Picture Day

Our Stake Primary put on a Temple Day for primary families. It was a wonderful event and an opportunity to show our children the temple. We took advantage of being there and took some much needed pictures of the kids, because we all know how great I am at taking pictures (not!).

My beautiful family - all together.

Doesn't it look like I have twins? People ask me all the time.

I couldn't help it, I had to add two pictures of mister Samuel. I just love the top picture.

Miss Lillian in all of her shoeless glory. Shoes do not stay on for very long with her, even though she loves shoes and has more than I do. (P.S. I seriously can't get over how gorgeous this kid is!)

Ah - this is kid is just so dag-gone cute.

And here are a few more of my favorite pics. 

I had to put this one in here because it just captures my boys and all their silliness.

And lest you think we take nothing but great pictures... here's how most of the pictures turned out:

My kids... in their true forms.

Wrong Number

A couple of years ago I changed my phone number. As soon as it was connected I started receiving phone calls for a Jaime. There were calls following up on requests for more education. I would tell them wrong number. Then there were the bill collectors. They were a little more aggressive not taking the "wrong number" response.

"This is so-and-so from collections, and we show you have an outstanding balance." "I'm sorry, I believe you have the wrong number." "Am I speaking to Jaime?" "No, you have the wrong number." "What is your name?" "Aubrey" "Could you leave a message for Jamie?" "I do not know any Jaimes." "Are you sure?"

Needless to say, they weren't quite convinced I was not Jaime. They kept calling at different times hoping to catch me off guard I guess. But the weirdest calls by far came from strange men, and let me tell you, there were a LOT of them. One of the strangest sounded eerily like my Uncle Ed. It came in rather late one night and he told me to just come on back to his room when I got there... When I explained to him I was not Jaime he hooted and apologized in a good-ol' boy fashion and told me to have a good night.

The calls finally started to peeter out, but I still get happy birthday texts when it's not my birthday and random phone calls and texts. I mostly ignore them. However, the other day I got a phone call at about 5:40am. I answered it to only have the person on the other end hang-up. Carlin mumbled "who was that?" and I said it must have been a drunk dial. Then I received the following text:

5:42am: Zorry who this
I  ignored it.
5:44am: What's yours name
I responded with the following:
5:48am: I'm an irate mother of three young children whom you just woke-up from a rather nice sleep and now it sounds like my baby is awake. I'm assuming I'm not the person you are looking for so please leave me alone. And use proper grammar and punctuation next time.
I thought that would be the end of it and started to fall back to sleep, then:
5:54am: You married

Seriously?! He didn't use proper grammar or punctuation so I didn't dignify him with a response. There is only one natural conclusion concerning this Jaime person - she was a student who racked up a bunch of debt. She panicked and entered the field of prostitution hoping to pay her debts down faster. Realizing that that may not have been the best idea she then canceled her phone and severed all contact with her past life and is hopefully trying to start anew somewhere else.

Anxiety

I'm a little anxious today. Why? Because today we have a moderate risk for tornadoes. Yep, this seasoned Oklahoman who has been through 18 years of tornado seasons in the state that receives the most tornadoes in the world is finding herself all tied up in knots.

The past few years I have seen tornado after tornado and I SWEAR they are getting closer to me, to my house, to my family. Every year I am glued to the TV because not only do I worry about myself but about my family and my in-laws and my friends scattered all across this state. Mostly I handle it with a mix of excitement and nerves. There is nothing more awe-inspiring and humbling than the weather in Oklahoma.

But this year is different. This year I'm suffering from a little PTSD from last year. This year I have three kids to protect. This year I find myself close to tears and fighting the fear. The fear from last year. And while I've mentioned last year briefly I have never said what happened. Well, now I'm ready to because I need to talk, or write. Whichever.

Here's how it went. Jacob was two weeks old. To the day. Which means I was two weeks post-partum from a c-section. I was home alone because my SIL Heather had decided to go home and try to get a few things done that afternoon. I saw the storm pop-up on the radar and I called Carlin and asked him to pick-up Samuel from school and come home early. I was near tears so Carlin felt it was his duty to calm me down and reassure me everything would be okay. "You're right," I said. "I am just a little emotional is all." Everything will be fine.

But it wasn't and the sirens went off and Carlin had to get off the phone with me and take shelter and his workplace and Samuel's school went on lock-down. And I am watching the news as Mike Morgan from channel four says there is a confirmed tornado on the ground and it's headed straight for the plant my husband works at and it has gone from nothing to an F5 in minutes. I'm holding my baby and my three year old is running around the house naked and now Mike Morgan is saying the tornado is a mile wide and now both of my sisters-in-law are in the direct path as well as my husband.

I call Heather because she is from Idaho and this is her first tornado season and Mitchell is at work and I say "get out of your house Heather." "But where will I go?" She says. "South," I say. "To my house or just keep driving." And she says, "Mitchell said I will be fine and he'll let me know if I need to leave." Now the tornado is barreling into homes. The helicopter pilot's house is getting hit, the news anchors' homes are getting hit. The movie theater, schools, workplaces are being evacuated. And now my SIL Samantha is calling to ask if I'm okay and I'm confused because yes, I'm fine but is she at work? That's when I hear yelling in the background and she says they have to get in the safe.

And that's it. That's the last I hear from my husband and my two sisters-in-law. The tornado is taking out cell towers. My baby wants to eat but I'm so stressed no milk comes. The sirens are going off and I'm in the closet trying to feed my baby and my 3 year old is running around naked because she thinks now is a good time to change her panties and someone is pounding on my door and I'm trying very, very hard not to cry. Surprisingly my Mom and Dad are able to get through to me, but I'm a mess. I reassure my Mom that Samantha was in the safe (she works at a bank) so she should be okay. But what about Carlin? What about Heather? I watch as the tornado makes a slight adjustment to the north and misses Carlin's work and according to the map Heather's house. But I still can't get through to them and now it's hitting more houses. Homes of friends. And schools. Samuel is stuck at school, I can't get to him. And my heart can't take it. The tears start and won't stop.

Hours later Carlin makes it home, Samantha makes it home, we are able to get through to Heather, she's fine and finally Samuel makes it home. I'm still watching the news and even the professional news anchors are struggling to keep it together. The worse part of it? The risk for severe weather won't go away. We have two weeks straight of apprehension, nervousness, dark skies, rain and finally another F5 tornado, the largest ever recorded. That storm dropped smaller tornadoes all over the city, hitting Carlin's work and causing power outages.

The past 11 months we've driven by the tornado path. We've seen the piles of rubble, the clearing away of the debris and the rebuilding of homes and businesses. The post office has been rebuilt, the hospital which was completely demolished is now under construction. And now we are gearing up for another tornado season. And I'm not sure if I will be able to handle it this time. I just have to remember I'm strong, I'm Oklahoma strong.

My chill baby

So, Jacob is turning into my climber. Today he was climbing on the playground equipment. He tries to climb on the fireplace. He even climbed underneath his changing table.

And then Lillian had to give it a go.

He is 10 months now and one smart little boy. When something rolls under the couch and he wants to get it he lays down flat on his tummy and stretches both arms above his head. The two oldest never did this. They just would run into the couch with their heads and start crying.

 He has seven teeth and one more that just broke through. He is pretty content with crawling right now but likes to pull himself up. He also does this funny bear-crawl on the laminate floor because he doesn't like the feel of it on his legs.

Oh - and eyelashes that won't quit. Did I mention those?

He has to be where everyone else is - especially Samuel and Lillian. They are pretty much his heroes. He gets super excited when Daddy comes home from work, squealing and crawling as fast as he can to Daddy's feet.

But mostly he's just chill. He'll sit there and quietly play with toys while I cook. He smiles at everyone even when he's sick or tired. In fact he gets a bit giddy when he's tired. He even fell asleep yesterday at church. During nursery (and the kids were a bit hyper so it wasn't quiet in there). I put him on the floor in the corner with Carlin's suit jacket on top of him and he slept through the last hour of church. Crazy, huh?

My Life

Hi, my name is Aubrey and I have Fibromyalgia. At least that's what the doctors think. You can't really test for fibromyalgia, you just have to rule out everything else. Which they've done, with a ton of blood work, an MRI, chiropractors, neurologists, and rheumatologists.

What is fibromyalgia? Good question. Basically it seems to be something with the nervous system misfiring.  You pretty much feel like you have the flu. All the time. I've been experiencing it for a few years now although we haven't figured it out until rather recently. This means I had it while pregnant with Jacob - and let me tell you, it was a painful pregnancy.

I try to fight it. To just work through the pain and fatigue, because motherhood never takes a break. Because my house won't clean itself. Because I hate feeling like this so I try to live in denial.

But then I have days like today where I wake-up in pain. Everything hurts. The fabric against my skin hurts. I know what is causing this particular flare-up, we've had illness in our family for the past three weeks. Stomach virus twice and now head colds which have turned into conjunctivitis, double ear infections and a sinus infection. So I'm exhausted. Staying up with sick kids and wiping gunk out of eyes and administering medication and cleaning up vomit and waking up with a kid coughing in your face...

Sorry, I had to vent a bit. Back to the main topic of this post. When a flare-up happens I barely function and that just frustrates me. My plans are ruined for the day and my kids start to beg for attention. Which just makes me feel awful.

I don't post this to ask for sympathy. I don't want pity or offers for help. I'm just trying to explain the bags under my eyes. The reason why I might agree to something and then back-out at the last minute. Or why I might say no to begin with. It also explains a bit of my orneriness, because when you're already hurting and then you've had three kids hanging on you all day and that causes more pain you don't have a lot of patience for others.

It also explains my lack of posting. Because the computer chair hurts me on my really bad days. Okay, so I have that off my chest now. I promise that the next few posts will be happier in nature because I have a lot to talk about, mainly how absolutely adorable and crazy my three beautiful children are to me. And pictures, lots of pictures of baby Jacob who might look back at this one day and say "where are all the pictures of me?" Until then, here's a picture to hold you over.

And a random fact: Did you know you are not supposed to double-space between sentences? Apparently this is an ancient practice from the days of type-writers that was taught to generations as young as me on regular keyboards. That would explain why Microsoft Word is always correcting my spacing.

You are Beautiful

My beautiful baby girl turned 4.  Four! Can you believe it?  I look at her and at four years old she is already drop-dead gorgeous.  Curly blonde hair, bright blue eyes, perfect skin and if she keeps her growth rate up she is going to be tall. And I wonder what am I going to do with her?  How am I going to handle her as she gets older and gets into boys and stuff?  Because it will happen, eventually.

It seems these days opinions are rather polarized. I should either restrict her from Disney Princesses, dress her as a hobo and pound into her head that beauty is NOT what you should be judged upon or I can make beauty and fashion EVERYTHING and enter her into pageants and what-not.  Whatever happened to simple balance?

Here's my problem: Every time I tell Lillian how beautiful she is I feel like I have to follow it up with how smart she is and explain to her that there is more to her than meets the eye. And she's only four, people!  But I worry that I am sending her the wrong message when I comment how pretty she looks in her new dress. 

So, I've been thinking and have finally come to a conclusion. I am going to tell Lillian that she is beautiful.  I want her to grow with a healthy self-image and in this day and age when girls are encouraged to look sexy at five, I want her to know that she can be beautiful without being slutty.

I want her to know it's possible to be beautiful and modest at the same time.  I want her to know, that when the time comes, there's nothing wrong with wearing make-up, doing your hair and taking care in your appearance.  I want her to be confident in who she is - ALL of who she is, the physical, mental and spiritual. 

She will be judged in her life.  School will judge her intellect and she will have grades and tests to prove that.  She will be judged at church and have opportunities to strengthen her testimony through callings and Young Women's and Girl's Camp.  But who am I going to let judge her beauty?  Am I going to let the world tell her how to look?  Or am I going to teach her how to judge herself in a healthy and respectful fashion?

Lillian runs around in pink and skirts and wild hair that she never let's me brush.  She does her nails and digs in the dirt with her brother.  She watches Disney, reads Fancy Nancy and loves ballet.  And I let her, I encourage her, because I want her to just be herself.

I love you my Lilly-bug.  And you will always my beautiful baby girl.

And then it was Christmas

Christmas went as usual.  It was Jacob's first Christmas and like every other baby's first Christmas he was satisfied with the wrapping paper and bows. 

Lillian and Samuel hit the jackpot for Christmas between the two families and Santa. 

I feel like pictures didn't really turn out very well.  We weren't great at taking any and then I just managed to look 9 months pregnant in every single one.  So, because I'm feeling a bit vain today, no pictures except for the ice storm we had the weekend before Christmas.

We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with my Grandparents (while my family took off to Red River, NM). Then Christmas dinner with the in-laws.  We watched light displays, went to our favorite places, decorated sugar cookies, opened pajamas, read our favorite Christmas stories, and watched our favorite movies. 

Overall it was a pretty simple and relaxing Christmas season.