All Hell breaks loose at 3:30pm

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.... I love those days I do, but hate those days too! I absolutely hate 3:30pm too! 3:30 is when we have to pick Caidan up from school. And it seems that they all GO crazy for something at that time. I am hungry! Can I watch TV? Caidan is looking at me! Kloe is bothering me! Kynlee is following me! I am scared of that show! Why do I have to put my coat up? Why do I have to put my shoes away? (and insert whining with all those questions!)

I am really not sure what it is. For Caidan I really do believe he needs down time and food when he gets home since the last time he ate during the day was lunch at 11:10. Normally after he eats he is MUCH more tolerable. I can't explain why Kloe is this way as she is like that all the time. Kynlee well she just seems to follow the mood of the house.

For us I have decided that planning things that involve taking the kids anywhere after school is just a bad idea. We might visit the library one night a week but other than that we don't do anything. It cuts down on the frustration for me and they seem to know that this is what happens. I typically don't ask them to do any there "chores" (except for putting coats and shoes away and Caidan emptying his lunch bo) until after dinner. It really does help with the crankiness. I also try to have dinner ready at about 5:30. They eat sooner and then have a little more play time before getting ready for bed.

But that time sucks too because it feels like my most productive time... I know... I have all day to be productive. But if you have read my blog before you know that I am NOT a morning person. Nope not at all. And if I get woken up it just makes it worse.  I really have tried to be a morning person... but I am just convinced its not me. I have always done better getting things done at night. When I was growing up I would do school later in the day (I was homeschooled)... I could just think better. Maybe if I went to "real" school growing up I would be better at getting this done earlier in the day... haha who am I kidding?  I wouldn't. I really do believe that this is me... but it does make it frustrating.

Maybe that is why Kynlee doesn't go to bed till later and if Chris is home sleeps in till 10am. and then decides to do this at 10pm. :) She is a little stinker. I had to go for that once a year check up at my doctors and he wanted to see a picture of the kids... he looked and Kynlee and said "she looks like a shit!" Well he wasn't wrong... :)

Where is Your Home?

Where do you call home? Is it where you live with your family or is it somewhere else where your family lives? Is it with another family or friends? I know where my home is now but I couldn't say that six years ago.

For the first ten years of my life I lived in Illinois. Its all I knew. A smaller town where the biggest thing in the town, at that time, was a Super Walmart. It really was great, or so I thought. Then my parents felt that God was calling them somewhere else. Which turned out to be Cincinnati, Ohio. When my parents first told me we where moving to Cincinnati I had no idea where Cincinnati was let a lone Ohio. Cincinnati was a very different place than the small town we had come from. Living in a small town it took only a couple minutes to get to anything (unless you were going to the mall), but living in Cincinnati everything was spread out. What used to take us two minutes to get to church now turned into twenty minutes.

There was a lot to get used to when we moved...a lot. But some how as a family we did. And in the ten years I lived in Cincinnati I grew. I grew up to be a woman. I learned things that I might not have learned living in a small town or had opportunities that I might not have been given. And now I realize I might have not met my amazing husband and had these beautiful children.

No one thought that anyone in our family would ever move back to that small town. (and honestly defiantly not me!) But everything changed when I met Chris. In the summer of 2006 right before I left to move to Houston, TX I feel in love with him. The summer in Texas was hard on a lot of levels but being away from someone you love is even harder. So at the end of that summer I moved back to Illinois with Chris. But it still wasn't what I called home.

For the first three years of our marriage I had still thought of home as where my parents and sisters and brother live. The feeling of not being home was hard especially after I had Caidan and then became pregnant with Kloe. Every time I left Cincinnati those first 3 years I would cry. I wouldn't even be out of Ohio and I would bawling. I hated hugging my family bye because I wanted to cry. But I didn't want them to see it. It wasn't that I was unhappy with Chris or that I didn't like where we were. Its just that my family was somewhere else. My sister are my best friends... so imagine moving away with out your best friend there. Plus I thought that I would always have kids and have my family close by. Another thing that was so hard was knowing that my family wanted us in Cincinnat just as much as I wanted to be there.

I can't tell you the exact time that it all changed for me, but it did. 4 years later! I remember driving into town saying, "We're home!" but when I had said that word "home" it felt like home. Like this is where I am supposed to be. That feeling of wanting to be in another state just didn't exist. The dogs where waiting for us at home. My own bed was at home. Our dysfunction of a life was home. My LIFE is here in my HOME in a small town in Illinois.

The way my perspective changed once I felt like this was home was so very different than I ever thought. I just really never thought that I could be so happy somewhere away from my family. But I was. And I was learning how to do things on my own.

Do you feel out of place where you are now? Do you think home is anywhere but where you are now? I always felt if I was unhappy someone that God would help. I didn't for once think that being unhappy and uncomfortable was just me ignoring what God was showing me. I am so happy here in this small town in Plano. I am part of a church where I have met some very amazing people. I have met moms in all different areas of life. I no longer leave my parents house crying. I no longer dream of living in Cincinnati. Now I dream of whatever Chris I dream about. Cause instead of just wanting to be somewhere other than where I am we can dream about being spontaneous and living somewhere completely different. (not that we would but you never know).

So... Where is Your Home?

2013 will be better...right??

I had this great post semi written about how 2013 was going to be a better year than 2012, blah blah blah.... But it just doesn't seem to be going that way and I really don't want to eat my words.

So far 2013 has sucked! :) Okay i might have had one or two good days in the last 17 days but so far it has sucked. I really do hate the hype of the "New Year." I always try to tell myself don't set your self up for something that you don't think is possible but I seem to do that a lot. And lets be honest to have 3 kids 5,4, and 18 months everything is unpredictable. What I think might happen today just might be scorched by something that happens with the kids. Maybe its just that my kids are young (and please say that this is the case) but everything that I do revolves around them. Whether I think it does or not it does.

I think I am just tired and frustrated. But I can't remember that last time I got a really good nights sleep (or I should say interrupted sleep in my own house), I don't know why my 18 month old refuses sleep so much. I asked the doctor about it who sent us to another doctor only for them to tell us it sounds more behavioral. Then she slept great for about a week later and now she is fighting every time we put her to sleep. Its frustrating because when I think we FINALLY have a good routine (if you can call it that) then BOOM shes gonna throw you another curve ball and you are going to have to start all over again. And then by the time you figure it out the BOOM happens all over again... or at least that seems how it has been the last 18 months.

Chris was sick since Christmas and it just took a toll on me... well Kynlee and Kloe were sick right before Christmas and both on antibiotics... then they both came down with the flue, then Caidan came down with the flu. Then Kloe and Kynlee went back to the doctor because they had bad coughs and nasty junk coming from their nose... Kloe still had an ear infection.... Chris and I both started to get sick around this time also... then we went to my parents... then we came home and went back to the doctor for all of us but Caidan. Kloe still had an ear infection... i had a sinus and Chris was bad. And Chris continued to get worse as we all got better. He was bad for about 10 days and is finally on the mend now, but all that sickness just takes a toll on me. Kids whine more when they are sick, you don't really (or shouldn't) take them any where. Plus you still need to do everything you should at home. And then by the time they go to bed you are ready too.

I am just struggling with parenting right now and finding a good balance for us all... which just seems unreachable to me. I know that there will be good days and bad, it just feel like we have bad days a lot.
I know I am just complaining and I really don't want anyone to feel sorry...but I need to vent and blogging for me gets the thoughts in my head out... and sometimes lets me focuses on other things...
So if you made it all the way through this THANK YOU!