What's A mUmmy to do?

I love each of my three sons but for reasons that are as different as they are. My middle son's wild and loud presence can sometimes drive me up the wall, but it is that same zest for life that often leaves me laughing for hours. Part of it is just his uninhibited love of fun (ahem, I have NO idea where he got that from). Part of it is his 4-year-old perspective on life. Case in point:

A couple weeks ago my friend returned from a long trip to Peru. We looked through her pictures and took time to explain to T2 where Peru is and what we were looking at along the way. Well later that evening we were getting ready to go out and T2 comments, "Mom, some day you are going to be buried."
Me- "What? did you say 'married'?"
T2- "No. Buried."
Me still utterly confused, "What? What did you say?"
T2- exclaiming now like I'm the dumbest mom on the planet, "BURIED! SOME DAY YOU ARE GOING TO BE BURIED IN THE GROUND! You know in Peru with the Mommies."
Me - (light bulb) "Ohhh" chuckle chuckle "Those were pictures of MUMMIES honey NOT MOMMIES. Not all the mommies go to Peru to be buried. I won't end up there."
T2 - thoughtful pause - "Oh. Well some day when you are old you will be buried though, right?"
Me- sigh, not really liking the point of this conversation anymore and realizing those were some pretty gross pictures of mUmmies and he doesn't seem in the least concerned at all that this was my fate - "I don't know, let's get going."

Seeing Us Through

I've been reading through Paul's letter to the Romans lately. It is a bit heady for me if I haven't had at least one cup of coffee but I think I'm still picking up the gist of things here and there. :)

Today in one of my most favorite chapters of the entire Bible my mind hovered over a verse I usually just read on by, "Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep." (12:15). Lately I've been rejoicing over new babies, groaning over lack of sleep with those same babies, praising with recovery from illness, and weeping over uncertain futures - all with my friends. In one verse Paul summed up the essence of the heart of a woman (or man) engaged in true fellowship with other women...and he just thought he was listing off instructions for godly living to the Christians in Rome! :) My heart full of joys and burdens once again confirms that life is such a mixed bag of blessings and trials. I'm so grateful I have His loving Presence and friends to see us through...until it all gets way way better on the other side of heaven that is!

The Advantage of Older Siblings

The advantages of older siblings is quite extensive and full of injustices suffered by the oldest child. The list is too extensive for me to cover today but I wanted to focus on just one in this post. CANDY. I'm pretty sure my older two boys had no idea what it was for many years - maybe a vague awareness around holidays and potty training (which are both equally celebrated around here). But enter the third boy and whallah (sp help please???) all previous attempts to protect and prolong the onslaught of sugar are almost entirely ignored...frankly I'm just too worn out to care anymore. Is that awful or what?! Also I'm more prone to spoil knowing he is our last. Whatever...I don't need to offer excuses, that isn't the topic of the post. It is what it is. And T3 LOVES LOVES LOVES his candy. In fact all three boys had a wonderful sugar filled Halloween. The funniest part was when anyone tried to take T3s bucket away he would absolutely throw a huge fit. So what did I do...what any other loving caring mother would do...I grabbed a video camera and proceeded to take it away several times to document the cause and effect. Another time when hubby tried to take away an empty MMs wrapper, T3 had a fit until he was allowed to inspect it and make sure there weren't any left.

And now for some pics:

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T3 is saying "Don't even think about touching my candy!"



T1 at the last minute switched from Transformer to Race car driver...whatever, we have them all on hand so "easy peasy, lemon squeezy" or is it "easy cheesy..." hmmm, I need to practice my new K lingo.



T2 went as a black widow spider. this was NOT one of the zillion costumes we owned so I transformed the ninja costume into a spider. amazing what some pantyhose (Hey, if finally got some use around here!) and a felt square can do.



This last pic is of the three sweater vests my mom made. soo cute! Thanks again, mom. And Thanks for the great visit Mom and Dad! We miss you already!