These are my people

Being a mom of 4 kids 9 and under, I don't have many dull moments. If I do happen upon one it usually is followed by some sort of chaos, someone screaming, a huge mess, someone starving or bleeding...I have a few dramatic children, so nearly anything can be made into a crisis (we've had a few rough moments about which way the wind was blowing in the window). You can't make this stuff up. 

However, as they are growing bigger, more of my moments are filled with interacting with them, watching them, playing with them, rather than actually tending to their needs. No one is nursing anymore, only the youngest is in diapers and they can all feed themselves (for the most part). 

Every once in a while I get to watch them without them being aware. A glimpse at who they are trying to be, a moment of make believe, of mimicking an older sibling (or me!), a moment lost in their own thoughts. Lately, as this happens I keep being in awe of these people. These little beings that have been so attached to me are growing into small humans. They each see the world in their own unique way, have their own reactions and responses to each situation as it presents itself and each add to our family in such a special way. 

They're each growing at their own pace, but the end point is obvious from the biggest down to the smallest of them. One day they will each grow fully into their own person. They won't need me anymore. All the ways that I spend my days busily caring for them will disappear as they will have learned to not only care for themselves, but for others. 

This simple fact amazes me. I know this is what motherhood is about. Shaping and molding children to one day contribute to this world, but to watch it begin to unfold before my own eyes, well, it's a little bit miraculous. These are my people. The people I love and care for. The people who I grew for months on end and rocked and nursed at all hours of the night. These are my people and I love them, I find them amazing, interesting and complex. 

These are my people. 

The Same New Beginnings

We're settling into routine out west and this year was the first year since I've been a mom that the beginning of the school year has looked the same as the previous one. We still had moments of wondering what the class would be like missing a few friends, a few tears over the end of summer (not only from me...), and a small amount of anxiety over the new beginnings that the school year brought, but it was nice to have it all be familiar. It was nice to expect and anticipate the routine that would be coming. To know what our days would look like and to be eager to return to familiar friends and activities. 

The big kids started school a few weeks earlier this year, but Ginny's preschool still waited to start until after the late labor day. This gave the littles and I a few weeks to do a few final visits to the zoo and playgrounds and soak up the last few days of summer. It was wonderful. We missed the bigs, but it was also so fun to see Wiley and Ginny lean on each other as playmates, making the transition from a house full to just the other for entertainment. 

This mama heart is full. It is great to have confidence in where I send my kids each day. They each have good teachers this year that will help shape them in the coming months. Ginny is in love with her preschool teacher and is already eagerly anticipating joining Lucy and Murray next year at their school. I'm pretty sure everyone will know her before she steps in for her first day and she will feel like the queen bee in kindergarten. She's a hoot how she chats up anyone who will listen once we're on campus. 

New beginnings none the less. It's all the same, familiar, but different. 

Lucy's in 4th grade and beginning to make that transition towards middle school. She's started playing soccer after school and is joining handbells (forgoing band because she didn't want another instrument to practice at home). We're starting to see friendships become more solid and she's becoming more aware of her peers and social things. 

Murray...well he's our steady eddy. Still all about running and being one of the fastest boys in his class. He's pretty easy going and I'm not sure much can shake him. It's fun to hear how he's immersed back with his friends and I love that they're growing up together. 

Ginny and Wiley. I won't be able to lump them together much longer. I am here, because well, that's where I sense the change. They play so creatively together. Often I overhear them playing house with Ginny being the mama and Wiley playing the part of a puppy or baby, they just find joy every day. I feel this year that these days are fleeting. In the past I've felt the start of a school year as a time to come up for air and just relax a bit, this year I feel the rush. The rush to just soak it all in before I start to lose them to school days and friends. Wiley's afternoon naps are numbered, Ginny's lazy mornings at home, outings in the neighborhood and trips to the grocery store after dropping the bigs at school...these things, they're all numbered now. Where before I felt like I was drowning in little people, I now see the end and I'm not ready for it just yet. So, for now we'll take each day as it comes. Settle into our school year and soak up as many snuggles and lazy days as we can manage. We'll also keep playing and being creative, cheering on the bigs in all they're accomplishing and just keep growing the best we can out west. 

Lucy is 8! Eight is Great!

I praise you for I am fearfully and wonderfully made

Psalm 139:14

That verse dear Lucy girl was on your birth announcement 8 years ago, I will also mention that you were the only child whom I actually mailed birth announcements for...but that's what you get for being the first.!

What a sweet, spunky girl you have grown into. I can never forget the day you made me a mom, how my world changed, how my universe grew and how you opened my eyes to instant, unconditional love, constant worry about someone elses' needs over my own, and indescribable joy. 

I look at who you've grown into and it amazes me. You are compassionate for other people, you're passionate, you're emotional, intense and incredibly creative. You continue to amaze me with how you see the world and insights you share. 

This year you are taking art classes, swimming lessons and piano. You work hard at all of them and each of your teacher's has great things to say about you. You've blossomed in second grade and are becoming a true leader. 

At home you love your siblings. You are sweet and playful with Wiley, goofy and playful with Ginny and a great companion for Murray...when you aren't arguing the way brothers and sisters do. 

Recently you were in the talent show at school and we were all incredibly proud of you. Proud not only of your talent of piano playing, but of your strength and confidence to go on the stage alone and play. 

You are strong, you are gentle. You are wild and quiet. You are spunky, you are sweet. 

You are growing into a young lady. Your lifetime of 8 years is amazing to me. It seems like just yesterday I held you in my arms in amazement of the tiny person you were. Today you growing too big for my lap. Your giggle brings me joy and I truly enjoy your company and sharing in life with you. 

I am so thankful the Lord chose you for our family and I am excited to see what HE has planned for your days ahead.

I love you Lucy girl, my first, sweet baby girl. 

Wordless Wednesday

Monday was our first quiet day at home in quite some time...this is what Lucy dressed herself in...she did her hair and all!

 

Thankful Thursday

Happy Birthday to my dear sweet Lucy. 

6 years ago you arrived into this world, into my life and things have never been the same. You turned your daddy and I from a couple of newlyweds into a family. You've brought us more joy and more work than we could have imagined. I remember it like it was yesterday, but I look at you and the infant I held in my arms in complete awe seems so far away...

You're 6! I can hardly believe it's been 6 years, but here you are, turning into a young lady before my eyes. So much about you is the same as that wonderful day 6 years ago...those blue, blue eyes! I would have bet those would have faded, but they're just as bright as they were that day. 

Your HAIR! It may be lighter, longer and "styled" a bit different, but sweet Lucy girl...your hair has been a trademark since the day you were born. 

You're independent and stubborn...both to your benefit. You don't give up...you get an idea in your head and you work until you get it just so!

You're my baby girl, my first sweet baby. That will never change. You Lucy girl, gave me the name Mama. A name I cherish and always hoped to have. You teach me and challenge me daily about  being a mom. You send me to my knees in prayer to help me do this job right. I oh so want to be the best mom I can for you.

Some things are the same, but you've also grown and changed so much! You're crafty, artistic, strong, flexible, energetic, thoughtful, kind, loving, and getting so tall and so mature. You make me smile. You're starting to show interest in "big kid" things. You're starting to shadow me in a new way. You're not just wanting to be under my feet and near me doing the things I do. You're watching me to learn so that you can do things yourself...for real. You're not satisfied with "washing your baby" while I wash Ginny. You watch closely and want to help me with my chores.  You're practicing for being a grown woman and I am aware of it Lucy. I'm aware that you're learning from me and I'm praying that I'm being an example worth following.

You're growing into a young woman right before my eyes. As much as I want you to slow down, to pause, to stay small and innocent forever...I am SO excited to watch you grown. You're an amazing, silly, cuddly lovely lady Lucille Grace and I wouldn't have you any other way!

From this...

To this...

I couldn't be more thankful for the past 6 years of being your mom! I love you Lucille Grace!

Wordless Wednesday

Lucy created her own "Bunny Hat" completely unassisted...I think it's pretty great!

 

What's the News: Maple Syrup

Lucy wanted to tell you what she learned at the farm yesterday. She was a little nervous so I fed her questions off camera...maybe one day I'll learn how to edit a bit...but here's the unedited news on Maple Syrup (which is DELICIOUS)

She lost a what?!?

That's right...our baby girl is growing up too fast...

Lucy lost her first tooth! I still remember her biting me at church in Albuquerque when I realized her first tooth (well, teeth) had just broken through...

Now they're falling out and coming in all over again. Lucy lost her first tooth last week on Wednesday, October 19th! I couldn't believe it!

We had been looking at making her tooth fairy pillow and I was actually out buying the supplies for it when the tooth fell out. Needless to say, we stayed up a bit past bedtime to get the pillow made so she could leave it hanging on her doorknob for the "tooth fairy" to visit. 

We still have a few finishing touches to complete on the pillow, but overall it worked great and is pretty cute (not as cute as mine growing up, but hey...I try!)

A Post to Post

Wow! I can't believe I haven't posted in SO long...I've thought about posts...I have post ideas...but I'm too busy enjoying the people the posts are about to sit down and actually post...hopefully I'll get some up soon! In the mean time...here's a sneak peak at the cute little people I'm enjoying :)

Book Review

I've never done this before, but I'm just so intrigued by this book and so much enjoying it, I felt I needed to do a review of this book and share it with my other mommy and teacher friends out there!

This week Lucy's lesson plans called for learning about prayer. The activity they gave you was to add prayer to before meals and family time and to introduce prayers your child can memorize to their day (as in Now I lay me...the Lord's prayer, etc.) Well, we do this already...quite a bit. In fact just a week or so ago we started working on Luther's Evening Prayer with the kids and when they get that the goal is to add in the morning prayer at breakfast.

So, even though I'd say she's doing the activity they suggested it made me think that while we do lots of praying with her and we let her tell us things she wants to pray about, how do we teach her to pray, really pray...go to God with her innermost worries, thoughts and thanksgivings?

I know I can model that...but only so much. Do I want my 5 year old to see my crying while I pray that I'm not adequate enough to be her mother?!? Really? I don't think she needs that ammo!

Enter the book review: When we went to DC for my sister's wedding in April we visited Nick's old church. They had just done a weekend conference for families/kids on praying and I had a great conversation with the woman who had organized it. She even gave me the book, I read it this summer and tucked it away thinking it would be great for Lucy in a few years.

Well, we're doing it now!

Praying in Color for Kids.

We're working our way through it chapter by chapter. Yesterday she "learned" to doodle. To let her pencil move and not try to make a picture...or anything really.

We talked about prayer and praying for things you think about.

I'm excited to see where this takes us! Next week we'll start working on our "doodle" being prayers for God. Intentionally thinking about being in God's presence and visualizing what we're praying about...without needing to put words on it.

I know it's a lot for a 5 year old, but if we start now, we can keep growing on it. I'm just trying to equip her with the tools to grow her prayer life as she grows!

Let me know if you check it out how it works for you and your kiddos!

Monkey See, Monkey Do...

Monkey see, monkey do happens at our house a lot these days...

Lucy does something, Murray does it louder and with more intensity...it's quite entertaining (most of the time). We've always called Lucy and Murray our little monkeys. It started because Lucy was so obsessed with monkeys and Curious George and continued because Murray was such a monkey himself...we did find him in the sink at 11 months! Ginny is just being lumped with them so far since she's given us no reason to think she won't be a little monkey as well. So I often just say...where are my monkeys? or Let's clean up monkeys! They know who I'm talking to and respond a lot better than when I call them kids or something similar.

Because we love monkeys so much at our house we have lots of monkey related things, including lots of monkey books. Today we were reading through a few of our favorites including Cha Cha Chimps and One Monkey Too Many. The plot of One Monkey too many is that every time they find an activity perfect for that number of monkeys another monkey arrives and trouble happens. On the last page the author leaves to go to lunch saying 5 is the perfect number of monkeys for the book and then a 6th sneaks in..."One monkey too many climbed into this book!" It's a great read! After reading the last page today I say to Lucy, "What do you think, do we have 1 monkey too many in our family now?"

Her response, "No mom, not even close!" Guess I better watch out!

Ginny's Baptism Up Close!

Here's a few highlights from Ginny's Baptism Weekend

in a totally random and no particular order (sorry)...

Olivia LOVED holding baby Ginny...I'm pretty sure she would have held her all day if we let her!

This is the most still I have EVER seen Murray sit in church. It was after the

service of course, and he was enthralled with the drums!

Evangeline Kate, baptized August 7th. She wore the "Murray" baptismal gown and a necklace from her Great Grandma Eve whom she's named after.

Big Sisters Olivia and Lucy

Koschmann family and Rudzinski family...oh how I wished we lived closer!

Koschmann Party of 5!

Yum! Nick made ribs (and chicken and corn)...

My last minute cake...it turned out pretty well

(there will be another post about this as it was the most delicious cake I've ever made

and I MUST share the recipe I found!)

Chloe holding Ginny...she is also baby obsessed...all the babies in my house were using all the baby equipment all weekend long...Ginny had to wait her turn to use the swing, car seat, bed, bouncy seat etc...adorable (since it was only for the weekend...)

Ginny was pooped after a long, super fun day...she just watched me clean up from the kitchen counter (don't worry...her daddy was standing right there by her!)

Sisters!

Thanks for our matching outfits Boba and Tommy! We love letting everyone know we're sisters!

Don't you love the hair bow mommy found to match my pink tutu...makes me think of your wedding day...everyone at church loved it! I told them I borrowed it from mommy :)

We have a big kid at our house!

I can't believe it...I know it's been approaching...but there's no denying it now...

We've started kindergarten, she's getting taller and has been showing characteristics of a big kid for quite a while now...

But, since we brought Ginny home from the hospital our "Little Lucy Girl" has made 3 major accomplishments:

*She started swimming on her own with no assistance...she can swim the front crawl, floating on her back and under water...it's pretty amazing!

*She can pump on a swing! What a joy this is for me...no more pushes...or sometimes just a little one to start her off!

*Yesterday we walked up to the school playground and Lucy went across the monkey bars all by herself without any help!

I can't believe how strong she's getting, how much control she has over her body and just what an all around "kid" she has become. It's not just the baby in the house...she's really growing up!

Our 'little" Lucy Girl

Our little Lucy girl isn't so little anymore! In fact, I just picked her up from her last day of preschool. In the fall she'll be a big kindergarten girl. Where did my sweet little baby go? Thursday will be her "Preschool Graduation"...but here's a few pictures of what she's been up to lately...

Lucy's first day of soccer...it was very muddy...but she had a great time!

Last week they got to wear their costumes to ballet...she loved being beautiful. We're excited to see her recital in June.

Of course she's been up to much, much more than just soccer and ballet, but these were a few fun photos I had that I wanted to share!

The Girls' Room

This weekend I got a bee in my bonnet...so to speak anyway. I decided it was time to cross off one of the bigger projects we have to do before baby. I decided to paint the purple stripes in Lucy's room to match the new bedding my wonderful mother is making for the new baby. The purple was requested by Lucy and we figured since she's giving up a lot of her space adding a color to her room was not an unreasonable request. Plus, each of our other children had a room painted for them (although Lucy waited over a year for that)...but, we figured it wasn't an absurd request.

That being said, I decided I would use the stripes we painstakingly measured out as my guide and buy the fattest paint tape I could find (3 inches) and use that to mark/measure out my stripes. So, the purple stripes are rather large, but I like them and think they freshen up Lucy's room.

I did the task on Saturday night and Lucy slept in the guest room...I did it alone because Nick had a paper to write and a few other things I knew needed his attention...it really only took me about an hour to tape and a little more than the length of an old college favorite movie playing in the background to

paint.

Here's the outcome...

Wordless Wednesday

Because sometimes it's hard to discern your favorite part of the day...

Saturday

Nick's out of town this weekend at the confirmation retreat.

This leaves me home with my 2 little monkeys with lots of time on our hands.

Thankfully we had lots of fun things to do and the

kids have been wonderful helpers.

Lucy had a tea party to go to for a friend's birthday this afternoon, and the invite instructed her to "wear her best tea apparel" Well, for Lucy that meant her flower girl dress from last spring.

She had a great time and when she came home I couldn't refuse snapping a few pictures...they do her no justice and she looked even cuter spinning around the house, I just didn't get the camera out fast enough! After taking Lucy's picture Murray insisted I get one of him...can't believe it, but it's true! Maybe we're leaving the camera shy phase behind? Not sure...but a mom can hope!

Thankful Thursdays

Last week I wrote about waiting on the Lord. While I'm still waiting on lots of things I am thankful that spring is arriving! What a blessing to have the smells, the feel, the sounds and the warmth of spring begin seeping in slowly.

It's getting late...but I am still thankful for today! I'm thankful for the warm weather we had. We were able to take our first walk to see the ducks. It was myself, the little girl I'm carrying with me and 6 of my favorite kids. Lucy, Murray ad 4 of their friends I was watching today. We were quite the sight to see! I really am thankful for the houseful though. It's amazing how well they all play and getting outside makes such a difference in the day.

I'm thankful for a little bit of girl time with Lucy getting our hair done today, we both got "just a smidge of a trim" (Lucy's words to our hairdresser). I got a bit of spring/summer color and Lucy got some curls! It was great to have some time outside of the house just hanging out with Lucy, she's getting SO big! I can't believe she's going to be 5 in the coming weeks.

We also had a great family trip to Target. We bought a few baby toys for the Crisis Pregnancy Center our church supports and shoes for the kids. We finished off that outing with a shamrock shake...they are going away you know...so we had to get just one more for the year! That makes 3 for me this season...it's been awhile since I've treated myself to 3 shamrock shakes in a month...I think it's because this baby girl likes them. At least that's what I'm telling myself!

I had lots of other thoughts today...I woke up thinking and just kept going all day. It was a day full of perspective and playing. It was quite an enjoyable day and I'm hoping this weather sticks around. It's hard to feel sick when it's beautiful outside.

Playing in the Snow!

So, once everyone had eaten breakfast and dressed appropriately the kids and I headed out in the snow today. It isn't anything "new" to the kids anymore to play in the snow (it's the 2nd snowiest February in either history or 10 years...I don't remember)...but, it's really one of the first times I've gone out in the snow with them this year. I've made a few appearances, but really they've been out shoveling with daddy and I've been inside where it's warm.

We had a great time together, they certainly enjoy being out in the snow. We only shoveled a few minutes and then we ventured to the back yard. Here's what we learned there:

*Pregnant ladies should really avoid making snow angels,

if you are pregnant and decide to make a snow angel...

be sure no one over the age of 5 can see you...

it's not very pretty to try to get up

w/o destroying the angel you created!

*You can not find all the grass in the yard with a small garden shovel.

Lucy used the garden shovel to dig for treasure.

About 5 minutes later she screamed

she had found it and showed us the grass!

(she wanted to find the whole yard...but it proved to be too long and she got cold)

*Racing in the snow can be dangerous...if you're 2 that is!

Murray kept wanting to race me...and he kept falling down...

I found it entertaining

*Wearing gloves that are too big makes using a small shovel extremely difficult!

(This was another Murray lesson)

...he so bad wanted to shovel "like cici" but just couldn't do it!

Overall we had a great time outside and finished it off with the last of the hot chocolate and marshmallows...I think I'll be buying more...I'm not convinced the snow is finished yet this year!