My Valentine

I will confess that Valentine’s Day has never been a huge deal for me.  I don’t expect anything extravagant from my Valentine, because 365 days out of the year I know that I am loved and my Valentine knows that I love him!

This year on Valentine’s Day I want to tell the world . . . I love my husband James with all my heart!

Here’s a photo of him that I absolutely love.

No, I didn’t get him an Angry Bird’s pig for Valentine’s Day. This photo is from Andy’s recent birthday party and we were cracking up at how excited Andy was about this gift.

Let me list some of the many other reasons why I love James.

James loves to laugh! He makes me laugh, I make him laugh, our kids laugh at us, and our kids make us laugh.  Laughter fills our house on a regular basis.  Laughter and love go hand in hand!

He is my very best friend on this Earth.

We can talk about anything and everything. Before either of us saw the other as a potential spouse we spent hours talking about things. More than 10 years later we still keep the lines of communication open!

James  is the most selfless and caring person I know. He will go out of his way to help me and to help others.

We have the same philosophy about life and love.

We share a love for God and a passion to serve God.

We are so much better at growing and maturing in our faith because we do it together!

He works hard to provide for the needs of our family.

We share a brood of wonderful little people.

We aren’t perfect, but we are perfect for each other.

I hope that today you are able to show the ones that you love how much you care about them!

Here We Grow

A few weeks ago Andy needed longer pants, This week I discovered that Joshua needed bigger shirts.  Eliana and Isabel couldn’t wear their dresses and Danielle couldn’t stretch out her legs in her sleeper outfits. The great clothes shift continues! Praise God I only have to buy clothes for Andy and Eliana. This time around we had some dear church friends give us pants that fit Andy’s skinny frame perfectly.

After Andy’s front tooth fell out this week his smile made James and I laugh out loud. He had lost his two bottom front teeth already, but it was not terribly noticeable when he smiled.  This guy is doing great in school and we’re so proud of how he is learning and growing.

Joshua has been between wanting to be totally independent and still wanting help with everything.  One minute he is telling us that he doesn’t need our help brushing his teeth and the next minute he is asking if we can help him put on his shoes or cover him up.  He loves his baby sister and he asks multiple times a day if I can take a picture of him holding Danielle. Miss Danielle is already 7 weeks old.  It seems like it was just a few days ago that we brought her home from the hospital.  She is holding her head up more. She’s starting to smile. She’s outgrowing her newborns clothes and diapers. She’s sleeping for longer stretches at night. Her eyes are still blue and her dark hair is growing back in.  She has a little cry with a minute or two pause before the next cry which tells me that she not too upset.  It’s a little bit like getting an early warning before she gets really upset. Usually the problem is that she needs  a diaper change, a new bib or she’s hungry. Sometimes she is just bored and wants a change of scenery.  With each one of the kids it seems that they grow and change much more quickly than their siblings before them.

Isabel has been adjusting to not being the baby in the house.  She’s been cutting 6 teeth at once, four of which are molars.  Before I realized she was teething actually took her to the doctor because she was drinking all the time and I thought she might be diabetic!  Her vocabulary is growing daily and she constantly amazes us with the words that she says. We still affectionately (most of the time) call her “Baby-zilla,” because of her tendency to destroy things, to take things that don’t belong to her, and to cause general messes where ever she goes. Sometimes I put her into the playpen instead of Danielle to give everyone a break from her!

Miss Eliana is as sassy as ever.  She gets frustrated easily and wears her heart on her sleeve.  She is progressing nicely with being potty trained.  Her expanding collection of stuffed animals has caused her to fall out of bed more than once.  If you have any ideas, suggestions or stories to help us convince her to move her toys off of her bed they are more than welcome!  She cries and cries even if we move her animals to the foot of her bed.  She wants all of them and she is absolutely broken-hearted if we put them into the toy buckets that we have just for animals.

Today Eliana said to me, “You got a lot of kids!” I responded by saying, “Yes, 5 kids is a lot!”  I will be the first one to confess that I get overwhelmed sometimes, but my kids are a tremendous blessing to me! While the kids grow and change, so do I.

What is More Fun?

What’s more fun than being awakened from dream-filled sleep at 2:30 in the morning by a crying 1-year old? Being awakened from a dream-filled sleep by a crying 1-year-old AND a crying 5-week old baby.

What’s more fun than being awakened from a dream-filled sleep by a crying 1-year-old and a crying 5-week-old baby? Putting the 1-year old in your bed and then changing and nursing the five-week-old

What’s more fun than being awakened from a dream-filled sleep by a crying 1-year-old and a crying 5-week-old baby, putting the one-year old in your bed and changing and nursing the five-week-old? Having the five-week-old super soak herself and you in spit-up so that an outfit change is required for both you and the baby.

What’s more fun than being awakened from a dream-filled sleep at 2:30 in the morning by a crying 1-year-old and a 5-week-old baby, putting the one-year old in your bed, changing and nursing the five-week-old, being super-soaked and changing outfits? The fact that at 4 a.m. the 5-week-old is finally asleep again but I’m wide awake and typing this blog.

Now it’s time to get the 1-year-old back into her own bed! Seven o’clock is fast approaching!

My Day: Part Two

2:15 I nurse Danielle some more.  She falls asleep for a little while and I put her in her swing.

2:55 Joshua comes into the living room and asks to turn the t.v. on.  I tell him no and that he has to wait until Andy gets home.  A few minutes later we hear the bus and I have Joshua open the door.  When Andy gets off the bus Joshua opens the door and yells, “Andy! Andy! You’re home!”  Andy shows me his school work. I let him pick out a short movie to watch.  He chooses, “The Land Before Time: The Big Freeze”  These boys love their dinosaurs, but the girls love them too!

5:00 Danielle is still asleep. All that nursing is basically cluster-feeding that helps her get some hours of sleep in a row! I had a little photo session with Isabel just to check out how my little suitcase looked in photos. Isabel had fun but I really need to work with her if I want her to keep bows in her hair.  I’m not a girly girl and so I haven’t been very good at teaching my girls about hair accessories.  I put away the clothes that my mom folded earlier today.

James came home after work and his shoes and jeans were super muddy.  I washed the jeans by themselves because of all the mud.  This is the one and only time that there is ever one single item in the washing machine. Definitely not making a dent in the laundry heap!

5:20 Danielle is still asleep.  I am nervous about making dinner.  This is usually the time of day when she wakes up crying and I have to nurse her and nurse her.  She doesn’t make a peep.

6:00 Dinner is ready. I decided to make pancakes, sausage, and bacon.  James said he was tired of eating sausage.  Andy has been moaning for a half hour that he is hungry. In fact just before I started cooking dinner he came in and asked, “You haven’t started dinner, yet?”  Eliana has come in to tell me that she is starving. I believe her because I saw what she had for lunch and it wasn’t much!  Isabel must have been hungry too because while I was making pancakes and putting them onto plates she hopped into her booster seat and started begging for me to give her pancake.

6:30 Everyone is finished with dinner.  James watches some shows on Netflix and I sit down to work on the graphic design project that I’ve been working on for the past week or so.  I can’t believe that Danielle is still asleep but she did nurse and nurse and nurse all through the day today.  As soon as I type this line I’m going to wake her up so I can make sure she is good and tired for the night tonight.  The kids are playing in their bedrooms. Every so often one of them comes into the the living room to tell on each other. Joshua: “Eliana made me hurt myself.”  Andy: Joshua is making me mad. Eliana: “Isabel is NOT my best friend!”  Isabel has started screaming when she doesn’t get her way.  It’s one of those screams that makes you think she must be really really injured, but in actuality she is just mad!  They are learning all kinds of things.

6:45 The girls and I try to wake Danielle up. When I pick her up she won’t open her eyes. I pump her legs and she starts tooting up a storm.  Remember earlier today I thought she was gassy?  Well, let’s just say I was correct!  I change her diaper and she starts crying and crying. I nurse her and James and I start watching an episode of Cake Boss on Netflix.

7:20 Feeding Isabel and Cake Boss have made me miss my 7p.m. snack time goal.  I go into the boys’ room to ask that they pick up books so they can have a snack before bedtime. Joshua is not helping pick up books so Andy gets fruit snacks while Joshua and Eliana pick up books. When I check on the progress that Joshua and Eliana have made they have stacked the books vertically instead of horizontally. Instead of making them fix the books I let them have a snack.

7:30 Our bathroom routine to get ready for bed goes like this . . . Go to the bathroom, wash your hands, brush your teeth, and wash your face.  Joshua has been fighting me about brushing his teeth by himself and tonight is no exception!  He has had a runny nose and he never wants me to clean his nose out.  Tonight I laid him on the floor and sat on him to put saline drops in his nose.  He basically yelled and cried the whole time.

7:49 Andy remembered that he hasn’t done his homework yet! Oops! While he did his homework I helped Eliana and Isabel with their bathroom routines. Eliana kept saying that she didn’t want to go to bed.  Isabel was whiney so I put her in her crib before anyone else was in bed.

8:00 Andy did his bathroom routine without any help. Tomorrow is Andy’s hilarious hair day at school because his class is starting to learn the H sound.  I wet Andy’s hair and put three little patches up with pony tail holders. He said he wants to have three horns like a triceratops! We’ll see what it looks like in the morning! His bed head is always awesome in the mornings any way.

8:10 Read Andy’s library book as tonight’s bed time story.  Made up a story about five little aliens racing all over town.  The aliens were named Andy, Joshua, Eliana, Isabel and Danielle.  One cop told them they were going too fast and then another told them they were going too slow. The little aliens were obedient  and that made there Mommy and Daddy happy.  I sang Holy Night and said goodnight to the boys. Then Eliana wanted me to sing another song and so I asked her if she wanted me to sing Jesus Loves Me.  After this she gave me a hug and a kiss and I told Eliana and Isabel goodnight.

10:30 I’m still nursing Danielle. I have only put this baby down one time and she cried the whole time.  I got her dressed for bed and changed her diaper. She is sitting in my lap and squirming around but she is still asleep.  James and I watched the State of the Union address. I yawned and lost interest. James was interested but he was also really tired from work and fell asleep once.

10:45 Danielle is more still now while she sleeps and I think maybe just maybe I’m going to try to put her down for the night.

My Day: Part 1

Having five kids has been an adventure, and I want to remember the ins and outs of my days.  I decided yesterday to blog about my day today.  I didn’t tell anyone yesterday because I wasn’t sure that I would actually be motivated to make time to write anything down. Here’s part one of my day!

5 a.m. Wake up to baby Danielle crying. Stumble through the room and find a diaper and a baby wipe. Move to living room. Start to unzip baby’s pajamas to find that her whole shoulder is soaking wet. She must have spit up on herself some time earlier. I go back into bedroom and feel around in the dark for another pajama outfit and baby starts crying again.  No one wakes up or even stirs when she cries.  She keeps crying while I take her back to the living room and while I am changing her outfit and her diaper.  I nurse her.

It’s 5:34 and Danielle seems to be asleep.  She doing that thing where she opens and closes her eyelids like she is dreaming. I love watching this girl sleep because she always ends up sharing her sweet smiles.  I wonder what she’s dreaming about. I check facebook and browse the Target advertisement online because I like to try to wait 15 minutes before laying Danielle down so she won’t spit up.

5:51 Joshua walks into the living room.  I tell him it’s too early to wake up. I tell him to go back to bed. He tells me two or three that he doesn’t want to go back to bed, but he goes. I take Danielle back to bed and get back into my bed.

6:00 I’ve been lying awake in bed and James’ alarm goes off. I am awake for an extra 10 minutes before I fall back asleep.

7:00 My alarm goes off.  When I go into the living room I find James having breakfast. Andy is getting dressed from school and Joshua is playing.  I have Andy get out the cereal and I get out bowls, spoons, cups, and milk.  I pour milk into the boys’ cups. I forgot and put the milk away before I put milk into Joshua’s bowl.  Joshua complains when I pour milk from his cup into his bowl because he wants more milk in his cup. I tell him that if he drinks all the milk in his cup I’ll give him more milk.

7:18 Eliana wakes up and joins us for breakfast.  I pour her cereal and milk and give her   a cup of milk.  She wants a cup for a girl, but she is okay when I tell her that all the girl cups are dirty. Andy has half of a bagel with cream cheese and a handful of trail mix before going to find his shoes and brush his teeth.  We all finish with breakfast.

7:28 Eliana and Joshua are playing. Eliana comes in to tell me that Isabel is awake.  When I go back to the girls’ room all is quiet, but I hear a little voice say “Mama, Mama” I check on Danielle who seems to be stirring but she is still asleep. I strap Isabel into her booster seat and give her cereal and milk in a cup.  I take Andy back to the bathroom to wet his hair with water and brush it.

7:35 I tell Andy it’s time to get his coat and backpack on.  It takes him all of 5 minutes to do this.  He tells everyone bye and we wait by the front door for the school bus to come around 7:45. Isabel says “Up! Up!” when she sees me, but when I check her bowl and ask her is she is done she shakes her head “No.”  A few minutes later James lets her up because she is still saying “Up! Up!”

8:18 Danielle is awake and wants to nurse. While I’m nursing, Isabel climbs up on the end table to look out the window. She gets down when I tell her to.  Joshua says he is thirsty and I tell him he has to wait.  Eliana can’t find her baby turtle and asks me to help her find it. I tell her she has to wait.  Isabel takes all of Andy’s birthday cards off the counter and puts them on the floor.  I ask Joshua to help me pick them up.  Danielle falls asleep nursing so I put her down so that I can change Isabel’s diaper.  While I am changing Isabel, Danielle wakes up and wants to nurse again. Joshua is playing with cars and gets mad when Isabel is trying to take his cars. Isabel proceeds to follow Joshua around trying to take his cars. I asked Joshua to give Isabel a car and then she is satisfied with helping Joshua put the cars in a bucket.  Isabel wants a drink.  She proceeds to try to give me her sippy cup. (How does my spell check not know the word “sippy?”) I tell her that I know she wants a drink but that Danielle is drinking Mommy’s milk and she has to wait. Danielle falls asleep again. Isabel finds a 2nd cup and cries while trying to give it to me. When I won’t take it he puts her cup on Danielle and wakes her up. Danielle then spits up on her pajamas. Back to the bedroom to change into another sleeper outfit and change her diaper. This time I remember to grab a bib. Isabel follows with white chocolate pretzels and I tell her to put them back. As soon as we walk back into the living room Danielle spits up all over her bib. I get her a new bib and put her in the baby swing.

9:10 As soon as the others see that I am free they are asking me to get them a drink, or something to eat. I give them drinks and a snack.

9:17  Danielle cries and wants to nurse again.

9:29 Danielle fell asleep again.

10:18 Since Danielle has been asleep I got the dishwasher loaded and I started the washer. Isabel, Eliana, Joshua are watching t.v. and playing.

10:30 Danielle woke up, and I decided that I really wanted to take a shower. I put Isabel in the playpen and Danielle in her bassinet.  I left both doors to the bathroom open so I can hear everyone. Eliana and Joshua are concentrating on the t.v.  While I’m in the shower Joshua comes in to ask if I can button his pants. I tell him that he has to wait until I get out of the shower.  When I get out of the shower I find the chocolate covered pretzel container by Danielle’s bed. Isabel has thrown everything out of the playpen and onto the floor. Danielle is yelling intermittently but not really crying. I talk to her and then she starts crying. I think that hearing that to Danielle my voice must be like hearing the ice cream truck music.  My milk is just that good and I don’t know if I should be flattered!

11 I’m nursing Danielle again.  Everyone wants a piece of Hawaiian bread.  I have Eliana give me the package so that I can get a roll out for her and she sits at the table with it.  I keep the package and give Isabel pieces of a roll because she will walk around and get bread all over the house.  Joshua wants a piece of bread too so I give him a roll and  he sits at the table with it.  A few minutes pass and Isabel has a whole roll and is walking around spreading bread crumbs all over.  I’m not sure who left their half eaten roll on the table but “Stinker-bella” found it!

11:30 My mom comes over.  She plays with the kids. She folds two baskets laundry. She holds Danielle while the older three kids and I have lunch. She brings a little bright red carry-on suitcase for me to use as a photo prop!  I actually think Danielle might be too big to fit in it! We shall see!

12:10 I make Joshua a peanut butter banana and jelly sandwich.  Eliana asks for ham and carrots. I give Isabel ham and cheese, because lately she won’t eat sandwich bread until it is Hawaiian bread of a bun of some sort. Eliana barely touches the ham and eats a few bites of carrots.  Joshua scarfs down his sandwich and then asks for more to drink.  Isabel eats of of her ham and cheese. I am able to eat my sandwich without nursing Danielle at the same time.  (I do have to say that I’m pretty good at eating and nursing at the same time!)

12:30 Naptime! Usually Isabel has taken an early nap but she doesn’t today. I nurse Danielle again. I send Eliana and Joshua to bed and my Mom takes Isabel to her bed. I realize that Danielle’s a little bit gassy so I change her diaper and she does some tummy time and my Mom holds her on her lap and pats her back! I show Mom photos on my computer that I have taken in the past week. Mom changes Danielle’s diaper again.  Danielle falls asleep and I put her in the playpen.

1:10 Success! All four kids are all taking a nap at the same time.   The house is so quiet that I can hear my fingers hitting the keys on my keyboard when I type!

1:30 Danielle is awake and moving around in the playpen.

1:40 Danielle starts crying so I change her diaper and nurse her again!

2:08 Danielle is awake and I’m holding her and typing at the same time!

Adjusting to Number Five

The past 13 days have been a blur.  The adjustment from four kids to five has been a crazy, adventure-filled and some times tear-filled time.  If you have read my blog before you know that we thrive on our daily routine.  Danielle is still adjusting to our routine, but I am happy to report that I think we’re all getting the hang of it.

There are several times a day when Danielle is nursing and one of the other kids requires my attention.  Like last week when Joshua waited until the last possible minute to go to the bathroom and he soaked the floor of the bathroom.  I honestly don’t think he got one drop of potty into the toilet!  I let Danielle exercise her lungs for the clean up.

Isabel is still getting used to not being the baby.  Thankfully she is a Daddy’s girl and will go to James when she wants to snuggle and I am busy with Danielle.  When Daddy is unavailable is when we tend to have waterworks.  Isabel seems to always wait until I am feeding Danielle to “ask” to have something  in sippy cup.  Her “asking” actually involves her shoving her empty cup at me and my putting it on the end table and telling her she has to wait until Danielle is done drinking Mommy’s milk.  We go through this several times in a row until Danielle is done nursing or she gets tired of waiting.  Isabel loves patting Danielle and giving her kisses and I’m thankful that she’s not acting out by trying to be mean to Danielle, because I have heard of kids being extremely jealous of a baby.

I have a theory about babies and meal time:  Babies always wants to eat when everyone else eats!  I must say that I’ve grown pretty confident about my ability to nurse and eat at the same time.  I can actually help Isabel eat while feeding Danielle and eating my own meal.

Andy, Joshua and Eliana have all done really well at adjusting to Danielle.  They are super sweet with her.  They try to sing to her when she is crying.  If she is in her bed and starts crying there are always one or two kids coming to me to tell me, “Your baby is awake!”  Joshua is still telling people Danielle came out of my belly.  Eliana still asks me some times if Danielle is still in my belly.  I can’t figure out what she is thinking on that topic. Maybe she thinks babies can go in and out, I don’t know.  Eliana says that Danielle is “cute but teeny, tiny.” Andy says, “Danielle is so cute! I just loves her.”

Thanks for checking in on us! We appreciate your continued prayers as we all continue adjusting!

Preparations Continue

We’re getting ready for Christmas and we’re getting ready for another baby. I hung up the Advent calendar for the second year in a row. More than just treats our Advent calendar has activities for each day that include things that will help us remember what Christmas is all about . . . Christ. There are days that we watch Christmas movies, days that we will make goodies for others, and days that we read stories. There is even a day where we will camp by the Christmas tree! They are all things that the kids will look forward to but more than that they will help our family keep the focus of Christmas on Jesus.

Because only a few short days after Christmas we will have a precious baby girl joining our family we are getting ready for baby Danielle to come. I want so much to know what date that my baby girl will make her entrance into the world. Not having a very firm due date has made me even more anxious about being prepared for the fact that Danielle is going to come when she’s good and ready. My due date was moved back three weeks at my 20+ week ultrasound and my  ultrasound a few weeks ago showed her right on target, but these later ultrasounds have a margin of error +/- 3 weeks!  It’s safe to say the date is UNKNOWN!

I want to make sure that James is not working out of town and I want to make sure that someone can come and stay with the older kids while I’m in the hospital. I want to have the bassinet set up. I want to have my bag packed and ready to go. I want to have my camera battery charged and my camera card cleared. In short, I want to prepared!

It seems like my list of things that are ready is short, but having some things ready is better than not having anything ready. Because Danielle is our 5th baby we have almost all that we need! All the teeny tiny newborn cloths are washed and folded, and put away. The two big things that we did have to buy are ready and assembled! We had to get rid of our old car seat and our stroller has seen better days. After 4 kids over a span of six years the carseat was EXPIRED!

God knew when Jesus would be born and He knows when my baby girl will be born as well.  Until that date we’ll continue with our preparations!

A Smile to Melt Mommy’s Heart

Since my ultrasound this morning I can’t stop looking at this face.

This is a 4-D Ultrasound of my baby Danielle smiling while I am talking to her.  She was posed with her feet, one arm, and part of her cord in front of her face but still the ultrasound tech was able to get this photo.  There seems to be some debate in the medical community about if baby’s can really smile or if it’s just a reflex.  There is no doubt that her smile makes me smile.  It is an amazing thing that God does when He creates a new life.  I am so thankful for this little glimpse of my baby girl.  I wish I had a video of how proudly Joshua was showing off his very own copy of this photo of his baby sister.  ”Her name is Danielle,” he told all the workers at the doctor’s office today. I’m in love with this baby girl and I can’t wait to meet her in about 54 days.

30 weeks, 65 days to grow!

 

Here are a few photos from my 30-week photo shoot taken by Andy, who is almost 6. I almost never like photos of myself, but looking at these photos that made me smile.  First of all, I am tickled by the fact that Andy loves taking photos. He is still practicing (I did crop most of these photos), but he really enjoys it. It has been fun teaching him about photography. Secondly, I love growing a baby. All the pregnancy woes are worth it because I have another baby to love! I wear my baby bump proudly! 

I’m teaching Andy about angles and perspective. He wanted the yellow tree in the background so I told him to lie down in the grass.

 

Andy told me to do a karate chop and waited patiently for me to comply. I’m not sure how well karate and pregnancy go together!

Joys and Woes of Parenting

Around 4:30 this morning I opened my eyes to find Joshua standing beside my bed.  ”My pants are wet,” are not the words Mommy wants to hear at this hour.  I sent him to the bathroom to undress and went to find  a flashlight so I could survey the amount of “moisture” in his bed.  Then I found some clean pajamas and gave them to him.  After stripping the bed and cleaning the plastic bed liner (Thank the Lord for whoever invented the bed liner!), I took his sheets into the laundry room and found clean sheets and another blanket to put on his bed.  I gave him a 1/2 dose of ibuprofen and put Vick’s on his chest and feet and tucked him into bed.

After all of that I was awake so I sat up and got on Facebook/played sweeps and won free mascara (I even don’t wear makeup but my Mom and my sisters-in-law do.) I could hear Joshua’s constant cough so I called him to come into the living room thinking maybe sitting up for a while would help him.  While he was sitting next to me coughing he gagged and got his pajama pants covered in mucous. I dug through clean clothes on the couch, and found another set of pajama pants. When Joshua was dressed again I asked if he was ready to try to go to sleep again and he said yes, so to his bed we went.

I almost went back to bed myself but I thought I’d sit up a little while longer.  I played a few more sweeps. While I was sitting up Eliana walked into the room.  I couldn’t even make out what she was trying to say.  She talks so softly when she wakes up that is just sounds like squeaking to me.  It didn’t seem urgent just something about her covers.  I told her that it wasn’t time to get up, (It was some time around 5:30 at this point.) but that I would go back to bed with her.  I walked her to her room and covered her up and she went back to sleep.

After a second kid got up, I decided that it was time for me to try to get a few more winks and so I laid down in bed.  I was started to drift off when I heard Isabel crying.  She has been doing really well at sleeping through the night but sometimes she walks up and just wants to be comforted.  I held her and talked to her until it seemed she was asleep again.  When I put her back down she cried but I talked to her and rubbed her back and she finally calmed down.

It was a few minutes after 6 when I finally got back to sleep.  It seemed like 5 minutes passed when my alarm went off at 7.  Which brings me to this wonderful resource that I found about parenting with joy.

10 Point Manifesto of Joyful Parenting

“4. Today, when stress mounts, I pray to dismount it with gratitude. My stress management plan will be intervention with verbal thanks. I can only feel one feeling at a time, and I choose to give thanks at all times. Fight feeling with feeling!”

I feel tired and when I am tired, I feel stressed because of all that I still have to do.  No one else is going to do my job today, so I choose to be thankful for all the blessings that I have.  I am especially thankful for my children, even when they cause me to lose sleep! :::Yawn:::