Worn Out

I am so tired of all the bickering going on in my house with the 2 extra girls in it. I would like to appeal to you more experienced moms of multiple children on how you deal with it. Please share your secrets cause seriously it is driving me crazy.

I believe this morning I am going to sit them down and lay down the law. If anyone is unwilling to share and arguing follows the item will be taken away for 30 minutes and will come back to the person that requested it (as long as they requested nicely). If it happens again with the same item it will go away for the rest of the day. If they can't sit together and complain they are to close or whatever everyone will have to move. How does that sound? I don't want to be an ogre but come on can't we get along?

The younger one tends to say if you don't do "whatever" I am not going to play with you again. The older one can't decide if she wants the younger ones to play with her or leave her alone. She sends mixed signals and then gets mad if the little ones stop wanting to play with her. Anna just doesn't know how to share and thinks if someone gets something that looks fun she should get it. She is finally picking up on the take turns thing but sometimes it is still hard.

Any words of wisdom would be greatly appreciated!!!

Where I come from

I realized yesterday that everyone likes to know where they come from. Not just the people around them but how they acted and what they were like as a smaller child. Anna is already curious about her life as a baby. So this is for my Anna!

Where Anna came from:

Anna came from 2 parents that loved her so much before she was ever born. We were on pins and needles just waiting to make sure she would be ok because she was so very small. She wasn't growing very well in me and now I realize it was just because she was anxious to get out and see the world and be a HUGE part of it. As a baby she didn't sleep much. She would catch a few short naps but only if I were holding her. Or to be more accurate if I nursed her. She was a champion nurser lol. She started growing in leaps and bounds after she was out in the world. Her size never held her back though. She was trying to roll over at a young age and sitting up pretty young too. I would have to go back and check my notes to see exactly when. Anna never liked tv as a baby. Baby Einstein did absolutely NOTHING for her. Even now at almost 4 I am doing good to get her to watch 30 minutes for me to get something done without her under me lol. She loved to swing! Except she didn't like going front to back she preferred side to side. She wouldn't sleep in her crib until she was 4 months old at which point she started sleeping through the night! At 7 months we went on a fabulous vacation to Holden Beach where she decided that sleeping through the night was totally over rated! Her first belly laugh was 4.5 months old. We were watching White Christmas, a movie that I loved and will cherish even more now!

As Anna has been growing she has gone through a number of phases. Some that I would like to forget and others that I will hold on to too get me through the tough ones ;) She went through the NO phase! Everything was NO even if she really meant yes. She is still going through a phase where she hits. If she gets mad or is not getting her way she strikes out. She is a Drama Queen and has been since she was a baby. She started posing for pictures when she was old enough to realize what a camera was. She turns everything into a HUGE deal. Which can be good if it is something like a picnic and a movie. Not so great if she bumps her toe and her world crumbles!

I expected most of these things though cause she is so much like me. She picks through her food to see if there is something gross in there. She laughs with her whole body and soul. She feels other peoples pain so deeply that she will cry for them. She loves to snuggle but also likes to have her space. She also has a lot of her Daddy in her. She likes to scare people and play tricks on them. She moves very slow (sometimes) making sure everything is JUST so! She likes a variety of different foods. She doesn't like to be touched after 10:00 PM lol. She loves to put things together and take things apart. She has to have things done a certain way and she hates it if you change it up on her. For example, we have assigned seating at the table, we have to go a certain way into the grocery store etc.

She is a quirky little kid and I love discovering these things about her. She loves to help clean house and do laundry! Maybe we can keep her that way lol. Her favorite chore is wiping tables and stuff. Anything with spray!!! She loves her babies and takes very good care of them. She will be a great Mommy one day! She feeds them, changes there diaper, rocks them and plays with them. She even selects a lucky one to ride in the car with us where ever we are going. She hates to leave them in when we go to the store but I make her leave it. I am afraid if we left it somewhere the world would come to an end as we know it. Remember DRAMA QUEEN!!!

She loves swimming and is a little fish. She is doing extraordinary with it, she can swim the width of the pool without help, do flips under the water and swim down to touch the bottom of the pool with her fingertips. She loves to have picnics in the living room and watch a movie. She loves sitting out in our driveway and waving at people as they go by. I don't think she realizes how much joy she brings to the people driving by. I can see most of them looking tired after a long day and then they see her waving with such a cute smile and their faces brighten up and most of them wave back or honk the horn. She loves to ride her bike and climb things. She loves to play with her very good friends. She has so many now I never imagined she would have so many friends. She tends to get shy with new people but she is breaking away from that a little at the time. She loves getting her nails done and her hair too. She enjoys getting in the car and going as long as we don't have to drive to long. She likes to pretend like she is driving the car. Her favorite thing to do at the park is swing! She would swing for hours if you would stand there and push her lol. She is starting to learn how to do it herself but knows it is much easier if someone does it for her lol.

She doesn't like big crowds, she doesn't like putting away her toys (I think it is because she is thinking I am just going to get them back out later), she doesn't like bug bites, she doesn't like sitting still for to long, she doesn't like having to get a bath until she gets in (she loves it after she gets in), she doesn't like missing things, she doesn't like not being able to do something one of her friends can do.

She loves pretty much all fruits, she loves chips, plain or with salsa and sour cream or dips. she loves hot stuff, she loves sweets, she loves granola bars but her favorite snack is goldfish! Her favorite meal is chicken and pasta or either ham. She doesn't like broccoli, she doesn't like raisins, she doesn't like well I can't think of anything else at the moment.

Right now we are facing the 3-4 year old attitude. Sometimes I am trying so hard not to laugh when she gets it going. She just gets this look on her face and some of the things that come out of her mouth. Other times I just want to hang her up by her toe nails lol.

She is a delightful little girl and I am so blessed that God brought her to my life.

Dancing with Anna!

Being a Mom is so confusing sometimes. It is like a confusing dance (I have never been a good dancer!) that is ever changing! They are growing and changing and we are growing and changing as parents as well. This means that things will be different from one day to the next.

Anna and I have been feeling growing pains lately. That struggle for power. The I am a big girl and I want to do it myself. I try to give where I can and stand firm where I need too. On the flip side of that sometimes I seem to push her to hard. But then I wonder if it is to hard or if it is necessary. See a confusing dance! Y'all tell me I am not alone on the dance floor! Tell me that we will survive and make it to the next step!

Learning!

I have been a busy girl. I am learning to drive a stick shift ha. Isn't that great I am 35 years old and I am discovering that you never stop learning. I did learn how to drive a manual car ages ago but I was never very good at it. Now Chris is working about 40 minutes away from home and to save on gas he takes my car 2-3 days a week. That leaves me and Anna home with his truck. Anna and I don't like to stay home all day. There is just something in us that has to go even if it is just up the street for 10 minutes lol. So we have been taking his truck out for a spin here or there. I never wonder to far away from home and I make sure it is in the morning when there is not a lot of traffic. Anna loves it! She gets to sit in the front cause he has a single cab truck with no air bag. She also loves it when I do the whole whiplash thing lol. Which I tend to do from first to second gear for some reason. I am working on it and the more I drive it the better I get.

I have learned a few things through this process besides how to gear down when you slow down to turn or how to know when to change the gears. I have learned that driving an automatic is totally not driving lol. It is a leisure activity! Driving a stick is work! I can't even hardly have a conversation with Anna cause I am focusing on all the different aspects of driving! I have learned that I kinda like it lol. I never thought I would say that but I am enjoying the challenge of it. I like how Anna laughs at me or she points out all that she can see.

I think once I have this mastered I will have to find a new challenge! Something new to learn! Maybe I will learn how to do something totally crazy! Or maybe I will just learn something simple. Whatever it is I am glad to know that learning doesn't stop even after you are in your mid-30s. Even after or maybe especially after having a little one. I do realize that I learn things daily from Anna. Sometimes I do it so effortlessly that I don't even realize I am learning. Other times I am a very slow learner! Either that or she changes the rules on me a lot lol.

What have you learned lately? Something exciting or mundane? Something that makes you laugh or sigh with frustration?