My Not-So-Ordinary Life

A very wise woman once told me “When your kids are grown and left home, you won’t remember how neat and clean your house was, you’ll remember the fun times you had messing it up.” (Thanks, Mom)
As a parent of a 19-month-old, Bray and a 3-year-old, Trenton, I find myself thinking of and using this advice more each day. I take time to enjoy the little things that may seem frustrating  and even horrible at times. These are the things that make my world go round. They keep a smile on my face and are my motivation at the end of the day.
Life isn’t about scrubing the bathtub after use, it is about preserving the reds, greens and blues of the bathtub chalk that was supposed to be easy to wash off.
I let my children ride bikes, skateboards and scooters around the kitchen table. The reward isn’t the dents on the walls or scuffs on the floor, it is hearing my son’s tale of his dirt bike track and how he just did a “160” for his fans.
The table is also my daughter’s favorite mountain to climb. Instead of getting her down every time, I take the opportunity to let her explore. As I sit in the chair, I watch as she examines each bill, phone and magazine, paying extra attention to whether I am letting her get by with it.
My children still sleep in the same bed as my husband and I. In exchange for cramped space and no alone time with one another, we share memories with our children, not many will experience. We hear the laughs and sighs of every dream. We hear the moans of pain that haven’t quite woke them when they are sick. She returns the favor with a hug. We hear the footsteps of our son as he quietly climbs out of bed and runs to the bathroom. We awake every weekend, not to an alarm clock, but to the sound and feel of kisses on our faces. Other mornings we watch as Trenton pulls the blanket off his sister, to greet her with “good morning sweetheart.”
I have learned many lessons on my quest to become a good parent. Never argue with a toddler when it comes to song lyrics. You will lose. Let them dress themselves, inside out and two different shoes, it is a fight that isn’t worth winning. Let their elbows be their muscles. It is cuter that way. When they lift their shirt to show you how full they are, take their word for it. When your son asks you to be his girlfriend, accept with a smile. He’ll never understand if you try to explain it.
Blow on nails to dry the polish even if they were painted hours ago. Agree to ice cream before dinner every once in awhile. Let them nurse whenever and wherever they wish, it will save their vocal chords. Deal with the pain and allow them to fix your hair. Trade wearing pants a few weeks for permanent marker tattoos on your legs.
In the end, you are not going to remember how shinny your floor was or where crayon marks on the walls were. I’ll trade all of my dirty dishes, unfolded laundry and harsh cleaning chemicals for the memories created my letting them go one more day. Take time to enjoy your children. Appreciate the little things.

I am a huge Hunt’s fan. (Hunt’s is a little local diner) I always see the pizza burger on the menu, and wonder what it tastes like.

I am the type of person, who gets the same thing every time. But I got the pizza burger and needless to say, I should have got my regular blt on toast, with a pickle and fries! lol

Nothing that Hunt’s did, just wasn’t my cup of tea.

My momma is the infamous “Halloween Lady” in Bonne Terre. She goes all out for Halloween each year. As part of the Daily Journal Relay for Life team, I decided to market it!

A few of us dressed up and hosted guided tours of my moms yard. We had people dressed up throughout the yard. You couldn’t tell what was real and what was fake. We simply took donations. No set amount. We raised over $150 for the cause. And had SOOO much fun. My mom, dressed as the devil, served a ‘witch’s brew’ (ice cream, soda and green food coloring, it looked neato.) There was cookies, ghost suckers and more. My brother, his friend and my husband hid and scared people. We had grown women crying. Teens were horrified. But yet somehow, children were not scared in the least.

I left my kids at the sitter. They are not scared at all of my moms house. They go there everyday and love it. I didn’t want them to hear people screaming and get scared.

A hayride stopped by. Anyway, long story short. It was great and we are for sure planning another one next year!

We also hosted a Halloween Costume Exchange, which was a huge success! We sold over 50 costumes. I can’t wait for next year. I love being a part of Relay!

Laugh if you must. But it was a big deal. I am terrified of spiders. I once didn’t bathe for a week, because I was convinced that the spider my mom killed while I was in the bathtub had babies who would attack me for killing their mother. Seriously, I am that big of a sissy.

I took a day off yesterday. While at home, with my kids, we were playing in their room. Out of nowhere, a huge, hairy spider crawls out of the barn we are playing with, right onto my daughter.

Out of instinct, I smashed it dead on her leg. Gross. That was honestly the first time I have killed a spider without a shoe or simply yelling for my husband to do it for me.

Needless to say, i am quite proud of myself!

I wore jelly shoes for the first time in decades! Wikipedia defines them as shoes made of PVC plastic. Jelly shoes come in a variety of brands and colors and the material is frequently infused with glitter. The “Jelly” in its name refers to the semi-transparent materials, with a jelly-like sheen. Jelly Shoes were designed after World War II when there was a leather shortage in Europe. They were very popular in the 1980s when a pair could frequently be purchased for less than one U.S. dollar. Jellies made a comeback in the late 1990s, and once again early in the 21st century, when they gained considerable of popularity with revised styles targeting adults.

My little sister, Jennifer, bought a pair and didn’t like them, so she gave them to me. To be, shoes are shoes.  If they get the job done, more power to them!

It does take me back to elementary school though. . . . Ah, those were the days!

Here they are: Uck, I hate feet!

Jen - DO NOT READ!

So, I have always been an avid fan of deer meat. It’s been a favorite of mine since I started dating my husband several years ago. My dad or brothers, neither hunt. So when I married into a hunting-obsessed family, it took a lot of getting used to.

My husband hasn’t got a dear yet this year. It’s only bow season, so I am confident he will. (I hope so, because I am the one who has to put up with the whining if he doesn’t, lol)

Anyway, his friend did, and brought it over for Nathan to help. I did too. I’ll save you the details, but let’s just say that I couldn’t eat it once it was done.

My son, Trenton, ate so much that we had to make him stop because we were afraid he would get a belly ache! My little girl, wasn’t a fan either.

Either way, I hadn’t cleaned one before. New thing. Cha-Ching.

As most of you know, I am a huge Lactivist a.k.a. Breastfeeding Activist. When I hear of the nurse-ins all over the country, I cringe to think I can’t be a part of it. (A nurse-in is, for example when a nursing mother gets kicked out of StarBucks in New York, and hundreds of mommas and their hungry babies stage a protest at every Starbucks around the world by breastfeeding their children in front of the stores.)

I am always jealous that I can’t be a part of that. This isn’t near on that scale, but over the weekend I participated in Quintessence Breastfeeding Challenge. A little history: In 2000, a man had heard of 536 children in Australia who “latched on” at the same time in 1999. The first Quintessence Breastfeeding Challenge was held in 2001 with 856 children at 26 sites throughout Canada.

After being rejected from the Guinness World Records Book, it was decided to make every breastfeeding baby count, and they came up with their own rules. In 2003, the US participated. Since Canada celebrates World Breastfeeding Month in October, unlike the US, who celebrates in August, this has became an annual ordeal.

So, long story short, my husband, Nathan, my son, Trenton (3) and my nursing daughter, Braylyn (18 months) got up early Saturday morning and drove to St. Louis, to Forest Park.

To everyone surprise, including the local organizer, the 2008 Autism Walk was also being held that day. Police has completely blocked off one of the main streets, leading to the zoo (the challenge was directly across from the zoo) If Nathan hadn’t known a second way to the zoo, we would’ve never found it.

So, here I am looking for a huge crowd of mommas and babies, with no luck. We took the kids to the zoo, and gave up. But at 11 a.m., right after we left the ‘Monkey House’, I sat down on a big rock with Braylyn and I nursed her.

I was part of it, whether I was with them or not! * LOL* My husband took a picture of it for my daughters scrapbook, but I am afraid virgin eyes aren’t ready for that on here. If you are freaking out about Angelina Jolie’s 2 inches of breast, you aren’t ready for my whole 9 yards!

We had a great time at the zoo and when we were leaving, I saw a crowd of women and children near our car. So we walked over, and sure enough. It was the crowd I was looking for. Only 9 women came. It was disappointing.

I talked with the other moms for a few minutes and shared stories. Nathan and Trenton played in the field, while I talked.

It felt good to be around other women who share my same views. It felt good to see one women nursing a 21 month old and the other a 26 month old! They are part of a HUGE underground, growing trend in the United States, that I am extremely proud to be a part of.

Women breastfeeding their babies, until the child is ready to stop. Not weaning at an age that “society” deems as appropriate. Go MOMMAS!

Ticks. I hate them with a passion. My son, Trenton, who is 3, had a tick bite on the back of his head. I am super obsessed with watching for signs of Lyme Disease, since my mom was diagnosed. I had been looking through his hair daily to watch it. On Saturday, the tick bite was almost completely gone, but I noticed a big lump a little below where the tick bite had been. It wasn’t red or bruised like he had hit his head. I showed my husband and we decided we’d better take him to the doctor Monday morning.

I did. It was the first time I had seen this doctor (Dr. Crawford), and I loved him. He explained that it was a swollen lymph note. I thought we only had them in our throats, I was wrong. He said that they are all over our body and that a lot of times when we get a tick, mosquito, or flea bite, anything that sucks blood, it causes a little infection at the site, causing the lymph note closest to swell.

Since I knew that Trenton had just had a tick bite, he is treating him with a strong round of antibiotics, just to be safe.

I am sure it will all be ok. Trenton isn’t really sick or anything. But you can tell he is trying to fight something off. He has been sleeping so much. And he is really whinny.

My mom was diagnosed with Lyme Disease about 4 years ago. She pretty much diagnosed herself, then had the doctor confirm it. She was right. When you are one of the millions of Americans without insurance, you can’t go to the doctor and say “Hey, something’s not right, I am sick” and let them spend thousands of dollars to run numerous tests. So she looked up all her symptoms online and asked her doctor to specifically test her for it. It came back positive.

From what I understand, there are three stages of Lyme Disease. Whatever stage you catch it in, is the stage it stays in the rest of your life. It is treated with antibiotics when an outbreat occurs, but never cured. She was and is in Stage 2. Stage 3 can be deadly if not caught.

She blames it on “old age” but I can notice a huge change in her. My mom is Wonderwoman,seriously. She does everything for everyone else. Her energy level is down; her joints are in constant pain. It is sad. But she is Linda. And she is making it.

Anyway, so that is my latest worry in my Not-So-Ordinary-Life of Me. Yikes.

So, the year is getting closer to an end. And I find myself running out of new things to do, that do not involve a lot of brain power, because to be honest, I don’t have much left.

Each time I find myself needing to complete a newbie, I cook. I never cook. So there are lots of new things to try. Last night I made hamburgers and I made home-made french fries. Nathan, my husband had to throw out the hamburgers and make more, because there was still blood (I never claimed to be a chef) But I sliced itty-bitty strips of potatoes and threw them in our “Fry Daddy”, deep fryer. They were yummy. Both my children ate all of theirs, with ketchup of course!

As I left work Friday evening, I had no plans. I do believe this is the first time in maybe forever this has happened. There always seems to be something going on, a birthday party, baby shower, Relay event, something.

I am happy to say, I did nothing this weekend. Friday night, our family grew with the addition of my son’s hamster. He got it for his birthday in July. However, he has been keeping it at my moms house, where he stays each day when I work. His male hamster, “Snowball” and my little brother’s female hamster, had babies. And since the Snowball would eat his babies if left in the cage, we took him to our house.

The neighbors across the street gave him a little box turtle when we got home from getting the hamster.

After dinner, I took the kids to the park. The new park in Bonne Terre, where the old elementary school used to be (Which by the way, I will blog about soon). There, he found and caught a little tree frog, which of course, we had to take home.

We spent Saturday lounging around the house, eating more than we should. Saturday night, my husband went fishing on the Mississippi and was gone pretty late. Me and the kids made a pallet in the floor and watched scary movies, and that’s where we stayed all night, cuddled in a little pile, just the three of us. It was nice.

On Sunday morning, we visited my husband’s grandma. Her pool was filled with frogs. Guess what we brought home? Five more.

This brings the total to six frogs, one turtle and one hamster, all in the course of two days. Trenton, my son, does good though. He remembers to feed and water each of them.

Oh, and we still have a dog, Harley as well.

I started decorating for Halloween. My mom, as most of you know, is the “halloween lady” in Bonne Terre. So I get all her hand-me-downs, as she decorates each year. She is a little too morbid for me though. My sister will have to keep that tradition going!

This is my 17-month-old daughter beating up her 3 year old brother, on our Saturday fight night! (LOL)