You know what??? It's gonna be okay....

You know what? As you all know I have three kids. They are all very different and I love it! I am not at all one of those moms that needs everything to be perfect all the time. I don't have to have everything in place with all four of us before we walk out the door in the morning. I like to call it laid back, but some people may not think it's as positive as that.

The reason I thought of this is because this morning I did something with my son that is not very politically correct. Nathan, my soon to be 7 year old still sucks his thumb. When Taylor was a baby she took a pacifier and she was addicted to it. She didn't stop taking her "bippy" until she was about 19 months old when her Grammy taught me a trick to cut a hole in the bippy so when she sucked on it it wouldn't feel right and she wouldn't want it. It worked like a charm! She threw all her bippies away herself and I didn't have to do a thing (except cut a couple of holes). But when Nathan was born I was right in the middle of my "anti-bippy" stage. Taylor was 17 months old and going strong with her bippy and I just didn't want to go through that with him. So I din't allow him to have one...so he began to suck his thumb. Hindsight's 20/20 people don't judge me!!! I know now looking back that this was the worst thing I could have let him start doing. You can't cut a hole in his thumb and let him throw it away...what was I thinking? I wasn't thinking is the answer. If I had thought about it I would have recalled how my brother had the hardest time with the thumb sucking thing. I think he finally kicked the habit when he was about 8. Sorry Matt you know it's true!!! But Nathan looked so cute as a baby doing it, all curled up on my lap with his blanket. Okay you get the picture, I was a sucker. So here we are 7 years later.

After work last night I went to Walmart and got a finger brace. I put it on his thumb and I'm telling you that thing is not coming off until he finds something more productive to do with his thumb than suck it all day and night. Think of all the things he's missing out on...there's thumb wrestling, giving thumb's up for encouragement, they're good for twiddling when you're bored...the possibilities are endless! The unethical part of this is coming up, he wanted to know what he would tell his friends about why his thumb was in this big silver brace and I said what any good red blooded American mother would say...LIE! Tell them you fell off your scooter and broke it, tell them you fell out of bed, tell them you cut it with scissors, got stitches, I don't care! As long as that thumb is in that brace and out of your mouth I'm good with little white lies. Justin just laughed at me and rolled his eyes and off to school they all went.

So like I said I am no longer worried about doing things the "right way"! And I would argue that once anyone has three little kids reaches this same point I'm at at some point or another. Am I right Aunt LeAnn? Sorry to put you on the spot but you're the only person I know who has had three little kids at the same time :). I took the kids to CiCi's the other night for their school night and I let Nicholas wear the cowboy dress up outfit that their Aunt gave Nathan for his bday. It is too big for him, but I don't care. He wore it, chaps and all, and he loved it! I'm not your average Mom I guess but really is there a normal when it comes to parenting? Let your kids wear what they want to wear every once in a while, let them potty train when they're ready (trust me they will let you know), so what if they're in their crib longer than you thought they were supposed to be. Who makes those rules anyway? I chose to be wild and crazy and let my kids have some choices....and by the way I don't care what your Mom or in my case Grandmother say, you CANNOT have a child fully potty trained by the time they are one!!! LIARS!!!

My Brother

So I watched Private Practice on Thursday and was about ready to jump off a bridge by the time it was over... I bawled my eyes out! Anyone who hasn't seen it needs to watch it NOW!! I, like Addison adore my big brother and always have. He is my only sibling and I'm glad because I know I could never love any other person in the world in the same way that I love my brother, so I decided to blog about him and share a little of his greatness with the world (or the five people who read my blog)! Sorry brother it's the best I could do :)


My brother is one of the greatest people that I know. He was over this past Saturday for a birthday celebration at my house for his son's 9th birthday. He is no ordinary Uncle to my kids, he is Super Uncle. I can have all three kids hanging on me all day whining about pretty much everything but the instant my brother walks through the door it's instant smiles and although they are still all crazy, they are happy and crazy which beats the heck out of whining and crazy! My brother is 15 months older than me and has this unlimited supply of energy. If the kids want to go outside to play ball, he goes outside to play ball. If they want to wrestle, he's the first one on the floor. If they want to go down to the school and play basketball, they are in the back of his truck before I know it and gone. It's great!

I had this big dream, when I found out in the fall of 1999 that I was going to be Aunt, that I was going to be the coolest Aunt in the world. I was going to babysit and take my nephew everywhere and he would love me. Not just because I was his Aunt but because I was the cool Aunt who let him do whatever he wanted and I wouldn't have kids for years so I would just focus on him! God had another plan for me however, and 2 weeks after my nephew, Corbin, was born I found out I was pregnant. Taylor and Corbin are 8 months and 19 days apart in age and have been two peas in a pod since they were tiny babies. They are a little version of Matt and me and I love it! Matt and I always got along, he says there were a couple of years when we were about 9 and 10 that we fought but I don't remember that. Probably because he was so nice to me all the time and I was a big pain! But to me he was my best friend. All his friends were my friends and he was so good to avoid my friends. Except Jennifer in the back of that truck.....we won't go there. Anyways, he's a great guy, father,brother, Uncle, son and friend!!! Just wanted to say I love you brother, even though you think my blog is stupid and I use bad grammar and I spelled bartending as two words (which wasn't my fault, spell check did that) I am lucky to have you...

Love, Sister

Taylor's tonsils (or lack of tonsils)

Tay had her tonsils out this past Friday. She did awesome and was as brave as any 8 year old girl could be! They got us in and out in under three hours which I thought was pretty incredible! The horror stories that I got from random moms were almost as bad as I remember them being when I was pregnant! Anyone who has a baby (or is currently pregnant) knows what I am talking about. The women who tell you about their near death, horrible child birth stories. But I have concluded that stories are exactly that...STORIES!!! Her getting her tonsils out was a whole lot easier than I thought it would be for sure! Just like child birth, I think that the build up is the worst part, it is a lot easier than people make it out to be.


Taylor had a lot of visitors and got a whole lot of presents and attention! She loved every minute of it. She is also enjoying the week off of school...as am I :)