A blessing in disguise

I found these two quotes on Pinterest recently and they could not be more true in my life right now. 

After working for Kindercare as a Prekindergarten/Kindergarten teacher for 4 1/2 years, I was put on suspension two days before Christmas for "failing to report suspected child abuse by a co-worker in a timely manner."  I asked to be suspended because there was a chance I would be fired and I knew I would not be the same teacher that I am every day knowing in the back of my mind that I would not see my kids the next day. They needed to investigate whether what I had done (or not done, depending on who you ask) was grounds for termination.  Fast forward two weeks, I called my work to see if they had made a decision and was asked to come in that afternoon. I can honestly say that I thought they would ask me to come back and this would be a final warning. I was shocked, angry and confused to learn that my termination paperwork was waiting for me.  I tried to gain enough composure to go gather 4 1/2 years of stuff from my classroom and avoid seeing my students as my boss was sure this would be very hard for them. I am not sure I agree with this but did not want to make a scene in front of them. I got to see one of them but only for a brief moment while her dad picked up. I gathered up what I could see in front of me in my classroom and then came the hardest part for me, cleaning out Michael's stuff. I considered Kindercare Mykayla and Michael's second home and this broke my heart! I loved Michael's teachers! Ms. Maria, the cook took the best care of him and his allergies, making sure he had a Michael safe lunch everyday when his slacker mom forgot : ) I grabbed his blankets that he napped with everyday there and his portfolio full of the best work his teachers had saved. When I got out to the van, I called Adam and my sister and cried a million tears before trying to head north for the weekend.

Throughout this whole time, I have been trying to see the positive just as both these quotes state in different ways. It seems like those kind of quotes find there way to Pinterest at just the right time. I wouldn't say I made a wrong choice just a poor, not thinking straight kind of choice. Obviously if I had to do this over, I would say something sooner but what is done is done. The way I look at it this is a blessing for me and my family in disguise. I had many days while working there that I wanted to get up and walk away but didn't because I LOVED my kids and I LOVED what I did! Trying to remain positive is not easy for that reason. These last two weeks I have missed my kids so much and many little things remind me of them. I was almost in tears at the library today thinking about how I used to diligently pick books out for them for each new unit. Not walking out of the library with 40 to 50 books was hard for me. Anyway, back on track...being positive means moving on and letting go. It has been four weeks and I am getting there. I know life does go on and this was for the better. Just need to keep telling myself that!!

I am confident this choice will bring me to the right place and I will develop from this negative in my life.

My day in pictures

I have seen a couple different bloggers do this before and thought it looked like such a great way to document my day. Decided to give it a try today. I had my camera with me the whole day and took snapshots of all different aspects and happenings of the day.

 Starting at top left:

* Michael had Trix and Pirate Booty for breakfast today. Breakfast of champions!

* Then he snuggled his blankies for a bit. This is only 3 of the 10 or so he has.

* Mykayla coloring her messenger bag she got for Christmas. (Normally Kayla would be at school by now but she had a dentist apt today)

* I got a little scrappin' in today.

* Mykayla plays on the iPhones more than her own Nintendo DS.

* He's "writing, writing, writing."

* Result of writing with purple marker and as a result, marker got taken away : )

* Mykayla recovering from a trip to the dentist. She was a champ though and got a $15 gift card to the movie theater for doing so well!

Starting at top left:

* Adam has repaired this fence three times now. I think it is up for good now!

* One of Michael's favorite hiding places is my scrapbook hutch.

* Adam relaxing after working hard on the fence.

* My guilty pleasure for the day, an Oreo Blizzard from DQ.

* Adam couldn't resist getting out the hockey stick and teaching Michael some moves. I think I have seen the last of my nice, newly painted walls : )

* Michael likes to eat his crackers in this basket.

* He is a great helper. Today was the dishwasher, yesterday he helped with laundry.

* Mykayla showing off her gift card and gauze : )

Starting at top left:

* Instead of walking today, Adam decided we would do some cardio workout. Mykayla was more than willing to go first and was the only one of the three of us to make it through all three rounds.

* Bath/shower night for both kiddos.

* The Crock Pot has been put to work the last couple weeks. Tonight it was pulled pork sandwiches. Yummy!!

* The MMA gloves and pads were used in our workout tonight. (More on that tomorrow)

* Snuggling up with the Elmo blanket for bedtime

* Michaels nightly ritual of being lathered up with Cerave cream and then jammies. 

* Mykayla was totally rockin' out in her room to Shake It Up. Notice the headphones?

* After bath, we do snuggle time. Wrap up and snuggle, snuggle, snuggle!! I used to do this with Kayla when she was that little too! 

 

Hope you enjoyed this small glimpse into our day as much as I enjoyed doing it.

Dump, sort, put away...repeat!

This about sums up my mornings.  We have put the desktop in Mykayla's room for a lack of a better place at this time. She mainly uses it for a night light to fall asleep to : ) Every once in a great while she will actually get on it. Anyway, the last couple weeks in the mornings her bedroom is where I have been hanging out. I have been busy looking for jobs online, uploading pictures, ordering pictures, blogging or just playing on Facebook : ) You can probably guess who my little buddy is that hangs out with me...Yep, that would be Michael. He takes advantage of sister being at school and takes control of her bedroom because he knows this is the only safe time to do so. (As I type, World War III is going in the background because he want in her room) You would think that the poor child has no toys of his own in his room. I guess sisters are more fun to mess with. This morning was no different for our routine and Michael did his best to dump every bucket in sisters room. I would then pick it up and turn around to another one being dumped. Here is what it looked like...

 Today he brought in his books to add to the fun.

Dollhouse furniture and somewhere mixed in there is Legos

All sorted.

Shoes got dumped too!

And this is all the boy toys in his room still in all their nice little buckets. 

Like I said, poor kid must not have any toys of his own : )

I know I should probably cherish the mornings we spend together wrecking Mykayla's room because soon he will want nothing to do with me I am sure. So for now, I guess it is worth the dumping, sorting and putting away several times.

* Since I have been trying to keep up on those "resolutions', you should know that we walked again today! We took all last week off because of "severe winter weather". We couldn't have walked down our driveway none the less the neighborhood. We had tons of snow followed by tons of ice. Today's walk was a good one and I started a little speed walking. Even Adam was having a hard time keeping up. The last 3 to 4 blocks of our walk, Mother Nature apparently thought we needed another shower for the day and we got dumped on.

Some of my favorites from the last couple weeks

One awesome thing about being home the last four weeks...Catching up on some much needed scrapbooking! I finished 2008 last week FINALLY!! No laughing : ) I would like to say that I scrap chronologically but that is just not true. I tend to skip around because I get bored with the current year I am working on. So actually finishing a year is a major accomplishment. Now because I jump around so much, I am about 75% done with 2009 too and am getting into pictures that Michael are in. (He's 2, that's not too bad is it?) Tonight I thought I would share some of my favorites from the last couple weeks.

I am hoping to post more scrapbook pages. I think I mentioned that in my very first blog but had not posted any yet. Add that to the new years "resolutions" : )

"Brother" aka Michael

I mentioned in my new year, new changes post that I am now a "stay at home" mom. (For now, at least) While being home, over the last 4 weeks, I have noticed Michael's vocabulary expand and become more and more clear. The other day I had cookies in the oven and the timer on the microwave went off.  He looked up and said "Oh, mommy cookies ready." A full sentence!! I was so impressed! He puts 2 or 3 words together and is trying really hard to communicate with those around him. For the most part, I can figure out what he is trying to express. Sometimes I have to ask a couple times. One new, kind of fun thing he has been doing is calling himself brother. Ask him who he is, "Brother." Ask him who that is in a picture, "Brother." So this week Adam was trying to help him learn his name. The conversation went something like this-Michael, say Mi. Michael would repeat. Say chael. Michael would repeat. Then Adam would say "Michael" Michael would repeat say "Brother" : ) Um, I think he thinks his name is brother! Adam's dad is Michael also so Papa Mike to Michael. He has now become Papa Brother (makes sense right??) I think we have some work to do.

Brother aka Michael

Having SNOW much fun!!

I know totally cheesy title but I couldn't resist : ) We had a blast today playing and sledding in the snow at a local middle school with the most perfect sledding hill. Christian stayed with us for the weekend so we enjoyed having him along with us.  Not much else to write, but lots of pictures. I had fun editing with the winterize and frost frame effect on Picnik too. Enjoy!

 Building a "noman" with daddy. I love this because Kayla called them "noman" when she was little too.

 Michael even went by himself a couple times. The first time, I was waiting at the bottom of the hill and didn't move in time. He collided right into me, fell off the sled and then stood up pouting and said "Daddy, did it." (He has the whole laying blame thing down really well right now)

 Christian "snowboarded" a couple times. 

 So did Adam.

 Mykayla was a pro at it.

100 people were surveyed..

Top 6 answers are on the board. Name an insect you would find in your home...

Pat: Spider (number 3 on the board)

 Adam: an ant (number 1 answer)

Eric: Fly (number 2 on the board)

Nick: Bee (number 5 on the board)

Scott: Praying Mantis (Strike 1)

Pat: Moth (Strike 2)

Adam: Cockroach -Actually, what he said was, "In my house, we have a cock-a-roach." 

(number 4 on the board)

Eric: Snake (Yes, he really said that. Strike 3) 

The best part about this was that the hostess restated the question after he said it, too funny!

The boys played two rounds on stage with as much enthusiasm and obnoxiousness as they could! Most of you know one if not all of the brothers right? Ok, so imagine them as their usual comedic, obnoxious selves and then TRIPLE that! It was pretty funny and they had a great time. After the game, they were asked to come "backstage" and got to be interviewed by the executive producer of the show. They of course charmed her and had her laughing the entire time. Scott topped off the interview by mentioning how much he loved The Steve Harvey Show. (Steve Harvey is the host of Family Feud)

Went walking today!

Well I did it, two days in a row of blogging!! (Patting myself on the back) Which means I am well on my way to keeping those "resolutions" I stated yesterday. The other one I mentioned besides blogging is eating better (still have to work on this one) and exercising. I am proud to say, I am 2 for 2!! (Or maybe it is 1 1/2 for 2) Adam, Michael and I went on an hour and 15 minute walk today. The sky was blue and the sun was out, but it was still pretty cold! Michael drove his bike while Adam and I took turns pushing him. It was a good 1st day of walking and I am looking forward to making it a daily thing.

 

Michael sporting the Elmo hat on his bike, he was loving it till he got sleepy.

 

Another great reason to go on a walk on a clear day.

And I think we have found a solution to the afternoon nap issue we were having. The walk made Michael super sleepy and he was gone for 2 hours!! Tomorrow we will have to go back to the stroller, he almost fell asleep on his handlebars a couple times.

New Year, new changes and hopefully new blog posts

2012 has already brought about several changes (good and bad, depending on how you look at it) in our household. Some of you may already know that after 4 1/2 years at Kindercare, I was let go as a teacher last Friday. Great way to start the new year huh? Long story but without going into too much detail, hopefully this will be a blessing in disguise for me and my family.  While I miss my kids at school a ton, I have had a chance to "teach" and be blessed by my own kids. Due to working at 6:45am for the last three years, I have never been able to help get Kayla off to school. Adam has done an amazing job at this since his schedule allowed for it. So for the last three weeks I have got to get up with Kayla and get her out the door to school. I have learned that her and daddy had a routine that I have apparently messed with it but I think she is getting used to it. This also means that I get to fix her hair. I know, seems kind of lame to be excited about but I haven't got to do that for some time.  She grumbles every morning when I want to do something different but for the most part is a trooper and lets me play for a bit.  The biggest change obviously is that I get to stay home with my little man and I am loving it!! I do have to add here though that one two year old seems to be much more exhausting than my 6 five year olds. He is one busy little boy and keeps me on my toes at all moments.  I think we are getting close to a "new' schedule at home and Michael enjoys being with both mommy and daddy till daddy goes to work. He is sleeping in till at least 8 (He got up with me at 6:30 before) and goes down for a nap around 1pm. This actually consists of playing in his room till 2pm and then napping till 3:30 or so. We will be looking into purchasing a darkening shade for his room. I know he took longer naps than that at school : )

I am not a new years resolution person, never have been.  I have decided while I am home though, I need to be better about blogging. (My brother in law would agree, right Eric? : ) I know, how many times have you heard me say this before? So I guess I can kind of consider this a new years resolution even though it is already the 11th day of the year and this is my first one. My other resolution should involve eating better and exercising. I am going to start by getting out and taking a walk with Michael during the day. I really have no more excuses as to why I am not doing it. I just need to get out there and do it!!