What has brought you joy today?

I’ve had a full morning already, but its been good. Solly was exhausted much earlier than usual, which is what happens when your leg gets stuck between your crib bars at ridiculous o’clock in the morning. When the baby is tired, the whole day feels tired. You get it 😉 But I managed to feed him little treats until he fell asleep in his high chair and I gave in and put him down. It timed out surprisingly well, though, and he and Rowan went down for naps pretty much right on time.

Now its just me and the girly, and she is feeling pretty sleepy as well. We’re both stretched out in the living room, watching a bit of tv. Now that the house is nice and quiet, I went to find myself some lunch. I suck at eating lunch, guys. My eating habits are terrible. But I’m trying hard these days to at least grab a handful of fresh veggies or something so I’m not completely sick to my stomach by the time supper rolls around.

Todays lunch brings me SO much joy! Guys, we have a case of nectarines! And they’re PERFECT! We splurged at Costco the other day when we saw all of the new fruit. I got a case of nectarines, my favorite, and Brady got a case of his favorite as well; peaches. The counter by our pantry smells amaaazing! I never want it to stop! But since I don’t want any fruit flies to magically appear and ruin everything, I will only get to enjoy the small/taste of my favorite fruit in the world for the next few days, while I eat the whole case by myself. Which I’m actually pretty ok with. Does anyone else have a weird thing with nectarines? Why are they SO GOOD???

Today has been a good day, and it will continue to be good, but today, my highlight is my nectarine lunch. I may even have two…

I’m not talking about big lofty dreams of travelling across the world. Those kind of dreams feel pretty far out of reach these days, and I’m content with that. I actually had a dream that we went on a trip, just Brady and I, to somewhere with an ocean. I don’t know much more than that, but I remember how refreshing it was. I woke up with the itch to make it happen.

As things are going, we are not going to be near an ocean anytime soon, but we have a lake trip planned in August that I am looking forward to now more than ever!! I’m anticipating some beach time, some lazy walking, some ice cream, and just soaking in the lake air that is somehow SO DIFFERENT than the air here at home. Its not even about the lake. Its about the lake life. The easy going, nowhere to be type of attitude we can carry there. I am SO ready to go!

We’re actually thinking we may try to drive up to the lake for a day next week. The kids can get reacquainted with our lake and surroundings, and we can get a feel for what they’ll enjoy most. I hope its the first of many day trips this summer.

As for trip trips, I decided a long time ago that I’m going somewhere hot for our ten year anniversary. Somewhere luxurious. Maui-ish. Don’t worry, I’ve told Brady my plan. He knows I’m going whether he comes or not, haha! So I’m never too twitchy for a trip when I know that one is coming up eventually 😉 We’re 8.5 years in, so its not too terribly far off. C’mon guys, support my beautiful fantasy!

Over the next year and a half, though, our beautiful lake life will have to do 🙂 I’m SO thankful for it!

When the little boys are sleeping, and Dekker is at school, I have some one on one time with Laela. Sometimes we just rest and watch a bit of tv, sometimes we color, sometimes she plays lego, etc. Today, I was thinking we’d duck up to my room and she could play while I cleaned our en suite up a bit. However, now that the boys are down, and the dishwasher is humming away, I feel like my work is done for the moment. Clearly, I’m feeling somewhat unmotivated, haha! But today, I am SO glad I wasn’t motivated!

VeggieTales is on the tv, and Laela and I were cuddled under some blankets when she asked if I’d paint her fingernails. For some background, I’ve painted Laela’s fingers and toes less than five times. Every time I do it, she’s sat patiently through it, and then immediately wailed and fussed for me to take it off. Its SO frustrating, because on one hand, sure, I can do that, and on another hand, NO!! So I haven’t initiated nail painting in a LONG time, and it hasn’t been missed. But Laela began asking a week or two ago to have her toes painted. I reminded her how it always went, and while she didn’t say she wouldn’t complain, she did understand that I wouldn’t be removing it immediately afterwards. So I painted her toes (Dekkers too) and she was happy with it. No complaints a few days later 🙂 Success. And now, this morning, she asked for her fingernails.

I explained to her that she’d have to sit and be patient while I painted them, and she said she would. I got a clipboard to lay on her lap and grabbed the color she requested from my bathroom. She was sitting on the couch, her fingers splayed on the clipboard in her lap, ready to go. So we did.

And she loves them!!

She sat so patiently, and even lifted each finger as I got to it to make it easier on me. As I sat in front of her on the floor, she on the couch, she said quietly “You’re great at this, mommy.” Its like she knew I needed the reassurance! It was SO sweet! 💗 I thanked her, and was done very soon after. She gushed that she “luffed” them, and gave me a kiss.

My little girly seems to be feeling pretty happy and breezy today, and I’m so thankful for that. Some days feel heavier than others, for a thousand different reasons, but the kids being happy makes ALL the difference!

Does anyone appreciate my plays on words? No? Just me? Thats fair. Dekker actually joined in my wordplay the other day, referring to cleaning up all the toys as “toydying.” So at least he supports my dry humor.

However, as the title suggests (if you understand me) I’m feeling pretty blah today. But I’m trying to be realistic about it, because we had SUCH an “up” weekend, I’m probably just coming down from it a bit. And I’m SO thankful for our wonderful weekend, so I’m trying to see my blah feeling as a good blah rather than a bad blah. Is any of this making sense? Moving on…

I got to sleep in pretty decently, which these days means past 7:00, and I’m ok with that. It is a whole new world having our room to ourselves. Brady and I sleep better, Solly sleeps better, and the big kids probably sleep a little bit less because they are so excited to share a room still, but they’re happy, so its worth it. So even when the days feel a little long or a little challenging, a good nights sleep makes all the difference.

The little boys went down for naps after lunch, and the big kids are hanging with me in the living room. We needed a tv break today, and I decided that Laela would get to choose their show today. She was elated, and Dekker didn’t even complain. Its as though he KNOWS he owes her one. He was in pretty rough shape this morning, and as a punishment, he had to go clean up the pieces of cereal from the dining room floor. They had rice krispies for breakfast, so there was a lot (Rowan is terrible at eating rice krispies, and all of the kids eat them dry) Anyway, Laela offered to help him with his punishment, and got down on the floor and picked up cereal with him. That was a definite high point for me. So when I suggested that Laela could pick the show, Dekker said “That makes sense” and buckled down to his Lego.

If the rest of the day feels difficult, or even just hem haw, THIS was a positive! Its good to remember the positives.

This all being said, I think we’re going to venture out this afternoon. We need some Costco staple items. Does anyone else constantly run out of milk, yogurt, and bananas at the same time?? Please let this not just be us! So we’ll load up on those things, some more fresh stuff (because our kids are devouring grape tomatoes right now) and then duck a bit further into the city for some makeup items for a couple of appointments I have coming up. Also Starbucks, because mango black tea lemonade is really working for me these days. Yum! So it seems like there are positive things yet to come!

I hope your Monday has been really good, despite my weird, downer post and the grey weather. Maybe it’ll drown some of the tent caterpillars! See, look! Another positive!

Today, Brady and I enjoyed a brief moment in the spotlight of the sun. We, along with our friend Carrie, played a set of songs at the local car show. It was SO fun, and SO worth all of the hours of work and practice that we put into it. We had a total blast. Thanks again, Carrie, for getting us involved, even though I know we bring a few complications into the mix 😉

We were so grateful to have my parents be willing participants as well, by caring for our kids during our sound check and practice, and bringing them to the event in our bus. Jerilee even came, and hung out with them, took pictures and videos, and supported and loved on everyone. We have SUCH amazing people in our corner.

Our town has been celebrating its centennial this weekend, which makes me feel quite emotional, if I’m being honest. I’ve not been feeling well at all this weekend, so I’m sad to say we’ve missed most of the events and goings on, but while this is a very important weekend for my town, its also a VERY memorable weekend for us. While our hometown celebrates its 100th year here, we celebrate our FIRST year here. We have officially been residents for ONE YEAR TODAY! I am SO honoured to be a part of this beautiful town. It has always been my home, but I’m confident that I can speak for the rest of my family when I say it felt like home to everyone the moment we set foot into our new house.

One year ago, so many people stepped up and helped us not only move stuff to our house, but arrange our things so they were usable and liveable. My closet was organized. My kitchen was set up according to my awkwardly specific map. Furniture was placed where I asked, and cribs were set up in the right places. I sat, and held my baby, and did very little to help, and it was AMAZING.

We have had such an immense year, loaded with SO much good and a pretty decent amount of hardship, if we’re being straight up. And I know we can’t always have the best thing, or the easiest thing, but I am so grateful that we’ve been able to live in this beautiful place during this time of life rather than so far away. What if Dekker had to start school out in Radisson, where I wasn’t happy with the system? What if we had the same problems from our rentals in our home, and couldn’t leave? What if, heaven forbid, we miscarried while in Radisson?? God would’ve seen us through, but it would’ve been so so much harder. Here, we’ve made closer friendships. We’ve become involved in the school and the town and in the church again, finally! We are part of a community that loves us and that we can shower love on too.

Today just really brought to light how far we’ve come. I’m so glad t it was finally our turn for this dream to come true.

I am SO proud to live where I live.

As I mentioned, this weekend is the annual weekend where our town celebrates itself with activities and events. And today began with a parade!

Unfortunately I was feeling pretty gross yesterday and it carried over into today. Brady did the whole morning with the kids and I slept until 10:00-ish. I got myself dragged out of bed and dressed, and we drove to my parents place around 10:30. There, we met my parents, my brother and his family, and a couple of their friends. We made it over to the parade path and picked our spot.

I loved the parade this year. The last time we went, there were a LOT of sirens and they really put Dekker off. I know lots of people liked the novelty, but just for our family specifically, that was the hard part of the parade. Enough that Dekker actually didn’t want to go :/ So I was very relieved when the emergency vehicles just waved and threw candy without blasting their sirens. It was really nice for us 🙂 There was one brief incident where Solly got nailed with a water balloon, though, haha! It was TOTALLY unintentional, and the thrower of the balloon was completely apologetic and looked to feel pretty sick about it. He recovered pretty quickly, and all was well, but it definitely a first! Lol! The kids pulled in a boatload of candy and got some sun. It was a good morning.

It was lunch time by the time the parade was over, and the little boys were ready for a nap. So was I, frankly. I have the body aches of a person who has been throwing up for days on end, even though I haven’t vomited at all! Just SO sore! So once again, Brady manned the kids and I went up to bed to rest my body, and eventually nap. It was exactly what he doctor ordered.

Brady woke me up when we had about a half hour before it was time to head out again. My mom had invited us to join the rest of the group for supper to celebrate Sollys birthday and all be together. We haven’t seen my brother and his family since Christmas, which is CRAZY, so it was definitely time. We had a great visit and supper, and the kids all ate their food super well. Solly ate an entire hot dog. As in a whole wiener and bun, plus some watermelon, and then about half of a sliver of cake, but at that point he was SO full! Pretty impressive eating skills, Solly Wolly!

The bigger kids all went downstairs to play after supper, and Solly and his littlest cousin sat upstairs at the table, playing with his new birthday truck. As is my moms usual, every single kid got a little present as well 😉 Can’t have anyone feeling left out!

Now, we’re home, because at least ONE of them is feeling finished 😉 Kids are down, bath is running, and we’re feeling pretty wiped out. Though if I’m being honest, I REALLY hope I’m awake and alive later this evening. Even if we can’t get to the fireworks, maybe we’ll be able to see them from here 🙂 Everything is just so much nicer now that we live here!

We didn’t get to the few activities we had hoped to today, but we’ll be somewhat out and about tomorrow anyway. I say again, car show, guys. You should probably come.

These last few days have been challenging with the kids. We’re in a fun new stage that is loaded down with arguing, lying, and flat out disobedience. Its SUCH a difficult time, and the days have felt pretty long. Yesterday, specifically, was unreal. Un. Real. Just unlike any other day I’ve ever had. This is out of the norm for us, and caught me quite off guard just how disobedient my kids were being.

By the time Brady got home, I was ready to high five him, run away to bed, and never ever surface. But once cannot simply tap out of parenting. To be fair, we come pretty close sometimes, when he gives me breaks to go hide in bed, watch some YouTube, and relax my brain a bit. In this case, however, Brady has been feeling nauseous with throbbing headaches for the last three days, and was in no shape to tap me out. On the contrary. I sent him right up to bed and he slept for a solid hour until I had to go get Dekker from school. We went to bed at 9:30 last night.

I won’t lie. I was pretty apprehensive going into today, for a number of reasons, actually. A big part of it, though, was based on yesterday and how incredibly hard it was. I didn’t want a redo of all of that I couldn’t handle it. I am SO thankful for a mom who spent almost the whole day with me, not because we had planned for it, but because she knew I needed the company. She stayed until Brady got home. Now that he’s home, he made me a passion tea lemonade and sent me up to bed. He suggested I try to find some positives to throw in here so I’m not a total downer. Don’t worry, my words, not his. So here are a few positives.

Company! I loved having my mom around, for my own enjoyment and also some solid distraction for my kids.

Passion tea lemonade, because its delicious.

I have less tent caterpillars than everyone else because we have no greenery. As an aside to this positive, don’t you find that wet splat sound they make when you step on them kind of satisfying? I do, but I’m in a pretty strange headspace right now…

I bought an old guilty pleasure song the other day and pumped it in thew van today, and I super duper enjoyed it 🙂 I highly recommend each of you purchase at least ONE guilty pleasure song that you haven’t heard in ages or are embarrassed to like. It feels great.

Our beautiful deck made for some fresh air this afternoon while the little boys were sleeping.

I still really like my purple hair.

I think thats about enough for now. Forgive me for being off my game. I’m trying to get back on it. This will be a busy week as our town celebrates its centennial! I recommend coming to the parade tomorrow morning, seeing the balloon guy tomorrow afternoon, hitting fireworks in the evening if you can, and definitely the show and shine Sunday afternoon! I hear the music is going to be pretty bomb 😉

We didn’t have any concrete plans nailed down for Solly’s birthday yesterday. I know that sounds bad, but we just didn’t. We didn’t know what the weather would be like, since the days have been insanely windy, and we had hoped to have a bit of a party out on the deck with ice cream and whatever else. But then yesterday, the day turned gorgeous and we had to pull something together last minute. I have to say, though, that I think it worked out!

Brady got home early from work, bearing Starbucks and Solly’s “birthday cake.” We’ll talk more about that later. He quickly got washed up and changed, and we ventured out on our first family bike ride! It was super hard to take pictures and everyone looks terrible, so I’ll spare you those, but I had Solly on the back of my bike, Brady hauled Rowan and Laela in the trailer, and Dekker rode his bike. It was a lot of fun 🙂 Though to be completely honest, I swear I haven’t sat on a bike since I was maybe fourteen, so that plus adding a kid on the back and driving on the lowest gear made it a bit tricky, haha! Against popular belief, apparently you can forget how to ride a bike! Or I can, anyway.

When we got back home, the kids wanted to stay outside, so we lugged some big Tonka trucks onto the deck and out we stayed. They LOVED the freedom and fun on the deck! The sun was BLAZING and the kids were turning red fast. I made sure they wore their hats, but they were just toasty. I knew they’d be devastated to go inside, so I opted for a deck supper. I ducked inside and put together plates of crackers and cheese, apple slices, pepperoni, and handfuls of fresh veggies. I refilled everyone’s water bottles, and brought everything out. This was an easy way to force them to sit still at least, so they wouldn’t be as sweaty.

When it was time to go inside, they were pretty sad, but recovered with the promise of Solly’y birthday treat! Not exactly the gourmet cake that Pinterest tells us kids are supposed to get, but still delicious 🙂 It also helped that Jerilee arrived right as we came inside, bearing balloons to celebrate Solly’s birthday!!

Everyone got a cake pop, though somehow I didn’t get a picture of one of the kids eating theirs, so we’ll just stick to the birthday boy. He didn’t hesitate even, really, and dove right in. Laela and Rowan definitely weren’t sure until I broke into them and proved there was cake in there.

A quick round of Snapchat with their Auntie Jerry, and everyone was off to bed!

It wound up to be a pretty awesome birthday! I had thought this was just a “for today” kind of lame party but I’m pretty satisfied with the outcome, actually, and I think my baby boy felt solliedly celebrated. (See what I did there?)

Yup. We party hard over here!

Today my precious Solly Wolly turns ONE! This year has been a total blur, loaded with all kinds of things. Rather than focusing on all of the huge changes our family has gone through and the hardships we’ve faced, I’d like to say how blessed we are to have had Solly along for the ride. He is an amazingly content, positive little dude, and he fits into our family so well. He requires and asks for so little, which is not only helpful, but reminds me to slow down in the times that he very clearly needs me to. I know that he means it when he asks for something. He’s so clear. I’m amazed by him on a daily basis.

While I’m saying the year has been a blur, the day he was born is not.

I will NEVER forget that day. It was relaxed and happy, which was perfectly fitting, because so were you 🙂

I was so smitten with you the moment I found out you were growing in my womb, but MAN! Meeting you was a complete game changer! You were soft and smooth and comfy and relaxed. You were HUGE. Almost as big as your record-holding brother. I am so thankful I was able to have you eight days early 😉 You were complication-free, and just wanted to sleep, which your dad and I were happy to comply with. Anything for the baby.

You’ve changed a lot since that day. Who knew a person could continue getting cuter past the point of average adorability?? You set the bar pretty high, my boy!

Thank you for joining our family and sharing all of your love with us! I love your heart, Solomon Brady. I hope you feel all of our love right back for you! Your daddy and I love you in a way you won’t likely grasp until you have babies of your own, and your siblings have a very protective love for you as well. I happen to know MANY other people out there who are quite fond of you, as well.

You are loved dearly. I hope your day is so happy.

I’ve been reaching a point of frustration with the fact that Solly is still in our room. I love the little guy, but he wakes up unreasonably early in the morning, and while we’ve been sleep training him forever, he consistently wakes up around 4:30am. And FOR SURE for sure if Brady is getting up for work. Its a guarantee, and I’m super duper not a fan. I’ve been starting to feel desperate to get him out of our room, but we just do NOT have a room for him! We’ve been waiting to bunk him in with Laela, but 4:30 is just too too early for her. We thought his mornings would get a bit longer as he got used to not getting up in the night, but they aren’t. As the days are getting longer (which we LOVE) the mornings are getting brighter earlier, successfully (you guessed it!) waking the baby earlier. We are SO over it.

This weekend, in discussion with Brady’s parents, I joked that we should just put the three older kids in one room together and then Solly could have his own room. And Brady and I just stared at each other. How have we not considered this before??

So yesterday evening, we rearranged the rooms! These are the before pictures. Please forgive the messy beds. I have yet to enforce bed-making, haha! Don’t judge!

The boys room is the top picture. Dekker’s bed and Rowan’s crib were actually end to end, but we had already moved the crib before I remembered to take pictures. No biggie, though. And then the bottom picture is the second, smaller bedroom. That’s Laela’s bed and a crib for Solly. But it just wasn’t happening.

So we switched to this!

Yup. We just lined them up, haha! All three kids fit across the room, with some space to get out between Laela and Dekker’s beds. At the end of Rowan’s crib is their dresser. Now, we haven’t committed to this change fully, so Laela’s clothes are still in her room, but if she’s going to stay in with the boys, we’ll move the clothes around and add her stuff in there somewhere too. Meanwhile, the second bedroom is just a crib and a big dresser, plus Laela’s end table and some bigger toys. Its kind of an awesome set up!

I likely don’t even have to say it, but the big kids agree that its an awesome set up 🙂

It took longer than usual for them to fall asleep, but no one expected anything different. It was funny to watch them and listen to them.

Solly is still not too concerned about his surroundings.

Is he the biggest burrito you’ve ever seen? Don’t hate on us for swaddling him still. He gets out of it instantly. Its more of an indicator for him that its bedtime than anything. We watched him on the monitor, too, and he crawled around his crib and chatted a little bit before succumbing to sleep. No crying or even fussing.

I only had one mild heart attack in the night, when Dekker came up to our room and told us Laela’s blanket had fallen off her bed. He was pretty distressed. He had tried to lift it back onto her bed for her but hadn’t been able to. Brady went down to help them and as it turns out, Laela had actually fallen out of bed, wrapped up in her blanket, and was still fast asleep! Brady lifted her back into bed and the night went on smoothly. WAY better than anticipated!

I woke up just before 7:00. I don’t remember my last uninterrupted sleep through until 7:00! I woke up with the sun and that was it. My first thought was to check the monitor. And it wasn’t on! I had a brief moment of “Oh no! Have they been awake for a super long time already??” But then I realized that the monitor was actually in sleep mode. As were ALL of our kids!!!

I lay back and rested and lay around and wasted some time on my phone. Then I got up, put on deodorant, brushed my teeth, and put on clothing straight out of my closet! As in NONE of it was worn yesterday and/or the day before! It was all fresh! This sounds small, but its a pretty big deal when someone lives in your closet. Or wakes up every time you open the door to your bathroom. I swear, guys, it was a whole new world! Finally around 8:30, the kids were awake and talking. Well, the big kids were. Solly had a brief moment where he stood and talked a bit, and then plunked back down and went back to sleep. Again, no fussing or crying at all. It was amazing!

I went down and got the big kids up and they got on breakfast. Solly woke up with the general hubbub, and our day began. I do not expect every night to go quite this smoothly, but I am THRILLED with how the first night went. I am encouraged and hopeful that this setup will be good for the kids, and in turn, for Brady and I. I see a new, earlier schedule in our future with this new arrangement, but I can roll with that 🙂

Today feels refreshing. I hope you all got some good rest last night as well!