Today...

Anna has been coughing like crazy. Carter is finally getting over strep throat and I think Kya might have an ear infection. I built a lego "ice cream truck" for Carter, but after he inspected it, he told me it was a van instead. He is very particular about how his lego creations need to be built. Sometimes he wants a door on it, sometimes he doesn't...and it needs a roof, but with this piece and NOT that one, thank you! He called me "normal" this afternoon and asked me if the word normal was bad or not. I told him it was okay to call someone normal. Sometimes he picks up words from television cartoons, and uses them in the funniest ways that make no sense. Sometimes he uses the bad words in the right context, and we have to have a little chat about those ones. Nowadays, even the Disney channel can defile a child's mind. There's this new cartoon called "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" and we all love that one. Anna has built animals, planes, playgrounds, and other such things out of legos. She is very creative. She always gets her hands on the pieces Carter wants. And then she keeps them for an unbearably long time while Carter usually waits for his turn. Sometimes he just grabs what he needs anyways, and then we have issues to deal with. Sometimes it gives me a headache, especially when, at the same time, Kya is in the bouncy chair crying because the toys dangling in front of her tick her off. I am not sure the exact reason she gets so mad in the bouncy chair, but she does! She grips the cute little plastic elephants with crinkly ears and pulls so hard that the friendly animals come flying at her little forehead. Yeah...issues today.

Anna got Kya to laugh today in the swing. It was a lovely sound to my aching head. As I stood there at the stove wondering what my life was reduced to, frying a grilled cheese sandwich for Carter for lunch and at the same time making Corn Flakes for Anna because her bolony sandwich tasted too dry, watching the clock as the hands got nearer to the time I could put all the kids down for naps and maybe have a short one myself, telling the kids to stop running up and down the hall and to stay in their chairs, please, so we can have lunch, and then Anna is back out of her chair and suddenly I hear Kya laughing. Anna is back in her chair, and I urge her again to get back out of that chair and make her laugh again. Sure enough, there is that blessed sound again. The cheese sandwich is done and the corn flakes are getting soggy, but I decide to try with the babe, and she does it again! I needed that, so so needed that moment today.

And so today I decided that it wouldn't matter to me how many issues I had to deal with, because that's just the dusty stuff. Everyday, I get to look at the sweetest baby, who woke up three times this afternoon before I could get her settled down for a reasonable nap, and I could never be angry because as soon as she sees me, I get a big smile from her, and her eyes are full of joy and she smells so heavenly as I pick her up and snuggle her onto my shoulder...

And today, I won't let the dusty stuff get in the way of Carter's silliness, and the random facts he tells me about life from his perspective that always makes me smile to myself or laugh outloud...and even when he is running away from me as I am trying to get him dressed after his bath, and he won't listen, and then gets mad because he wanted to get dressed himself, but it is too late now, and he is REALLY peeved at me and morphes into tantrum-mode, and I feel my patience slipping away and my head pounding harder from the intense noise from his war cry....it's just dust. And it can be brushed off. And after Carter took a timeout in his room, and we had a good talk about using our words and manners, and he is smiling at me with his red little cheeks and dimples and blue-grey eyes...and I am in wonder that such a perfect little guy was created, and he is mine, and I wouldn't trade him for any other boy in the world, even the ones who are well behaved and can already read and count to 100, because he can't, but he tells me secrets and does amazing flips and totally laughs at all the funny parts when we watch cartoons or movies. And I can laugh with him, and we both look at each other and know exactly why.

Today, I am surrounded with dust. It never goes away. Dust from the tears Anna cries when I brush her snarles out, and from her whining because she can't have a fruit snack before lunch and she is NOT wearing those pants because they make her underwear bunch all up, and I tell her, quite exasperated, that she doesn't like to wear ANY of her pants, but she tells me adamently that she likes to wear her leggings, in which I have to remind her are two sizes too small. But apparently they don't bunch her panties up. Dust, and I am just ignoring it for now.

Because I think it is awesome that Anna's favorite character in Scooby Doo is Velma. And she likes her because she is the one who solves all the mysteries. And when I watch Anna play Wii bowling, it makes me laugh at her intensity with which she swings the control as she is biting her lip trying to concentrate on getting a strike or spare. She is never satisfied unless she gets the one or the other! And she has amazing eyelashes. And she almost always remembers to cough into her elbow when she coughs, and for some reason that makes me feel very proud.

"I should've stolen every moment, now there's a page with not enough on it, where we belong. I guess I'll never understand it, why do we take it all for granted, until it's gone...cuz then it's gone. Love who you love. With all that you have, and don't waste the time to fly so fast. Love who you love, and say that you do. Hold on as tight as they'll let you.

Give all you got like it's your last day, your heart and soul before it's too late, and pull em in, so close enough that they can feel it, with every single breath that you're breathing, breathe it in. Again and again!

Love who you love."

(thanks Rascal Flatts. If you want to listen to the song it's on my playlist called "Love who you Love")

I know who I love, even when life is covered in dust bunnies. But it's nice to be reminded every once in awhile, you know? Especially when my head aches so....