TODAY

I read several blogs, they are kinda, ok really, addicting. Usually they are an entertaining look into other moms lives, a fun way to pass time when work is slow.

Today they make me insanely jealous.

Today, well everyday but today more then usual, I want to be a stay at home mom.

Today I miss my baby girl, terribly.

Today I want to pick my boys up from school, hear all about their day, have time to help with their homework and not feel like there are a million other things that need to be done around our messy house.

Today I want to learn to cook the amazing meals that I read about today, with fresh fruits and vegetable from their own gardens. For my kids to eat something besides frozen, store bought meals. (And, I want a reason to wear this adorable apron I saw on the anthropology website.)

Today I want to go for a run, I miss running. I feel like I don’t have time until after the kids are in bed and that is around 9pm and that is just too late to run outside, alone, in the crazy world we live in. Also, after I get the kids to bed I should be cleaning and doing laundry.

Today I want to more of a girly girl. I want to be excited that JCrew has their new spring line out. I want not to feel like such a bum in my Kohl’s jeans and faded navy blue t-shirt, no make-up and un-styled hair – yep I went to work just like that.

Today I want a passion, something that I love. I enjoy taking pictures; I’m not great at it. I have taken one class with AZ Highways and understood the concepts, but I have not been able to apply them, maybe I really just don’t have a passion for photography.

Today I would like takes bits and pieces from these moms’ lives and make them my own.

Instead, I will get home at 7:30 tonight, give Madison a bath, sign a homework slip, and start the bedtime routine. That will take about an hour or so; it will be 9pm before I know it. J and I will watch one of our many DVR’d shows and it will be time for bed, to end another day. Hopefully I will be able to squeeze in a load of laundry and maybe get the kitchen picked up, who knows.

I don’t want anyone to misunderstand, I have a good life.

I have 2 wonderful children of my own, and a stepson of J’s,

I have a job – and although I don’t always enjoy going to work, it’s a good job,

And although I don’t see them as often as I can/should/want to, my entire immediate family lives close by, they are here when I need them.

It’s just days, like today, I guess I’m not as grateful as I should be, I want more, but who doesn’t. Am I wrong? I think sometimes it ok to want more. I hope that it will push me to start to make small changes to better my, J's, and my children’s lives.

COUNT DOWN

And the count down begins, we have so many exciting things to look forward to next month. So here goes...

3 days until Madison next swimming lesson. She has had 2 lessons so far and loves it. She is doing great. Madison starts counting down for her next lesson starting on Mondays. It has been a fun way to teach her the days of the week (tuesday, wednesday, thursday anyway)


8 days until Madison appointment at Phoenix Children's Hospital to have her MRI read by Dr E and Dr M. Familiar doors huh? In a weird way it's a comforting place. PCH has been amazing for Madison, she has the best doctors and nurses that we greatly appreciate. My mom and dad will be joining Madison and I for this reading. (thanks for coming mom and dad)

10 days until I go on vacation from work, 3 weeks off. I am so excited. J's mom (grandma) has taken care of Madison since I went back to work, she was only 5 weeks old. But once a year grandma and grandpa take a vacation and J and I get to stay home with the kids. We are really looking forward to this vacation, one of the weeks more then the rest. Also, 10 days until another swimming lesson for Madison. Hopefully at the end of this session she will figure out how to blow bubbles with her nose, right now she refuses.

13 days until Easter, and our family Easter Party that is held at our house. The kids really love getting together to play, the Easter Egg Hunt, dying eggs, and eating. I love having all my family over. (I am posting this before we have finalized everything, and please no one get your feelings hurt, that you are the last to know, we have not told anyone yet - late planning on my part. I will be making calls tomorrow.) (picture is from last year, I need to find Madison's dress so I can take her this year, I hear Cracker Barrel has some cute fancy dresses - thanks aunt alicia)

16 days until our farewell dinner with our Make a Wish, wish granters. It will be at Peter Piper Pizza, how fun for the kids. J and I have not told them that they will be going to Disney World for Madisons's wish (to meet a real princess). They will be thrilled. At the farewell dinner J and I will get the vacation schedule so we can start our planning. I'm getting really excited to see how the kids will react. I will have my camera ready.

17 days until another swim lesson. Maybe we will have all of the days of the week learned by this lesson, maybe Madison will make bubbles with her nose, we'll see.

19 days until Disney World, to meet a princess. Hopefully Madison gets to meet Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty, that is who she wants to be. They have long blonde hair, just like her. 7 whole days in FL. I will have so many pictures from this trip so be ready for another photo heavy post.

31 days until another swim lesson for Madison, the last for April. She has lessons thru the end of May for this session. Depending on how she does, we most likely will be signing her up for another session for the summer.

Haircut Time

March 28 2009

before, my scraggly looking boy.

Austin doesn't like to get his hair cut - must be a boy thing because Madison thinks she should have a Spa Day (hair cut,nails with decals and glitter, and mini pedi) every weekend. He looks so cute with shorter hair.



just like the pictures shows - she looks up to her big brothers, and although she can drive them crazy, they look after her.



this is the sweet princess smile, don't let her fool you.


not much else going on today, getting ready to play guess who with Madison, J's on the xbox, zac is on one of the computers and austin is watching some DVR'd shows. (what would we do without all the technology?)

Photo Heavy - catching up for March

madison after her MRI - she recovered great, the giggle gas made her pretty funny.

madison getting ready for swimming lessons

saying thanks

zachary's turn - not as excited as madison, but he enjoyed it

more of madison riding the horse

a friend of J's took madison horseback riding - she loved it

madison and grandma

madison and grandpa

Zachary - this is J's son, my stepson

my baby girl

my handsome son

someone isn't getting her way - so stinkin' cute

daddy taught madison to play hopscotch - she loves it

madison's first black eye - 4 years old (not too bad)

madison blowing bubbles

austin blowing bubbles

so like I said, pretty photo heavy. But, now I am caught up for March and can update more often but with less pictures.

playing catch up (already)

I started writing a few posts before I (or, I should say J) came up with the title. So here it is...

March 24, 2009

Yesterday was not too bad…, but what does that say about me? Madison was terrified. She had every right to be. She fought. She screamed. She asked several times for just one more kiss, which I gladly gave. She asked to give her daddy one more kiss (that was her way out, dad was standing guard, just out side the door). We tried to reason with her, but how do you reason with a 4 year old that is scared out of her mind. Eventually, we held her down and the mask was forced over her face. It doesn’t take long, once the mask is on. Maybe 30 seconds total. The room, Madison, went from tense and loud to quiet and she looked peaceful. I’m sure those 30 seconds, for Madison felt like a lifetime. I hate that she was so scared. I hate that she has had to go through this more times then I want to try to remember. I hate that for now, there is no end in sight. Madison has Brain Cancer, a Grade 3 Astrocytoma in her spinal cord. An end to these scans; the scans that tell us that she is healthily and cancer free, I’m not sure if that is in the cards for us anytime soon. But, we will gladly fight this battle every 6 months to be told that our beautifully feisty 4-year-old daughter is still cancer free.

And now, I wait. This is the hardest part for me. Her dad and I glanced at the CD that we are able to take with us. He says the scans are clear and that she is fine. I hope that he is right. I want to say I know he is right, I looked at the scans too and from what we were taught in our crash course of reading MRI’s I didn’t see anything that would make me worry. I also did not spend 8 years in medical school and honestly, I don’t really fully understand the scans until Dr M and Dr E are looking at them with me, patiently answering my questions and pointing everything out. Madison and I have an appointment April 7 to have this scan read by her medical team. 2 weeks from today, that is a lifetime for me. I just want to know that my baby is ok so I can feel like I can get back to our lives, for another 6 months.

After Madison’s scan yesterday, I was able to take her to Build a Bear. She got an adorable lamb that she outfitted in a cute pink floral dress and princess sparkly glass (or clear plastic) slippers. (That is what Madison wants to wear everyday, a dress or skirt, pink, and princess slippers. She is our little princess.) We shared pepperoni pizza and pink lemonade for lunch. We stopped in the Lego store to let her play and ended up getting a bucket of individually selected Lego’s, lots of pink little pieces. She was so excited for daddy to come home from work to play Lego’s with her. We were also lured into Sketchers by the super cute, pink and purple (Madison’s favorite colors) tennis shoes. They were perfect for our special trip that we will be taking in April. There will be plenty of walking involved and her flip-flops or princess slippers will not be the best choice of footwear.

So, like I said, the day was not too bad… for me. Any (or every) day I can spend with her is a good day.

March 25, 2009

It’s going to be a long day. I can already tell. I took the boys to school; we were there at 8am, which has been a struggle for me, but just in time for Austin to miss raising the flag, bummer. Then I came to work and hung out until 10am, that was 1½ hour of wasted time. And now it only 10:33 and I will be here until 7pm. Hopefully I will get some work done. I’ve been so distracted. (Funny, I was just talking to my older sister about my son being easily distracted; don’t have to wonder who he gets that from.) Ok, so 2 audits done and it is 10:52am, how times flies.

Some exciting news, last night I received a call from Megan with Make a Wish. I found out that we will be staying in a villa at Give Kids the World, a mini resort for Make a Wish (and other foundations) kids, kids with life threatening illnesses. (It’s still hard to think my daughter qualifies for this, she is amazingly perfect, a completely normal 4 year old, no noticeable side effects from her 2 tumor resections and super quick recoveries, she still has her beautiful blonde hair even after 11 months of chemotherapy and 6 weeks of radiation. She was never sick from all this – we are so lucky. Lucky? Yes, I mean lucky. Madison is a gift; she has taught me to appreciate life and the crazy little things that come along with it. She has proved to me over and over that there really are miracles.) Anyway, the villas, they look adorable, a comfortable home away from home for the week that we will be in FL. Several of our days will be spent at Disney World, then Sea World, or Epcot, or Universal Studios… and there are so many other options, like the Kennedy Space Center that I think the boys would really like that. We will just have to see where our days take us. I’m so excited for this time with our family. I’m excited to take the kids away from everyday life and give them a chance to enjoy just being kids, and for their dad and I to have time to focus on each one of them. We are in the process of scheduling our farewell dinner with our Make a Wish friends, it is looking like it will be the week before we leave for Disney. I have decided to let Megan and Christi tell the kids about our trip, partly for my sanity (I don’t want to field questions for the next 3 weeks), but mostly because they have been so patient with me and my changing my mind several times through out this process. They deserve the credit.


Also last night, Austin brought home a packet from school that needed to be signed. It’s science fair time! I remember being in 6th grade, just like Austin, and getting the science fair packet. I was so excited. I hope he is too. I hope he has fun with whatever project he decides to do. School hasn’t been his strong point this year. I think it has a lot to do with his teacher, she is a difficult teacher. Austin really likes her though; it’s me that struggles. Maybe I don’t like being told my son isn’t perfect. Anyway, I hope the science fair and the project helps bring some fun back to learning for him.

I promise next time I will not be so long winded, also I will have pictures ready to post.