February 1, 2014

Doing it all- a confesh sesh

Holy crap.
This is so my life right now.

I just spent the last 30 minutes of nap-time writing a post on doing it all and boom.  It disappeared.
Kill me now.  Lets see if I can remember what I wrote.  I guarantee it will be less wordy but hey.. I need to get this out.


I haven't blogged in over a month.
I've been super overwhelmed with life.
And honestly, I didn't know if anyone cared or even missed it.
I've been on the fence about stopping blogging all together.


Let's back up.
I've always been someone feels the need to do it all and do it well.
I've always been involved in leadership positions, clubs, service groups, etc.
Student council, service club president, prom queen, sorority president, one of the first of my friends to get married, one of the first to have a baby, have pictures and ideas "pinned" by other teachers, have people ask to recreate my parties for their kids, etc. My kids have always been good, well behaved, cute, and well dressed.  I've always thought this makes up who I am.  If I didn't do certain things, I was afraid people would think I couldn't do. Not that I didn't want to.

For instance. The cookie party.
Every year I host a Christmas cookie party for friends and family.  This would have been the 8th year. I had such anxiety over this damn party.  We had only 1 free weekend day in the month of December.  I knew that people were expecting me to do it.  I had friends texting me about dates and times well in advance because they knew I would be doing it. But damn. I didn't want to.  I could care less about baking, eating, and voting on cookies. But I felt guilty.  People expected me to do it.  I liked how everyone said, "I don't know how you do it all". Again.  It felt like this made up who I was.  But I really, really, didn't want to do.  So after talking with my mom and Nick. I didn't do it.  (You may be thinking- wow- she is a crackhead.) And you may be right.  My friends didn't care about the cookie party.  They were totally fine. Everyone survived and we still managed to have a wonderful Christmas.  In the grand scheme of life- this was no big deal.  But I had made it into a huge deal in my head.

I took last year off to transition into having 3 kids.  But I knew financially I couldn't do it again.  We couldn't possibly live in the zip code we live in with just Nick's job.  Yes, we could sell and move south where houses are less expensive.  Yes, we could cut cable and other luxuries but I don't want to.  So I work.  And if I had to work, I knew I wanted to be Super Teacher/ Super Mom.  I had friends who taught and then quit when it became to much with the kids.  I knew I could give both jobs 100 percent.  Even though they couldn't do it all, I would.  But damn. It's hard.  I am FAR from perfect at either job.  Even though I bring my school bag home with work each night, I still feel like there are things I could be doing better.  Even though I know my kids are loved, fed, bathed, and safe - I still feel discouraged that we have dishes in the sink and who knows the last time I vacuumed.

If you follow me on Instagram you know Reagan has been having a hard time at school.  He's been disrespectful and defiant and has even bitten another student.  I freaked.  After talking with Nick I realized the reason I was most upset was because he wasn't been "the perfect son" for our "perfect family".  I suddenly realized that maybe his teacher didn't think I had it all together.  If we had it all together, he wouldn't be acting this way.  How on Earth did I get this twisted to be about me?

I came home from a board meeting for our Mothers of Multiples group last night thinking, why don't I run for president next year? This would be the natural thing.  I know I'm overwhelmed with everything right now. I know I already feel like I'm spread thin.  But if anyone can do it... I should be able to do it.  I told Nick this and he replied - "hell no".

I need to refocus.
I need to be the best mom, wife, teacher, daughter, friend, etc. I can be for me.
Not for other people.
Not for what others think of me.

I'm learning it's okay not to do it all. I'm learning it's okay to fail. Well, maybe not fail.  But maybe not be perfect all the time. No one is perfect.  Yes. My twins still use pacifiers. Yes. My 4 year old is naughty at school.  Yes. I'd rather go to bed and watch real housewives alone than spend  time talking with my husband most nights.  You'll get over it and we'll all survive.  

Santa 2013

Yes, I know... it's February 1st! (Happy February!)  But I realized I never posted a picture of the kids with Santa this year. The kids were sick with colds and not feeling too hot, plus we were running low on money- so I knew the free pictures from Bass Pro Shop was the way to go this year! 

The twins screamed bloody murder the entire time and Reagan just kind of stood there.  When Santa asked Reagan what he wanted this year, he responded in the quietest whisper -"a shellraiser".  It was pretty anti-climatic.  I was definitely happy we didn't pay for this year's picture! But I'm also glad we got it captured for posterity! 



January 7, 2014

Christmas 2013

Our Christmas vacation was an interesting one!
We were all hit by the tummy bug for a good solid week of our 2 week break. One person would get it, then the next, and so on like dominoes!  What a bummer.  But the good news was the actual Christmas celebration was nice. Here is a little photo recap of our holiday!

Buddy our elf said good-bye


And continued the tradition of bringing Christmas jammies for Christmas Eve


For Christmas Eve we had appetizers at my parents' house before church



After church we came home and had birthday cake for Jesus


We left Santa cookies, milk, and cheese stick for Rudolph. (We didn't have any carrots!)



Christmas morning the kids woke up and we opened presents






After opening presents at our house, we headed over to my parents' house to open more gifts!






Then my older sister and her family came over.  We all had a delicious lunch, the kids played outside, and we opened more gifts!




Later that afternoon we headed back to our house.  Nick's mom and grandma came over with dinner and more gifts!  We had another fun celebration!






I hope you all had as great a Christmas as we did!
Happy 2014! 


January 2, 2014

Random Acts of Christmas Kindness

This Christmas season I knew I wanted to spread some holiday cheer and help teach Reagan that Christmas means more than just presents.  I looked online and found a fantastic website.



Lil Light O Mine has compiled a TON of wonderful ideas for families to perform random acts of Christmas kindness- basically- Light Up Others with Kindness. I.Loved.It.  She posts free gift tags, notes, coloring pages, etc.  Man. There was so much. I really feel inspired to start it earlier next year so we can do even more! I seriously get lost in this woman's blog and mission! 

Here are some pictures of things Reagan and I did this season to Light Up Others with Kindness!

(1)
Donating toys to the Fireman for the Salvation Army!



And Rea Rea got to take a ride in the firetruck!


(2)
Shopping for an Angel Tree child.


(3) 
Give handwarmers and Starbucks gc to the bell ringers outside of the stores.

(4)
Leave 50 cents taped to toy machines and soda machines at Walmart.

(5)
Leave a thank you note and candy for the mailman.

(6)
Deliver candy canes and wish busy shoppers a Merry Christmas.





Reagan had a BLAST doing this and although he was pretty shy at first, he really liked to find people "who needed a smile" when delivering his candy canes. 

I think this will definitely be a new family tradition!



I even took this into our classroom.
My kids had a BLAST doing a 2 weeks full of random acts of kindness!

I did a quick set-up and put each task in a bag on the board.


Day 1

Play with someone new at recess.  
Find someone who looks like they need a friend and invite them to play with you!

Day 2

Pick up trash around your school without getting any grabber (reward from office).  
Do it because it makes you feel good to make your school better.




Day 3

Give someone a compliment today.
What are they good at? What do you like about them?


Day 4

Give someone at recess a sticker and a smile today!
Choose someone who you don't normally play with.



Day 5

Make bookmarks and deliver them with candy canes to our 4th Grade Buddies classroom.




Day 6

 Drop off Christmas candy and thank you notes to our principal.  
Thank her for all of her hard work and tell her why you like our school.



Day 7

Sharpen pencils and deliver them to a special classroom.




Day 8

Give hand warmers to our crossing guard and thank her for helping get to school so safely.



Day 9

Deliver Christmas candy to our cafeteria workers and thank them for all of their hard work!

Day 10

Deliver Christmas candy to the school nurse! 


Our class had so much fun on our "kindness mission" and couldn't wait to open the bags each day.  
I just love doing this and the kids really got into it as well.


January 1, 2014

Other Christmas Fun at School

There were so many fun holiday things going on at our school before break!
Here is a quick glimpse into the fun:

(1)
parent gifts
This year I decided to doing something a little easier for parent ornament/gifts.
We made reindeer photo ornaments and they were almost stress free!

 front

 back

For parent cards, the kids illustrated gingerbread house cards and wrote sweet little notes.

I didn't manage to get a picture of the wrapping/bag, but if you've read my blog for a few years, its the same snowman one I did in the past. (You can look in my history and find the pictures!)

(2)
Reindeer Run

Our school's annual "turkey trot" got cancelled this year due to the rain, so the PE coaches created the "reindeer run".  Our firsties worse reindeer hats and ran laps around the field as Christmas music played in the background. It was too cute!



After the run there was a raffle for kids to win sports balls and athletic equipment.


It ended with a cool Otter Pop treat.
Such fun!

(3)
Candy Trains

The first grade at my school has been making candy trains each December for over 15 years. This was my first candy train experience (my past first grade team always did gingerbread houses). The candy trains were very fun and the directions were on the smartboard in a step by step process.  We had a lot of parents to help the kids and they turned out super cute!



(4)
Holiday Sing Along

I was so excited for the holiday sing along! The entire school (k-6) gathers in the cafeteria in their pajamas and sings Christmas songs together.  Each grade had a specific song to solo and then there were about 6 that we sang all together.  It was precious and totally got me in the Christmas spirit! :)


Even Reagan came in his pajamas for the sing along! 
Too fun! 


It was so cute to see my little firsties in their jammies!


(5)
Christmas gifts to my kids


This year I used my bonus points from Scholastic to get the kids books for Christmas.  
My mom was awesome enough to wrap them all for me!

(6)
Christmas gifts to my kids' teachers

I got all the kids' teachers Starbucks gift cards and Reagan's teacher a personalized tumbler for her iced coffee. 

(7)
Polar Express

We started by reading the story The Polar Express and doing some work to go with it. Then the day of the PJ day, we all got our tickets to ride the Polar Express.  We watched it on our smart board and had a lot of fun together.


Earlier that morning I had put a package full of bells in the freezer.  I asked our fabulous secretary to call down into our classroom after lunch and say that there was a special package delivered for our class.  She did an awesome job and put in lots of fluff to get the kids excited.  I sent down two of my kiddos (one whom I was so happy to have sent down) to get the package.  Boy.  This little darling came back with the most elaborate story about how she saw Santa Claus, pet the reindeer, etc.  The kids were all staring at her in awe .... She sold it for me. Thank the Lord I sent her down! I think she might actually think she saw them? Who knows... I just had to laugh. 



The kids were in heaven and couldn't get over how cold the bells were (obviously- they were from the North Pole!) and how they smelled just like Santa (not sure where they got that from... but I went with it!) Anyways, it was a great way to end the day!