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!