The Funk (And Not the Good Kind)



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The older I get, the more I discover my strengths and my weaknesses. I like to think I've always been a rather mellow, patient, easy-flow kind of person. It takes a lot to ruffle my feathers, and I rarely get overwhelmed by anything. I don't really get mad at anyone or anything. I've even learned to let go of old grudges I carried for years. Aside from my daily road rage, my temper just kind of steadies on an even plane.

 

And yet, lately, I've been feeling overwhelmed. It's this week, really. And there's not anything super specific to pin it down on. It's a mountain of little things, insignificant things that I know I shouldn't even let bother me. I know they're fleeting moments of aggravation, and in the scheme of things, they don't deserve the attention I'm giving them.

 

But yet, they keep piling up. And I'd be inhuman to say they aren't bothering me. Because they are. I've been rushed, forgetful, easily agitated, melancholy, and just plain tired all week (and we're only halfway through the week).

 

Even with four kids, our lives run on a pretty smooth schedule. It's not air-tight, and we can usually change things up fairly easy, but still -- we have our own sort of normal, and everyone is predictably their same crazy selves. We make it work for us, and honestly, most days it doesn't even feel like we're working that hard.

 

This week has felt hella hard.

 

I guess this is just one of those funks, I know people go in and out of them all of the time. I'm in the funk right now, deep and thick -- and I wouldn't be so upset or angry about it if I just had a viable or justifiable reason to be in the funk.

 

I keep thinking to myself, "what is wrong with you?! there are so many other things going on right now, snap out of it!"

 

But here I am, keeping it honest and writing it down -- hopefully sooner, rather than later, I can look back on this from the other side. Shake it off. Move forward. Get over yourself, woman.

Throwback to an old photo of me and Sidney - back when I thought one screaming baby was overwhelming. HA!

 

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A good blogger would have posted an official Thanksgiving review post complete with lovely photos and tidbits of a glorious day. I am not a good blogger....obviously!

Our day was glorious, the food delicious, the family wonderful -- but I didn't take any photos. As goes of late, Justin and I are too busy taking turns stuffing our faces and chasing our kids to do much official photo-taking. It's something I want to remedy -- snap a picture (or maybe even two!) each holiday. 

We shall see...

Anyway, here's a generic "lately" post, which I haven't done in quite a while -- but something needs to go here, so here goes:

Our new Christmas tree! We upgraded this year and bought a 7.5 ft fancy KMart pre-lit monstrostiy - and I love it. This was taken pretty much straight out of the box before we fluffled any branches or added any ornaments. Still so pretty (and yes, I admit, this year I put up the tree two weeks before Thanksgiving - WHO AM I?!) 

To make room for the above-seen Christmas tree, we had to rearrange our living room a little -- Rhealen is very pleased with the new arrangement and has taken to sitting like this often. She's an odd ball, little thing.

He is THE cutest little thing in hats and beanies and toboggans, but he absolutely HATES wearing them - you have to tie them tight up under his chin and even then, he's figured out how to wiggle out of them. 

Oh, these two -- two of a kind, exactly alike, cut from the same cloth. You know the old sayings. They play better together than any daddy + daughter duo you've ever seen, but they also fight like cats and dogs. Living with the oldest one here has taught me a lot about how to raise the youngest one. Lord help me!

This is the "cake" I made for Thanksgiving dinner - and I use the term cake loosely, because it's more a chocolate catastrophe covered in Reece's Pieces. It worked, I guess. (I wouldn't know, I don't like chocolate!)

Cutie! And this one likes hats :)

Justin went out of town this past Saturday to visit some extended family, so while the Daddy was away -- Buddy got let in to play! Justin is very anti-dog-in-the-house (something about allergies! psh!) but we snuck in our favorite pooch for some kisses. It was a cold morning anyway! 

These two enjoy time spent in the kitchen with me - they'll gladly lick spoons and bowls and taste-test 'til they're stuffed. 

My sweet boy & me before the morning drop-off :) 

Where We're At Right Now...

Just a little update on the recent happenings - it's all so wild lately, regular updating just isn't going to happen. But I want to remember the little tidbits so I'm just throwing them out here haphazardly before they slip away...

-//- Rhealen is in the biggest "No! Stop it!" phase ever right now. The terrible twos are quite terrible when she chooses so; I feel so bad for poor Sidney, who seems to get the brunt of her mean streaks. I hope she (we) get over this phase sooner rather than later!

-//- Jaxon has two teeth! I'm not sure I mentioned that in his last monthly update (or if he even had them then) but he sure does! Two sweet little pearly whites on the bottom and, with the way he's been chewing and drooling, I don't think it'll take too much longer before more teeth start popping in! 

-//- Sidney lost her third tooth the other day! One of her front two teeth had been loose for what seemed like weeks on end; she'd never let us wiggle it or touch it, and she had no desire to do so herself. I guess time just won the battle, and out it came the other day while the girls and I were out to eat with "Gran" and "Pops"! That super-nice tooth fairy (read: her daddy) left her a whopping $3. 

-//- Sidney also finished up her swim-lessons this week; Gran and Pops took her this year, and I got to attend her wrap party. I was so proud to see her jumping in fearlessly, zooming down the (little) slide with a big splash!, and overall enjoying being the water with little to no fear. Hopefully, with one more year of lessons (and plenty of practice between now and then) she'll be ready for the deep end and diving board all on her own!

-//- School starts back too soon, and it's so unreal to think we have ourselves a first grader. It seems, to me anyway, like first grade is the last year of being little. Second grade just seems so big and old and a world away from my nearly six-year-old. I really hope this year kind of creeps by (yeah right!)

-//- I think we're all loving this weather right now. It's insane that we've had little to no humidity, especially in the evenings! There's that familiar crispness in the air, and if you close your eyes, for a moment you can trick yourself into believing it's mid-October and fall is all around you. August, you're definitely starting out on the right foot, feel free to keep it up!

-//- We finally, FINALLY, have cable+internet at our house! It's been a long (nearly) three months, and while I'm going to miss certain aspects of that forced time together with zero TV, I do enjoy sitting down to our shows in the evenings and cartoons first thing in the morning with sleepy-headed babies. Also, whoohoo for joining DISH, as we now have an iPad 2 headed our way!

Life is full and good and we're all just digging along nicely. Keep on, keepin' on life -- you're doing a fine job right now!

Catch Up, Catch All

My kids are finally in bed, it's dark out and raining, and I'm sitting here in the "old" house hammering out what is going to be a long, heavy-worded, catch-up catch-all post. Hectic isn't even the right word for how life's been going lately. Batshit crazy insanely beyond hectic might begin to cover it, but I doubt it ... so here goes, the past few weeks caught up as much as I can. 

And maybe if we ever get our internet installed at the "new" house I can begin to blog again with some normalcy. 'Cause momma sure does miss it...

On the 6th, our sweet little nugget Rhealen Jo turned the terrible TWO -- she's officially a toddler and a officially a terrible one at that. But we love her so! At her two-year check-up, they said she's a skinny mini, just averaging in the 10th percentile, but overall a healthy gal. She's still in love with farm animals --cows in particular-- adores her big sister and is on the hugest Shrek craze you ever did see. I think we've watched all four movies with her at least 1,000 times...each. 

Jaxon is now five months old -- I call him fat and sassy! He's nearing 18 lbs and has the best belly and leg rolls ever. He's a total momma's boy --and even though Justin likes to tease me about him getting over it someday-- I hope he never changes. I believe he thinks Sidney is the funniest person ever, and he's rolling around the floor like a madman these days -- though he still hates tummy time! I love this fella, he's just the mostest. 

For Sidney's Kindergarten field trip, we went to the Knoxville Zoo (Jaxon didn't join us, it would've just been too much!) Poor RJ was sick as could be on our trip, but she made the most of it and we all had a really good time. The last time I was at the Knoxville zoo was when I was pregnant with Sidney on the Kindergarten field trip during my AmeriCorps years, so it was hard to believe time had passed by so quickly and now it was her turn! It's just unreal, ya'll...

Last weekend, Sidney and I got to participate in our dear sweet Dobby's wedding! The little ones stayed home with their Poppa (and Mamaw Shirley) while we girlied it up and did the bridesmaid/flower girl thing. At the reception there was amazing food, awesome dancing, and a pretty sweet photobooth! I think SidMo drug every single person she could talk into that thing for photos; there's a ton of her! It was such a joy to see Stephanie & Michael exchange their vows, and I'm so glad they let me and my sweet girl be a part of it all. 

We've also had a ton of other "happenings" happening, like Rhealen's birthday party (which I've yet to upload the pictures off the camera, yet), Sidney's summer school program, lots of time spent outdoors when the heat/humidity isn't unbearable, and movie-watching galore late at night -- no school nights for Sidney are the best! 

There's also a lot more fun things lined up like Sidney's trip to Michigan with Mom & Peanut, my grand-parents coming in from Columbia to see us (hopefully next weekend!), Poppa's Day, hanging out at the lake, 4th of July, and all the other joys of sweet summertime bliss. 

Here's to enjoying every second of it, however crazy wild it may most definitely will be! 

Unfriend, Unfollow Happily

Lately I've been all about "cleaning house".**

I'm careful to watch my Twitter stream, and when a name pops up that I don't interact with much or really feel much interest in following anymore, I delete. While browsing my Facebook I've started "unfriend"ing people more confidently; my question I ask myself is, "When I see this person in public, do we speak or act friendly?" If the answer is no, or that I never see them in public (with the exception of family/friends that live far away), I hit "unfriend" and move on.

I've un-followed and un-"liked" celebrities  photographers, everything on Facebook that pops up unwanted in my stream. Those friends/distant family members I don't want to delete, I simply hide their activity.

I stop following useless Tumblr sites, and blessedly, I recently figured out how to un-follow a ton of blogs that were taking up room in my reader list but never in my mind/heart. I am ALL about decluttering my online life at the moment (let's chalk it up to nesting) and believe me, it feels so good.

I can't believe how much it bogs me down to be following so much activity all the time; I'm all for connection and interacting with the world around me (online) in a global way, but I find myself craving boundaries. Limitless does not equal happiness for me. The more I purge, the better I feel.

I like to think of the internet as a crowded room - it's nice to have a diverse group of different people talking and sharing ideas, but if you get too many people in there at once, it all bogs down and all you hear is the hum of static noise. You have to clear out the space a little to hear the voices around you; the voices that really matter to you and the ones who make you thankful for such a wonderful thing like the world wide web.


**Cleaning house online, mind you. I'm sure my husband would disagree that I've been as enthusiastic about this process around the house.

poor little RJ

Poor baby RJ has been cutting her back molars (on both sides!) and it's not been much of a fun fest at our house lately. Couple that with a newly discovered acid-reflux problem, and our sweet miss has been hurting something fierce this past week.

This weekend was incredibly rough, Friday night in particular. For the first time ever, I was one of those parents driving my screaming kid around at 2:30 in the morning, and let me tell you, I do not envy those of you who do that on a regular basis. Poor girl and I actually slept out in the car for a few hours because I was too terrified to wake her back up by carrying her inside.

Hopefully those teeth will pop through soon enough and her anti-acid medicine will kick in so we can get back to our regular, cheerful little lady. I hate seeing my baby all pitiful and unhappy!

(PS it only took about seven minutes total to go from the top picture to the bottom - also? It's really awkward to take a picture of a cute kid sleeping on your chest without being ZOMG! BOOBIES!) 

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My kids are such bums @ Lowes

What used to be my lunch (cheese dog, potato salad & Crush, the best orange soda ever!) 

My blue eyed beauty

Jodi spoils all them babies! 

Having fun at Gran's house - notice the "walking" RJ! 

Again, those eyes. They kill me. 

Summer reading - just for fun! 

RJ & her birthday cake! 

Windows down, hanging out in the drive-thru! 

Between summer school and bible school, she's all schooled up! And loving it! 

Sidney and her new buddy Tanzi; she can't stop talking about her! 

My silly, sweet girl! 

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It's hard to get a good picture of all the jumping happening here! 

Happy sisters :)

My gal has style

McD's date

Quincy & Rhealen

My little model - the third picture down kills me! 

Bundled up - it's been super chilly here! 

Could she be any cuter? I think not. 

Waiting on the big sister to do her bathroom business! 

Every now and then we get a day warm enough to swing. 

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Beau accompanied me on a workday last week - he's my "other" baby! 

Sidney was all about the karaoke at our Christmas party.

She's an expert present-opener nowadays!! 

My darling girls at dinner - they both behaved so well! 

I see so much of her Daddy in her sometimes, it's scary. 

My sweet smiling baby - she's really started babbling this week! 

My little cousin Samantha and I have the same fashion sense! 

Sidney at her school Christmas dinner - she was so proud of her reindeer hat! 

My girls at Gran's house...

The many sweet faces of Rhealen Jo - that top left picture kills me with cuteness! 

Pajama day at school - Sidney's favorite! 

Two funny ladies: Dobby & Rhealen