Admittedly it's been a while. When I stopped writing on this blog, I was having so many health problems and seeing so many doctors (and counselors - found out I have ADD - that explained boatloads of things)...then miraculously, Dr. Charles Hamel did a lymes test and it was positive. I cured it with homeopathic drops and low-dose-naltrexone. It took over a year to heal, but when I could make it a whole day without naps, I was a new person :) So a year ago, we decided to sell our beloved Church Road home and move to something (hopefully) bigger and on a more ideal street (cul de sac preferably) with more neighbors and people and here we are at our new house that is about a block from our old one! I love it here. If only you knew the stress, distress and crazy road God had us on to get here - I really don't even want to think about it - it is still too fresh...and it was hard on our marriage! But it had to do with Jon looking for a different job while building this house while we lived in an apartment for 8 months with bikes parked in the living room and all along having no idea what was going to happen and thinking this house probably wouldn't work out. But I prayed it would :) We moved in right before Christmas - kind of feels like we "missed" Christmas this year (moving is TERRIBLE by the way)....but I can't believe it is already February and I am finalizing projects and settling in...adding lots of color :)...I hope to be completely done with that soon! And I love Jon now more than ever - and not just because of this great house and him having a job he loves - just because Jon is awesome. Ok, I'm crying time to move on.
But I am just in love with my kids ages and I just need to reflect on that. I mean FINALLY I am not secretly wishing my kids would grow up. It felt like they were going to be toddlers FOREVER...it REALLY did...and that wasn't a happy thing for me. Those baby and toddler years are HARD HARD HARD for me. Not being able to communicate with them. The constant messes. They get sick all the time. They melt-down in public and the isolation due to the rest of the world having no desire to see a baby or toddler headed in their direction (and a woman crazy enough to have one even more so). The baby/toddler's desperate need for structure in the sleep and eating schedules (and my complete inability to provide structure no matter how much advice I am given from other moms who do it easily - giving advice to moms should be seen as cruel and inhumane BTW, I mean it is just so sensitive when you are already doing the very dang best you can and you are so exhausted...I hope I remember that as an older woman). It makes me want to cry to think about how terrible all that is...I mean I feel GUILTY that I feel that way about those baby/toddler years...but now I feel little panic bubbles gurgling inside of me that that are GROWING UP...and that is a new feeling for me. (And moving out one day - are you kidding me? I will just die). I LOVE these kids. I cannot even describe the love I have for each one of them. They are perfect and I would not change ONE thing about Anna Kate, J.R., Caroline or Peter. I just feel really speechless - just kidding - I can always talk more (you are thinking "Phew! I was worried she wasn't going to say anything else."). But seriously, I enjoy every minute I have with them. Now if I could just FOCUS on them more that would be awesome b/c I feel constantly distracted by my to-do-list (cooking and cleaning - Lord help me), computer and the 2 million ideas that pop into my head each day. But it's a DEEP DEEP DEEP thankfulness in my heart for these 4 treasures and the way God shows me that is how He feels about us...I just didn't feel that when they were little - if God loved me the way I loved them then He was definitely feeling overtired and overwhelmed by me 24/7 and that's how I really felt He must have felt about me....but now that they are older I am sooooooooooooooo happy. And I am so happy to see parent/child relationships this beautiful indescribable way. Thank you Lord.
