On Growing Up

This year I turned 30. It wasn't a big deal, thirty schmirty I thought. Until. UNTIL. Recent events. On the way home from Kroger tonight--because at 30 with 3 kids a trip to the grocery store after dinner alone is kinda a big deal. I saw a tax business and on the sign they boasted "Since 1981". I snickered...ooh big deal 1981 that's only like--holy crap--thirty years ago. And I was born...and thirty years is a long time for a business. And did I mention that a few weeks ago I was at a friends house where I may or may not have been one of the oldest there. And we were pulling up some music and on the TV I see a music station titled "Classic Rap" Hold up right there. Classic Rap. That's not possible, Rap just came out like last year. Classic is like old. But wait. 30 isn't old. It surely isn't. But when I was 18, 30 was old. It just happened. I was trucking along living my life not counting the years but the days until my next birthday. Happily reminding everyone and anyone I met. Eager for it to come. And now I look up and I am 30. Not old, but 30. And I am a grown up and I don't feel like it. I feel like a child raising children. I want to stop and look at them and say who are you and why must you call me Mommy and ask me to give you drinks. Because I am certainly not old enough or responsible enough to have you. But I am. And I have. And it's wonderful. But from time to time I stop and think. Wow. This is my life. It's awesome, It's amazing. But where did the time go. Wasn't I just sitting at home polishing my tennis shoes getting ready to head to kindergarden. (because I so did). Didn't I just move to a new school in a new town where I cried from being so incredibly shy and nervous. Amazing how time flies. Not just for my children's lives but my own. 30 is not old. 30 is just beginning. But when you are extra young 30 is old. 30 is a milestone. 3 decades of life. Amazing. What's stranger still is the thought of looking back at my own children's lives when they are 30...because if the past 30 years of me have flown the next 22 of them will rocket.

Some Things

Georgia type things. Georgia and Tennessee are neighbors and in a mere 4 hours you can be smack dab in the middle of TN. Because of this close proximity one would think that things would be similar. Similar rules, similar critters, similar bugs, but no, not so much.
Here in Georgia apparently there are gigantic beetles that live under things in peoples front yards. These gigantic beetles fit right in the palm of your hand and could possibly pass as a pet--but watch out they have claws for mouths and might eat your cat. Huge I tell you, HUGE. In a previous post you saw the centipede/millipede/holy crap I hope that isn't in my house bug we discovered at the park. We have fun spiders--not. Fun creepy crawly hair long things we find in the house. Wasps the size of Texas-- and have I mentioned I am so afraid of wasps I can't even move if I see one. That I scream like a 13 year old with Bieber-fever. Yes this is a problem for me. Yesterday morning I thought I would go enjoy my coffee on the deck while Maddie did her thing in the yard...um no. I sit take a sip and hear a suspicious sounding buzz. I freeze. I look down slowly and it has landed on my chair--I take a deep breath, remain calm I tell myself. Instead like a lunatic I scream, spill my coffee and run inside. Giant stinging things: 1, Rachel: 0. Five minutes ago I glanced out my window to my right--giant stinging thing was out there at the window daring me to come outside.
We ran some errands today. Me and the giggling trio. When we got home I let the dog outside, I stood on the deck...I heard a odd noise...I looked up...it was a squirrel chirping at me from the tree 10 ft away. Looking me in the eye. I screamed at it to go away. It chirped back. Jumped away and then I see and hear 2 others jumping closer. I tried to be brave, I did. Instead I hung my head in squirrel fear shame and slowly stepped back into the house. I am virtually positive that chirp was a warning and then a call for all of the other squirrels to show themselves and to let me know they will attack me. Death by squirrel, it could happen. As could death by giant stinging thing (which again made it's self known at my window 2 seconds ago) and most certainly death by giant beetle with fangs. I think I should just stay inside with the giggling trio for the summer. And I didn't even tell you about the mosquito's or the rabid raccoon. Georgia great outdoors: 97, Rachel: 1 (I get a point for hiking in the woods this weekend).

On a slightly less scary note our yet again broken upstairs A/C will be replaced with a brand new unit. It will be cause for celebration when we get the go ahead from the warranty company. If not I might package up the afor mentioned beetle and mail it to someone special *cough*previousowner*cough*
For idea of size--this is blury from my cell phone. That leaf is BIG. See the acorn up top--the acorn that is the normal size for a large beetle thingy. And note this guy is up a little and that part of it is in the needles. Trust me it was gargantuan

AmicaLOLA

This weekend we ventured out to the great outdoors to begin the quest of "Explore Georgia". This quest will likely take the rest of forever--but new state=new parks and new adventures. We set our sites on Amicalola Falls--we have been passing the signs for it for months, since before we even found our house. On the Georgia State Parks website Robert discovered Geocaching. Geocaching I had heard of but for whatever reason never thought to tell Robert about it--too cool I suspect. Never the less I told him about it and we decided to give it a whirl. We packed lunches and headed out. After a few trips around the park and much map reading and discovering that our GPS's aren't really apt for geocaching we found our box. Then took off to explore the park! Had a fantastic time, I could have wandered around forever. Our little hikers however are walking whiners and were done 5 min after finding the box. Actually Jakeb and Zachary did great--Gavin began whinefest #342131 immediatly upon stepping foot out of his bed for the day. The falls are neato schmeato and definitely a place we will go to again! For now we are on to the next park! Can't beat $5 for a day of exploration for the entire fam. Some snaps from the day...
I spent about 10 min sitting by the water playing with camera settings...the "rock" the water is rushing over is actually a tree that is across the creek...pretty cool how it cut right thru it.



Robert and Gavin stopped halfway down to the bottom of the falls and headed back up to get the car--no way all 3 boys (and shamefully myself likely to be included) would have made it back up the 500 stairs down. My camera is on a rock here

Another crazy Georgia bug...

A decent shot of Jakeb's new do

500 steps down--the see thru-ness made Jakeb and I queasy!

Water rushing under foot...

Looking up the falls which continued down under our feet the rest of the mountain

If you stay at the lodge there that's the view you wake up to..well the one behind the boys

Zman taking a break--turned to see him like this. See he really is that cool...


The fam damily with our geocach box

The guys proud of their find!

Walking up to find our box...camera is on the trail

Walking with the neat stick Robert found..

This is Gavin's whining face...telling me he's too tiiirreddd to waaaaalllkkk

Just a cute shot...

Hair today gone tomorrow...

Jakeb has hair, lots of fantastic gorgeous hair. Robert and I have hair envy. His rocks ours is seriously lacking. I mean really mine is so thin it's ridiculous. And Robert's well it's about the same except it's short. Jakeb's hair is the same color as mine--maybe a shade or two different but essentially the same. Brown with some blonde streaks and it's long...or was. For a boy. It has wonderful body and a few curls tossed in for fun. He likes it long. Though the truth I think is that he despises having it cut and the long hair has become his thing. People tell him it needs to be cut, he pushes back and let's it get longer. People tell him he looks like a girl...we encourage him to do what he wants--after all it's his hair--so he let's it get longer. For a while now he was asking for it to be cut and truthfully we didn't want it to be cut, so we questioned his motives...was the cutting to be for him or was he tired of everyone else's comments. At Burger King play area a couple weeks ago a girl told him he looked like a girl. I told him shrug it off, but then it dawned on me. He's 8. That's hard and he's been doing it for a while. Maybe it's time to relieve the hair pressure if he's asking. New school, new look. Blah blah. So we talked again, decided to just cut the length off the back. So I did. And he cried. He took one look in the mirror and his eyes said it all. He didn't want to hurt my feelings so he lied, he said it's "ok". But I asked him why he looked like he was going to cry, tell me how you really feel. He didn't like it, he didn't want that much cut. He cried. His hair was his thing and now it's gone. But he looks great, it's long on top still and shorter in the back and sides. He looks cool. It's taken some time but he likes it now. And no matter what his hair looks like he's cool.

Me and Myself

I happened to peak at my little site meter counter thingy at the bottom of the page. I am waiting for it to finally pick up on the fact that I am no longer in TN, but as of yet it's not. So there are 544342 pings for "Murfreesboro, TN" Since I added the little counter doo hickey I have had 14k+ plus hits on the blog---in 3 years. Most of which are ME. What can I say I like what I say...that and if I want to check up on all my bloggers I read (but never comments) I come here to see who's updated. And apparently I do that more than I should. I have about 97 other things I should be doing than checking to see who said what 63 dozen times a day. or sadly to see what it was I said 3 hrs ago. WHAT? I gotta see what mistakes I made in my grammar.
I wish my really IP would hit so that I wouldn't have to see how many really times I check here...being the loser that I am (Mom I know I am not a loser--you don't have to email me back and tell me that) See I know I have 2 fans...I forced them to be by signing them up for email updates. My mom and my husband. Readers or not, fans or not--this is here for me and for the boys--really more for their wives because if they are anything like my husband they will probably read thru this once respond with "Wow. That's cool Mom. Thanks." and never think about it again. Until then the sad fact that I read my own blog more than anyone else still remains. Except it's not sad, just funny.

Nerves of Steel

Or not. When I was a kid and my grandmother refused to let us ride down the driveway on our bikes I never understood why. I mean after all *I* knew to stop before we hit the street...instead we labeled her a worrier as there were a great many things she fretted over. Now I get it. I would NEVER let the boys ride down that driveway on their bikes...heck I barely let them ride to the end of our driveway on their bikes. I come from a long line of worriers on both sides. It's genetics really.
Monday I realized the boys only have 6 more weeks until they start school. And I worry. I worry for them. They don't yet because their concept of 6 weeks isn't quite grasped. To them 6 weeks is a lifetime, to me 6 weeks is an hour.
Now when I say I worry...this isn't a losing sleep sort of worry.
If I blogged about all the things I really worry over that might cause me to loose sleep someone might question my sanity. And at times I do...because I am pretty sure we might all be safer if we grow our own food, make our own clothing, and live far far away from everyone in a bomb shelter-- probably in the ground...but let's not talk about that mmmk?
Back to 6 weeks until school. This is a new school which is actually a very very old school. The people at this school are incredibly nice so I am not too concerned. Everyone raves about this school. But what if the kids are mean to my sweet boys. What if they are so nervous the first day they are near tears. I know that feeling and it's horrible. I have attended no less than eleven schools. Moving schools flat out sucks. They don't know this and I don't plan to mention it but oh the pit I get in my stomach for them. Zachary will probably roll right in just fine. Jakeb is older, more sensitive and much more aware. Seriously he told me that when girls walk by he gets very nervous and shy. Yikes. He's 8. I think part of those nerves are because girls just like him. He's cute. Now I am biased but the kid is cute (seriously all 3 are cute--did you SEE Zachary in that last post--I mean really). He told me a few months back "that all the boys in my class, think that most the girls in my class like me"...I imagine this was based on the love notes he received in his desk for two weeks. I think I would be nervous around girls too if I were him. Girls don't phase Zachary yet, but after all he is betrothed already he isn't worried about girls...in his mind he's got one.
The nerves they get I feel too...I wish I could take them away. To give them the confidence I always wish I had or at least the illusion of it. They will be fine and in 3 months I will look back and know I worried for nothing but until then I worry for them. That and I really like them being home with me. They are good boys, they get along like magic, (most of the time) and I enjoy their company. Really I do. And don't even get me started on the fact that Gavin starts school in a year. Do you realize how fast years go by after 25!? oh.my.god.in.a.year.

One

Occasionally I day dream about what it is like to have just 1 child...how easy it must be. No packing multiple bags, no lines for drinks, no swagger wagon...just easy. But then I think how much *I* would miss and how much that child would long for a sibling and know I wouldn't have it any other way...actually I would, I could toss a couple extra kiddo's in to the mix and just be peachy and happy.

This weekend I headed back to the 'boro minus 2 children. I snatched up the opportunity to spend some alone time with my "middle child" and I was so excited to get to! Excited for him to get some one on one time with ALL of his grandparents and the chance to just have one. Zachary was more than willing to go, and before we even had pulled out of the driveway he stated his concerns about leaving. About leaving behind his brothers. I know they missed him like crazy and he wanted to call and tell them something every other hour.

Zachary is an awesome kiddo. Fun and happy. Silly and sweet. He's not afraid to try new foods and new things and just is happy. If you need a pal to play a board game or go for a hike or learn about a new bug or animal he's your guy. If you want someone to try your new dish or listen to your new joke he's the man. If you need someone to teach you how to make the best under arm fart sounds, real farts, or loud burps Zman is the one to come to. Loud, boisterous, fun loving Zachary and I had a a great weekend. He's a funny guy and the flip to his funny silly side is quite serious and quiet but this is reserved for one on one time and teachers...90% of the time he's w.i.l.d. It was wonderful to get to spend the weekend with him and give him a break from being "the middle".

Wordless Wednesday (on a Friday!)

(this is just a whisper since this is a quiet day...took these of the boys at the new house last week....they are also on the new Lilac Hill Blog [old one got goofed up...so gotta new addy for it and updated a bit]...I had started this post on Wednesday but got distracted and forgot...have lots more of them but these are the 3 that jumped out at me first)

Summer of {Brotherly} Love

One of my biggest points of 'mommy guilt' is that I don't stop what I am doing and sit down and play with my boys. We occasionally throw together a craft or I bust out the play dough. We frequently have tickle fests and chasing. Once in a blue moon I drag them thru a ruthless game of Trouble or Sorry....Zachary is the only one eager for this most of the time. But rarely do we sit down with a stack of toys. Now that they are older they are less interested in my version of play...which frequently ends with me suggesting we...Organize the toys!!! Yay, that's fun right? Who knew 8 and 6 year old little boys don't find organizing fun...they truly are missing out.
Gavin and I might sit down for a few and play trains...but mind you all of these moments are very few and far between. I much prefer to load them into the car and head out for a day of exploring...they prefer to stay home and play. And play they do...with each other. It amazes me really and reminds me that while I don't play with them as often as I would like, something else is happening. They are loving each other...they are building a wonderful bond...one that I hope they cherish as much as I do. Sure we have a handful of arguments but they are usually minor and we move on. They adore each other. And for that I have no guilt. They are amazingly close and they are happy.

Settling In

Finally feel like we are getting settled here. I will say that since day one we have felt at home, and very happy about that. I still occasionally get the heebie jeebies about being in someone elses house esp since we didn't know or meet the previous owner and don't know a darn thing about them. Today at the pool someone referred to it as the "Carlotta House"...um no sorry not anymore. But btw what's their story anyway cus Google doesn't tell me much...yes I totally did that. What? For real the daughter left her name in the bathroom...they aren't the last owners but the last ones to actually live here...I am curious sue me.
Robert is currently pressure washing the algae off the outdoor surfaces. And we have had a fabulous weekend here at home. My mom and David spent the night last night. David was kind enough to help Robert fix a few things and my mom and I hung out with the boys. We spoiled them with a trip to Toys R Us. Where Grandma treated them to Kung Zhu pets and Ds Games. Because you know they have no toys and all...
I am pretty sure the dogs think this is the best place ever and the kitties are itching and twitching to get outside and eat every squirrel and chipmunk in Georgia...yes we have chipmunks that are so squezzably cute.
And the shopping. I am pretty sure Robert might need a second job...or I need to push my photography on everyone in town. That's the bummer part is that I finally was getting regular business and now I have to start over. Or travel back and forth every weekend. Which is not happening. Ho hum.
I did drag the boys out for some torture...er I mean photo sessions of their beautiful faces. All 3 were long over due for their "birthday shots" but waiting proved beneficial since we got to do them here AND show off their new 'dos and lost teeth. Rockin' I tell ya, rockin'.

Flashback

I was just petering around the blog...and got to wondering just whatI was saying almost 3 years ago when I started this blog. I didn't grab my first post but one that jumped out at me. I remember this like it was yesterday and until I read this I would have thought it WAS yesterday. But look at these baby faces....

September 26, 2007
Dance Baby, Dance!
That is what we did last night! Oh what fun! Really, it was! Jakeb on Monday afternoon told me he wanted to have a dance party...yep believe it, Mr. No Dance himself requested a dance party. So I told him that a dance party did of course require dancing, to which he then said nevermind I don't want a dance party, but after so more discussing he decided that yes he wanted a dance party. We scheduled our dance party last night and gosh they were so cute! Jakeb instructed us on our attire for this event...it was to be "fancy clothes" he chose a button up "jacket" aka a button up shirt and his nice shorts, Zachary wore the same, and Gavin wore one of his nice outfits. I was told that I needed to wear a dress..."like the ones you wear out to dinner with your friends" is what he told me...although I have never worn a dress to dinner LOL! Then he said we needed fancy drinks and fancy food...I stopped it there because we don't have fancy drinks nor fancy food especially not 5 min before the party...on a school night no less! LOL. We borrowed a strobe light from Hope and cranked up the music and went to town. OMG talk about cute and funny!! Jakeb danced his little tush off and of course Zachary did as well! Another moment of me swelling up with happiness watching them play and dance and just have a great time. Jakeb doesn't dance EVER, in fact the few times I have tried to get him to dance with me resulted in him in tears that's how much he doesn't want to dance so this was a BIG deal! I of course took lots of pictures before and after and video taped...the neighbors probably are wondering what in the world was going on over here! It was so fun!
Now to brag on myself...which I don't know if I do very often...I know in my own head I don't LOL. My photog class is going very well! I really just love it...I want to have my own darkroom so bad! There is something about developing and printing your own pics. Looking at a picture and knowing you created that picture...obviously not the person or the subject but the picture itself, you took, you processed! Speaking of processing...I came across some pictures online recently and the people where talking about the processing of the picture and it just struck me as odd because they are digital there is no processing! LOL But it's different you do process them digitally but not nearly to the hand done magnitude of film. It's just so freaking cool! Don't get me wrong I am all about my digital SLR, but there is something to be said for film. And most professional film photographers are pretty anti digital...many don't even own digital. It's interesting to see the division of the two. The art of it all. Anyway random tangent...so in my class we have critques of our pictures from the assignment each week and everyone (well those who do their work!) hangs their pictures on the wall for everyone to see and the professor to critique. And I see the others and think those are so much better than mine...but he seems to think I do quite well in my printing and picture taking :) He actually said one of my prints was "beautifully done" and looked "just like it's supposed to" the printing quality and the picture. It was so nice to hear! Yay me! THEN in my geog class my professor in there told me I write very well...something that I have the hardest time with when writing papers because I feel like I write horribly! So that was great to hear too :) It's nice to get those compliments! School is going quite well so that is great :)
Not been too busy this week, which has been nice! Just school for all of us, we had lunch with some friends today and Zachary had his tumbling class. Tomorrow is school for J and Z and Kindermusik for G-baby. Tonight I read the boys a book "Bear of My Heart" and it's a VERY sweet book, a new favorite of mine! And I told the boys about it being a Mommy Bear talk to her baby etc etc and when I tucked them in I said "Goodnight Bear of my Heart" to each of them...Zachary's response? "I am not a Bear, I am ZACHARY of your heart" Awww!!
Ok enough gushing about my 3 bears of my heart .....and myself!
Here are some pics from our dance party last night....

Before the "party"...

Again all of us before the party...not sure why the pic got all pixeled and ignore my non fancy hair...this was last minute afterall!

Zachary breaking down!

Jakeb shaking a leg...or an arm!

All 3 of them moving and grooving, so cute!

Spinning each other around

Getting silly!

Not many of Gavin boy because he was a little freaked about with all the commotion and the strobe light! So I am holding him in all the pictures...you can tell in the one of all us before hand he looks scared. We set the timer on the camera and they/we kept getting all excited and running up to it to set it then running off and he didn't know what we were doing and why we kept running from the camera so it scared him LOL! Poor kid! Anyway it was lots of fun!

Have a great few days!

Pass the salt.

Dinner at our house is a nightly ahem*battle*ahem. Conversations go roughly like this...

"Jakeb sit down"

*loud burp*
"Zachary what do you say?"

"Jakeb sit down."

"Gavin take another bit."

"Mommy, mommy...mommy..."

"Please don't interupt I am trying to talk to Daddy"

"Jakeb please SIT down."

"Zachary how ya doin' over there?"
"Good can I have some of your food..."

"Gavin get back to the table"

"Jakeb put your milk down"
"and SIT down and take a bite"

"Gavin stop talking and take a bite"

"Daddy, Daddy, Daddy...."

"Gavin will you TAKE a bite"
"How many more bites do I have to take?"
"Well seeing as you have only had 1/2 of a bite I would say I can't answer that yet..."

"Jakeb put your milk down..."

"Can I have some water?"

Gavin TAKE A BITE"

"Jakeb SIT DOWN"

"Gavin get back in your seat"

"...Ok Jakeb 3 more bites..."

"Gavin eat"
"but HOW MANY bites..."
"Ok fine....6 bites..."
"how about 3"
"how about 8"
"no 3"
"no 6 or 8 you choose"
"TAKE A BITE!!"

by this point the dishes are done and I need a drink...yet there Gavin and usually Jakeb sit...er stand.

We have threatened Jakeb with duck tape on his seat...I threaten Gavin with the high chair. And Zachary well he eats, he's done...he moves on. He's not kidding around about the food. Jakeb and Gavin see it as a nuisance, unless of course it's milk, m&m's, or crackers.

Dumb Dumb

Gavin has been doing some serious patience trying...oh...for the past 3 years. Pretty sure he was a fantastic baby. Today at lunch we hit a break through....as he sat crying because I told him to take one more bite of his food and to swallow it. I stomped up from the table exasperated and feeling like the kid is just slow or something because really it's sit there and cry with a massive wad of food in your mouth for the next whenever to prove some point I refuse to accept--because afterall he's 4-- or swallow the damn bite of food, get up from the table, and go play. I mean I am no genius but I am pretty sure the answer is obvious. The choice should be clear, however Gavin is so stuck on showing me he's boss he doesn't see the obvious...that and he's 4. And I am fairly confident the most stubborn hard headed 4 year old in existence. In fairness I am quite stubborn but at 4 I don't know that I let my true colors show quite as much as this child does.
Anyway our break through hit when I snapped...I couldn't help it this is a daily idiotic battle....I had had enough and I told him he was sitting there being dumb about the whole thing. That it was just dumb for him to sit there crying over this when he could just swallow the dang bite and get up. Duh. He of course acted all indignant and insulted and yelled at me for saying he was dumb. But I corrected him and reminded him I didn't say he was dumb but he was ACTING dumb. He paused for 2 seconds thought then swallowed his food and got up. Finally he got it! and all it took was me telling him he was being dumb for it to make sense because I had certainly explained this to him umpteen times. If I had known that I would have resorted to name calling years ago!

Thursday's Thrifty Thirteen

1. I felt the need to blog but just couldn't come up with a decent topic then realized this would work.

2. Tomorrow we have to head back to TN and not one of us wants to....for no other reason than we all feel like we just got here and are enjoying just relaxing.

3. I wish we could get a fence slapped up like NOW. Walking the dogs sucks. Lazy I know.

4. There are 534320892 squirrels in our yard, they seem to like to prance around in the front directly in front of our floor level windows. I am virtually positive they do this to taunt the dogs and cats. It's quite funny...until I have to clean the window's.

5. We STILL do not have a working upstairs A/C unit. It's hot but not horrid, the unit should be repaired tomorrow.

6. All of the other issues have yet to be resolved....I am not exactly sure what the next step is.

7. Robert swung by Lowe's and grabbed a huge stack of paint samples. The "neutral" walls are boring him...I am surprised he jumped on it so quickly, I am still ok to wait a bit. Which is reversed this time around!

8. I wish we could snap our fingers and have all the yard work done...but it's probably going to take months or years to get it where we want it.

9. Both Gavin and Zachary have come down with random fevers this week. Odd.

10. We have done nothing all week, lounged around the house all.week. It's been great.

11. I am however ready to get moving and figuring my way around!

12. Craigslist rocks...got rid of all of our boxes Yay!

13. I need to pick up my camera more....I have picked it up twice since we have been here and both times only to take pictures of the boys toys!