I'm thinking of...

Roman's favorite game:

The Latest Funnies

This is going to be one my standard list posts.  Some of these go quite a ways back. 

Best of Roman:

• One day, for preschool, we were reading a book that talked about jobs. I had Roman make a list of all the different types of jobs he could think of.  We came up with a pretty good amount.  Then we went through the list and wrote someone's name next to each job.  So, Chrissy by hairstylist, Katy by teacher, etc.  He was very insistent that I write his name next to "farmer" and "priest".  Love that.
• For quite some time we had been trying to put an end to the constant jumping off of couches.  (For the record, it appears that we have been successful...for now).  Anyway, right before we moved, Roman kept doing it and I explained that, since Silas can climb up on the couches now, we have to stop because he could really hurt himself if he tried to do that.  The rest of the conversation went like this:

Roman:  "We should sell Silas"
Me:  "UM, NO.  I don't ever want to hear you say that again.  We love Silas.  You love your brother!  You're always so sweet to him".
Roman:  "Yes, I love him.  But I want you to grow another baby in your tummy."
Me:  "What?  Uh, okay.  If that is God's plan, someday I would love to have another baby in my tummy.  But we don't have to sell Silas for that to happen."

• Is that not the most random conversation you have ever heard?  That kid is something else. 
• But then he comes up with these very profound thoughts during some of our discussions about Easter.  Like "Three days was long" and "The tomb is life".  Uh, whoah.
• As I mentioned in this post, we had a little incident on Easter Sunday which involved Roman's index finger and our very first trip to the ER.  Later that day, we were getting ready to skype with family and I asked Roman "Are you going to tell Grandma and Grandpa about your finger?"  He looked at me very seriously and said "That was terrible.  I don't want to talk about it."
• One day I told Roman that he could not have a treat after lunch because he had been disobedient.  He yelled back at me "This is unjust!".  I laughed out loud.  A+ parenting.  For the record, he learned that one from Charlotte's Web.  It just surprised me that he used it in the right context.
• Our dear friend, Monica, got the boys a book when she came to visit us a while ago.  The story is about a baby bear that goes exploring by himself for the first time.  It has beautiful photography of a real bear cub in nature.  Love it.  I was reading it to Roman for the first time and, just a few pages in, we read something about the baby bear going out to explore the big wide world.  The whole left page was a picture of the bear cub and in the bottom corner of the right page was a small bunny.  I asked Roman "What do you think is going to happen next?"  He responded "The bunny is going to eat baby bear".  Wow.  Apparently, we need to work on our predicting skills.
• Current favorite game:  The Describing Game.  This is really fun.  Just ask him to play and he will be thrilled.  He starts with "I'm thinking of an animal..." (or food or person) and gives you clues until you guess what he is talking about.  He loves it.  Then it will be your turn to describe.  As soon as he thinks he's got the answer he starts laughing really hard from the sheer excitement.  It's awesome. 
• We painted the walls in our new kitchen/dinging room gray.  I asked Roman if he liked it.  He said "Yes.  But I wanted you to paint the walls red." 

"Which walls?", I asked. 
"All of them", he told me. 
"All the walls in our whole house?", I asked. 
"Yes", he said. 

• And, of course, the raccoon updates.  Because I know that's what you're waiting for!  :)

Roman:  "What day is tomorrow?"
Joe:  "Raccoon day".

Roman:  "Is your mama a llama?"
Joe:  "No, my mama's a raccoon".
Roman:  laughs...then thinking..."No, your mama's a grandma".

Joe always gives the boys these very elaborate high fives before bed.  They involve movie quotes, and other crazy shenanigans.  There is really no way to describe it with words.  It's like a ten minute process.  At the end of the high five, he has recently added a raccoon sighting.  He will pretend they are done with the high five, like he's about to leave their room, when suddenly he will "find one" in the hallway...he makes raccoon noises and scratches on the wall so they will think there's one there.  Sometimes he has to chase it to catch it.  He ends with pretending to have one in his arms when he runs back into their room.  I feel this may have scarred me for life as a child, but they love it, so whatev.




Best of Judah:

• says "Eener" instead of "Ernie".
• loves trying to make Silas do tricks - like he will start singing "Jesus loves..." and wait for Silas to chime in with "Me".
• He still has a crazy lisp, which  know is still totally normal for his age...which is good because I think it is the cutest thing in the world. 
• Sings phrases that happen to be in his head.  example:  "Mrs. Drake's house" over and over - to a tune.  a very random tune.  So funny.
• Misses Iowa.  He is still struggling at going to bed on his own and staying in his own bed the whole night.  Most of the time I am more than happy to cuddle him.  Sometimes when I have his knee over my shoulder in the middle of the night, I don't  feel as happy about it. 
• But, really, he talks about our friends and family in Iowa a lot.  (we all do) He doesn't seem to be upset about it, just talks about them a lot.  And then he does things like this:

Me:  "what should we do tomorrow?"
Judah:  "go to park"
Me:  "that's a good idea.  What park would you like to go to?"
Judah:  "I go to Mrs. Aitchison's house". 

• He really is just the sweetest little guy.  I'm loving the stage that he's at.  I love that he's talking more and I'm getting to hear more about what he's thinking.  I love that he's still cuddly and that he's so excitable.  Love.
• If it weren't for the fact that he is a boy and Charlie is a dog, I would say they were twins separated at birth.  They are both wild and gross and cute and cuddly and love to wrestle each other and run away from me when I ask them to come.  They both want to be outside all day and they both want something to eat as soon as they're inside.  They always want the same toys, they want the sand out of the sandbox, they want to dump out any container that happens to be full of water.  They both destroy a lot of things.
• Still loves to vaccuum.
• He is just getting to the "I want to do it myself" phase, which is fun and super annoying all at the same time.  So fun to see him work on something and be proud of his accomplishment.  So not fun that he FREAKS out if I so much as touch the buckle in the carseat.  It takes us a while to get anywhere these days.  :)
• Today we went to the circus.  The boys had a great time.  When we got in the van I said "Judah, what was your favorite thing at the circus?"  (You know, I'm expecting him to talk about the monkey driving a wagon, or the magic show or the pony ride).  Do you know what he said?  He said "I eat popcorn".  ha!
• And if you want to hear a funny story about Judah...that involves me nursing Silas, you'll have to ask me about it in real life.  It's a good one, but not necessarily appropriate for the blog.

Best of Silas:

• One night, I made the mistake of pointing out that he had penguins on his pajamas.  Now, if he is wearing them, I will think that he's about to drift off to sleep when suddenly I will hear "Pen-win!" very loudly.  :)
• "duddle" for "cuddle"...and he does love to cuddle.  And I love that about him.
• loves to give Charlie commands like "Sit!" and "Betch!" for "fetch".
• If you start the counting he will chime in with "two" and "boor" (four) in the right places.
• "nuss!" for "nurse"
• calls Roman "Judah".  all the time.  Maybe he just thinks "Judah" means "brother". ?
• he's a lot like one-year-old Roman was, in that he will try to say almost any word you ask him to say. He's a lot like one-year-old Judah was, in that he feels the need to climb on top of the kitchen table every 3 minutes.  This combination could, potentially, be the death of my sanity.
• loves to sing "wheels on the bus"
• will eat his lunch nicely until I look away...when he will immediately begin throwing all the food on the floor, regardless of whether or not he is actually enjoying eating said food.
• says "bahma" for grandma and "bahpa" for grandpa.
• Daaadddy! is still his favorite though.  The way he says it totally trumps any other name on the planet.  Cutest ever.

And, just for fun...Best of crazy things that have come out of my mouth recently (because no one should ever have to say some of the sentences I catch myself saying!!):

• "Please don't put that sticker on your penis".

I'm not exactly sure what it is.  Maybe it's the new house.  Maybe because we have spent so much more time in nature.  Maybe it's my lack of a social life.

Whatever the reason(s), my eyes have been opened.  Suddenly things seem clearer.  It's not a realization of things I didn't know before as much the rebirth of timeless truth.

We serve a God who is bigger than our circumstances, who can do more than we could ever ask or imagine.  And the most beautiful part is that He is nearer than we know.  He always was, but I think the whole being thrust into something I dont' know at all, has made me acutely aware of His presence.

I have found that God loves to prove himself faithful in the midst of chaos.

Our last days in Iowa, I stood in my kitchen watching these women pack all of my dishes into boxes.  The crinkling of the packing paper, the sound of the tape sealing it all snugly in...it was almost deafening.  It was hard to think that one day we would live in Iowa and the next we wouldn't.  For three and a half years we lived in a house that had been in our family much longer than that.  We brought babies home to that house, we sang them lullabies and prayed over them, and tucked them in under that roof.  We laughed and celebrated friends and family, babies and weddings and graduations.  We had our share of struggles there, too, of course, but oh the sweet memories that we have in that place.

For the months we spent preparing for the move, I was trying to not let my feelings "get in the way".  That day, though, as I walked around the house aimlessly cleaning and answering questions about what to pack, I was overcome with the sorrow of leaving... and at the same time, I began to feel how near God was to me in all of this.  I knew without a doubt that His hand was on this situation.  I knew that he wouldn't just lead us away from good - that he was intentionally bringing us to something new. 

And everyday, he is gracious enough to show me more and more purpose in all of this. 

The details have fallen together in an astounding way.

Joe's new job is as amazing as we had hoped.

Our location is a perfect fit for us.

He has led us to all of this. 

But He has also led me to this fresh take on motherhood. 

I can't remember a time when I didn't have the desire to be Mom.   I think it has been written on my heart for all of my life. 

But even though my desire is to love my children well, I will certainly always fail.  My biggest goals as a parent (so far!) are to be present and purposeful.  That has kind of been my mantra over the last few years.  Be present and purposeful.  But, I think for anyone with goals, it's easy to lose sight of what/who you want to be in the mundane day-to-day.  Sometimes amid the diapers and the tantrums and the cooking and cleaning and bathing and bedtime, I just feel overwhelmed...you know like I want to cry and eat chocolate and go shopping, because certainly a trip to target is the same as therapy.  (anyone with me here??)  Don't get me wrong, everyone needs a break sometimes and you should take one for yourself.  It's a very good thing.  But, in my case, I mostly have to face the fact that taking a break to refresh and reset is not the same as being selfish.  And lots of times, it's just me being selfish.

But (to make a long story longer) here's what I'm realizing (again):

• It's not just the daily tasks of providing for my childrens' physical needs, it's the formation of souls.  It is eternally significant. 
• I love spending time with my kids.  That's not saying that there aren't moments when I want to rip my hair out because for.the.love, how many things can Judah break while I'm trying to unload the dishwasher??  But, I determine my attitude.  And I can make or break our day by how I handle a situation.
• Not worrying about hair and make-up, having no schedule and no place to be, leads to all kinds of fun and creative and messy play.  Which is my favorite kind.  Everyone is happiest that way.
• On that note, we hadn't done a lot of messy play when we were trying to sell our house, it has been a while.  Our current favorite is water and sand.  I had seriously forgotten that the combination of these two things will provide hours of entertainment.
• There is enough time to get the important things done.  I obviously can't do it all.  I would love to cook and clean and do crafts and write books and teach gymnastics and help with  youth group and volunteer at a crisis pregnancy center and etc, etc, etc.  All of those are good things that I love and maybe I'll get to do some of them here.  Or maybe I'll get to do other things I don't even know I love yet.  But, with what I've been given today, I know what the priorities should be, and making them happen is as easy as knowing the other things can wait for another day.
• I often miss my friends/groups/things we were involved in.  But on the other hand, there is freedom in knowing that no one will be stopping by so I have to have the house clean or myself "put together".  It's nice that I don't have to look at my calendar before knowing if we'll have time to go to the park tomorrow.  I can say "yes" to my kids more often and I'm realizing that that's how it should be.  I don't particularly want to go back to saying "we're too busy for me to do that with you today".

And I'm just in awe that He knew all of this before.  This timing was not an accident.  God putting this family together and placing us right here right now was no accident.  How generous that He would allow me to have a renewed appreciation for their childhood and for the honor that is is to witness it all.

All the glory is yours, Lord.

Things I love about Wisonsin

1.  best.burgers.ever.
2.  the beer is good.  really good.  and I'm not usually a beer drinker.
3.  cheese.  (duh).  specifically fried cheese curds.  at The Old Fashioned.  Mmmmmm.
4.  green.  beautiful, green landscape. 
      *On the phone with my brother the other day he said "how's your yard?  It looks really green".  this is how the rest of the conversation went:

me:  "Our yard?  Yeah, it's green." 
J:  "I've always thought that Wisconsin was really green"
me:  "Really?  You've always thought that about Wisconsin?"
J:  "Yeah.  Well, actually it started when I came home from Iraq.  We flew into Ft McCoy and, granted, we were coming from the desert, but there was a plane full of adult men who couldn't stop talking about how green Wisconsin is."

isn't he the cutest?  :)

5.  the scenic:city ratio.  We live a little ways outside of town in a beautiful little wooded neighborhood.  I love it.  It's more private, there is more space.  There are dairy farms less than a mile away and we can hear the cows mooing when we play outside.  We have a big hill the boys love to roll down/ride bikes down/etc.  There is plenty of room for the dog to run around.  We LOVE the location of our house.  What makes it even cooler is that it only takes about half hour-40 minutes to get to ANYTHING in the city.  not at all similar to our options in old B-town.  In our old location, half an hour would get us to church and Target.  Now, 15-30 miles gets us unlimited options.  And we get to see beautiful scenery on the way.  best of both worlds.
6.  Our house is awesome.  We feel at home.  We feel at peace.  We are making it our own.  Don't get me wrong, we have a ways to go, but we love it.
7.  So many fun things to do.  Free zoo.  Awesome indoor playground.  Incredible parks everywhere.  There is always something new to explore.  Still on the agenda:  children's museum, farmer's market, many-a-delicious-restaurant, and much more.
(Can you tell I like food?)
8.  My boys love Wisconsin.  This is huge.  It would be very hard for me to love it if they didn't.  Don't get me wrong, we miss Iowa.  We miss my family and our friends and our church and all the familiar.  We talk about Iowa a lot.  We are still mourning much of what we have left behind.  But, somehow, at the same time, we are all so excited to be here.  We really DO feel at home and we are enjoying the family bonding that has come with only having each other and the good Lord to depend on.
9.  God likes to show off in Wisconsin.  (Ok, He is amazing all the time and everywhere, but it is just incredible to watch Him prove his faithfulness in this new endeavor.)  We have had one confirmation after another that this is where we are supposed to be.  The short version goes like this:

• when we learned we would be moving to WI, our friends got us in touch with some of their friends who live in the area.  We went to dinner during our first visit to WI and they are fantastic.
• also, the first time we visited WI to house hunt we were drawn to a particular suburb... but how were we supposed to know if our gut instinct was a good choice for relocating a family?
• turns out we know a couple that live in this suburb (they used to be in a Bible study with us when Joe and I first got married). 
• the second time we visited the area, we found this house and were praying we'd get it. (we actually got a better deal on it than we were anticipating!  yay!)  we also visited our friends' church - where we got to hear a guest speaker - who turned out to be another friend we know from Iowa.
• we keep "coincidentally" meeting people who are awesome.  example:  yesterday at the park, I met a lady and was asking about her kids.  During the course of the conversation, she mentioned that she goes to the same church we visited.  Her kids go the school.  She is the coordinator of Family Adoration.  "coincidence".

10.  There are raccoons.  Okay, this one is a little strange, but it's become the running joke in our family.  Before we moved we told Roman that there were woods behind our house.  He was very excited and asked about the animals in the woods.  We told him there were probably deer, opossums, raccoons, squirrels, bugs, etc.  He got really excited about that and was always telling us that he was going to see all these animals when we got to Wisconsin.  We had to explain that we probably wouldn't actually see those animals very often.  One time I was telling him that raccoons don't really like people, that they would be scared of him, and that if they weren't scared, he should leave them alone because they could bite.  Then he got a little worried about raccoons.  SO, when we got here, one day he asked Joe if they could go exploring in the woods.  Joe said "no, there are raccoons in the woods".  He dropped the topic.  Then the next day they were in the yard and Roman heard something in the bushes.  Roman said "is that a raccoon?"  joe said  "We should go check it out"  So, as they approached, Joe grabbed Roman and scared. the. crap. out of him.  They had a good laugh about it after Roman calmed down.  So now, anytime we are doing something new or Roman doesn't want to do something (or any other time it seems appropriate) we bring the raccoon to the situation.  Examples:
Roman:  " i want chicken and fries for lunch." 
Joe:  "how about raccoon and fries?"

Roman:  "I don't like these noodles"
joe:  "but they're raccoon noodles"

Roman"  I want to go to McDonalds"
Joe:  "I want to go to the racoon restaurant"

Roman:  "I don't want to go to bed"
Joe:  "If you don't go to your room, I'm going to put a raccoon in your bed"

I wish I could think of more, but it's just constant, so there are too many to remember.  This is awesome because Roman finds it hilarious.  instantly puts him in a good mood when you say the word "raccoon".


So, in summary, Wisconsin is delicious, beautiful, clearly God's plan for us, and full of raccoons. 
Which, apparently, is all we need.