Holy Moses

On Sunday night, I was tired and after a long weekend of playing and enjoying family time we went to bed early. I passed out and was sound asleep, which isn't always typical, I'm normally sleeping with one eye & ear open, listening for Flynne.

Around 2:30am I woke up suddenly to a large furry excited figure barreling toward me in bed. I freaked. Literally, jumped as sideways and backwards as I could into my husband, while screaming. I guess my husband heard him coming & wasn't awakened by my screaming, thank goodness! Because if he was, I'm sure I'd just have been "over-reacting", like I do with 99% of everything else in my life, according to him!

Moses, our big furry white golden retriever, is not an upstairs dog. Just in the last month or so, Moses has been allowed to sleep outside of his crate, the first time in his almost two years of life. Also, up until now he was such a baby that he wouldn't even think about going through a doorway that was partially opened, or the gates that are all over the house.

He is definitely full of energy and loves people & attention. Even though Moses can be high maintenance, he is a part of our family & we love him tons.

Dinner AND a BaBy!

Saturday, at 4 o'clock, I decided we needed a family outing. So, I convinced my husband that it would be a great idea to go to Mansfield to Outback for dinner, then to Sam's Club for essentials and a quick return to Target. And, since I said "family outing" this meant that we also took Flynne & Moses. (Moses will sit in the car for hours, as long as he is with us!)

Even though I called ahead to Outback, we still had to wait about 5 minutes to get seated, not an issue, but they were super busy. We got seated and I cleaned off the high chair for Flynne (so what if I'm an anal mom). Flynne was eating puffs and having a good old time. I even made the comment, stupid me, how it was nice that it was a little louder and didn't really matter if Flynne had a sudden outburst of sound!

Right before our food came is when she decided that she no longer wanted to be in her high chair and flailed her body around until we took her out, while screaming! Welp, there went our nice family outing. Billy decided he should pick up his eating speed (maybe the first time in a year he's had to sacrifice a meal) while I tried to get Flynne to eat something. He then took Flynne to go walk around, because all she really wants right now is to be independent, and I seriously devoured my salad in less than 7 minutes, which is typical, because all moms know that if you want to eat, you better do it fast!

We made it to Sam's Club and as usual I managed to spend too much money in under 20 minutes and I'm not joking, every time my husband says, "did you know you were going to spend that much?" And every time I remind him that the two boxes of diapers add up to almost $80! Raising a child is not cheap! But neither is managing a household and feeding a family! AND they are ALL worth it :)

Moral of our night, "we need more date nights". We attempted to go out, it failed! At least we can say we tried! Here's to a night out as a couple soon & here's to all our dinners in as a family, because honestly I wouldn't trade them for the world!

Bathroom Remodel

This past week flew by. It seems like I've been super busy & lots has happened, but I don't have too much to talk about.

Flynne's been teething & a little on the fussy side. Thank goodness for ibuprofen, I seriously think she knows when she needs it AND that it makes her feel better. Or maybe, I want to think she knows that because, after all, don't we all want our kids to be geniuses. Teething and fussiness also mean she hasn't hardly napped at all for the last week. This is normally not a huge deal, but I was given a book to read from a friend that was REALLY good! All I wanted was 30 minutes to read, I'm not that picky!

Instead, over my 4 day weekend I don't think I got hardly any pages completed, oh well, I did get in a ton of quality time with my sweet girl. She's walking all over & surprising us with words & sounds all the time.

My husband slaved away all weekend working in our new bathroom. He tiled the floor (all by himself) and did an AMAZING job! He's so talented, what a catch! On Wednesday night, we started painting the bathroom once Flynne was in bed. It went pretty smooth & quick! We went out of our box on the color choice & are anxious to see how it all comes together. I'll post a picture of our color choices and let you guess which one we chose!

The walls are painted, cabinets are in & one light is hung! I'll post updated picks soon!

Valentine's Day Love

On Valentine's Day I had conferences until 8, one of the longest days of the school year, and the second longest time I've been away from Flynne. I know, I should be very grateful that I have a job where I see my child more than others get to see their own. It's still hard.

Conferences are kind of a joke sometimes, parents don't schedule times & it's a first-come first-serve style. Being a middle school teacher I hardly ever have any parents, which makes it even harder to sit in my classroom from 2 to 8. My fellow teacher and I have great plans of completing progress reports, paperwork, etc. during this time, however it NEVER happens. We share a classroom and have become very good at distracting each other, always. And maybe a bit of her procrastination has rubbed off on me, nevertheless, I don't know how I'd get through some days without her!

Sometimes we like to distract other teachers too, and on this night we had too much fun making our husbands Valentine's Day cards, chatting, & having probably more fun than some of the other teachers would prefer. We don't care though, it helps is get through, and what's wrong with having some fun on the job!

While I was chatting it up in another classroom, I was surprised by a parent in the hallway, who also works at Annette's Victorian Garden, with a beautiful arrangement of flowers from Billy & Flynne! What a pleasant surprise! They were & still are gorgeous! I'm truly blessed by my thoughtful husband, & best friend.

I feel like I'm blessed in so many aspects of my life, and on this day & always, I appreciate my best friends at school, my husband, Flynne & family!

Lutherans & Catherans

On Thursday, one of my students tells me that he did his homework, but he left it at church last night. This is a common excuse from him lately and I kind of just shook my head. (Sidenote: this student just started going to church and has probably never been to church in his life before now, I think this is great & highly encourage it.) He then proceeds to tell me that it was Ash Wednesday and shows me the bulletin as proof he was there. I said, "I know it was Ash Wednesday, I'm a Christian too!" His reply, "Mrs. Chandler, I'm not a Christian, it's a Lutheran church." Funny, right? Well, I didn't laugh since I knew this is all new to him. I tried to explain to him that there are many denominations, but that if you believe in God, then you are a Christian too. He said, matter of factly, "I know, there are Lutherans and Catherans..." At this point I was walking him to the door, smiled and told him to have a good night. Bless his heart, he meant Catholics, I think!

This student is the same student who has an extreme number of missing assignments and poor grades. The other day during intervention, he had a Bible, Catechism book & notecards on his desk. I proceeded to ask him what he was doing. Making flash cards for church! Well, that's great and all, but what about all the missing school work you could AND should be working on. I had to tell him to put it away and that now wasn't the time to work on that.

As I was telling a small group of teachers about this, they laughed and then one said, "maybe you should let him work on those notecards, at least he would be doing something." Hmm..that's a great thought, but where do you draw the line? This then leads me to my next thoughts. Wouldn't it be so much better to be able to have God back in school? Why can't we talk about Him? What if I would be able to introduce other kids to Christ and the awesome things he brings to our lives? (I know I could teach at a private school, but my point is that there are tons of kids who aren't fortunate enough to have parents that take them to Church & these are some of the kids that need Him the most). I can't imagine being in 8th grade and just now getting introduced to God, just now going to church for the first time.

I think back to my own childhood, how I took going to church and being raised in a Christian based home with good morals and ethics, for granted. How could I be so naive? Doesn't everyone go to church on Sunday mornings? Doesn't everyone go to Sunday School? Don't all families pray together before dinner and say prayers before bed? Growing up I dreaded Sunday mornings, "dad, do we HAVE to go to church?" His reply was always the same, "Erin, you GET to go to church". My brother and I would grumble, but what I didn't know, was how fortunate I was. I didn't know there were other little kids everywhere that probably really wanted to go to church, who wanted to see what we did on Sunday mornings and wanted to know who this God person was.

I hope my husband and I can instill in Flynne the "GET TOs" of life and not the "HAVE TOs". I hope we are able to raise her with good morals & ethics, and start a strong Christian foundation for her, like my parents did for me. I hope she WANTS to go to church and share what she learns with her friends. I hate that I took a lot of my childhood for granted, but I'm sure we all do, until we grow up and realize what's important & what truly matters in life.

**this post can definitely be elaborated on & I already have many different thoughts that I could add...for another day!

Hair Makeover

I'm quite compulsive when it comes to my hair. It normally goes something like this, I can't stand it anymore, I'm chopping it off. I then hurry and text my beautician (is that really what they are still called?) and see how soon I can get in. I make an appointment, and then stew about whether I really want to chop it off. I'm now sitting in the chair and tell her to cut it to my chin. Really? Yes, that's about 3 inches! Or 5 or 6, she's says! Go for it, just cut it and be done. She does and I love it!

Now, my normal cheap or lazy self would let my new cute style grow another 5 or 6 inches before a trim and/or cut. I really like my new cut and semi-promised her that I would keep up with it this time! We'll see.

**I got my hair cut on a Saturday, so going back to work on Monday was as if I was a totally different person. Students, both boys and girls, are extremely observant. Immediately they were making comments, but I had one that stuck out! I walked into one of my classrooms and one of the students said "Mrs. Chandler, you got your hair cut, I love it!" Thanks, I replied. Then another student (boy) speaks up and says, "WHYYYY?" (while sort of putting his hands up). I turned around & laughed and then asked him, "who are you, my husband?" He laughed & admitted he liked my hair longer. For real, these 8th graders are pretty darn opinionated & don't have a problem with sharing their thoughts.

Temper Tantrums, already???

Literally, on Flynne's 1st Birthday, I witnessed her first temper tantrum. Holy moly! I was kind of in awe and couldn't really believe it was happening. What was wrong with her. She enjoys playing with our phones and watching "Gigglebellies" on YouTube. I had a video "If You're Happy & You Know It" on the phone (how ironic!) and once it ended she was so mad. Threw the phone down, and then proceeded to throw her body against the floor and kick her legs. Flynne isn't around other kids much, which leads me to this question... Where in the world did she learn this? I really didn't know how to respond, but I do know that everything I did only made her more mad! Both my husband and I are hoping this isn't the beginning of the terrible twos, since she is JUST one! I'm continually reminded by many, that OUR sweet daughter may have a little bit of her momma in her! Good for her! She's blessed! :)