On Being A Mother, Getting OLD, and Talking to God...

For all of the times that I may have been talking about some of the struggles of being a mom...how exhausting it can be, the sometimes crappy sleep, the throw up and wiping butts...the meltdowns, the 2 million questions that are usually the same thing asked in various ways, etc...I rarely focus on how rewarding and empowering being a mother is...and I say rarely because it's far easier to get caught up in all the work that goes along with being a mom, instead of the payoff.  Yesterday I decided that Adler needed a little one on one time with me so while Ayris and Asher played downstairs we went up to take a shower and it was there, as I had a stronghold on Adler straddling my hip while beating on my chest with his fist AND trying to bounce up and down my side (now that he's big enough to go crazy in his jumper, when he's out of it, he'll be kicking his legs, trying to bounce on whoever is holding him) that I realized how having children really can make you feel accomplished.  I managed to brush my teeth, wash my hair with shampoo AND conditioner, wash my entire body as well as Adler's all while holding him for those 20 minutes.  Obviously this isn't the first time we've showered together but it was the first time that I was overcome with gratitude for being able to juggle it all.   Being a woman in general can be a daunting task, but adding motherhood onto it adds a whole new realm of responsibilty and pressure.  I may not be changing lives out in the world but I'm hopefully changing my children's lives by being here.  They won't remember how totally awesome their mama was at taking a shower while holding them as a baby but hopefully they'll remember the small moments that happened in between the juggling bit...like standing for 5 minutes smiling together as Adler tried to eat the thousands of little water droplets that kept hitting his tongue...or in Ayris and Asher's case, the shampoo mohawks and fog drawings on the shower door.  It's exhausting but it's rewarding...and for all of the moments that do make you want to scream "REALLY?!?!?", there's probably thousands of women out there who'd do anything to trade places with you...to wear vomit and wipe butts and juggle a million things all at once just so they too could experience the awesomeness of being a mom.

In addition to being more grateful of my role, I'm trying to get my life back in order...not that I felt it was ever really off track, but I can always be more appreciative, more loving, more accepting, more forgiving.  And in trying to become this better version of myself, I'm trying to become more aware of God and what he's doing in my life...or at least trying to do.  But as I was laying in bed last night TRYING to get through my prayers, I couldn't help but smile at what a conundrum it all is.  God made me who I am but I question if he doesn't secretly wish he could go back and tweak some things =)  I am seriously like someone with ADD on crack when trying to get through my prayers.  I shouldn't label myeslf with ADD when I don't have it but if a person were to look at my brain and see thoughts...for instance, if I had 97 little thought circles in my head that you could see, at any given time, as many as 77 of those 97 circles would probably be lit up...I can see why Chris' eyebrows start to raise as we're having a conversation and I've veered off in so many different directions that sometimes I don't even get back to my initial thought until he circles me back...well praying is about 600 times worse because I don't see God rolling his eyes, as an indicator for me to wrap it up... so often times, this is how it goes:

Dear God,

Thank you for blessing my life with three beautiful children.  Please forgive me for my sins...while we're talking about sins, am I supposed to list out my sins or can I just say, please forgive me of my sins and you'll just erase them all?  Because I'm pretty sure I said God a handful of times today...Like "Oh my God!", not because I was talking about you or something...oh, and I'm pretty sure I said retarded a few times too...and though I don't think it's a sin to say retarded, I should probably stop.  I didn't lie at all today though...not that I lie alot, but like white lies.  But if I go into something knowing that it's a sin...like lying, and then I ask forgiveness knowing full well that it was a sin to begin with..does that still count...or do you like forgive me less?  Because I don't think I can be perfect.  I wonder what I should do with my day tomorrow since Chris is giving me some time...maybe I should see a movie...that 127 hours looks good but I don't think it's here in MN yet.  Whatever, it won't matter...I'm really just going for the popcorn.  That reminds me, I need to go to Target after the movie to get those boxes of cereal with the free movie tickets on the front...oh, which means I'll have to print off those Cinnamin Toast Crunch coupons online before I leave.  Wait, where was I going with this...crap, I was praying.  God, you still there?  So forgive me for my sins.  Man, I should download that Original Sin song by Taylor...wait, what was her name?  I'll google that tomorrow.  Maybe I should google it now because I'll forget tomorrow.  Taylor Dayne..that's it.  But now I wonder, should I even be listening to a song about looking for an original sin?  Probably not but, what the heck, I'm not perfect...I probably shouldn't be watching half of the tv shows that I do either but I'm not quitting that.  OH MY GOSH, I'M LIKE SOMEONE WITH ADD ON CRACK!  Sorry God...I just said gosh AND I keep getting sidetracked.  But yeah, I'm totally going to write about this on the blog tomorrow...

At which point, I spend the next 11 minutes thinking about what I'll say on the blog (that I have long since forgotten)...honestly though, my 45 minute prayer could really be about 4 minutes in length if I could actually get the prayer all out without wandering to 20 other things throughout...that's what I'm saying about God though...he knows I'm like this already so in essence, when he made me...he knew full well he'd be putting in a good 45 minutes worth of time on mostly senseless stuff...and he still made me anyway.  It occured to me last week that God made me increasingly special, when I got caught up talking to my friend Debbie:

"I think being Catholic would be awesome in that respect only (going to confessional)...getting to sit in a box telling all my sins to someone and talking about whatever...I'd probably visit that box everyday. They'd have to kick me out too...there'd be a line forming because I'd be in there forever. I wonder if there are rules for that...like time limits...cuz I'm sure I'm not the only person like that. This kind of makes me want to go find a confessional. You think they would let an Assemblies of God person just come in and sit in the box and talk even if I'm not Catholic? I think that's gonna go on my bucket list if so...that, right along with milking a cow. I've always wanted to do that. God made me special didn't he??? =)"

All of you are probably thinking about how fortunate Chris is to have me right about now huh?? =)  He knows he totally scored big time with me! =) Seriously though, I WANT to go sit in a box and talk to a priest.

Anyway, I've strayed long enough here...on with some pictures!

Working on his Rod Stewart like Asher did here:





So Chris and I helped the kids carve their pumpkins and then they asked for butter knives to do a little something themselves...Asher's ended up completely faceless and Ayris' lost his teeth and got a bunch of holes added...but they were happy and proud so it's all good...


Kind of an eclectic group of trick-or-treaters but...cute non the less...


By the time we got home from visiting the grandparents houses, Asher had ripped the butt in his spiderman costume so he became Iron Man...and around 3:30 or so Ayris came down with a fever but she insisted on going to 4 houses even though she was miserable...which is why she looks it in this picture...


My baby girl is growing up..and it kinda sucks for this mom...




Sitting in the sink after the "my mom is so amazing and awesome" shower that we took...


Look at those legs!  Such a chunk...I don't know how you people can come on here and see these pictures of Adler without just wanting to drive on over to hold him...sometimes if I'm on the blog and see his pictures at night, I just want to go wake him up and give him some little squishes on his cheeks!




And this lovely picture is further proof of my aging body...I have no idea how I got this bruise...it's like they just show up...and the last time I checked, people like my mom and grandma were the ones who had mystery bruises....guess I'm joining that super cool club now. 


Some pictures I got of Adler talking to Grandma Sooner:
"Oh hi Grandma, what's up?"


"Really, are you serious?"


"That's like the best news ever!"


"Yeah, thanks for letting me know, I'm going to tell all of my baby friends"


"Uh Grandma, I'm going have to call you later...mom's all up in my business again with her camera"


And our lovely little middle child had been missing for a bit so when I went upstairs to find him, I found him sitting in his sisters hat eating day old popcorn on our bed...never a dull moment with this one =)  There is an extremely lucky lady out there right now probably sitting in her own cartoon pajamas not even knowing that 20+ years from now, she's going to be married to this fine man!