a tale of three sickies

I love how different all the kids are.  They've been sick again this week with some kind of fever virus.  It's a sudden, high fever that lasts about a day.  Timber was the first one to get sick.  He probably had the worst of it since he was dealing with the high fever plus some major teeth coming in, lots of snot because of the teeth, a cut on his lip that made it painful to eat, and even a random bloody nose!  He was understandably grumpy but easily distracted from his misery when Daddy started playing cars with him.

 

Flora caught the bug next.  We're in such tight quarters here that I knew it was only a matter of time before the other kids caught Timber's fever.  There's not exactly a great place to quarantine a sick kid here -- Flora and Scout's room doesn't have a door.  I guess I could put him/her on the top bunk and take away the ladder......haha, maybe next time.  So, Flora had a fever and you would have thought the world was coming to an end.  She was miserable, needy, and difficult to please.  I tried to take a picture of Flora sick on the couch today but she protested vehemently.  So much drama in that one!  She spent most of the day on the couch with her blanket and pillow.  Even now that her fever is gone she's still trying to milk her illness for all it's worth.  "Mommy," she says, "I think I'm still very sick because I have coughs."  I haven't heard a single cough out of her.  Then she said, "I don't think I can eat anything big yet.  Can you give me just one carrot."  So she ate one baby carrot for breakfast.  And then her pillow fell off the couch and she called for me to come get it for her.  She could have reached it herself but she's "sick."  And this is all today, the day AFTER she had her fever.  She wants to still be sick today so that she can pick what we watch on tv.  We watch a lot of tv on sick days.....we've watched a LOT of tv in South Dakota! 

But today is Scout's sick day.  Scout is very different when he's sick.  He prefers rolling around on the floor to lying on the couch or bed.  His reply when I ask him how he is feeling is always, "Fine" -- even though I just measured his temperature at 104 degrees and he's shivering like a puppy in a bathtub.  He prefers to be left alone when he's sick.

 

I always feel like I take better care of Flora when she's sick because I'm able to DO so much to make her feel better whereas Scout basically just needs me to give him medicine every once in a while.

I'm feeling good today because I know that we're almost through this round of sickness!  Timber is all better (except for those pesky teeth that are still trying to push through), Flora is mostly better (although she would say otherwise, I'm sure), and Scout's fever seems to be subsiding some (of course, he's been "fine" all along).  Looking forward to healthy days so we can get out of the house and find some more fun things to do in South Dakota!!!  And probably pick up more germs along the way...

 

south dakota so far....

Well, hello!  Yes, I still have children and, yes, they are still doing and saying cute and funny things.  I'm just not writing about them.  Bad, Mommy Blogger, bad!! 

So here we are in South Dakota.  I can honestly say I never expected to be living in South Dakota!!  As lovely as it is and as comfortable as we are, I'm still glad it's only a temporary move.  (If you have no idea why we're in South Dakota, read here.) 

We drove up on a Wednesday, stopped in Omaha on the way to visit the awesome zoo, and arrived in Chester, SD at around 5:30pm.  We met our fabulous hosts and they took us out for dinner at a restaurant overlooking beautiful Lake Madison.  Timber started the meal by throwing a screaming, crying fit over his drink which caused the whole quiet place to stare at us for a while.  I calmed him down and we had a pleasant dinner until Timber capped off the evening by gagging on some food and throwing up a little on his plate.  Check please! 

The next morning (Thursday) the kids and I drove the 35 minutes to the Sioux Falls Walmart to stock up on food.  We spent too much time and too much money in the store and just as I was unloading all of our groceries into the back of the van Scout tells me he needs to go poo-poo.  I told him to wait.  It's a risky little game but I was betting that it wasn't urgent.  I preferred to take my chances on him pooping his pants than take all three kids back into Walmart to use the restroom.  This story has a happy ending.  Scout made it through playing at the mall, playing at the park, eating lunch, and driving all the way back to our house before he remembered that he had to go. 

Unfortunately, lunch wasn't exactly a lovely experience.  We met one of the local pastors that Chris will be working with and his wife at the mall food court for lunch.  There was a fountain and our first mistake was sitting next to the fountain.  I thought Flora and Scout would enjoy looking at it while they ate -- and they did -- but Timber also enjoyed looking at it and felt like he needed to really experience the fountain with all his senses.  After throwing another screaming, crying fit over his drink he spent the remainder of lunch leaning as far into the fountain as I would allow.  He was pretty soaked when we left the mall.  I didn't think Flora and Scout needed too much supervision around the fountain since I was confident they wouldn't try to get in it.  My bad.  I looked over at one point and saw them both with their drinking straws IN the fountain.  Who knows if they actually drank fountain water.  I prefer not to think about it.  Not exactly the first impression I was hoping to make on our new friends....

Thursday afternoon was fairly peaceful and calm and I was able to finally get everything unpacked into our cute little basement apartment.  Friday I got to sleep in and take care of a lot of computer stuff on my morning off (yes, my Fridays off are still enforced even in South Dakota).  I was ready for a good day and a fun weekend......and then Flora threw up.  And then Scout threw up.  And then Timber threw up.  We had at least one child throwing up Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.  So much for meeting new friends, visiting new parks, and attending a new church.  Some crazy severe weather came through several times during the weekend too.  When it rains hard we have to lower the window coverings on our screened-in porch -- basically converting our house to a dark cave.  The kids and I were like little moles living underground for a few days.  Haha, it wasn't really that bad.  It felt cozy and safe and warm -- but I think if it had lasted longer than three days I would have had some cabin fever symptoms!  The silver lining to this cloud of vomit is that Chris and I avoided the bug and all of the furniture and carpets in our apartment were spared.  The bad part is that I actually took Scout to the doctor Monday afternoon because he had been throwing up for 3 days.  She took some blood to make sure it wasn't bacterial and deemed him "very viral" and told me to keep him hydrated.  And, of course, he was fine by Monday night.  The best way to cure a child is to make a doctor appointment.  Not that the doctor does anything.....it's kind of like how the best way to make it rain is to wash your car. 
 
So, now it's Tuesday and everyone seems to be feeling fine as we approach the one-week-in-South-Dakota mark.  Flora is a little bit homesick (she drew a picture of home this morning) and they're all already bored with the toy/book/puzzle selection I brought.  But right now they're dancing and twirling each other so maybe being bored will inspire them to be even more creative in their play!  We ventured out to the yard today even though it was cold and very windy.  I definitely should have packed more long-sleeve shirts and pants....

Big Changes for the Borkert Family

A few weeks ago Chris announced that April 30th would be his last day at Hope Fellowship Church.  We are entering a new phase of life and desire to plant a new church in the Kansas City area.

Church planting doesn't mean that we are leaving our church because we are unhappy there.
Church planting doesn't mean that we think we can start a "better" church.
Church planting doesn't mean that we will try to lure all our friends away from Hope Fellowship.

Church planting means that we see a need for more churches in our area.
Church planting means that there are still so many lost people in our city.
But ultimately, church planting means following God's leading.

If you are wondering why we want to start a new church instead of building up an existing church you're not alone.  I asked Chris that question many times in the beginning.  For a GREAT answer to all the "Why Plant Churches?" questions, see this response by Tim Keller.  The idea is to start a church and have that church ready to plant another church in 3-5 years.  It's multiplication.

We will leave for South Dakota during the first week of May and stay there for 5-6 weeks while Chris does a short "internship" with an NAB church that has planted other churches in the area.  We will spend some time visiting our families in Colorado and Arkansas and come back to Kansas City in late June.  Chris will start his residency (like an internship) with Cedar Ridge Christian Church in Lenexa, KS on July 1st.  We plan to stay in our current home while Chris makes the 30 minute commute to Lenexa.  This residency will last approximately 9 months.  Chris will be able to learn a lot about church planting from Cedar Ridge and will get to interact with other church planters in the Kansas City metro area.  During this time of residency, we will be praying about where to plant a new church.  That is the question I get asked most often -- "Where will your church be located?" -- and the answer is we simply don't know yet.  Ask God, maybe He'll tell you!

We will also be raising support during this residency period as it is not a paid position.    Many of you will be getting letters from us in the next few weeks.  This is the part that totally freaks me out but I'm trying to stay calm and trust God to work everything out for us.  I don't like the idea of asking for money.  Chris says it's just my pride (and he's right) but it's also the security that comes from a regular job with a regular paycheck.  I'm still trying to give that fear/worry over to God and place my security solely in him.  We will need to fund-raise our salary and money to launch the future church plant.  The goal is to officially "launch" a new church in Fall 2013 and for that church to be self-supported in about two years. 

So, where did all this come from??

We know some of you were/are very surprised by our announcement but this has been in the works for several years with the leadership at Hope Fellowship and within the SWA being included in the entire process.  I was afraid that some people might feel blindsided since it was not made public until Chris' resignation on March 4th.  While a few people knew what was going on most of you were surprised when Chris announced his resignation (or when you read this blog post!).

It all started four years ago when Chris was encouraged to attend a Church Planters' Retreat by the Regional Minister of our church's association (our association = SWA).  Chris was excited and ready to plant right away but I was pregnant with Scout and not ready to even think about such a huge life change.  He continued reading everything he could find about church planting and talking to people about it.  Finally, after we were done having kids, we pulled it off the back burner and started taking more serious steps to make it happen.  We had to take several personality/IQ/mental stability tests for the SWA's church planting committee and eventually met with them for a formal assessment.  We were approved and our name was added to a list of potential SWA church planters.

Chris also formed a relationship with the Vision 360 Kansas City catalyst and began pursuing a relationship with them.  Vision 360 is basically a church planting organization that plants churches all over the world.  You can read much more about Vision 360 on their website.  We took even more personality-type tests for them and met with a group of their Kansas City representatives who recommended us for a formal Vision 360 assessment.  Whereas the SWA assessment process took about 8 hours, the Vision 360 assessment was 4 intense days!  We were sent to their assessment center in Orlando, Florida this past October (not a bad place to be sent!) to participate in an assessment with 10 other couples from around the country.  The end result was that we were "conditionally recommended" for partnership with Vision 360 with the primary condition being that we complete a 9-12 month church planting residency.  We were tremendously encouraged during our time in Florida.  Discerning, professional, godly men and women thoroughly assessed us and were very excited about us planting a church!  They confirmed that this was God's calling and were very optimistic about our church planting future.  We didn't talk to all of the couples after our official "yea" or "nay" meeting on the last day of assessment but we heard that not all of them were approved.  I just add that information so it's clear that we didn't just go down there for a pat on the back.  They could have told us we were not right for church planting and we were prepared for the possibility of hearing that.


Vision 360 continues to offer encouragement and invaluable knowledge and experience for our church planting journey and we are excited about our relationship with them moving forward.  Hope Fellowship is not in a place to be able to support us financially in this venture but we hope to leave there blessed with the moral support of the church family we have grown to love over these past 7 1/2 years.  We will certainly miss seeing the people of Hope Fellowship every week but are also excited to start the next chapter of our lives.  Please remember our family in your prayers as we step out into this Great Adventure!


So, there it is.  I'm sure I left some stuff out so feel free to ask Chris or me any questions you still have.  I think I will start a church planting blog soon to keep everyone updated on everything that's going on without cluttering up the family blog.  I'll post that web address when I get it up and running!

 

flora's chores

I took Flora grocery shopping with me last night and she kept asking to buy stuff.  Finally I explained chores to her and told her that maybe someday she could do chores and earn money to buy things on her own.  She seemed excited and announced that she already knew what she wanted her chore to be -- she wants to be in charge of all the shopping! 
She brought the topic back up this morning and listed some other chores that she would be willing to do:  feeding our dog (we don't have a dog), making lunches (I would TOTALLY be down with that!!), and buying purses. 

silly kids

Last week, we all piled in the van to take Chris to get a vasectomy.  One of my friends laughed about us all going and asked if that was to remind him why he was doing it.  That wasn't our original motivation but it was probably a good strategy to prevent him from backing out at the last minute.  We just told the kids that Daddy was going to the doctor.  They have always talked about the doctor as someone who fixes people.  After we dropped Chris off, I told the kids we would go get donuts while Daddy was at the doctor.  I laughed out loud when Scout asked, "And then we will go pick him up and he will be fixed?"  Um, yeah....exactly. 

So we went to get donuts and then came back to hang out in the doctor's office parking lot until Chris was done.  I let Flora and Scout get out of their car seats while we waited.  After a few minutes I heard Scout counting to ten.  I asked what they were doing and he told me they were playing hide-and-seek.  Seriously, only a 3-year-old and a 4-year-old could figure out a way to play hide-and-seek in a van.

**********

I was eating a bowl of cereal this morning and doling out bites to three little mouths.  Scout requested a helicopter bite so I made the appropriate noises and zoomed the bite into his mouth and then did the same for Timber.  When it was Flora's turn, she requested "an airplane bite that is flying the princess to the Ball."

**********

We've given up television for Lent.  Chris and I aren't watching any tv after the kids go to bed (which is basically the only time we watch tv anyway but if we ever need/want to watch the early news it wouldn't be "breaking the rules").  I decided to cut back the kids' tv watching during this time too.  They watch a lot of tv....or at least the tv is on a lot whether they are watching it or not.  Go ahead and judge me -- but at least it's all educational television.  :-)

So anyway, now they are restricted to an hour of tv when they wake up and and hour before bedtime.  That may still seem like a lot to some people but it's definitely a reduction for us.  The hour in the morning is absolutely necessary as I require at least that long to become functional after waking up.  Surprisingly, since we implemented this new tv rule they seem to be less interested in their nighttime tv.  The first day they were all three glued to Kipper but on subsequent nights they will only half-watch.  They get really excited about picking out which show to watch but then I find them playing instead of watching.  It's also been a good way to get them to pick up toys at the end of the day because they know they have to clean up before they can watch a show. 

Overall, it's been a good thing so far.  The plan is to keep the same rule for them after Lent is over too, although I'm sure there will be exception days.

**********

Scout is an awesome pray-er.  He squeezes his eyes shut tight and clasps his little hands together on his forehead and prays his little heart out.  It's really too cute.  Last night, Chris read them a storybook about Noah's ark and then asked Scout to pray before bedtime.  He spent the majority of his little prayer asking God to take care of the animals on the boat and to give them food to eat, etc.

**********

Flora said she wished we could have a girl baby instead of a boy baby.
"But then we wouldn't have our little Timber," I said.  "That would be sad."
"Well," she said, "we could call the girl baby Timber." 
Poor guy -- so easily replaced....

my tooth hurt and the kids got sick -- snip snip

If you've read the title of this post then you really don't need to read any further.  I'm not going to say anything particularly amusing or insightful.  It's been rough (but not exactly bad) and writing is cathartic for me.  Hopefully I won't have more to add to this in coming days.....

My oh my!  Let me provide a little timeline of the couple weeks:

Sunday night -- Stefanie has upset stomach

Monday -- Stefanie has upset stomach (It must have been something I ate since no one else got sick -- and I didn't actually "get sick" but felt really BLAH all day.  Really too bad since it was our first and likely ONLY snow day this winter.)

Tuesday -- Timber has fever and cold symptoms (Happy Valentine's Day!)

Wednesday -- Stefanie wakes up with toothache.  Scout and Timber have runny noses/coughs.

Thursday -- Toothache gets worse.  Visit dentist #1.  Flora has a fever.

Friday -- Toothache is horrible!!  Dentist #1 is closed.  Visit dentist #2.  Dentist #2 doesn't do root canals in her office.  Refer to endodontist.  Cry.  Get a root canal.  Flora still has a fever.

Saturday -- Recovery from root canal is painful.  Chris and Stefanie start exhibiting cold symptoms.  Flora still has a fever.

Sunday -- Recovery from root canal is painful.  Cold symptoms suck.  Flora still has a fever.

Monday -- Hooray!  Tooth is finally feeling much better!  Hard to enjoy due to lack of sleep -- Flora was up all night with fever and coughing.  Stefanie's cold is getting better.....Chris' cold is getting worse.  Flora still has a fever.

Tuesday -- Take Flora to doctor: bronchitis.  Get antibiotics.  Come home to find Chris has set up two humidifiers in our bedroom.  He chugs some NyQuil and heads back to bed as soon as I get home.

Wedneday & Thursday -- We all feel better with each passing day.  Still cold symptoms for Chris, Stefanie, and Flora and still some lingering tooth pain for Stefanie but much better than this time last week.

Friday -- Chris is scheduled to get a vasectomy.  The perfect way to cap off this crazy two weeks, right?!

Notes:

1.  I have never felt as completely hopeless as I did when the endodontist's receptionist informed me that I was only scheduled for a consultation and would have to wait until Tuesday to schedule my root canal.  It was like being in the final stages of labor and finding out that it would still be another few days before the baby would come.  I'm not comparing my toothache to labor pains -- if I had to live with one for three days I would definitely choose the toothache -- but in the moment it seemed like the worse news I could possibly hear.

2.  It was NOT the worse news I could possibly hear.  It's so easy to get caught up in our own struggles and totally lose perspective.  If my biggest problem this week is a root canal and sick kids then I have a pretty good life.  A very good life.  We are very, very blessed and it would be ungrateful and ridiculous to let one week of ill health make me think otherwise.

3.  But my tooth hurt really badly and the thought of living with the pain for three more days was overwhelming.  So.....I cried.  I didn't intentionally cry to guilt the endodontist into staying late on a Friday to fix my tooth.  Honestly.  I don't think I can fake cry....maybe I can....I'll have to try it sometime -- but these were REAL tears.  And they all felt sorry for me and stayed late to do my root canal.  Of course, it wasn't completely out of the goodness of their hearts -- the dental assistant informed me that she was "on overtime pay as of five minutes ago" and had a martini waiting for her after work so she didn't mind staying at all.  And also I was paying them a lot of money.  Oh, and they usually leave the office at 2pm on Fridays so even staying "late" meant that they were still out of the office by 5pm.  It was very nice of them to stay.....I'm just pointing out that there were more factors in play than just my tears.   

4.  Chris is awesome.  I seriously couldn't function while my tooth was hurting and the pain medication I was given only slightly lessened the pain before the root canal.  He brought a bunch of work home and worked in the living room while supervising the kids.  He fixed lunches and wiped bums and broke up arguments.  I helped out but it was hard to be around the kids because their high-pitched voices seemed to go in my ear and straight to my tooth.  Weird, I know.

5.  Chris was great with the kids but not so much the cleaning.  The night of my root canal we sat on the couch and surveyed the disaster area that was our house.  Sometimes I think I don't do anything during the day but after seeing what happens when I REALLY don't do anything for a few days I now know differently.  But we laughed about the fact that we were so perfectly matched because such a messy house didn't bother either of us.  I mean, it would bother me if it was like that all the time, but under the circumstances, it was nice that neither of us was freaking out about a messy house.  We're both messy people at heart.  And the next day, Chris and the kids did an awesome job of cleaning up the living room and kitchen.

6. For some reason, America's Funniest Home Videos was the only thing that could take my mind of the pain when my tooth was hurting.  So when I look back on those foggy days, AFV is pretty the only thing I can remember doing.  I watched it during the day and late at night when I was staying awake until I could take my next dose of medicine.  The thought of watching it now is not very appealing.  I may always associate AFV with pain.....bummer.

See?  I told you this post wasn't worth reading.  But I feel better now that I've written all of that out of my system! 

State of the Union 2012

Ok, so I'm a little late this year but here is my annual State of the Union address (I'll try to keep it shorter than that other guy's State of the Union address):

Timber

     Well, let's see.....  Obviously 2011 was a big year for Timber.  He learned to roll, sit, stand, walk, run, talk(ish), eat solid food, and got his first haircut.  It's hard to top that, huh?!  Maybe I should have saved him for last....  Timber is now 16-months-old and loves chasing Flora and Scout through the house.  He tries so hard to play their big-kid games and is usually pretty good at pretending to know what he's doing.  When he's not imitating Flora and Scout he is usually watching DORA!!, "reading" an animal book, or putting together his puzzles.  He has only recently discovered puzzles and can't seem to get enough of them.
     We recently discovered that Timber is allergic to peanuts and almonds.  On a scale from 0 (no allergy) to 6 (severe allergy), his blood test only put him at a 0.42.  While we're thankful for the low number, we're continuing to follow the doctor's orders to avoid all peanuts and almonds (and basically all nuts since there's so much cross-contamination, I guess) for a couple more years.  Apparently, peanut allergies can worsen with each exposure and we don't want that!  Before he starts school we will do another blood test and possibly meet with an allergist to do an exposure test in a controlled environment.  But that is all a long way off.  Right now we are finding it fairly easy to avoid peanuts and almonds.  And we have an epi-pen that we hope we never need to use -- just in case!

 Scout

     Scout is a little smarty-pants.  He's a scrawny little thing but tough as nails.  He's loud and fast and usually stinky -- basically, he's a boy.  Scout is using the big-boy potty as of last summer and, let me tell you, having only one kid in diapers is aMAZing!  Scout has been seizure-free since his febrile seizure in July.  Of course, he hasn't had a fever since July either but the doctor is fairly confident that he probably does not have a febrile seizure condition.  She said that kids with febrile seizure disorders tend to find ways to develop a fever more often than other kids.  Also, Scout thanks Jesus for Christmas EVERY TIME he prays.  

 

Flora

     Flora is completely out of diapers now!!  She is no longer wearing nighttime diapers and I am sooooo happy to have one child completely out of diapers.  She took a dance class last Fall and absolutely LOVED it!  She also started Awana at church and looks forward to "Awana day" all week.  I think we might try a soccer league next year just to change things up.  I'm completely torn about whether or not to send her to preschool this coming Fall but I think I'm getting close to a decision.  I think I will keep her home this next school year but enroll her in a summer preschool in Summer 2013 -- right before she starts kindergarten.  That's not THE decision yet, but that's what I'm leaning toward.
     Flora is very fancy.  She carries a purse with sparkly lip gloss in it around the house all day and it's not usual for her to pop into her room to change into a princess dress.  We're going to a Fancy Nancy program at the library this Saturday and she already has an "exquisite" outfit picked out to wear.  If you want to pay her the highest compliment, just tell her she looks "exquisite."  She's my girly girly girly girl and I love it!  Flora also participated in our church's Christmas program for the first time in December.  This is a picture of her at the program.  It was a cowboy/ranch themed skit.

 

Chris and Stefanie

     Well, we just aren't very exciting right now.  We did make some major 2012 resolutions that we hope to accomplish in the next 11 months.  Mainly, lose weight, get out of debt, and make my feet look pretty.  We each lost 10 pounds in January!  Woohoo!!  I've developed a deep and meaningful relationship with the treadmill.  I will update more about us when something exciting happens.  There's probably more I could tell now but I'm tired of writing and Chris just got home and I'm not feeling very creative tonight so it probably wouldn't be very interesting anyway. (This is us at our small group's ugly sweater Christmas party -- Chris doesn't usually look this sleazy and I don't usually wear turtlenecks.)

Oh, and my new blog layout includes this nifty LIKE button at the bottom.  I could probably remove it, but then you wouldn't be able to tell me that you LIKE my blog!!  Haha, but no worries, I can't see who LIKEs each post (and I DID remove the DISLIKE button!!).  :-)

crafty moms

Kids.  They're strange little boogers.  Why do they think inappropriate words are funny?  And why do they feel the need to giggle about them in the shopping cart at JoAnn's??  Of course, Mommy had to put a stop to that.  JoAnn's is a relatively quiet store so who knows how many people were judging me for my children's crude sense of humor.

Once I put a stop to the penis giggling they decided to play a rhyming game.
"Ball.  Call.  Wall.  Doll."
"My kids are SO smart," I thought.
"Cat.  Hat.  Bat.  Rat."
"And they're SO sweet to play a little rhyming game while I'm shopping."
"Duck.  Tuck.  F---."
"WHOA!  No more rhyming!!!"
Of course, once Flora had said THAT word she said it again and then said, "Huh, that's a funny word."  I just held my breath hoping that would be the end of it.  I almost expected one of her dolls to have a new name when we got home but thankfully she forgot about her new word discovery once she saw all the jewelry-making supplies at JoAnn's.  Whew!

I really enjoyed browsing JoAnn's with a cart full of kids.  It made me feel like one of THOSE moms -- the moms who sew dresses and pillows and trash can covers and toilet seat cushions, who create beautiful wall hangings out of old toilet paper rolls and fancy door wreaths out of popsicle sticks and teabags, who re-purpose a broken toaster into a funky lamp or a bucket of bottle caps into the Mona Lisa.  I can barely make time to keep my eyebrows plucked, let alone design fashion jewelry out of kitchen utensils.  Somehow these crafty moms manage to dream, design, and create while still putting three meals on the table for their kids.  And I assume their kids don't just watch tv all day so there must be some kind of parent-child interaction taking place.  And kids don't change their own diapers or blow their own noses for at least a couple years.....and then there's the Mess and the Laundry.  The Mess and the Laundry -- my ever-present companions.  At least I'll never be lonely....even if I'm never crafty.

So, ANYWAY, I enjoy walking around JoAnn's with a cart full of kids because as long as I'm in the store I can pretend to be one of those crafty moms.  I imagine that everyone in the store assumes I am a crafty mom (because why else would I be pushing three kids in a too-tiny cart through JoAnn's??) and I certainly don't tell them any differently.

This whole crafty mom thing is all Pinterest's fault -- I wish I could say I was above it all but I'm not.
I want to be crafty.
So I make things.
They're never great but I applaud myself for creating something besides a baby.

Because apparently making babies is not enough to qualify me as a crafty mom these days.

hide-and-seek (aka shout-at-the-wall-and-run)

Flora and Scout play hide-and-seek.  Scout hides while Flora puts her face to the wall and counts loudly to twenty.  She runs off to find Scout.  Timber immediately runs to the wall-spot that Flora has vacated and presses his face to the wall to shout nonsense before running off after Flora.  He has no idea what he's doing but loves playing the "shout at the wall game."  It makes me laugh every time! 

kids say....

Me:  Timber, say "Mama."
Timber:  DORA!
Me:  Mama
Timber:  DORA!
Me:  MAMA!
Timber:  DORA DORA DORA!

*****

Scout:  Mommy, I don't know which way to go.
Me:  (in sing-songy Dora voice because, yeah, I do that) Who do we ask for help when we don't know which way to go?
Timber:  MAP!
--Flora, Scout, and I all turn to stare at him in surprise--
(only Dora-moms will understand)

*****

Me:  Scout, do you need to go pee-pee?
Scout:  No, I need to FLYYYYYY!

*****

Cute Flora-words that I don't bother correcting:
pattern = patterin
something = fumpin
level = langle