Backseat Banter

Over the last few weeks, I've been storing up some conversations to share with you.
Evan & Ryan have had these conversations with themselves and with each other in the back seat of the car and I've had the pleasure of eavesdropping.....

R: Why do we have to live so far away from everyone? [in his 3 year old world, driving more than 15 minutes anywhere "takes sooooooooo long."]

E: Some people live in France and don't have any friends.

R: Why?

E: It takes years to get to France.

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Driving past the post office where all the cute little blue & white mail trucks "sleep" at night...

E: Look! That's where they make mail!

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Listening to my current favorite CD by Shawn McDonald in the car. In the song Beautiful, the words are "Won't you take me, and make me beautiful."

R: I like this song, Ev. It says "Take me and BAKE me ~ he gets fried up."

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And lastly, I keep my make-up bag in the car and slap on my pretty face when we're stopped at red lights.

R: Mommy, what are you putting on your eyes?

M: Mascara.

R: Is that chocolate for your eyes?

M: Sort of :)

Out of the Mouths of Babes

Well, the good news about my mom has done a complete 180.

Her doctor called her on Friday and said the pathology report came back showing liver cancer that has metastisized from the lung. A second report said that she tested positive for markers for colon cancer. A third report said that 2/3 of the liver biopsies were cancer free.

Needless to say, we are frustrated and confused and distraught.

We know God is in control, but sometimes in our humanity, we fail to rest in His comfort and peace and we let our minds go to the dark valleys of our worst fears.

My sister, Jill, and I had just spoken on the phone on Sunday and had voiced our concerns and fears to each other.

Not five minutes went by when my phone rang. It was Jill. Again.

I answered it. Jill proceeded to tell me how she was watching my niece, Ava, playing with her toys.

Out of the blue, Ava sang, "My God is so big, so strong and so mighty, there's nothing my God cannot do."

Boy, did we need to hear that!
Isn't God good?

If you think of it today, please pray for my mom and dad. They will be seeing an oncologist at University of Pennsylvania. Hopefully, we'll have some answers.

Early Riser

Someone needs to teach my Ryan that Saturdays are for sleeping in,

because apparently he's not understanding the words coming out of my mouth....

I don't get it. He was

up until 10:30ish last night...

up at 3:40 a.m. coughing ~ needed a breathing treatment and a dose of cough syrup....

but, never fail, still up and at 'em. bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. at 7:30 this morning.

You're probably thinking, "That's not early, Amy." And you're right.

But the other two sleep in, especially when they've been up so late.

Nathan until 8:30 and Evan until 9:19 this morning. Sensible boys. :)

It's just that I'm tired [literally and figuratively!] of being awakened by

the incessant rolling of the toilet paper roll,

the 52 toilet flushes,

the scraping of the stool across the linoleum floor,

and the tapping on the wall. On the other side of which lies my sleepy head.

Followed inevitably by the

"Get your tired butt out of your warm bed 'Moooom-my, wipe my hieney'" wake-up call.

I guess I'm lamenting the fact that

"one of these kids is doing his own thing...one of these kids is just not the same..."

Or maybe I'm just a tad jealous of my boy's regularity. :)

Life is Good

I admit....I have been a blog slacker these last two weeks.

Life has gotten in the way :) and sometimes you just can't bring yourself to blog about it.

BUT, yesterday, there was good news.

My mom FINALLY had her liver biopsy on the six spots found on her liver almost 7 weeks ago and everything came back clear ~ non-malignant, benign, no cancer, zip, zero, zilch ~

PRAISE GOD!

Now we go to the next round of dr. consults, incessant waiting, and testing to find out about the spot on her lung. Which, frankly, isn't something I'm overly worried about.

Yes, it's suspicious ~ but it's small.

Yes, it's in an awkward spot to get to ~ but God's in control.

Funny how something scary like this helps put things in perspective. I've been truly blessed these last few weeks by friends who have told me they are praying for me and my family.

On Monday, my MOPS mentor mom dropped in out of the blue with two beautiful bunches of tulips. They've brightened my kitchen all week long.

Yesterday, while I was waiting for the call from my dad that my mom came out of the biopsy okay, my friend, Andrea, brought over lunch and then straightened up my downstairs while I relayed messages between my dad, my sisters, and my brother.

And then, last night, Mark came home from Pittsburgh [work trip] with Life is Good t-shirts for me and the kids. Nathan got a cement mixer, Ryan got a monkey, and Evan got a soccer player. Daddy sure picked out the perfect shirts for his boys.

Life is good because God is good. :)

Great Cake Soap Giveaway

HURRY!!

Before time runs out.....

Skip on over to my friend, Kari's blog. She's hosting a bloggy giveaway and the products look yummy enough to eat!!

You can check them out here.

But, today's the deadline, so don't waste any more time :)

Just a Jot....

So, yesterday, I held a scrapbook crop at my house. It was my first attempt at a crop and since I've never really been to one hosted at someone's house, I think it turned out o.k.

My wonderful sister-in-law Saint Cindi came out and kept an eye on the kids. The only mishap was that neither one of us remembered to pick up Evan off the bus. Lucky for us, the school district didn't follow its own rule, and let a kindergartener jump off the bus without someone there to pick them up. A few tears, some Swedish fish, and the rest of Madagascar 2 later and my little guy was back to his normal self. Talk about feeling like the guilty mom!!

Anyway, it was great fun to meet ~ finally! :) ~ in real life, Emilie. She was just as nice in person as I'd imagined she'd be. And her little kiddos, Chicken and Fifi, were even cuter in person. Poor Emilie couldn't stop sneezing, though ~ hope she wasn't allergic to my house :) That didn't slow her down, though ~ you should have seen her pumping out the layouts in between all the "bless you's!"

It was also great to scrap with Cassie again. We've scrapped together a few times with other CKMBers in the last year. She was working on the cutest circle tree card. Might have to steal that idea - hee, hee. Her 8 year old daughter came along and she is quite the scrapper, too.

My dear friend, Karen, rounded out the group of four. Karen and I have tried to scrap together regularly but the "regularly" part has escaped us as of late. We definitely need to work on that, because it's just nice to have an excuse to spend time with a good friend.

Overall, it was a good scrapping day. I completed almost 4 layouts and have the makings of at least 2 more. Hopefully, I'll find time to finish those up, take some photos and post them here soon.

Thanks, ladies, for a wonderful time. Hope we can do it again soon!

Vote for ME! :)

I got brave and submitted a scrapbooking layout for a Cosmo Cricket "Seeing Green" blog posting.

You can see it HERE! Or just look at it here.....




Don't get too excited ~ all the entries are posted (I'm surprised there were only 23 entries, actually)


I'm #18.....in case you were wondering....


All you have to do is leave a comment on their blog saying how awesome you think #18 is ~ hahahaha!!

But only if you mean it [I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to win a Cosmo Cricket prize, though ~ and who knows, maybe I'll share!]

The Reader

Nathan has loved books from the time he was a baby. If he ever disappeared, I knew I could find him on the floor of his bedroom flipping through the books in his book basket.

He reads in the car.

Now he's got C reading when he's here with us during the day.

He's not picky. He'll read magazines and sales circulars that come in the mail.

He must have inherited the love for cereal-box reading from his mommy ~ hee, hee!

And recently, this is how he's been spending his free time....

(Make sure you pause the music in the sidebar so you can hear the video):

I can't get enough of this!

Snow Day

This past Monday, we were hit with the Nor'Easter and it snowed all day. Evan had off school and I didn't have the kids I babysit, so we were free and clear to go sledding.

Our friends, Rob & Karen, have this awesome hill in their backyard that we've been dying to try for 3! years now. This was the first decent snowfall in that long of a time!

Evan, Ryan, and I headed over while Nathan was napping [don't worry, Mark was working from home...] We had an absolute blast!

Evan had NO fear.....after one time down with me, he was on his own. He LOVED it ~ and didn't complain once about climbing back up the hill. [And it was QUITE a climb ~ it's Wednesday, and I'm still sore - hahahaha!]

Ryan had NO fear either, but that hill was like a mountain to my 3 foot tall little man. He lasted about 3 trips and was content to play at the top of the hill with the other kids.

Once the kids were done, the BIG kids had fun, too. We had a bunch of runs where five of us flew down at the same time. I'm pretty sure that I had more fun than my kids did and I SO needed that!! :) I wish Mark & Nathan had been there to enjoy it, too...

Thanks, Rob & Karen, for a great time!

Give me some space

Mark was gone 4 days last week for work so my sister, Jill, and her daughter, Ava, came out to spend one night with us. The next morning, Jill was getting Ava dressed and Nathan was getting in the way and just being a nudge to Ava.

Jill said, "Hey Nathan, can you give Ava a little space, please?"

I was amazed at how quickly he responded to Jill when he stopped what he was doing and left the room.

He returned in a few minutes and handed Ava the infamous space helmet and space boots from our dress-up basket.

"Here you go."

He's a smart one, isnt' he?