I've been thinking...

... a lot lately!!

I think about time travel. I think about neutrinos that clock a better time than the speed of light.

I think about ways to better myself - mostly for my family's sake. I hate being a yeller. I know kids that don't listen, definitely don't listen to a yelly Mom...

I think about the best things to eat for our family.

I think about Darth Vader and how tragic it must have been for him to spend half his life misguided by the dark Sith Lord Sidious - when all he wanted to do was save his love from death.

I think about politics and how powerless I feel in our country as a jobless, non tax paying adult. Sure I vote, but honestly, I've even lost faith in how truthful the elections are.

I think about the ways we let the kids spend their time. If they need more/less stimulation from their activities and toys.

I think about the economy and how if I don't do something soon, our way of life that has already changed dramatically, but we are still comfortable in, will again change dramatically. But in a much less comfortable way.

I think about different ways to channel my creativity. I find that for me - not having a creative outlet - is doom doom gloomy.

I think about ways to reinvigorate my marriage. Three little children have a way of pushing sexuality out of a marriage. And for my husband - not having a healthy sex life is doom doom gloomy.

I think about ways to declutter my home. To make it more organized. A clean, organized home is as equally hard to keep with three children as it is important for them to have to grow up in.

I think about how satisfying it is for me to be home and raise my children, making sure all their needs are met. That they are growing physically, emotionally and mentally properly. But there is a stupid voice in my head that tells me I need to do something to contribute financially. There has to be an answer so that I'm not miserable and can still meet these needs of my children.

I think tomorrow's my birthday...

Belated Thanksgiving Post

The only thing that would've made our Thanksgiving better than it was is this: seeing my Mom, Dad and sisters.

The food was. to. die. for. (and I'm NOT exaggerating, I swear.)

 The appetizer spread.
All was deelish, some I want to point out because they were super duper deelish....
The green stuff: Avocado Dip. The smooshed polka dot stuff: Chocolate Chip Cheese Ball, and they are hidden, but there: Bacon wrapped mini hot dogs.

(What's missing? I guess I was so excited about the actual dinner, I forgot to take a picture. :( Sorry.)

 

The boys on the couch. Too stuffed to move.

 OMG. The pies. Let me see if I can get these right...
From bottom to top of picture: Pumpkin Pie, Pumpkin Cheesecake, Sweet Potato Pie, Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Brownies, Pecan Pie, Lemon Tangerine Cake, Sour Cream Apple Pie and the second Pumpkin Cheesecake that looked more like a pie.

 Thanksgiving To Go Bag.

 Obviously, we ALL ate too much. 

...

Seriously, though. Happy Thanksgiving from the Deneweth's. <3

Things I'm thankful for: my husband <3, my Roxy, my Bear, my Zoie, my part time kid Cameron. My Mom, Dad, Lala and Steffensmeiers. My in-law family (I actually love that my husband has 3 sisters!) My health, my family's health. The love we all have for each other. My home, the food in our kitchen and our running water and electricity. The things my children teach me about the world and about myself everyday. The beautiful environment I get to live in (Florida rocks). My friends!!! New things in the world to discover. The magic my kid's reassure me that exists everywhere. Pandora radio. Steve Jobs and his vision. My bed. Wine. Rock and Roll. The YMCA. Yoga. Coffee and Chocolate. And much much much more, I'm sure. :)

(in no particular order)

5:00 pm, Monday afternoon prayer

Dear Universe,

Please direct enough energy to my body to keep up with my kidlets this week. I want to have fun, be productive and make it a memorable Thanksgiving Holiday week.

So far today's been a bust. It actually all started downhill on Saturday... I declare a reboot.

When systems are all reset - I'd like energy. Upbeat, creative, peaceful loving energy for the remainder of this week.

Thank You and that is all.

<3

The Mall

It rained today. But I had a Bear that needed a playground and I had a $5 off coupon for DSW. So to the mall we went!

The Bear and Zoie played, I got my Five Guys on (YUM) and replaced my beat up flattened black Roxy flip flops with brand new black Roxy flip flops. What can I say? The black flip flop is an important staple basic to my wardrobe.

The mall is a very multitasking place. You can shop, play, eat, people watch, sleep... (One day I will get a picture of the old men napping in lounge chairs - they make me laugh every time). 

In my teen years, the mall was such a super cool place to be. A place to scope out hot boys, gather absolutely necessary fashion essentials, meet up with friends and be seen.

As I became an older teenager and into my twenties, the mall was where I worked. A still familiar setting, a community I was very comfortable in, but it was starting to lose its coolness. I no longer wanted to be there all the time - I had to.

Today, at the mall - a place I frequent maybe 6 times a year - this place was no longer the familiar setting it was in my past. I didn't feel as comfortable as I used to - actually I pretty much felt out of place.

There was a huge Aeropostale ad seen throughout the whole mall featuring a cute red headed girl in her bra and panties that made me feel uncomfortable. I don't know if it's because she looked like she was 15 and practically naked. I don't know if it was because I know tons of teenage girls will look at that chick and hate on themselves a bit because real people don't look like that.

The kiosks feature pop-up sales people trying to lure you in. It's sad, but you just have to avoid eye contact. There was one with a creepy old guy getting a free hand mineral massage from a young blonde. He was standing weird and close to her. The way he looked at her made me want to vomit.

And I never realized before how overpriced and crappy the stuff in Claire's is.

Oh. :(

Does this mean I'm getting old?

...

After dinner, we went to Pop In Play at Pump It Up. 

This is where I felt like I fit in. This is where I was comfortable. Pffft. I'm not getting old, I'm living it up on gigantic blow up slides. :)



I was so proud of this one. I got Zoie's reaction going down the slide. She really loves that thing.

Waiting for 4:00 coffee

I look soo tired, right??

 Every day, I have two lattes. One in the morning when I wake up (to function), and one in the afternoon (to make it to bedtime). My afternoon coffee has historically been at 5:00 sharp, but since the time change, it's been moved up to 4:00 sharp.

I'm like a drug addict waiting for my fix. I can't survive without it. It's sad, really.

... out...

Is there such a thing as a Brain Graveyard?

There are certain people on this planet that bring out the absolute worst in me.

Q: What's is one thing about yourself that you would change?

A: I would take the portion of my brain that makes me judgmental and cut it out and bury it in the graveyard. (I thought about saying flushing it down the toilet - but I think even a portion of my brain deserves a slight bit more dignity than that.)

I actively try to be non-judgmental to everyone. I like to see the good in everything and to give everyone a good benefit of the doubt. I want to be a warm, positive, empathetic/sympathetic human being. This is my goal.

For the most part, I'd say I am doing a pretty good job working towards that goal. But some people bring out the opposite in me. AND. I. HATE. IT.

It's like a chemical reaction. The part of my brain that says, 'Let's just think about where this person is coming from and why they are making this certain decision' takes a coffee break and the little red scantily clad she-devil on my right shoulder makes her appearance. No benefit of the doubt. Only malicious thoughts.

The good news? There aren't that many people I've come across that incite this reaction. The bad news? I can't seem to get over it.

Currently, I'm working on talking it out with my therapist (aka the Hubs, Christopher). I try to force myself to talk about positive aspects of said people. I try to acknowledge our differences, accept that those differences are different, yet okay. The therapist is suggesting confrontation.

I am not ready for that. I have no filter in situations. A filter would be nice sometimes.

Finding the time

Lately, the hardest part of crossing things off my list is finding the time. There are so many important things that need to be done, and so many of them seem to be of equal priority.

Playing. Cleaning. Making food. Crafting/creative time. Personal hygiene. Family time. Exercise. Play dates. Resting.

All these things need to be done on a daily basis. Times five people. With the exponential difficulty that is added on by three (sometimes four) children in tow.

Some days I am Super Mom and can do it all. Other days? Other days I can barely get three meals on the table without exhaustion setting in.

So what's the secret? What is the thing that makes these days so different? Maybe it's the lunar phases? Maybe... heck - I have no more guesses.

I've tried schedules (I suck at schedules). I've tried lowering my expectations. I've tried just letting things slide. But just enough is never good enough for me. My expectations are high, but I promise you they are realistic.

There are some Moms who can conquer and defeat every single day. I've read about them on blogs. I stalk them on Facebook and Twitter. You Super Moms out there, bequeath your secret to me.

I have an inkling that patience is part of their secret?

...

“The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.”
-Albert Einstein

Hmmmmm... ponder this. 

This quote also led me back to one of my recently found philosophies:
Consider that you are doing exactly what you should be doing and are exactly where you are supposed to be.

Does anyone else think about things sometimes so much that they don't make sense anymore? This happens to me all the time.

Yesterday...

In the Deneweth house, we try to reserve Sundays for family time. A fun activity for everyone (mostly the kids) to enjoy. Yesterday was a particularly good Sunday...

A bacon munchin' ZoBo.

Pancakes, BACON!! and eggs for breakfast. Everyone's favorite breakfast. Even little Zoie is now a bacon lover. And I think I may have finally perfected my homemade pancake recipe. (Yay! Go me.)

 ...

Sarasota Chalk Festival. Particularly crowded. AND a different type of crowd that we are used to. But it's always nice to see the art. This activity was mainly geared toward Roxy - our budding little artist.

...

 The sand here looks like snow...
I'm thinking a picture with mittens and scarves is in order for a Christmas card?

Siesta Key Beach. Since we didn't spend as long as we had thought at the Chalk Festival we suggested a quick trip to the beach. The beach always brings out the best in the Bear. Somehow - I never seem to have an extra set of clothes for these children when they are needed. Whatev. We had lots of fun.

...

Dinner with Aunt Marianne and Uncle Dennis. Our snowbird family from up north. It's the first time we'd seen them since they 'flew' back down. The kids, of course, were mute the entire dinner.

...

Heavenly dessert in the form of a Gelati from Rita's. I've been craving a gelati since having my first in the OBX in August. Every road trip out of the Brandon area, I've scoped out the Rita's locations and I guess all my whining paid off because my dreams were actualized last night. It was just as deelish as I had remembered. <3

...

Wine and a bang trim courtesy of Christopher. Yes - Christopher cut my bangs using a chip clip as a guide. Yes - I'm still getting used to them. No - there isn't an accompanying photo. Although, Roxy said I looked like Cinderella. :)

...

Okay - so now back to work. I've got a boy to socialize and a little girl to get started on, too. If you are reading this, wish me luck.

Socializing The Bear

The Bear at his first day of Stay and Play at the Y - refusing to go in.

Firstly - the Bear is a completely different animal than Roxy. It's amazing they come from the same gene pool.

Secondly - maybe I'm just a paranoid Mom? I have this fear that if I don't nip this in the bud right now, he will have many years of expensive therapy in his future.

Me: Maybe he's antisocial. Maybe he's on the autistic spectrum. Maybe he's depressed. I'm probably just doing something wrong.
Chris: He's just different than Roxy. It doesn't mean there is anything wrong with him.

So, here's what I'm talking about... he's not real good around unfamiliar people. He makes everything difficult. He pesters. He gets things done by making others do them for him (future executive?). It's hard to get him excited about things.

He's okay at home where we pretty much (most of the time) know how to deal with him. But around other people, he doesn't really make eye contact or conversate much. I know he's 3 - but I've been watching other kids and he's just, well... different. We go to parks and sometimes he will play with other kids normally, sometimes he doesn't at all.

In an effort to thwart this before Pre-K starts less than a year from now - we've taken some steps to socialize the Bear to be a proper almost 4 year old. Most recently, we enrolled him in a 3 day a week/ 2 hour 'Stay and Play' at the YMCA. This week was our first week. The deal is that I drop him off at the Play Center (which at our Y is a kick ass climbie structure with slides and awesomeness) and he plays for 30 minutes - then the teacher gathers the children and goes to a classroom for the remaining 1.5 hours for crafts, snacks, stories, songs, etc.

So far he will not let me drop him off at Play Center.

So far he has screamed for Mommy for at least 10 minutes before he settles in. The second day, he didn't settle at all and had to leave early.

He leaves 'school' saying he had fun and can't wait till the next school day - but when we get there it's been a different story.

I will keep trying. I think every day it does get a little better. I just hope I'm doing the right thing. I pray for patience to deal with this kid every day.

My current doubts... Maybe I'm pushing him to do something he's not ready for? Maybe he's just meant to do other things and I'm not sure how to deal with his unique personality properly? Maybe I need different perspective. My worst fear is to mold my children into something they aren't meant to be.

At the very least - I hope he knows I'm trying.

Halloween Pictures for Posterity

Halloween was a good one!

It was dry, warm enough, the candy was sweet and so were the children. The decorations are now put away, the candy wrappers still remain - but we miss the Halloween Hoopla already. We can't wait until next year. ;)

Getting ready to carve the pumpkins!!!

It was a little like brain surgery. We broke out the plastic gloves and all.

 Presenting: Darth Vader, My Little Angel, Baby Rapunzel