Long Term Gratification

Bode saved his money for over a year to buy the Lego Millennium Falcon.  

If you know how much my son loves to buy stuff, you will understand how big of a deal this is. 

 It was a great lesson in self discipline and the pay off was huge.  

One morning he woke up at 6 AM because he "heard a plop" and thought it was the mailman dropping his treasure on the front porch.  It was actually me trying to do the Insanity Workout video in the living room.  How sad is that?

We could have bought this for him for Christmas or his birthday, but there is something to be said for saving and buying something with your own money.  

I don't really know what is to be said for it but it's something profound, trust me.

When the day finally came he declared it the best day of his life.

This should keep Andy and him busy for at least a week.  It also looks like we won't be eating dinner at the table for at least that long.
I see a Full House marathon and several bags of jelly beans in Mia's and my future.  
So basically, we all win.

Every Woman's Dream Come True

What woman doesn't want to be in a wet swimsuit in the middle of the winter?  I know! Thankfully, my husband knows this and booked a trip to Great Wolf Lodge.  

 He splurged on the "Kids Kamp" room complete with a little sleeping cabin for the kids.  Totally worth it because that meant that there were no children in our bed or anywhere near it.

 Bode began every single ride in tears and ended it begging for more.  We've always been willing to emotionally torture our children for the sake of a theme park ride.  We're all, "If you don't die, you'll totally thank us for this.  Now get up there and slide down that 30 story water coaster.  Don't make me tell you again."

 Mia and Andy went strong from open until close. Bode and I like to break it up a bit with food and naps. Thank goodness I insisted on having that second child.

 Might I suggest going to Great Wolf on a weekday in February? There is no one there. It's awesome.

 Poor Andy spent half the time bench pressing Bode.  He was one for 1,452.

Despite the impending snowpocolypse looming over our us, we had a wonderful time and the kids were thrilled to pieces.  I'd totally go again...in one year.

Worth the read

Heaven knows I'm not one to give parenting advice - these kids don't even have hats and gloves on for goodness sake.  However, I came across this article recently and it has some great reminders about how we talk to our kids.  It's worth the read.

In other news, we had a snow day today.  Andy was less than thrilled since Thursdays are his day off - my heart breaks for him, really it does.

Bode has said some pretty incredible stuff lately.  It isn't that he is especially funny, it's more that he never shuts his mouth, and when you're talking at that kind of rate you are bound to say something pretty outlandish at some point.

Yesterday he said he loved watching Ringo (the dog) pee "It's amazing how much pee comes out of that dog.  I love it!"  Immediately after that he asked me to join him in the bathroom for his morning p00p because he had lots of stuff to tell me.

And he did.  Believe me.

I asked him what he was going to do next year when he has to go to the bathroom at "big" school.  He said he would just ask the teacher to come in there so he could talk to her.

Wowzers.

Love Him

Faith like a child

Our sweet small group kids signed a soccer ball and sent it to Ghana.  It wasn't much, and it wasn't going to change the world or anything, but the point is they did it.

And it did make a difference.

A lot of times I find myself paralyzed by all of the pain in this world and I rationalize away my conviction to do something about it.  I reason that if I can't do everything I might as well not do anything.  

I totally get why Jesus loved kids so much.  I have no doubt that they are a lot less infuriating to Him than adults.  Absolutely no doubt.

Holy Cuteness

This is Abigail Abeka, Mia's pen pal at the Village of Hope.  

My MIL and her travel group were able to get a picture of her last week holding Mia's letter.  

Love. Love. Love.

Abigail wanted to know who Mollie is.  So do I.

After almost four years of trying to grow her hair out like Pocahontas, Mia finally faced the reality that is her thin, limp and lifeless hair.  Sorry, babe, you can blame me for that one.

However, this girl can rock a mom bob like nobody's business.

 Notice the jersey:

Notice how I am still biting my tongue and letting him wear it everyday. 

 Every. Single. Day.

What I hear at the gym

And the gym I am referring to is my son's tiny tots tumble-around or whatever in the world it's called.  Basically, there are about 97 stressed out moms sitting in a waiting area watching our kids do forward rolls through a glass window.

It's not exciting.  They are really just romping around like wild banshees.  Which is why I am willing to pay for it in the winter time - boys are going to act like wild banshees somewhere and I'd rather it not be on my furniture.

I usually take a text book and my daily bible because those are the two things I am always behind in reading.

I faked my reading today and took notes on the conversations going on around me:

"Emmmmmyyyy, I'm right here.  Look here, Emmy, Mommy's right here.  I see you Emmy.  I love you, Emmy.  I'm here Emmy, Mommy's not going anywhere."

"Jude is really struggling with his dismounts.  I try to talk to him about it but he won't listen.  Look, right there.  See?  Look at that dismount.  I get nervous every time it's his turn because he can't stick the dismount."

"Oh, we're on goat milk exclusively."

"I would never have an epidural.  It just wasn't an option for me.  I didn't want to put my child at risk."

"That poor woman works everyday and I just wonder when she has time to see her child?"

"None of us got a single minute of sleep last night because Lucas kept coughing - and he sleeps right between us.  It was awful."

It was eye opening for me because I am usually right in the middle of these conversations, because it's really all mothers talk about when they get together.  It's our lives.  I get it.  But listening to it was pretty humbling.  Also, pretty boring.  

I wonder how our parenting would change if we spent more time talking about our faith, our pain, the poor, our dreams?  I don't know because I don't really do it.  I prefer meaningless banter about the latest line of sippy cups and which preschool is better.

I think I need to get over myself.  Or better yet, I think I need to get over my kids.  I think they need to know that they are not the center of the Universe, that I care about other things too, that I am committed to serving the least, that I am first a Christian woman, then a wife, then a mother.

I think I need to change.  And I'll start by never telling my birth story in public again.  

That's a promise.

Winter is the new Spring

Today was so beautiful that I told my children if they did not leave the house for the afternoon I would throw away all the sugar and toys in the entire house.  They decided it wasn't worth the risk and went to explore the woods at the end of our culdesac.  

Of course this took longer to dress for than it did to actually explore.  Who needs scouts when you live with Mia?  These little nerds were prepared for anything.  They had one giant walking stick, one sword, a sun hat, a bandana, a package of yogurt raisins, one water bottle, a notebook, two pens, 75 cents, and a bible.  

By the way, Bode has worn that jersey for 6 days in a row only taking it off to shower and for Sunday morning church.  I don't even care that he wore it to school multiple days in a row.  Did you hear that?  It doesn't bother me one little bit.  I am choosing my battles and this isn't one of them.  Look how in control of this motherhood thing I am?  I'm totally high-fiving myself right now.  (If Mia ever tries to pull a stunt like this I will kill her.)

Mia has discovered Pinterest which means I am completely out of tape, flour, paint, cardboard, kleenex boxes, foam, sharpies, glitter, glue, paper towels, magnets, and pretty much everything else she has decided to turn into a project.

 Today she made moon sand (eight parts flour to one part baby oil).  I'm also out of flour.

Winter in Oklahoma

There's a good chance that in five minutes it will start snowing.

Back to life, back to reality

You know you're back to the real world when you go from this:

(Ah-Ma-Zing seats at the Thunder Game with great and very generous friends)

(I think my eyeballs are somewhere in there....)

To this:

(strange rashes, three puking family members, homework, 4 hour night classes, a broken heater, and other nonawesome stuff)

Who wants to join me in the countdown to spring break?
And who can help me get rid of these nasty STD arms?

Christmas: A time to lower expectations.

I love Christmas.  I cry every year when the break is over.  I love spending time with my family and watching my kids' eyes light up with joy and all that.  So don't get me wrong here.

But, this year we went with the whole "we are not going overboard on crap, and these kids can just get over themselves" approach.  And I still stand by my philosophy that it was good for them.  

(The grandparents more than made up for our general apathy this year, obviously).

Santa brought Mia an ant farm and Bode an over-the-door basketball goal.  And at the last minute I unwrapped the Lego Creationary game that Andy and I had planned to give them just to beef it up a bit.

Mia took one look at her ant farm and got a look on her face that said, "What did I do to deserve this."  In my defense, the kid is impossible to buy for and Bode told her that I bought her a book light at the store (the one thing she asked for from Santa) so that was blown.  Anyway, "meh" was the theme of the morning.

And then all the Lashley ladies went to Inspirations Tea Room for lunch and I started running my mouth about how Andy and I had to search high and low to find that silly Creationary game without thinking a thing about what I was saying, which happens to be the story of my life.  (When will I learn?)  

And there sat Mia with big tears rolling down her face.  She leaned over and whispered to me, "But Mama, Santa brought us that game."

And there was no way to recover.  I had blown the whole Santa thing without even realizing it.  In a way I was kind of relieved that at least she didn't think Santa was a jerk.  She knows we are and she's used to that.  

So then she asked if she could return her ant farm.  I said no, only because I bought it on Amazon and didn't save the paperwork.  

And just like that I shattered my daughters dreams.
Bode's still picking his nose and playing secret hideout in my shower so I think we still have a few more years of the Santa game with him.

And then Andy and I went away on our traditional New Years getaway to Dallas.  When we were halfway there Andy decided to tell me that he had a fever but not to worry, he wasn't really sick at all, it was just a fluke.

Of course he didn't pack so much as a single Tylenol.  Which would have been fine for a person who wasn't actually sick.  He went to bed at the hotel and didn't get up until 4:00 PM the next day.

And not to be outdone, my parents ended up having to take Bode to the ER in the middle of the night.  I am happy to report that this is Bode's personal record for meeting our deductible - 20 minutes into the new year.  Way to go, son!

Perhaps my kids were a little underwhelmed by their gifts from us this year.  But we spent hours together playing games, laughing, snuggling, and drinking hot chocolate with more marshmallows than cocoa in the cups.  And that is exactly why I loved every minute of it.