They're amazing actually
I used to attend MOPS. I loved it, Eden however, did not so much. I'll never forget one thing that I learned there though, "your kids are always listening". The speaker, I can't remember her name or even the topic she was speaking on, but she told a story about how she had her young kids at the grocery store with her and the cashier or bagger or someone commented on her having "trouble" on her hands. She knew her kids were watching and quickly replied that they were no trouble, but rather her little helpers.
I don't know why hearing that stuck with me, but I'm so glad it has. There's been so many instances where people refer to my little gems as trouble (it's usually at the grocery store) and I happily reply that they're my little helpers.
Eden's taken quite a shine to the title and does in fact live up to it. She helps me with the laundry, cleaning up toys (well, sort of, we're working on it at least), helps in the kitchen, unloads the silverware out of the dishwasher. Anyway, all just little things that I've been thinking about how she does help. Then I got to thinking, my kids are amazing:
Eden knows her address
Micah has a new record of 5 and a half jars of baby food in a day
Eden knows almost every letter of the alphabet
Micah can make an awesome Chewbaca noise
Eden has this incredible sense of empathy; She's 2, and I feel like she surpasses me in this area
Micah says "nigh-nigh", for real, at about 3am every morning
Eden knows how to tease and I never taught her; I had no idea teasing was instinctual
Micah claps every time I pick him up, it's adorable
Eden finds little "treasures" (rocks, micromachine mini loaders, strawberry shortcake doll, love notes I've written Mike) and will keep them in her little fist all day
Micah can rock his high chair on 2 legs; he rocks himself, and because he's so heavy it goes back and forth on 2 legs
But most importantly, or I should say amazingly in keeping with my title, is this guy:
He provides for us
He is an amazing dad. I can't get over the things he does to get a smile out of the kids (you're wishing I'd tell you, but I won't for his sake)
He never complains. You should see the traffic he drives though to and from work, it makes me insane, and it feels like I'm off-roading in my Trooper, but I'm not, it's just the freeway
I honestly believe he's the kindest person I will ever meet. Always. It makes me look kinda mean
He's so inspiring. Not only does he do this through living his own life, but he's so encouraging. I recently told him that I wanted to be a lactation consultant, which I thought wouldn't be that hard to become. I was totally wrong, it would be like getting another bachelor's, and yet he was still encouraging.
I know I'm bragging, but it is my blog, and I love my family. They're amazing. We all have our melt-downs, most often mommy and Eden, but man, I've really got it good.
It's tight
As you may think by the title, this post is not about our new cash only budget. Which by the way, it's so crazy to me to see how much I used to spend using a credit card versus using only cash. Just today, at Wal-Mart (not a fan, but their prices are better on some things I needed) I needed dryer sheets. Normally I'd buy Bounce brand and be done with it, but today, I was shocked at how expensive that brand is. It was probably three times more than Great Value. Maybe they made their brand name to be an intended pun. Anyway, this post is not about budgets, but rather this little guy.
He loves to suck his tongue, and it's so adorable. But he lives life where everything is a tight squeeze. When I put him in little jeans or pants, I usually have to stand him up to shimmy the pants around him. I'd say it's a pretty tight squeeze when he never has the button or zipper done on his pants either.
But what he really loves most of all, is crawling, scooting, or backing under things. It's such a tight squeeze for him. Under the rocker, under the love seat (we don't own a couch), even once under the pack and play. It's kind of crazy how this little guys likes to find the little nooks and cranny's and stuff himself in there.
But he loves it, and I love letting my kids doing things they love, even if it means hiding behind the curtains.
Kiss it
It happened while I was feeding this little guy,
that I realized Eden is growing up.
To be honest, it kind of hit me hard.
Only days ago, we were looking at pictures of her cousins,
who only years ago, were so small, and now they're grown.
And I felt it.
I knew right then and there that my little girl is growing up too.
She came to me to show me a bug bite on her elbow,
naturally asking me to kiss it.
But that kiss,
it didn't make it any better.
It's small,
the bite and the whole incident I write about.
But it makes me know, she's definitely growing up.
This one's for you mom
My mom and I had a brief talk a week ago about Eden and her new desire to pick out her own clothes. I told my mom it's fine with me, it goes against my grain to let my daughter run around looking like a clown at times, but she's proud of herself and I love how she doesn't care what others think.
Case in point:
Wow! I kept trying to tell her that she didn't need a hat, that it wasn't that cold, but no, she insisted that she needed to wear this hat and of course put on her lip balm before we left.
We walked into town with Eden and Micah sitting side by side in the stroller and it was a beautiful day with so many people out. We always get a lot of smiles when we're out, but on this particular day, not only did we get smiles, we got chuckles and laughs.
Allow me...
...to introduce you to Eden's pet dogs:
the one on the left is "Soggy Wing" and the one on the right is "Leaf Dog".
And because I know you're dying to know how old they are, they're 2 months and 4 months.
But don't worry, "their birthday is comin'."
For real though, this face, uggghh, she gets me. I feel like we've been having a conversation over, and over, and over lately that's like ten years premature. She tilts her head down a little and says in a little quiet voice, "Wish I had a pet dog."
