The magic of Christmas!

Winter fun at the Allen house!

Hello Santa...

Tonight Darcy was throwing one of her VERY dramatic tantrums and I still don't know exactly why. Sometimes she just thinks she needs to cry...hormones already? She was kicking and crying on the steps probably about something Drewby did to her. After about 10 minutes of this, I said I probably needed to make a call to Santa to report her behavior(I hate that I do this to my kiddos, but it just happens sometimes) and she finally settled down after I talked to Santa on the phone(leaving a message on Gma and Gpa's answering machine. ;) After about an hour had passed and she settled down with a warm bath and cozy jammies and slippers, she asked me for Santa's number. I responded that only moms and dads get to know Santa's phone number. She said, "Well, I am a Mommy to my baby, Eva, and I need to talk to Santa." I told her the number(555-2929) and she repeated the numbers while dialing on her play cellphone. Here is the conversation she had with Santa.

"Hi, Santa? This is Darcy, Eva's Mommy. Yes, Eva has made very good choices today and I think she deserves some gifts. Okay, thank you Santa."

Oh, how I adore that little tantrum throwing girl. :)

Cleaning up!

The twins are in the sunporch cleanig up and here is what tey are saying.

Darcy-"Whenever you clean up, you just work together and it's not so tough."

Drew-"Whenever you clean up, if you just don't do it, the teachers always will." (typical man)

Halloween

Life is NUTS! I am super busy with teaching full-time again, being a Mommy, teaching Kindermusik and now yoga....why oh why? I guess I do it all because I LOVE children, It is just going to take a while before I can get into a routine that works for me. Right now, I am overwhelmed, but I am trying to keep a positive attitude, which is difficult.
We really enjoyed Halloween this year, the kiddos were all excited about their costumes and we had Halloween activities that seemed would never end. The witch came to our house on Halloween and took our candy again in exchage for some nice toys, which was very exciting.
Being with Drew and Darcy for their classroom party was a lot of fun, I am so glad I get to be a part of their education. I was also able to attend Ashton's party and surprised him by reading the Humbug Witch to his class. He knew I was coming, but he did not know I was coming as the Humbug Witch. I loved his face when I walked in. Super cute! I read this darling book at our Community Halloween Party as well, which was a hit.
These years are going by so quickly and I need to remind myself to enjoy every moment. The laundry will eventually get done, or we will just buy new clothes and the floors will get cleaned, or we can just replace them. ;) You get the point, I love my family and need to be reminded to breathe myself. Life is such a blessing, even when times are rough.
As we would say in yoga..."Namaste".

Little Stinker

Wow, summer is going too quickly. It seems like just a few weeks ago Ashton and I were dreaming of sleeping in and playing at the pool and now we are planning when to shop for school supplies.

Ashton is my little challenge and it seems like he is either the sweetest thing in the world or a complete stinker and today he showed that stinker side. Drew went on night #2 last night sleeping without his dear kitty and blanky because they were missing. I offered a reward of $1 yesterday to anyone who could find the missing "lovies". Nobody spoke up and I was worried that Ashton threw them in the trash as a prank. This morning, I had completely lost my mind searching for the "lovies" and I decided to offere $5 to anyone who could find them. Interesting how Ashton immediately remembered where he hid them two days ago. Drew now has his kitty and blanky and Ashton has $5. Oh Ashton, thanks for all the gray hairs and wrinkles. I love you!

Our Angel

"God saw you getting tired and a cure was not to be. So He put His arms around you and whispered "come to me." With tearful eyes I watched you, and saw you pass away. Although I loved you dearly, I could not make you stay. A golden heart stopped beating, hard working hands at rest. God broke my heart to prove to me He only takes the best."

"Nice Chatting With You"

We had a wonderful family weekend camping at Twin Anchors and the kiddos and Daddy did a lot of fishing. All three children got along and played great together all weekend, which is pretty rare at our house. I have concluded that the relaxation and getting away from the hustle and bustle is much needed at our house right now and it was therapeutic for everyone!

One evening while the boys were all fishing, Darcy and I were watching them from a distance and just relaxing in the grass. Darcy looked up at me and said, "Mommy, it is so nice to just sit and chat with you." I told her how much I loved "chatting" with her too, but I really hoped the boys get back soon so they were not riding their bikes back in the dark. Darcy said, "Mom, let's pray to God for him to bring our boys back safely." We prayed and then Darcy talked to me about how God always watches us and hears us. We talked about how God also forgives us and Darcy wanted to know what "forgive means". I explained it to her through scenarios and talking about love. She now understands forgive, but when her brother hit her when we got home and told her sorry, she just to not forgive him. ;) What an amazing feeling it is to have a daughter and I hope she will always enjoy "chatting" with me.

God Bless

Family

Tonight we were having "Family Movie Night" and Darcy said, "Mom, this is a good family movie because we are all watching it together." I asked Darcy what a family was and she said, "We are all together." What an amazing family I have and oh how blessed I feel to have them all. A loving, supportive husband and three beautiful, caring children. Really, we had everything we needed tonight while watching our "family movie", we don't need a big fancy house or expensive vacations to have fun. All it really takes is all of us just hanging out being a family. I hope and pray that our children will learn the importance of family and how important it is for all of us to support and love one another.
Gosh, what adorable kiddos in this picture...thank goodness those bunnies do not belong to us!

God's blessings!

Thank you God

For three days, Daddy has been on a business trip and we have been praying for his safe return during our prayers. Tonight after we were finished praying, Darcy said, "Mom, when we go to bed tomorrow and Daddy is home, I want to thank God for bringing him back to us safely." We prayed and God brought Daddy home to us tonight and the twins were up to thank God for that.

God does answer prayers if we take the time to talk to him.

Two Eyes

Ashton and Daddy ended the evening by playing a bit of Mario Cart and when Andrew got to the Donkey Kong or something like that, Ashton let Daddy know what he needed to do in this particular spot. Now, each player has their own screen, so Andrew replied, "How did you know I was at Donkey Kong, you should be watching your own screen." Ashton says, "Dad, I have two eyes."

Instant Yoga Butt

Ashton has a great sense of humor, thank goodness, as he is the child who I lose my patience with the most. I hate to admit it, but I was dancing around the living room singing and shaking my "booty" in a new pair of jeans that are a bit tight in the behiney. I left the tag on, knowing that I would most likely be returning them when Ashton says, "Mom, why are you shaking your booty with tags hanging from your jeans?" I let him know that I was going to return the jeans because they were too tight in the behiney when he laughed and said, "Mom, they are not too tight, you have an instant yoga butt!" There was a commercial a while back for Old Navy yoga pants that advertised they would give you an instant yoga butt and being a 6 year old boy, Ashton thought this was the greatest commercial EVER made!

Thank goodness after 3 kiddos, I still have a yoga butt in the eyes of my little guy. :)

ONE OF THESE THINGS IS NOT LIKE THE OTHER...

Ever since the twins entered our lives, I knew that Drewby was going to be a handfull. He was not like the other two, he was a screamer with a mind of his own that was overpowering. He knew what he wanted and he wanted it yesterday. He has grown into this ADORABLE, sweet, snuggly little boy, but he continues to have a mind of his own. I am proud of him for not being afraid to be different sometimes and this past week was one of those moments that reminded me of just how much our little guy does indeed have a mind of his own.

I found an adorable craft making bunnies out of socks and so the kiddos and I sat down with all our materials and got to work. Drew was bouncing his partially made bunny all over the table and floor until it turned to a blob and then decided he did not want a cute little bunny, he wanted a rat. Yes, a rat. I proceeded to work on the cute bunnies and Ashton helped Drew turn his sock into a rat instead of a bunny. We now have 3 new additions to the family. Two bunnies, one named Jackie the Jack Rabbit and one named Tinkerbell Cinderella and a rat named Rat-a-Tat-Tat.

I love the differences between our children and have a good laugh each day because of our little boy who is not like the others. :)

Fridays with Friends!

Friends

As a woman who enjoys her days with her children each and every day, it is so important to have good friends, and that, I have. I sent out an email on Thursday night reminding all my dear friends that I would be taking Thing 1 and Thing 2 to the gym to run at 9:30 AM on Friday. I almost cried when I walked in and saw the gym full of my dearest friends and all their little ones. We spent the morning laughing and even crying a little as we discussed things from nutrition to tantrums. I am truly blessed to live in a community where so many smart and talented mothers have chosen the path to be home with our children to enjoy the little things that happen each and every minute.

I could not take on the challenges of mothering without them.

God bless

Go Fish, "Mommy School" and "Ashton School"

Reading

Ashton has really started to enjoy his reading. He loves to bring books home from the library that he can read. Yesterday after he got home from school, he wanted to read his library book right away and then decided to teach Drew and Darcy how to read. From all the DIBELS testing at school(which as a teacher, I think are the most pointless tests EVER), Ashton feels that he needs to give the twins DIBELS tests. He takes each twin, one at a time and reads with them from his Starfall series books and then scores them based on the difficulty level of the book and how many words they "read" correctly. He is pretty fair and this morning when he woke up, he got each of them caught up with one another and scored them both at a 14 before he headed out the door to school. I think I might have a future little teacher on my hands and am LOVING every minute of it!

Today after taking the twins to Kindermusik and then Story Time, we came home to work on our letter of the day, which was "I" and then played a few games of Go Fish before our lunch and naps. Watching Drew and Darcy play Go Fish is about the funniest thing ever. They show each other their cards when asking for a certain one and both peek at the others whenever they shift around to "Go Fish"....so adorable.

With our new computer, I am trying to figure out how to upload pics, but will post some soon of them playing their game of Go Fish.

I am so blessed and feel so much better now that I have dropped several Kindermusik classes to spend more time with my kiddos while the time quickly slips away from us. :(

Simple Joys

I could not possibly dream of a better morning. Well, at least in the dead of winter in Iowa. A note from my hubby this morning(who was at Bible Study across the street) reads, "I will take Asher to school. I love you." Oh, bliss. No rushing to get the three kiddos and myself ready to drive Ashton to Slater. I could stay in my jammies and just get one little man ready to go. Because of the calm in the house, I was able to enoy two storybooks with Ashton and Darcy while Drewby slept and before pushing Ashton out the door. Once Ashton was gone, I finally showered and the twins and I spent almost 2 hours at the library reading books and playing with blocks. We were the only children in the library and so we had a large area all to ourselves to enjoy the comfort of books and each other. It was sooooo relaxing. I decided to find myself a book and was even able to sit in the rocking chair while reading a book and watching my lovely children play with the blocks. After the library, we had some races in the gym and then finally home to have lunch and make some pumpkin muffins. To top it all off, they are sleeping now and I am enjoying Blog Land. Oh the joys of staying home. :)

Creativity

I continue to be amazed at how creative our children can be. It is simply beautiful that their brains are so pure and have so much imagination. After making airplanes and rockets with Ashton after school a few days ago, he called me in to see his new "hand sanitizer dispenser." Ashton made sure that everyone was keeping their germs at bay be frequently visiting the pump. Everywhere you go these days, they have a pump with an alcohol-based hand sanitizer in them, so I guess we might as well have one in our own house. When Andrew walked in the door from work, Ashton immediately directed him to the pump to kill all those germs from his busy hand-shaking day at work. ;)

Fall and Winter

Oh, it feels good to be back! I have officially left the FB world and come back to where I feel more productive...keeping up with my children and their youth is so much more important than roaming around FB.

It has been a busy, busy Fall and Winter...Ashton started Kindergarten and I am involved in a Co-op Preschool with the twins. I was so blessed to fall into a group of women, many educators like myself, who decided being home with their children was where they needed to be and "retired" from public school teaching. The group of women came together and now we team teach our own children, taking turns with days in the classroom and having time to ourselves on days that we don't teach.

School for all the children is going so well. Ashton really jumped right into Kindergarten without many issues, sure, he loves to be home with Mommy, but only had one major fit about going to school and it was short-lived. He came home today saying, "my teacher said that I am the best in the classroom." He had a sub today and she told him that he was the nicest child and did a great job on all his work today. What could make a Mommy more proud?

As much as I don't like this crummy weather and really, REALLY want Spring, I am so glad that I am home with my kiddos and watching them all grow into amazing little people. I know too well that they grow way too fast and my time with them is soooo short. I still get sad when I think about Ashton already being six! How did that happen.

I am blessed beyond words and love my family beyond words as well.

God Bless

Ashton

Tonight after Daddy got home from work, I needed to get out of the house BADLY and so did Ashton. Ashton and I decided to spend the evening at the Huxley library and we had so much fun together. I realized how much I missed him and his personality when he is not with his 3-year old brother and sister...such a different little guy. We held hands in the library going from shelf to shelf looking for the perfect robot and cat books, two of his passions. The calm of the library at 6:30 in the evening is almost as relaxing as meditation in my yoga class. We found ourselves sitting on the floor in the the middle of wonderful books, choosing which ones to take home. I am so happy that we decided to spend this time together and hope and pray that we will remember to do it more often. We ended our evening together snuggled in his bed reading the first of the Junie B. Jones series...I think we are going to like them! Fun, fun! We are not so fond of the title of the first book, but Ashton says we can call it, "silly bus" vs. "stupid bus"!

Love you Asher!