Here we are, on day four of summer vacation. Over the past few days, it has been apparent that Joshua and Noah don't totally know what to do with themselves with less structure. More bickering. More whining. More boredom. But yesterday afternoon, they began to figure it out. Yesterday afternoon, they discovered mud. Today, they have been outside for almost five hours straight (which has been heaven as I'm not feeling great) and are just now starting to ask to come in, mostly because they are tired of b...
All right, folks. I'm all riled up again. Let's start with our Constitution, with the Bill of Rights, shall we? Amendment X says, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." This means that if the Constitution has not given the power to the federal government, then the power goes to the State and to the people. Education falls into this category. Nowhere in the Constitution is the ...
This was taken on Saturday night at our favorite restaurant, the downtown El Gaucho, where we celebrated nearly ten years of marriage come this September. I wore a beautiful new maternity dress that Jason gave me for our weekend sans children, which unfortunately you can't see that well in this picture. Our weekend was perfection - no cooking or dishes, wonderful food, whale watching, napping, Iron Man 3, the Corpus Christi Mass at the St. James Cathedral and Pike Place Market in the sunshine. We stoppe...
*****(Spoiler Alert - This contains details about the 4th episode of Season 3 of Downton Abbey)***** The past 24 hours have been filled with needless worry. As mothers, I don't think there's really any way around this reality. To start, we watched the 4th episode of the third season of Downton Abbey last night. As the episode progressed, I became suspicious that I was not going to like the outcome. The youngest daughter is going through childbirth and there are complications. Aware that I may not want...
My last post described how I want to focus on the joy and blessing of motherhood, especially on Mother's Day. While I believe that with all of my heart, this post has a bit of a different tune. For while my children indeed do not grow halos for any holiday, there's definitely a deeper problem than just not being angelic. Before I was a parent, I thought I knew some things about raising children. You may wonder what made me so presumptuous, but with a lot of experience working with children and their fa...
Happy Mother's Day! I just enjoyed going to Mass with my husband, children, parents and brother, followed by a delicious brunch at Arnie's with more family. It was lovely. As I'm sure all mothers do, I look forward to Mother's Day. But as with a lot of holidays, I've noticed that my expectations can be unrealistic. I love holidays and traditions and celebrating life with family and friends. Those are some of my favorite times. But in a way, you can almost look forward to a holiday or celebration too mu...
We had a fantastic weekend, full of celebrating. Jason had his 40th birthday last Friday. His mom, Liz, visited us from Hawaii to be here for the occasion. On Friday, we dropped off the kids at a friend's and went to the Space Needle for lunch. It was such a glorious day! The only time I think I have ever been to the top of the Space Needle was when I was a child, so it was so much fun to see it now. We had the most perfect day for it. The food was delicious and we really enjoyed ourselves. Afterwards, ...
I took this shot yesterday and it is quickly becoming a favorite photo of mine. About seven years ago, we were living in Kent, I was teaching and Joshua was a one-year-old. I was really lonely. I was the only one of my friends to be a married mom, we had moved to an area where I didn't know anyone, we were further away from my family and I wasn't really connecting with any of my fellow teachers. The Pre-K program that I taught was very separate from the rest of the school, so I really didn't even see th...
I woke up this morning feeling so awful. Nausea and a headache - Are you kidding me? After yesterday which was a pretty awful day, this was very discouraging. I stumbled into the kitchen and sat down. The day ahead seemed unconquerable. ALL I wanted to do was crawl back into bed. I have been reading a book of devotions titled, "More Devotions for Homeschool Moms," by Jackie Wellwood. There is also a first book of devotions. These are the most down-to-earth, relatable, practical devotions I have ever r...
WARNING! THIS IS A PREGNANCY RANT. THIS POST IS NOT CUTE. IT IS NOT INSPIRING. THIS POST IS REAL. IF YOU ARE LOOKING FOR CUTE OR INSPIRING, LOOK ELSEWHERE OR COME BACK AT ANOTHER TIME. I checked out some books from the library, many of which have to do with pregnancy and childbirth. This may seem funny, as most of these books are written for first-time moms, which obviously I'm not. But even though I've done this three times before, I don't think I'll ever get this pregnancy thing down. Some women cla...
