Not Me, I Would Never Do That!

My First Attempt at Not Me Monday...here goes:

I absolutely DID NOT let Hannah and Calah climb all over the Target baby furniture displays so I could shop uninterrupted in the baby section. That would be rude and inconsiderate to other customers.

I totally DID NOT skip church today to go to Starbucks...and I DEFINITELY DID NOT make my hubby take all three kids by himself. That would be so mean. Men should never have to take the kids anywhere by themselves.

I SERIOUSLY DID NOT let Hannah get a pop-tart and juice box and turn on the TV by herself this morning so that I could stay in bed a little longer...I totally always get up and cook a gourmet breakfast with heart-shaped eggs and smiley-face pancakes.

I DID NOT put Johnson's Lavender bedtime lotion on my baby when I realized he smelled like drool because I was too tired to give him a bath last night. Wow.

I TOTALLY DID NOT pass up the low-fat, but more expensive, Skinny Cow ice cream for the Breyers Mint Chocolate Chip Buy One Get One Free and blame my decision on the economy.

I AM NOT secretly desperate to get above 6 comments on any one blog posting. I certainly have other things to concern myself with. I am very very busy and important.

I DID NOT re-wash the same load of clothes three times because I was too lazy to switch it over to the dryer before it got moldy-smelling. Twice.

I DEFINITELY DID NOT let my husband watch football uninterrupted today so that there would be a greater chance he would let me out of the bedtime routine to study. It was merely a selfless act of love.

This is fun!

All-Inclusive Friday

Well, it's the end of a very long week that went by very fast (if that makes any sense). On a beautiful, sunny fall day, the kids are napping, the house is a mess, and I sit here eating Peanut M & Ms in front of the computer and throwing out random thoughts to whomever is listening in blogland. Yesterday was an especially long day. I had clinical from 7am-1pm, came home for a little while and then got called into work from 5pm-10pm. So, its only natural that today I'm a little tired. But, I'm happy to be home with the kids and thankful that I don't have to rush off anywhere. Wait, I just said I'm happy to be home with the kids...even though I'm tired...even though there are baby cheetos all over the floor, and eternal laundry to do, and a four-year-old that keeps trying to open her squeeky door during naptime and sneak out because she's excited about her new Spiderman Lantern that she got for being such a helpful big sister.

Surprisingly, I didn't lose my patience today when Calah decided that she HAD to stand on my lap as I fed Jacob in his highchair so she could feed him too, dropping oatmeal all over my pants and the floor. Who am I to say she can't practice her mommy skills?

Am I hoping that they all sleep for 3 hours so I can write this blog AND take a nap? Of course, I am not beyond all my selfish tendencies...but today, the restlessness inside is quiet and I am thankful for what God has given me.

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Today Hannah asked me what color God was. She didn't mean black or white...she meant purple because that was the color of the clouds in her illustrated Bible story book. I told her I wasn't really sure what color He was. And she said she would find out when she went up to Heaven. Then she asked me if we could go to Heaven together. Smile/Tear.

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What else? Oh yeah...this is kinda funny. So a few weeks ago, I made my morning journey to the drive-thru Dunkin Donuts. I don't do this everyday, but mostly on those mornings that I absolutely NEED to get both good coffee and out of the house. Pulling away from the drive thru, I decided to pull over a little and park in one of the parking spaces because the kids were all demanding their donuts and I was trying to put my money away, etc. The parking space ran parallel, and immediately next to, the exit driveway. After getting everyone situated, I decided to make a call on my cell phone. Forgetting that I was in a parking space and not in the exit driveway itself, I put the car in drive, accelerated quickly and bounded up and over both the concrete parking block and the barrier to the grass parkway on the other side. Shocked at the unexpected jostling, the kids all stared at me wide-eyed. I laughed, threw the car in reverse, and then stopped laughing when I realized that we were COMPLETELY stuck. I put the car in drive and tried to move forward...nothing. Then, I started to panic. Still in my pjs, with all three kids...what was I going to do? Call a tow truck? Jon? The police? What the heck was I going to do with all the kids in a tow truck? So, I locked the car and ran full speed into the Dunkin Donuts, hoping they could help me. Well...making donuts is not really in the same field as removing cars from ditches. They came out and just sort of stared at the car. And then they laughed. A lot.

Lucky for me, all was not lost. As we were trying to decide on a course of action, a Jeep pulled into the parking lot with the words JEEP OFFROAD plastered across the windsheild. This man was just on a quick stop for coffee, but happened to have a jack, a gigantic chain, and some other random stuff used for returning cars to their rightful place on the road. Without hesitation, he attached my car to his car and pulled us out. (I took the kids out of the car, just in case the gas line had been punctured in the crash. Again, paranoid, sorry). After about a million thank-yous, I bought him his coffee and donuts and then both of us were on our way. Coincidence? Maybe, but probably not. God knows I can't talk on my cell phone and drive at the same time. He is very smart.

The funny part is, today I returned to the scene and was surprised to see all the Dunkin Donuts people remembered me...and were all still laughing.

Welcome to my beautiful chaos.

Family Friends

I've always understood the phrase family friends to mean those who are "friends of the family". But, as I've grown older, I've discovered a whole new meaning to the phrase. To me, family friends, means friends that FEEL just like your family. As a child, I remember that some of the best times were spent with family friends. Friends like these don't grow on trees, although since a lot of ours have moved away, I kind of wish they did. It would be nice on the lonely days to just step outside and pluck some off the branches and place them in our living room. In my selfish mind, I've also thought many times that there should be ridiculously large fines if you move to a different state. As far as I'm concerned, everyone should just stay in Illinois...in the suburbs! Sadly, that is not how things work. So, we have to settle for occasional visits. What's nice about family friends is that we always seem to pick up right where we left off. There is no awkardness...just laughter and understanding. Family friends love you for who you are and when you're with them, you can just be...


This weekend our family friends Ryan and Lauren came for a visit with their daughter Abby. Jon met Ryan as freshman at Wheaton College in 1995. I really just wanted to put one picture of them in here, but I couldn't pick just one:

On a college ski trip to Montana:



Not sure if Ryan is making this face because of the glasses Jon is wearing or the girl who is quite obviously not me...


Remember what I was saying about friends loving you for who you are?


I came into the picture a few years later in 1999 when I met Ryan at the local Outback Steakhouse where we both were working. LONG story short, he introduced me to Jon, we all went to Europe, and the rest is history.


After Jon and I got together, the three of us hung out on a pretty regular basis, but there was always something (or someone) missing. When I met Lauren in early 2005, I knew immediately the space was filled.

All of us camping in 2005 with our other family friends, Ben & Rebekah


Since then, our families have grown and we now have little family friends running around at our gatherings.

Calah and Abby...


Not sure why these are so small...





And...thanks to family, we can go out to dinner alone with family friends...



Anyway, as always, we had a great time. Now they just need to move back to Illinois so I don't have to buy a friend tree.

Under the Stars

This weekend marked the beginning of what I hope will become a Strong family tradition. On Friday night, Jon took Hannah camping away from home for the first time. After lunch, he and Hannah headed over to Blackwell, a forest preserve near our house, and set up camp. They had a tent, lots of books, flashlights, campfire, smores, and even did some hiking. I was definitely just a little nervous about the whole idea. She is only 4 after all...here were some of my paranoid thoughts:

• What if she wanders off and falls in the lake?


• What if she gets frostbite?


• What if she sleepwalks out of the tent and Jon doesn't hear her?


• What if she falls in the campfire?


• What if there is a stranger danger lurking in the forest?


• What if she gets stung by a bee and there is no Benadryl anywhere and she dies of respiratory compromise?


• What if she doesn't sleep well and gets sick?

Lucky for Hannah, Jon is actually rational and they had a great time. None of the above occured. Later in the day, I took Calah and Jacob to meet them and we all had dinner together and let the kids play in the tent. Around 7pm, I took the little kids home and Jon and Hannah stayed the night.

I don't particularly like camping...at least in a tent. Maybe it's because every time I've gone in the past 5 years, I've been in the early stages of pregnancy. For some reason, when I am pregnant, I am horribly repulsed by the smell of grills and/or campfires. So now, when I think of camping, I think of nausea. Also, I can never sleep in a tent. It's too quiet without my precious fan and all I hear are the strange animal noises that seem to come way too close to the other side of the paper-thin vinyl. Seriously, we all know that's not keeping out any bear with giant claws! I also don't really like the whole no showering thing... BUT, other than that, it's fun and I do think it's a great family activity...hopefully an RV will magically find its way into our budget in the not too distant future. Oh well, a girl can dream...

Fridays Downtown: A Personal Favorite

One of my favorite things to do on Friday mornings is to take the kids to the downtown area of our small town. It is filled with so many memories of when I was growing up that it is just one of those places that feels like home to me. Much of it is unchanged...the same barber shop, Hardware Store, Popcorn Shop, Paper House, and Adams Park with the same central fountain. They've added a Starbucks (Hallelujah), and some newer restaurants which I am also thankful for. The town is definitely trying to grow and add some more up-to-date stores, but there are some owners who have been doing business since the 1950s and, although their merchandise is somewhat out-dated, refuse to sell out to the mainstream stores such as Gap, etc... I'm not sure how I feel about that. On one hand I think it would be awesome to be able to actually shop in the downtown area, but also, I always feel bad for these shop owners who have been in business all these years...downtown Wheaton just wouldn't be quite the same without them (even if I've never once bought anything in those stores).
In just over a month, Jon's company will be moving into its new building in the heart of downtown. He will have a 2 minute drive to work everyday! So, we will have one more stop on these little Friday morning excursions! Here is our morning in pictures...

The End