Spring update

Everyone is doing well here.  To recap our fall/winter, we've had some ups and downs.  Brian went back to school for civil engineering, which is great, but it was really hard to transition to him not being here hardly at all.  I try to keep reminding myself that it's only temporary, even though it's really tough.

I continued with my previous clients from the year before for babysitting which also meant I'd have another baby to care for in October.  Thankfully she is a very good natured baby and we have lots of fun with baby L.  Everyone seems to get along with the occasional scuffle that you expect from kids who are more like brother and sister than friends/clients.

Curtis got pretty sick right before Christmas with pneumonia that went undetected, but thankfully he got much better after we discovered what was making him so sick.  Poor kid.  We had a great Christmas both here in NC and up in Ohio.  The boys are more into holidays this year than ever before, which brings back feelings about Christmas that I haven't felt since I was a kid.  So fun!

Curtis has 2 more months of preschool before he "graduates".  Before he went to preschool, he could identify some sight words and now, thanks to his love of reading and to preschool, he can now read entire books with very little help from me.  He gets so proud of himself and it's truly a proud mommy moment for me.  When he was born, I made it a point to be sure to make time at night to read him stories before bed.  He LOVES books and Wesley has caught onto that as well.  They love to sit down and pick out their favorite books at the end of the day.  Curtis will attend the local school for kindergarten this fall.  He's pretty excited to ride the bus for the first time.  I'm sure I will cry.

Wesley is growing up so fast.  We're still (ugh yes, still) working on getting rid of his paci for good, but he's been a lot better about leaving it for nap and bed times.  He's VERY attached to it, which is awful, but it's such a comfort item for him and with me doing bed time solo 5 days a week, I can't handle a melt down every night over no paci, so... he still has it.  Potty training got put on the back burner since I have 5 kids in the house and it's hard to focus on him not making a huge mess on the floor to add to the clean up.  Ha!  For the past 3 or 4 days, we have been diaper and pants free at home and he hasn't had any accidents as long as he's half nakey.  Wes will be going to his first year of preschool this fall for 2 days a week.  I'm really excited and so is he.  I was hesitant to send him to pre-k for 3 years since he misses the school cutoff by 2 days, but we need the break from each other.

I can't believe how big the boys are getting!  It seems like yesterday that Curtis was born and now I have 2 adorable boys.  Sometimes I forget to stop and smell the roses and enjoy them to the fullest.  My days are hectic to say the least and I need to remind myself to enjoy the time while they are little because they will grow up SO fast!

Brian is doing well at school.  He got a 4.0 his first semester and is aiming high for his spring semester grades too.  His classes have been pretty challenging.  Most of them have to do with intense math equations etc (as is expected with engineering) so they can be difficult.  I'm proud of him for going for his goal of getting a second degree.  He originally had planned to get his degree in engineering when he started out at Ohio State in 1998, but changed his major to aviation and then resumed his aviation degree at BGSU.  Unfortunately, due to an eye issue, he is not able to fly commercial planes anymore which led him to pursue a job in aviation operations instead.  He's looking forward to a more challenging career in engineering in a few years!  He should graduate (hopefully) in 2016!

I have been doing fairly well.  My stress levels, as you can imagine, are pretty high some days.  I have had to learn to manage some depression symptoms again, but I'm doing a pretty good job of that.  Exercise has been a huge part of that and eating right.  I recently decided to go gluten free for myself and that has made a big impact on how I feel overall.  It's been interesting to find foods I can cook that are gluten free.  I plan to stay this way long term, so I better get used to it :).

I'm going to try to blog more often.  It's hard to make something like this a routine!  My lent was about giving up wine (sad face) and adding a Bible study.  I got a Kindle Fire for a Christmas bonus (thanks to my clients) and I downloaded a great Bible app on there that I can select a Bible study course that fits me.  I chose one that allows me to read a little bit of the bible every day for 365 days!  Pretty neat and I'm learning SO much by doing that.  It also can read it aloud to me, so I can even "read" it when I do dishes etc.

Well, if you read all this, you deserve a medal!  HA!  Enjoy some recent pix of the kids :).