I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these goggles. Of course they have bright stripes and like i said before those bright stripes make me happy! We are a skiing and snowboarding family, we love to go to Boyne or Crystal every winter. It is so much fun to go as a family and i think it will be something we can all do together for years to come. My boys already go down the hill faster than me i think... it won't be long and they'll be doing jumps, mogels, tricks etc. and leaving mom in the powder dust! Back to goggles... Marc and I have had the same goggles since high school and considering we are over 35 and moving onto 40 those goggles are outdated and very ugly. This year we were both a little embarassed in our dorky goggles and figured it was probably time to get new ones. I then found the above goggles in Crystals ski magazine and fell in love. Now let me give you some background... i am not really a namebrand kind of gal, if it is cute i buy it... it doesn't have to have a certain "name" for me to feel "cool". Why is it then that i see a car and think it is sharp and then realize oh of course it is it's a Lexus or i pick out other things and always it is expensive... ugghh it drives me crazy! Well, the goggles were no exception, i got online to check them out and discovered they were on sale... yipee, they are on sale right? yeah -on sale for $105. Yup 105 dollars. Needless to say i have not purchased these goggles but they sure are cute with their happy little stripes

Thankful Tuesday

Today I am thankful for strong and healthy bodies. I am thankful that Marc, myself and the boys are healthy and strong... a blessing to be thankful for!

OVERWHELMED

Overwhelmed and over committed that sums up life these days. I cannot wait for June - SUMMER to arrive, my life should slow down some then. I need those lazy, hazy summer days. I will still have a more hectic schedule than usual come summer but it should be a lot less crazy than it is right now! I feel like so many good things vie for my attention but I need to learn to say NO! I need one year where I solely focus on my family and their needs not the needs of school and church. Not working is not an option so I have to do that but everything else is going to go. There will be other years to help school and church but next year my focus is my family!! It is so hard to enjoy life when I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off and then when I'm stressed I start yelling at the boys and snipping at Marc and not being the wife and mom I want to be! God called me to be a mom when he blessed me with these boys and I need to realize that I cannot allow all these other things to pull me and stretch me to the max and then have nothing left to give my family. I wish I could be superwoman, it seems as though so many women can juggle it all but i am not one of them! I will still look for easy ways to help when I can but for now I'm going to set some boundaries and look forward to next year not feeling overwhelmed and over committed but rather OVERJOYED!

Thoughtful Thursdays and Thankful Tuesdays

~Luke's class has been doing "thoughtful" things every thursday and the radio station has been doing thankful thursdays and I thought both idea's were really cool. So tune in every tuesday and thursday... I will begin thankful tuesdays and thoughtful thursdays next week. Every tuesday I will post something I'm thankful for and every thursday I hope to do something thoughtful and will let you know what that was...(that will help keep me accountable). So if you have something your thankful for or something thoughtful to do, post a comment and let me know. I believe God desires for us to have gratitude in our hearts and He calls us to be compassionate and to show his love in tangible ways... so tune in as I try to be more grateful for my many blessings and as I try to show more compassion to those who desperately need it and as I try to show God's love to other's through my actions!

1 * 2 ...Tie my shoe

There are just some things that as a parent you need to teach your children and quite honestly you do not enjoy the process because it can be extremely frustrating. The top two for me are potty training and teaching them to tie their shoes. Of course it does not help that I have very little patience..." just shoot me now" is the thought that comes to mind. Yesterday was one of those days... Jaeger has been struggling lately with being the youngest from being the first out in dodgeball, to being the youngest in the neighborhood and then of course that he could not tie his shoes. He has been crying a lot about these types of things lately and yesterday he had a complete meltdown because he couldn't tie those darn shoes! Now remember, I have very little patience and really like immediate gratification and following in my footsteps is my Jaeger Jay. We practiced tying, he and I, but Jabes really doesn't like being shown how to do something he just wants to know how on his own... he wants to know how to do it without mom's help and he wants to know how to do it NOW! This became very frustrating and at one point I gave up because he was frustrated ( ummm let me rephrase that... he was pissed ) so I left him to his own devices and I kid you not he was flipping out in the kitchen, in hysterics because he could not tie his shoe. Again, shoot me now!! Well, by some small miracle he regained his composure today and actually allowed me to show him one more time and hallelujah Jesus he figured it out and has been tying his own shoes all afternoon! I will be praising Jesus all night that this did not become a drawn out affair... I would not be able to handle meltdowns like yesterday everyday that is for sure. So for the record I now have 3 boys potty-trained and 3 boys who can tie their very own shoes! I should have a party!!

Wild Crazy Boys!

Luke, Jack and Jaeger with the neighbor boys (their best friends) all dressed in their camoflage and "hunting" all through the neighborhood. I cracked up when I looked outside and there they all were decked in head to toe "camo" I love their imaginations and their wild spirits! And below my 3 "tough" guys... one of the things I love about boys is that for all that toughness there is also that wonderful tenderness that each one of them has and the tender love they always show their mom!!

Growing up I always envisioned myself as a mom of girls. I assumed I'd have a boy in there somewhere but I was sure I'd have girls. I mean I was never the tomboy... Heather fit that role in our family. I wouldn't say I was prissy but definitely very girlie. I was never ever a risk taker, didn't really like to get dirty and really thought boy things like fish and worms were rather quite disgusting. I expected dress up boxes filled with frilly dresses... I expected little fingernails painted in glitter nail polish. I envisioned pink everything for my little princess. We would shop together, someday pick out prom dresses together and ahhhhh... someday even the wedding dress. I am a girlie kind of mom! So who could've imagined that I would be the mom of not 1 but 3 wild and crazy little boys. Boys who fall off kitchen chairs in hysterics when someone even mentions the word fart, boys all casting fishing poles with hooks at the same time in Grandpa's fishing boat, boys who not only don't mind dirt but are always covered head to toe in it and boys who wear camouflage ( see pics above ) yes "camo" not pink cinderella dresses. My boys have alot to teach their mom like how to pop wheelie's and how to put a worm on a hook and how to make "farting sounds" with my armpits or better yet maybe this mom will stay girlie and boost my boys ego's as I ooh and ahh over their wheelie's and let them feel macho when I need them to put the worm on the hook for me and simply just laugh at my silly boys when crazy sounds come from armpits. All this being said ...who could've imagined the joy of boys and how crazy blessed I feel to be the mom of 3 wild but wonderful boys!

Gold and Silver, I have none...

but worth a million are my sons!

HAPPY

My Happy Cup

colorful notepads

my Gap sweater in happy colorful stripes

I feel so happy today and it is simply because I finally feel better, my energy is back! I feel happy enough to shout yahoo's, do cartwheels and run up and give complete stranger's a bear hug... seriously, I feel that happy. Speaking of being happy; did ya'all know I have a "happy cup"? I have this crazy addiction to buying all those adorable starbucks mugs to contain my other addiction, coffee and one day came across my "happy cup". See the picture above... just looking at it makes me happy. People even know it as my happy cup, just ask Marc's family who all want their own happy cup for the cottage. You might just ask, what is it that makes this cup happy? It is the happy colors and the stripes. I soon realized that I gravitate towards all things in these sunny, bright colors and in stripes. These are the colors I love and they simply make me happy! Want a bear hug? I'm giving them out today!

Take note of the pics above and my love of all things in colorful stripes or polka dots! From coffee mugs to that Gap sweater to beach towels and more, those colors color my world with happiness! By the way... my happy cup is now a pencil holder due to the fact that although very happy it was very large and my coffee got cold too fast and that did not make me well, happy!