I must be crazy having another baby!

I remember after having Colton I swore I would never have another child and as he got older and I was done with diapers, diaper bags, bottles, and waking up every two hours I would always think YES! I am so done and then for some reason when he was four I decided I wanted another baby, I never thought I would feel that way and now that I am pregnant all I can think is man I must be crazy!!!! Don't get me wrong I am excited and thankful, but pregnancy is alot harder than I remember and Colton will be in kindergarten next yr. I was finally going to have time to myself, now I am going to have to wait five more yrs for that! When my baby is born my oldest will be twelve, that is kind of crazy! I feel kind of sad because I know Cason will not be very interested in the baby, he will be interested in whatever twelve yr old boys are interested in. I can only pray that even with the age gap they will be close. I know Cortney will be very interested in the baby because he is the most excited!  He will be nine when I have this baby so there is a significant age gap but that is not to bad.

On a side note, the boys have came up with a new game its called stinky face. This is where they try to fart in each others faces?? I pray every night for God to let me have a little girl so I can understand someone in my household!

Now back to pregnancy, It is amazing to me all the changes your body goes through when you are pregnant! In alot of ways I feel like a teenager again, I have broke out worse than I can ever remember, I cry over everything and when I am not crying I am yelling. I can not remember the last time that I did my hair! I think I have forgotten how to use my straightener! The absolute worst thing I have a belly!! I am only about ten weeks along and already showing! I guess that is not the worst, the worst is probably that I feel like I have a flu that just wont go away! Isn't there any meds I can take? I need a magical pill! And did anyone know that there is an EVEN longer list of no no foods now? I am so sad that I can not eat sushi or fried eggs! That is like half of my diet! I should of thought this pregnancy thing through! I am sure I could of bought a baby somewhere!  I planted myself a money tree outside, I am just waiting for it to sprout! I could have just waited a little bit longer for it and then walah (?) I could have bought a cute bundle of joy! Or maybe I could have just waited for the stork to bring me one? I saw it happen on Dumbo, so I am sure it could happen that way to me! All joking aside being pregnant is hard work, and I get super aggravated when people do not understand that I feel sick and extremely tired all the time. Pregnant women just need more naps then others, and for me personally I do not like driving fast over bumps or around turns. It makes me feel even sicker. And do not mention the words kitchen or fridge to me! Even the thought of those things make me feel grossed out. And if I have to open the fridge, oh man you don't want to be here for that! I have to say my poor husband and kids are finding out first hand how it is when I don't clean anymore. I have never seen this house like this and while it is not disgusting it is not in anyway as clean as I like it! Pregnancy is hard! Hmmm I think I already said that!

You know what I love though, I love that when I was at the Dr. the other day I was able to hear the heart beat! It was so deep and strong, and then we saw the little bean on the ultrasound machine! Colton was with me and I told him "look that is your baby sister" He pointed to the little blob and got very excited! He thinks she (I think it will be a girl, I could be wrong but we wont know for two more months) look like a baby hamster, and I kind of agree with him! He always talks about our baby in my belly, I think he is starting to come around to the idea. And although right now I am miserable! I know it will all be worth it. As soon as I feel her moving around, and then when I get to hold her, I will forget about all the crappy pregnant stuff just like I did every other time. I cant wait! :)

Daily Struggles

Recently my husband and I started going to church. We have found that it has brought our family much closer together. For me personally it has helped me to start kicking some bad habits, and to just be an overall nicer person and maybe to be more understanding of others as they struggle in their daily life. It has been hard though and although the blessings have been coming in small but significant ways, there has also been some downsides. It is always hard when you change your lifestyle, I have been told many times in my life when you change, and your friends do not change with you, you grow apart and are not friends anymore. This has never happened to me until now and I find myself trying to hold on to friendships with certain people who I feel as if they are not really trying. It makes me very sad. Especially because I have tried to make allowances for these people, but it seems like since I don't drink, and I have became much more family oriented they don't like to be around. I understand that it may be weird for them, but I think if you are good friends that you should be able to overcome differences, especially if the changes made are for the betterment of yourself and you family?  I understand that some people are not ready to change. and never will, and they like where they are in life. I am fine with that, I just hate feeling cut out of someones life.  I guess some people are not meant to be friends forever, but I think the hardest is when you feel that way with a family member!  I don't know how to change what I see happening. I wish I did. And I wonder if this has happened with many people who have decided that their way of life was not good for them and decided to change it. As individuals we all have our own personal struggles to overcome, and it is not always easy. I personally have many of my own. What keeps me strong is knowing that we all have many blessings also. I believe with all my heart that every blessing comes along to help us overcome these struggles. I feel as if I did not make a drastic change in my life and if I would of kept going on the way I was with my drinking, that I probably would of not had a very happy ending. You can only drink steadily for so long before it starts taking a toll on your family, your life, spirit and body.  I still struggle everyday and everyday I want to drink. That feeling doesn't go away quickly. Lucky for me the Lord sent me a little blessing to help me through my struggle, I don't think I could of done it on my own. Unfortunately my husbands disapproval just wasn't working. Now that my mind is clear I feel so sad about all the time I wasted "having a good time" and I have realized that I don't have to drink to be an awesome person, I am still funny and people still like me. Some people probably like me better now because I am not so obnoxious!! I know my kids and my husband like it alot better and that is the most important. Another struggle I have is judging myself very harshly. I always look at others and think, man she is perfect why cant I be like that? I wish I could be that skinny, that crafty, that pretty, that rich (lol) that great of a mom, that smart, that great of a housekeeper, and so on and so on.  That kind of thinking is just setting yourself up for disaster and nobody has a perfect life. That person just has different struggles. It is hard not to only see the great though and to compare yourself to it. So if I could ever give one piece of advice to anybody going through some kind of struggle it would be, behind closed doors, what looks like a perfect person or life is not always so, everyone has struggles and everyone handles them differently.  Be who you are and love yourself. Your faults and all, because that is what makes you who you are and if there was no struggles, there would be no joy either.

Choices

Our lives are made up of small and big decisions, some are hard to make and others easy. And that one small decision can change your life and the lives of those around forever. Even just smiling at someone can change their whole day, and make them incredibly happy, then maybe they will smile or even help someone, and then the effect can go on and even change the world for the better. Just like if you do something bad, that choice can go on to effect the world in a negative way. I think that maybe we all do not think about the effect that we have on the world around us often enough. We walk through the world not thinking about others as much as we should. Anyone can make a difference if they choose to take notice and make a choice!
  I found this  on a facebook page and I really liked what it says, and I think that it is something we could all live by!



 I Choose...
to live by choice, not by chance;
to make changes, not excuses;
to be motivated, not manipulated;
to be useful, not used;
to excel, not compete;
I choose self-esteem, not self pity;
I choose to listen to my inner voice,
not the random opinion of others.

♥Wendy

fat, fat, fat, fat.......yeah I said it.

Lately I have been killing myself at the gym, just so I can feel hot, and wear whatever I want to wear, without worrying about the muffin top, or a belly that pokes out farther than my boobs do.  Its crazy how much hard work it is just to fit my big ol' butt into a pair of skinny jeans! I have been wondering where this obsession   comes from, And are there others out there??  I know that there has to be others, because when I am at the gym, I always see other women in there, heaving, huffing, faces red, sweat dripping down their into shirts. All that work just to fit into those HATED skinny jeans!!

I have changed my clothes like three times, while I have been writing this because I can not find anything that I feel good in, and I think that it is important to feel that you look good.

I have finally settled on some spacious jammie pants from old navy that are seriously comfy, and a sweater. This is what I choose to wear to school tonight, and yes I am happy with it, even though I have tons and tons of cute jeans and tops and dresses. Yep I choose jammie pants. (that's sarcasm)!

Ok I have gone to school, and slept all night,  And I just put back on those same jammie pants! They are super comfy! I love Old Navy!

SO when does it start? Why are some women/girls fine with their bodies and others are not? I have always been one of those women who thought that I was not skinny enough, it has never mattered how skinny I was, I ALWAYS had a thought in the back of my mind that I needed to loose weight. One day i was texting my friend Lauren complaining to her about how I hated my body, and blah blah blah, I just wanted to look good. She had not one ounce of compassion,not one ounce at all!! Do you know what she told me. She said "you have got to stop being so mean to yourself" And she was and still is right about that! Why are women so brutal on themselves? I am sure most men and other women do not even notice the faults that glare out at us (like beacons in the night sky) every morning when we look into our most dreaded enemy, THE MIRROR. I used to think that the scale was my most dreaded enemy, but I have recently come to realize that no it is definitely ANY full length mirror. The scale only points out that you have eaten way to much junk food, or pasta or just to much of anything. The mirror points out that, and all those fine lines that creep up on you and you never notice them, until one day BAM there they are and you are now thinking about botox. Or at least I am!


YUM! I just made some really good peanut butter oatmeal cookies!!

These are gonna kill me!!
This blog is taking me forever to write! I keep losing focus.

I know when it starts! It starts when you are little and maybe just a little chubby, and you don't know, or care that you are. And then BAM like a train hitting you, another little girl points at you and laughs and says "your fat" and then for the rest of your life, you sneak cookies when nobody is watching!! Or you wait until they leave and eat half the plate and RUIN the work out at the gym that you just killed yourself doing!! What i want to know is how do you break this cycle?

 Well I have decided to stop worrying about the scale or the mirror, and only worry about how I feel and if my clothes fit right. I decided to get healthy and fit instead of thin or skinny. Less cardio and more weight training! I now look at pictures of people like this,

   

for inspiration, instead of this,

That ^^^ is what girls get when they google model, this (under)is what they get when they google thin model.

This ^^^ is super disgusting, and I never thought otherwise, but if a chubby little girl wants to be a model and she see's this, what is she going to think? And the sad thing is this was not the worst picture that I found. And it was not hard to find this either!

Its really important to live a healthy life and not get caught up in trying to be super skinny, not many women naturally are, and even on them it usually doesn't look great. And most that are probably would like to gain weight. I only have boys, but I still worry that my constant worry and struggle with the scale could affect them. I know if I had a little girl, I would be worried about it very much. We have to teach our children not to worry about it as long as they are healthy and happy! And we also have to not worry about it as much! I know that it is easier said then done, but you have to start somewhere. And we have to learn to just be happy with ourselves!

Pondering the Perplexitites of the Poop Phenomonon.

After living with mostly all boys for the last twelve years I often think there is not much that can surprise or shock me anymore, I am often proven wrong on that assumption! I wonder how often other parents feel that way? Do your kids ever do something that is so out of left field that you just stop and say wow? And it is not always bad, sometimes it is dang funny!! So as I said I am surrounded by boys, except for my cute little weiner dog Marley :) and sometimes my baby sister Ray.

She is really cute, but you will just have to take my word for it because I just searched for a picture of her for a long time and I can not find one. My dog, not Ray, well Ray is cute too, but I was not talking about her. Ok this tangent needs to stop!

Ok so, what was I talking about? The Poop phenomonon, so what is this about? Why do little boys always talk about poop and farts and other bodily functions?  My boys also will burp and fart when company is over and they just laugh and go on about their business. For the life of me I cant not understand, and I know people will probably think that we do not teach them manners, BUT believe me it is not like I have not tried. No matter how many times I tell them not to fart in front of company they just don't care, luckily they now know the meaning of excuse me, so that is something at least.

Any mothers who have all girls (and even maybe just one boy) probably do not have to listen to the constant talk about poop and farts? I could be wrong about that, but I am pretty sure little girls dont talk about that. I was once a little girl and all I really talked about was barbie and tea sets etc. When Case was little(he had no censor then and still does not now, that is one of things I love most about him, with his attitude he says to the world "hey world, here I am, take me or leave me I dont care".) so he would just blurt out "poop poopy poopy, everyone eats poop" at somebodies house I would be mortified and had no clue if I should laugh or scold him. Let me remind you I had very little parenting or real life experience at this time, so I would chuckle uneasily and go on with whatever we were doing. A couple years later along came Cortney, my bright, but awfully shy middle son who is so dang cute he is going to break a million hearts before he is twelve, without even trying. And it did not take him long to catch onto the poop talk, so now I had two little boys spouting off about it. I thought this was pretty strange. Than one day I saw something that I thought was really really weird.
I was at my brother in laws house and I walked partway up the stairs and I saw my little nephew on the potty, and than I noticed he was completely NAKED!! I was like what the heck are you doing kid? And he said "i'm poopin" LOL! as simple as that. I was like, "naked? with the door open?" He looked at me like I was the crazy one. Well I though ok this kid is weird, way cute but weird :) Than my lovely sister in law informed me that both of her boys pooped naked, well I did not know what to think about this, so I decided to pay close attention to my boys when they went to the bathroom, and guess what!! They both pooped naked to, and they were not shy about leaving the door open on numerous occasions either. This is very strange for me to find out. I still to this day don't understand it, and all three of my boys poop naked or have.(I don't know if the older two still do, I usually don't see them in the bathroom anymore, they are getting to "THAT" age.) Now that Colton has gotten to the poop talk fascination age, it seems like that is all I ever hear about. Three boys all yelling and laughing and talking about it, and making fart noises. I still don't get what is soooo fun or funny about the sound of a fart??!And man if I thought my two older boys were bad Colton is definitely the worst. If he even hears the word he laughs and laughs, sometimes he has to run to the bathroom because he has been laughing so hard that he almost pee's his pants. And he does not give a thought to where we are or who is around us, if he wants to make a joke about farts or poop he will. I am really surprised that their dad has not shown them how to make an armpit fart yet!! So I have finally realized that little boys are sooo different than little girls!! And Now when the fart and poop jokes happen. I just shrug it off and think man my kids are so funny, and mostly normal, unless...........this might just be a Weight family thing hahahahaha!

I was a teen mom before it was "cool"!

So these days you can not pick up a magazine or turn on the t.v. without seeing something about one of the teen moms from the popular MTV reality show Teen Mom. My first question is, why is this show so popular?

I don't think it is very entertaining to watch young girls humiliate themselves on national t.v. by making bad decisions (maybe not all of them have made bad decisions) in their lives, with money, boyfriends and the raising of the said babies. Why is that entertaining for people? And is it just me or does it seem like teen pregnancy has exploded since this show has started. It could have nothing to do with the show at all, or it could be because young impressionable girls see teen pregnancy and parenthood as glamorous after watching the show, and I am sure the girls get paid to be on the show also, I could be wrong about that so don't quote me!


I just had to take a break from writing this to play charades with my crazy kids.... :) my oldest son is practicing to be a mime in Paris :)

My second question is, why would anyone want to go through that experience on national television?

I remember when I first saw the show, I was like wow!! I wish I would of known I could get paid to let the world into my private torture as a teen mom, now I am so glad that I did not get the chance to do that. I am pretty sure I would of been mortified now to look back at all the mistakes that I made, and to know that everyone could judge me when I  fumbled (I got pregnant a few months before I turned 16, so there was probably a dozen mistakes in the first day)! I had just as much drama and hardships as those girls. Not the same hardships, but it was just as hard. I like to think that I handled the whole situation with grace and maturity, but looking back now, I am pretty sure that I did not (and these days I am wearing rose colored glasses). I was a teen with a kid, what exactly did i know about babies, life, or anything for that matter. I will tell you what I knew, absolutely nothing! Luckily I was extremely blessed with an amazing family that all helped as much as they could! But they left the initial raising of my son to my now husband and me. I am still to this day surprised by our parents reactions, I know they were disappointed, but they did not freak out or get crazy. My mom basically figured there was nothing she could do since the baby was growing in my belly, and nobody in either of our families believes in abortions.

My last question is, if you were a young mom, or a teen mom how would you of done things different, or would you have done nothing different at all?

My son is now eleven and even though him, his dad, I all had to grow up together, he has turned out to be a great kid, who is talented, inspiring, and amazingly funny. I am sure that he has taught me more than I could ever teach him. It was super hard being a teen mom and I know I did alot of things differently than I would now, but I would never take him back, he has blessed my life in more ways than I ever could of imagined!  I honestly don't think I would do much different!  It was hard to learn and grow together, but we are all closer than I could have hoped for and he turned out dang good for being stuck with two crazy teen parents who didn't know what they were doing!!

I have to say I was a lucky girl, my boyfriend (now husband), stayed around and has been a great dad to all 3 of our sons and we have now been together for 12 yrs, we have not always got along, but we made it work, and we fought for each other, when one or the other wanted to give up. So just because you are a teen parent that does not mean your life is going to suck and all your choices will be wrong. It is just really hard and you have to have a lot of determination, if you do you might just make it through the hard times, and there will be many! I do not recommend going about having a family this way, it seems like doing it the "right" way is hard enough with out adding all the extra extra hard stuff that comes along with being a teen parent.

 This is us on Dec. 31st 201, My two oldest boys and I were baptized, and my husband is the one who baptized us, it was an amazing day for our little family. And a testament of how far we have come together as a family!!





Much love to my mom, Sarah. my mother in law, Robin, and to my grandfather and grandmother. There are many others who gave us emotional, and sometimes even a little financial support, but with out these three I do not know where we would of been!!! Love ya guys!

Things that I swore I would never say to my kids

When I was young my mom would say things to me, and to this day i can still see myself, blond ponytail swinging furiously as i stomped around, after she said one of these horrible phrases or words to me. I can still hear myself yell at her "I will never say that to my kid, not ever"! Than one of the many doors, usually the bathroom or my bedroom door would slam. If it happened to be my bedroom that I went to sulk in, loud music could be heard quite quickly. You would think that she had said something so terrible that it would make me not love her anymore. Eventually I would come out of whatever room I had holed myself up in, and life would resume as normal until the next time she dared to utter something that I did not feel was the right answer. Here are my favorites.
1. NO..........
after which I always replied to her with WHY?? And than she said.....
2. Because I said so.....
The dreaded because I said so which is not a great answer, but works when you are in a bind and cant think of nothing better to say!
3. When I was your age....
I hated when my mom would say this, (or my grandparents) EX: when I was your age I had to walk 5 miles in snow up to my eyeballs...
4. Do as i say not as I do....
you can not get much more hypocritical than this, but it works in a time crunch.

After all these years I have come to the conclusion that my mother was right, and she knew all those yrs ago that i would indeed say these things to my children one day.