Behind the Scenes

I saw this quote on pinterest a few months back. It said something like:

"Don't compare your behind the scenes to everyone else' highlight reel."

I think in this day and age it's easy to see the things people post on their facebook and blogs and try to compare your life to theirs. It's important to remember though that a lot of times people are only posting the good things about their lives, because really, who wants to read a blog where the person's complaining all the time?

I try not to do too much comparing between my life and others. Quite honestly I love my life and I'm grateful for all the blessings I have. But I have been thinking about my behind the scenes. Because there are definitely things in my life I'm trying to work on and improve on and areas where I feel I fall short.

 

So here are some of my behind the scenes:

-Sometimes the list of things I know I should be doing feels long and overwhelming. I have been pretty good about personal scripture study but I can be better. I want to be better. I definitely need to be better at family scripture study. I know we should do it but other things always seem to come up. Colin has been talking about Jesus a lot lately and I love that but I know there's definitely more I can teach him and the perfect way to start that is to focus on family scripture study. That is one of my goals.

-I feel like I waste a lot of time. I'm blessed and privileged to be home with the kids most of the time. And the days I am at work I'm very blessed to have my mom watch them. But I feel like on the days I am home with them I spend a lot of my time wasted on the computer, my phone, watching TV, etc. when I could be interacting with them. Don't get me wrong, I do play with my kids but I feel like there are lots of times I may be sending the message that what I feel I need to do right then (aka: the dishes, clean up) is more important than getting on the floor and playing with them in that instant when they're asking for it. The dishes can wait. They'll still be there an hour later. My kids won't always be this age and they won't always want to play with me. I'm trying to be better at dropping what I'm doing and living in the moment with them. There's a quote from Dieter F. Uchtdorf from October's General Conference. He said:

"If we fail to give our best personal self and undivided time to those who are truly important to us, one day we will regret it. Let us resolve to cherish those we love by spending meaningful time with them, doing things together, and cultivating treasured memories."

I'm working on that!

-Sometimes I feel guilty because I feel like I live for bedtime. I'm excited to lay the kids down and have some kid free time to myself. Usually I don't fill that time productively. I spend it watching TV and decompressing from the day. I think it's okay to be excited for time to yourself because in order to keep it all together and keep your sanity you need that. I just wish instead of checking the clock every 5 minutes at night seeing when it's time to put the kids to bed I'd be thinking "How can I spend this time with them showing them how much I love them."

-I definitely lose my cool sometimes. I'm trying to be more patient and realize that if we're 30 minutes late to playgroup that's okay. I don't need to rush Colin into the car and tell him to hurry up. He's doing the best he can. Sometimes he may be lolly-gagging but I can just let him enjoy the moment rather than rush him along and stress us both out.

-Colin loves drawing and one of his favorite things to do right now is draw a picture or have me draw a picture, tape it like it's laminated, and cut it out. He does more of this at my moms house than mine because I lose my patients with it. I don't want all those little papers sitting around my house and I don't feel like wasting all that tape. Pretty stupid excuses, I know! I'm trying to go with it and let him enjoy something that he loves. So what if I've got taped up drawings all over the house. He loves them and it makes him happy!

-Sometimes (read: a lot) I get tired of keeping the house clean, doing the laundry, doing the dishes, etc. (And I'm pretty sure Colin is a hoarder!) It's a never ending job. As soon as you get it done there's more to be done. I think rather than focusing on the endless list of chores I should focus on the blessing it is to have that list and amount of work. We've got a nice house to live in, food, clothes, health and most importantly the people that I love to share all of these things with. It doesn't get much better than that!

These are some of the main things I've been thinking about lately. Quite the list I've got to work on! I'm grateful for my children and the blessing they are in our lives. If it weren't for them I wouldn't have this list of stuff to work on. I'm grateful for Ryan. I know he gets frustrated a lot by his commute, his job, etc. but I'm glad he gets up every day and does it to support us.

President Uchtdorf also said:

"...external circumstances don't really matter or determine our happiness. We do matter. We determine our happiness. You and I are ultimately in charge of our own happiness."

I feel pretty happy with how my life is going at this point but I know that if I can focus on these behind the scenes and make some changes to be a better person that happiness can and will be expounded upon!

Stretching

A few weeks ago when Ryan was stretching after his workout Peyton went up to the wall to stretch with him. It was the cutest thing ever! She did it again Wednesday night before basketball and we had to get a picture!

 

Last night when we were saying prayers before Peyton went to bed she folded her arms...she didn't quite keep them folded for the picture though! And I don't know what that face is?!

{She folded them a couple weeks ago in nursery too!}

And some late breaking news: James popped the question on Thursday night! Congrats Rachel and James!

Parent/Teacher Conference #2

I met with Colin's teacher last week for his 2nd parent/teacher conference. Last time they met with every parent. This time they just wanted to meet with parents of the kids who are going to kindergarten next year (and probably others if they're having issues). Rather than go on the actual conference day she asked if I'd just come in early one day before I dropped Colin off. He immediately sat down to color and Peyton played with Mrs. Doughty.

Colin's doing great.

-He counted to 19 for her and counted objects to 19 as well.

-He knows all his colors.

-He recognized the numbers 1 and 3.

-The uppercase letters he recognized are: B,C,F,J,K,L,O,P,Q,S,V,X, and Z.

-The lowercase letters he recognized are: c,f,j,k,o,p,s,t,v,x,z. Ms. Coca said he's doing really well the the zoo phonics letters when they practice.

-He knew all the shapes (circle, square, triangle, oval, rectangle, diamond, star, heart).

She said he's a great friend and they love having him in class.

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Here's what Peyton's been up to:

-She's saying a ton of words now. There's no way I remember them all. She repeats a lot of the stuff we say. I do remember that she's said: spoon (poon), sock, shoe, down, no, bye, ice, more, go. She said Peyton the other day when we were reading a book with a mirror on the back page. She hasn't said it since. That's all the new ones I remember right now.

-She points to her eyes, nose, and ears when you ask where they are. Sometimes she points to her mouth but sometimes she points to her nose instead. When you ask where her belly button is she pulls her shirt up and points to it. It's hilarious!

 



Odds and Ends

I think my blogging became a little sporadic over the holidays and there were stories I wanted to tell but I forgot. So I made a list of the ones I remember--some of these things have just happened too! I've also got a smorgasbord of pictures from the last little while!

 

Colin and I were playing Guess Who after church today. Ryan's on his way to Florida for business so I was helping Colin get his board set up and he was like "That's great helping! I hope Heavenly Father and Jesus are proud of you!" What a sweet boy! I love how he thinks about them and tries to focus on making them happy!

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One day in November Colin came downstairs wearing a PJ shirt as a suit jacket and asked me if I wanted to dance with him. Then he said "Oh nuts, I forgot my tie!" He is hilarious!

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On Tuesday morning we were watching Spiderman and Colin yelled "Don't do it, doctor" at the TV. Peyton was sitting in her high chair eating breakfast and immediately started screaming "Don't doctor". It was soooo funny! That was the first time she'd ever said doctor before! Peyton also said birthday on Tuesday--for Colin's birthday!

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Last Sunday Colin wanted to watch a video about Christ's crucifixion called 'To This End Was I Born'. Peyton was watching as well and she pointed at the TV and said "Jesus". Then Ryan said "That's right, it's Jesus." She looked at him with the biggest smile and went straight back to watching the video. It melted my heart! There is no doubt in my mind that she remembers being in Heaven with him not too long ago! That same day Colin was pretending to be Jesus. Ryan was Heavenly Father and I was Mary. It was pretty cute. He said a couple really cute things but I can't remember what they were.

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The other night Colin blurted out "More babies" to which Ryan replied "No more babies." (A favorite saying of his---I completely disagree!) Anyway, Colin was like "Mommy, just go to the hospital. You can drive yourself there, right?" It was hilarious!

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Peyton also started saying Jason this week and is calling Colin "Co" (sounds like kaw). I love these guys so much!

 

Colin was super excited about his spiderman candle, which I forgot to get a picture of. These are from Mom and Dad's camera! And at this point I had not put enough candles in...denial much?!

Ryan got a new weight vest. I just thought he deserved to have a picture on here!

This is her bruise from head butting her crib at nap time! She is a crazy girl! But we sure do love her to pieces!

Took Kim out for her birthday!!!

Let's Party!

We had Colin's birthday party today. It was fun as usual! A couple months ago he said he wanted an Avengers cake but then he decided on Spiderman. Last night Ryan was trying to switch him back to Captain America which didn't make me too happy since I already had everything for Spiderman! Luckily Colin was happy to stick with Spiderman!

I showed him a picture of his cake last night after I finished it (he was already in bed). Today he asked to see it numerous times and it was the first thing he showed everyone when they got to our house! He sure does get excited about his cakes!

After pizza we opened presents. There was definitely a super hero theme this year!

Peyton trying on the lizard mask.

Not really sure how she got that bruise on her cheek!

Ready for cake!

Getting in some super hero action

We love our {not so} little guy!!!

 

We are so blessed to have such great family and friends come spend the afternoon with us to celebrate Colin's 5th birthday! I still can't believe how fast these years have gone! And if anyone is itching to play superheroes- I'm pretty sure we've got all the costumes and action figures :)

Happy Birthday 5 Year Old!!!

Colin's 5th birthday was Tuesday! It is so crazy to me that he's 5 years old already! He seems like such a big boy but it does not feel like he can be 5 already! I think he had a really great birthday! We hung out until it was time to leave for school. He took cupcakes for his class. While he was at school Peyton and I went shopping to get him some presents. After school we went to DQ to get him an ice cream cake (Daddy's idea!) He wanted pizza for dinner and we spent the evening hanging out! Colin's such a great big brother and son and we love him SOOOOOOO much! Happy birthday baby boy!

 

Surprise surprise that all his pictures include him in PJ's! I wanted to get one after school with his crown on but he literally bolted to his room and put his PJ's back on as soon as we walked in the door!

He loves his new spider man shirt!!

12/28/12

Last Friday, December 28th I went through the temple. I had been thinking about doing it pretty much the whole year and finally after discussing it with Ryan decided to go ahead and go! I chose Christmas time since all my siblings were home so Mom, Dad, Josh, Joni, and Jason could all be there.

It was a great day! I took the kids over to Mom and Dad's and Rachel watched them while we were gone. Mom, Dad, Joni, and I went a little earlier than the boys. Ever since we made the decision for me to go through I have had numerous instances where I have felt overwhelming feelings of love and joy which I truly believe are from Heavenly Father. Those feelings were multiplied being in the temple. I felt so much peace, joy, and happiness and am grateful for the support showed to me by my family and friends!

Ryan met our friend, Byron up there around 2:30 when we were getting close to getting done. They were sitting in the waiting room when we came out. It was a great feeling to have Ryan there to show his support to me. I am grateful for the love and support he's shown me, especially since he knows how important this is to me!

 

Other people who came to support us:

-Kim and Mike

-Sara and Byron

-Beth and Mike Johnson

-Laurie Hebdon

-Pearl
-Joy English

60.

Today is my Grandma and Grandpa's 60th Anniversary! Pretty awesome! They wanted to get everyone together to celebrate. Every fall they go up to Pere Marquette and stay at a lodge. They thought that would be the perfect spot to all hang out.

So Sunday after Peyton's nap we drove up. It's a little over an hour away from our house. We got settled into our rooms and then all had dinner at the lodge restaurant. There's 25 people in our family and we were all able to be there for dinner! Pretty awesome! A couple people couldn't stay the night because they had to work yesterday but most of us did sleep over and spend a lot of time together!

 

Nolan loves babies! On Christmas Eve he took her binky out of her mouth and told her to talk. When we took pictures Saturday morning he said "Peyton. Down." Sunday night was no different. He came to give her kisses as soon as he could!

And yes, her whole forehead is black and blue! She's been head butting her crib at nap time. The bruise is spreading and she's starting to get a black eye.

After dinner we got ready to go swimming! Peyton, of course needed to play with my phone. Colin was just being silly!

She didn't want to be in the water. As soon as her feet touched it the first time she pulled her legs back up to keep from getting wet!

She had more fun just sitting with people!

We stayed at the pool until a little after 9 and then we all hung out in the great room and played games and talked. Peyton had finally had enough around 10:30 so we took her back to the room. She refused to sleep in her crib so she ended up in our bed. Once she was asleep I was getting ready to go back downstairs and Josh brought Colin up. Once I got him in bed I went back down for about an hour and a half. I ended up back in our room at 12:30.

 

Monday morning the people who were still there met for breakfast before driving back home. Since I neglected to get pictures of us all on Sunday night I decided breakfast pictures would have to do! 

Jason was trying to look silly and Josh was trying to look mean!

Josh won Colin a frog at the arcade game.

It had started snowing yesterday morning so we drove home in the snow. It was such a fun weekend getaway!

Congrats Grandma and Grandpa!

 

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For New Year's Eve Peyton and I went to the mall with Josh and Joni and Ryan and Colin came over to Mom and Dad's after a nap. Last night we did fondue (steak and shrimp followed by chocolate with fruit for dessert a few hours later) and played games to ring in the new year. I can't believe it's 2013! Insane!

 

Josh and Joni left around noon so we ran over this morning to hang out before they had to go. Rachel goes back Friday and Jason has another week and a half left. Dad doesn't head back to D.C. until Monday so he got a nice break too! This has been such a fun Christmas break even though people were sick. As always, the time flew by!



Snow by Day, Wicked by Night

Friday afternoon as we were leaving the temple it began to snow. I didn't think it would amount to anything but alas it did! We went back to Mom and Dad's that night to have dinner but didn't stay over too late because we weren't sure if the roads were going to ice. Saturday morning Colin woke up bright and early ready to play outside. The boys went out for a little bit to shovel and throw some snowballs but then they had to come inside so we could get ready to go to family pictures with the Grodeon clan. After pictures we all took naps and then Colin played in the backyard for about an hour. The neighbor boy next door (about 17 years old) was in his back yard and they were throwing snowballs at each other. It was cute! I went out with him for a little bit too and pulled him around the house on his penguin. Let me tell you, after about 2 trips around my lungs were burning!

That night Ryan and I met Mom, Dad, Josh, Joni, Jason, Rachel, and Ryan at WICKED! It was SO good! I wanted to get a picture of the whole group but we never did. The funniest part of night was during intermission. A few years ago Ryan and I took Mom and Dad to The Phantom of the Opera and Ryan wasn't a huge fan. I thought he'd enjoy Wicked more so when the intermission began I asked him if he liked it. He was like "yeah." Then he stood up and got his coat from the back of his chair. I was like "Why are you getting your coat?" Then Josh goes "Did you think it was over?" and Ryan was like "Yeah...there's more?! What the hell?" It was hilarious!

 

Ryan claims this was his thought process:

He checked the time, the show had been on for an hour and a half, he thought "That's long enough", then everyone started getting up, my dad stood up, Ryan thought it was time to go. Ryan stood up and saw a lady in a gray coat which reinforced in his mind that it was time to leave. Dad told Ryan we need to get him some culture! 

Christmas Day and the Rest of Jeannie's Trip

Here's the recap of Jeannie's trip and the rest of the Christmas pictures I haven't posted! (Side note: I was horrible at taking pictures this year! I always had my camera but I rarely seemed to use it! Ryan has also noted that he wasn't in any of the pictures from Christmas this year--besides the family one Christmas Eve, which I love, by the way! So I'll have to do better next year!)

 

Jeannie arrived late Thursday night. Ryan worked Friday so Jeannie, I, and the kids went to McDonald's for lunch (per Colin's request). Then we stopped by Hobby Lobby, my parents to see Jason, and Schnuck's to get some things for dinner. That night we hung out and went to bed kind of early since I had to work the next day.

Saturday was a lazy day! I worked 7-11 and we really just hung out all afternoon. We ordered pizza that night, Ryan and Jeannie made a trip to Target. We had planned to go see Josh and Joni but we were all a little too lazy to do it!

Sunday was Peyton's infamous vomiting scene at church. After pooping on the floor before her bath when we got home she took a long nap and seemed to feel better afterwards. That night we had my family over for dinner and then hung out after they left.

Christmas Eve Jeannie and I ran to the store to get some last minute things for dinner that night, the kids took naps, and we opened presents before going to Grandma and Grandpas.

Christmas day we saw what Santa brought, had breakfast, went to Mom and Dad's. Opened presents, watched movies, hung out, dealt with people not feeling well, had dinner.

On Wednesday we laid around trying to rest. Jeannie was feeling a lot better than on Tuesday but still not great. We watched Tangled and played. That night we went to Eckert's for dinner and Ryan played basketball.

Thursday Jeannie was sick again so we just hung out for awhile until it was time to go to the airport. After we dropped her off the kids and I met Rachel and Joni at Old Navy where Colin had the worst tantrum he's ever had in his life. Screaming at the top of his lungs, pulling back when I was trying to hold his hand out to the car. Oh it was not fun! I seriously thought that if a policeman was there they'd think I was stealing him because of how loud he was screaming and crying! He calmed down after we went to my parents for a little bit but he did have to go straight to bed as soon as we got home (per Ryan).

So there you have it! Our week with Jeannie. Hopefully the next time we see each other everyone will be healthy!

 

Christmas morning

Grandma Betty got all the dogs in the family Christmas PJ's--they're sooo cute! However, the dogs won't sit still long enough to get a good picture so this is it!

The only picture we have of Jeannie from her trip. Luckily Ryan took this one!