of bed in the morning and try to sneak back to it in the afternoon. I did get some incredible pictures of San Francisco and some of this side of the country. Plus, I have pictures from Tre's birthday still waiting to be loaded, and some of Princess Leila in her new wardrobe. So, I'll be back eventually.

All that to say this: here's the plan. I'm going to get out of bed tomorrow and try to be nice. I'm going to go as fast as I can without losing my patience with my kids or my husband. I'm going to pick up what I can and fold all the clothes that are in the dryer right now. I'm going to try to do something generous for someone that I know because people are constantly doing this for me. I might not cook. But I will kiss everyone in the house as often as I can, so that they know I love them even if I fall in a heap at the end of the day. That's the plan.

Summertime

The kids in our neighborhood all went back to school this week, so before that happened, I snapped a couple of pictures of their summertime activities for posterity's sake.
This little stinker, don't you just want to scoop her up? I do too! And I do every chance I get.
Trek and Tre were play fighting on the trampoline this morning and Trek clocked Tre in the nose; Tre came in with a bloody nose howling about how he was going to get Tre back. Micah came storming in shortly after snarling about how Trek better watch out because he was going to get it back. I reminded them of Jesus's forgiveness and told them that they needed to forgive Trek. After a couple of failed attempts, I let them know that if they didn't practice forgiveness, I was going to get them back. They're all best friends again.
Jasmine is such a mommy already, she always takes to the little ones immediately. This is a continuation of the tea party she hosted on our stoop the day before school started. She is such a jewel!
Of course you can't forget the hours we spent in front of the Wii... and all the neighborhood kids' joy along with us.

Gotta love the summertime! Woohoo! Just a couple short weeks until ours is done too...

Sparkpeople

For a few months, I've been vicariously doing weight watchers, using the manual points calculator and logging my food journal on Word. After some prodding from other users, I had decided to sign up for Weight Watchers online; my manual entries were not cutting the mustard. As a matter of fact, I plateaued and then started to gain weight so I was doing something wrong. While I was on the Internet searching for some answers and found this goldmine: www.sparkpeople.com It's a lot like Weight Watchers Online, only it calculates fat and calories and is totally free! I've been using it for a little over two weeks and only have about five pounds to lose to meet my goal weight. I'm so excited about it, I just had to share it with you here.

One thing about it that really intrigued me is that the guy that started it is a multi-millionaire and set it up and made it free to *spark people* to lose weight. He is a health philanthropist. I look forward to getting on everyday, there are all kinds of motivational tools and incentives to stay the course; it's so fun! Check it out and let me know what you think.

Deisha

I love this outfit; someone that Dale works with gave this to her and I had to get a picture before she outgrew it! This shot is clearly on a rainy day in Deisha's world.
She still fusses, but the sun is starting to come out for her. She's smiling and laughing and learning all about her hands because she is constantly investigating them. I love that!!!
I just took this picture a minute ago. For about three shots she smiled right before the flash. On the other four she smiled right after. She's gonna be a stinker just like her older brother and sister. Get ready world, there's another Sutton on the horizon!

Betcha!

... thought I fell off the face the earth??? Well I didn't. I'm still here. We had Tre's birthday, which I've been meaning to write about and post pictures and haven't yet, so I thought I'd wait until I got that done, but I have to load the pictures. For some reason loading the pictures seems like the most daunting task and I just haven't gotten it done. I even bought batteries and everything... it's just one more thing.

So I have this baby that cries all the time. OK, she doesn't cry all the time. She only cries when I can't hold her and she wants me to, or she's falling asleep and she really doesn't want to, or she wants to nurse instead of take the pacifier, and I can't sit on the couch all day long. As much as it might simplify my frustration, I just can't. I had resigned to the fact that she was fussy during the day, but after I got her into bed, she would sleep until daybreak. Whew. I had from about nine o'clock to seven o'clock to decompress from the day. However, she has decided to transfer her contentment to various parts of the day- not one long stretch, just an hour here, an hour there. So last night, and the night before that, and the night before that, she's been waking about every half hour to switch sides. Seriously, this baby wants to be latched on all night long. I am going crazy.

Sometimes I want to yell, sometimes I want to cry, and sometimes I just plain want to run head first through the sliding glass doors to release some of this tension. There's this war inside me because I want, more than anything, to enjoy these next few months because it will probably be the last time I have a baby, and I love having a baby so much. In fact I adore it, but she's making it so tough to really enjoy. And then, when she's happy, she looks into my eyes and smiles the most endearing smile and even laughs sometimes because we're so in love with each other. I'm Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde; totally happy one minute, totally miserable the next hour.

That's the other reason I haven't been here. But I'll tell you one thing; the complex B vitamin really does work. And here's why. There are some-- undesirable side effects of this vitamin, some minor intestinal side effects. They affect the entire household if you know what I mean, without getting too graphic here. So I stopped taking them just to see if that was really the case or maybe it was some weird leftover postpartum issue. Lo and behold, the issue ceased after a few days, but my moods took an immediate dive. Now, I've been back on for a week and I am back to feeling grounded and level. I didn't yell at my kids even one time all of last week and I was a single parent to boot. So that's a blessing.

Please pray for my little Deisha. (DAY-shuh; rhymes with geisha. Some spell it Dacia, just in case you were wondering.) If there's something we can do to regulate her schedule and her moods, I would do just about anything at this point. I thrive on normalcy and right now there is none; it's making me loco.

Disappointment

I have, countless times, been disappointed in my life. Disappointment should be a friend to me. I am the queen of dashed expectations. I have said for years that if I could just lower my expectations of circumstances I would live a more simple life laced with sweeter happiness. But somehow I cannot make the shift. I am an optimist almost to a fault. While it strengthens my faith on certain levels, filling me with hope, it also trips me up time and time again.

There's this war inside me between the acknowledgement that I have everything I've ever hoped for, and the daily let-downs that threaten my peace. It's like swinging from branch to branch- I get one thing resolved and swing on to the next so I can fret over it. It's strange because I know I have everything. I lack nothing. But I freak out if I get a bill I didn't expect or a phone call that bugs me. I don't know. Someday I'll find a balance and learn to live in quiet submission under the sovereignty of God and his perfect, sustaining grace.

But for now what I have in this life, is a promise. It's the hope that I always come back to when I get tripped up by something insurmountable.

"Behold, I lay in Zion, a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. And he who believes in Him will not be disappointed."

Just in case you were wondering...

This is what we look like now. I've never been very good about setting up appointments to have our pictures taken. I always thought it was a little too expensive to get a bunch of copies of us in the same clothes with the same smile. As a matter of fact, our family portaits consist of:
1. A freebee that I got from the Welcome Wagon where we met with a guy set-up in a hotel room smoking and watching the Simpsons across the hall from his *studio*. I gotta admit, Dale and I both breathed a little easier when that one was over with.
2. A picture taken for the church directory when we were on staff. I probably would've skipped it if we hadn't been required to show.
3. The generosity of a truly gifted friend and photographer that gave us a couple of photo shoots as gifts after the birth of babies. www.beckynovacek.typepad.com **If you are driving distance from Omaha, call her.** Now that we've been spoiled by her creativity and ease behind the camera, it's hard to take anyone else seriously.
4. A sweet neighbor here that insisted on photographing ou family. That is what we have here.

After we committed to a date, she brought clothes that would match for each of the kids and even offered to do the girls' hair. It was so thoughtful and they really turned out nicely. She set us up at the park across the street from our house so it was really convenient too.

I've never been very good about sharing either. I want to share; I want each one of you to have a lovely photograph of my family, Kennedy in her basketball getup, Micah in his football gear, and the rest of us doing whatever we do when the picture is taken, but I'm just not very good about following through on that desire. So here it is, a recent picture of all of us in matching clothes. And since I really want to send you a copy, I probably won't so feel free to print as many of these as you like and share them with all your neighbors.

Wild Thing

A few years ago we went all out on Easter clothes for all the kids. Kennedy had a really fancy dress for the Military ball, so Jasmine got a fancy dress. Tre was really little, so he got a little short outfit, but Micah, being the big boy that he was, needed a suit. I would have been content to go to Target and find something reasonable because that's the way I am, but Dale wanted to buy him a really nice suit. He found one at Burlington Coat Factory, made by Fubu, that cost a lot, LOT, of money. I went along with it, thinking he could wear it for a couple of years and it would ultimately be a practical purchase. Needless to say, Micah wore the suit twice before he outgrew it.

Tre, somehow, has been able to fit the suit ever since. To say he's built leaner than Micah is kind of an understatement. If boys were two-wheeled transportation, Tre would be a ten-speed, Micah would be a Harley. The kid is about the turn six and the suit is a 4, but he still slides right into it. The problem is that we live in California. No one dresses up for anything around here. I haven't been to a wedding recently, but seriously, there were kids in sweat pants on Easter Sunday this year. So it hangs in the closet in all its glory, just passing the days until it goes out in a garbage bag to Goodwill.

This past week, Jasmine comes in wearing a wedding dress and walking around like she's the Queen of Sheba or something, getting all kinds of attention, which tripped Tre's trigger. He begged to put on his *tuxedo*. I don't like to let him play in it because: A. He's accident prone. Case in point, he was cutting some paper with scissors in his bed two nights ago and he clipped his toe. Even though he never cried until I drowned it in peroxide, it still bleeds when we take the band-aid off. B. He's an incredibly messy eater. It's gotten better, but he still doesn't quite get the concept of taking a bite; he thinks he needs to finish a meal in one bite, if it's possible. And he tries to make that possible by unloading as much from the plate into his mouth as he can cram in there. . And C. He's accident prone. The kid spills something every day. He knocks something over EVERY SINGLE DAY. The chances of the tuxedo coming out unscathed from a couple of hours of playtime with Tre are as slim as he is. It's a nice suit and I want someone else to enjoy it's fantasticness someday. But it's also his, and it's just hanging in the closet. So I let him put it on sometimes. This week was one of those exciting times and this is what you get when you get Tre in a tuxedo. Look out universe.

He spent close to twenty minutes on his hair, and apparently he prefers to have one side of the collar popped and the other side in place. He also talks like a Vally Boy- lots of heavy sighs and *dude*s, and he doesn't smile because smiling is not cool. He's my kid. What else can I say?

Party Time! Party Time!

While Daddy was gone, we had a slumber party in the living. I've been looking forward to the fort building all week. So during the Spongebob marathon, I built the fort, while Micah looked on in awe of my skills. He was pretty excited about it. So was Max.
This is what it looked like from the inside from the left of the front door. Behind Micah was what they called the back porch because that's where the window was open and it was about fifty degrees outside, so it was cold once you climbed out there. Eventually, Micah and Jasmine dragged their blankets and pillows in there for the night.
This is the green room, where Max and Scooter slept. They never want to miss out on the action. If you can't tell, we're underneath the dining room table.
Tre started to putter out at about ten o'clock. He tried to stay awake, but he was pretty exhausted from getting up at 7am and then a marathon of his own including running, jumping, yelling, stomping, bouncing, cutting things, telling jokes, and asking questions. Thousands of questions.
Since we're living cheap this week, we ate Totinos pizzas for dinner, which, while they are super delicious, don't quite satisfy. After dinner, we decided we were going to need some snacks. Normally we would have purchased a cart full of candy and cookies and chips for an occasion like this, but we had to be creative. Jasmine made brownies, which were out of this world, I must say.
And then we made homemade kettle corn. We always spend four dollars on a bag of this melt-in-your-mouth goodness at the farmer's market when we go. And I am tempted every time I see a stand at a carnival to buy some. So I got online and found a recipe and went to town. It was so easy and just as good as the real stuff. Woohoo! Once I've mastered an indulgence like this, the temptation loses it's power over me.
Leila saw a few episodes of Spongebob, but I don't think she even made it through the kettle corn, poor thing. Her daily regimen, not unlike Tre's, is exhausting. If she's not out by 9pm, we're all in trouble.

Micah is just getting out of the fort now, at 10:16am. I had to go rough him up to get him up. I knew he'd be sleeping late when he got up for the third time at 1:30am. Such is life around here.