voss voyage

We are in the middle of some major sleep transitions in our house. We live in a 3 bedroom house, and with six of us living here, that means everyone has to share a room with at least one other person. Up until recently Allison & Mia have been sleeping alone in separate rooms & the twins have been sleeping in the master bedroom with us. Not any more! We have begun the "big move." #1 Get Allison to sleep in the top bunk without getting up at night. This took 2 weeks. Once we found the right bribe, it was easy. For staying in her bed 14 nights in a row she was gifted with a CD that plays songs with her name in each song. She got this one  http://www.mymusiccd.com/music_original.html : #2 Get Mia to sleep in the bottom bunk. She has been sleeping in a crib in another room. She is scared and asking for her crib. Once she is asleep she stays all night, but getting to sleep is a bit of a challenge. A funny thing happened the other day. Patrick told Mia to go to her ro...

I'm a pretty bold, honest person. I say it how it is. Those of you who have know me for only the past 10 years or so wouldn't believe that I haven't always been like this. The lying started in high school...at first, it was just my feelings & emotions. In college I progressed to hiding some pretty horrible behaviors. In the early post-college years I flat out lied about close to everything. The hiding and lying threatened my job and almost took my life. I hated myself. I hated my body, my personality, everything. And I didn't know why. I had no idea why I was so depressed, confused and angry. I had had a wonderful childhood and came from a great family. There was no abuse, no rebellion, no tragic deaths or horrible secrets. So the guilt set in. Shoot, I don't even have a good reason to feel this way. Depression turned to guilt turned to shame. It all became too much and the feelings needed an outlet. Thus, the birth of my 7-year-long struggle with an eating di...

We had a great time celebrating with some of Patrick's family recently..... The twins got some lovin' from Annette & Susan GREAT food Beautiful Preggo's!! Cousin laughter Wonderful sisters and hosts! Here are some random snapshots of the kids in the past month.... When Allison is home she almost always has some sort of dress up clothes on. One of Natalie's favorite toys. She plays with this for long periods of time. Begging for food from big sister. Notice how long their pants are....... They don't call it double trouble for nothing!! Aren't the dresses cute?!  Thanks, Aunt Sonja! Waiting for big sisters to come home. Peek-a-boo! They were playing with each other. It was really funny!

I often wonder myself what I do all day. So I mentally took notes yesterday of the order of my day. While days do vary considerably, here is a typical day in my life... *Jenna (12m) wakes me up *Struggle to kitchen to get coffee and greet Allison (5) & Mia (3), who are at the table eating breakfast. They get up earlier with Patrick who, THANK GOD, is a morning person. Patrick goes to get ready for work. *Check my email and the weather. I started doing this because I once sent Allison to school in a turtleneck & sweater and it was 70 degrees. I *thought* because its February, it was winter. *Put Jenna in high chair for breakfast; clean up A & M. *Dress & assemble A & M. They attempt to do this on their own, but still need some help in picking clothes, doing hair, teeth,etc. *Natalie wakes up. Put Natalie in high chair, get Jenna down--change & dress her. *Assemble school stuff--lunch, homework, snack, etc. *Get Nats down--change & dress her. *Potty ...

Why I love staying at home (but sending my kids to school). When I was working, most of my friends worked. Now, most of my friends stay home full time. It took awhile for my circle of friends to shift, and it occurred slowly as I worked less and stayed home more. I am really blessed to be a nurse where there is the option to work FT, PT or relief ( really PT). Because it took awhile to have kids, I was able to observe others struggle through the decision to work or stay home (or do both). I tried really hard to learn from their experiences. But truly, everyone's life is different and thus when it came time for me to decide, it wasn't that easy. God eventually showed me that working as a RN in a hospital was just too stressful for me and my growing family, and I stopped working all together. What a blessing it is to have a choice to stay home. I know not everyone can do that and I am so thankful. I love that I can stay in my PJ's all day if I want to, have picnics under...