Mom!

Isaac is so funny. Earlier this evening I heard him shout to me from the hallway, "Mom! I have to go to the bathroom!" Then a few seconds later, "Mom! I'm going to the bathroom!" A few seconds later, "Mom! I'm sitting on the toilet!" And a few seconds after that, "Mom! I'm peeing now!"

I love it. I love that he has enough confidence in my love and interest in him that he just knows that I'm interested in his toileting habits. I love it.

I've been feeling kinda worthless lately. I know my kids aren't that grown up, but they're also not babies anymore and they just don't need me as much as they used to. It's been hard, not being needed. But having Isaac holler to me this evening helped me realize something. They do need me. They need me to care. They need me to be there for all their "Mom!" moments. And I do try to be. I've always tried. But now I understand better why I need to be there.

My mom is a wonderful example of this. I just know she cares. And I know that even now, when I'm (basically) all grown up, she still cares and is interested. Hopefully I have more interesting things to say than, "Hey mom! I'm going to the bathroom!" But even those times when I don't, she still listens and cares.

That's the kind of mom I want to be. I want my kids to just know that I care and am interested in even the smallest details of their lives.

A Spider Story...

I was on the phone with Chad this afternoon when I saw a spider. ON MY BED. WHERE I SLEEP. There's a small chance I *may* have overreacted a little, but really, it was a SPIDER. ON MY BED. So, we're chatting on the phone and suddenly I start screaming (it's a SPIDER!) and in my memory I'm screaming the word "spider" but apparently it was incoherent because all Chad heard was a bunch of screaming and he has no idea what's going on so he's walking through school thinking that one of us is dying and it's not until a minute later when I've transferred the spider to the floor so I can KILL it that he can finally understand what all the hullabaloo was all about. He wasn't too happy with me. "What is going on?!? Leah! What is going on?!? Are you alright?" Like I said, I *may* have overreacted, but seriously Chad, haven't we been married long enough for you to tell my "it's-a-spider-we're-all-gonna-die!" scream from my "it's-an-axe-murderer-we're-all-gonna-die!" scream?

The difference between boys and girls

 Isaac provides us with some great conversation tidbits... The other day he walked in on Cosette going potty and when she wiped he got after her:

I: "Cosette, you only wipe when you go poop!"

C: "No, I wipe every time!"

I: "No. MOM! Tell Cosette that you only wipe when you poop!"

M: "Isaac, girls have to wipe every time."

I: "WHAT?!? Girls have to wipe EVERY TIME?"

 



October

 We survived Halloween this year. Is it just me or does halloween seem to be lasting longer and longer nowdays? I remember when I was young it was just ONE day a year. It seems that now everyone starts celebrating a week or two early so you end up with two weeks of celebration. Anyhow... I took the kids trick-or-treating this year will Ellen and William and Christopher and some friends. I forgot that the kids haven't been trick-or-treating since they were itty-bitty so the whole idea was novel and fascinating to them. After a block of trick-or-treating Debbie came booking it off a porch and yelled over her shoulder to me, "Mom! This is AWESOME! We should do this more often!" haha And Isaac was blown away by the idea of going to "actual houses" (as he put it, over and over and over again last night.). He just couldn't believe that you could go knock on doors because all they can remember is trunk-or-treating. Anyways, it was a real treat for me to take them because they enjoyed it so much, it was really fun to see.

And here's a random picture of Cosette asleep at the computer desk. Love it.

Well, that's basically it for October. I only took a few pictures this month which, let's face it, isn't a bad thing considering the thousands of pictures I have of the rest of the kids' young lives.