Craziness

On Friday me and the hubby took a day to try to get all of our shopping done. This is a major undertaking for us. We are sometimes finishing our shopping on Christmas Eve on the way to my in-laws. This year we have it so together. We had such a great time together on Friday. We went to a local metropolis to begin our hunt. Wasted trip.....we didn't buy a single thing, but lunch. So we drove back to the local metropolis, but they were out of everything we had our eye on. So we ended up buying more groceries than gifts. We came on Friday afternoon and ended up placing orders via the internet. Hopefully they will all arrive on time. If not, sorry kiddos....we tried. I am so excited about the weeks coming forward. There are so many great things happening. My baby girl will turn 6 soon. My how time flies. She is such an angel. She has a beautiful outlook on life, but such a tender heart. My sister will come home for the holidays so of course I can't wait for this. I miss her so. I wish she lived closer. I know that 3 hours isn't that far, but it seems like a world apart sometimes. Wishing you all a Merry Christmas. Remember this is the birth of our savior.

Thankful for so much

Well another Thanksgiving has come and gone, but it was such a great one. I try to reflect often about the many things I am thankful for and I have so much it is overwhelming. Over the holiday my sister and her family came to visit for 4 days and that was just heaven. For all the fights we had growing up and how much I thought she hated me we have grown into such great friends. I love her so much and I am so thankful that I was blessed with a sister who loves me. She has given me so much love and allowed me to love her family. I even got to see my nephew Ben. I have not seen him since July because he is the college man, but he spent some time with his Auntie this week. Getting to see the twins is also a great treat. They are so sweet and respectful. Lori has done a great job with them.
Then on Thursday we celebrated at my in-laws house. I love Thanksgiving at the Simpson's. There is so much love that flows through this house. I am blessed with in-laws that love me and make me feel like I am one of their own children. Then I have my brother and sister in laws who are just the greatest. I love just to sit and talk with the entire family. Joel is usually pulling me away or telling me he is going to leave me there.
My sister, Ben, and I decided on Friday we would brave Walmart at 5 AM. How fun!!! I hope this starts a yearly tradition. We were home by 8:00 and the van was loaded down. Then my father and Modena came over from Pickens for an after Thanksgiving breakfast. I have such a loving wonderful father. He just amazes me. I am truly a thankful girl. It took me several years to realize what my father did for our family, but it finally sunk in.
I am also thankful that the Lord has kept Joel and I employed. Even with Joel being laid off once a month we are still thankful he has a job to go to. There are so many people that would love to have a job and both of us to so I am thankful.
Last but certainly not least I am thankful for my wonderful husband and babies. I went through such a valley before the Lord gave me Joel. I was so lost and searching for happiness, but couldn't find it anywhere. I had no love for myself and this person came along and has shown me so much love. I never have to doubt Joel's love for me. He shows me everyday which is so rare.
I also have two of the most precious, loving, beautiful children on the earth. I know everyone says that about their children, but mine really are. As wild as they are everyday at least I can hold and love on them. I hope to never take my children for granted. I love them so much. I don't claim to be the best parent ever, but I know my children know I love them.
I hope everyone who reads this realizes how much they have to be thankful for.

Back at it

I have been really slack about my blogging, but I am going to get back at it.

So much has happened in the last few months. Maddie has started kindergarten, Brother moved into a new class at preschool, and Joel and I are just loving life.

School has been a great transition for Maddie. She loves it and wants so bad to read. We practice all the time and I believe it will be very soon. Her teacher is great and says she is a joy and ray of sunshine to have in the class. Of course I have a tendency to agree with her completely. On Sunday after Halloween she had to separate all her candy by brand, tallied it and then added it all up. Hopefully this isn't a sign of a compulsive behavior. Maybe she is going to love math. Maddie is such a tender hearted person. She just loves people so much. I really hope she is able to distinguish bad people from good. It is a fear of mine that someone is just going to squish the love right out of her heart by letting her down or hurting her feelings. She is just so good.

Brother is going through a little running stage. He runs every where and the faster he runs the more he laughs. He ran away from me at the grocery the other day and almost made it to the front door before I caught him. I may have to get a leash or learn to laso so I can catch him easier. He is such a loving little boy and makes me smile like his sister does. Every morning when I get him out of his room he just pats my back. Then he makes me laugh every morning because as soon as he wakes up he wants breakfast. No sitting around pondering what he wants. It is just high gear and feed me so I can keep going.



Last night at church our pastor spoke of trust in the Lord. One lady mentioned that when she became saved that when an issue came up she would call the sisters in the church or the pastors wife. One day no one answered and she said the Lord spoke to her and asked her who she was going to call now. Sometimes we look all around for help and support when all we have to do is call on the Lord and TRUST that his will be done. Very eye opening. We put trust in so many other people and things. When all we have to do is trust in the Lord. Amazing!!

Slack

Well, I have been such a slacker about bloggin. It is T-Ball Season and there is so much going on. It was such a beautiful weekend. We went to an Easter Egg hunt sponsored by NWCG and had a wonderful time. It was so much fun I hated to leave. The children had a great time. Some of Maddie't friends from TLC were there so she was in heaven. Brother got to check out the tractors so he was also in heaven. Then later in the day we had our Easter with the Simpson clan at Grammy and PaPa's. It was so much fun. I love getting together with my family. We always laugh and just love hanging out with everyone. Next weekend will be busy, but such a great celebration.

Hope to blog more soonPaige

School

I can't believe that we registered Maddie for school last week. I am so amazed that she will be attending kindergarten in the fall. I am excited for her, but I feel like all her innocence is going to be gone. She goes to preschool/daycare now, but this is a very new experience. I now that I can't keep it from happening, but I am just amazed that the years have gone by so fast. We were talking at a family dinner the other night that Joel and I will be married 7 years in September. That just amazed me. I actually had the number of years wrong. I thought it would just be 6. In these 7 short years we have managed to be blessed with these two healthy, beautiful children and now one is going off to school. In these elementary years she will form life-long friendships. I remember my friends from elementary school and it was so fun before we started worrying about our hair, clothes, or boys. So innocent and just there to have fun and learn a little bit. I hope that Madelyn is blessed with the best teachers there are and that she never gets a crappy teacher. I hope so much for Madelyn and I think I worry the most about her. Maybe because she is girl? I am not sure. Eli is just seems to be so tough and strong and very sure of himself. Maddie is very head strong, but she sees the good in everyone. I hope she doesn't get hurt by this, but I also don't want to make her feel like she had to question everyone intentions. Next week we have Jump into Kindergarten so I am sure after that I will have something interesting to post. Have a great weekend.

In the womb

Do you think that our children's personalities are formed as early as conception? I wonder if it is something that is influenced over time or are you born with it? What do you think?

One of Those Mothers

I think I have turned into "one of those mothers". There is a little girl at Maddie's school that is driving me insane. Maddie is a little dramatic so I am not sure that everything she tells me is exactly as it went down, but yesterday I had my fill. Everyday she tells me of the "problems" they had during the day. It is usually something small, but today she wrote on Maddie's shirt. Not a little bit, but several huge streaks. Maddie waited until we got into the car to tell me about this. I decided I was taking this little girl on myself. So today when I picked her up at school I asked the little girl is she wrote on Maddie's clothes. She said, "I don't know." Okay I know these children are only 5, but they know if they wrote on someones clothes. I asked her not to do it again and left. Now I am concerned that Maddie is going to be one of those children who doesn't stand up for herself. I have told her over and over not to play with this child, but she feels sorry for her because no one else will play with her because she is so mean. Maddie lets this child manipulate her into playing with her. Maybe I am taking this too serious but I believe the adult we become has a lot to do with our personality development as a child. By no means do I want Maddie to be the bully, but how do I instill in her not to take this crap. I don't want her to be a follower. I want her to be comfortable with who she is, but she isn't comfortable with this if she tells me about is daily. Any suggestions? I won't always be there to be the MOTHER that butts in.

By the way---funny, but not funny....today when I picked brother up we got into the car and he said you big butt came to get me today. First we don't say butt, so I am not sure where this came from. So I told him we don't say butt. So he fixed it and said you big hiney came to get me a school. Should I take the hint?
Funny that he said this, but I tried not to laugh in front of him. Anyway.

Eli is Three

Well technically he will not be three until tomorrow, but we celebrated today. We had the best party today. We keep them small, just family, but they really are better this way. Madelyn's 1st through 3rd birthday parties really stressed me out. We would have all these people over, during the holidays because her birthday is 12-24, and have balloons, clowns, you name it. I would be so stressed by the time it got here that it really wasn't worth it. Finally when Madelyn turned 4 I said I wasn't doing it anymore. We still have parties, but they are localized to just family. Today my dad, Modena, Jetta, Nathan, Vickie, Rayford, Jon, Poppy, Robbie, and Moder joined us to celebrate number 3 for the Big E. I really had a great time. We had lunch, cake, ice cream and good family time. I am really blessed for the family that I have. It is amazing how easy it is to take it for granted. I have looked over the last few years of my life I see so much that I have let pass by. I get so absorbed in my husband and babies that I just let things go, but today was not one of those days. I really enjoyed the time with my family and we got to celebrate 3 fingers. That is what he tells me....Mom, I am going to be 3 fingers. He loved being able to play outside with his sister and Robbie. I believe his favorite toy was the Lightening McQueen car that came on top of his cake. He really enjoyed himself. I did too. It was nice and no stress. I am so thankful the Lord has blessed me with 2 happy, healthy, and beautiful children. Today are sermon in church was on how do you know you have been blessed. The easiest way is by seeing proof. I remember about 1 year ago I had taken a pan out of the oven and set it up on top of the stove. Little Eli walked up and placed his little had on the pan. He immediately began to scream at the top of his lungs. I was beating myself up because I had put the pan to close to the edge and because of me he was hurting. We had recently had a sermon on believing with all your heart. The sermon came to mind and I grabbed Eli up and started praying that the Lord would take the pain away. I prayed and prayed. I just a few seconds he stopped crying and there were no signs of him touching the pan. That was my proof that all I had to do was ask for a blessing and I would get it. I asked the Lord for a wonderful husband and healthy children and I got blessed with so much more. I have a great family and I am so thankful for them.

Just like Daddy

It amazes me how fast children pick up the habits of their parents. I am sitting outside on the back deck enjoying this glorious day. My son is potty training so the question came up as to when was the last time he peed. Of course he hasn't since we came home, so what does DH do? He lets him pee off the back porch. Are all men obsessed with urinating outside? My husband loves to pee outside and now he is teaching our son. I don't understand why they can't just walk in the house. We have 3 toilets in the house, but they chose to go outside. I am honestly a bit jealous because I can't do this with ease. I have heard other women say that their husbands/sons are the same way. Maybe this is a natural born instinct of a man? We live back in the woods so it really doesn't matter, but I think if we lived in town he would do the same thing. A few weeks ago he took the children deer scouting while I took a nap. When they came back he told Maddie to tell me what happened. She told me all these other great things that had happened on their trip. DH took off his jacket and one of the sleeves was missing from his shirt. Maddie then began to tell me the story. They had walked for about an hour, way to far from the house, when she decided that she need to take a poo. They couldn't get back to the house so DH lets her poo in the woods. He doesn't have any paper so him being the great dad that he is he rips the sleeve off his shirt and she uses this. SOOOOOO Funny. I love it. Thank goodness it was him and not me. I wouldn't have been able to tear my shirt because I would have been laughing. My dear husband....he keeps me laughing all the time. One of the many reasons I am glad he is mine......

Daddy

I came home work today to a wonderful creation. I am so proud of my little husband that I have to tell you about it. Over Christmas my sister and brother in law tore down their old swing set. Their boys were way to old for it and it was getting OLD. So we asked them to keep the slide because we wanted to build the children something at the house. We really didn't want to spend the money on one of those outragous swing sets, but thought we were going to have to. Joel is one of those people that is great with his hands so he thought he could save us some money and do it on his own. Well he started today and I am so proud of him. He has built the children this great swinging set. He has built the base so that he can create it into a tree house. He has the slide already on and we hope to finish tomorrow. He worked so hard today all by himself. He amazes me. He is such a good daddy. I didn't even know he was going to do this today. He surprised us all. The children were so exicted when we got home today. They had to take several trips down the slide, which is very fast. He is going to also put a sandbox underneath so that the children can play in it. He is so good. I am so happy that we found each other. He is a blessing to me. I have not figured out how I deserve him, but I am so happy that I have him. I love Joel.

Disappointed

Friday Madelyn and I went to a girls basketball game at a local high school. My sister-in-law is the asst coach so we went to show our support. Of course Madelyn wanted to sit close to the top so that we could see everything going on. I think she did this because I am clumsey and there was the chance that Mom might fall down the bleachers and everyone would get a good laugh. Anyway, "up top" is where all the younger people sit. By younger I mean the children in high school.
These children need to have their mouths washed out with soap. They showed no respect for me or my child. I could not believe some of the foul language that was coming out of their mouths. If they could have heard how stupid they sounded they would have quit right away. I can handle a little foul mouth, but not every word. I am not sure how anyone was supposed to understand what they were talking about with the cursing. If this is what we have to look forward to as the next generation then we are in BIG trouble. It wasn't all the children, but you know the saying. If you sleep with the dog you are going to get fleas. If I EVER hear my children utter those words or is someone else does. I really hope they tell me so I can wash their mouths out. They should have hushed out of respect for me, but also for Madelyn. I should have been a good mom and stood up and said something, and I am not sure why I tolerated it. That is the word I was looking for.....tolorated.......why did I do this. How many others things am I going to tolerate? Homosexuality, bi-racial marriage, my child's vocabulary. I am going to promise you right now.....I will not longer tolerate this type of language around my children........I will pick up on the others later.

Imagination Station

I guess another reason for me to have this blog is so I can make a record of some of the funny antics my children do. Both of our children are very imaginative. I hope that this stays with them until they are old. A vivid imagination is such a horrible thing to waste. Mine gets me into trouble sometimes, but it keeps me laughing also. Anyway--Saturday my in-laws come to get our daughter so she could spend the night with them. We had been playing in the house with hoola-hoops and other toys, but the hoola-hoop ended up in the foyer. Maddie was getting her stuff ready to go and we were going to go outside and wait for them. She pulls her overnight bag, herself, and her pocketbook in the hoola-hoop. I just give her a look and I said Maddie what are you doing. She said Mom I am in the elevator. Then she acted like the doors opened up and continued on her way. I was just amazed at how much fun that seemed.

Then on Tuesday morning Maddie and I were in the bathroom getting ready for school. Big E was in the bedroom with his back to us. I could tell he was doing something, but I could not figure out what. I finally asked him what he was doing. He said I'm fishing. Of course I said what? He said I fishing mom with my fishing rod. I went in the bedroom and he had a cup of milk and he was fishing with a belt. What a great fishing rod.

I really hope they keep their imaginations brewing. So often we squish this natural instinct because we don't want our children to seem different. I don't want to make my children feel stupid because they are just being kids. In these times children are required to grow up way too fast and they don't have time to have fun. Sometimes I allow my children to wear clothes that don't match or a heavy jacket and hat in the middle of summer. They eventually figure it out after a few hours that it really isn't all that cool. So I guess this post is that I am proud of the imagination station brewing at the Simpson Castle. I just want it to keep on brewing. Have a great one.

I wonder

Have you ever heard of twins that were apart from each other and something would happen and the other twin would feel it. It didn't matter if it was something good or bad the other may feel the same way. Something very similar happened last night. My children are not twins, they are 26 months apart, but listen to this. Last night I put the children to bed and I was watching a movie. Maddie had gone back and forth with me that I needed to come to her room to check out the bed, give her a huggie, anything to stay awake. Well after several trips up the stairs, I really don't understand why I am overweight because I go up and down these stairs about 50 times a night, anyway----she called down and told me that brother had just peed in his pullup. He is almost 3 and he can't make it through the night. I had already taken him to pee so I thought he couldn't have peed yet. I need to add that they are in separate rooms so I have no idea how she knew this. I treked up the stairs to change brother, still dazed as to how she knew this. I thought maybe he told her from his room. I get up to his room and he is sound asleep. I roll him over and check his pullup and sure enough he was wet. How on earth did she know this? I wonder if this was just a weird thing or if she felt him pee. I asked her and she said she just got a feeling that he was peeing in his pullup. I am not sure what to think. It was just really weird. She loves her brother, but could they be that close? Maybe they have this "Special" connection. I love my sister, but I never remember knowing when she peed. Anyway that is my thought for today. I hope everyone has a great week. I look forward to a good one. I am so thankful for the wonderful blessings that the Lord has given me. I am never sure how to express my thankfulness, but I really am. More on that story later......stay tuned and there is no telling what I may reveal.

Today

Today I have just not felt like myself. The weather was beautiful so I am not sure what was wrong. We had to take Maddie back to the DR today. Two weeks ago the DR found protein, blood and white cells in her urine. This was the second time so I was a little freaked out. I worry so much about the health of my children. On top of all of this she has not really had much of an appetite but I think it has been because of this cold she has had. Anyway when we went back today there was only a little bit of protein so we are good. I am not sure how to feel about this because how will I ever know if she has blood in her urine again. Wait until she is sick again and just have her checked. Maybe I am making more of it that it should be, but I wouldn't think this was a good thing. I will have to do a little more research to calm my nerves. I try to keep it to myself because Joel will just tell me not to worry. I know the Lord will take care of us. I do need to get a handle on her attitude though. This morning she wouldn't talk to me on the way to school because I made her wear a jacket and it messed up her hair. She kept telling me her hair looked stupid. I thought it looked really pretty, but I don't count I guess. Then when I dropped her off at preschool she was loving all over me. I try to tell them both everyday how happy I am that God gave them to me. This morning she told me that she was glad God gave me to her. She goes from not talking to me, to thankful she has me. Typical girl I guess. Eli is his funny self. He didn't get into timeout at all today so that is great. We did pick them up early so I guess we were one up because of that. I am glad the weekend is here. Not much planned, but I look forward to the time with my family.

To blog or not to blog

Well I have decided to blog. I have been toying with this idea for months, and finally came to the conclusion that I must blog. There are many different reasons that I feel compelled to blog, but the winner to me is that I have so much stuff in my heart that I want to write about and this is the easiest way to do it. I have been looking at other's blogs and it is very similar to a journal or diary that you can read without getting into trouble. That entices me even more. I hope if people read my blog they feel some of the wonderul things that I feel. I hope you see how much I love my God, my husband, and my wonderful, healthy, beautiful children. I look forward to sharing with you what I get to experience everyday. If you are a wife or mother I hope we can share experiences or you get a tid bit of knowledge from me. I do not profess to be the best mother, but I love my children and I try to show them exactly how much I love and care for them. I hope that if you don't know Jesus as your savior if you read something in one of my posts that it brings you to know him. I am hopeful for a lot, but most of all I just want to write.
I hear that blogging is addictive so we shall see.
Have a wonderful day