Life and Smiles

Sweater post is still not here - can you tell that I'm not really on top of things.

Oh well..

I have many days when I feel that I'm just hanging on by a thread... whose thread I can't always tell... and as the kids seem to have all shifted into stages of over dramatic, excessive back talking, and increased lack of tolerance for one another, well I guess you can see where my mental sanity lies.

It probably has not helped that our family seems to barely make it a week before someone is down sick again - and this month in particular we spent a solid two weeks and probably a bit more with at least someone down and most of that time with everyone except Bob down. That really put a damper on my personal goals, but I guess that should be expected in this crazy world of motherhood.

I am, though, finding a groove... not so much with kids and housework, but at least back in my writing and my knitting. Things that generally help me to settle my mental insanity and find a way to breath a little easier amongst the natural chaos called raising kids.

There are many things which have made me smile along the way too - and I wish I had a better way to remember them all so I could share them... but here's some of what I can recall.

Jacob has discovered SigningTime - as in that's all he wants to watch and if it's not running during the day (whether he's watching it or not) he throws a fit. I love it most of the time because signing is important to me... even though I've lost most of my own skill in it. I've decided to pick it back up and starting in about a week I'll take free online lessons once a week with at least Gabi - and then I have a great friend who is an interpreter out at one of the prisons who said she'd help me practice. It's time to brush back up and learn some more.

But back to Jacob - he knows so many signs and I love it when he uses them. He memorizes songs super fast and since they are filled with songs he's easily caught singing one of those throughout the day.

Today he was made because I told him he could not get the DVDs out by himself and he said "No Fair!" - that's only cute because he's only 20 months old and it was so much better than "NO!!!!" Later on he was handed a Peep from one of the kids and he said "Oohh Yeeaah!" - it was so funny because this kids just knows how to say things - not just the words, but the way the words are said - to really let you know what he means.

As I mentioned, he sings songs all the time and learns them quickly. For a long time now I've sung him lots of songs at night. Now he gets two... I'm turning into mean mommy and won't sit for a half hour to an hour singing to him at night... nap time is another story all together - but what I love most is that he can not only tell me which songs he wants, he sings them with me. And when I leave, he often will sing to himself - and we known which songs they are because we can actually understand him! The last two nights, though, he's be rather animated telling some soft of story - to the boys or his bear, I don't know - but it's cute and since he doesn't get out of bed to come find me, I let him get away with it.. .it only lasts up to 15 minutes after I leave anyway.

Well - that was really Jacob stuff.. .I know there are things that make me smile with the other kids, but right now they aren't at the top of my super tired brain... so, maybe next time I'll remember some more and be a little better rounded.