Happy Birthday to me!

Saturday was my birthday.  I turned the big 35.  Which is ok because I have been 35 now for a couple years.  I know weird, but I have kind of lost track of how old I was.  A couple years ago I told a preacher's wife that I was 25.  I was serious too.  However, I was only about 8 yrs off.  A little later I had to call her and say, "Did I tell you I was 25 earlier?" Ha Ha  So now this has become a joke at church and I'm known for staying in my 20's even though I testified to being saved for 30 yrs back in April.  So funny!

I was sent to my bedroom late Friday night by Maynard and the kids.  Which was such a blessing. Ha!  While I was in my room they were baking me a birthday cake.  They were going to suprise me.  I of course knew what they were doing because I had bought the cake mix and icing to help them along in their adventure.  Kids love suprising their mommy's so I knew they needed a little help.  It wasn't too much longer and Amelia came and crawled in bed beside me and said, "Mom, sshhh, we are making you a cake."  Then she fell asleep.  The boys began hollering for me and I came in the kitchen to find this beautiful masterpiece.

Sure was made with lots of love. (It tasted really good)

Saturday morning Maynard and the kids brought me gifts and their cards.  Then we had more cake for breakfast then headed out to some yard sales.  I found some really good deals and so that always makes going to yard sales fun.  Then we had my birthday lunch at where else than Shiloh's roadhouse.

We stopped by at the cemetery where Maynard's family is buried.

Amelia paying her respects to someone we don't know.  But hey, it had a bench to sit on.

Jerry and Lisa Parker

Maynard with his brother and sister's grave.  They both died like a year apart.  His sister was killed in a car wreck and his brother was burned in a fire.  Very tragic deaths and I am amazed at the strength of this family to be able to endure this kind of pain and hurt.

After visiting the graveyard, we dropped the kids off at Maynard's Mom's house.  I always call her Maynard's Mom.  I could say Mother-n-law, but that is just so awkward for me. lol  Apparantly, she has 2 names.  Some people call her Darlene and others call her Sue.  So I'm confused what I'm supposed to call her.  I am soooooo serious.  I avoid calling her by name and she is referred to as "Maynard's mom." Ha ha  So anyways........  Maynard and I headed to Richmond.  We got there and we kind of had noticed we were in a solemn mood.  I guess visiting a graveyard will do that to you.  We stopped at a Goodwill and then in real quick to Culvers to grab something quick to eat and then we went back to pick up the kiddos.  Sometimes I desparately need to get away, but when I finally do I just picture my kids choking or getting hurt and I just can't enjoy my time away from them. 

So that was the end of my special day.  But it was nice and shared with the people I love!!!!!!

Last day of 1st grade!

Josiah lives for awards day each school year.  There's just something about getting your name called and going up front to collect a trophy, medallion, or certificate.  He had to memorize the whole book of James this year and let me tell you it wasn't easy.  I constantly reminded him of that trophy waiting for him at the end of the year and that always seemed to motivate him.  We finally got it memorized.  Sheww, lots of hard work there!  He is in first grade and the all the other classes were memorizing the same scriptures as well.  I was pretty proud of him to be memorizing something that the high schoolers were memorizing too.

Unfortunately, the night before awards service I heard him in the bathroom throwing up.  Poor guy threw up every hour.  He got up for school that morning, but I sent him back to bed after a dose of Zofran.  I knew his heart would be broken if he didn't get to claim that trophy he worked so hard for.  I called the school and they said it was okay to bring him in just for the awards service.  So that's what we did.  I watched him from my seat and prayed to God in Heaven he didn't spew everywhere!!!

Josiah proudly rockin' his awards

He ended up with lots of awards.

Trophy-Memorizing the book of James
Trophy-Read 300 books in class
Blue medallion-Honor roll all year
Burgandy Medallion-Citizen award (good attendance and low demerits) Yeah, not sure why he got it.
Certificate-Spelling
Certificate-Social Studies
Certificate-Bible knowledge (most proud of this one)
Certificate-Christian Growth award
Certificate-Character trait was "Thankfulnes"

I was pretty proud of him and all of his hard work.

Friday was his last day of school!

We celebrated with a bike wreck and spent Saturday evening in the ER.  Of course ya'll know how much we love our special room at the ER.

Can't help but smile when I see the bible book on his bed.  Would you believe there was no t.v. in there. Ha Loved it!!

Josiah fell on his bike and took a hit to his chest with his handlebars.  He was hurt pretty bad and was gasping for breath and almost passed out.  He is very dramatic so it was hard to believe him, but after an hour of crying and seeing the big bruise on his chest, we decided to take him.  They took an xray, but everything was okay.  They just said he had bruised his ribs and would be sore for about a week.  I'm very thankful he wasn't hurt any worse.  Someone mentioned dressing my children in suits of armor.  It may be something I will look into for sure! Ha

Happy Summer Break!

Things been a little too normal too long so............

I know, I know.  Ya'll have been dissapointed in my normal postings latelty.  Things have been going pretty smoothly and I had began to think that maybe, just maybe my motherhood is about to calm down for a spell.  I mean I am actually braving trips to the grocery store now with 2 kids undertow.  They have been behaving pretty well for the most part.  Then it all came to a head one day........  We were desparate for a few groceries and I couldn't put if off any longer.  I dropped Josiah off at school and me, Titus, and Amelia went to the grocery store.  I got out, opened the side door and out they came.  Something caught Titus's eye on the ground.  I believe it was smashed, carmel candy or something.  Anyways, he and Amelia were really impressed with that mess.  So much that Titus had to gasp and step back the same time as I was shutting my van door.  I shut the door right on his upper arm.  Hard.....like, really hard.  Titus is not a crier.  When he does cry, I know he is hurt.  It didn't take long for the crying to come.  Not sure who cried the hardest, me or Titus.  I mean do you know how bad it feels to know that you caused your child to get hurt?????  We sat down in the van and I held him while he screamed and cried.  The look he gave me was so puzzled as to ask, "Why did you do that to me, Mommy?"  I pulled his sleeve up and it there was only one line on his arm.  It really didn't look to bad at the time.  He moved his arm around for me and I figured he was ok.  I asked him if he sill felt like going in the store and he did.  He stopped crying and we went in to get some groceries.  I kept watching him and noticed he wasn't using that arm.  As matter of fact, he was just holding it crossed across his belly like it was already in a sling of some sort. I finished getting my groceries, loaded up the van, and went a few buildings down and took Titus to the Dr's office.  Here he is waiting for the Dr to come.

See how happy he was with me?

 

The Dr came in and checked him arm out.  Titus never whinced or cried out in pain at all.  There was still only one line on his arm.  The Dr. declared he was fine and that it was just a deep bruise and didn't think he needed an xray.  I would have felt more comfortable if he had an xray taken, but I guess the Dr felt otherwise.  However, I am very thankful he wasn't hurt worse than what he was.  I just knew that his arm was broken.  I'm not sure how we have managed to escape any broken bones or stitches yet, but so far so good.
*Edited:  I forgot to mention that while our Dr was checking Titus's arm out and Titus was telling him what had happened, Amelia blurted out, "Yeah, she tried to get me too, but I jumped out of the way."  Thank you, Amelia!!!  The Dr just laughed and teased that he needed to call Social Services on me!  I was mortified!!!!!!

Here is part of the bruise that showed up by that evening.  There is a fainter bruise on the inside of the arm that I couldn't fit in the picture.  It is looking pretty yucky, by now.


 

And you know what else happend to this little cutie Saturday morning?

What?  He isn't even in school  yet!!!!

 

We were in the car driving around to yard sales on Saturday morning when Titus tells me his tooth is loose.  I mean I've heard it a gazillion times ever since Josiah's teeth have been falling out almost daily.  I said, "uh huh, ok, Titus."  "No, really mom it is."  So I felt of it and it was a little bit loose.  I asked him if he had hit his mouth on anything to make it loose and he said no.  It could have only been 15 minutes or less when I heard, "I just pulled it out, Mom."  I looked back and he was proudly holding a tiny, tiny white tooth in his hand.  This goes to show you the kid's pain level tolerance.  He never whinced or cried, he just yanked that barely loose tooth right out!  He was thrilled about the tooth fairy coming to his house.  I think he got a little nervous about it when he yelled from his bed, "Mom, will Jack (our lab) bark when the Tooth Fairy gets here?"  Then Amelia hollered from her bed, "MOM, the Tooth Fairy won't see me will she?" ha ha ha  My kids make laugh so hard sometimes!!  And then other times, I won't to knock them out.  Because of crazy stuff like this:

Yes, he is in a hospital bed.  This is our special room at the ER.  No one is allowed to use it, but the Parker kids. (not really, a bit of sarcasm here)

This is back to Saturday.  The same day Titus lost his first tooth.  I got ahead of myself earlier.  I realize I could fix that being that I haven't hit post yet, but nah, that's too much trouble.

Maynard ran into the store real quick while I sat with the kids.  Titus unbuckled and leaned up front for some reason.  He can never stay buckled in a vehicle that is not moving.  Ya'll know how I am obcessed with ears, right?  Well, as he leaned over I decided to do an ear check.  Can't help it, yes I have a problem.  This time however, I was successful and all my ear checking was not done in vain.  As I looked in his ear I seen a peice of white something in there.  At first I'm like, "Wow, this is a big chunk.  Then I realize that is not wax.  Since I left home without my trusty bobby pin, I used my car keys.  I pulled it out and it was a peice of styrofoam.  I went through the whole spill, "What?????  Why is there styrofoam in your ear?  When did you do this?  Why did you do this?  Are you crazy?"  Then I asked to see his other ear.  He really put up a fuss and declared that that ear was fine and there was nothing in it.  So I yanked him back down and checked that ear too.  What did I see?  Another peice of styrofoam in that ear.  This one was way too deep for me to even try to dig out.  Maynard came back to the car and I had to explain our problem.  He was furious.  Just 2 weeks prior we had Amelia in the er for hurting her finger and now Titus had filled his ears with styrofoam.  He may have mentioned that he didn't enjoy spending his Saturdays off work sitting in the ER.  Maynard tried to remove the styrofoam, but he was making me nervous and Titus was scared for his life.  We went ahead and went to the hospital.  I asked the triage if that was really an emergency and if he needed to be seen before I registered.  They delcared that he did need to be seen because even a small peice left in his ear over night could set up a bad infection.  So I trusted their judgement and they took us straight back.  It was so deep that the DR had a hard time getting it out and was a bit nervous to even try.  He got it out finally and declared the other ear styrofoam free.  (I had already removed it)  Titus finally told me he had just put the styrofoam in his ear about an hour prior to me finding it.  Josiah said Titus told him that he was acting like he had hearing aids like Papaw!!!  This is the same kid who stuck a bandaid up his nose and we had to go to ER because he was gagging and trying to puke.  They never did find that bandaid.  They guess he swallowed it somehow. 

So all this happened from Tuesday to Saturday.

Oh yeah!  Amelia also ate a silicone packet out of an empty medicine bottle.  I had to call poision control about that.  Did you know that those things don't even hurt you?  They need to remove "Do not eat" off of the label if in fact you can eat it and not get hurt.

I knew we were too normal for too long for it to stay that way!