Four years old

Can you believe our baby is four years old already?! Well she is. She had her checkup this morning. She was bouncing off the walls, talking to everyone, and being super silly. I had warned her that she was probably going to get shots (and she did, 4 of them!) but she had obviously not remembered what that was like. The poor nurse had just given a baby shots next door and then told Kaylee "please don't be sad with me". She's always been so awesome with my kiddos and she's always so sad when she has to give them shots. Kaylee did ok. She was upset, obviously, but didn't scream much, lol. After she said "why did she do that to me?". The poor nurse was upset. I told Kaylee that we have shots so we don't feel really bad and asked her if she wanted to feel really bad. She said yes. Silly. But after a toy from the treasure chest, a lollipop, and a My Little Pony sticker, everything was mostly ok. She asked me later "why did she poke me?". Love this age :-)

So she's now 34 lbs and 40.5 inches tall. And no worries at all with hearing or vision. She's an amazing little girl. Even if she is 4 going on 14!

Toys

So I'm sure every parent goes through the growing pains of an overwhelming amount of toys in their house. Or maybe we just let them have too many. Or... we are incredibly blessed with a big group of friends and family at our kids birthday parties and so we have a LOT of toys. Yeah, probably that last one is most accurate. This last weekend we finally decided that enough was enough and we have relocated the toy chests, tubs, etc. to their rooms instead of being in the living room. When they were babies, this was a necessary evil, and now, it doesn't have to be. It's been an odd feeling though. Toys have been a part of that room for 6 years. And yet, there's an overwhelming feeling of bliss associated with that move. And I know my hubby is happier, lol. We also are starting to weed out the baby toys from their rooms. We've kept all of the stuffed animals cause I hate getting rid of those... and books... I was actually really proud of Brendan cause he gave up a toy that I didn't think he'd be ready to give up yet. And I haven't had many complaints from them about the toys I took out.

Kaylee starts ballet tomorrow. Excited of course and a little bit nervous too. Probably just because I'm so NOT a dance mom, lol. Looking forward to it for sure though. She has her pink leotard, pink tights, pink bow/bun holder, and pink shoes all ready for tomorrow morning. And, in a rare occasion, we are all able to make it tomorrow to watch. Should be interesting to see how Brendan handles being the one who has to sit and watch for once. Their cousin will be in the younger class that meets at some other time but it should be fun to watch them both in the recital next summer.

I've started yet another attempt to get in better shape. I decided I need to find something I can do consistently to prove to myself that just moving is better than nothing. So I discovered the Ab Challenge on a friend's page and completed day 3 yesterday. Today is a rest day. Each workout consists of sit-ups, crunches, leg lifts, and planks in various amounts. I really need to meet this goal. And then do another month to prove I can and another and another until it becomes such a habit I can't live without it. Here's hoping :-)

We are here!

We are still here. Just crazy busy these days. And busy in a for real way, not in a "we're just trying to relax, leave us alone" kind of way. In the midst of everything I realized I hadn't updated in forever again.

Summer has been SO hot here. For some reason, it hasn't bothered me as much as it has in past summers. We've been outside more and I've really enjoyed it. Got the tan to prove it too! Brendan has been playing coach pitch baseball at the Y again. And, just like last year, the Y just can't seem to get their act together. I tried to register Kaylee for soccer and was told they didn't have it for her age group. And yet, EVERY Saturday during Brendan's games there are 3 year olds behind us playing soccer. In the land of baseball... we have seen every age during the games from 3 - 10. So every week the rules seem to be different too. Sometimes they let them try hitting off the tee after striking out from pitches and sometimes they don't. Ridiculous. But I suppose that's what we get for wanting to play baseball in the summer in Houston. From now on, we'll be doing baseball in the spring. 

Brendan had his 6 year checkup (how can he be 6?!) and he is 44 lbs and 46 inches tall (almost 4 ft!). Everything else looks good too. I just knew that this visit would be the one where they tell me he's too skinny and I need to feed him more or give him one of those weight gain shakes. So when Brent offered to take him, I was relieved, lol. Then it turned out that I had nothing to worry about. He's right in the middle percentile for weight :-)

I turned 32 in June. Pretty soon my siblings and I will all be in our thirties. Time seems to be flying these days. We're trying to mend the wicked ways of our twenties and eat well. Some days/weeks it works but more often than not, it doesn't. It's hard to change, lol! We're actually considering joining the CrossFit craze. We're gonna try out a class after baseball gets over. We've gotta do something and at least the one we're going to try has a kid area for while you work out. Although some days I feel like I could bring them with their Kindles in tow to the gym I currently have a membership at (make that have, but don't use), and they'd be fine. 

Kaylee is her normal happy-go-lucky self. Her love of princesses, dresses, and all things pink is unwavering. She does at least let me dress her in jeans and other colors every once in a while. But if she had it her way, it would be dresses and sandals every day. 

That's all I can think of for now. Hope everyone is doing well!

Disney Infinity, Death, and Tax Season

See what I did there? Lol. A sad attempt at humor in a week that has been less than humorous...

We'll start with the good. We bought Disney Infinity for Brendan for Christmas (ahem... Santa got it for him). It's amazing! SO much to do and he has such an imagination that running around the toy box area with him is really fun. He's built an incredible world to play in. Playing all the quests in the different worlds has been fun too. Although, we tend to do marathon questing days so we can get the really cool stuff that comes with the last 4 or 5 quests. I really hope they realize they could just keep making characters for one game instead of trying to do a second game. Although I doubt that'll happen :-/ 

Kaylee has a lot of fun watching us play actually since it's characters she knows too. She tried to play once and brother was not happy. They get along most of the time, but they are becoming more like normal brothers and sisters each day, lol. She mostly likes to wear her princess dress and twirl and jump. SUCH a girly girl! We're definitely gonna get her in a sport this summer (soccer probably) and then we'll do either gymnastics or ballet in the fall. Brother is gonna do t-ball again and last year it seemed like all the little sisters except for Kaylee were doing soccer, so maybe she can make some friends to hang out with during brother's practices/games.

And for the death... My Grandpa died on Sunday. He was the last of my grandparents. We told Brendan because he was aware of who he was and we knew he would ask about him. We tried our best to explain, but I'm not sure he took it seriously. So we decided it's probably best to not take him to the viewing or funeral. I am very glad that Grandpa isn't in pain anymore, but I hate saying goodbye. 

Taxes... Oi vey this has been one of the worst tax seasons yet. I WOULD be getting a LOT more done if our programs were working more often. And of course, the aforementioned death has interrupted the flow of things as well. But hopefully things will get back to normal after this and I can have a more normal work schedule as well. 

A random update, but hopefully they'll get less random and will happen more often. I kinda missed blogging :-)

Kaylee checkup

Kaylee had her 3 year checkup earlier this week. Everything is good. She's getting taller and skinnier. I've actually seen her rib cage for the first time in the last 3-6 months, lol! She's 31 lbs and 37.75 inches. Kaylee also proved that she was blessed with my blood pressure. She was running around like crazy and it was only 93/46. Gotta love those genes! Silly girl had a flu shot and was more upset that her band-aid was a band-aid and not a sticker cause it was shiny. She was all smiles two seconds after.

Both of my kids are amazing me in how much they love to draw and color. I don't remember ever loving either one of those activities. Probably because I was never very good at it. Turns out I'm pretty decent at painting though! I've done two paintings in the past year at those drink wine and paint places, both for bachelorette parties :-)

Haha, just noticed that I'm sitting in the exact same spot in both pictures. And realizing that the photo booth pics I've taken at the last two weddings I went to, I am also in that front left spot. Apparently that's my go-to picture spot.

Things have been hectic this week trying to get ready for a garage sale and a Thirty-One bag party. Shameless plug: www.mythirtyone.com/Jhood If you wanna shop, look for my name under "My Parties". 

Brendan is still struggling with staying on green all week at school (for conduct they have colors purple-best, green-good, yellow-not-so-good, orange-bad, red-worst). But then he got his first report card and his conduct was marked E for excellent. Either his teacher had a pregnancy brain moment or he must have some real heathens in his class, lol. His schoolwork seems to be right on par though, so at least there's that :-) And by the way... when did they take away grades for cutting and pasting in Kindergarten? I'm mad only because I never got a check for that... always a minus :-(

Kaylee is loving MDO as always. She talks about going to see Ms. Kim and Ms. Anna a lot. We're working on potty training still. Hoping we'll be out of diapers before the Disney trip. That would be awesome. Kaylee doesn't take naps (except at MDO) now :-( Bedtime has been horrendous pretty much since she learned how to walk. I never get to leave her room without her crying, it doesn't matter how much time I spend in there. She just thinks bedtime is playtime with mommy. Could be due to nights when she woke up in the middle of the night and I just give up and sleep on the couch while she plays. So now that she is at the age where she doesn't "need" naps, we decided it was time to give them up. Last night actually wasn't as bad as it has been. Not great, but not awful. 

Daddy has started collecting old video games cause he and his friend John got nostalgic. It's fun to see all the old games though. And amazing to see how good he is at all of them. He has what he calls the "game gene". It's quite a sight to behold. So if anyone has any old games, consoles, etc. we'd love to take them off your hands for ya :-)

That's about it for us Beans. Hope everyone is doing well!

Bad guys

So I've been thinking about the TV shows we love and what our kids love to watch and how they reflect what's going on in our world today. The recurring theme in that part of our lives is bad guys. Brendan almost always sides with bad guys when he watches shows or watches us play video games. I can't tell you how many times he's told me "don't shoot the bad guys!". And some of our favorite shows have bad guys as the stars (Dexter and Breaking Bad). So what's up with that?!

First we'll talk about Brendan...

This one has stumped me for a while now but when I think about the super heroes he loves and his love of Star Wars, who can help but love the bad guys in those? They're awesome! I don't think I've known any boy who didn't love Darth Vader at one point in their lives. He can control you with his mind and fight with a lightsaber. So cool! Same with all of the super heroes (at least in their cartoon/comic forms). The bad guys look cool and do/say silly things. In fact the bad guys that existed in our cartoons growing up have been changed to be bumbling idiots instead of evil guys that you're genuinely afraid of. Best example? Pete the Cat from the Mickey Mouse cartoons. Does anyone remember that episode (usually shown around Halloween) where Pluto goes to doggy hell and stands before a jury of cats with Pete as the judge? He was downright scary back then! Now he's just mean and goofy (no pun intended, lol). So, my conclusion with all of this is that I think because bad guys are less scary now, it makes the old bad guys not as scary and therefore likable. 

Now for us...

First, Dexter... If you're not familiar with the show, he's a serial killer but he works for the Miami Metro Police as a blood spatter analyst. He's obsessed with blood and so he kills with knives. But before you go thinking he's all evil, he lives by a code that only "allows" him to kill people who deserve to be killed. People who've done unspeakable things and gotten away with it by our judicial system standards. And so yes, what he does is bad, but he's channeled it to where I wouldn't call him evil. Why do we make these "exceptions" for something that by biblical standards isn't okay at all? The culture we live in these days is a scary place with laws bending to almost the breaking point at every turn. And so the thought that there could be someone out there who is helping protect you in a way you could never even think about much less try, is actually comforting. At least in my mind. The fact is our judicial system "works" but that doesn't always mean it's right. It is fair to have a jury of your peers but humans are fallible and therefore not always the best judges. Don't take this to mean I think we need to bring computers into the mix or anything, just acknowledging that a system that was put in place by people of faith is no longer working well. And I'm not saying that people that do not believe in a higher being can't have morals.

Then Breaking Bad... A chemistry teacher finds out he has cancer and has no way to pay for treatment, much less find a way to provide for his family if he dies. He goes on a ride-along with his DEA brother-in-law and sees a former student running away from a Meth lab. Long story short... he decides he can cook a pure Meth that will bring in a ton of money and help him meet his goals. As the series continues his morals slip until he the drug business is all-consuming and he loves the power that comes with it. So... why the heck would someone like me love a show about a substance I've never seen in real life and would never know how to get if in some bizarre universe I wanted it?! Because a man of middle class stature who is a teacher for Pete's sake should be able to afford the health care he needed and turned to desperate measures to save himself and his family. It's also a fascinating realm of existence that I have no knowledge about. And in a time when this country is trying to legalize marijuana so that maybe crime, drug abuse, and turning to heavier drugs will decrease, it's good to see the dark side of things. 

To sum things up... One of my favorite book series of all time is Frank Peretti's This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness. They open your eyes to spiritual warfare. They've also caused me to no longer be able to watch scary movies, lol. Especially ones like The Exorcism of Emily Rose. They made demons too real and so that movie in particular scared the heck out of me! All of that to say I think it's important to be aware of the dark. If we live with our heads in the sand pretending our faithful lives are all that matter, I don't think we will be prepared for the demons of this world. We won't be prepared to witness to the lost and bring them into the light. 

Ok... promise next post will be back to light-hearted kid talk :-)

Better

Ok, that looks better :-) And it looks good on the mobile version. Something about that background picture reminds me of the outdoor scenes in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. So my nerdiness is satisfied.