Nearing the End and GRATEFUL

We are nearing the END of this whole fiasco, and it has been more of an EMOTIONAL circus
to say the least! I have had days that I CRY myself to sleep and days that I get up and
know that this is my situation and I can EMBRACE it a bit more. I have to say that
on the days that are just plain CRAP, I have an AMAZING support team behind
me that REMIND me of everything that I have been through and have
CHANGED, for that I am most GRATEFUL! I look at Life in general in a
completely different light. When I laugh I REALLY laugh,
When I get notes from my kids it TOUCHES me deeper than before,
When we all snuggle in my bed I am able to let go of everything
else and ENJOY my kids a bit more! Things are just DIFFERENT, in a mostly positive way:)
I have learned so much about MYSELF in this process as well, how your subconscious
is naturally DRAWN to certain personality types based on your EXPERIENCES as a child.
It has been so educational for so many reasons!
I am ME and I am glad to be ME!
It has been far too long since I could say that about myself, but there is
no going back, not EVER again! I am def grateful that I know
What I know now. I dont sit and stew about what went WRONG, and
WHY me anymore. Those have all been ANSWERED in one way
or another. I know I dont say it ENOUGH, but THANK YOU to everyone
That has been there for me, you TRULY dont understand what it has
MEANT to me. You know Who you ARE!
XOXOXOXO

a beautiful day!! SO lets go PLAY!

Reese was soooooo excited to get her pics takin! what a little POSER! So sweet and so kind!
Quincy follows EVERYTHING Reese does, so of course Reese Poses and Q does too!! She is such a sweet, and life loving kiddo! She sure loves her kids!!
So these two were sitting down while the older kids rode their bikes up and down this little retention basin and they sat here and played house! I love to listen to their conversations with eachother!
Awwww my BOYZ!! These two are seriously 2 peas in a pod! So polar opposite in so many ways , but the def balance eachother out! Sooooo sweet and gentle, until one of them gets a swift kick in the bawllz, then game on!! They wrestle it out and beat it out and act like nothin ever happened!
Rhett figured out how to pop a wheelie! He shows me EVERYTIME we go outside! He loves to be outside, surprisingly he hasnt found a sport he LOVES yet......Still working on that one!
Kali Ray! such a life filled kid! Loves life and wants a piece of everything it has to offer! Such a great big sister and friend to her little sisters as well! mmmmmmawah!

It was a BEAUTIFUL day today, soooo we got up, cleaned the casa after a night of playing with Tami and her super cute kiddos, and decided today was a PERFECT day to load up the bikes in the back of my car, bungee cord the tailgate and find a park that will suit all the members of my circus! We went to in-n-out first and got a box of burgers and fries and set out to find the PERFECT park! Well we found one that had a slide and a bike path!
I totally LOVED seeing these 5 kiddos play and giggle with each other!
I am sooooo very BLESSED to have such great kiddos! They have no filter,
their love is pure and untainted.
When they say "I LOVE YOU" you feel it, DEEP down and REAL!
When they are with their dad I miss them, ALOT!!
That may be one of the only times I actually get REAL sleep,
but I awake in my big cozy bed alone and without my snuggle bugs!
I am grateful that I have such fun and energetic kiddos, that soak up "mom time" like they do!
Thanks for the amazing Saturday guys! I love you, with NO NUMBERS!!
(Reese used to describe her love that way cause when I would say I loved her she would ask if I loved her 100, and I used to tell her there are not numbers high enough to describe how much love I have. To her 100 is SOOOOO much!)

Chanocho!! Let me borrow some of your Swwweats

So my kiddos LOVE to have movie night with me, and I obviously do as well! I love to hear them laugh outloud, hysterically at Jack Black in NAcho (one of my very favs) or at Napoleon saying "tina ya fat lard come eat your dinner!" these are the moments that I sure hope I dont loose, or forget! What if I am old and I dont remember the OUTLOUD laughs and priceless GIGGLES these members of my circus create?! I just want them all to be happy, healthy and laughable FOREVER!! I dont ever want them to have experiences that would ever tarnish those things. We had a discussion the other day about how as parents. ya you, we will ALL, EVERY SINGLE one of us ruin some thing for our kids and change the way they think, whether we mean to or not. It just happens. I just hope that they see how much I love and care for them, and how I would give anything in the whole world to be able to bottle their little giggles and have them forever.
Chase has got one of the BEST napoleon impressions! No matter where we are if he says anything like napoleon i bust up! Love that kid! Love them all! at the end of the day i just want them all to know it, deeply know it!
XOXO
Em

Draggin

So this week I have been draggin!! Last week I was on a roll, getting crap done and feeling good doing it! This week? not so much. In fact the 30th was my anniversary, 13 years, and i tried to just stay busy with some good friends to not think about it so much. Dont know what is harder the fact that its 13 whole years or that I lost out on something that I put soooooo much time and energy into. I realize that I was not a perfect wife, nobody is, but I do know that I know I fought a good fight and in the end THAT is where I get my peace. I know that I did all I could to make it work, even though it didnt go my way. I have lost out on too many things during this process, but have gained so much as well. I have really gotten to know ME, and I realized that I dont need anyone else to reassure me that who I am is enough.
I had a dream last week, I have VERY vivid and used to be mostly stressful dreams, and I went to petsmart to pick out a lizard to accompany my boys pet chameleon. And as I was looking in all the small glass tanks a catapillar caught my eye, it was the exact one from ALICE and WONDERLAND!! He was plump and colorful and smoking a pipe, of course! He even had the little hands and boots on his feet! It really was CRAZY!! Anyway in this dream, I debated on buying him, WHY u ask? Because I didnt know what kind of Butterfly he would be!! So you can look at this crazy dream as just a crazy dream, but since my dreams usually coincide with my emotions and what chaos is going on, it seems to me that is a fear of mine. What if I end up the same way after another marriage? What if I think the person I marry is all the colorful wonderful things and ends up to be all show? Scares the CRAP out of me! I have had very few family members in this position, and of course not this EXACT one, and they end up in the mirror image of the first one!
Maybe I shouldn't even think too much on it. I want my kids to grow up and see that their dad and I are happy, even if we aren't together and happy. They deserve to see me with someone that calls me during the day because he just has 5 mins to make me laugh, and someone to giggle in bed over super lame things that only we would find hilarious. They deserve to know the difference in a happy healthy relationship, I just wish they didnt have to learn this way.

Darla

SO anyone that has seen the movie little rascals will def appreciate this story!
Q loves to snuggle her mommy, in fact every morning after I get the kiddos up and dressed and out the door, this little sweetheart says
"oh after MY kids leave you will snuggle me?!"
and I do love to sleep so this is a goooooood combo!
Really how can you say no to that?! So every morning after HER kids
leave we climb into my HUGE bed and she holds my hand and sucks
her thumb with the other hand and we watch cartoons til she is done snuggling me!
Well we were laying in my bed the other am and Lexa was on the one
side then Q, then me and we were both asleep and we are awakened
to the sound of Q as loud as she could say......
"dear darla, I hate your stinkin guts, you make me vomit,
you are scum between my toes"
I literally was laughing outloud at my lil chubby Q repeating
the lines to the movie, word for word! What a doll!
and to top it off after we settled back in to our snoozes she
started singing you are so beautiful to me! hahahahah!
LOVE her!!

Seeing Clear

over the last 6 or so years i have been in a tail spin of many sorts. on a personal level, trying to remember the person i was raised to be, and trying desperately to let her back in and take over the chaos for me. that doesnt just HAPPEN, it takes alot of tears, hard work and more than any "normal" dose of reality. sometimes this reality smacks you square in the kisser and you dont even have a right hook as a counter to it! it has taken me seeing the things that i viewed as to be my very most prized possessions all but ripped from me. it has also taken nights of crazy dreams and remembering things that my heart has tried to lock away so deep that it couldnt hurt me any longer and it just pops up when you least expect it! for the first time in WAY too long i feel like the clarity is finally coming out! i want to dance around in my kitchen singing at the top of my lungs like i used to do when i thought i was "happy". well THAT girl is gone and ME has returned, stronger and hopefully wiser that she had been in the recent years. I have had some amazing support and some seriously amazing family and friends to snuggle me when i have needed it, and to tell me a funny story when i needed a good giggle. i have learned the value of a REAL smile, i think most people would say i love to smile, but having come from the places i have and the emotions that i have had, a GOOD, REAL, TRUE smile is definitely valued! I am not perfect, not by ANY stretch of the imagination, but you know what? i am def in a place where i have seen perfect moments!

I just want a real hug!!

I dont know what title I would name this post so I thought that one actually fit. I have done alot of not only soul searching and self-searching during this process, but also I have been doing alot of learning as well. Today was an emotionally draining day for me in particular. I had an apt today that went alot deeper than I am typically "willing" to go. I had a few HUGE realizations. One of the things that i absolutely realized was that on that awful Aug morning when all the "stuff" came to light, I knew I wasnt protected. Not only was my heart not protected, but neither was my own personal health. I put faith and trust where it had no business being, because i chose to fight longer and harder for something that was only mine to want. I have no doubt that a part of him did want our seemingly perfect appearing family to stay whole, but the "fight" was no longer there. He didnt move out for another 8 months after that day, and those 8 months proved a TON of things for me. Back to that Aug. i realized today at my apt that part, and a very small part, of the nightmares that i have are due to the fact that even in that moment where you somehow expect all the love and proteciton and comfort, i didnt feel it as deep as i needed it. I didnt tell a single soul everything that went on, I did tell one person a small, VERY small portion of the story. I think I thought that she could somehow help me through it, she couldnt.
I realized today that you know who I wanted a hug from? My mother, funny that I am in those shoes that when my kids are sad or upset or feel vulnerable, they want a hug.....from ME! My mom and I havent always been the best of friends and quite frankly used to fight like wild banshees, but in those very scary moments I wanted HER hugs, and HER protection, to make it all better! Now I know with all the surety in the world that i she could take this hurt away and this pain, she would and wouldnt even hesitate! But this isnt hers and its mine, my time to grow and learn! Heaven surely know how I have learned, grown, twisted, bruised and broke! But you know what? I am lucky, still. I have amazing FAMILY and real TRUE friends that really dont care if and when I am all of those things, they love me anyways and support me anyways.
So next time you see your sweet babies with even a hint of that "Something is off" just give them a hug, a REAL mom HUG!

Creativity!!

It has been a while since I have taken the kids "OUT" to do something other than parks or something that doesn't cost money, SOOOO we decided sat was the day to get out away from chores and a house full of unmade beds and disorganized play rooms and get a bit dirty! We went and picked out some ceramics and sat and painted and talked and just really enjoyed the afternoon with each other. I loved to watch them get into "the zone" and watch their own ideas unfold. Reese came in this am and reminded me that we only have 6 more days to get our pottery back! I am anxious to see how they all look:) So thanks to my 5 little dates, it was a great day!

Some Deep thoughts

These two NEVER cease to amaze me with the closeness that they have for each other! Last night Rhett was having a REALLY hard time, like hysterical because he REALLY misses his dad living here. He said that when he is here he misses his dad, and when he is there he misses me. I have never been a child of a divorce and really cant understand how it feels for these little ones. I do however know what it is like to think you have your life planned out with your spouse, who you love more than you can even imagine . I also know what it is like to realize that your goals and plans cant be with him any more. I remember so vividly the day their dad and I sat down with these two to tell them that he wasnt going to be living at our home anymore. I did most of the talking, i say talking but if I could call it shocking that would make more sense. Their dad stood next to the fire place and was sobbing so hard he couldnt speak, and it took everything in my power to not fall apart on the floor, but I knew these sweet innocnet boys needed the strenght. I have all the time later when I am in my own bed with the door locked to break. and I know that day will be forever burned in there minds, as it will be for me as well. They both listened to every word and every emotion that was shared that night. I spend countless nights holding them and sobbing with them, until we were to exhausted to keep our eyes open. I wish so bad that I could take that away from them and erase it from their memory, but I cant. I can make sure that I am here when they have a hard time or when they just need a hug, sometimes that all they need. We chose not to have then girls in the convo because they are still so small and cant quite grasp the divorce concept.
Well Lastnight, out of the blue, Rhett and Chase came in and wanted t talk. So i let them in to lay in my bed for a bit. I had no idea Rhett was so upset. He usually lets me know before but this time he just laid in my lap and bawlled his eyes out. It broke my heart to hear those sobs! I cant imagine how our Father in Heaven feels to sit back and know that we just need a hug, and he isnt here to hold us til we are alright. But there are reminders for us that he is here and that he would hold us and never let go if we didnt need to learn something from all of this.
So after Rhett had calmed down a bit, we were just sitting in my bed and Chase was laying on the opposite side of me and he looked up and said
"So I have a question dude, does anyone beat you up at school?"
Rhett: "no but sometimes I get picked on"
Chase: "dude point them out and I will back you up!"
I literally tried my hardest not to laugh, but I know Chase meant it! These two really are here to help eachother out, no DOUBT! I love my children and I am grateful everyday for the role they play in my life! Our Father in Heaven really has shown me how lucky I am!

Resolutions WHAT?!

So I have started......AGAIN! These beauties are one the the things that really do make me feel productive! The smell of the saw dust and the sound of my saws just make me smile! And knowing that when the saw turns off that hopefully (if my math is correct) it will turn into something pretty and useful! I made a few shelves for a good friends mom right before xmas and it made me feel sooo good! Anyone that knows me knows that home depot and lowes are up there on my fav places to shop! My dad actually said that most girls he knows go to the mall when they are depressed and I go to Home depot and buy a smoker for yummy meat! He is right about that! While I do love Forever21 and Nordy's I just looooove a good hardware store!
These are almost done here! I love finding things that other people may think is trash and making something pretty and useful out of them!