January 3rd - 27th, 2020: Back to the grind

Oh my. Time is slipping past me and I have gotten out of my groove with writing. My track record has been terrible lately. I have over a month to write about right now and I don't think I can do that in one post, so I'll do it in two, but gosh dangit I need to make myself write tonight and tomorrow night so I can be officially caught up. Once I am caught up, I'm convinced I will be into writing everyday simply on account that I now know getting behind is the WORST. Must be avoided at all costs. 

I haven't taken major notes, but I've at least written down some funny details about the last few weeks since we've been home from our trip. Before I get to that though, here are some odds and ends we have been up to since getting home:

• Since the matching Christmas jammies that we ordered came late, I decided to just wait until we got home to snap some pictures. So Saturday the 9th, before we took down the tree and all of our Christmas decorations (I know, kinda late getting it all down, but it's an ordeal and too hard for me to do without Adam's help so Saturday was our first real chance since I'm too spent on weeknights after he's home and the kids are in bed. Not to mention I dread putting it all away - the house looks so bare and depressing once it's all gone..) we did that little photoshoot. Got some hilarious outtakes, as usual and to be expected. There was always an offender in every picture, but some were just so funny that I kinda love those and I'm not bothered by the fact that I didn't get a perfect picture with all 3 smiling. Let's be honest. their personalities shine through the best when they aren't smiling. Rowan's new thing is making this face that looks like Popeye and it is pretty hilarious. He just kept doing it because we couldn't help but laugh. 😂
• Saturday the 16th, we ventured out to the Discovery Center which we hadn't been to since the beginning of the pandemic. We got there 30 minutes before it closed (didn't think about it closing earlier than normal because of the pandemic), so it was kind of a joke, but at least the kids could explore and get out some energy for a little bit. Afterwards, we went to Old Navy so Adam could find some new jeans and I swear we're like a 3 ring circus when we all go somewhere together like that. The kids obviously do not love going shopping like that, but I really wanted to see the jeans options and weigh in on them too so I needed to see him try them on. 🤷 A few partial meltdowns later, we finally made it outta there. Ironically, Adam didn't buy most of the jeans in the store because there was a 30% off online deal going on, so he ordered them that night and by accident had them delivered to my parents' house instead of ours when he didn't think to change the shipping info after Christmas at their house. 🤦🤦 That ended up being a headache to sort out, but an extra $13 later, my mom got them shipped to our house. ANYWAY, after leaving Old Navy it was dinner time so we decided to stop and get a couple pizzas from Dominos. Rowan was so terrible in the car waiting that the poor kid got the consequence of having to watch us all eat pizza once we were home, while he couldn't eat any himself. We certainly gave him some warnings, but to no avail. He was not a happy camper for awhile!!! Maybe that will teach him to be more patient next time. 
• Sunday the 17th, we went over to our friends' house (the Pylants) for dinner and games. We had Chicken curry that was delish and they introduced a new game to us called Splendor. It didn't seem like a game that would be up my alley because initially it sounded kinda complicated, but I got the hang of it and it was actually pretty dang fun. I even won! 🙌
• Monday the 18th was Martin Luther King day, so Maeve had no school and Adam actually had the day off! Amanda (Pylant) invited us over to her house again for a playdate, which Adam actually went for since he had some stuff he wanted to get done. He ended up being more than happy to have the peace and quiet so he could really be productive. So much so that when we were still at her house as the dinner hour approached and she invited us to stay and eat, Adam was given the option to join, but he declined and insisted that I stay because he didn't want the peace and quiet to end. 😂😏 We had some great (and some juicy) conversation while the kids played and another friend stopped by as well at one point and the 3 of us got lost in some deep conversation for a bit. For dinner, she made homemade bread to use for cold cut sandwiches and man, that sandwich was SO good. It was your typical sandwich, nothing fancy as far as the sandwich toppings, so it must have been the homemade bread that really set it apart!! She had also made homemade carrot cake and cupcakes and sent us home with a bunch of cupcakes. I am spoiled by her!! 😍 We always go to their house because it has more space, but I'm excited for the day we upgrade to a bigger house so that I can be the one to invite people over and make awesome food and treats to send home with them. 
• Saturday the 23rd, I got spoiled by Adam because he got the kids out of my hair for a little while and I enjoyed the quieter house - instead of vegging and watching Netflix (which sounded appealing) I was super happy to get some thank you notes written and treat stains in some of the kids clothes and cross those items off my to do list. The joys of being an adult... living large over here! 🤣😅 Adam also earned some extra points when he surprised me by buying some ground beef at the store so that we could make real tacos (as opposed to our typical vegan take on tacos) cause I had been craving some good Mexican food the last few days before that. He even got a packet of taco bell taco seasoning. Party! They were delish and we washed them down some some smores that he made over our fire. Thank goodness for him being willing to make fires even in the cold weather cause -- kids always love an opportunity to have some smores without having to be out in the cold. The fire helps, but when the warm house is 2 feet away it's hard to pass that up. 🤷 We ended up using the rest of the ground beef to make hamburgers on Sunday so that was fun too!
• Our weekdays all end up feeling mostly the same, but I do have to share a few miracles that we'll add to what we'll call the Maeve School Morning Saga. Usually it's drama, drama, drama - but we've had some near disasters that resulted in successes so I can't leave those stories unsaid: 
• Normally, when Maeve doesn't have something available and clean that she wishes she could wear, she starts to spiral. My gut reaction is to act a little more hyper, put extra pressure on her, and focus too much on how we don't have much time. This never helps and only turns the morning into meltdown central, while I'm losing my temper. I recently decided that the better approach on my end would be to relax and not feel the need to rush her so much, tell her that it does totally stink that what she wants isn't available, but calmly remind her of her other options. And calmly let her know if she can't make a decision within a few minutes, that I'd have to decide for her at that point. Being calm when we're in a time crunch is not my forte, especially when the whining begins. BUT I totally stuck to this approach one morning when she started to go down the hole and I was amazed at how quickly I pulled her back out of it and the crisis was averted. Major lesson learned for me! It's okay to take the time to address a small fire instead of brushing it off and allowing it to turn into a big fire. Totally what I was doing before and I'm glad I was able to break that bad habit! 🙏
• Another morning, I woke up at 6:55am when we're supposed to leave at 7:05am. Apparently I opened up my alarms the night before, but didn't actually swipe one on. 🤦 It's a miracle that I naturally woke up before it was really too late and it's also a miracle that I managed to get us out the door on time still. I jumped out of bed and rushed around, but still thought we were screwed. Thanks to total cooperation from the kids and help from Adam, we pulled it off!! 🙌🙏
• Last but not least, on a different morning that instead we got out later than we should have, it was so congested trying to get in the parking lot. I think it ended up taking till close to 7:25am to actually pull in and I knew that there was NO way I could get her through those doors on time unless we got directed to the front. Chances are more slim for that the later it gets, but I prayed and the heavens answered and we literally got the last spot in that line. 🙏  She still went through those doors with a few minutes to spare!! Hallelujah. 

Now onto the random notes that I did write down - mostly funny stuff from the last month:

~One morning Rowan saw something that caught his eye out the window and said in disbelief, "What the junk??" 🤣 He's obviously been listening to his Daddy ha. 

~The first couple of weeks of January, Rowan was obsessed with saying the word "Boom!" He was following up literally almost anything with it. I wish I could remember the funniest examples, but I can't. He'd certainly always call it out when he finished something or did something well. It kept us laughing for sure!

~One night while laying with Maeve in bed, she started acting very distressed about my bandaid usage. She had been noticing that whenever they'd get too wet from showering or washing hands a million times, I'd have to get rid of them and get new ones. So basically, she gave me a talking to telling me that I was "wasting them" and that I need to stop doing that because they "cost money"... 🤦😂Thank goodness I have my 5 year old to keep me in line financially. Phew!

~Maeve has been very into her bitty babies since we've been back at home playing with them. It's double the work since there are two and I can't tell you how many nights I've put jammies on both my real baby and at least one of those pretend babies too. 😏 It's pretty cute though because she has started to let Rowan sleep with one of them and basically calls it his baby now and often they both come downstairs in the morning holding their respective babies. A dream come true for Rowan who lives for copying and being just like his big sis. 🥰 Anyway, I got a good laugh one night when Maeve walked into my room, saw her baby on the bed, and said "Baby! Hi little chunky!" 😂😂 I wonder where she heard that term from... 😏

~This conversation from a couple weeks ago had us laughing... 

        Me: "Dad's birthday is coming up!"

        *Earth shattering screams of excitement from the kids*

        Me: "You guys should think of a little gift you wanna give him!"

        Adam: "How about obedience?"

        Rowan: *thinks for a second* "....Nah!" 😂😂

~I got a foam bat that has a little foam softball to go with it a while back, thinking maybe Rowan could earn it if he ever had a really good long stretch not having a potty accident. Maeve noticed it said for ages 5+ on it and pointed out that Rowan was too young for it. So for a while, Rowan was dead set on waiting until he was 5 to open it, convinced he was too young to use it. Recently though, he decided he wanted to try it out so I let him open it and BOY was he obsessed at first!!! He's not really familiar with the term softball, so he still calls it a baseball and instead of saying "let's play baseball" he would shorten it to "let's play base" 😂😂 - so multiple times a day for probably 2 weeks straight I had to hear him say "Mom, let's play base!". And I definitely threw the ball for him a lot and he's got a pretty good stance for a 3 year old. We were laughing because instinctively he just knew how to hold the bat without any coaching, whereas Maeve on the other hand was clueless and awkward, even after my instruction. 🤣 I think it's pretty clear who the athletic one will be! 

~In addition to playing a lot of "base" around the clock, for those same 2 weeks we had Parry Grip songs playing on repeat. Rowan even knew how to turn them on and my gosh, those songs are so obnoxious. Their favorites are Raining Tacos, Yum Yum Breakfast Burrito, Space Unicorn, Cat Flushing a Toilet, and Pancake Robot. You can tell they're obnoxious from the titles alone. I thought I was going to die one day from listening them so much. 😱 

~Maeve makes certain clothing decisions based on what day of the week it is (she's a little OCD) and one morning she was asking me what day of the week it was while getting dressed. Rowan was also getting dressed and I had already picked out his clothes, but after hearing her ask and hearing my response of Wednesday he said "Is this my Wednesday shirt and Wednesday pants?" 😂🤦 Oh dear... another OCD creature in the making. 

~Maeve was brainstorming what she could get for Adam for his birthday and came up with a tie. While trying to decide what it should look like she threw out "Maybe one with steak on it! Or soda! Or I know!! What if it said Happy Birthday on it?! Or maybe one with a rainbow on it!" 🤦😂😂 Great ideas sister, great ideas. He'll certainly be pleased with one of those options... 😜

~The kids like to play piano tutorial music videos on the TV, so they're basically just listening to the songs and I don't count it as screen time. One afternoon though they ended up going off course and started watching actual music videos. Once I busted them and made them turn it off since they weren't supposed to be watching stuff, Rowan said "I wasn't watching it, I was just sitting watching the clock Mommy!" 😂 Nice try, bud. A winning argument for sure. 

~One day Maeve asked me if my hair tie was waterproof and then said "Oh that's funny I asked that! Should you write that down? (in my blogging notes)" 😂🤦

~On MLK day, as we were getting ready to leave the Pylants' house, Amanda asked her kids to go put their jammies on. A few minutes later, Rowan came over to me and asked where his jammies were, like he needed to put them on too. 😂😍 Sweet boy just wanted to join in on getting ready for bed, ha. 

~One day Rowan went pee in the potty and he noticed that the water still looked clear in the toilet. He said with a very serious face, "It's just cause it went down and it was just pee water!" 🤔 Well, that explains it. 

~One night Rowan was feeling very needy and sad at bedtime and desperately wanted me to keep laying with him. While choking back tears he said, "I want you so much!" 🥰😍 And just like that I turned into mush. He's a genius and knows exactly how to get me to stay with him for as long as he wants! 

~Alexa was telling us the weather one day and shared that there would be showers. After hearing that, Rowan told me I could take a shower. Phew! 😂 Thank goodness for mother nature. 

~Maeve decided at the beginning of January that she really wanted to get a school lunch. Turns out, they're actually free for the rest of the school year. I knew this, but I was hesitant to let her jump on the bandwagon for fear that she'd love it and beg for it all the time. It's hard to argue with free, but it's also not the healthiest food. Luckily, when she brought it up she seemed to understand and be okay with ordering every once in a while being best. When I told her it would be free she was in total disbelief. She said in the car on the way home from school the day that she got it "Mommy, it's crazy. At restaurants - you have to pay! At the store - you have to pay! At my school - no! You don't!!"  😂😂Her world was truly rocked that day.

~Nolan has started shaking his head no and it's pretty stinking cute. He can also say "ball" now and it's no surprise that is his first real word. He is obsessed and says it a million times a day. 😍 Still being lazy though and not walking, but little stinker. 

~This conversation 😂🤦:

        Rowan: "I don't want lemonade!"

        Maeve: "Why?" 

        Rowan: "Because I always drink it all!"

        Maeve: "Well that means you love it, so don't you want it?"

        Rowan: "....Yes! I do!" 

~Every now and then Adam calls me honey bunches of oats when I call him at work. So when he called me while at the store one day, I answered saying "What up honey bunches of oats?" and he said "Oh my gosh, that is so crazy you said that because I'm literally standing in front of the honey bunches of oats and looking at them right now." 😂🤯 What are the odds! Gave us a good laugh for sure. 

~Adam is far too obsessed with cracking backs and necks now after being around my brother Josh at Christmas time. It's a problem. I really don't like getting either cracked, but he doesn't really know how to take no for an answer (just like Josh... wonder who he learned from 🙄)  and he can't help himself but crack me and the kids anyway. So I've at least started demanding some form of payment - like sour candy, Dr. Pepper, or a massage. Gotta win somehow! 😉

~Rowan has been getting really good at writing certain letters and numbers these days (he even knows how to write his name now!) and he was making a card one day and wrote the letter G with a marker. He was not satisfied with how it looked and the poor, sweet boy took an eraser to it in hopes to erase it and try again. 🥰 Little did he know you cannot erase marker. Made me smile and laugh on the inside for sure. 

~Rowan is also learning how to dress himself these days and he's mostly excited about it, but it takes him sooo much longer. It is pretty painful to sit and watch, I so badly want to take over. 😅

~One afternoon I asked Rowan if he wanted to read books and he responded, "Well, you need to read them to me if there's hard letters that I can't read" and then went on to list all the letters he knows. As if that means he knows how to read words. 😂 Not exactly how it works, bud! 😏

~Nolan has turned into a beggar for food anytime I'm eating, even if he has just been fed. 🤦 I made toast one morning for both Rowan and myself and sweet Rowan started feeding him bites of his toast so I didn't have to feed him mine. 🥰 Such a nice brother!

~This isn't funny, but so wild and bizarre that I have to share. I stopped nursing Nolan a few weeks ago and as I was weaning, I got to a point where I felt like I was totally empty and had no milk to offer. After feeling that way for like a week, out of nowhere one day I woke up feeling so engorged I wanted to die!! I thought for sure that meant that I would continue to be engorged between feedings until I stopped completely, but then the next day I woke up totally empty again. 🤯🤯🤯 Whaaaaat?!? Is this the twilight zone?? It was so weird and I have no idea how to explain that one. It's certainly never happened to me before in my breastfeeding days. So crazy!

I think that's about all I got. So now for a ton of pictures!! 

Nothing but trouble! 

I just can't even with that smile and those teeth 😍😍😍

The most normal one 

Rowan 😂

My personal favorite 😂😂🤦 Nolan is scared to be a part of the family, as he should be 

Nolan 😍😍

Another favorite 😂😂 - there goes the pop eye face on Rowan 

Rowan just had to put on a show 😂🤦

😂🤣

😍😍

😂😍

Popeye appears again 🤣

😂

Normal smiles! Cute sibs! 

A rare snow day in Tennessee!! 🙊🙌

We even made a snowman! 

That stance! 😂 He loves Maeve. 

😍😍

He managed to basically put on my loungewear top 😂

Bouncy curls for days!! My mom sent me home with a special curling iron for her that I'm loving! And cutest outfit ever. 😍😍 

Yep, that's my boy. 😆

Zoey found a comfy spot 😂

Trouble! Smoking on his pipe 😂😜

Cute girl! 

His favorite way to wear headbands 😂

Future blackmail 😂

How to properly eat bread when you're 3 

😍😍

Under the bed party! 

Maeve's eyes 😂

If only his name was Roman! Almost nailed it 😂

😂

He drew a snowman! 

This series though... 👇😍😍

I could eat him! 

Two doggies on my lap. 😍

Rowan and Nolan had a wrestling match (read Rowan throwing Nolan around) that lasted 10 minutes and Nolan laughed through 90% of it 😂😍

Brothers 😍😍

He was terrified for his life here 😂

How Rowan wears my headphones 😂

Maeve had a couple days where she was obsessed with wearing this scarf like a belt. She even wore it over her jammies to bed! 😂😂

His Christmas tree was too cute so I had to snap a pic- Maeve helped him with it 

I vacuumed literally 10 seconds before this happened..... 🙄😂 Sooo he got to eat as much of it as he wanted 

The kids went above and beyond to block Nolan from their play area behind the couch. 😂

They really thought of every detail... Like blocking under the stool so he couldn't crawl through 😂👌

Adam's under there somewhere! 😂

Rowan's face and hand placement 😂👌

And some videos too that have had me laughing way too much! Lots of shenanigans go down around here and my children are truly insane. 😂😂😂

https://youtu.be/8rWt0ivOeF4 - gotta love her dress over her clothes and socks with her flats 😂

https://youtu.be/gFqYPOVfIHc - how Rowan plays video games in his princess dress that he must wear because it's "his size" 😂🤦

https://youtu.be/_k9tid06Xqc - to clarify he's "singing" It's Raining Tacos in this one 🤦🤯😂

https://youtu.be/9KSSoN1jEnE - his preschool song 🥰

https://youtu.be/e5SQTiqOxXo

I also forgot to share this one of Naomi from New Years in my last post! 👉https://youtu.be/4nx2K9-nHYs

Peace and blessings. ✌️