Thankful

I think when you've been married for a good amount of time, coupled with the busyness and stress of life and kids and work and activities, it's easy to let common manners and courtesy towards your spouse or children go out the window. I remember growing up rarely hearing my parents ever say thank you, or please, or even I love you. I suppose you could attribute some of that to the culture, but at the root of it, it was just a genuine lack of appreciation for each other.

That feeling of entitlement so quickly and easily creeps in. I'm entitled to feel this way. I'm entitled to have my spouse do those things because that is their job. I'm entitled to not say thank you because they didn't say thank you to me. I'm entitled. Even as a young child, I remembering vowing that I would fight hard to make courtesy and thankfulness the natural fiber of my future family.

10 years into our marriage and four children later, it's a daily fight to remember that vow. That feeling of entitlement is always bubbling under the surface, and it takes effort and grace to keep it there. But I do hope that our kids are growing up realizing that "thank you" and "please" are not just reserved for strangers or acquaintances. I hope that they hear it and say it often.

So yes, I just wrote a blog about my husband. But I don't want my thanks and appreciation to be limited to special occasions and big moments. So thank you that you took the kids to school this morning so I could run. Thank you that you are currently using your day off to paint the outside of the house. Thank you that you are taking care of Selah so I can go out to lunch with girlfriends. Thank you that you put up with my crazy, bordering on violent, ranting yesterday because our wretched cable provider dvr (ahem...comcast sucks) failed to record the glee episode. Thank you.

Yearly Birthday Post

Today is the husband's birthday. I've officially known him since I was sixteen years old, so I've walked through life with him for the past 19 years. 19 years is a long time to amass some memories.

There was our first date to taco bell for my birthday. His one and only credit card got eaten up by the atm machine, so we found ourselves wandering U.of I's campus with what I had in my purse, which was two dollars and some change. So taco bell it was. Hmmph.

There was the time my water broke in the middle of the night with our firstborn. I cried out to him that we needed to go to the hospital and without even opening his eyes, he pulled the doctor card and told me that I probably just peed on myself. Needless to say, if I didn't have amniotic fluid dripping down my leg, I would have given him my best right hook.

But for every one of those memories, I have a million more truly amazing ones.

Like when we were in Africa together and covered in dirt and grime and dust. Our clothes were filthy, we probably smelled, and our hair was a hot mess (his hair without product in it is definitely way worse than mine without product). But I remember him goofing around with some of the village kids, laughing as he spun them around and held them. And he never looked more handsome.

Or the daily, but no less extraordinary, moments of watching him try to put his daughter's hair in a bow, or waiting to watch his sports game because Selah is watching her barbie video. Or when he does the dirty jobs around the house which include, but are not limited to:
changing toilets and getting nasty whiffs of the sewage pipe....
cleaning out our outdoor garbage can that had maggots wiggling around all over the bottom...
disposing of the r.o.u.s's (rodents of unusual size) that we seem to find in our backyard....side note, "Princess Bride" is still one of the best movies ever.

Or going through stressful and difficult life moments, and knowing we are fighting through it together. Especially this past year, with moving and starting over to his mother's illness, I will look back on this season of life and be thankful for John's inner strength and character.

So happy birthday husband of one and father to four and doctor to many! Here's to another year of memories.  I'll make sure to buy you a taco today.

LIfe Lessons at the Buffet

So last week, all our boys had their first batch of soccer games. Our oldest two won their games, and our third guy ran around, which we consider a win since he doesn't like to sweat. So to celebrate, we went out to a family dinner to Sweet Tomatoes. My kids have never been to an all you can eat buffet type place. I don't even know if they knew such things existed. Anyway, you would have thought they had died and gone to heaven. Their eyes were as wide as saucers, and they excitedly filled their plates over and over again.

Salad, pasta, bread, soup, pizza, pudding, fruit...they consumed it all. Then to cap it all off, they made their own sundaes complete with toppings and sauce galore. Midway through the meal, I started getting that tingly feeling we moms get sometimes that serve as our warning signal or red flag, and I felt compelled to tell them to stop eating. But they looked so happy that I ignored it and watched them go back for more and more.

As we left the restaurant, I glanced over at my oldest and again felt that tingly feeling. But, I just assumed that feeling was because it had been such a long day for all of us and we just needed to go home. We loaded up into the car and started driving. We were telling jokes and laughing when all of a sudden, my oldest's laugh turned into a bubbly, gurgle/gagging sound. I turned around and saw that his cheeks were puffed out and his lips were barely containing whatever was in there. I quickly passed back a bag in which he promptly emptied out the contents of his mouth and more. When he had finished, his only comment between moans was, "There goes my chocolate sundae with sprinkles and oreos." It took some serious effort for the rest of us to keep our food down during this episode, but thankfully, we did since I had no more plastic bags to spare.

Important life lesson was learned by my kids that day. There is a fine line between enjoyment and gluttony. I don't think they will be repeating this anytime soon. I certainly won't be ignoring my tingly feelings anymore either. And I most definitely will be putting some extra bags in my car just in case.

Angel in the SUV

I have officially lost my mind. "Mom brain" has now become a normal way of life for me. The smart, responsible, detail-oriented person I used to be has been replaced by this new creature that is forever misplacing her keys, or spilling her coffee, or calling her children by the wrong names. But today, I think I hit an all-time personal low.

I was in my garage getting ready to pick up my third from kindergarten. I rummaged through my purse and realized that my keys were in the house. Cursing my mom brain, I put my purse on the trunk and ran inside to grab my keys (you know what's coming). I dashed back outside and sped off on my way. I drove through my neighborhood and out into one of the main roadways. A few minutes later, I see a SUV honking their horn and driving fast behind me. At the next light, they pull up next to me and frantically wave my purse around! Somewhere along the way, my purse had flown off my car and spilled out onto the road. Of course, my purse is jammed with too many things and never zipped, so all the contents had gone spilling out. This angel in the SUV stopped and picked up all my items on the street and raced after me. Before I could even adequately thank her, she went on her merry way, leaving me feeling both elated and moronic at the same time.

So, to the angel in the SUV, thank you for sparing me the humiliation of losing my purse and all its valuable contents. Thank you also for not saying anything about the insane amount of candy I carry in my purse (my emergency stash for preventing meltdowns in public places) or the equally insane amount of lip gloss (it's a bit of an obsession, I admit). Most of all, thank you for not judging or laughing at me for driving with my purse on the car.