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.

Speaking of frying your brain

I got up this morning and told myself I'd journal before the day took off, which I do on the computer. So I get on the computer and there is this error message, so I call my friend in India to see what I should do. After a couple of hours on the phone together, he told me what I already knew- to back up my files and we'd reinstall the operating system. So I did and then I tried to connect to the internet and couldn't for whatever reason, and so I called Comcast and set up an appointment to have someone come and fix it. And then after all the hours of backing up files, pictures, music... I realized that the problem getting online might be connected to my computer problem, so I called and cancelled. Well, while we were doing numerous lengthy tests, I learned that my friend, the one that spoke English beautifully, was going home in an hour and I'd have to wait to talk to him again until he goes back to work the next time. And the backing up took all of that hour and more. So I left him a message and then tried to log on with the laptop, which failed. So with final resolve to abandon ship, I put away the laptop and plugged everything back in to the tower and turned on the musicmatch jukebox, one major component of our computer usage, and guess what. No sound. *snort* My brain is starting to short out; please forgive my scatteredness...

So I turned all the volumes up and dug the tower out one more time and tried the plug in every hole until I got blasted with Planet Rock. Then I thought I'd try one last time to connect and HAHAHAHA I'm on. I'm ON RIGHT NOW!!!!

I'd like to first of all thank the academy for believing in. And more than that my friend at Dell whose name I will never know, for telling me during our first hour that I'd be qualified to be a tech by the end of all of this. Because, frankly, I am. But don't call me if you have computer trouble. I have a lot of kids and I like them more than teching. However, it might be worth considering after they're grown, I mean, computers, right? Everyone's got one!

P.S. Pictures coming soon.

Let the sun shine!

The days are going fast; I feel like I'm nesting again. Now that Deisha is settling into a routine and is willing to be awake without having to be held the whole time, I have a new lease on life!

This morning we all got up late. Even Deisha wasn't ready to get out of bed until after 8:30. It was so great. Last night I let them all watch movies until they conked out. It was probably close to ll:00 when the last one crashed, so that wasn't too bad. It paid off because they slept late. After we all got out of our jammies and had our teeth brushed, I turned on a new aerobics video that I bought at Wal-Mart. It was a lovely purchase at only twenty-five cents, and it's no wonder. They must've recorded it on the local channel and tried it out on the shelves. It's pretty dorky, but man is it a work-out! My legs threatened to give out on me all day. Anyway, I turned it on and before the first five minutes were up, all five kids had a can of vegetables in each hand and were doing the video with me. It was so funny!

The exciting activity of the day was ice cream at McDonald's playland. I made a goal for myself to only spend the cash that I have in purse, which was ten dollars. Rather than give in to the convenience of eating there, I overcame and served up sandwiches before we left. We spent about an hour in there with all the other stir crazy children in Lompoc. I always hate going in there when it's crowded because I have to explain every time that, "Some kids say those words, but we don't" or "Some kids' moms don't care if they scream, but I do. So don't." And, "I don't know why those boy are riding trays down the slide, but just you can't." I'm always torn between scolding someone else's kid for breaking the rules and just letting them get away with their raucous behavior. Usually I just try not to make a scene as long as no one's getting hurt.

Tonight we watched Karate Kid II and made broiled s'mores. They were good, but there's something about a good old-fashioned marshmellow roasted over a campfire. They just taste better. Leila insisted several times that we shut the tv off and come to her birthday party. Jasmine and I were the only ones to come at first, but Kennedy showed up late with a present and Tre came over for a piece of cake. (The movie just ended and she is in there jumping up and down saying, "Party time, Party time, my busday!")

Back on the nesting, I'm getting all kinds of things done. Today I took all the washable pieces off the stroller, bleached them, and loaded it in the truck. I have a load of books to take to Goodwill tomorrow, and the kids and I cleaned out the shed. I just feel like a million bucks when I get stuff done.

I have also been working on a little project that I can't wait to finish and share with you here. But until I get a little further on it, you'll just have to sit in suspense and wonder. Or call. I don't keep secrets very well.