A Fort Kind Of Night

Another night of flashlight tag, chase, kid shows? No, let's spice it up and create a huge daddy inspired fort city, otherwise known as Pillow Corner, Blanket Town.  This is has been fit with 2 trees, a surrounding road and a car to boot.  We've added a few wall lights for ambience and enjoyed an evening of book reading with flashlights and a lot of laughs.  Here are a few pictures of our family fun night.

Ouchie

Oh Baby, No Baby!

Each night, I spend individual time with both Gavin and Sophia where we snuggle, sing a song and talk about random things before they go to sleep.  Gavin has been heart breaking lately as he tries to make it last as long as possible, literally tugging on my shirt as I go.

Clinging to my shirt he says "I love you so much mama and it's hard to let go."  These words ring in my head as I walk away thinking about it.  It is truly hard to hear such words; however, I am so thankful that I even have the opportunity to hear them.  For many years, I wondered if we would ever have children.  My doctor indicated that this is not likely and we tried to beat odds for so long that we didn't know if our wishes would ever come true. 

Now, we have two beautiful children and we decided, when Sophia came into our world, that our blessings would stop there; however, Gavin is convinced that this is not the case.  He has been adamant that we really need another baby.  "For Sophia, so she can have a sister, because she really needs one," is what he'll say.  He also claims that he'll call her "cutie pie," but if it is a boy, he can still call him cutie pie. 

I keep trying to remind him that we are a family of four and it will only be us.  I have made attempts at clarifying we do not have enough space in our car, but he has it all figured out.  He said we have four car seats  and that we can follow each other and "all of us can go the speed limit."  The baby, Gavin and daddy would ride in one car and Sophia and I can be in the other car.  ...sounds perfectly logical doesn't it? 

Since our night-night talks, many conversations have come up, encouraged by Gavin that we are in need of another baby.  With questions being answered like, "how did our skin grow in your belly?" to "how does a baby come out of your belly?"  Oh how difficult it will be to squelch his new dreams of a soft little one, because I understand his want to have a new little companion. 

At this point, I am thankful that I have had my many little moments with my little people.  It is "hard to let go" of them as I watch their youth slip away, knowing I will never get this again.  In the meantime, to make it a little easier, I'll refer to both of them as "cutie pie"  and look through pictures of my beautiful lovelies as they grew up faster than I ever imagined. 

So Many Little Things

Here are a few "little" things that make me smile A LOT, and sometimes drive me crazy too.

* Sophia ALWAYS wants to dress up as a princess and get married.

* Gavin has to go potty in the middle of dinner, every single night.
* Sophia gets EVERYTHING in her hair, and then sticks it in her mouth...mid-day snack, not sure.
* When Sophia starts to say something to me and can't remember, she'll say, "um, um, I love you mama." I don't mind her forgetfulness, because it means I get to hear nice words.
* When Gavin gets excited at soccer, he jumps around like an gazelle.  It's pretty cute.

* Both of them ALWAYS ask for a snack when they enter the car, even if they just had one 10 seconds prior.
* Gavin has been doing this cheese thing with his tongue.  I guess he thinks it's cute.  It's not his best look.

* I love it when they come up with clever imagination games like "turtle."  I'll be sad when this is gone.
* Gavin's favorite cereal is frosted shredded wheat.  Out of all the other options, which he has tried, that is his all-time favorite.  Then I think...is he an old man at heart?
* Sophia's favorite thing to do when she gets in the car is scrounge around for old snack crumbs, which I think she leaves intentionally.  Gross, but she'll eat 5 day old popcorn or pretzels if she finds it in the car.  Maybe this is why she likes to leave my car looking like a tornado hit the snack bag.
* Gavin is our "game guy."  He will play ANY game at ANY time.  He loves games.
* Sophia squeezes as much toothpaste as possible onto her toothbrush.  She has officially been banned from applying it herself.
* Gavin lines his cars around the table and has them participate in "races," which usually consist of pushing them forward, finding out which one you want to win, and making sure it doesn't. 
* Both Sophia and Gavin adore books, for which I am very thankful.  It is a privilege at our house.
* When Gavin has something in his mind, like racing, he can only focus on that one thing, racing, racing, racing, can I race with a racy race race?  Kind of funny.
* If we see a train, it's a lucky ducky day.  We go to visit the red caboose every morning on our way to daycare.  We even wish it a good day.
* "I rocket-ship love you, I hope you have a good night, a good sleep, I love you, I'll see you in the morning and I love you more than 109 million rainbows." -Gavin and then, repeated by Sophia.

Just random thoughts that make me think I'm one lucky ducky lady.  I don't want to forget the ordinary things.  They are equally as important to my heart as the big events. 

Bug Tastes

Unfortunately, Gavin has been experiencing yet another round of ear infection issues.  This is with his third set of tubes and two sets of antibiotics.  There are times that I think, 'When will this ever end for him?' On top of this, he is battling allergy season, which has already been a doozie, a swollen taste bud and a stiff neck.  He seriously looks like he is going through a war zone sometimes.  Poor guy.

Tonight we tried to lighten the tone of all the sickness and grumpiness and had a little family fun night with Chinese food and games.  We played Willy's Wiggly Web, Lalaloopsy, Red Rover and Fleas on a Dog...yes, that is the name of the game and the point of the game, I could have been a millionaire if I had thought of it. We had a great night of laughs and we all had a good time of silliness.  It truly did our hearts good.

On the way upstairs, we were having so much fun and laughing when Sophia busts out with, "Gavin, show daddy your bug tastes!"
     "What are you talking about?" Todd responds back.
     "Do you want to see Gavin's blue taste bug?" she says seriously, meaning taste bud.
BWAAHHHHHAAAHHH-----Blue Taste Bugs! What in the world?! You can't make this stuff up! What a great night of laughing and silly fun.  I would never have imagined that a swollen taste bud could bring us such joy or rather the kids that are concerned about the swollen "taste bug." Pretty soon, they both will be rolling their eyes at us over this story.  I don't care.  It will be etched in our memories forever. 

SCABAHDOO!

For some reason, sitting at the dinner table is the perfect opportunity to allow all gasses to escape from the body. At least my children think so.  Constantly we hear gas noise and giggles, knowing that this will trigger annoyance.  Gavin lets off a few, Sophia lets out a belch the size of Texas. 

     "What in the world was that?" I ask her, shocked that a little girl could sound like a 1,000 pound cow.

     "It was the people in my throat.  They are yelling scabahdoo!"

Your guess is as good as mine as to what in the world this means.  How can I possibly be angry at people yelling in her throat.  You have to admit...it was pretty creative.

5,000 Piece Puzzles

Chilly?  He's got a jacket ready that he's stashed in the back for when I'll need it.
Hot?  He's asking me if I'd like a cool drink.
Tired?  "Take a nap,"  he says as he states he'll finish cleaning up the dishes in the sink.

How is it that he just knows what to say?  What to do?  How to make me feel better?  I have a hypothesis, but I don't quite know how the magic works.  Here is my thinking...When God leads you to your soul mate, they are just so in-tune with who you are, how you feel, and what you need that they themselves almost feel YOU.  That is the only explanation as to how couples, such as my relationship with Todd, works in this inexplicable manner. 

I'm not saying that all moments are perfect in every second of our marriage, no...let's be real; however, I am stating that there is an undeniable aura-like feeling around how we interact with each other.  I refer to it as "the back of the hand."  We are each other's back of the hand as we move with the other, know where we are going and generally agree with the movements, but we can also "slap" some sense into the other one when necessary. 

I have noticed that not all couples have this puzzle piece.  I'm imagining it would be like having the whole 5000 piece puzzle put together minus the upper right corner piece.  How crappy would that feel to have all that work put in, all that heart and soul invested in seeing a completed product only to find out that the box never contained that last, missing piece?

Well, I have the piece, in fact, all the pieces.  There are days that I realize that I have sections of my puzzle that are put together incorrectly, but I am confident that all 5000 of my pieces are accounted for.

Cheers to the love of my life.  As this Valentine's Day is coming upon me, I realize that I'm one lucky lady and, let's admit it, he is one lucky fellow too. :)