Free chocolate? I'm there.

Jana's giving away chocolate, y'all. Free chocolate. Free homemade chocolate. Need I say more? Go put your name in the hat!!

I wonder...

...are we the only family that doesn't decorate the back of the Christmas tree that's backed to the wall or in the corner? The part that no one ever sees?

I went, I shopped, I conquered

Yes, I did it. Not only did Mom and I shop on Black Friday, but we shopped at 4:45am. The hordes of people were astounding. It was more crowded than I imagined it would be. People who found out what I was planning (shopping at 5am) thought I was crazy and said they would never do that....I told them that as long as I don't have to do it with my 3 kids in tow, nothin' scares me.

But my mom and I walked away victorious. We got every "blitz" item we went after and I've just about finished my shopping except for a few things for each of the kids and Sweet Hubby. We had a great time...even though we waited in the check out line for an hour at the Wal*mart.

Oh, and I also have to admit, we went to Wal*mart not once, not twice but three times today. Two stores, three trips. Add a few more drops to my bucket-full of crazy.

And I also have to state that it was wild crazy chaos, but aside from the one lady who (unsuccessfully) attempted to snatch my blitz ad from my basket, all the other bleary-eyed people were very nice, patient and helpful. There were no fights, or disagreements or grown adults wrestling each other to the ground for a $25 talking toy.

And now, excuse me while I collapse in to bed.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

I asked this kids this morning what they were each thankful for. Their answers show that either I'm not doing as badly as I thought with them, or that they've been brainwashed well enough to give the "right" answers.

Stephen-my family, that I get to see my family today, my home, that we have food to eat, that God is here.....that's it!

Zachary-you, that's it. (I tried to pry more out of him, but I think there was a glass of milk, a vitamin and a TV show calling his name. I asked him if he was thankful for anything else and he said, "Nope. I just like you." And then he ran into the other room.)

Marc-Adam-here's our conversation:
Me: what are you thankful for, Marc-Adam?
M-A: Dahbee.
Me: What are you thankful for?
M-A: huh?
Me: What are you thankful for?
M-A: uhhhhhh....baby?
Me: Baby?
M-A: uh-huh.
(Stephen, from the other room: it's a racing car!)
M-A (bolting from my lap and running to where Stephen is): Truck!

And I have to add one more thing that I'm thankful for: I'm thankful for the first sweet little nudges and flutters that our newest little turkey is giving me. It's like Baby is making sure that I remember that I have one more blessing to be thankful for.

Thankful

We all have so much to be thankful for.

This morning I spent a little time with each child telling him that tomorrow was Thanksgiving and that I was thankful for him and I told each one what I loved about him. And it's more than just being thankful for my husband and kids. I'm thankful for what I have because of them. This love, this life is all because of what I have with them. God has been more than generous to me.

I look around and regardless of the crappy or scary things that are going on in my world and the larger world outside, I know that life is good. Life is good.

And I can't give enough thanks.

I wonder....

...If I'm the only female in the western hemisphere that hasn't jumped aboard the Twilight train? And has no interest in jumping aboard.

Something's not right about this

Their playroom looks like this:


And they spent part of their morning fighting over this:


Something just doesn't add up....

Not enough bleach in the world

So the kids have been sick for several days. Sweet Hubby and I think we're coming down with it, too, and while we tried our "old wives' tale" prevention method on Hubby in hopes that he wouldn't actually come down with it(this is the worst week of all weeks for him to get sick), I didn't have the heart to do it because the kids have really suffered with this and I'll feel badly if I'm able to dodge it by preventing it. (Somehow I don't feel like that sentence makes sense at all....then again, I'm pretty sure the logic doesn't make sense.) I kept the kids home from church yesterday (which I'm glad I did because I found out there's also a tummy bug going around and I'd much rather deal with the snotty noses and hacking coughs than tummy issues). I'm not sure if they're still contagious. No one's really running a fever, but the noses and coughs are terrible. We've been through almost an entire bottle of Children'sMucinex this week and I'm pretty sure there's been enough coughing and germ spreading going on around here to infect a small country. If I had nickel for every time I've said, "Cover your mouth!!" Of course, I also feel kinda bad when I'm telling them to cover their mouth while they sound like they're coughing up a lung.

Over the next few days, I'm going to try to work on disinfecting the house with hopes that they don't reinfect it. And above all, I'm praying that they start to get better and that I don't get it, too, because I'd really really hate to spend Thanksgiving alone. Sweet Hubby has to work the night before Thanksgiving and the night of Thanksgiving, so he'll be sleeping all Thanksgiving day, and the idea of spending all day alone at home with the kids is just really very sad. But there's no way I can feel good about spending the day with Sweet Hubby's family while we are carrying the Plague.

Just in case, I think I'm going to thaw a chicken and have Sweet Hubby pick up our favorite rolls. I've got a can of green beans and a can of sweet potatoes in the pantry. That'll make for a faux Thanksgiving meal, I guess.

I wonder....

I've been thinking about doing this for a while--posting about the funny/strange/random/interesting things that I wonder about. Mainly because I want to share with you a little bit about who I am and I think the things I think about will help to show you. Also, when I wonder something that you might actually know the answer to, you can fill me in. And when I wonder something weird, you can let me know if you wonder that, too, or if I've totally lost it and I need to get out more. So this will be a recurring thing here at Imperfection. Feel free to chime in with your own wonderings, or make a post all your own on your blog (but be sure to let me know, so I can check it out).

So here's what's been on my brain the last week or so:

You know how last summer, gas prices sky-rocketed? And because of that, the price of EVERYTHING else went up, too, especially food prices and all the Big Fat Companies said it was because of rising fuel costs? So I wonder....why am I still paying $4 for a gallon of milk, or $5 dollars for a 1/2 pound of cheese or almost $3.00 for a loaf of bread when gas prices are the lowest they've been for almost 4 years?

And consequently, I also wonder what kind of Christmas bonuses the Big Fat Company CEOs are getting.

Silly and sweet

The kids have been funny and sweet lately. A couple days ago, Marc-Adam was asking for me to pick him up. He just kept saying "UP! Up!". When I asked him what to say, Stephen jumped in trying to be silly and said, "Up, please!" in a baby voice. Marc-Adam pushed him out of the way and yelled "My up please!"

Zachary's got a nasty little bug. Snotty, coughing, irritable...the works. He's slept most of the day today and after playing by himself in the playroom for about 10 minutes, Stephen plopped down next to me on the couch and sighed real big. I said, "What's up, Bud?" He said, in a pouty little tone, "I wish Zachary would get better." I asked him if he missed him and he said yes. He was actually sad for Zachary and himself at the same time. And then when I made Zachary lunch in bed, Stephen was so excited for Zachary. He couldn't quit smiling about it. It was so cute and sweet.

Zachary's convinced that the new baby is going to be a sister for him. When I ask him what her name is, he says, "Gene-VEEEEVE!" Which is right, I just love the way he says it....all the emphasis on "VEEEVE".

Buggy Update

After my post yesterday, the boys, who were still talking about putting the bug in the trash and trying to get rid of it, starting discussing between themselves what the natural predators would be for that kind of roach. When they decided a bird would eat a bug, they started to make bird calls, hoping to scare the bug out of the house. The fact that there was no open door or window didn't seem to bother them.

Before Sweet Hubby got home, my mother-in-law came by to pick us up so we could go run some errands. Zachary immediately reported the situation to her and she disposed of the bug for us.

All is right with the world.

Crazy bug-hater

I walked in to the living room last night after putting the kids to bed, and saw a large semi-dead tree roach in the middle of the floor. Like the completely mature adult that I am, I left it there, hoping it would be more dead in the morning...and also hoping that Sweet Hubby would be home before the kids freaked out too much about it.

When we got up this morning, it was still there. I assumed (wrongly) that it was 100% dead, seeing as how it was still in the same place and position in the living room. (I should probably state here my disgust for just about everything with six legs...add wings to those six legs, and I'm done, acting like a complete fool if it comes anywhere within 20 feet of me--or looks like it might think about coming anywhere within 20 feet of me....and this is a trait I've passed on to my children). After the kids and I stared at it for a while (still assuming it's deadness), Stephen bravely volunteered to pick it up. There was no argument from me as I threw the paper towel at him. He wadded the paper towel, picked it up and headed for the kitchen trash.

And then. It moved.

At which point Stephen threw the paper towel and the roach 5 feet in the air, Zachary and I squealed, leaped out of our skins and landed on the couch. The kids were pretty freaked out, I however, was laughing hysterically. Stephen, in desperate attempts to convince me that I should be the one to pick it up, started telling me that I was the grown-up and all I had to do was pick it up and run to the trash and why don't we get a shoe to kill it first and we could make Zachary do it or maybe Marc-Adam would do it and we had to eat breakfast soon and he wasn't going to eat breakfast with that thing sitting next to the table...and on and on and on. In a completely shameful moment of desperation, I asked Marc-Adam if he wanted to smack the bug with a shoe, to which he replied, "Ew."

The poor bug was actually still moving, twitching it's legs *shudder* and spinning in buggy circles on it's back. I decided it was time to take some action, because seriously, I was hungry and no way was I eating breakfast with the bug looking at me. So, again like the completely mature adult that I am, I retrieved the paper towel, threw it over the bug and pushed the bug and paper towel over to the trash can with a broom. I added in a smack for good measure and that's when the bug came out from underneath paper towel (consequently, it was also when I needed a change of clothes). It wriggled and squirmed in it's feeble attempts to rescue itself from the crazy lady, but eventually flipped back to it's back and spun in a few more buggy circles.

And ladies and gentleman, that's where it still sits as I type this. Sweet Hubby won't be home for another hour or so, but I'm content with the bug's location at this time. I don't have to look at it or think about it (despite the children telling me repeatedly that all I have to do is pick it up and put it the trash).

I'm gonna buy me a lottery ticket!

OK, so not really, since we don't play the lottery, but seriously, I've won two bloggy giveaways in two days!! I won a Yoplait Kids giveaway from Nicole @ As Many as We're Given and a preschool Spanish DVD from Mommy Daisy. I'm so excited! I never win anything. Actually, I won something once....when Sweet Hubby and I were engaged, we won a 4day/3 night stay at a hotel in Hawaii from a bridal show. But we couldn't afford the plane tickets.

I'm going to go see what other giveaways are going on now!! :)

Freak. Out.

That's pretty much what I did in church this morning (literally in front of God and everybody) when Sweet Hubby pointed something out to me. Apparently, this conflicts with the big deal music ministry Christmas program that I'm a part of at our church. I do this kind of thing all the time, where I plan two things to happen at the same time and it never clicks to me that they happen AT THE SAME TIME. I talked briefly to the music director and he told me he would tear me to shreds if I didn't come to the program. Nice. He wasn't mean about it and he was smiling. He wouldn't actually be ugly about it, I'm sure, but I know he really wants every voice there and every single person is important to him. So we're trying to figure out how to make both things work. The kids really really want to go the concert AND the tickets were a gift. The tickets also have our names on them and state that they may ask for ID at the door to make sure that the tickets actually belong to the people presenting them.

I think we're going to try to do both, but it's going to make for a hectic night and we'd miss a large chunk of the concert.

I'm so sad.

Off the market

So. We took the house off the market. Our contract was up next month anyway, and I was just so tired of thinking about it. I didn't figure anyone would be coming to look at it over the holidays and if we keep it on the market till after the first of the year, then it's getting too close to when the baby's coming and I'm just not comfortable with that. I don't want things to be up in the air during that time. I don't want to have to deal with packing and moving all while getting things prepared for a new little person. Besides, I've gotten settled back in to the idea of living here a little bit longer. And the truth is, as much as I don't like the little town we live in, I love our little house. It's just...us. It's home. Even though we do plan on moving within the next few years, I'll be sad to leave it behind.

So we're staying put for a bit longer. Just so you know.

Thankful Thursday

I think the Thankful Thursday thing is nothing new, but Jana has decided to devote the next couple Thursdays to things she's thankful for being that it's November and all. I started to list out the a few of the little, fun things I'm thankful for in the comment section on her blog, but decided to my own post. She asked what non-serious things are you thankful for (other than the serious things like family, home, health, etc.). Here are some of mine:

• A family that lets me nibble food off of their plates--especially since I rarely share food off of mine.
• DVR (Jana said this, too), so I can keep up with my favorite shows...there are a few that come on before the boys are in bed and I otherwise would miss them (the VCR is dead to me).
• Stretchy pants. 'Nuff said.
• Cinammon Cinnammon Cinnamon. I love the smell. I boil cinnamon sticks on the stove and it's the one smell that I can stand anytime and it also eats up the yucky smells I can't stand. It also doesn't stink up the house when I forget that I'm boiling it and it burns.
  
• A hubby that will run out and buy me snacks when I ask.
  
• Phineas and Ferb. Seriously one of the funniest shows I've seen in a while. And it's safe for the boys to watch. Bonus.
• Fox News. I've made my love for Fox News no secret. I realized I might have a problem when I was surfing the Fox News website while having it on the TV.

What are you thankful for? Feel free to leave your list in the comments or make your own post.

Little by little

Besides what I posted a few weeks ago about feeling crabby, I haven't been posting how I've really been feeling. The truth is, for a little while there, things weren't good at all. Not only was I exhausted and nauseous all the time (which in and of itself makes life hard), I think I was also dealing with with some mild, short-term depression. If the fatigue and nausea wasn't enough to lay me out, the depression was. I had hard time doing any of my normal activities and I felt like the kids were really the ones paying the price, so most of the time, I drug myself along to keep things normal for them, even when I would have have rathered just stay in bed, never stepping foot outside my door. Looking back, I'm glad I did, because I think just laying on the couch or in bed all the time would have made me feel worse for longer.

But now, the clouds are starting break a little bit and I'm starting to feel like my normal self. I'm still nauseous most of the time and dealing with all-day sickness. But the fatigue and "blues" have started to fade, so I'm able to actually function, even between dates with my toilet. Normally, this level of nausea would be enough to keep me whining, but now I have a little perspective.

It feels fantastic to feel half-way normal again.

Four

Really? You're four? Zachary, slow down buddy boy. You're getting too big too fast! You are officially a big boy in my mind now.



It's been a great year. You're really growing into your own person, your own personality and you are such joy to be around. I love how you are still a snuggler. Every time I sit down, you immediately fold yourself in to the curve of my side. And today when you did that, you had a bowl of goldfish snacks, so you sat there and fed me goldfish as we snuggled and a watched a little TV. You do that quite a bit. You're very generous with most things when given the chance. However, you do NOT like to have things taken away from you, so it's always better for us to ask first.

This year, you've learned lots of new things. When we started school, I geared most of our activities toward Stephen, but you are keeping up wonderfully and you insist on having your turn at the school table. You know all your letters and numbers now and are beginning to sound out words.

You still talk with a precious little lisp, and when you talk there is such excitement in your voice. You are still a lot like your mama because I've noticed quite a bit lately that when you feel a certain way about something, you feel it intensely. You are either very excited, very happy, very mad or very sad. You are never "just a little" anything.

Yesterday, we started an experiment. You see, you carry your lovey around with you everywhere. Not only does the lovey get filthy, but you constantly have your fingers in your mouth because of it. So starting yesterday, I told you that lovey could not come out of your bed. You could have it at naps and nighttime, but for the rest of the day, you would be lovey-free. You whined quite a bit about it, and at one point, I couldn't find you anywhere in the house. I went in to your room (that was almost completely dark), flipped on the light and found you cuddled in your bed with your lovey. You spent quite a bit of time in your room by yourself yesterday. Today was much better, and you missed lovey a lot less, although, I did notice that lovey somehow snuck out of your room a couple of times.

You are still apprehensive about trying new things in general, but I noticed this year, that you are getting better about it and you are more easily convinced than you used to be. You've also shown that you can be quite the chatty child. Especially when you are by yourself without your brothers around, you are just full of thought and question and conversation. Never a dull a moment. :)

Zachary, you are still my sweet little boy. So laid back and easy-going (most of the time). You march to the beat of your own drum, but once in a while, it seems like it sounds a lot like mine. I'm relieved for you that we have a new baby coming, because you'll no longer be the middle child. I'm not sure what that means for you down the road, but I hope it's a good thing.

I'm so glad God gave us you. And I can't wait to see what we can do together in your 5th year!

Love,
Mama

YAY YAY YAY!!!

On Dec. 12, me and 3 (out of the 4) of my favorite guys are gonna be here.



Did I mention YAY!?

I knew it was coming

I was pretty sure this would be the next thing we would be hearing about.

A lot less talk, and a little more action

Well, it's over now. Thank goodness. I've made it no secret here in my little corner of the bloggy world who we were supporting in the election last night. So obviously, we're not exactly stoked in the Sweet house this morning. I was wrong on how quickly the election would be decided, and I was really surprised at how large the margin was between the two candidates. I thought for sure it would be much much closer, regardless of who won. But I still stick to my thought that about half of the country shares in my disappointment this morning. I also find it--what? strange, funny, ironic?--that our Democrat-run congress has a 9% approval rating, and yet, we've elected more democrats to office. I'm not sure what that says. However, most all the county and state elections went the way that I voted, so I'm feeling pretty good about that.

Saying that I'm skeptical of a President Obama is an understatement. I don't think that he can accomplish everything that he's promised, and honestly, I don't want him to since I don't agree with any of his policies or plans. But I'm trying to keep an open mind and I'm accepting that this has been the decision of our country. It takes every shred of will and maturity that I have within me to do that, though. I'm interested to see what direction the country will take and to see if Americans are happy with the change they've voted for. Honestly, I'm a little nervous. But I'm holding tight to my belief that God is in control of this. So I remain optimistic and hopeful.

I hope that in the next 4 years I'm pleasantly surprised by how this all plays out. But I'm also prepared to quit just talking about politics and half-whining about what I don't want to happen. I decided a couple days ago (before we knew who would be elected) that for the 2012 election, I'm going to do more. I'm still going to talk about it, I'm still going to be listening to everything that's going on, but I'm going to find my politicial cause and the candidates that I back, and I'm going to get involved. I'm not sure why I didn't make that decision 6 months ago. I know it wouldn't have made a difference in this election, but I think I would have felt better about the outcome.

So I'm curious...what are your thoughts today? What do you think the next 4 years has in store for us?

Our civic duty is done for the day

We voted! The kids were excited, even though I don't think they fully comprehended the whole process. But each of the older two boys got to help press our "Cast Ballot" buttons and Stephen helped me spin my little dial to make our selections. I was hoping we'd get some stickers like we have in the past, but we didn't. Darn. I was really in it for the sticker. :)

We had a little scare in our voting process. The place that we normally go to to vote told us that our name wasn't on the list and told us to try another precinct's polling place. I was worried that something had happened to our registration. But we headed over to the other precinct and sure enough, we were on that list. I think the change in polling places has something to do with where we vote in the primaries vs. the general election.

I'm excited and nervous to find out the results, but like I stated a few days ago, I'm relieved that this campaign season is over. I'm not naive enough to believe that this election is over yet, though. I have a feeling this thing might drag for a few days at least. And it is a little disheartening that no matter who wins this election, at least 50% of the country won't be happy. People just feel so strongly about it.

So I hope you've voted. An opportunity to help make such a huge decision doesn't come along every day.

I should have thought this through a little better

The downside to not celebrating Halloween and not taking the kids out to trick-or-treat or, at the very least, taking them to the "Fall Festival"?

There is NO CANDY in the house when I start rummaging at 10:30pm to find something sweet.

I keep thinking of all the booty I could have confiscated for myself for their own good.