Motivation for the home

So I have always struggled with keeping my house clean, even before I had kiddos or a hubby! I always have clothes and paperwork everywhere and feel like I can barely keep up with the daily chores. But now that I am going to have three kiddos soon and be homeschooling plus other random things I have decided that I really need to get a schedule going that will help me stay on top of the house work. So I was inspired by pinterest of course to make a to do list. I put it in a frame so I can use a dry erase marker to check it all off as I do it. This will help me not have paper to do lists all over the place. But of course because I was inspired by pinterest I couldn't just make a list, I had to try to make the list look cute! So I typed up my list which has things to do daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly and then tried to make it cute. So here it is:

Update as usual

Well as usual I have not kept up with this blog so I need to update you before I can attempt yet again to start blogging on a normal basis :o) I am now 30 weeks pregnant with baby boy Greyson Kristopher Mykel. So only 9 weeks to go at the most! Its finally feeling close. I have so much to do before he gets here, I am hoping the nesting energy comes soon. This pregnancy has been the smoothest so far compared to the others. I truly believe that is because so many people are praying for my mom and our whole family as we go through all this craziness. I haven't been on bedrest at all which is a huge blessing. My blood pressure has stayed stable thanks to meds and the chiropractor. I did find out I have gestational diabetes again which is not good, but I am not as worried about it this time. It just gives me motivation to be way more careful about what I eat for the next few months, and hopefully beyond that. I have definitely been more exhausted during this pregnancy, but that is probably because I am always chasing around a 4 year old and a 2 year old.

We have had such a great summer! We got to go camping as a family twice, which is quite an adventure when you are prego but it was so fun. We love spending time with our life group and other friends from church out in the wild where we can let our kids run free(kinda). I am always amazed at how relaxing camping is even with the munchkins. Its so refreshing to have quality time with other like minded adults and just get to enjoy life. Other than the camping trips we have just been trying to stay cool by swimming or hiding in the house during the afternoons. My mom and dad even came up to visit us a few weeks ago which was sooo exciting!

So now as summer is rapidly coming to an end we are getting ready for a new adventure, homeschooling kindergarten. Timmy is so excited to start, almost as excited as me and Curty are! We decided to mainly go with the Sonlight curriculum because it seemed like subject matter that Timmy would really be interested in. So we are going to be busy adjusting to a new schedule but I know both the kiddos will love it, and it will make the time till Greyson gets here go super fast. Here are some maternity pics we just got done by the very talented Michele Valerie:

So there is the update, hope you enjoyed it!

Update on our busy life

So a few months ago I had my aunt help me redesign this blog and I was really excited to start blogging more often, but then.... surprise, we got prego! I have been completely exhausted the last few months which is why I haven't blogged at all. I am now 13 weeks prego though and have a tiny bit more energy so hopefully I can start writing more. I really enjoy blogging, it helps me process everything that is going on in my life at the time. Everything from the huge things like how my pregnancy is going and how I am dealing with my moms tumors, to the smaller things like if I have kept the kiddos entertained enough, if I am involved enough or too much with social groups and church ect. Its just a great way to review all of my thoughts and share what is important. So with that said maybe I will become more consistent for a couple months.

The last few months have been pretty crazy. In the midst of it, it felt like time was going so slow, this pregnancy is going to last forever! Now that I look back though I realize the time has gone by so fast! This is my first pregnancy that I am high risk from the beginning because of my high blood pressure so its already been busy. Plus the blood pressure meds seem to make me even more tired that what is normal for pregnancy. The medicine is working so far though which is very exciting! We have already gotten to see baby 3 times and of course its already adorable! Its also very active, I started feeling it move around 8 weeks and Curtis has already felt it once too. So we might be super busy when this baby gets here :o)

Other than that life has been about the same. My mom is still doing chemo which is exhausting and hard on her body but she is still being super strong and going through it to spend some more time with all of us. We try to go see her every 4 to 6 weeks, this weekend is one of those weeks so I am super excited to see her! Curtis is still working hard as ever and being an amazing hubby and daddy at the same time. He has had to be superdad the last few months with me barely functioning. He is pretty much the best hubby ever, I am so blessed by him.

The kids have been keeping me busy. They seem to go through phases where for a month or so they are really good and life goes pretty smoothly and I love every minute of being a mom... and then the next month they switch. So right now we are in the month where they are pushing every limit and challenging our parenting skills basically every minute. I definitely need prayer for wisdom in how to deal with them and how to point them to Christ through the discipline. Its all pretty overwhelming but then at the same time they can be so stinking cute and funny that it makes it all worth it(I just dont remember that every second of the day).

So that is a little update and hopefully I will posting a lot more soon!

The kids starting to enjoy each other, 

 Timmy can always make her laugh!

Beena enjoying Just dance,
this ended up being the best Christmas present from Papa ever!

So here are a few random pictures of 2011. The year went so fast so I wanted to highlight a few of our favorite moments. I also wanted to show of my new blog design. My amazing Aunt Liz made the most awesome header for it! If you ever need any design work done you can find her at www.ejcdesigns.com. Hope you enjoy the pics. I am gonna try once again to get more consistent with blogging so be on the look out for more! Happy New Year everybody!

Christmas with Beena and Papa before we knew Beena was sick

Another Dancing one! SO much fun!

They love their Beena & Papa

Allanna enjoying her first cupcake

Her pretty birthday outfit

Timmy learned how to make silly faces

And Allanna became a goofball

Camping!

We moved into a house!

Days at the water park

Timmy turned 4!

Timmy's 4th birthday was a monster party

Boat trips with life group

Camping with our life group

Snifferface at the water park

Timmy's first time tubing!

I ran my first half marathon!!!

The start of advent!!!

I love Christmas time!! I enjoy other holidays but Christmas is by far my favorite. Because of this I have tried to make it a tradition for our family to celebrate advent so that we can enjoy every day during this season and stay focused on the real meaning of Christmas. This Christmas I am even more excited than normal for a couple reasons. The first one is that Timmy is old enough to start understanding parts of what it means to be excited about Jesus! Obviously he is not going to understand all of it or really be interested in all the Bible readings but I love knowing that we are getting a chance to show him a love for the Bible and a love for the real meaning of Christmas. Allanna is still to young to understand but she is going to love the crafts, cookies, and watching the candles! The other reason I am looking forward to this time of reflection and anticipation is because I feel as though I have been extremely distracted for the last year. Its been a tough year with everyone's health which should have made me draw closer to God but instead I feel like I have been too busy to really draw near to Him. So I am really excited to have this time of renewed focus. I know that I shouldn't have waited so long  to work on this, But God uses anything He wants to too help us get refocused :o)

I am mainly using two different websites for a list of verses and other activities for advent. Here are the links in case you want to follow along too :o)

http://www.teachingmom.com/features/advent.html
http://www.homeschooled-kids.com/advent.html

So tonight we will be lighting the first candle and will start reading verses about the prophesies of Jesus' birth and his 2nd coming. The kiddos just finished their first craft which they loved. We made little candle holders with empty baby food jars, glue, and tissue paper. They are still drying so I don't have a picture with the candle in it yet but here are a few pics of the kiddos working on them.

Fun with the kiddos

Okay so after the last post I thought it would be nice to show that we really did have a great day still! My kids favorite thing to do, even better than the park, is painting or pretty much doing crafts of any kind! They definitely got my grandma's and my sister's artistic side! So anyways here are some pics of them enjoying some painting time today. We started out painting  a pumpkin and a birdhouse... and then of course ended in all out "finger paint" aka body paint and repainting the kitchen :o) So enjoy these pictures of my future famous artists!

Timmy's masterpiece from yesterday, we used their hands to make a tree.

Allanna's masterpiece, an apple tree

He just discovered he could make a handprint!

My Amazing special boy

So tonight's blog is a little vent on the difficult times that come with being a mommy. Being a parent is such a huge responsibility and such a huge blessing! My baby boy, who is now almost 4, is the sweetest most loving little man ever, but he is also quite a handful. As many of you know we have been aware for awhile that he may be on the autistic spectrum mostly because he is behind in speech... but we have held of on further testing because his doctor thinks he is just a quirky kiddo and that we dont need to be concerned about labeling him at this point. We totally agree with this most days and have seen so much growth in Timmy that most of the time we feel like at this point we are doing whats best for him and just helping him grow up at his own pace in his own way. But in all honesty it is so hard seeing that your baby is not "normal" like other kiddos. One of my favorite shows is Parenthood, and in this show the family has a son who has aspergers, which is a highly functioning autism. Anyways a few weeks ago the mom on the show goes to see how he is doing at his new school and she sees him sitting by himself during lunch and it breaks her heart to see that he is not making friends. And of course I cry during this show every week because I am just starting to totally understand her feelings. For the most part Timmy is growing up so much! He is talking a ton and he is able to understand and answer questions, and he is even able to have almost conversations with people. But then there are nights like tonight where he just has a rough night. And on nights like these I see that he doesn't know how to relate to kids his own age. And kids his age get frustrated with the way he wants to play and then of course that upsets him because he doesn't understand what they are upset at. And its just exhausting as a parent to explain to him over and over things that he just doesn't get yet. So its just one of those emotional nights for me where I just want to see him be able to play with other kids and enjoy himself instead of having to constantly take him out of situations and remind him of the correct way to behave. Its just exhausting for both of us, but luckily he only remembers all of it for a minute where as I get to keep thinking about it all... Wondering if we are doing enough to help him ect. Anyway so that is my vent. I am probably just emotional because I get a little tired when Curty works this much but I just felt like maybe writing a blog would help me. So friends just pray as normal that we have wisdom to raise our little man the way God wants us too!