it doesn't make sense

i just don't get it sometimes. i don't get why things are they way they are. why hard things happen to really great people. why great things happen to people who make horrible decisions. why life doesn't make sense.

it seems like every day, i learn about a friend who desperately wants to have a child and can't. or who is so excited to have a baby and has a miscarriage. or who is adopting out of the foster system and has their child taken back.

and then i see teen moms having babies. yes, multiple. i see crappy parents getting to keep their kids. i see myself, having two kids very easily when it wasn't a decision we had to think through very hard.

and i just don't get it.

i don't write this to hear that i am a great mom, or that God gave me hiba and matthias for a reason, or anything like that. i know all of that. so please don't tell me. because that is the opposite of the point i am trying to make. i know that He must have a good plan and i am glad, although often confused, that He chose me to be their mom. but it still doesn't make sense to me. jason and i never really thought through having kids. it was just easy. and so we had two. and then we decided to not have more. and that was that, no problems, no drawn out discussions, no waiting. and to be completely honest, i don't know why we got two. i love my kids dearly, and i would not trade them, and i cannot imagine life without them (although sometimes i try to...). but, i can't help but think, i've never thought i was super cut out to be a mom. it was not the deepest desire in my heart. i am glad and thankful that it happened - and i'm not trying to be trite or make it sound like i don't love my kids or that i'm not glad now that i am a mom. i'm just staying, it wasn't what i yearned for. so why did i get two? why did i get them so easily? and why can't so many people - who i know and love, who would make wonderful parents, way better parents that i feel i am, who deeply, deeply want a baby - have one?

it does make me want to be a better mom. to love my kids better. to spend more time with them and less time watching tv. to read them more books. to pray for and with them more. to hug them more. because i do know that, for whatever crazy reason, i was given these two kids. and guilt or confusion or whatever that i got them and someone else didn't will never change that.

it won't ever make perfect sense to me, the way God works. i don't think i'll ever have the answers. i'll probably always feel inadequate, i'll probably always think someone else could be doing my job better, i'll probably always feel a little guilt when i hear about a friend who is having trouble having children, i'll probably always be really sad for them and not know what to do.

so for today, i'll weep with those who weep. i'll pray for healing, miracles, hope, peace, comfort. i'll hug my kids and try to overlook my shortcomings and trust that God knows what he's doing. and that will have to be enough for now.

boys will be boys

*the other day, matthias told me and jason that he wants to have 10 kids. after telling him that he is crazy, i asked him what he would name his kids. he thought about it and then answered very thoughtfully, "ummmm, hiba....and, ummmm POOPY! and PEEPEE. hahahahahahahah!".

*yesterday, after everyone in our house was finally over the sickness (knock on wood), we had this conversation -
m: are you still sick?
me: nope, all better!
m: oh, good. now we have someone to take us to (pause...me, thinking he will say pre-school) POOPY POTTY! (lots of laughter).

*and last, but not least, yesterday hiba and matthias were playing outside when they came running into the house, matthias screaming after hiba. hiba ran into the bathroom and matthias sat outside the door, crying.
me: why are you crying?
m: the bathroom is outside! we are pretending the bathroom is outside!
me: well, that's fun to pretend, but if hiba really needs to go potty, she needs to come inside because girls can't go potty outside.
m: (suddenly cheered up) but boys can!
me: well, yes, but...
and before i could say anything else, matthias was out the door and to the middle of the yard.

awesome. boys will be boys. 

sick days

it all started about 12:15 friday night - or i guess saturday morning to be more exact. as i was sleeping soundly in my bed, i heard matthias crying. so i did what every great mom does...roll over and hope he goes back to sleep on his own. after a few minutes, it became clear to me that he was not going to just fall back asleep, so i got up to see what was wrong.

turns out, he had a good excuse. it's hard to lay back down and go to sleep when there is throw-up all over your pillow. so i got him up, cleaned him off, changed the sheets, started a load of laundry, and put him back to bed. ten minutes later...it became apparent that this might be a long night. i repeated the previous process, except decided to have him lay on the couch with me to see if he would be throwing up again, because we were out of clean sheets that fit on his bed. so we laid/sat for a few minutes, and then rushed to the bathroom for round number three.

so i spent the rest of the night not sleeping very much, crushing ice as quietly as possible (which turns out is not very quiet), doing four loads of laundry, getting thrown up on, and snuggling with my little boy.

this is how matthias spent most of saturday.

he would not sleep on his bed or the couch -
he wanted the living room floor

it was actually a decent day for me. jason got up about 7:30, so i hopped back into our bed and slept till about 11:45. jason had a home rugby game, so he went to that, i got hiba lunch, and then sent her off to the game with grandma. so it was just me and matthias for most of the day. and he's a pretty good patient. he mostly wants to be left alone, except for when he doesn't. and when he wants attention it is usually a drink, a hug, or a popsicle, all of which take approximately four seconds until he wants to be left alone again. so i enjoyed watching football, organizing life, and having a chillaxed day. not to bad.

sunday morning, he still didn't feel great. hiba and i went to church, and matthias did more of this:

by sunday afternoon, he was back to his normal self and feeling great. monday was a fairly normal day. i had washed all the sheets and sanitized everything in our house. we were in the clear.

or so i thought.

monday night, the bug got me AND jason. talk about horrible. the only good thing about being sick is the knowledge that a) i have sick days and b) the kids' daycare is open. but, when both parents are sick, i felt a little iffy about sending them to daycare, and jason didn't want to. so, we kept them home. luckily for me, i am a much bigger baby than jason is when we are sick, so i got the bedroom and he got the couch, which means he also got to watch awesome kids t.v. shows and get them dressed, take care of them, etc. while i closed the bedroom door and pretended no one else existed. super grandma came to the rescue sometime mid-morning (since i shut myself in the bedroom and ignored everything in life, i really have no idea when) and kept the kids till about bedtime. we both started feeling betterish in the afternoon, so i went to kroger to get what every sick person needs - ramen noodles and sprite. i'm sure both of them greatly added to our recovery.

this morning, jason was back to normal, but i was still not feeling great. i will be the first to admit that i milk being sick for all i can, but after spending two days in the house due to this stupid bug, i really was ready to get out of the house. but a pounding headache, chills, and achiness made me think that my co-workers would be less than thrilled if i decided to go back to work. so i helped get the kids ready, loaded them into the car, and went back to sleep.

i woke up about 1 p.m. and felt great. i still had a bit of a headache that could be attributed to dehydration, lack of caffeine, or sinuses, so i took drank a glass of water, a cup of coffee, and took some ibuprofen and sinus meds and felt great pretty quickly. a large burst of energy led to me rewashing all of the sheets, towels, and dirty clothes, and sanitizing everything in the house. now our house is sparkling clean with fresh smelling sheets, and house smells like sanitizing spray - which, ironically, makes me want to throw-up. so, knock on wood, we beat the bug and are all back to normal.  

the apple restaurant

do you ever have plan that you know will either be really great or a horrible disaster? well, i had one of those today.

there is a mexican restaurant right down the road from our house. we go there all the time. next to the restaurant, there is another little deli - apple spice junction, better known at our house as "the apple restaurant". one day, several months ago, i suggested that we go there for dinner. well, turns out, it is only open monday - friday for lunches. so, no big deal, we ate mexican instead.

fast forward to the last few weeks. hiba has taken a big interest in the apple restaurant. and she asks when we can go there almost every time we pass it, which happens to be every morning and afternoon, to and from work. but the problem is that both jason and i work full time, so going somewhere that is open only for lunch on weekdays is a little tricky. we explained this to hiba, and her solution was that next labor day we can eat there. labor day is a holiday, and a weekday, and she does not have school on labor day, so we can go there. we explained that it is probably closed on labor day, so she suggested halloween. we explained that halloween is not a school holiday, just a fun holiday. so she gave up, but still talked about it a lot.

fast forward to today. hiba had a therapy appointment at the dennis center at 1. which meant that she and i could have a lunch date - at the apple restaurant! i told her on tuesday and she was SUPER excited. she told me that she would tell her teachers that they did not need to give her lunch on thursday because she was going to lunch at the apple restaurant with me. and she told them. every five minutes for the next two days.

and then i realized that this might not be a great idea. because apple slice junction is a deli. hiba doesn't like sandwhiches. unless it's pbj, which i was pretty sure was not on their menu. mostly on their menu is things like chicken salad, potato soup, and other "weird" food (according to hiba). awesome. so the thing that she is super excited about is going to be awful to her. it will not meet any of her expectations, it will not have anything she is interested in eating, and it will not be the way it is supposed to me. she will not like anything on the menu and have a huge meltdown and i will drag her out kicking and screaming.

and then i realized that they have cookies. and as long as i'm ok with it, she will gladly eat cookies for lunch. and they probably have cheese sandwiches, which she will probably eat. and as long as i decide to be chill, it will be great.

so this afternoon, i checked her out of school (after her lunchtime at school, which i did warn her about, but still stressed her out since she TOLD them she was eating lunch with me, but they gave her lunch anyway....), and we headed off to the apple restaurant. they had a kids meal that came with a sandwich, chips, a drink, and a cookie. she said she would try the cheese sandwich. but she just wanted water and no potato chips (which was fine with me since it meant a free drink and extra bag of chips for me). we got to sit at this little bar-type table, with high chairs, which she loved. she tried the cheese and didn't like it, but ate the bread and the cookie. which is a great lunch.

and she LOVED it. she told me a million times how excited she was that she got to try the apple restaurant. how it was so fun just hiba and mommy. how she was a big girl sitting in the big chair. it was great.

and i totally knew it was going to be a great idea all along.

birthday weekend!

this weekend was all about matthias. we had a great time celebrating him and his big three years.

birthday pictures!!

on saturday, hiba, matthias, lizzie, and i drove to clarksville to meet up with my parents for a birthday party. clarksville is pretty much halfway between siloam and little rock, so it's a great meeting point for me and my parents.

we started out at the clarksville bowling alley. for anyone who has every been to or driven through clarksville, the bowling alley is pretty much everything you might imagine it to be (or not to be...). but, matthias had fun and loved that it was all about his birthday party.

matthias and grammy cheering on the bowlers

hiba and oscar

watching the slowest bowl in the history of ever

yay! we knocked some down!!

but, disappointed we didn't get it in the gutter....
matthias didn't really get the point. oh well. he had fun.

after a riveting bowling game, we headed over to sparda park since the rain was holding off for some cupcakes and presents. there was the added bonus of the pirate ship park, which was a hit once matthias was fully assured that he would in fact get cupcakes even if he did play on the playground first.

pirate playground!

birthday cupcakes!

makin' a wish!

birthday boy!

cupcake face!

hiba's "cupcake face".
not sure where she came up with that.

trains!

hiba riding while matthias was picking
out a present with oscar

jason had a rugby game on saturday, so sunday birthday day number two. it started with breakfast at ihop.

matthias enjoying scarfing down his create-a-face

followed by church, a long nap, and then a great visit with some wonderful friends who were in town for the day to pack up their house as have moved to texas. the perea kids were some of hiba's best friends, so it was a super special treat to be able to see them again.

the perea, spenst, and pollack kids pushing the truck to texas

next up - what birthday celebration is not complete without a visit to senior tequilias!

and finally, back home for more cupcakes and presents with gramma, daddy, mommy, and hiba.

puzzle from hiba

angry birds shirt from grandma!

angry bird!

superhero mask and cape from daddy!

cupcakes!

captain underwear!

i absolutely love that matthias loved his birthday, even without my obsessive prodding. happy birtthday, buddy boy!