Out of Practice and Happy About It

This past week I had a moment that took me back the good old days. By the good old days, I mean when I first started this blog.

At that point, I couldn't go anywhere without someone telling me, "Wow, you're hands are full!" I had two small children and one on the way. Yes, my hands were full both figuratively and literally.

Of course, being at that stage in motherhood gave me plenty of blog fodder. Tons of it really. And yes, most it seemed to involve messes. I thought I was pretty much past those days. Enter Wednesday night.

We were leaving church and one of my kiddos had to use the bathroom. Of course, this child didn't realize this need until we were in the van. Normally I'd tell my kids they'd have to wait, but this time my kiddo had that certain look. I knew that if I forced my child to wait until after our 20 minute drive home, it would not end well.

Fortunately, Tony was with me so he stayed with the two children while I took the one inside to use the bathroom. I thought we'd be in and out. Instead, it was nearly 30 minutes before we came back to the car.

In the meantime, I had a child who went into the stall and couldn't get the toilet paper roll to work and then couldn't unlock the door. I had to make the child crawl back in the stall and figure out how to unlock it. In the process, the child who couldn't get the toilet paper to work had to do without toilet paper.

Going without toilet paper made a mess. This meant that I walked out with underw*ar in my hand and I had to reassure my kiddo it was okay to do without and just toss on pants until we got home. (I know. Aren't you so glad I'm sharing this?) Of course, the child again got locked in the stall and I finally realized it wasn't because my child didn't know how to operate the lock. Rather, my kiddo didn't know to pull on the door instead of push. I just stood there dumbfounded at how complicated a quick trip to the bathroom had become.

Once we were finally on our way home again, I couldn't help but laugh. That kind of event used to be our experience nearly every time my children had to use a public bathroom. In fact, that was probably mild compared to other outings we've had. I probably wouldn't have even found that blog worthy two years ago. Clearly, I'm out of practice. And in this case, I don't care if practice makes perfect, I'm content being out of practice with these types of incidents!

Hopefully it will be quite some time before I have another bathroom mishap to tell, but just to be safe, I'm going to sweetly ask my husband to take the kids to the bathroom the next time we're out in public!

Two Months Later...

I wonder how many post titles will have "Two Months" in the title? Anyways...

I wanted to share my favorite back to school picture of the year. Well yes, that is what I wanted to do. Blogger had other ideas. Sigh.

I'll have to describe it...

My little man got to school on his first day of kindergarten. He got his things put away in his locker and found his seat. He excitedly sat down only to find his teacher had put pink Play-doh at his seat. What? The insult. I couldn't help myself. I snapped a picture of him glaring at the offensive stuff. Right after that I swapped his for blue. I'm sure the girl who came to sit by him didn't mind!

Fortunately, school has only gotten better for him from that point. He's one of the younger ones in his class and he's doing just great. To say we're proud of him would be an understatement. We sent our oldest child to kindergarten last year and it's just as much fun to watch our second born experience his first year at school.

Way to go Chris! We're so proud of you!

Two Months! That Long? Really?

Wow, I don't think I've ever let two months go by without blogging. I'll be my mom doesn't even check this anymore. I do need to give a shout out to my little bro though, because I'll bet he still checks it regularly.

I started this blog four years ago when I was expecting our third child. She's now three months away from being four years old. My how time flies! It's funny because I started this blog to simply record our lives, but after having three children in just over as many years, it sort of took on a theme. It was the place I recorded the craziness of keeping up with three young children. Well, those three children are still young, but 6, 5, and 3, things certainly aren't what they used to be. I don't even buy diapers or pull-ups anymore! (Yes, it's awesome!)

My blogging has slowed for a couple of reasons. Mainly, it's slowed because though life has gotten easier as my children have gotten bigger, it's also gotten busier. Since two of my children go to school all day, I feel like I should do my best to get things done while they're gone so I can give them my full attention in the evening. That means I'm running errands and doing chores during the day and spending time with them in the late afternoons and evenings. Of course, my three year old is still with me most of the time and I love that!

The other reason my blog has slowed is because we've had a tough couple of years with one of our kiddo's behavior. I didn't want to record a bunch of negative memories. Quite honestly, at the end of many days I had to follow the motto of, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all!" Sure, there were plenty of good things mixed in during those times and I do wish I'd recorded more of them. Who knows, maybe one day I will.

A high school friend recently started up a blog. I love reading it! It made me remember that I had way more than two reasons that I loved blogging. So, I started typing this post. I don't know that I'll ever be back to the frequency I blogged a couple of years ago, but I'm going to try. I miss it. I love looking back and remembering what my days used to be like. I like laughing at the silly things I posted when I first started my blog.

Now that I have two school-age children, I'm truly realizing how fast the time goes. I want to remember this time. I want to savor it. I've found blogging is a way to do that. Here goes...