And that is why you should always listen to your mother....

So the other day I saw a cute centerpiece for fall and attempted to re-create it on my kitchen table. I took a huge hurricane vase and then put a small cylinder vase in the middle and then poured some carmel candy corns around the bottom and then put a candle in the cylinder vase. Voila, a really cute and easy centerpiece. What I failed to think through is that there is a huge container of candy corns on my kitchen table for all the kids to see!! The girls noticed before Cuatro and before they could get their hand in the container I made a rule that NO ONE was to eat the candy. I went back to tend to Audrey while the girls sat at the table doing their homework and Cuatro climbed the window. I finally made it back to the table to help the girls and by then Cuatro had discovered the wonderful candy corns. As he was putting his hands in I told him the candy was fake and poisonous so he better not touch it (Before you judge me, please know that the poison card always works with Cuatro and I did not want to be fighting with him over my pretty handiwork!). Well all of a sudden Laura starts to cry uncontrollably. I asked her what was wrong and she said through her tears, "I ate the candy corns and now I am going to die because they are poisonous!!!" After I whispered to her the truth she was fine but she is still wary of the candy on the table:) She should have listened to her mother.....

Does Cuarto have a future in the NFL?

This video speaks for itself. Cuatro is in the blue jersey second from the right-#41.

Worthy Lessons to Remember

We have a bit of a black cloud over us this week. There is so much going on with our family right now and I just wanted to remind myself and the kids of some verses about revenge. There are people around us who want to bring stress into our lives for their selfish gain and it makes us sad. Relationships have been severed and the whole situation is hard to handle. But what makes our perspective different than the one bringing the pain is our good God. He is in control and He has our good in mind. I have shed tears but have been given such peace through the following scripture. He loves our family and while this might be a refining period, it is for our good and His glory. My prayer is that we come through this with dignity. Here is what I am clinging to right now:

Romans 12:17 - "Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody."
Proverbs 20:22-"Do not say, "I will pay you back for this wrong!" Wait for the Lord and He will deliver you."
1 Peter 3:9-"Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult, but with blessing, because to this you were called so that you might inherit a blessing."

I will be honest and say that all sorts of thoughts went through my head as we found out this person's intent yesterday but I was reminded to take these thoughts captive and remember that I serve a BIG God and a GOOD God. We are to act ABOVE reproach and He will take care of the rest. God has been so faithful in making us aware of some bitterness creeping in. Joe and I know that we have been given so much-I don't mean material wealth but the gift of a wonderful home life, healthy children, a sweet marriage and many family and friends who are praying for us right this minute. I hope that as you children read this one day that you know that money and stuff you aquire do not matter. It all goes away in the end. May you know that your treasure is in heaven not here on earth. May greed not blind your life and ruin your relationships. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

And it starts.....

So this has been the week from down under and I don't mean Australia. I mean as in H-E-double hockey sticks. We had a great full weekend of activity and a family overnight trip to the ranch. The kids had a ball just playing in the dirt and riding all around on the hunting Jeep. So Sunday afternoon, we loaded our dirty and tired bodies into the car and took off for home 3 hours away. About one hour into our departure, Cuatro throws up all over himself. We are still on a county road so we pull over, clean him and his seat up, and he insists on wearing a new set of clothes. So we dress him again and take off. WELL, 50 minutes later we stop to let us girls take a potty break and Cuatro complains that his tummy hurts again. So I leap into action and throw his straps off and put him over the side of the car and tell him to throw up outside not inside. He smiles and starts playing with buttons on the car and anything else he can get his hands on. I think he is just bored sitting in his car seat and put him back in and we drive off again. Well, not even 5 minutes on the highway and we hear an awful noise and look back to see our son throwing up (exorcist style) about a week's worth of food EVERYWHERE. It did not stop for 2 minutes. I am in shock and Joe is trying to pull over as fast as he can with a huge trailer hooked up to our car. I am trying to find paper towels and Clorox wipes and Joe is telling me to get Cuatro out of the car. So I open my door to the tallest grass I have ever seen and refuse to step out---hello!!! snakes live in this kind of stuff. So Joe gets out and gets our son out and I vainly try to clean him and his seat up. We stripped our sweet three year old on the side of I-35 and I give up on the seat and tell Joe to get it out of the car and on the trailer. We put Cuatro in our back-up booster and a new diaper and go on our merry way. And I had the privilege of sitting next to him the rest of the way holding a plastic bag in case there was another episode. He promptly fell asleep about five minutes after we got back on the road and he had chosen Barbie and the Diamond castle to watch on the DVD. So fast forward to Wednesday at 4am where Laura starts throwing up. Here we go again!! Well, I still had to get Grace and Cuatro to their respective schools by 7:30 and 8:25 respectively. So everyone is ready to walk out the door and Laura throws up all over the floor. SO I clean it up and send her to the other house (Joe's office) to stay with her daddy until I return because there DID NOT need to be any more puking in the car. Needless to say, we are so late at this point to drop Grace off. The policy for being tardy is to have your parent walk you into the school office and sign you in. Well, I tell Grace this when we park at her school and she says, "really, you have to come in and bring these two in too (these two are Cuatro and Audrey)?". I looked at her in shock because I saw in her eyes that she was embarrassed to be seen with us!! It didn't help that I was in workout clothes and a ponytail and no makeup. I might have looked like death warmed over but I was her mama. I went through 37 weeks of throwing up, swollen feet, a rare all-over-body rash for her and then endured a 15 hour labor on top of that. And she wanted nothing to do with me or her little brother who is now shouting, "I get to go to school!!" at the top of his little lungs. Or her sweet, innocent, adorable 8 month old sister who was by this time wailing. I just don't see how we are embarrassing??? Nonetheless, I drag everyone out of the car and walk slowly to the office. All the while my sweet Grace is walking far behind us while Cuatro is running full force to the first open door so excited because he thinks he is going to Kindergarten (think this is going to end badly???). We get to the office, I sign her in and she gets her hall pass. I then ask a really dumb question which was, "Would you like us to walk you to your classroom?". And she said, "No, I can go by myself." And she quickly runs off (her class is a few feet from the office). So I watch her go and try not to cry and then tell Cuatro that we have to go. Well, you might have guess what happened. It wasn't pretty. There was a three year old jumping up and down, crying, and screaming that he didn't want to leave and that he was five and a half and can go to Kindergarten. I reminded him of his field trip and his friend Carson being at his school and all was right with the world and we walked to the car without further incident. But my mommy heart was a little sad as I drove off. Five years old is way too young to be embarrassed by your family, right? I thought so too. Oh Grace, I love you dearly and I hope that one day we don't embarrass you---that might be a really big stretch though.

P.S. As I was writing this, I was interrupted by Laura throwing up once again. I resumed my story once I got that "crime scene" cleaned up:) AHH, the endless joy of being a mommy.

Why I have been Absent from Blogging

I have not posted in FOREVER. And yes I have been busy. But that is not the reason I have neglected my blog. It is a much more complicated answer but a funny one...did you expect any less?

So one night, I was working on the laptop at my desk in the kitchen when I heard a disturbing scream from the girl's room. So I got up and put my laptop on the stove since it was in route to the room. I then got distracted with things like bathtime, storytime, and threatening Cuatro. So around 8pm, I emerged from the back of the house to a really weird smell in the kitchen. I called Joe to see if he could smell it too since it smelled like something was burning. And burning my laptop was. I had failed to see if the cooktop was off before setting something like a laptop on it. The computer had been there for so long, that the bottom was completely melted...gone...finished. I cried and Joe LAUGHED. I knew I loved a sense of humor in a man for some reason:) So I was without the internet for about two weeks and was starting to twitch. So Joe went and bought me an IPAD and assured me that I would love it and could do everything on it that I did on a laptop. It was really great until I figured out that I could not edit the posts in my blog or email a group of people from my account or use any type of Microsoft Office document. This is the three things I use most!!! So now I have a laptop and we all use the IPAD for fun...Cuatro especially when he found out he could see movies on it. So there is my excuse. But I am back and plan on doing a catch up post with pictures soon!! Until then, enjoy Audrey's birth story two posts below that I was finally able to edit and finish.

See you soon!!