And Aiden is off to pre-k. Still at his old school. Even though he is five we made the decision to wait a year to make the leap into kindergarten. What’s the point? Life is complicated and hard, I see no reason to push the little guy into it. He’ll figure it out sooner rather than later. He loves it. Well he loved the first day. We missed school yesterday because we were on a vacation. Met up with my friends from high school and college. They brought their husbands and kids. I brought my kids. Made Keith stay at home and work. So I drove 6 hours to PA. It should have taken me 4 but I had to stop for two feedings.  Then Keith’s GPS decided to F with me when it told me I had reached my destination. AH, no, evil GPS I have reached a mountain. Got out and knocked on the side of it to make sure my friends hadn’t dug their way in. Thankfully no. Instead I drove around for over an hour until I figured out where I was going. I found it and we got the kids to bed. Saturday we had a lazy day. Kids destroyed property, tied leaves to their heads, hunted bears, went swimming, played princess, and got into fights. We broke up fights, cleaned up leaves, hunted bears, and drank. Enough to drown out the screaming from the fights and enough to dull the pain of a bear attack. Sunday we took the kids on an alpine slide. It was like a luge but with less crashing. We also bowled one of the worst games of my life. Plus we were in a dry county with seven kids in a bowling ally. Awesome. Monday was going home day. Which was good. I missed my pups. GPS on, bags packed, kids sleepy, I was ready. But wait my friend GPS turned on my again. Instead of leading me to the turnpike I trekked through the mountains of PA waiting for my van to break down and then we would be forced to live as mountain people. Not to mention I could not stop the car because you never stop a car on vacation when children are sleeping. Its like that crappy movie Speed. We finally got into Maryland and I saw this…It was amazing and I have to go back. We came, we saw, we made a lot of messes. Good to know that after knowing people for decades we never change. We just multiply. Gremlins aint go nothing on us. Check out our fun…

Aunt Monkeys.  Happy Birthday to the kids favorite Aunt Monkey! You are now old enough where I will not say your age. Because that would be rude. Its always rude to bust on your sister for being old especially when she is 5 years younger than your 32 years. Twenty some years ago she was born and my rein over the family came to an end. I was booted out of my seat at the dinner table, I wasn’t able to have my mom take me to my first day of kindergarten, I had to share my room with a baby, and finally the biggest insult of all I was no longer the only grandchild on my mom’s side. Rude. It really amounted to %50 percent less presents. My sister really got all of the best qualities. She is an amazing musician. I on the other hand was a miserable excuse for someone that played an instrument. She earned first chair, um I believe they kept me hidden behind a screen somewhere. She also is fabulous at art. Truly great. I can draw stick figures. Now let’s talk about her golf game. Actually lets not, its just another way I look silly. I love my sister I really do and I have even forgiven her for hitting me with a snow globe when she was two. And please, I never ever think about the time she chased me into the house with a giant log. Its great that we have been able to put all that behind us.

Happy birthday Morgan.

but really shouldn’t. Really working on not letting little things bother me. Here is the first thing…I go a little crazy inside when people look at the kids and say “I don’t know how you do it”.  Do what? Take care of my children? What am I supposed to do lay in bed all day thinking to myself I really can’t do this, I really can’t live my life. Or maybe they are thinking my children are mental and they feel sorry for me. Which happens to have a  two fold connotation because they are then insulting my children and my parenting skills.

I also get angry when someone tells me my children are hyper. Okay they aren’t. They are busy, curious, and at times wild. They are also newly 5 and almost 4. I would be scared if they sat and smiled at me all day long. Many children in my brief teaching career where “hyper”. I know what it is and I know what faults my kids have. But hyper. no.

People who buy brand new cars, stop in front of my house to ask for directions to the beach which is straight ahead, and then get mad when dirt gets blown on your car  from the dirt pile the kids are building. Oh and please don’t tell me five times that your car is new. I could care less about cars. I really think they are a giant waste of money so don’t expect me to be impressed or concerned by an inanimate object. Now if your car could get me a cup of coffee or tell a dirty joke. We could probably talk.

People who seem offended by gossip. You really aren’t. We all enjoy it.

Thinking I am going to check on my dirt throwing, hyper active kids, while I call people and gossip. What have you done with your day?

Or maybe a nice beginning to our last week before school. Kids played outside a lot this weekend as I made a conscious effort to keep them moving. Do you ever wonder why people say conscious effort? Do we ever do things with an unconscious effort?  They came up with a safe new game. They ride down our driveway on a big wheel together into the  driveway across the street.  I did buy them each a big wheel they just prefer to ride together. My parents did not buy me a big wheel, which really upsets me still because it was something EVERYONE else had. I also did not have an easy bake oven. This is probably why I am lacking in culinary skills. My goal this week is to cut down on TV watching. Not for me, I am hoping to watch more TV. The kids need to watch less. Aiden discovered the power rangers this week, which is horrible. Now I have watched my share of Power Rangers over the years, with all the babysitting I have done. But these new Power Rangers are horrible. Just horrible. All I am going to say is that their new name is “Power Rangers Jungle Fury” and really i’m going to leave it at that.

Charlotte is still an absolute amazing baby. I really think there is something to be said for not being under a lot of stress while pregnant. With Aiden I was teaching my special ed kids and building a house. When I was pregnant with Madeleine I was taking care of a baby and dealing with family illness. This time was nothing compared to before. Or maybe I just completely rock as a mother. Yeah, I am sure that’s not true. I let Aiden and Mads watch TV this morning alone while I slept an extra hour. I did give them a snack before I went back to bed but apparently my snack was not enough. So Aiden poured himself and his sister some Coke and drank it with a fruit rollup. I never said I wasn’t amazing.

Fine. Really, I am. I get asked if I am doing alright a lot. And it is nice to know that people are concerned but honestly, after having two children, adding the baby has been great.  Today I left the dogs in the house and spent some outside with the kids. When I got back into the house part of the trash was spread all over the floor. Nothing quite like coffee grounds and Charlotte diapers. As I cleaned the floors the front door opened letting in two excited kids and let out three really excited dogs. Now when my dogs get out its a huge cluster#%$@. Their only goal is to head toward the beach as fast as possible. So I have to yell for the kids to get into the van, grab the keys, and throw Charlotte in her carseat. Once I do that then we can try to beat them down to the beach. Dogs were captured and all was right with our world. While explaining this story to a mom at Karate she commented that I must be having a bad day. I thought about this for a minute. Nope, I explained. I am just having a day. Because when you have three kids and three dogs this is par for the course.  A bad day would be someone being ill or injured. But what I have is normal. For me. And I really don’t mind. So it didn’t matter that I had to change my shirt twice before noon or that my feet were dirty from chasing the kids down the driveway. In fact, it was a good day because the kids were in bed by 8 and my friend Heather K. from my MOPS group, brought us dinner. Really that’s like a double bonus. Oh and gymnastics is on. I think it might be a gold star day.

Charlotte likes to sleep. Really likes to sleep. We are waiting for her to wake up and kick our asses like her brother and sister did. Madeleine and Aiden loved to scream at night, they loved it so much they did it for a couple months. Sometimes still Madeleine will let out a lengthy scream except at her age we call it a tantrum. Still laughable because now she has added stomping her whole leg like a horse when angered. We have adjusted to a three child house much better than when we added child number two. Everything has the appearance of being just fine but appearances tend to be deceiving so instead i’ll say we are all fine for now. Even though she is big on sleep we did manage to take some pictures with her eyes open… And just so no one is thinking I am a horrible mother I do not let my cat sleep with my baby. This is only funny to those of you who know the cat.

Happy Early Birthday Aiden! Five years ago today Keith and I sat down to dinner at Red Lobster. Its always been a joke with us that we live in Annapolis and eat at Red Lobster. Come to think of it, not sure its even funny. We sat down to dinner in Annapolis after checking into our hotel. You see, our house was not done being built and after staying for almost a week with friends we figured it was time to move to hotel. The next morning I left Keith at the hotel while I headed to my doctors for my final visit before my due date on the 31st. Checking into the office was normal, it was when I got into the examining room that things became dicey. My water broke before the doctor could come in. She informed me that I had to go across the street to labor and delivery. For some reason this shocked me. I always assumed that first babies were late. Besides the fact that Keith and I had our final home inspection to go to. But apparently when your water breaks you have to have the baby. With great annoyance, I headed across the street. But not before I called our builder to let him know we weren’t going to make it. Of course he was fine with it and even wanted to know if Keith was excited. Keith! I had completely forgotten to call him and tell him I was in labor. Nice right?  I did manage to call him and it took awhile for me to convince him I was not joking, that I really was in labor. Eight hours after checking in, we had an amazing 7lb 9oz baby. He used to be very sweet and cuddly. Now he is such a boy with his favorite things being and not in any order of importance; spitting, jumping off of furniture, fighting with Madeleine, climbing on his dogs, arguing with us, watching hockey, going to baseball games, and yelling all the naughty words he can think of at NASCAR races. He also loves spending time with his grandpa and dad. Happy Birthday Aiden, we are so blessed to have you in our lives.

Its been almost a week since Charlotte was born. I can honestly say its been a true joy bringing her into our family. Aiden and Madeleine are completely taken with her and have not experienced bouts of jealousy. It made a difference having Keith home for a week not to mention my family here helping out. Plenty hands to go around. Friday night, while I was in the hospital, my dad and Keith took Aiden to see the Tiger’s play the Orioles. Aiden had an amazing time eating as much junk food as humanly possible. Saturday we came home from the hospital, my dad, mom, and the kids came to pick me up. I am pretty sure they were more excited about me coming home than they were bringing Charlotte home. Sunday the kids went to the movies with my parents where they saw Kung Fu Panda.  This is the second time the kids have been to the movies in a month, talk about a big deal for the 5 and under set. Monday and Tuesday they went to the water park in Chesapeake Beach. Its safe to say all the adults are exhausted. Charlotte has been sleeping about 4-5 hours at night, which is awesome for all of us. I still make sure I sleep for awhile during the day but I have been feeling better. Last night my dad and I took the dogs for a short walk. I wanted to know if my legs still functioned and was relieved to know they do work. My dad and aunt left this morning. I do have to say the well wishes from the majority of my family is appreciated and I am thankful for you all. To a certain uncle of mine, it has not gone unnoticed that I have not heard from you. It will be remembered. I do keep score in a secret book for when people cross me. I may not be able to walk quickly but I can still walk.

Arrived rather quickly on Thursday night. Beginning Thursday around 12:00 I began having rather mild contractions. They really were not a big deal. I did some shopping with my aunt, mom, and the kids at the Amish Market here in Annapolis. After we went home and I did some walking to help move things along. By two they still were not a big deal so I chose to take Aiden to Karate and then to Babies R Us. Don’t worry my mom and Aunt were with Aiden and I. Towards the end of shopping I began to experience more pain so I opted to stop by my doctors office to get checked out. Sure enough they sent me to the hospital to get monitored for awhile. I ended up spending two hours in triage. Let me tell you something, while they were making me walk around labor and delivery, my contractions became really intense. So intense that I scared a whole bunch of soon to be new moms who were on a tour of the floor. I kept going back to my triage nurse to tell here these were like nothing I had ever felt before. She kept having me walk. By 8:00 pm. I was a cursing mess. Keith and I were trying to tell them this was my third baby and things were moving fast. Luckily by 8:00 I was 5cm and they were going to admit me. Fine. Great. At this point I was yelling that I was done and I wanted an epidural. My triage nurse told me to calm down and this was when Keith went to get my mom who was downstairs. Yes I was literally screaming for my mom like a freak of nature. The anesthesiologist was in the O.R. so he would not be able to get there for 10 minutes. At this point it was 8:20 and we realized that I was almost 10 cm and I needed to push soon. Um yeah, I can tell you that I absolutely needed to push. Out lovely little girl was born by 8:43. She was 8lbs and 2 oz. It was not what I expected but it was brilliant. I was thrilled to feel so amazing after giving birth to her, like I accomplished something amazing. And I did.

During this time Keith, my mom, and my aunt were a perfect team; in other words they did not seem overwhelmed when I was acting like something possessed.

Aiden has been asking for awhile now to play soccer, although he has never seen anyone play soccer… But whatever he wants soccer, i’ll find him soccer. They have week long camps for his age group run by a group called UK Elite so I enrolled him in the camp along with Madeleine. She usually loves to do what Aiden does but apparently, that is changing. She had no interest in playing with a bunch of boys. Not to mention she was not happy with uniform and having to wear shorts with tennis shoes and please do not get her started on the color of the soccer ball. It is red and not pink.

Day one: Aiden had a great time with his coach while Madeleine sat on the grass with Ann and I. She would occasionaly get up and kick the ball with Ann. Oh and she used the bathroom about 10 times which was great. It was only 90 degrees outside and the bathrooms were even hotter. Not to mention and we won’t mention, the dead beetles in the sink. I did spell it beetle, just in case those of you were concerned that Ringo Starr was dead in a sink.

Day two: Aiden was again great during camp. He met some really fun friends and was completely enthralled with his coaches. Madeleine…not so much. She did not want anyone talking to her or even encouraging her to play.

Day three: Madeleine wore a dress and Barbie dress up shoes to practice. He coach asked her how she was going with the shoes and dress. Without talking to him she picked up her ball and ran onto the field. That’s my girl, knowing how to run in heels in crucial.

The rest of the week continued on like that. I ended up coming home every day after soccer and sleeping because the heat kicked my ass. Actually it doesn’t take much to kick my ass, I tend to randomly fall asleep every time I stop moving. This is going to become awkward if the baby does not arrive soon. I do have some awesome pics of me playing and I use the term loosely, playing soccer with Aiden. Feel free to laugh, except for you Cousin Phil. If you laugh I will come back and hurt you like I used to when you were a little punk.