Big thirty three!

Happy Birthday Craigy! You are always the one to let the kids stay up late and fall asleep in our bed, make me laugh when I'm crying and keep your cool when everything around you is falling apart. Your positive attitude and encouraging words do more for this family than you'll ever realize. We love you..."all the way to the mountains and back."

Happy Birthday Hallie and CJ!

Two years ago today I gave birth to our twins Hallie and CJ. It has been the fastest two years of my life! It has been filled with sleepless nights, unparalleled joy and tears of happiness, guilt, fear and fatigue.

They were born C-section. Hallie came out first and surprised us with her little cleft-lip. CJ came a few minutes later and had the face of Curious George. I've called him my little monkey since. Hallie weighed 4 lbs 5 oz and CJ was 5 lbs 14 oz. I still don't know how they both fit inside of me but I do remember how abnormally huge my stomach was. Craig just laughed every time he saw my naked body. In retrospect I'm glad I had him to help me see the humor in my hugely disfigured body.

They stayed in the hospital for 2 1/2 weeks after birth and I remember going to bed every night feeling so empty without them. When they finally came home I began to understand what true sleep deprivation was. 3 a.m. feedings were the hardest. I remember looking over at Craig feeding Hallie, his head bobbing up and down, eyes closed... then before I realized it I was doing the same thing! As they grew it became easier but I still remember many mornings going to get them out of their cribs, sitting in the floor and feeding them then falling asleep on their floor while they crawled all over me. I'd give anything for a few more minutes of sleep.

They love each other so much! When Hallie wakes up in the morning she shouts, "CJ! C JAAAAAAAAAAY!" until he sleepily responds, "No, no, no, no." Apparently he loves to sleep like his mom. They laugh at each other and comfort each other when they're sad. And every time I give CJ a snack he reaches out his other hand and says, "Hallie?"

They are my little miracles. (aren't they all?) We wanted them so badly and remembering how hard I prayed and hoped and dreamed about them makes them even more endearing. Happy Birthday to my sweet little double trouble....Hallie and CJ!

A night in the life of Gracie Bonham

Do you ever have moments when your kids do something that make you go "Wow, I am incredibly lucky to be your mom." Last night was one of those for me. Grace had to do an overnight sleep study at Primary Children's Medical Center. She's always been a terrible snorer and extremely restless in her sleep so her ENT wanted to do the study before he would remove her tonsils. He wanted to make sure there isn't anything else going on that we should know about. It took almost an hour and two grown men to get her all glued, taped and wrapped up for the study...Then she was supposed to go to sleep with all that junk on her! After finishing up with all the probes the guys verbally awarded Gracie with the "Bravest patient of the night award." She just giggled.

Throughout the night I could hear kids down the hall screaming "take it off" and didn't doubt that I might be screaming the same thing if I was in their place. I laid awake staring at the ceiling and thinking about that little girl in the bed next to me. She hasn't always taken these things well. There was a time when every doctor's visit included her kicking and screaming and me crying but slowly over the years she's become accustomed to it all; the poking, sticking and taping. She is learning to take it all with grace....I think we picked the right name for her after all.

Work in progress

My posts are growing fewer and farther between. I think its because of a combination of things: I am hearting the weather lately, spring cleaning is calling my name, and I've begun writing a column 3-4 times a week for examiner.com I love it! I've always loved to write and now I get the chance to do it more often and exercise that part of my brain that has been dormant for too long! I hope you will all check out my site and come back often. I just started so remember that it is a work in progress.

Girl's night out!

Pillow Talk

Craig finally returned from his mountain lion hunt a few days ago. I hate it when he's gone. It feels so wrong to go to bed without him. Almost eerie. I try to wear myself out completely so that when I finally do hit the sack I fall asleep quickly. Sometimes it works, others it doesn't. I just miss my chatty man. We always have great plans to go to bed early but as soon as the lights go out... the verbiage begins. "Wasn't it cute when Hallie ...?" "I wish I could turn back time to when..." There is never a shortage of conversation until either he or I start having slurred speech and half-sentences. It's all over from there until the next night. But when he's gone it surprises me how much I REALLY miss it. I'll be the first to admit that sometimes we drive each other crazy. But isn't it nice to know that at the end of the day all you want is to be beside the one you love. Happy Valentine's my love.

"Real Person?"

I love being a mother; wouldn't trade it for a million dollars but some days it would feel nice to be a "real person" for the day... A woman without snot smeared across her shirt or a gummy bear stuck to the bottom of her sock. How would it feel to wake up, get straight to work doing whatever task I set my mind to achieve that day and do it without 20 interruptions per minute? Not to mention trying to have a shower without someone opening the door every 30 seconds to tell me what someone else took from them, spilled on the floor or wrote on the wall. By now everyone reading this is thinking what a horrible mom. That's okay...I'm just saying what we are all thinking sometimes. Parenting is hard! Is this REALLY what we signed up for?

In light of the recent economy slump, I've begun looking for a job. At first the search was exciting. The prospect of someone paying me money for whatever talent I may have sounded very appealing. I could get up in the morning, be that "real person" for a few hours then come home again. Like a split-identity or something, right? So it seemed until the actual applying, interviewing and phone-calls began...

Suddenly I was overwhelmed with what I will have to sacrifice if I go to work. All the walks on sunny afternoons. Staying in bed till 10 am watching cartoons with kids piled all over me. Sticky kisses and scraped knees. This is what I dreamed of doing my entire life and when I think of leaving it behind everyday it absolutely breaks my heart. With every one of these messy little stinkers in my house I have given up another little piece of myself but in doing so have gained so much more. I have learned to love, to feel and to dream what someday might hold for each of them.

So while I may be out in the work force shortly, I've learned an important lesson for now: Cherish it...Every second of it! Cherish untangling Barbie's hair from the Matchbox car wheels. Cherish untying the socks wrapped around the big dinosaurs to hold on the baby dinos. Cherish the laughs and the tears and the fact that I can be here for ALL of it today....because we never know what tomorrow brings.

This IS what I signed up for. The hardest, most exhausting, messiest, most emotionally draining position in the world! And the most priceless...Motherhood.