I have..... but I haven't.....

Giggling Girl's first ever Gingerbread house attempts, Caylee's is on the left Carleigh's on the right, she said her's was hit by a blizzard!!

I have spent much of my time from the week before Thanksgiving until now getting ready for Christmas, we have gone to the festival of trees and seen Santa a time or two, I helped host a Breakfast with Santa at my dad's work where I was the Elf who took Santa pictures, we have done a mitten drive and Carleigh has lost her first tooth, I have done a cute craft project with Tricia that I would rather shoot myself in the foot than attempt to do again! I have threw a birthday party for Tim and my brother-in-law at my house which prompted me to clean like mad the weekend before Christmas which was a wonderful thing going into this crazy fun holiday week, I have watched Carleigh in her Christmas plays and made Christmas bows and treat bags for her class, I have baked some goodies and read lots of Christmas stories to my giggling girls, I have shopped Black Friday and had a wonderful Thanksgiving, I have watched the CMA Christmas special 500 times because Caylee LOVES to dance and sing to the music, I have made gingerbread houses out of graham crackers and milk cartoons, made real Christmas Swags out of branches off of my Christmas Tree and watched LOTS of Christmas movies, I have driven around looking at Christmas lights and relished in the ooohs and ahhhs and the "it's boootiful mama's" and I have let the girls unwrap Christmas presents early, I have taken down my dead Christmas tree the week before Christmas while being extra glad I put up two this year and I have LOVED every single minute of this Holiday Season but I haven't : even started wrapping, not close to being finished shopping, haven't decided what all to bake, ordered my Christmas cards, mailed said cards, or even taken the picture to go on the said cards, I haven't read a full Christmas fiction novel which I must tell you is a TRAGEDY folks! I haven't picked out my Christmas outfits or done any blog post with picture updates, in fact I have not taken a ton of pictures. I haven't video taped and we haven't made it to the festival of lights and I only have 2 more days to finish!!!! Did I mention I work a full-time job?? ...........................It is quite possible that this year I am going to be okay with not sending out the Christmas Cards and that I am okay with the Children's Christmas stories replacing my beloved Christmas novels..........I mean who doesn't like the book Santa's Stuck??? Right, the story line is incredibly complex and I just didn't know if they were ever going to get him out!!!  2 DAYS 2 DAYS HOW IS THERE ONLY 2 DAYS LEFT TO FINISH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you Mary!

( Sorry for the messy look of our blog! I am currently working on winterizing it but it takes more time to do that than I have had lately! I also know I am WAY overdue for some updates and I have lots I need to get wrote down like Carleigh's FIRST visit from the tooth fairy!!! :) I will definitely be back to do a catch up post but for today I had something else on my heart)

Christmas is all around us, I see it everywhere I look. Facebook is full of it, I have watched everyone around me as they have prepared and relished in the season. I have seen tons of "generic" posts about making the season about Jesus rather than Santa and other posts defending why they choose to do Elf on the Shelf and Santa even though they are Christians. I have heard lots of great Christmas carols and enjoyed lots of good Christmas goodies. I LOVE Christmas and always have, it has always been a magical and special time at our house, I secertly think that my mom is one of Santa's Elves and always has been! I enjoy teaching my kids the traditions I have grown up with and watching their eyes light up. I LOVE that Carleigh can tell you the WHOLE Christmas story and that she is intrigued and in love with baby Jesus's Birthday and I also love the sparkle I see in Caylee's eye's as she opens a present. It is definitely a magical time of year!

I will never forget the first Christmas that I was mom for. I was nearly nine month's pregnant with Carleigh and I was watching a reenactment of that Christmas Eve so many years ago. It was in that moment that I "got" Mary. My tummy was heavy with child, and I could understand how tired she must have felt after such long days of endless travel, My ankles hurt and I had comfortable shoes on, she wouldn't have had that luxury, I had comfortable maternity clothes to help support the heaviness of my baby, Mary wouldn't have had that either. I had a wedding ring on my finger and everyone knew who the father of my baby was and their were no doubts about that. Mary didn't have that kind of security. I was in my early twenties, Mary would have been younger than me by far.........and yet she had a maturity about her that I STILL don't have even though I am now 29, yes my first year as a mom I was able to understand Mary in a way I had never imagined and the tears filled my eyes .....
The second year I was a mom for Christmas I had a 11 month old on my hip who I loved more than I could ever imagine, she was my everything and I couldn't (and still can't) imagine my life without her. My second year as a mom I "Got" Mary even more.....I now knew the love she felt when she looked down at her sweet baby boy for the first time. I know how her heart swelled with love and how she tired to pick out what features of her He had. I understood her love for Him in a way that I had never been able to before, and not only did I understand a side of Mary I had never understood before, I understood a side of Jesus, he came just like any other baby, he looked up at his mommy with those sweet baby eyes and puffy newborn lips and He LOVED unconditionally just like my babies love me that way. He loved her in that "you can do no wrong because you are my mom" kind of way. My second year of Christmas I understood a mother's love like never before.....and it was breathtaking.
I am now going into my 6th Christmas as a mom, and the wonder of it still takes my breath away. This Christmas I am getting to experience Carleigh understanding, truly understanding, Christmas. She understands how babies are born (well at least that they come out of your tummy), She understands that Jesus was a baby born to his mommy Mary and that God is his Daddy but that Joseph was there with Mary, She is starting to put it all together and that is enough for now, but I am praying that someday she will be able to look at me, while holding her own baby and say Mom, I "get" Mary now, I truly understand how she must have felt on that dark night with the North Star shining down on her, oh the love she must have felt. 

Thank you Mary, for loving and mothering our Savior in only that way that a mother can. Thank you for rejoicing over each milestone He made and for kissing his booboo's and rocking him to sleep at night, thank you for nursing him through illness and for teaching him. Thank you Mary for making a sacrifice that no mother should ever have to make.....

This song means more to me than any other Christmas song now because I understand a whole lot more than I used too!

Craft Time!!

Let it be known that I was so sick for a week :( Our whole family was, I contemplated doing a post on it but truth is I don't want to relive it! HA!! It was one of those weeks where I was trying to be super sick, the girls were both sick, I was trying to work, and bleach the house like a mad woman and it just made for an exhausting experience! BUT we survived! and We are well for thanksgiving!!! But it does mean that we missed 2 craft nights so Trish and I had to make up for that last night and so I present to you our Thanksgiving Day Turkey shirts!!! Trish came up with the hand print idea!!

I didn't take pictures as we went along because I always forget I have this fun blog to keep up!! :) So anyway, you start by your kiddo's hand onto a piece of paper and then cutting it out and tracing it onto your fabric, the we used iron on transfer and adhered it to the back of the fabric, and maybe onto my ironing board cover, but ya know that isn't really all that important to know, except that if you are in love with your ironing board cover, don't use it :), Next you arrange your hand prints on your shirt and then you use your iron to iron them on, we then used brown fleece and cut out a turkey body, we just did this free hand, we  hot glued on some googly eyes (NOTE: If you use hot glue on your shirt you CAN NOT dry them in a dryer, really you can't, don't ask me how I know...LOL!) and we used a piece of felt to make a beak which we also hot glued on, Ironed on their names and

this is our finished product which

Carleigh modeled for me this morning and happily wore to school!  Happy Crafting and

 HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!!

Be Blessed but most importantly, Be A BLESSING!!!

Ramblings

I need a wine bottle with a nipple on it today, I have had a long day and I don't drink but tonight a bubbly glass of Verde would go down pretty smooth!! But instead I will drink my ice tea in a wine glass and watch the CMA's, right now there are some blond hooche mama dancers shaking it for Luke Bryan, I wonder how much it would cost to have my body made to look like theirs?? We would have to take into account the feeding tube they would have to put in because I would have to have my jaw wired shut so I could stay looking that way, but cost is no object in my dream world right!! I forgot to put a sandwich in Carleigh's lunch box today, and my desk at work looked worst when I left tonight then it did this morning when I got there!! I am feeling run down from being sick but am feeling much better than I have the past few days, looking forward to the three day weekend! I always decorate our house for Christmas on Veteran's Day, this year is no exception!!! The blog will be getting a Christmas makeover too!! Be watching for it! Tis the Season to be Jolly even if tonight I am feeling like the Grinch!! I am suffering from MAJOR writers block, I tried to write the follow up post to my Dear Me at 16 post, I deleted it, I will try again another day! For now I am signing off as my darling daughters are sleeping and I am feeling a tug toward my big cozy bed, Do you think if I turn off the lights on the house so I can't see the mess, it means it really isn't there?? I am going to try it tonight! I will let you know in the morning how that works for me!!! Buenos Noches Blog Friends!!!!!

Don't sleeping babies make everything right in the world!!! LOVE THEM!!!!

4 years ago........(M1)

4 years ago on this day I was pregnant, I wrote a journal entry about the best birthday present ever....Tim and I had received a phone call that we were pregnant after months of rigorous fertility treatments, Carleigh was finally going to be a big sister! The next words out of the nurses mouth were, "are you sitting down?" and I said sure why? and she proceed to tell me that our HCG levels were through the roof at a whooping 2400, she said everything indicated that the pregnancy would be twins or possibly triplets!!!! OH MY WORD PEOPLE! LOL Tim and I laughed until we cried!! You see, this was the last cycle that our fertility doctor was going to do with us before we began IVF, which was a road I just didn't want to have to embark down, so these babies were an answer to my prayers, begging God to spare me from IVF.  We called our parents and siblings and put Carleigh's big sister shirt on her and took pictures and sent them out via cell phone, we celebrated because when you suffer from infertility your baby is a baby from the day it is made, there is no debate in a fertility office of when a baby is a baby at least not in my head!! and we started talking plans about where we would put multiples and how I would most definitely have to quit working and we fell in love with these tiny little babies that were nestled warm and snug in my belly we were SO naive about what could happen, today I am going to let the story end there, I am going to relish in those happy moments we felt when we found out that we were indeed expecting and that it was probably twins or triplets, I am going to reread that journal entry and laugh at Tim's reaction and recall my own which was "Holy Sh*t Brenda(our RE nurse) are you kidding me!!" I felt safe with those high numbers because all through my first trimester with Carleigh, they told me we could lose her because the numbers were low and not rising correctly, fear NEVER entered my mind that day. What a beautiful day it was 4 years ago...........



Miscarriages are such a taboo subject, they aren't talked about often and yet they happen in 1 out of 4 pregnancies I am going to do a couple of posts of how having a miscarriage affected my life and those around me and how I dealt with it, I am doing this for a couple of reasons, one being I want it documented for my girls in case they ever have to go through it as I was the first one in my immediate family to experience it and it can be really hard for people to understand, and secondly because there isn't much information out there what it is like, mostly there is info about the emotional parts of dealing with it years later.... so come back and read if you are interested they will be scattered throughout the month, if this isn't something that you feel comfortable reading I will title the post with the letter M and a number in the sequence I write them and you will know that it is a miscarriage post!! Thanks for reading and come back soon!!! There are a couple of craft projects a brewing that you won't want to miss!!

TRICK OR TREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dear, Me at 16

There is so much I wish I would have known at 16, 21, and 25 so I am going to do a little series called "Dear Me"

Dear Me at 16,

First and Foremost, embrace that pant size, I am hear to tell you it is the smallest your ever going to be, don't be ashamed of your body because that will only bring down your self-esteem and you have a lot going for you. Love yourself because you are special, just because, you are YOU. Drive a little slower, life is going by fast enough, don't be in a hurry to get anywhere else, any sooner than you need too. Dance a little more, don't be a wall flower, the boys your trying to impress, really aren't going to be swayed but your dance swagger...Speaking of boys.... OH MY ....... that one your holding so tightly too, tell him what it is you have been meaning to say, don't wait......don't wonder, put it all out on the table.....even up the score so that you know right then and there if he is worth waiting for, being with, and giving a piece of your heart to, because you see, my dear, the waiting, the wondering, it grows into something beautiful but eventually becomes stunted, the weeds choke it out and you are left with a bunch of "if only's", it would have been so much better to have known, than to give that piece of your heart away, because it is so hard to reclaim it, and you can never get it all back....and you silly girl are the kind of girl that will grow up to find the positives in it all, you won't regret it, but if you could change a few things about how you did it you would definitely do it differently. Moving on, that homecoming party, don't hold back, just be you and go with it, don't be scared, this night will be one from your high school days that you will look back on and laugh about, and cherish, and just a side note, make sure and learn the difference between cop sirens on CD and real life ones....JUST SAYING! I guess, the most important thing I would say to you is that, it is all going to be okay, the life you are dreaming about it IS going to come true, you ARE going to get married to a WONDERFUL prince charming, you ARE going to be blessed with two BEAUTIFUL baby girl's and you WILL find fulfillment for that empty filling that all 16 year old girls have. So for this season in your life, just enjoy being a kid, enjoy lazy days sleeping in, read all the books you possibly can, spend as much time as your parents will let you with your friends, steal sweet first kisses in the headlights of your car, listen to the radio as loud as you can stand it. All of that grown up stuff, it is coming, and then you are going to be wondering what the hurry was!!

Love,
Yourself!

Caylee -31 months

Sweet Girl Caylee you are 31 months old today!!!!!!!!!! I can't believe you have been in our lives for 31 months already! You weigh 52 pounds and are 41 inches tall!!!  This precious time is just flying by, I know mama holds on a little tighter because you are my last but I am so proud of all the big girl things you are doing and I am really relishing all the ways you are still my baby!! You are a talking pro, their isn't anything you can't say. You can definitely tell us what you are wanting when you want it. You call Carleigh sis or sissy and you love to go in and give her kisses each night before bed. You have really gotten into reading and like to sit and read books with us. You are a great eater but you won't eat any kind of vegetable, you love everything else. You are also a milk addict! you drink it like CRAZY!!! It is very possible that you still have a bottle and a binky but I will never tell, it is our little secret!!

Your facial expressions are priceless and you have a definite strong will to your attitude.... you are our little Denise the Menace and unlike any child that has ever crossed the path of our family yet. You are going down in the family record books as "more rotten than Tommy Jr!!!" LOL! and that is saying something because he was a very spirited child! We wouldn't change anything about you, although chasing you, I should be a size 6, funny how that doesn't work that way! Some of the things I want to remember about you at this age are : " I have a milky pweeeseee" "We take sissy to scool now mommy? ""mommy me go with you" I wuv you"  "you're my bestest fwriend" You also LOVE to sing!! You know the words to Gullah Gullah Islands many songs altough Blue's Clue is your new favorite, you really like Joe and Dora is becoming a fast favorite!! You are so excited about Halloween this year and I can tell that this Holiday season will be a favorite with you and Carleigh! You both are very animated and love to see the lights on houses. We drove around last night and you kept saying "pumkins and It scare me mom It scare me! I can't wait to see how much you change and grown in the next few months, it is hard to believe that when Carleigh was your age you were growing in my belly! We love you Caylee Michele!!!

Love, Mama

The Weekend!

So the weekend is upon us and I am SO excited because we have NOTHING planned!! I am excited to cuddle up with my kiddos who aren't feeling 100 percent and sit by the fire and watch Halloween Spongebob and The Elf!! Making countless batches of coco in my cocoa motion machine and I am going to make Halloween hair bows and do another fun craft project I got out of a magazine and just enjoy the down time!! I think I will even finish painting my hallway and tackle the rest of my Mountain of laundry! We may squeeze in some Christmas shopping and some outdoor projects as well.....Oh boy it looks like my doing nothing weekend is filling up! I better quit typing about it before I have a list two feet long!!!!!!! :) Have a great weekend everyone!!! and for a Flashback Friday morning I present to you..........

The Clothing Drive Post Pt 3 I didn't know I would write!

You can read part 1 here and part 2 here

I didn't expect to write anymore about the clothing drive, It was an amazing event but I had shared everything I intended to and then I received a  message from a woman who attend the clothing giveaway and she had inadvertently left a bag of clothes that she had found for herself on the floor by a chair. It just so happens where she sat the bag was the same place we were putting the clothes that needed to go out. I told her I would talk to the other ladies and see if by some chance they picked it  up or moved it, this poor woman was almost in tears as she told me that her daughter and her had been so excited to find clothes in her size as she had just lost a bunch of weight and couldn’t afford to shop for clothes…….I hung up with her determined to help her out some way!! So I called Tricia who in turn called her mom and we came up with a plan to use some clothes that didn't make it to the clothing drive and were going to make some arrangements to find some  pants in her size so that we could at least give the woman SOMETHING, I called the woman back and asked what sizes she needed and she told me and I called Trish back our plan was going to work but it wasn’t the greatest plan as this woman had shirts and jackets for winter in her bag too and that was when I remembered that I had the bag of clothes in the back of my van . This particular bag never made it to the clothing drive because when I went to pick it up, I got busy talking and never put it into the back of my van, I then ran over it. Tim was supposed to stop by and get them the next day and forgot so we FINALLY picked it up late Saturday night, I rushed down to the van with Trish on the phone and I said to her “If I open this bag and it has 2 pairs of size 8 jeans in it you are going to hear my gleeful screams in Divernon!! I about fell to my knees when I opened the bag and it was FULL of size 8 pants and small and medium shirts! There was even had a jacket in there!! OH MY GOSH!!!!!!  There were really no words!! GOD IS AMAZING!!!! I know now that there was a reason I was flighty and ran over that bag of clothes and then Tim was absentminded and forgot to pick them up of that porch! God had handpicked them for this special precious woman!!!! I called her back and she is was so relieved, when I dropped them off last night she was so thankful, and I was just without words!! Me SPEECHLESS!!! I think Jesus got bored with the fish and five loaves story and has decided to dabble in fashion!! LOL!!!

and He met me there! Clothing Drive Part 2

It was a boys table, size 10 -12, and it was one of the fullest boys tables we had when the event started  and now I looked at it and the pants were gone and there were a few shirts left, as I straigthened up what was left a man walked in and I heard him saying to himself, please have size 12 please have size 12, my heart sunk, and I immediately wanted to look at him and tell him I would take him shopping right then as I knew we were all out of that size, at the moment it didn't matter to me that we had already helped so many, in that moment I felt like this was going to be a complete failure because to me having someone walk through that door anticipating there need would be met and then failing at that, that felt worse than any good we could have done. I looked up at him and smiled and then I looked back down at the table willing it to grow some pants, not even joking, I was like, begging it to sprout them! As I got ready to tell him we were out of size twelve a lady from my church walked in the door and up to me with a tote full of pants and said  "here, these are a size twelve, look can you believe my son never even took the tags off!!!" OH MY GOSH, I didn't know if I should cry or jump up and down and act like a crazy fool!!!!! I mean my table just grew pants, it was amazing. The gentlemen was very grateful and said to me that he could now let his middle son wear his oldest sons pants and these would cloth his oldest son! Across the room there was a woman looking for clothes for her daughter, she had some success and thanked us as she left, she came back a little while later carrying a bag of clothes. She said that these were clothes her daughter had outgrown and she wanted to give back to our cause and that she was so thankful for the clothes she had found in her own daugther's size. The clothes she brought replenished another table that was near empty. A couple hours later an elderly lady walked in and in her hand she had three pairs of pants, I went to lay them on a table and minutes later another elderly lady came in looking for the same size... JESUS MET US THERE ALL DAY LONG!!! I kept SEEING Him in so many tangible ways. The first time you may have been able to call it a coincidence if you are a non-believer, and the second time could have been luck but by the third time you would have been in awe!!! It was a modern day fish and bread story straight out of the bible!! I feel like the amount of clothes that exited the church that day had to far surpass the amount that we put on those tables on Friday. And as if this wasn't enough, Jesus must have really wanted to show off! This is the part of the story where a young single mom enters in, I don't want to give out to many details because I want to respect her privacy but believe me when I say she has her hands full of babies, she didn't enter into the church that day expecting to find anything more than free clothes, she definitely didn't come knowing that she would leave an impact on 5 ladies at cornerstone but she did, and the next day she allowed her little girl to attend church and Sunday school at our church!!! Can we get a WOOT WOOT!!! Yup Jesus, He met us there at our little ol' clothing drive, in a church in a small town in the middle of cornfields, He was there amongst us and man do I wish I could have given Him a high five and a big hug because I will NEVER be the same. I may look the same, and even act the same but I will be forever humbled at getting to witness a small town country miracle that day!

"We only have here five loaves of bread and two fish, they answered, "Bring them here to me," Jesus said and he directed the people to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to Heaven, he gave thanks and broke the loaves. Then he gave them to the disciples and the disciples gave them to the people. They all ate and were satisfied and the disciples picked up the twelve basketful's of broken pieces that were left over. The number of those who ate was about five thousand men besides woman and children"- Matthew 14:9

Be Blessed Today!!!! Jesus Loves YOU!

video courtesy of youtube.com

I Saw a need......... Clothing Drive part 1

My mind is reeling from this weekend, please stick this post out with me, I promise you will be glad you did. A couple of months back I blogged about an inspiration to jump on the bandwagon with Patrice a fellow blog mom who issued the Get your Serve on Challenge, as most you of you know I decided to organize a community clothing giveaway  at my church because I felt that times are hard for just about everyone, of every income level right now, and over the past few weeks with the help of many of you, I received numerous clothing donations and this weekend my best friend Tricia (who jumped on board with me, no questions asked, knowing she was getting herself into a big project and a lot of work! I couldn't have done it without her!!!!) and I along with a handful of wonderful ladies from my church, made the clothing giveaway come to life, in a bigger way than I EVER EVER dreamed possible!! You see, I have been a Christian for as long as I can remember, I have always believed in God and known Jesus Christ as my Savior (don't click off the page, stick this out with me, I promise I am not going to get preachy on you! Although I do think Jesus is pretty amazing and I hope you take the time to get to know Him!) and I have always prayed to Him when I was feeling happy, and clung to him when I was feeling scared, a I begged of him until my heart was raw when I was trying to get pregnant, and I cried out to him when we lost our babies to miscarriages but never in all of my years had I SEEN Jesus, I have felt him comfort me, and calm me and give me peace but never have I witnessed a moment where I SAW Jesus visibly in a room. (Are you sticking with me???) On Friday we spent all day organizing, folding and hanging up bag upon bag of clothing we had 20 tables and 3 hanging racks along with these coats racks to utilize!

People we so generous, this picture was taken a few days before we went to organize, there was more than this people, the response to our call for donations was amazing!! When we opened the bags we found clothes that were in great shape, lots of name brands, and lots of things with the tags still on it. There were winter coats, Halloween costumes, shoes and suits and so much more! On Saturday morning we set up platters of cookies and juice and made signs to hang up around town, I kept telling Tricia I was nervous no one would show up! At 8:50 we went outside to put a huge banner on the side of the building and there were two cars in the parking lot by the time we were done!! I was so excited! We went back in, did a few final things and at 9:00 I went to open the doors and ,oh my gosh guys, there was a LINE of people!! It was JUST like black Friday! They rushed in to our tables, we stood back in awe, within fifteen minutes I counted more than 50 people going through the tables with more people walking in, (not a shabby start in our small town!) they were filling up shopping bags and garbage bags and for a few moments I panicked! There was absolutely NO WAY the amount of clothes we had on those tables was going to last as long as we had planned for especially with everyone filling up shopping bags and trash bags! and so I prayed that those that needed them worst would get there quickly and went around to help the ones that were already there!





and the people kept coming and going, the ones leaving were so appreciative and thankful, people were kind to each other and other's were in awe that everything was completely free and that there was no catch. We heard from numerous people saying that this helped them because they weren't sure how they were going to get coats and clothes for winter. And then the inevitable happened, one our tables got down to almost nothing, it was  a popular kids size and we were only 45 minutes or so into the giveaway....

and now because it is Eleven o'clock at night and my daughter is still awake with a miserable allergy attack and a stuffy nose that is making her completely miserable I am going to have to leave you hanging! Watch for part 2 tomorrow!! This story just gets better and better!!!

THAT mom makes a reapperance!

Oh My Goodness!! Has life been crazy busy or what! I love fall and all that comes with it but boy do the weekends fill up fast! We have had birthday parties, and cheerleading camp, soccer and performances at the football game, a candlelight tour of New Salem and school projects, pumpkin carving activites and allergies. The days are flying by and before I know it, it is time to fall asleep at night! I know this sounds picture perfect and in many ways it is but let's be real, how many times do we plan something and it go the EXACT opposite??? yup pretty much everytime! LOL! at least in my less than perfect world! It would seem that my darling, sweet, monster of a two year old is at the peak of tantrums, attitude and sass! (At least I am praying it is at the peak! LOL!) so all of these fun activites I have planned have had at least one moment where I was THAT mom. Ya know the one who is boderline pshyco?? Have you met her?? I am her! Let's share a few examples shall we?? Book Fair 2011 Auburn Elementary Library (remember I am a "single" mother during the evenings of the week) I pick up the girls and head to Casey's to order cheese sticks and pizza for dinner because we have a packed evening, making the most of my time I decide to head to the book fair while our order is being completed, we park, Carleigh hops out and I see my first error, I have no stroller for Caylee, right then I should have got back in the car, I mean I could hear that scary foreshadowing music in my head, but oh no, I got this, so I get her out and hold her hand and off we go, we stop and have a little talk, the three of us, of how we are going to be good girls, and only touch with one finger. We get to the door and they have a table set up,Carleigh has to sign in, Caylee tries to grab said pen and write on the table...I distract her, Carleigh finishes and  we step ONE foot in the door of said library and bam a book is off the rack and on the floor.....SIGH... pick up said book, grab Caylee's hand, remind her of the one finger rule by showing her how to point with said finger, walk two more steps, bamm another book down....so I decide to pick her cute darling 50 pound 3 and a half foot self up and carry her on my hip like she is dainty. . . oh yes, picture now a child who is the size of  a four and half year old, throwing her self back, yelling, crying and going into MAJOR meltdown mode, all the while her big sister is being an angel SLOWLY looking at each book picking out her favorites, here she comes, THAT MOM, watch out everyone! I whisper into Caylees ear, with that stern mom voice, that does NO good, "Caylee Michelle straigthen up right now or you are going to be in big trouble" nothing, nada, not evening a slight glimmer that she heard me...I rush Carleigh along and get up to check out, Caylee is still acting like a small hellion, we have to pay so I literally sat her down between my legs and held her there with my calf muscles while she acted liked I was killing her, I whisper loudly to her to knock if off before I give her something to throw a fit about, yup that classic line, remember when your parents used it??? I remember hushing up the second it came out of my parents mouth, Caylee was unphased, I then picked her up, and she dangled like a limp 50lb pound dead weight noodle. Can we say mortified!!! Everyone was watching us, I am sure they were wondering why I didn't spank her right then and there but I was not in a good mommy place to execute a punishment, she did not get to get her book that she wanted as her punishment and that was part of why she was having a fit,we get out to the car, I buckle her in, as soon as the seat belt clicked, the crying stopped, and there was complete silence. I drag my, huffing, puffing sweaty self, to the drive side seat, slump into it, I look and felt like I was just drug out back and beaten by a gang of huge men..... I look at the clock it had only been ten minutes since we had departed the car....................say what!!?!?!?!!!

I had some more examples, but reliving that one while writing it has worn me out!! How about you have you been THAT mom lately????

Falling

                                                                             More

                                                                                and

                                                                          More

                                                                                 in

                                                                             LOVE

with these two each day!!!!!!!!!

We have kicked fall off with a bunch of fun already and the weekends of October hold a promise of much more fun! I am LOVING the stages the girls are at right now! :) So Much Fun!

P.S. I will be back with a full update from the weekend activites!

Kripsy Kreme Donut's Recipe!! YUMMY!!!!

Carleigh was my donut cutter outter :)

MMMM Everyone I know loves Krispy Kreme donuts, they are a huge hit in my house and this weekend I used a receipe I found online that claimed to be like Kripsy Kreme and let me tell ya, I think they were pretty darn close!!



Sorry for no fancy plating up :) I remembered to snap a picture after I had already put them in a container!
















Tim is raving about them, we filled a couple, that was fun too! :) I got the reciepe from Wiki How

Doughnut Batter

• 2 pkgs. regular or rapid rise yeast
• 1/4 cup warm water (105−115 degrees)
• 1 1/2 cups lukewarm milk (scalded then cooled)
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2 eggs
• 1/3 cup shortening
• 5 cups all−purpose flour
• Vegetable oil

Creamy Glaze

• 1/3 cup butter
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 2-4 tbsp. hot water

Let me know if you try this tasty treat!! I think next time I do it I am going to do some research and use butter instead of crisco and a little more sugar!! ENJOY!

GLEEfull!!!

It is very possible that after reading this post you will think I have resorted back to High school. I will probably be called a Geek Gleek and a Loser, but you know what I am OK with that!! I am embracing my Gleekness!! and maybe taking my best friend down with me in the process....ummmm I would apologize Trish but I am not really sorry! LOL!! You see, the countdown to the Glee season premiere is totally on! I have a huge obsession with Darren Criss (Blaine) and well with the whole show really. I mean I am not obsessed enough that I would attend Glee in 3D on opening night.....

oh this picture??? ummmmm nope I sure didn't take that....

I am way to mature to go opening night, and we DEFINITELY didn't enjoy ourselves so much that we stayed for the second showing... NOPE not us!!!

And there is no way you would ever catch me in Glee paraphernalia.... that would definitely not be something I would be caught dead in, especially in public..........

It is possible that Glee is my favorite show of all times, it is also possible that I have converted my best friend, husband and daughters to love Glee also....it may be becoming a family obsession....only time will tell!!

Well I better get back to re-watching season 1 in time for the big show premiere next Tuesday, Hey Trish what good food are we going to have for our kick-off???!! Hehehe!!  

Warning Signs

Let me start this post with a disclaimer!!  I am not a doctor, I am a wanna be doctor but have no degree :) I am a self proclaimed nurse by googling trade but am not licensed in any way, shape, or form! Ok, now that we got that little tidbit out of the way we can move forward with this post! I also don't know the rules of using Internet data so I am just going to tell you what I know about PCOS and the warning signs and symptoms that I have, and I pretty much have them all! If you suspect yourself or your daughter might have PCOS after reading this I strongly urge you to contact your doctor about it, an OB/GYN would probably be better than a family practice doctor, but I am sure your family doctor can recommend  someone if she feels the need to! The biggest thing about PCOS is that it is often times misdiagnosed or not caught at all. It took my mom reading a magazine article, dragging me to the doctor and showing it to him to get the right diagnosis. There are so many reasons why finding out early is imperative! First and foremost, a girl with the side effects of PCOS is going to get made fun of at school, it is just a fact. But boy would I have felt better about the teasing if I would have known that I wasn't doing something wrong to cause the things I was teased about ( such as always thinking the extra weight was due to overeating, the gray patches due to not "scrubbing" hard enough, the crazy hair growth from not shaving often enough). And I can't stress enough how important it is to know about PCOS so as to protect what little fertility you may have! It is only by the grace of God that I decided to try to have babies so young, and only because I had gotten a PCOS diagnosis my senior year in High School did my OB/GYN start me on fertility treatments after just 4 or 5 months of trying. I never went back on birth control after I had Carleigh at age 23 and we started active fertility treatments when she was around 15 months old, in just 15 months my fertility had decreased even more, the treatment regiment that worked with her did not work with getting pregnant with my other pregnancies, by the time I conceived Caylee I was on the strongest doses of meds that you can do for IUI for 14 days and still only grew one egg, we had two insemination's and this was the last cycle we were going to do before IVF. That was a huge change in just a couple of years! My Reproductive Endocrinologist told me I was her youngest patient to date and that she wished more of her patients would seek treatment out earlier because the success rates are much higher!

PCOS presents with some or all, and even only one or two of the following symptoms. There may be more that I am not listing but you can check google PCOS and get a few really good websites if you want more information!

weight gain/being overweight and having a hard time losing it
insulin resistance
gray patches of skin on the elbows, knees, neck, groin
excess facial hair (sides of face, chin, upper lip) side note: in junior high the facial hair was worse on the side of my face, now I am just hairy everywhere! Thank you old age! LOL!
Delayed starting of period ( I was fifteen)
irregular periods- (I was put on birth control for this)
Anxiety- (this can also present as panic attacks, I have had anxiety since I was a small child, this was one of the first signs/symptoms I probably presented with, following with the weight gain)
Infertility
Male Patterned Baldness ( I do not have this one yet, but let it be known when I get it I will be turning into Daniel instead of DeAnna, this is your warning! )
Acne
Dry/Oily Skin
Elevated Blood Pressure (I do not have this symptom yet or at least it hasn't been diagnosed)

If you had problems with any of these areas and were never diagnosed I would urge you to get checked out and I would urge you to watch your daughters as they grow up. I would say that I was full blown PCOS by age 13, that is when I peeked with all of my symptoms. Next week I will compile some websites that have good PCOS information on them. There are many ways to alter your diet and physical changes you can make to help control your PCOS. (It is very possible that I find the diets extermely miserable and awful but I will never admit that!) There is also good infromation out there to help you to increase your chances of pregnancy! Have a GREAT Tuesday!! And even though this post was heavy, I sure hope you have giggling good day!!!

Labor Day Weekend!!

Before the week is officially over I want to get these pictures up from Labor Day! We took the kiddo's camping and had a prefect weekend! It was hot enough to swim and cool enough we didn't die of heat exhaustion! But I will say that by Sunday night we needed sweatshirts and jeans which was insane since Friday  it was 100 degrees!! What the heck weather!! Oh and did I mention that for the first time in like 6 weeks we got rain! Yeah, what the heck do you do with 5 girls aged from 13 to 2, and one Uncle/daddy in a camper when it rains???

Why Lego's, a laptop and sleep to the sound of rain pelting the tin roof of course!! (The two lumps on the bed are the 13 year olds?? Oh and that uncle/dad??

He can sleep through anything!!! UGH! I wish I had that special power!

We cooked some more pretty awesome meals over the campfire! Can I brag on myself? I ROCK the campfire cooking!! LOL!! I told Tim I need two campfires so that I can cook more at items at a time though! We did BBQ chicken, baked potatoes, hamburgers, cowboy baked beans, and some awesome grilled ham and cheese sandwhiches as our new things this weekend!! YUM YUM! We also had a pizza delivered to the campground on the first night there! Don't Judge, I never said I was a rustic camper! I like to mix modern conveniences and Amish ways! LOL!

We got up early on Monday morning to head out to our annual Labor day Parade and Picnic. We are a proud to be union family and take Labor day festivities very seriously! :)

Every year we get a family picture at the parade, as our family has grown our pictures have gotten a little more tricky to get!! I will say that this is the best/worst picture we have ever taken! and it was the best pick of all that we took! LOL!! Oh my goodness!! I sure hope that come October we can get our act together for our family portiats! :) Oh did I mention the wind was blowing so hard that we pretty much had to hold onto the small children, hences the HORRIBLE hairdo's!!

I hope everyone has a GREAT weekend! Monday I will be featuring a "warning signs of PCOS post" Mom's of young girls, it's a post you won't want to miss!!

Get your SERVE on!!

So I have been a part of the blogging world for a little over 2 years, long before I had a blog I read blogs. It is a fun hobby that I love! One of my ALL TIME favorite bloggers is Patrice (also known as Jonah's mommy!!) She is a down to earth lady who writes with humor about her everyday life taking care of Jonah who has EB. Jonah is adorable, really go over and check him out, he will make your heart melt into a million pieces! I wish he lived closer so he and Caylee could have a play date!! They are only about a month apart, I know they would be great pals! So Patrice is a definite go getter, she has organized great fundraisers many things, including DEBRA which is a foundation that helps out EB families, she also organized fundraisers to earn money to help baby Anton come home from the orphanage and now she has come up with this really cool idea called "Get your Serve On". If you get a minute hop on over and check her out! Grateful for Giggling Girls (I am nicknaming us GGG) is going to link up with Patrice and Get our Serve on. I have had this idea rolling around in my head for months since I read about the concept out in the blogosphere, it is a Community Clothing Swap and I am so excited to announce that I am putting this event together in our Community! My church is going to allow me to use our building to host it and the date is October 15th!! I haven't set on a official time yet! The concept is that I will accept donations (in abundance I hope!) and then set it up in the church like a store, and then those in the community that have a need for clothing in the coming months can come shopping for FREE, no money exchanged, no goods exchanged, no questions asked! I am hoping to arrange for help in the nursery so that mother's can shop while the kiddos play, and to have cookies and punch! Did I mention I can't wait!! One statement that Patrice said that really stuck with me was that an excuse that we often use, myself included, is that my kids are to young to get anything out of serving others, they aren't going to understand it, Patrice countered that argument by saying, what if our kids grow up never knowing what it is like NOT to serve, what if serving others is something they have always known... That statement really got me thinking! I want my girls to be eager to serve others, to always be helpful and not do things only to earn money or recognition! So do you have it in you? Are you willing to jump aboard the Get your Serve on train? With God's help we can change one life, one event, one community, one person at a time!!!  If this is something that you want to consider, then head on over to the Get your Serve on facebook page, and join! There are lots of good ideas being shared over there! and hop over to see Patrice, she tells all about in her blog post The proposal !! If you do decide to jump on the movement, leave me a comment I can't wait to watch it grow!!

What IF????

What If I hadn't been overweight as a child??
What If I hadn't been teased for the "hairness" of my arms and face???
What If I would have known that the dark patches on my skin weren't "dirt"
What If I would have developed apporiately for my age?
What If I had told Tim I may never be able to naturally conceive a child?
What If he had turned away and never looked back?
What If I had given up after trying naturally with no success of getting pregnant?
What If the treatments had never worked?
What If I can never get over the desire to have a big family?
What If I always long for just one more chance to be pregnant?
What If I didn't have to deal daily with the facial hair
What If I didn't have to deal with the horrible anxiety and panic attacks?
What If I could live one day feeling normal, beautiful, and less "manly"
What If I let PCOS rob me of my desires?
What If I let PCOS dictate who I am?
What If I let PCOS come between me and my faith
What If I let PCOS shape me?
What If I let four letters consume me?

What if that little girl at school getting made fun of, has a disease? One she doesn't even know about, and yet your child is taunting her for being overweight, or looking different? or teasing her for having "dirt" spots on her knees and elbows. What if you are whispering about how her parents should make her be more active? They should make her scrub those "spots" off in the shower? What if we took the time to educate our children and ourselves? What if PCOS wasn't spoken only in hushed tones at the doctors office? What if we took a stand to make a change, to raise awareness of PCOS and all that goes with it? What if we caught it when it first shows signs in young girls and helped them to battle it and to not be ashamed of it??

What if you could make a difference?

September is PCOS Awareness Month, Please help me to take the shame out of PCOS? I will be doing posts throughout the month, highlighting warning signs and symptoms, educating on PCOS, what it is and what it does. Please help me to make this four letter word, one that we aren't afraid to use!

image used from an online source

Flashback Friday on a Thursday!!!

I am pretty confident that I could never deny that I am my children's mother!!

Giggling Girls Crock Pot Italian Beef!!! So Easy!!

First of all, thank you for all the feedback on the Cleaning Reveal!! It is fun to hear back from everyone! I have to say that my weekend was filled with a lot of cleaning, but also with a lot of messing so I don't feel like I made enough headway to start yet! BUT I have higher hopes for this weekend! Anyway, I promised a recipe over the weekend, and I suck at doing blog posts on the weekends so from now one I am just not going to make that promise! LOL! But I am here today with a recipe that you will definitely want to try!!! It is a HUGE hit in my family especially among the men, and truthfully I haven't had one person not like it when we have made it! and it is SO easy!! and I am pretty excited because Kelly over at Kelly's Corner is doing a link up of crock pot receipes!!! So if you are stopping by from Kelly's blog we hope you will look around and come back and see us again!!!! It is always fun to meet new bloggy friends!

Crock Pot Italian Beef

Ingredients

Rump Roast ( I usually do between a 3 and 5 pound one)

Italian Salad Dressing (regular size bottle you will use half of, a small bottle use the whole thing)

The Dry Italian Seasoning Packet (Hidden Valley has a really good one!)

Salt, Pepper, and Garlic Salt

Hoagie Buns

Shredded Colby Jack Cheese (optional)

jalapenos (optional)

Start by taking your roast out of the package (don't forget that little pad thingy that sticks to the bottom, not that I would know that from cooking one on myself or anything!), we than season it generously with salt, pepper, garlic salt and then we put it into a preheat skillet to brown it on both sides. Once we get a nice sear on it we move  it into the crock pot!! Now you can use your roast fresh, frozen or thawed out! If it is frozen you are going to want to let it cook longer in your crock pot! We turn our crock pot on high and set it for 8 hours or however long you are going to be gone, or just on high if you don't have a timer. Then I pour two or three cups of water on it, put the lid on and let it go slow cook. The longer it cooks the better as your meant will become fork tender. Than about an hour (sometimes I wait until 30 minutes before) I drain off the water that has now turned into beef broth, and shred my meat. Next add your small bottle, or half of your big bottle of dressing, (Sorry if you like exact measurements, I don't seem to roll that way! LOL!) your dry packet of Italian Seasoning, stir it all together and throw in your peppers if you so choose. Let cook for another 30 minutes or so and then serve on hoagie buns topped with Cheddar cheese for the best results...you can forgo the cheese but in my world cheese makes everything better!!

As always, Thanks for cooking with the giggling girls!!!! (Time for new apron pictures, I will get right on that!)

The Cleaning Schedule Reveal!!!!

So I have created our cleaning schedules, I have posted pictures of them below! I am going to slide them into clear plastic covers so that we can mark them off with dry erase markers! I am pretty excited to implement these! My plan is to get my house spotless this weekend, all of my laundry caught up completely and start fresh on Monday! This works well because I am having friends over on Saturday, and that is always great motivation for my household! I will keep you all posted on the journey as we start! I plan to do an interview with Carleigh and Tim to see what they think of our new schedule too!! I definitely think it is important to include the girls in ways that they can help, I may do a little allowance or something but haven't decided on that yet. Anyone have any opinions on that?? I was thinking about having a few things that are expected but then paying Carleigh for anything extra, like folding washcloths for a quarter, something like that!  I loved hearing all of the tips you guys shared with me! If you think of anymore please send them my way! I have some major problem areas with Socks, Rubbermaid Tupperware, and shoes, any suggestion in those areas would be fantastic!!! 

And if any of you jump on the cleaning schedule bandwagon, please let me know! It would be fun to encourage each other!!!  I am hoping to get a new recipe or two up over the weekend, So check back in with us in the next day or two!!! Have a GREAT day!

Working Mom Shortcut-Cleaning Schedules!

So here at Giggling Girls we are getting ready to embark on a new journey. Now I am a pretty decent housekeeper! Not as good as my mom but I do okay. Well except for laundry! I HATE Laundry!! But we will get back to that!! I read quite a few blogs and I found a few stay at home mom's that use cleaning schedules. Now when I stayed home and even when I worked part-time, I felt that doing the housework was my job, I am a firm believer in roles in marriage and I believe the household duties fall to the woman IF she is staying home or working part-time. Now hold on all you stay at home people, don't go getting your undies in a bunch!! Just because that is my opinion doesn't make it yours and I am okay with that! That is just how my household ran, Tim helped out but most of the work including getting up with our girls fell to me (and his jobs were mowing the yard, taking down the trash, doing that "guy" stuff )  and I was good with that UNTIL we made the family decision that I would take a new job that would require me to go back to work full time. When we were discussing this I made it very clear that if I was going to work full-time I was not going to be the full-time maid, and Tim agreed. I started working and I did okay managing and Tim pulled his weight and all was fine and then the weeks passed and things started slipping, both girls became more mobile and more messy and things started getting left undone. So now, one of my biggest gripes is that my house is never as clean as I would like it, I know to some I hold a to high standard of clean, and I have learned to compromise somewhat but it isn't working well so I am going to implement a Cleaning Schedule!! You should see how excited Tim is!!! He just can't wait to find out what his new duties are going to be!!! So as I am creating our new calender and schedule (which don't worry I will share with you) I am wanting to know, what are some of your quick cleaning tips, your best kept secrets to a clean home, and habits you have gotten into that  help things go smoothly!! I can't wait  to hear them! Oh and don't worry I will touch back on the laundry thing ........(yeah maybe this is why I get piles of laundry, I ALWAYS run the other direction when it comes up!!)

8 years

8 years ago yesterday, I got married to my husband, fulfilling one of my life long dreams. I had a storybook wedding, it was prefect and beautiful, I had the long dress and the pretty veil and the PRETTIEST flowers around (yes the flowers were my most favorite part of my wedding!) The church was over flowing with people there to share in our excitement and the reception was and epic Haines party, there was dancing and great food, and drinking, cake cutting and ice sculptures it was a PREFECT day.

Our flower girls, we had four of them but Lexie was just a baby and didn't stand for the ceremony! That is Lydia looking at us! Isn't she a doll!!

My dad walking me down the aisle, can you see my smile, boy that Tim he sure had me wrapped around his finger!!

My bridesmaids! Yes we did black and I love love love how the flowers popped against the dresses!! I can't believe that it has been 8 years!

Tim,

The 8 years we have been together have been filled with lots of ups and downs, we have smiled and laughed and cried, fought and wanted to give up but kept pushing on. There are days that you drive me absolutely crazy and days that I think being a lesbian would be a much better choice, but every night before I go to bed, even on the few nights we weren't talking, I am always thankful that we found each other on that blind date to the Olive Garden and I am so very happy to be sharing this crazy, wonderful, chaotic, busy life with you! I pray that God graces us with many more years to drive each other crazy and with many more moments of loving each other! I love you!

Love, DeAnna