Endless Pursuit for Mom of the Year

      “My dad always used to tell me that if they challenge you to an after-school fight, tell them you won't wait - you can kick their ass right now.” ~ Cameron Diaz ------------------------------------------------ I have one sister and one brother. Growing up, it didn't feel my dad parented us any differently because we were a boy or a girl.  Perhaps he did and I just never realized it, but it sure never seemed that way. However, I can specifically pinpoint things that were best learned from my dad. Happy Father's Day, Dad! And, knowing my girls are there this week, possibly they will come home with some of these lessons. It's OK, I'm bracing myself.    1. Take it like a man. This lesson was best served in the backyard with the garage as a backdrop.  Me with a bat on my shoulder.  My brother catching and my father pitching.  Sometimes the roles switched and Rob simply hit balls at me.  There was blood, there were lo...

We didn't forecast this magnitude of rain,  but we did have rain in the forecast. ~ Nick Petro --------------------------------------------------------------- Well, for those of you in the Midwest, you'd know we got quite a bit of rain today.  Much more than expected.  Now I'll admit, I've had my fair share of rainy day issues, but none quite so daring as my sister. My niece informed me of these issues today as my sister noticed a clogged gutter and rain pouring out of it.  Instead of waiting for the rain to calm, or the lightning to stop, or perhaps until after she'd had her morning coffee, my sister pulled a complete and total Bob Pontious.  That's right, perhaps she is a bit more like our father than I expected.  Instead, she put on her ever trusty rain coat, grabbed a metal ladder (note my mention that it was lightning outside), put on her ever practical and I'm sure health and safety certified sandals, climbed the ladder and cleaned the gutters....

My father would take me to the playground, and put me on mood swings. ~ Jay London -------------------------------------------------------------- I'm not sure if it's my need to be a good parent, raise my children well, teach them to be polite and kind, or simply my path to mom of the year, but a harmless trip to the park today really set me off.  And to think it all started with a slide.  Aaron is away at a conference so I took the girls out today for some fun.  This included going to Bandshell Park to play.  I chose this park because I didn't think there would be many people there so the girls could adequately play without it being too crowded.  Malea started with the small slides but it didn't take her long to warm up and she was going for the giant tornado slide.  She has no fear!  This is all fine, but she is only 19 months old and very small for her age, so the other, bigger kids could trample her in no time.  She did love the slide....

"Multi-tasking - screwing everything up simultaneously." ~ Unknown ---------------------------------------------------------- I remember a time once, many years ago, when my husband was more daring than he is now.  Either that, or he's simply given up.  However, I once complained about my limited time in the morning and I remember him telling me this, "Maybe if you got up earlier this wouldn't be a problem."  Yep, that's the one and only time he said that to me or perhaps my look of death shortly after his statement has adequately been seared into his brain.  This leads me to the concept of multi-tasking.  Let's just get it straight right now that men and women do this very differently.  For instance, I may cook, catch up on emails, load the dishwasher and keep Malea calm all at the same time.  Aaron's version of multi-tasking went to a whole new level tonight when I was putting Maddie to bed.  Aaron had firearms qualification today and his...

A memory lasts forever, never does it die.  True friends stay together, never say goodbye. ~unknown -------------------------------------------------------------------------- As I type tonight, I find it hard to believe that my baby is over 18 months old.  I know the time flies but every day I seem reminded how quickly it does pass.   Tomorrow is Malea's final day at the daycare she has attended since she was 10 weeks old.  I will forever be thankful for the Christmas Eve we took a call from a kind woman named Stephanie, who told us a sudden opening had come up at the daycare of our choice.  With one quick visit on that cold day, we knew this was the right place for our baby.  And, we had no idea how lucky we really would be as only 3 days after she started daycare, the original place we had booked her suddenly closed.  It truly was fate.   I remember how hard it was to leave Malea that first day.  It's alw...

Lives of great men remind us we can make our lives sublime.  And, departing, leave behind us footprints in the sand of time. ~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow ------------------------------------------------------------ Being a working mom, I often wonder how my children are throughout the day and what they might be doing.  Recently, I've been wondering if I birthed Malea or a Baywatch baby.  Every day when Malea arrives home, aside from screaming for a snack and juice (because she wants service NOW), we find mounds of sand in her shoes.  Madison was exactly the same and I know as new parents, it took us some time to learn where to take off her shoes after many times of dumping sand on our living room floor.  However, you forget things from one child to the next.  Just like I forgot that Maddie's favorite phrase was, "Oh me gosh!"  (That's right...me...NOT my.)  It didn't take me long to remember after dumping sand either on myself or a clean kitc...

The secret of happiness is the determination to be happy always, rather than wait for outer circumstances to make one happy.  ~ J. Donald Walters ------------------------------------------------------------ Madison had a sleepover this weekend.  I knew about the sleepover a week ago but didn't tell her right away because I knew we'd be counting down the days until she could go.  She was so excited that she put her backpack on and waited at the door for them to arrive to pick her up.  That was anticipation at its best!  It was her first sleepover at someone's house.  I'm not worried a bit as her friend, Samantha, has slept over at our house.  They met in daycare and have been great friends ever since, even though they don't go to the same school.  What should be a memorable parent moment; a milestone in my daughter's life, I find myself thinking about what this will be like when she is a teenager.  Let's just say those thoughts ...