worry less...pray more.

sometimes many times being a parent is hard...for me, not the running around....we are so busy i can't breathe, keeping up with household things...but i struggle in the emotional/worry/anxiety department. i am a worrier...HA! i know my dad is saying an "amen" to that right now...because i have been and always will be one of those people who...when it comes to my kids...thinks the worst. i TRY so hard to hide it or pretend that is is not there, but i have realized that it will.not.go.away. 

for example. when i was little...i'm talking six or seven...when we traveled, i would watch for "hospital" signs, so that if my dad had a heart attack(what the heck??) while he was driving, i could jump up in the front seat and know exactly where to go to get help. i mean...seriously. who does that? or even better...i would always think of jobs that i might be able to do if my parents died because i would have to take care of seth and jon and i would need to work. because...i'm SURE we would not go live with family and i would be left to raise my brothers.... :-0

so now that i have my own kids...bless their hearts....every time they get sick, thanks to google, they have some rare form of cancer. and i can't even think straight until they are off to school and back to normal. poor hutton had a week of anxiety about school and other activities that had me on the verge of a breakdown and marching him right into a psychology office. i just knew something terrible was wrong. friday night he cried himself and i prayed myself to sleep. and guess what? he woke up saturday with a smile. thank GOD!

sooo...i know i said that i didn't have any new years resolutions, but actually that is a lie. i have a few...and one of them is to "worry less and pray more". i even bought a sign to hang in my house as a daily reminder....so hopefully when that worry starts creeping in....i can remember to squash it with bible verses...and my mind will be eased. 

Luke 12:25 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his  span of life?

No one can pray and worry at the same time.- Max Lucado

happy monday! 

h

hello strangers....

well....the good thing about having a blog that nobody reads and that doesn't bring in any money is this...you can take a four month vacation! ;)  the last time i wrote i was recovering from a breakdown because hutt started kindergarten. ummm...i seem to have recovered quite well. here is a quick recap of events over the last quarter of a YEAR! yikes!

• i started WORKING! can you freakin' believe it? ok ok...it's not every day, and it's not full time, but it gives me extra money to redecorate every room in my house at least once a year now! ;)  my good friend leigh, who is an awesome interior designer, asked if i would want to be her assistant. what what? i had to think about it...for all of four seconds. IT IS SO DANG FUN! and guess what? i had to learn how to use my GPS and not freak out when i get lost. i have only called brian one time...and well...that is another story for another day...
• brian and i went on a vaca to san francisco and wine country in september for my cousin's wedding. best trip of my life. most of my dad's side of the family plus my parents and my brother and sister-in-law were there and those hilarious people + lots and lots of wine = more fun than you can even imagine. every morning i woke up, my stomach was sore from laughing like a hyena. oh the fun! 
• exercise...what is THAT??
• weight gain...oh...i KNOW what you are.... ;)
• if you want to have an easy time losing weight here is the secret formula. after the holidays, put on tight exercise pants and an exercise bra and  wear it around the house. you will NOT set foot in the kitchen. holy rolls!! :-0  
• so i decided not to drink during the week...and lordy lordy..i miss that nightly glass of wine while i cook. my meals have become much less exciting...
• i turned 35...and we went with my parents, brother, sister-in-law, and nephew to the mountains for the weekend...complete with MORE wine drinking. once again, total fun.
• lainey is acing school. so far, she has had straight A's her entire middle school career. hutton has sweet teachers and is also doing great in school, but could take it or leave it...i feel his pain. i never liked school either...and then i became a SCHOOL TEACHER! bahahahahahahaha   talk about making NO sense...
• i volunteered to be class mom in Hutt's class this year, and i almost fell out of my seat at the first meeting when i was handed my FOLDER of responsibilities. apparently that role is serious business...
• my goal for 2013 is to get ALL of my pictures off of my computer and either printed, made into photo books, or put on discs. don't judge, but since 2008 i have  not printed off the first picture.
• and lastly, i didn't make any nyr because i never keep them and it just makes me feel like a failure. raise your hand if you agree.

hope everyone has a happy wednesday!

h :)

ps. apparently "fun" is my new favorite word.... 

celebrity observations...

i'll admit it...i read celebrity trash sites...people.com and usmagazine.com. it's like a drug. i'm amazed by watching train wrecks. i know. don't judge. so, here are just a few things that i have in noticed the past few weeks...

jennie garth. i know you are proud of your new stick skinny body....but you absolutely look 15 years older. fat is good for the face. its makes you look younger. just look at me. i TOTALLY agree with that one. ;)

leann rimes. bless your heart. once a cheater...always a cheater. if he cheated WITH you...he will cheat ON you. no amount of "anxiety treatment" is going to change that.

kristen stewart. girl. you made a big mistake. and you just lost about 539,228,971 fans. hope it was worth it.

rihanna and chris brown. go ahead and get back together already. you know you would if you weren't so embarrassed about hitting one another...and then running back to each other.

kanye and kim. two people who each think they are one notch below jesus=perfect match.

honey boo boo. there.are.no.words.EVER. raise your hand if you can't look away.

any celebrity who has just given birth. ok. we KNOW! you can get back to your "pre-baby" weight in two weeks. i could get back to my pre-five year old weight also...if all i ate were five saltines, lettuce leaves, and laxatives all day.

baby names. totally fascinating. but here is where y'all probably won't agree with me. i actually LIKE strange names. wanna know why? after being a teacher, i swore that i would name my kids something different, so every time they were mentioned in the class, they weren't jon c, jon m, jon r, and jon b. ANNOYING! so far i have only come across ONE lainey, and ONE hutton. and that suits me just fine...

happy weekend!!

h

chest

when brian and i got married, we lived in a small condo...so we were short on storage. brian's mom bought us this HUGE chest that you can fit a million things in. when we moved to this house, it made the cut, but of COURSE i have had the itch to give it some flare ever since. it kinda had a "country" look...which is TOTALLY FINE if that is your style, but it wasn't meshing well with our other furniture. and to be honest, we still need the space, so getting something different was out of the question!  our closets in this house are small! (but i LOVE it brian, and i'm not complaining...just stating a fact!) anyway....that went WAY off track....where were we?
 oh! ok. so....i determined that part of the problem was that the hardware was too small for the piece. i found this hardware

 on sale at the home depot for $1.98 each! woot! i know. awesome huh?
  i knew i wanted a slatey blue color, so i enlisted the help of my favorite decorator...PINTEREST...and found some ideas. i sent pictures to my sweet cousin, who then told me the perfect color...wrought iron by martha stewart. yay! and as soon as brian left to go out of town, i drove my butt straight to the store, looked at the color, and then had it color matched with the primer PLUS paint by behr!  love that stuff!
 it only took me about 45 min. to complete BOTH coats(i waited an hour between each coat). immediately the chest looked so much better...that is until i remembered that i didn't know how to work the drill, so i would have to wait until brian came home to complete my project! boo!
 so......last night, even though he was exhausted from his trip, he drilled my new holes for me! and it looks AWESOME! exactly what i was going for! amazing how a little paint and new hardware can completely change the look of something! now on to the next project....

before
mismatched knobs and all

before

after
2 coats of paint

new hardware

after

after

after

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY

tomorrow is our 18th...i mean 8th anniversary. what an amazing  ride it has been so far. i look forward to many many more years...

I LOVE YOU BRIAN!!

(this is as sappy as i get...)

daddy

i'm sorry...i had to.

girls...i'm so so sorry about the dresses. it really doesn't make sense because i don't even like pink! ha!

lainey...the sweetest and most beautiful flower girl ever!

it was such a fun fun day! the stories...oh the stories....it just wouldn't have been hannah's wedding without them.
things i regret....i wish i would have eaten.
the end.

ps. but the stories that came from the honeymoon are even better....maybe..just maybe..one day..i will tell one(or seven) of them on here....

what have we learned?

i have learned a few things during this first week of school...so i wrote a post about it. like to hear it? here it goes.....

• i miss sleeping past 6:20
• just being real...i HATE making lunches(i know..weird)
• coffee is extremely gross without creamer
• pre-teens are H.A.R.D.
• the PTA parents at Hutt's school are WAY over the top...it sometimes scares me. i'm just trying to help out...not compete(NOT YOU CAROLYN AND HEATHER!-y'all are awesome!)
• moms deserve a medal for making it through week one 
• does anyone else think the paperwork is redonkulous?
• going to the bus stop 25 min. early on the first day is not going to make the bus get there any quicker
• i can actually spend an 3-4 hours doing a whole lot of nothing....pinterest anyone?
• anxiety=insomnia 
• i worked for a long time on this project today and when i went to complete the finishing touch, i messed the whole thing up. i may or may not have almost cried(i blame fatigue)
• i hate a quiet and dark house....if you stopped by in the middle of the day, i would have almost all the lights and tv's on...even if i'm not in the room
• 5yr olds have meltdowns on day four
• you are always harder on your firstborn
• don't judge...but i have made my bed every day this week...i know....hutt was so shocked  that he asked me who did it. HA!
• i miss summer fun, but i'm going to be honest. i do better with schedules
• lainey started swimming today and i'm secretly hoping she will be the next missy franklin
• now that the kids are in school, i'm scouting out the next room/piece of furniture i can paint
• friday brings extreme excitement again...as in YAY!  no school tomorrow

sooo....needless to say, we are ready for the weekend....but i have a feeling we will all be too exhausted to have any fun! ;)

kindergarten smindergarten

 well...this is it. tomorrow i send my baby away...and i'm sure he'll come back realizing that he actually loves school, and thinking that i am a crazy nut that was trying to trap him into snuggling with him all day. ;)
 i'm hoping that the send off isn't as bad as i have worked it up in my mind to be...but there is no breath holding going on over here...
 it's funny the reaction i have gotten from people. some pat me on the back, some agree, and some wonder why i'm so sad. "aren't you going to be so GLAD to have so much time alone?"  ummm....no. hutt is my buddy. he has shopped, decorated, painted, danced, traveled, cooked, sang, cried, laughed, worried, gardened, played, exercised, and talked on the phone with me. (i even tricked him into taking naps just so i could have one too! ha!) i am sad to see him go. it will be so quiet and lonely here without him. 
 and last night i laid in bed thinking about all these funny things i could say that would make this "light and non-serious" but now i can't remember them...and it doesn't seem so funny anymore! :(

 on another note...i have decided to take up the profession of helicopter mom. so i am signing up for "room mother" for hutton's class. but oddly enough, the teacher looks at the list of names and CHOOSES someone! what the ??????  so i'm hoping that my jammin' giant size olympic rings that i made for the teacher luncheon will give me a slight advantage....i'll keep you posted.
 needless to say, this has been a hard week. i have been so sad, that poor brian can't even look at me without getting his head chopped off,(why are we meanest to the ones we love the most when we are worried/stressed/sad???....and if you tell me that i'm the only person who does that...we aren't friends anymore) and i have consumed more alcohol that trader joes stocks on the shelves....no judging please. 
 but tomorrow i will awake bright and early, put on my smile, and try not to cry as my favorite boy in the entire world starts a new chapter in his life...then i will promptly march myself down the street and "sip and sob" with my sweet "kindergarten moms".....

happy first day of school everyone.....