I hafta learn science, Mom.

W: Can we make playdough tomorrow?
Me: Maybe, we'll see.
W: Can we make a volcano.
Me: I don't know, maybe.
W: C'mon Mom, we hafta. That's science and I hafta learn science.

dude. he's 4.

W: Mom, I don't know how to read.
Me: I know you don't right now but you'll learn soon and I'll help ya.
W: Science, reading, math, driving.... I'll never learn it all.

-- insert dramatic sigh here made by W --

W: How'd you do it, Mom? How'd you learn everything?
Me: In school and it took some time. You'll be ok, I promise.
W: Did you know cat starts with a C?
Me: See, you're on your way! Cat does start with a C!
W: One thing down, lots more to go.

W leaves the room.

He. kills. me. ;)

I'm in a listing mood today.

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER...

10 things I'd like to do within the next 0-5 years:
* sell this house & build our next.
* become an even more eco-friendly family.
* Make a difference in someones life.
* Go on the Disney cruise & vacation again with our kids now that's there's 4 of them, not 2.
* Become a doula or a mortician.
* Lose 40-50 lbs, get healthy & fit and stay that way.
* Get a breast augmentation, tummy tuck & liposuction.
* Feel good about myself again.
* Volunteer more.
* Run naked through a lavender field.


10 things I want to accomplish today:
* shower
* clean the bathroom
* pick up W from school
* keep plugging away at the laundry
* watch Survivor
* finish up the Christmas cards (yes, FINISH them!)
* clean up the perpetually messy living room
* vaccuum
* spend some time with Garth after the kids are in bed
* pray


10 things I like to do:
* read, sleep, eat. repeat.
* do nice things for others
* travel
* spend time with my family
* laugh with Garth & my kids
* parent naturally & live eco-consciously
* swim
* drink beer with friends
* be with my sister
* shop


10 things I despise:
* homophobes
* doing dishes
* having a dirty house
* bad hair days
* irresponsible people
* judgemental people
* deadbeat parents
* people you can't count on
* clutter
* liars


10 things I like about myself:
* my family
* my hair
* my stellar personality
* my creativity & craftiness
* my desire to help others
* my relationship with God
* my teeth
* my ability to be a good & true friend
* my bargain shopping abilities
* my sense of humor


10 things I don't particularly like about myself:
* my anxiety
* my after-babies body
* my laziness & lack of motivation
* my disorganization
* my short temper & lack of patience
* my never-ending exhaustion
* my inability to cook
* my weight
* my forgetfulness
* my back & leg issue that won't go away.

10 positive traits I think describe me:
* funny
* giving
* generous
* loving
* loyal
* fair
* honest
* competitive
* determined
* responsible

A Vicious Cycle.

Its 10:45 am and I was supposed to be at a playdate over an hour ago. Since its a good friend of mine, she understands and is fine with why I haven't shown up yet.

My daughter is still asleep. I mean snoring still asleep. Like I said her name twice in the doorway and she kept snoring still asleep. It's 10:45 in the morning!!!

Her sleep is so off-kilter and it screws with my days. When she's asleep I go on the assumption that she needs it so I'm quiet around the house, tip-toe'ing around to let her do what her body obviously wants or needs to do.

Here comes the cycle. I'm quiet. There's only so much I can do in this house and remain quiet as a church mouse. I have no problem with laundry, its a pretty quiet task. I can pick up the living room to a certain extent. I can't rustle around dishes, can't vaccuum.... by the time she wakes up, its time to feed her, change her, play with her and then I've lost all motivation to clean, vaccuum... it really isn't a pretty cycle.

Shopping online is pretty quiet. Too bad my computer is 6 years old and dying a slow, agonizing and i-may-throw-it-out-the-window-VERY-soon death.

Today I'm up, showered, diaper bag packed, MY SHOES ARE EVEN ON (!!!). I'm ready to go out the door. Dina's got the coffee on and I'm ready to drink some.

First I gave E until 9am and then I was waking her.

snore. snore.

Then I gave E until 10am and then I was truly going to wake her.

snore snore.

call her name twice only to be met by more snores.

Ok, so now its 10 minutes to 11 and at 11, I AM waking her.

will I?

Some days I pray for her to sleep so I can have some time to myself. Today I want her to wake up. I want to go to Dina's. I want her to play with Sydney. I want to drink some of Dina's coffee, dang it. There's always something about Dina's coffee that is so stankin' good - perhaps its just that I didn't make it.

I even want to vaccuum the living room right now.

Ahhhhh the quandaries of my life. If this is as bad as its going to get today, I'LL TAKE IT!!!!

Napoleon and other Dyanamites.

My 6 year old knows almost the entire Napoleon Dynamite movie by heart. I really don't know if that's actually sad or funny but I will say its pretty dang funny watching him reenact entire scenes. He will recite scenes in full detail, proper facial expressions, the whole bit. Its quite an act to watch. Our oldest (13) says we need to YouTube it, he'd be famous.

Tonite while we were eating dinner, J was doing the dance scene for us. Being a little bit nerdy and a little bit rock & roll himself, J managed to nail the dance scene and strangely looks a lot like Napoleon while doing it. I thought I might choke on my yummy burger (perfectly rare, Garth, way to go, thanks!!!).

It was a good, tame day. I think B & E are both coming down with colds. E was pretty low key and easily entertainable today so that was nice. I managed to get some laundry done, go to the post office, pick up W from school and score a 2 hour nap this afternoon.

It's Nov. 6 ~ 6 days into my birthmonth. I'm still winning the "Be Nice To Garth For One Entire Month" challenge and that feels pretty good. All in all, a good but pretty non-productive day. We all need those once in a while.... or often, or whatever. :)

The Undertaking.

The weirdest thing happened to me this week.

A little backstory:
Those who closely know me know that my goal of becoming a mortician got lost along the way. I haven't completely let the dream die but its reality gets smaller and smaller with each child born and as the years seem to slip away from me.

6+ years ago I met my friends Lisa & Dana on a pregnancy message board for July 2001 moms. Lisa & I had an instant connection when we learned our first born children were so close in age and that we were now both pregnant with our 2nd children. Lisa's oldest daughter is autistic and I had worked with autistic children prior to my oldest sons birth which gave us even more to discuss.

Dana & I hit it off immediately when our stellar, obnoxious & over-the-top outgoing personalities collided & meshed together like a musical medley. Dana's middle child was born with an extremely rare genetic condition called Cardio-Facio-Cutaneous Syndrome, or CFC for short (read more about it here: http://www.cfcsyndrome.org/ ). It was through Dana and falling in love with her daughter Camden in person that I learned more of this rare condition. My pregnancy message board days are no more but these friendships have gone on to become something much more than some "online buddies from some message board" to very true, solid and lifelong relationships that I would miss terribly if they were no longer in my life.

Ok so back to the wierdest thing this week:

Lisa emails me and tells me she stumbled upon a show on PBS that she knew I'd love. It was called The Undertaking and it chronicles several families who are about to and/or who have very recently lost close relatives in a small town of Michigan. A lot of it is told through the eyes of the undertaker, who is also a poet, and gives details of the hows, whys & whats that an undertaker undertakes in dealing with death & dying. Totally the mortuary science that I really get into. Kudos to Lisa in that respect for pointing me in the direction of this film. I would LOVE to do an internship of some kind at the Lynch & Sons funeral home. They appear to be amazing, kind people.

Sadly, after looking into the film further, I learned that Lisa had seen its last viewing scheduled on PBS.

Happily, I learned that I could watch the entire episode plus a few extra segments at PBS online.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/undertaking/

This morning I received an email from Dana regarding the film. She had received an email from one of the women featured in the documentary through the CFC International Foundation. Coincidentally, one of the stories featured is of a 26 month old, Anthony, who has CFC. Rare genetic disorder, remember? How ironic that this film is right up my alley with the mortuary stuff AND it has a child featured in it that has the same RARE genetic disorder as one of my very good friends' children AND this family featured live only about 40 minutes from me?!

The woman in the movie is amazing. She is totally someone I'd want to be friends with. Straight-forward, funny but just simply "real" as she is interviewed multiple times during the dying process and memorial & burial arrangments of her 2 year old son Anthony. Heartbreaking reality at its finest, Nevada (the mom) was documented experiencing this undoubtedly, tremendously tough time with such class, amazing composure & grace and was a true testament to what being a mom is all about. Nevada read Anthony's eulogy herself at his memorial service. It was amazingly written, strongly spoken and heart-warming. Nevada & her husband Anthony, along with each of their fathers were the only pall-bearers of Anthony's casket and they alone lowered him into the ground. Amazing strength and such very, very real people & emotions.

If you have the time, its a totally reality check to watch the documentary via the internet. If you have the cash, its a totally awesome thing to donate to the CFC Foundation. I know I have, and will continue to do so, and it was money well spent.

I crack myself up with my ghetto abilities!

Oh the Christmas cards. Oh MY, the Christmas cards. Yup, they'll be done early this year. The pictures have arrived and look great! The cards, which had already been purchased, plus the pictures, well, probably not the best match together fit-wise. BUT, I like the pictures and I like the cards so together they will be... even if it took some creative imagination to get them to somewhat work together.

Poor W. So short in stature that the photo card frame crops him right out of sight.

SuperMama Christmas Card Maker to the rescue, ghetto style!

I hole punched a place in the picture frame for his little face to stare out of.

I'm dying of laughter as I even type this.

I showed my sister-in-law when she dropped off B this afternoon and we both laughed almost to the point of tears.

She said, "Oh Marissa, how YOU!" and then laughed even harder.

If you're on my Christmas card list, and you receive a card from me, expect it to be a little bit Christmas and a little bit ghetto. But 100% all ME, wishing YOU a Merry Christmas just the same.

So, after you get my Christmas card, feel the love it brings & display it proudly throughout the Christmas season, throw the ghetto card away and keep the awesome pic of my family, ok? Thanks. :)

Getting back to nature.

A few years ago, Garth & I bought a 9.5 acre piece of heaven. It's just enough off the beaten path of city life to be uber-quiet & deer-filled but not far enough that I'll have to pack snacks for the kids for a "ride into town for sundries" or anything.

Garth goes out there ALL the time (and yeah Garth, don't deny it, those aren't deer trails, those are GARTH trails). I go out there only like 2-3 times a year. I love it there but it depresses me that its going to be like forever til we live there so I tend to stay away.

We took a trip there yesterday with the 3 youngest kids, B was staying the weekend with his aunt (not the SIL I don't like BTW, I like this one very much!). It may have been THE perfect fall day. Garth burned some brush and I wandered around with the kids, eating cheezits and taking pictures. I feel so peaceful there, the trees are tall and strong. There are big plans there, you can just feel it. We know where our house will go, where the barn will be with out pet goats, where we'll someday have alpaca grazing, where we'll have a huge garden, an inground swimming pool, etc... oh the plans. Thank you George Bush for keeping my dream on hold with this sucky war-torn economy (I'm already against the next war, by the way).

We were like the Jeffersons "movin' on up" when we bought our huge 5+ bedroom home 6 years ago yet we feel (and sometimes act!) like the Clampetts trying to get out of it now. No one is buying big houses. Who knew when we bought this awesome dream home that someday we'd dream to actually get more back to our roots, more at one with the earth, live far more green than we currently do and ultimately, downsize. Who knew. Just who knew?

This old bench awaits us. I will find a place for this deteriorating thing somewhere on our property when we live there. We found an old horseshoe too. I'm going to put that somewhere in our house or barn for sure.

Teaching them young the art of a good tree hug:

So its Day 4 of my birthmonth and Garth dared me yesterday that I couldn't not give in to my OCD tendencies and go to Michael's for something that could wait until today's 40% off coupon came. It was actually hard! I was more determined to prove him wrong and prove to myself that I could do it than I was to take the trip for the $3 item and I did it!! Garth congratulated me this morning for not caving in to my bizarre idiosyncrasies and dared me to prove him wrong that I couldn't be nice to him for an entire month. I laughed and knew I probably couldn't do it but I guess to prove him wrong, I'm going to try. I like a good challenge!

Go! Go! Go!

Ever feel like your life is seriously moving in fast forward? My days are long but the weeks, months and years seem to be flying by. Somedays I can't wait to get back into bed to make that particular day be over and other days I wish I could freeze frame that moment for all eternity.

I've decided this year I'm going to enjoy Christmas. We're a church-going, Christian family who embraces the joys of Christmas and the reason behind it. We sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and this year I'm making Him an awesome birthday cake thanks to my newly acquired cake decorating skills. What I don't enjoy is the endless commercials, the "I want that!", the mental stress & money spent trying to impress family & friends with gifts that actually mean very little, the parties, the pictures, the money, the cards, the wrapping, the family scheduling, the money, the driving, the here, the there, the everywhere, the money. The stress.

I'm not doing it this year. I'm just not. I refuse. I'm attending our Christmas Eve church service with my immediate family and afterwards we'll dash over to my dads church and worship with the rest of my family. As stressful as pulling that off was last year, I really enjoyed it and hope to do it again. I made a rule a few years ago and we're sticking to it regardless of the guilt that gets placed upon the new rule by others. We will not travel on Christmas Eve. Period. We will attend church as a family, our children will sleep in their own beds and they will wake up to their own Christmas morning at their own home with gifts from Santa and their parents. Period. It's what I wanted so badly as a child and am determined to give to my children as a gift.

My Christmas cards are already in the works. The pictures have been taken (oh what a day I don't wish to relive), they've been printed and are enroute to me, the cards have been purchased, the list has been checked. CHECK. Still need stamps, to write in them, address them and get them off.... I guess it's a little early to actually mail them yet.

Christmas giving. Oh the budget. Oh my, the budget. We're working diligently on really staying under budget this year. I've been shopping for deals and refuse to buy more just because I got a deal. This just isn't how I want to show my love and appreciation of others by giving them just stuff. I'm already about half way done with my shopping and it feels great!

My friend Anisa (who's friendship has truly been a Godsend and a lifesaver to me this past year) and I spent 10 HOURS canning 100% homemade apple butter and apple preserves one day last month. We actually self-taught ourselves to can to undertake this feat. My neighbor, I love her, walked me through the procedure so I'm about 99.8% confident no one will be harmed in the making of this years gifts. We plan to give our canned goodies to our kids' teachers, bus drivers, our mail carriers, our family (with their other gifts), etc. Just a nice gesture that says Merry Christmas without the need to break the bank. We used decorative jars and made cute labels and they actually turned out to be something we could be proud to give. I'm so proud of us!!

So here it is November 3 (three days into my birthmonth, thankyouverymuch!) and I'm well on my way to getting all the Christmas STUFF out of the way so I can try to enjoy Christmas, without the truly unnecessary stress. We shall see if it works.

Welcome to The Commune!!

Yes, I call our family a commune. Living with my 4 kids, husband and 1 cat (the sole-surviving of 3) is as close as I'll ever get to living in a commune. I've always wanted to live in a commune. Like polygamy but everyone gets their own husband/spouse/partner. I love the idea of communal living. The sharing of meals, the sharing of responsibilites, the constant companionship, girlfriends who live with you and never have to go home. My dream would be to have many acres, homestead off the land and have one huge house with multiple bedrooms and a huge communal living space. If there's a little communal love, eh, I'm pretty open-minded. A girl can dream, ya know.

It'll never happen. <dramatic sigh>

Boy #1 in our commune is B. Rockin' in at 13 years old, he is the epitome of a great kid. Smart, funny, responsible, sensitive.... does have a weird knack for not being able to find things though. I mean a missing item is sitting straight in front of him, barely missing, and he's looking on the ceiling for it weird. He sports a whisp of blonde bangs, loves video games, and riding his new trick bike. Lives for ghost stories on tv, loves sushi yet downright refuses to eat cheesy potatoes, cottage cheese or potato salad. He excels at both football and lacrosse and shocks me with how tough he can be physically. Bruised from head to toe during football season, he rarely complains. His goal: sack 'em!!

Boy #2 is J. He is possibly THE smartest person I've ever met and he's just crossed the 6-year-old finish line. The kid is amazing. Yes, I call him a nerd, but I do it with the utmost respect and love. He IS a nerd. He loves wearing shirts with a chest pocket and wonders how many pencils he can fit in there and yes, I've seen him try it. The cute little glasses surely don't help the cause either but hey, I will admit, he looks downright awesome in them. He loves wearing a watch so he can calculate time between soccer goals, how long it takes to get somewhere and if we say 30 seconds, you can bet he'll tell you when you've surpassed 31. Not only smart, the kid is a soccer whiz. Watching him run circles around other teams (and his own teammates too, toot! toot!), he dominates on a soccer field. It doesn't take a bystander too long to realize it either... it probably doesn't help that his mom and dad stand on the sidelines yelling about how awesome he is either.

Boy #3 - W. Almost 5 and acting every smart alec minute of it. Our little digestive reflux burping champion. He'd take out a large beer-guzzling man and not be shy about it. Lives to climb, yell and do all-things-boy but is also fun enough to let his mama put bows in his hair for a good laugh. One of his favorite things to do is laugh. Say "butt" and he laughs. Genuine belly laughs that we adults have pretty much forgotten how to do. W also has this insane obsession with touching people. Not in an inappropriate he's-going-to-grow-up-to-be-a-pedophile kind of way but in a wow-your-skin-is-so-soft-let-me-touch-that sort of way. He has actually reached out and touched strangers ears at church. It's truly weird but oh, so W -- let's all hope he outgrows it. What's cute at 4 will NOT be cute at 40. He also loves Superman, athletic wear and pretty much will only wear croc shoes. Prefers real over imitation crocs as well. Ahh, that's my boy.

So imagine our surpise when baby #4 came out with a vagina....

E. Our sunshine. Our princess. The apple of our eye, whatever that means. 17 months old and already has herself wrapped tightly around every single member of our family's littlest fingers. Even the cat adores her. E is a feisty one. Good natured and funny yet sports her mama's attitude. Has issues with her ears & hearing but she's doing great after only 1 surgery. She does need to find some better sleep habits though, this new screaming all night teething *bs* is totally for the birds and wow, will I ever be glad once she's got her full set. She has certainly changed the dynamics of our family and I'm ever so grateful for her existence & the niche' she has carved as being the little princess in our family. She is simply so cute I could put a fork in her and eat her whole, and wouldn't even need gravy or ketchup.

Last but hardly least, my 5th ....errr, I mean my husband. Garth, 38 years old, the Prince Charming I had doubted even existed. Sensitive but sometimes a little too insensitive, funny but sometimes not very funny, an ass at times but kind. Generous, loving and always believes in me even when I don't have the energy to believe in myself. Some days I want to kick him to the curb but I don't. Somedays I just want to hug him and not let go but I don't. He & I need to work on being more of a couple again and a little less on being just parents to the 4 best kids on this planet. Striking a balance between those two things has definitely presented us with a challenge. But no matter what, I love him, he's mine and I really do hope to take on the long haul of life with him by my side to the end.

Garth & I are not on any mission to go forth, multiply and replenish the earth any more than we already have. We've each doubled our own selves and have run out of hands. Four hands, four kids, tubes tied. Unless God has some funny I-seriously-won't-understand-the-punch-line joke to tell us, the commune is now closed to newcomers.

Addictions. Roller Coasters. Secrets. Oh My.

Addictions. Who has them? I do! I do! I'm completely hooked on: caffeine (ice tea, coffee & diet coke), cloth & wool diapers, baby shoes, internet shopping, hair bows... and http://www.postsecret.com/ .

Post Secret is a website where people mail in their deepest secrets on a postcard. Claim it, own it and set it free. Each Sunday the website is updated with new secrets. Sometimes the mailed in secrets will pop up on the website, sometimes they'll pop up in a post secret book and sometimes they'll just find themselves in the hands of someone else who will hold your secret for you.

I won't say when or where but I submitted a post secret. Lo and behold there on the post secret website it one day did appear. Whoa. Talk about taking reality to a new level. There was my secret for the world to see. I got it off my chest and set it free. Its now for the world to have, its no longer mine. I felt like a lead brick was lifted off my chest when I saw it there. I honestly felt like my life moved forward that day.

I've suffered from anxiety my entire life. After having children I got the distinct pleasure of also throwing a little depression into the mix. Right now is one of my downs and I'm doing my best to push forward, keep it together and fix it. No one should have to live this way. It's just not fair, it's seriously no fun and my biggest desire in life is to have my brain just STOP the roller coaster (an even larger desire than for being skinny again, my breast augmentation and tummy tuck and if you've ever listened to me talk for 5 minutes you know about my desire for those...). I wish my brain would just stop running a mile a minute, stop keeping me awake at night worrying about the stupidest things known to man, stop sending my life into a complete and utter and embarrasing tailspin because I can't find one of my daughters $40 shoes, stop and smell the roses once in awhile and realize that my life does have dozens & dozens of roses in it. I just wish it would stop. It's truly a roller coaster and I beg God daily to please just let me off.

This morning I woke up and was thinking about my post secret and reminded myself that when I saw it online, it was time to let it go. I wish I could do this with whatever the heck is going on in my brain. The crying is getting old, it ruins my mascara daily. The bouts of pure panic are physically & mentally exhausting. The highs are high & the lows are low and wow, does that ever sound cliche'. I do know its not bi-polar disorder because I've exhausted my research online and with several doctors trying to figure out if it was. It's not. I almost wish it was so I could just put a name to my issue and resolve it.

Ok, I've rambled. I'm usually going to chat about my kids here. For the most part I'm a fun-loving gal who loves God, her husband, her kids, her family and her friends (and yup, pretty much in that particular order). Today this was on my brain and it was time to just STOP, own it and set it free. Wish me luck.

** Oh yeah, and today begins my birthMONTH. **
Most people get a birthDAY.
I'm so vain I started celebrating my birthMONTH about 20 years ago.
It stuck.
So Happy BirthMONTH Marissa, you go girl.