School Already?!

When you have kids, one of the things that (eventually) hits your mind is getting them ready for school.

With this comes everything from books, games, preschool, etc. and you do everything in your power to get your babies ready to face the big scary kindergarten room. Now, we’ve been through this with Emma, who is now in 1st grade, but we are in the process of getting Maddie into kindergarten and I’m learning just how different these 2 beauties really are.

Emma took to learning with a quickness; she soaked everything up from day one and absolutely loved going to school. Maddie? Nah, she wants to go to school purely for the play and socialization aspects.

Chris and I have started really researching what a child should know by the time they start school and finding that we need to spend more time with Maddie than we did with Emma at actually pushing information at her.

She knows how to count, recognize colors and shapes and she loves to draw. She can recite the alphabet like it’s nothing but she doesn’t have much interest in reading; being read to, absolutely, but not the other way around. Emma was “reading” to us at a very early age so Maddie is tossing a curve ball at us.

The most important thing we are learning from this is that it’s OK for the girls to be this different; we need to cherish that and build on it.

We have a lot of teachers in our group of family and friends and they’ve all been awesome at telling us that she’ll be fine, she’s so smart and she’ll pick everything up in no time. But, we want more than that. We want to make sure she gets the best possible start and so we started really looking into at home programs, to go along with her preschool lessons, which we can do with her at night and on weekends.

It’s a really big undertaking considering we have another in school and a 3 year old who thinks the world (and it’s time) fully belongs to him, but we also feel it’s so important.

I got on Google and started looking for printouts and books that could lead us and we found an insane amount of language development, thinking, reading and a billion other things to get her ready!

I’m still trying to decide who is more excited because I am really excited about working with her on these things. Not only am I finding things she can do, but I’m finding checklists for us to be able to keep track of it all.

This is going to be a much different “beginning to school” than we had with Emma, but it’s going to be awesome anyhow!

Food Dyes

My second book is so, so different than my first and one of the things that is a big part of the book is what we’ve gone through, and are still going through, with Maddie and artificial dyes. This issue popped up again yesterday and I felt it was really important to put it on another stage because people need to be aware.

My middle beauty has an issue with artificial food dyes; meaning she becomes a highly skilled (in the art of pissing me off) little terror when she gets any; and I do mean ANY amount.

We talked to the multiple doctors at the Naval Hospital, teachers, friends, co-workers, etc. and finally realized that to keep her as the awesome little bit that she is, we needed to give her the foods and drinks her system could handle.

We went through our entire kitchen and pantry and got rid of every single thing that had artificial coloring in it and replaced it with products that used natural ingredients to color their stuff. The change in her was almost immediate; her nightly tantrums stopped, her fighting us at every corner stopped and her mean streak stopped.

She’s one of the most beautiful and loving little girls I’ve ever had the pleasure of being around and, when she ate or drank something with artificial dyes, she became the exact opposite of the girl we know. It was heartbreaking to watch because you could see in her eyes that she hated how she was behaving but she was powerless to stop it.

My baby girl is only 4, so the fact that she lived her life this way hurt; I feel like we should have realized sooner what was going on. But, Emma didn’t have these problems so it was all so new to us.

Our family and friends have been amazing and don’t send the kids anything she can’t eat. But, yesterday, she got her hands on a box of Valentine’s Day conversation hearts and started eating them before I realized what they were. She was so angry at me when I took them, but I could already see the change in her.

Last night was miserable. She made herself into a statue, stopped talking and refused to do anything she was told. Chris and I, already knowing this was coming, calmed ourselves and took turns talking quietly to her. It took about 30 minutes but I finally saw it leave while I was hugging her in her room. She has this “tell” and it’s how we always know she’s reached the point where she can let go of what she’s feeling and get back to being Maddie. She’ll all of a sudden start telling us about everything that made her mad during the day, even if it has nothing to do with what we are talking about, she wants us to know.

After she gets it all out, she’s exhausted and ready to sleep; Chris and I are usually ready to sleep at that point, too. It’s emotionally and mentally draining on everyone involved.

We don’t let any of the kids have dyes anymore; we don’t even have medicine in the house that uses them. I’ve spoken to a number of parents who have discovered the same reaction in their kids due to dyes and I wish more would look into it.

I’m not one of those parents that is all about natural/organic everything, I’m just not. But I believe in this because I’ve SEEN what it did to my girl and I believe that artificial dyes need to come out of foods as a whole.

I really hope this post reaches someone that’s in the same situation we were in and finds their answers.

That Moment When...

You are towards the end of your pregnancy, hot as Hades, and your cousin says: "smile because I'm talking your damn picture!" Worst. Thing. Ever.

I hate having my picture taken; I have no clue as to why though. I'm a straight mamarazzi. I'll follow my kids everywhere and snap thousands of pictures to show any and everyone. But you put a camera in my face and we'll have words.

I clearly don't scare my cousin. She basically told me to sit my butt down and deal with it.

She's an amazing photographer and I love how she takes photos of the family constantly. (Especially since we've been away from home for 9 years...)

So, the reason for this post? I woke up and was notified by Facebook that my amazingly, wonderful, beautiful cousin tagged me in those pregnancy photos from 7 years ago.

Even pregnant my face was skinnier then. Ticks me off something fierce. But, what can I say? I love donuts.

Back to these photos: I realized that one day, my kids are going to wonder why I'm hiding in every photo. That they'll want to see me as much as I want to see my mom. (Who is a notorious hider from cameras) I don't want that so I'm making a conscious effort to lose the chunk that I hate and get in more photos with my kids.

Meaning more gym time, not so much less donut time. Let's not get crazy here.



If any of you are in the Bay Area and are in need of a photographer, call Sandy; she's so worth it!

http://www.sandrarosephotography.com/

Creativeness

Creativity is something that, for me, comes and goes. When I see something that I love, I play with the design until it feels right. Does that make sense?

Probably not.

This picture popped up on my Facebook feed today:

I am so in love with this idea that I feel the need to gp take a sewing class just to make something similar. Someone took old baby clothes and turned it into a mini quilt. Talk about genius! 

My problem? I don't sew, nor do I save baby clothes. Does that make me a crap parent? The lack of keeping things for nostalgia moments like this? 

I might need to become a hoarder just incase something like this happens again. 

"Babe? Why the hell are you stock piling old socks that have holes and missing mates?!" Uh, what if I want to make sock puppets one day? Don't deny me my creativeness! 

That would go over well.

Mommy Flu

I woke up around 3 am this past Tuesday with a scratch in my throat that let me know I was about to hate life. The next morning, my voice started to go. I left work early 3 days last week and have come to the conclusion that I'm dying.

There's simply nothing else that makes sense. I can't talk, coughing constantly, gagging thanks to snot monsters in my nose and throat and I look like a Walking Dead extra.

My kids don't get it. They literally told me to drink my diet coke and get out of bed. Freaking harsh. How about you go get me a diet coke, some cookies and don't make me crazy until I can yell at you from the other side of the house, ya?

And the hubs. He made the mistake of asking me to make the kids some lunch.

He won't do that again.

Not while I'm clearly dying.

Where's my mom with some soup?

There should be a company that sends out a mommy fill in for when we're sick. This person cleans, cooks, etc while I hide and watch Hallmark.

I might create it.

Book Titles

I've just finished writing the first draft of my second book and I can’t think of a title to save myself.

It's downright pissing me off.

Sarcasm is my strong suit, my favorite language and damn funny; I’m just not sure how it'll be received based on the book subject.

I should just do whatever the heck I want to, right?

It's nice to see you all agreeing with me!

Though, I bet this post makes Cyn and Steph want to run for the hills, or booze, considering how "fun" formatting the first book was...

My sister and I went back and forth on a few different names and I think we picked one. 

Possibly.

Most likely. 

Getting Back to Awesome

Winning My Battle with PPD

We are in the editing stages right now, but I'm really hoping to have this published before the end of tax season! 

(That's April 15th, for those that weren't aware...)

Enjoy the Silence

You know those moments, when you first wake up, and it’s quiet and calm all around you?

If you answered yes, we can’t be friends.

This never happens in my house. If I’m not woken up by the blaring sound of my husband’s alarm, it’s by a cat, dog or child demanding my immediate attention. Don’t they know I was up late catching up on Once Upon a Time?

Every day starts like that; crazy and instantly loud.

Then, one day, I wake up and it’s quiet. Hub’s alarm didn’t wake me up, the pups are asleep on their beds, the cats aren’t in sight and all 3 kids are still curled up in their beds sleeping. It’s a thing of beauty. I don’t even know how to handle it because it’s so rare, so I do the first thing that comes to mind: grab a handful of chocolate chips from the pantry, my phone (which contains the latest story I’m reading) and my pillow and get to enjoying the silence!

The problem is, I get lost in reading, the kids over sleep and the next thing I know, we’re freaking late. And, I’m not talking 5 minutes here; I’m talking “still need to make lunches, get dressed and holy hell-I think I put my makeup on in the dark!” late.

My girls, in these crazy mornings, have become my “lunch helpers” and put together their own lunches so I can chase my son around the house with him yelling, “I not get dressed!” It goes great until one wants honey with their peanut butter and the other wants jelly. That’s when the claws come out and I’m even later because I have to clean up the condiments on the floor before we go. They’d help but they are too busy pouting in the hallway because they got plain peanut better since mommy was over listening to them.

Don’t worry; this makes them blame me for ruining e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g instead of putting it on each other.

Win-win, right?

Is this thing on?

If I had to add up the number of times I've read "create an author's blog" with my hands, well...

I'm terrible at blogs; mainly because I'm terrible at keeping up with them. Calling this a resolution would do nothing to help me remember to post, so we'll call this an experiment instead.

Maybe I'll get on this a few times a week and keep everyone updated on my next book, but with it being tax season, that probably won't happen.

Oh, you didn't know? Let me break it down for you:

-married to the military
-both work full time
-3 kids 6 and under
-2 cats, 2 dogs
-live 8 hours from almost all our family


There ya have it. My life in 5 bullet points. And I hate having my picture taken. Hate it.

This is going to be fun, ya?