Forget the Jonas Brothers...

meet the Brownie Band:


Because really, there's nothing I'd rather hear than spatulas and spoons banging against metal pots and pans...


But there's nothin' like booming, clashing, and whamming to cure some 5 o'clock kiddo crankiness.

Jacob's Growth Chart

After some emails and an overwhelming majority of votes on my little blog poll, the winner was the transportation theme. Now I can't credit myself with the general idea, but I'm pretty happy with the result:


In it's final resting place in the playroom:


And a few close up's because knowing my children, markers and crayon marks will soon cover up the artsy fartsy trucks I painstakingly created :)



Anyways, after hanging it up for me, he mentions that I should create an Etsy store and sell 'em there.

I start to think about it and get my hopes up, imagining orders (and moulah!) piling in like there's no tomorrow! But then reality sets in... I made these during nap times. Many days of many nap times. Is the $30 bucks I would charge worth missing every nap??

Um, no. I'm theoretically increasing my price to $200 per chart ;)

Pajama night

I go to Fitness Bootcamp every Monday and Wednesday night while Justin takes care of our Brownies. I give them a bath in the afternoon so that's one less thing he has to do. I make dinner and have it ready when he comes hoime. That way, he can spend the rest of the night playing with them until their bedtimes at 7 pm.

He enjoys this time with them (at least that's what he says!). He tells me what they did that night; how Lauren went "piddle" on her big girl potty, how Jacob cruised about the furniture, how many times Lauren suffocated cuddled Tessa, etc. And he always tells me what books Lauren wanted to read as part of her bedtime routine. Usually its "Bad Dog Marley!" or "Laurnen's Bible". But not last night...

She could have cared less about the books. Oh no, last night it was all about the jammies.

When I get Lauren in her jammies, she has 2 choices of what she can wear; this one or that one. Same goes with the toothbrush we brush her teeth with; Princess' or Elmo. This plan of attack works out well and I rarely have any battles at this point. I had assumed the Hubster and I did things the same way by giving 2 choices.

Apparently not. Because when I walked in her room this morning, I was greeted with this:


So I ask the Hubster what happened and he says, "oh, she didn't want to wear jammies last night".

Uh huh. That doesn't explain why there's a mound of pj's on her floor. So I probe and he says "I just kept pulling them out one by one and asking her if she wanted to wear these"...

????????????????????

Yes, he tried to reason with a two year old... and lost. He went though 15+ pairs of jammies and not one fit the bill for our FancyPants. He eventually had to wrestle with her to get her in these:


But because he's a sucker good dad, he let her get away with it. And guess who had the pleasure of folding and putting them all away?



Yeah, not the cutie above. Or Moosecake. Or the Hubster.

Lucky me ;)

All time low..

Weighed myself this morning and I'm at 155 lbs, a new milestone for me. Another 5 lbs and I'll be in the 140's. Seriously? The 140's. As in bye-bye size 10's... hello single digit jeans!

Stay at Home Mom thoughts...

I just feel like my brain is jumbled tonight. Not completely sure why, so I thought I'd write it all out in hopes of getting some much needed clarity.

I think it has to do with the fact that I have been struggling to do *it* all. I am growing in my walk with God, continually striving to be a loving wife to my husband, taking care of our babies, keeping our home clean and organized, preparing nutritious edible meals for us, maintaining friendships to keep sane, exercising and training for 5k's to continue my weight loss, etc... I just feel like there's so much I want to do and so many obligations...

And when I say "take care of the kids", that's not even the half of it... I'm not talkin' setting them down in front of the babysitter TV all day. We don't even have a TV anymore. Besides changing diapers, nursing a baby, feeding meals and snacks, and potty training, I sit down and interact and play. I model behavior for them and attempt to teach values and morals without them even knowing it. I teach them songs and games. We go to the park, go outdoors to "invesgate" flowers and ladybugs, we cook, we paint, we go to the Library, go to playdates... we go everywhere that is free and kiddo friendly, all in the name of nurturing their curiosity and development. Exhausting at times, but worth every minute.


Tonight at Bootcamp we talked about training for a 10k. I would LOVE to train with all of my friends and prove to myself that I can do this. In fact, I got all excited at the prospects. But then we started talking about the training schedule and these 5 pm running meetings. And this is where the problems lie... 1) I just don't have enough time to do it. Between dinner, baths, bedtime stories, spending some much needed time with my husband and alllll of the other obligations, there simply aren't enough hours in the day. 2) But beyond the time constarints, do I really wanna leave my babies for a few hours to run??? Do I want to give up precious time with them in order to burn a couple hundred calories??

Everyone says these infant/toddler years go by super fast. Everyone says to enjoy every second of it, even when both are tugging at your legs and begging to be held. Because when they are 3 and 4 years of age, they won't want to be carried....or cuddled... or kissed on.


The Hubster and I make sacrifices so that I can stay home and raise our children. For this period in my life, I have made this role a very high priority (after being my husband's wife). I do this because I am madly in love with my children and want the best for them. This love makes being a Stay at Home Mom the most rewarding, fulfilling job in the world... even if I won't be able to run that stinkin' 10k.


And that's why I have decided to put 10k training on the back burner (I will do 5k's though with the Hubster and kiddos in the jogging stroller). Soon enough, my children will be older and a bit more self sufficient. When this happens, I will be able to focus on my body and train my heart out. Until then, I will continue to do my very best teaching, playing and loving my children with every ounce of my being. Being a Stay at Home Mom isn't an easy job (if you do it right), but one day when they're loving, confident, independent adults, I will look back on these times and know I made the right decision.

Where's Waldo...

errrr, I mean Jacob???

Really? I can have a Time Out?

After "widing Moose" in the ball pit today,


I told Lauren that she couldn't ride him because he actually liked to breathe. She became frustrated and insisted "yes, Laurnen wide Moose!" and then proceeded to gave me the look. All mom's know the look... that sly, smug expression that threatens to do the exact thing you told them not to do. At 2 years old, they're testing us, and I was bound and determined that she wouldn't test me on straddling her lil' bro and squeezing the air outta his body.

Anyways, while in the midst of giving the look, she gets up, focuses on Jacob and slowly lowers herself on top on him once more. Before she plopped down on him, I warned her that if she sat on Jacob again, she would need to go to Time Out. This was her warning.

She turns to me, her eyes light up and she waddles her little self to the corner and proclaims happily "Laurnen Time Out!"


And there she sat, happy as could be. Clearly, these Time Outs are severe punishment for her. Someone call CPS, she's being mistreated.

My lil' man...

apparently no longer wants to be known as "Porkchop" or "Moosey Man". Instead he prefers "Macho Man, Meathead and Mr. Abs of Steel":

Jacob likes older women:

He was charmin' his older sister's friend, Gracie. She's almost 2, so he's feelin' pretty studly being 10 months and all...

Good catch, Moosey Man, we think she's pretty cute too!

Park day with pals

I have cute kids, I can't help it. I took about 900 pictures today and these were some of the highlights:


Lauren spent the majority of the time investigating the tunnels, swinging, playing with her friends and teeter tottering:


Jacob spent his time hanging with his momma and swinging. He loved the swing, hence the happy, smiley faces he was sportin':


See? Now you can understand why I took so many dang pictures...