Busted

My sweet babybug was caught in a lie - and we take lying very seriously around these here parts. I disciplined her appropriately/harshly. Evidently, the three consequences dished out by yours truly were not enough penance for her - she also put herself into a humbling and pitiful time out. Does that mean she'd make a good Catholic?

I love her so.

Mary's three!

My Littlest Girl,

Today you are three! You learned how to say your birthday a few months ago - "My birfday is July sisteen." You proceed to tell everybody. In the line at the grocery store, to all kinds of random people - real and imaginary - on your personal cell phone and my personal favorite, to the Spanish speaking yard guy who may have thought you were requesting princess shaped bushes.

You still have MANY 'terrible two' moments. Which will all change today, right? RIGHT? You FLIP OUT out for reasons such as these. Makes me want to drink, just thinking about it, which is a bad idea on several counts (namely it's 4am and we'd all prefer your brother to have a decent IQ and not twitch) - so let's instead focus on your immense cuteness, of which there is plenty of.

You're free with compliments. You love my "lipstick, earrings, toes, teeth, clothes, smile, belly, purse, dish..." You name it, you love it. You'd think that would get old, you complimenting everything all. the. time. But it doesn't, I take you at your word and it never fails to make me smile. Except that one time when you loved my pimple. Geez.

You adore the pool and are always wanting to "catch Daddy". We never correct you saying it's the other way around, because we all know who wears the cute little skirts in the relationship. When you're in the mood to swim, you get nekkid, grab your suit, get your earplugs and plop them in my lap for a subtle hint. You jump in the pool, arms and legs flying, huge smile on your face - and swim your little heart out. You're brave enough now to jump in by yourself, over and over again with no one to catch. You love to push your sisters in the pool at which time you all have a good laugh and then nicely demand popsicles.

You love having control over something - being in charge of turning the tv off (less the part about the tv actually being off), getting something I asked for, carrying towels to the pool, whatever. Because I mentioned I couldn't find it within earshot of you, last night you spent 15 minutes looking for a grater (as in cheese). You had no idea what a grater was, but you were on a quest. After an exhaustive search, you solicited help from Coco. "Coco, can you please help me find Mama's thing stuff?" Never did find my thing stuff.

You: love eggs, can't get enough D-d-d-d-d-Dora, prefer shoes that are too big for you, hop when excited, like to change clothes multiple times daily, need but don't like naps, give the best hugs, eat enough for a teenager, have the best sideways smile, talk constantly, like to chase your sisters, have a love/hate relationship with ponytails, love to be read to, call me Mama, say "boogeries!" when you need to blow your nose, rise with the roosters, love to get mail, are fickle, say hi to every stranger you see, constantly ask for milk and don't drink it, demand company in the bathroom for just the first two seconds, have never had your hair cut, pronounce yellow 'yey-yow', love babies, are adored.

The depth of love I have for you still amazes me. Until you experience a mother's love, you can never know... I can get all gushy just thinking about you, I literally feel an ache in my heart (is it possible to love too much?) and I often tip-toe in to watch you sleep, you're such a lovely sleeper. You've been around three years now; I had lived 32 years without you and yet it's unimaginable how that was possible. All those years, and I never knew I wasn't whole.

As you like to say, I love you all the way over there,

Mama

My new favorite child

Coco: Is there anything I can do that would help you?

Me: (Swoon!) Yes, please clean this, pick up that, clean clean clean....

Coco: Sure, Mommy! (And goes and DOES IT with a great attitude!!!)

And the new favorite kid award goes to:

Am I the luckiest mom ever or WHAT?!!? (She can call me old all she wants if she CLEANS!!)

My favorite child

Gracie: Do you remember when you were a kid and your teeth were loose?

Me: Yep, sure do.

Gracie: Wow. That's great. How old are you again?

Me: 35

Coco: That's SO OLD, MOM. You're REALLY old. OLD!

Me: (cringe/grimace)

Gracie: She is NOT, Coco. She's a young, lovely mom.

Coco: Um, I guess maybe you're not soooo old.

And the favorite kid award goes to:

Ha ha haaa - NOT

This is generally a fluff blog. Look what cute thing my kid said! My other kid! Again! My (one time only) doctor is a smooth-low talker! I'm hormonal! I have exciting dreams about contact paper! I cannot. stand. the mis-use of 'your' and and and...! I wish so many things! I have an adorable daughter! I love things! My hubby can be so nice! I remind someone of a middle-aged black woman! And am evidently racist! I'm impatient! I am a gigantic idiot!

Right now, though, I feel the need to put down the fluff and take a stand. I just read this. Go ahead and click over there, read it for yourself. It's about a pastor who just asked his daughter (with small children no less) to stash his p0rn collection. 10 boxes worth. Seems one of his congregations is 'not pleased with him'. The others 'support him completely' - to which I wonder what/who they think they're supporting?

I am a Christian. A believer in God and in Christ. A person. A highly imperfect but forgiven person. A person who strives to be who God calls me to be, although I often fail spectacularly. I get sin. I get the entanglement of thoughts, the desire for things that we should turn our backs on. I get how slippery the slope can get. I get how pastors are people who sin, every person sins. Regardless that they are and should be held to a higher standard, they're still people. People who sin. People who sin and should repent.

This, though, I don't get.

This is sin. Big, fat, ugly sin. Plain and simple. Black and white. This is not ok!! He's been collecting this filth seemingly his entire life without remorse, without conviction. Gets RIGHTEOUS and DESERVED heat from his congregation and does he repent? get rid of it? feel convicted? come clean? get help (there's lots of Christian help for this very common sin)? NO. 'The p0rn god' hides the evidence. And most likely lies through his teeth. Goes unrepentantly deeper into the shadows and involves his family. Thank goodness he did - now we can all get a good laugh!

The comments on that post are mostly along the lines of "This is so hilarious!" I can see how this can be funny to a non-believer. Sounds like a classic... "You hear the one about the pastor and his 10 box p0rn collection?!" But as a Christian, I just can't see it that way. I can't see the humor in a man who consistently and repeatedly preaches one thing (I assume, anyway, because guess what?! SHOCKER! The Bible is chalk full of scripture that encourages wise and righteous living - and warns against the opposite) then does another. I see the sadness. The hypocrisy. The disappointment. The deception. The lives this will impact.

If I were him, I would be fearing God. In a big way. Even if he 'fools' everybody else, God knows.

"Let us pray" is right.

~We will return to your normally scheduled fluffiness shortly.

Missing having kids around, Part 2. Kinda.

Ok, so there's really no Part 2 - but I did say Part 1 and so I'm now legally obligated to mention Part 2, am I not? The kids will now be home in a matter of hours and I. need. more. time. !!! Mostly to get stuff done. I MISS THEM SO MUCH. So there's that. Which will make it joyous for them to be home. For at least 20 minutes.

But all of the ORGANIZING and RELAXING and ORGANIZING and TIME ALONE IN THE POOL and ORGANIZING and SLEEPING I meant to accomplish while they were away -- well, DANG.

Missing having kids around, Part 1

The past couple of days, the kids have been at Nana & Papa's (Justin's parents). They live a couple of hours away and so to 'make the drop' we met half-way. I cried nearly all the way home while cursing myself and calling/texting his mom to remind her of little things - little things that really, everyone still would have lived without her knowing. I'm sure she's never been so temped to turn her phone right OFF. I am one of those irritating moms who CANNOT WAIT to have some time to herself and then the instant it happens, moooourns the mourning of the broken-hearted, crying into a tub full of Ben and Jerry's. At least I didn't have to share.

I made cinnamon rolls for breakfast this morning (which I never, ever do, they just looked sooo delicious in the store). And by made, I mean I popped the tube and set the oven. Pioneer Woman should have me shot. So I gave one to Justin along with a smoothie and sent him off to work. 5 cinnamon rolls minus 1 cinnamon roll. Then I ate one. And now I want another one. Or three. I just made a startling revelation. There is no one else to blame for the additional consumption of cinnamon rolls. In my normal life, all of them could easily disappear and no one really had to know who ate what. Now, all by my lonesome, it's painfully clear I alone am responsible for said disappearance of the fatty, sugary goodness. Hey, wait! I have a tiny resident child that I can blame anything and everything on and society will most likely smirk with understanding and acceptance. THANK GOD.

NorCal

So I started this post on vacation but never did get the darn thing finished. So, if all of my 'tenses' aren't correct, you know why (who, me, lazy?). We were gone for 9 days to very Northern California, redwood country, where it's easy to feel short.

We're visiting my parents in northern CA - my dad is working here on an extended project so they're doing the live here/live there thing for who knows how long.

They're living in an... apartment? loft? former brothel? (yeah, that!) on the second floor of commercial building downtown - one block from the bay/boardwalk, across the street there is a gazebo/fountain complete with hungry pigeons and there are quaint shops & eateries galore in every direction. It's furnished in French Fanciness and I'm constantly afraid the kids will break something. As long as it's not the coffee maker, I'm sure we can handle it. So yeah, back to the brothel... it was the most ahem, highly uh, traveled? utilized? visited? brothel on the west coast until they started cracking down on that sort of thing, or perhaps until a wife or two got wind of it.

Our bedroom has two doors to it, they just knocked out the wall between the rooms of uh, entertainment? and made it into a French Moroccan boudoir. How often does one get to say 'boudoir' and not sound uppity? It's interesting to think of all who once 'slept' there. *Blush* There is a large upstairs courtyard that connects a small office and main apartment which also has a conservatory. Very interesting digs.

I know what I'm about to admit sounds very ignorant (but if the shoe fits...): this is the first time I've actually realized that June/July doesn't necessarily mean summer. Duh. I guess it's like a lot of people north of wherever can't understand that we often can wear short sleeves on Christmas. While I'm sure our patio at home is sizzling, I'm sitting here BUNDLED up, snuggling my coffee cup, wishing I thought a high of 58 with WIND would be cold. Wuss. In my defense, weather.com didn't disclose the sometimes wind, the bone-cutting, nose-running, cry-inducing wind. I brought a few light coats & pants but that's it. We went to the thrift store to buy 'real' winter clothes - thank you, God, for cute cast-offs!

Yay cold!:

Having been home for about a week, I need to now re-read (and re-read and re-read) the part about having been cold... it seems like a dream, a far-fetched, unattainable dream. Because dudes: did I ever tell you about the time the mascara literally melted right off of my eyelashes? Trails of dripping mascara intertwined with trails of dripping tears (or was that just sweat?)...

Still. It's good to be home. Nearly if not equally as good as it was to be away.