They Call Me Mom

They are 5 and 2...
And they call me Mom.

They fall down and get back up. They do super cool things that they want me to watch (over and over and over). They are thirsty. They need a snack. They have to go to the bathroom every night after they lay down in bed. They play EVERY sport in my living room and knock over only the things that are breakable. They build the coolest train tracks and incorporate road construction into every set up. They put Wet Floor signs in the bathroom EVERY morning when I get out of the shower and they have a stop light in their playroom. They have basketball hoops on every floor and show me replays of every shot they make. They still like Gangnam Style. They think I'm funny...

And they call me Mom.

37 Reasons I Just Can't

My whole body hurt when I got home from work yesterday. Office work - it's not for the weak. It was cold in my cute little office and apparently I sat with my muscles tensed all day long because when I got in my car and blasted the heat and started to thaw, everything started to ache.
I hate getting old.
And being cold.

Anyway, I didn't think that my cold day in the office was going to be anything worth writing about because, well, a cold day in the office is not really something that I thought most people would find to be a compelling read AND I didn't want to seem all whiney and complainy and bratty. "Poor Courtney - sitting in her very own office at her very awesome job feeling very cold and very sorry for herself. Isn't life just very awful." Yeah. I wasn't really looking for sympathy over a chilly office...I just wanted to thaw out and enjoy a family dinner to celebrate my dad's birthday and go home and watch The Blacklist. But instead, the all over tension manifested itself into a massive tension headache and I was on the verge of crossing over to the "scary mommy" version of myself in a hurry.

Appreciating Now What I Know I'm Going To Miss Then

Firsts can be fun.
First dance, first kiss, first time living away from home, first jobs…
First birthdays, first steps, first words...
First road trip, first time flying, first time seeing the ocean…

Firsts are where you start. They are the stepping stones to all of your nexts. They mark the beginning of something new for you and sometimes the end of something else.

When you are a parent,  you basically measure it all in firsts. First time sleeping through the night, first time climbing out of crib, first bite of real food, first sippy cup, first tooth, first step, first word. For a while, everything is a first.

And then, without you even realizing that it is happening, the firsts aren’t acknowledged quite as much because they start to blend together. After the onslaught of firsts during the first year, you start to notice less individual firsts and start seeing more of the whole. Suddenly you are seeing this little person emerging and while you still catch a first here and there, you find yourself randomly staring at your little one wondering how they got where they are so damn fast.

What Makes You Beautiful

Just a couple of days ago, I noticed one of my friends tagged in a post on Facebook where she was told to post 5 pictures of herself that made her feel beautiful. Slowly, my news feed has started to fill with more and more of these groups of 5 pictures posted by friends who have been tagged in this little "challenge" and I don't think I have ever enjoyed a little Facebook mini trend more than I am loving this one.

It's not much of a secret that I am my own worst critic. I can find the flaw in any good that I do and in a flood of compliments, the thing that tends to stick with me the longest is the one person who didn't think I did enough.

I honestly doubt that I'm alone.

It's easy to be hard on yourself. Social media is plastered with picture perfect images that have a tendency to make us focus on everyone else's awesomeness while we are sitting in our pajamas next to a massive pile of laundry. It's easy to look at someone's amazing vacation pictures and be jealous that you can't afford to go on vacation all of the time...never mind the fact that you just got back from your own vacation a week ago and you honestly don't know how many vacations that person has taken. You could be 15 vacations up on that chick, but you still are jealous. Let's face it, If you let it, Facebook can kinda make you feel like crap.

But something about this one just stood out to me.

10 Reasons I Annoy The Crap Out Myself

I am annoying the bejesus out of myself this week. My level of annoyance with myself is so high that it rivals the annoyance caused by walking into the laundry room to find a pair of jeans on the floor right next to the hamper. Right. Freaking. Next to it. You were so close! You were in the right room! You made it all the way to the hamper! You couldn't have just gone the extra mile and extended your arm about 2 inches before dropping the jeans from your grasp?

Ah! I need to focus! This is not about other people being annoying, it is about me being annoying.

Focusing really shouldn't be that hard but for some reason, I have zero ability to focus this week. I have interrupted my own projects so many times that nearly every single thing I have attempted to do can be considered a project. Pour the kids a cup of juice? No big deal. Well, no big deal if I wouldn't have stopped to read a message from work, realized that I need to take out the garbage, started trying to figure out where the stench in the kitchen is coming from since it seemed to be coming from somewhere other than the trash, cleaned off the sticky spot on the counter that I found as I walked towards to the sink to see if it was the smelly culprit, grabbed my phone again to add counter top cleaner to the grocery list, done a mental check of what day of the week it was and who got paid when this week, and...

Ice Cream, Brothers, And The Things That Make It All Worth While

I have been having a lot of moments lately. Being a parent of a 5 year old and a 2 year old lends itself to a lot of emotionally charged moments. Actually, being a parent at all lends itself to a lot of emotionally charged moments.

It's life. With kids. There are a lot of moments.

There are a million moments that fly by so incredibly fast yet feel so incredibly long when you are going through them. There are days that I never want to repeat and there are seconds that I wish would have lasted hours. There are moments that are so adorable and awesome that I can almost feel my heart breaking at the thought that someday my little dudes will be too big and too cool to share those moments with me and there are moments when I feel like I'm walking a very fine line between having my shit together and losing it all entirely.

There are a lot of moments.

Postpartum Depression, PUPPS, And My Son's 2nd Birthday

I've been extremely moody lately. My fuse is short, my tendency to yell is greater than my tendency to speak, and I want it to be someone or something's fault. I don't want it to be just because I am a crabby beast.

My youngest little dude turned 2 yesterday and it wasn't until he went to bed last night after our day of awesome family fun that I realized that my extreme bitchiness that has plagued me recently seems to be stemming from my reflecting back on when he was born.

DO NOT GET ME WRONG! I love everything about being that little boy's mommy. He brings about more happiness and laughter (and hilarious faces) than I ever could have hoped for. I think most parents have a tendency to reflect back to the actual day their child was born as each birthday approaches. And while Blake's birth will always rank up as one of the best days of my life, sadly, I still feel a little anxiety and a LOT of guilt when I think about the time leading up to and following his birth.

I had a really really hard time with everything that came along with having Blake and the parts of it that messed me up the most are currently thrusting me into a state of serious guilt and it is damn near suffocating.

Happy Mother's Day - To The Mom I Can Only Hope To Sort Of Be

I appreciate Mother's Day in an entirely different way now that I am a mom.

That is a pretty obvious statement, but my appreciation is a bit different than you might think.

Yes, I appreciate the homemade cards and crafts that are so adorably made at preschool or at my own kitchen table more than my little boys will ever know, and just the thought of possibly eating a meal at home where I didn't have to cook or clean or prep or care is more than I could ever want.

But my motherly appreciation for Mother's Day is not of what I receive tomorrow or whatever we may do. And while my appreciation is also for all of the moms who are out their doing their mom thing, all of the moms who have struggled struggles that the world may never know and for all of the moms who have been doing this FAR longer than I...the true appreciation I have for Mother's Day is much more simple than all of that.

My appreciation on Mother's Day is simply for my mom.

Life Isn't Fair...But There Is Always Something To Be Thankful For

I didn't know what to wear last night.

I stood in my closet and wasn't sure what to wear or how to accessorize.

If you know me at all, you aren't shocked. Really there have only been about 2 times in my life when I have felt confident that my outfit or accessory choice was anywhere near right and I typically just go with whatever I have on when I am out of time and have to walk out of the house and it has only gotten worse since I have had kids.

The only reason any of it was even a second thought last night was because where I was going was to celebrate the life of someone who had more sense of style than anyone I have met in my entire life.

The thing about life is that it is a million different things all wrapped into one and sometimes, like right now, it is impossible to separate all of those things into anything that makes any sort of sense.

Life is beautiful and fragile and heartbreaking and perfect. It is happy and sad and terrible and amazing. It is busy and lonely and hopeful and hopeless.
It is full of millions and millions of moments that shape you, but it is how you choose to handle those moments, what you choose to make of those moments, who you choose to impact with those moments that make you who you are.

Life is a whole big bunch of things...but often times, fair isn't one of them.

The Type Of Mom I Didn't Set Out To Be

I had a whole different blog to write today. It was kind of funny kind of cute and it had lots of fun pictures. I was going to keep it light today. I was going to post something entirely different.

And then we sat down to do homework.

Ben has never been one for coloring or writing or even drawing. It is just not his thing.
I never really pushed it because it didn't seem necessary. Judge me of you must, I am one who thinks that the more you force something on a kid, the less interest they are going to show.

He can write his name, has known his letters for as long as I can remember and he can count up to...well, he will count until you tell him to stop.

I'm not saying I have a gifted kid and am not going barf "oh my gosh my kid is the smartest kid on the planet" all over this blog. I'm not saying he is behind or ahead or that he has hit every benchmark.

I'm saying that parenting scares the crap out of me.

It Will Always Be So Much More Than "Just A Game"

Sports are not just something we do around here.
They aren't games, they aren't hobbies and they aren't ways to fill our time...
Sports are something we live.

I remember the first time I saw my husband cry.
We were 18 years old and had just pulled into the parking lot of a Bakers Square to get some food after the last basketball game of our senior year of high school.
I put my mom's minivan into park and looked over at him and saw the tears rolling down his cheeks. I had no idea what to do, no idea what to say and was almost afraid to move.

He doesn't cry when he is sad, he doesn't yell when he is angry and the only reason I know when he is nervous is because I have been around 16 years and I've caught on to his mannerisms.
He was then and is now the steadiest line I have ever seen.
His composure during a downslide is one that I wish I could have ever.
Heartbreak or happy, up by 50, pitching a 17 strike out game or getting eaten alive on the mound you would never know by looking at him.
He is as steady as it goes.

Before We Had Kids, We Were Really Good At Us

I am Mama.
I give in to the pleading eyes that want to read one more book. I fall victim to the smile that begs to stay up a little bit later to play a few more rounds of tackle in the living room and the little tug at my pant leg that wants to be held. I soften at the change of tone that my two littles know will always get them what they want and I forgive a temper tantrum with a single I'm sorry.

I am Mommy.
I sleep in rocking chairs with them when their little noses can't breathe through their own colds at night. I am the neck they bury their heads in when they are sad and the person who steals them out of the arms of whoever picked them up after a bad fall because I know I can make it better with a hug and a kiss. I calm nerves and rub backs and sing songs at 2:00 in the morning when they have tummy aches.

I am a mom.
It's who I am and what I do. I mom all day long...even when I'm not momming. From the moment I earned that title, it became impossible to not be changed by it. In every decision I made from that moment on, there was a new person influencing me. No matter how big or how small, I am completely incapable of making a decision without those two little humans of mine floating around in my head.

I read an article tonight that made me stop and think about the time we spend being mom, and the time we stop spending being a part of a couple. How right this girl was. What if a section of those birthing classes was devoted to a little friendly reminder of how you got there in the first place.
No, not that.I'm talking about the two people who decided to start that family...the two people who you were before you decided to become more.

When Facebook Makes You Feel Like A Bad Parent, Just Read This

I signed onto Facebook the other day and had the sweetest message from a friend I went to college with telling me that I make her feel like a bad parent on a daily basis.

I was totally flattered.

That kind of makes me sound like a jerk face, but I am relatively hard on myself, so it was nice to hear that! I have gotten lots of compliments lately on a couple of the pictures of projects and accomplishments that I have posted, and while they have all made me feel super awesome, they have also reminded me of just how deceiving this whole social media / massive race to post the best picture of your kid in your perfectly clean house really is.

I'm a victim of it...daily.
Pretty house. Great big yard. Super cute cloth diaper. Skinny mom of 3. No laundry on the floor. Beautifully painted walls. Gorgeous hair. Delicious dinner that I couldn't have even made before I had kids. Happy baby. How does she look that good after just having a baby? Awesome wardrobe. Dinner with her kids and husband...

Things My Kids Have Ruined

I am one of those who truly believes that my life is better because of my kids.
I see things differently now that I have them and I enjoy so much more because of them.
But with all of the good that they have brought...they have taken a few things down with them.
And now, a list of things my kids have ruined.

1 - Songs.
While they have made some songs more enjoyable, they have actually done a really good job ruining plenty of them. Any song with a swear in it? "Mom. Mom. Did you hear that? They said a bad word. Mom, you say that word...and it's bad." Awesome. And thanks.

We were driving in the car a few weeks ago when a song I didn't recognize came on the radio and I hear a genuinely excited voice in the back seat ask me to turn the volume up. "This is Daddy's faaaavorite song. We need to listen to it super loud." So, I turn up the volume super loud (something I typically do only when someone is screaming at the top of their lungs and I just don't want to hear it anymore) and I wait to hear something that I recognize...but that doesn't happen. Then I start to think it sounds like Lady Gaga and now I'm REALLY curious because I have not really ever known Joe to be a big Lady Gaga fan.

And then I hear it.

Firsts & Lasts

Out of nowhere tonight my littlest little guy started dancing in the middle of the living room to the song playing in between worlds on Super Mario Bros.  He was cracking himself up and didn't care at all that nobody seemed to be paying much attention.

I swear, Blake has grown up more in the past week than even seems possible. 

I feel like he is taller, smarter, funnier and brattier than he was just a few days ago...and as much as I love it is as much as I hate it. 

I sat down on the couch just to watch him in all of his silly glory and I had this familiar knot in my stomach. It's the same knot every time. It's not a tear jerker, it's not the result of something awful I tried to make for dinner and it's not the knot that I get when I realize that I forgot to do something really important. 

It is the knot that pops up out of nowhere when something makes me stop for a second and realize how very fast time flies by. 

Yes...My 1 1/2 Year Old Has His Own iPad. No...I Don't Feel Bad.

Both of our boys got iPad Minis for Christmas.

Yes...both boys. The almost 5 year old and the 1 1/2 year old. 

There is the occasional judgmental stare that follows my telling some people that, but honestly,  those don't bother me all that much.

Yes. My 1 1/2 year old has his own iPad. He also has a temper and a pretty decent screen protector on it, although I am fairly certain that is not the main point of concern when said judgers are in the middle of judging me. But if you are reading this as a judger and were concerned solely for the protection of the iPad...rest assured that we have it set to withstand the wrath of Blake. 

It kind of makes me laugh when I get these looks, honestly. 

The Anti-Resolution Resolution

I am really not a fan of New Year's resolutions, and I refuse to make one. I mean honestly, I already have a list of things I want to do more of, or things I want to be better at....I don't need a New Year's Resolution added to this mix. Really.

Even the daily goals I set for myself are so high that I rarely go to bed thinking I have done enough. And, on the off chance that I do feel like I got it all done, it is 2:30 in the morning and I get about 3 hours of sleep before my alarm goes off and Joe is yelling at me to either wake up or just stop bothering to set an alarm at all. So I get out of bed all cranky and tired, because nobody should attempt to function on as little sleep as I do, and I start out my day feeling like I have fallen behind before it even starts. 

I power through the day with ridiculous amounts of caffeine and I stop to eat whenever I think about it and then I wonder why I feel like I am literally dying. And no, I did not just misuse the word "literally" there. Just ask my family and a few of my closest friends...I am so tired that I actually have convinced myself that I am dying (again...because I convinced myself of this last year when I was crying because it was my last Christmas).