Living In His Blessings

And Praising Him Every Step of the Way

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Post-Thanksgiving Update

I swear it seems like someone has changed the calendar somehow and I'm now only averaging about 5 days a week. And this same culprit has somehow managed to tack on about 47 things on the average day's list of "things to do today". I can't seem to keep up. It seems like I go to sleep on Saturday night and wake up on Thursday morning!!!

So, here we are on yet another Saturday evening and it's time for another update. Sadly, there isn't much to post about this week since our family has been only half its normal size all week. Both Ryann and Kamri left on Friday of last week to spend the Thanksgiving break with their Dads. I know that I've been doing this visitation thing for 9 years now, but I swear it never really gets any easier. I miss those two little girls like crazy when they're gone! Good thing I have a 1 ½ year old to keep me busy in their absence.

This week can pretty much be summed up in one word. BUSY!!! I worked 3 ½ days this week and was off work on Thursday and Friday. Since my family traditionally does not have our Thanksgiving dinner on Thursdays, we were invited to go spend that time with my boss' family. And while most people might think that's strange……it felt completely normal to us. Because as you may remember me mentioning, I have pretty much the most amazing boss on the planet and the ladies I work with are literally like family to me. So, we got to enjoy some family time with them on Thursday before Steve had to leave for work and Grant and I headed to my parent's house for a low-key dinner and then headed home. Up until late Thursday night, I still had not decided whether I was going to do any Black Friday shopping this year or not. But, in the end, the lure of shopping from home in my pjs definitely won out. And therefore, I didn't get the ONE deal that I really wanted…..and that's a new laptop. Mine completely died about 3 months ago and I've been borrowing Steve's since then while patiently waiting for the Black Friday sales to bring me an awesome deal. No such luck this year……so, I'll have to put that on my Santa Wish List.

I did however venture out Friday morning for some shopping time with my mom and was able to pick up a couple more Christmas gifts. Then I came home and prepared a VERY scaled down version of Thanksgiving dinner for Steve's dad and our family. Since there were only 3 adults and Grant….I didn't do anything elaborate. Just the Thanksgiving staples……but Paul was grateful and we were happy to be able to have a small Thanksgiving dinner with him.

Saturday morning I met up with Adam to pick up Ryann and then we headed to my parent's house for our family Thanksgiving dinner. It was wonderful even if we weren't all able to be there. Kamri is still at her father's house until Monday and Brittany showed up late due to being scheduled to work. And of course, since it's Saturday Steve had to be at work at 4:00. I'll have pictures of today's festivities to share as soon as I get them from my mom.

That's about it for us……it may not sound like much but I feel like I haven't slept more than 15 hours all week. And I really don't expect that to change much as Christmas gets closer. There's just so much to do and never enough time to get it all done. However, I would just like to say that I'm SO excited that I will have all three of my babies at home for Christmas this year! I LOVE odd years! :D

I'm sure that I'll have LOTS to post about in the next 30 days! So check back soon!

Love to all,
Melony : )

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Where has the time gone?!?!

It is so hard for me to believe that it's been almost a month and a half since my last update. There have been so many new developments and changes, but it's just really hard to find time to sit down and blog these days. I really don't even know where to start. But I'll warn you……this post might will be long!

Kamri turned 8 on October 16th. And we had the realization that Steve has now been around for almost half of her life. It seems like it's gone by so fast! We ended up having a party for Kamri at my mom's house since it's more of a central location. Kamri originally thought she wanted to have a party at the local skate rink, but after giving that some thought, we decided it really didn't make much sense at this point. Emma & Dean can't skate yet, Grant & Wyatt are too young, my parents are too old (sorry, mom), Jessica's too pregnant and I'm too scared! So, it really would have only been Ryann and Kamri that got to enjoy the skating part. We decided to stick with a simple at home party that everyone would enjoy and I have to say that I think Kamri had a great time. She's doing very very well in school academically and behaviorally and I couldn't be more proud!

Ryann has definitely started to blossom into a "tween". She's starting to have conversations with me that sometimes amaze me. I literally can talk to her just like she's an adult (when it comes to certain subjects, of course). She's so stinkin' smart!!! She went to the orthodontist recently and hopefully we will be getting her braces off within the next couple of months. I know that she's anxious to see what the end result will be. She's also expressed an interest in singing lately and so I'm thinking about possibly talking to a friend of mine from church who may be able to give voice lessons to Ryann every couple of weeks. This is still a "processing thought" so I'm not 100% sure where it will lead.

Our horse riding teacher, Hannah has been unavailable for several weeks now because she's in the process of moving to her newly built house. Twister and Joker will also be making the move and both of the girls are very eager to get back "in the saddle" and start up with their lessons again. I'm excited for them to be able to start riding again soon, too. I know how much they enjoyed it.

Grant……oh dear. It seems that this is where the biggest changes take place. There's something new every day. But what else can you expect from a 20 month old little boy?? Grant has now graduated to a toddler bed since he was climbing into Kamri's bed every day at naptime to sleep anyway. I figured this meant he was ready for his own big boy bed. It's been a bit of a struggle the past few nights (which I completely expected to be the case). He now has a new freedom that he's never had before. And he takes advantage of that freedom every single night. The crazy thing is, during the day he goes into his room and randomly lies down in his bed to sleep……no crying involved. Also, we started Grant at a new daycare last week on a Tuesday/Thursday schedule. And it appears as though that's not going to work out. I will take full responsibility for this decision. Because after a mere two days at daycare, my son came home with a stomach bug AND a cold. The stomach bug was then passed on to myself just as he was finished with it and I missed two valuable days of work. So, for now…..you can count us out on the daycare scene. I'm much happier having my boy at home and healthy!

Have I mentioned that Grant is a climber??? Is this a common theme among little boys??? Are there any other terrifying interesting quirks that boys have that I should know about now so as to prepare myself for the future??? Last night as I was in the kitchen making dinner, I turned around to find my son literally crawling on the dining room table in order to reach something in the middle of it. I could not believe my eyes and was momentarily frozen with shock. Just the night before, we caught him climbing up his toy box/shelf. This incident was a little more frightening since he could have easily fallen if Ryann hadn't been nearby to catch him. So seriously, is this normal for boys?!?! Because I don't EVER remember my girls being climbers! Lord help me……help me not die of a heart attack!

Everything is still going just wonderfully at my job. I am convinced that I have undoubtedly the most amazing boss on the planet and I am SO very blessed to have this position. And on top of that blessing, we recently received another! Steve received a completely unexpected phone call from the owner of the bowling alley in Greenville (where Steve and I happened to meet) who proceeded to offer him a Management position! We really weren't sure what to make of this new development since Steve had not even been looking for work. But with the blessing of my job literally falling into my lap and then this one falling into Steve's……we just aren't sure what to make of things! So, for right now Steve is working 3-4 shifts a week and loving it. He enjoys being around other bowlers and hopefully this is going to give him an opportunity to get some practice hours in. However, right now he's not able to bowl because almost 2 weeks ago during the first minutes of his last soccer game of the season, he hurt his knee and has been pretty much out of commission since. We are all hoping that it isn't anything requiring serious medical attention. And for now, it's looks promising because it's finally starting to hurt less and looks less swollen. So, we are still praying for a speedy recovery!

Whew, I warned you there was a lot! That's what I get for waiting so long to update this thing. My fingers are tired……and my Excedrin PM is definitely starting to kick in. So, although I'm sure that there's more to tell……this girl is beat. I'll have to update more later.


 

We hope everyone is doing well. More to come soon (hopefully)!

Love to all,

Melony : )