Some things I have realized..

yes, even in I have deep moments.

1. My children are teaching me tolerance ~ I can tolerate them running and screaming through the house for about 3 hrs.
2. My tolerance is not yet perfect ~ after about 3 hrs, I am forced to find them each separate jobs so that they will be quiet and stop running.
3. Knitting is teaching me patience ~ I can wait almost forever when I have my knitting with me.
4. My patience seems  conditional ~ if the kids are with me, or if I don’t have my knitting, my patience is apparently absent.
5. Knitting has also taught me that time is relative ~ when knitting a sock, those first 8 inches seem to just fly by, but that last inch, though worked at the same pace, can take hours.
6. There is no such thing as too much yarn ~ just trust me on this one. And don’t ask how much yarn I own.
7. I love my extended family, and sometimes I love them more the further away they are from me.
8. In some ways, I am a very old fashioned woman ~ I love cooking, canning, putting up food, making things “from scratch” as in not using mixes, taking care of my family (though the whole washing dishes by hand thing, it is for the birds)  and just in general being a homemaker.
9. In other ways, I am very modern ~ I love my computer and internet, and I am not willing to give them, or my cell phone up. (mind you, cell phone is our only phone, we gave up a land line years ago)
10. Knitting has taught me to plan ahead ~ it is easier to use up extra yarn than to find more of the same color and dye lot to finish a project.
11. I have learned that beauty is relative ~ I have a red circular shawl pinned to one wall, I knitted the shawl, and dyed it myself, I am very proud of it and I thin it is beautiful, I have had people ask me why I have a huge doily on the wall.
12. I have learned that by the age of 3 children can no longer hear the sound of their mother’s voice.
13. A child who loves to read is a gift, though sometimes you may wish that she reads slower, so that it is easier to keep her in reading material.
14. A child who doesn’t love to read, sometimes just hasn’t yet found something she enjoys reading.
15. Time spent reading is never wasted. Trust me on this one, ignore the rest of my family.

Life goes on…..

It has been a day so far.

I have worked on sorting out items from a co-op I have co-hosted, still waiting on shipping supplies. but we got some of it sorted. The girls helped, I would sit with a box and my spreadsheet, and tell them how many of what item to bring me, and I would pack it into the boxes. We will finish a soon as shipping supplies get here, both boxes and customs forms, because some of the participants are overseas with military.

We got a movie in today’s mail, it is 2 Fast 2 Furious, which I have not yet seen, mostly because it doesn’t have Vin Diesil in it and what is the point if there is no Vin? But #4 came out on DVD, and Hubster is being stubborn about watching #4 without having seen #’s 2 and 3… *sigh* men.  I am sure that once he gets home we will have a marathon, not only of these movies, but of all the things I have recorded over the last 3 weeks. He will want to catch up.

I have battled the laundry monster. He was threatening to eat my house again. I am always shocked at how much laundry a family of 5 can produce. I have more in the washer but it will have to wait until after 7 to get dry.

I mixed up pizza crust, I talked the girls into pizza pockets for dinner. I will make small(ish) circles of dough, add the toppings each child wants, then fold them up and bake. Great  personalized pizza meals. This way, I can make mine with mushrooms and far less sauce than the rest of the family likes, I swear they want so much sauce your toppings slide off. So we put together 4 pockets… 1 for each kid and 1 for mommy…

I have cleaned up some of the scattered mess that three kids always creates, but I am sure there will be more later.

Maybe after my house apes are in bed I can catch some TV and maybe do some knitting. I am not holding my breath.

silly child…

This morning I decided it was time to go through my linen closet and sort out towels, placemats, sheets, etc. and put them in the proper stacks, not just where my kids have shoved them, so that we can locate the things I know should be in there. This took me about 20 minutes, as I had to refold several items. Then I moved on to the next job on my list, and did that..

And suddenly I realized that my 2yo is missing… he is WAY to silent to be behaving himself.. so I start looking, I knew he had headed down the hall, so I check the girls room, and his… then PLOP something fell out of the linen closet, it is a table cloth off the second shelf, so I open the cabinet… and there, curled in a ball on the second shelf, is my 2yo.. grinning like the monkey he is. So I pulled him out and told him that was not a play place, if he must crawl into a cabinet use the dirty clothes cabinet, (where he and the girls play regularly) cause there are no shelves in there for him to fall off of or break!

Its Veteran’s Day

and being the grand child of two vets, and the spouse to another, not to mention the numerous friends and other family members who are also Vets, it is a holiday that is close to my heart. So when my 8 year old mentioned this weekend that there was no school on Tuesday, I took the opportunity to make sure she understands what the holiday is about. I asked her if she knew why there is no school today, she said it is Vet’s Day. I continued to question her what exactly it meant, and she said Veterinarian’s Day, but she knew the concept honoring those in our military, she was just getting the words Veteran, and Veterinarian mixed up. We discussed it a little while longer, and I made her understand that we are not just honoring those we know, but all Veterans, and those who died doing the job too. She seemed to grasp the concept, but I foresee having this conversation every year, for several years to come, especially since I have 2 more children who I need to make sure understand…

As my children

are running through the house screaming, and telling me how bored they are, I wonder…. Why was I missing them again? I should have just enjoyed the silence and ability to watch what I wanted on TV without worrying would it scare someone, or is it something little eyes shouldn’t see, or little ears hear. *sigh* I must think about dinner…

I am sure I will remember soon why I was missing them… prolly around the time my 2 year old clings to my neck for some small reason, or my 8 year old does something to be helpful…

cleaning…

and cleaning and cleaning, that is how we spent our day. I am talking MAJOR cleaning. moving couches and cleaning in and under them, moving all the things on the counter top and wiping down behind them and all.

And OMG the mopping. I must have mopped 8 times, I mopped until the mop didn’t come up dirty. Mind you, I have tile floors… in the desert. it is NEVER completely clean.

I am so ready for it to be bed time so I can have the relative peace of no running or screaming kids.

that time of day

rolls around again. As I put the baby in bed, for the third time, and have the older kids gather up their dirty laundry and pick up after themselves, in preparation for going to bed, I start considering what I will need to do tomorrow.

the start of the grocery list,

the to do list,

Meal planning,

activity planning to entertain 3 active monkeys.

is it any wonder I am exausted at the idea?Then I take a few breaths, and realize, it is quiet. ah… sweet adult time. I wonder if I should read something or watch something rated over PG-13?

Not sure

which is gonna make me insane first, The heat, the lack of sleep, or the children. Maybe all 3.

My 2 year old has quit napping, so by the end of the day, he is cranky and hard to deal with. Plus, he is waking up really really early, 4:30 yesterday, 4:00 this morning, and today, just as I managed to drag my half asleep ass in to him, he is crawling back into bed. So I laid him back down, and went back to bed myself. Only to be awoken for the day just 2 1/2 short hours later (need I mention that this brought my grand total of sleep last night to just 4 hours?)

On top of the fact that is is pushing 6pm and it is still over 100 outside.

Why Me?

my 6 year old is about to make me insane. She keeps chasing her brother around the house and taking his toys away, just to hear him scream. I think they are both very, very close to bed! And only an hour early!

Swimsuits. argh.

I knew my girls needed new swim suits this year. Their old ones were just too tiny, and plumb worn out. So I started looking. I hit my staple store, the local Super Walmart, and look around. they had about 10,000 two piece suits and maybe 15 one piece suits. So I start digging. I am not going to buy my 6 year old and 8 year old two piece suits, partly, cause I refuse to allow my 6 and 8 year old children to dress like they are 20!

I did finally manage to find two one piece suits, in the right sizes, that didn’t have legs cut to the armpits. They are kinda plain, no cartoon characters, no really wild colors, but they are still cute, and seem sturdy enough to last at least the summer.