Audrey's a Composer

Her newest songs: (the first inspired by her mother, no doubt)

Stop Crying
By Audrey

"Stop Stop" Crying/everything is gonna be allright/if you stop crying all of us will stop crying if you stop "to"/so "stop stop" crying/you'er gonna be all right

Well everybody cry's all the time/just stop/just stop/it's all right


Their is Greatness in Love
by Audrey

Love is great and hate is bad/I don't care if you hate me, just love other people

I love you but you can't tell me what to do/Sometimes it's difacolt to say this but/we're gonna stay up all night until we get a party pronto

I love you but you can't tell me "what to"/Parents say it's kinda weird we "aren't listening"/where gonna stay up all night waiting for them to finally say yes

I love you but you can't tell me what to "do"/ sometimes it's difacolt to say this but where gonna stay up all night

short one

I've been waiting for something interesting to happen so I could blog about it, but things have been relatively quiet around here....not something I'm complaining about, mind you, but just nothing worth writing about. My friend Lori suggested I write about Cole taking a steak knife from the dishwasher to cut his own orange, and then threatening Ashton with it, but to me, that's just ordinary every-day stuff in this house. I did have to buy a purse yesterday because someone (no one is fessing up) slammed my former purse around and managed to crack open a jar of nail polish inside it. I really wonder if they were just merely trying to help me out and give me something blog-worthy.

I'm going to get out today and enjoy the gorgeous weather - it seems it's been a long time, and the waters in my backyard lake are still receding (but not leaking into my basement). I also want to get out in order to remove my messy children from the house, since we have dinner guests and 24-7 Mess Monitoring does not seem like fun. Right now the little seem happily occupied with the new bowling set I got them, which replaced the bocce ball and plastic cups they were using before.

I hope you all have a blessed and warm and toasty day.

Happy Easter!

I bet you thought I wasn't serious about coming back! But, really, it was just my computer that went dead on me. I had to wait until my darling husband could get me going on my new one so I could resume my rambling. Funny, when he was starting up my outlook, he came across a note he wrote to himself a couple of years ago, titled "what to do if Sally screws up her email" (that's a slight paraphrase). I could be offended, but I think I'd rather be happy that my husband knows me so well. He's often said I have the reverse Midas Touch. Everything I touch seems to break into a million pieces.

This month I've cleaned up two floods from one side of my basement due to a squirting sump pump, one flood on the other side due to an unplugged sump pump and a typical Michigan April snow storm, another flood in the kids' bathroom due to a certain Cole throwing two pairs of socks in the toilet, an expensive trip to the shop for bad brakes (and a tuneup) on my van, another trip a week later for a leaky valve, a trip to the Geek Squad to blow out a mountain of dust out of my ailing computer, and a second trip when the computer completely keeled over so I could be told by the experts that it is toast, and, finally, a family visit to the computer store to buy a teensy tinsy little red computer that is now set up so I can tell you all of this. (and yes, Janet, I would love a Mac one day but what I really need is that Panasonic Titanium steel laptop that can be thrown off a building and shot with a 22 and survive...none of the tests on it included handling by Cole, though).

So now that I'm completely broke, I have plenty of time to sit around and write in blogs.

Since the title of this blog is "Happy Easter!" then perhaps I should be more..rejoiceful? And I am, actually. There are so many millions of ways all my broken everythings could have been a lot worse. We could have had no savings (or no tax return). We could have NOT backed up our hard drive two days before my computer fritzed. My husband might not have figured out how to download my external hard drive into a computer with no disk drive. I could have gotten in an accident in my car. the floods could have been worse, or I could have been bogged down with work and no time to clean up numerous floods. So, yes, I'm praising God. He's good, He really is. And watching the Passion movie again last night reminds me that these piddly events really pale when you look into the face of the One who suffered so much for us.

He is Risen! Happy Easter, everyone!

I'll leave you with a short kid story: Yesterday, I made cookies, and a half hour later, came upstairs to find all of them gone. I asked Ashton, "did you eat all those cookies??" And he said, "I only ate one! (long pause)... at a time."

Revival! Of the Blog at Least

I've been meaning to re-start my blog for the last few weeks (funny how that always happens) and I decided, why not start it when I'm sitting around with some unexpected free time - I was supposed to be at the gym - while I wait for a plumber to come help us with flood #4 (in the last two weeks). I've never thought I'd be wading in so much water in my own house..certainly not in such a short time frame! Too bad it's not summer, I could get the kids their bathing suits and pull out the beach ball and goggles and we could have an indoor beach party!!

In other news, one of the things that has gotten me interested in blogging again (besides being able to feed these into my Facebook notes) is that I've been doing some soul-searching and taking some actual steps to reduce my working time and increase quality time, with my family, with GOD, with myself. Finally, I see a line - a line that has been drawn to show me how much work is healthy and how much ISN'T, and what the Bible has to say about that. If it's my superior multi-tasking skills or my success in business that defines me, there's something wrong with that!! Obviously, multi-tasking to the point of insanity isn't healthy, and why would I want to be defined as a frantic, sloppy, irritable maniac anyway? I'd rather be defined as a child of God.

So, in order to strive toward that Balance, I'm working to add things back into my life that have been left behind too long. And the blog is a good way for me to remember just how funny life can be. So, if my house floods a million times, and I have to vacuum three times before 9 a.m. (Cole should never be allowed to carry food around), and if my computer continually goes wacky on me, it might seem sort of hilarious later on when it's in my blog.

Sitting around being Lazy

A conversation with Audrey:

Audrey: Mom, do you want the house spic and span today?
Me: I want the house spic and span every day!
Audrey: Do you want it that way for Dad?
Me: Yes, of course
Audrey: And also, in case people come over, they don't call you a lazy housewife?

I just love my family so much!

I don't think I have actually talked about my family much these days, but I'm sitting here in a hotel room surrounded by all five of my favorite people and I'm overtaken by my love for them. I love all their quirks and silliness and all their individual traits that make them each unique.

We are on our first FULL FAMILY vacation of the summer. Only two days, to Muskegon, so we can go to the amusement park tomorrow and maybe a park on Sunday. Today we went swimming in the indoor pool, after going to lunch and telling stories that made us all laugh so hard we were crying. I don't know what the other customers thought of all our hysterics, but it was priceless for me. Wesley, lately, gets so tickled by certain things that he nearly chokes himself laughing once he gets going. Andy gave everyone nicknames a couple of weeks ago at breakfast, and Wesley became Guardian of the Bacon (he's a little bit of a control freak when it comes to bacon), Audrey was "Little Miss Greedy Pants," Ashton was "Pooper Scooper", and Cole was "Booger." Wesley kept repeating everyone's names and in the third or so recitation, he was laughing so hard he was nearly purple. I love that he is getting to that age when he really enjoys moments and activities - he doesn't just participate in them. He is relishing life, and I am so blessed by his enthusiasm.

Audrey is such a free spirit, and a lover and a cuddler. She is suddenly into brushing her hair 30 times a day and wanting to wear nail polish and lip gloss. Ashton is hilarious. Everything is something to be discovered or a process to figure out. He is currently obsessed with the pole in my basement "where all the pee and poop goes". Today he was yelling to Dad through the filter in the pool. Cole is such a crazy mix of completely nuts and super-affectionate. One of the stories Andy told today was about an incident earlier this week, when, one by one, the three older kids came upstairs from the basement grasping some part of their bodies and crying. Then up comes Cole, sucking away on his pacifier, happily swinging away with a set of drumsticks. Amazing that my one-year-old can singlehandedly beat up all his siblings and still coming away looking cute and baby-like. He has been singing parts of a song we learned in VBS...funny, the only lines he knows are "We won't be quiet" and "No, No, No, No, No." It's like his theme song.

My wonderful husband and I had a long-awaited 10-year anniversary trip in Chicago, and it was reviving and glorious...as much as we missed the kids, it was nice be adults for a few days. I wasn't quite used to using the restroom without two or three kids standing over me, or getting out of a car without unstrapping carseats and hauling out strollers and screaming like a maniac for everyone to NOT MOVE or else they will surely get killed in the parking lot. It was also just nice to reconnect with my long-lost lover, to spend time with the guy I love and not just the father of my kids.

So, this weekend it is just us. And, while the hotel room looks like a major storm blew through and we've only been here four hours, I'm going to relish every moment and thank God for this wonderful crazy bunch of people.

Shopping!!!

My friend Diane has a gift for "personal shopping." She has taken several of my friends out to shop and helped them pick out flattering and up-to-date clothing and accessories, so we can stop walking around all frumpy and "letting ourselves go." Of course, we know that beauty is from within, not from outward adornment, but there is a time when one has "let herself go" too much. I was at that place. Being in business for myself and trying to manage a household with four young children is, um, time consuming. So, the first thing to go is almost always my appearance. I don't want to launch into a skin-care regimen at night (when all I want to do is fall into my bed), I don't want to take the extra 10 minutes to apply makeup, I don't even know WHAT to do with my hair, so it's inevitably back in a ponytail. Ashton begs me to leave my hair down every day, and when it is down (on those rare occasions) I get showered with compliments from my four-year-old and my husband. Why not take some pride in your appearance? Your body is a temple, right? And having no regard for it whatsoever is no more glorifying to God than vanity would be. Plus, when you have a husband who is blessed by a wife who isn't ponytailed, makeupless, wearing sweats and covered in paint splatters and grumbling about how stressed she is...that's a good thing.

So, anyway, Diane took me shopping last night. We worked on the basics, mostly, since I've needed some good jeans and black pants that fit properly. It was GREAT. I can't believe how much better I feel just buying the bigger size. When I can pull up a pair of pants and slide into them, easily fastening the button, I feel about 20 times better about myself than if I try to squeeze into something smaller and watch my middle bulge out and spill over the top. When I wear something that was cut for my body type, I feel so much better and more confident. Makes me actually WANT to wear my hair down and put on some makeup! And maybe, just maybe, make it to the gym more than once a month.

What's best is that we prayed before we shopped. What a good reminder that everything can and should be prayed over!