Author: Brixanne

Want to know why I lost my s#!+ today?

D absolutely could NOT figure out how to be a decent human being to his brother who was at our house for the morning. I’m trying to raise decent human beings, not @$$holes. He couldn’t figure it out though. And I yelled at him. And swore, because I swear. And made him stand in a corner.

I wish that I had reacted in a calm way. Figured out how to not lose my cool and talk to him on a level that he would understand. Don’t get me wrong… I TRIED to do it that way but he just KEPT GOING. I wish I could have some kind of Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins ability to just sigh and move on with some witty saying that makes my kids behave.

BUT I DON’T.

And try as I might, I just don’t think I can BE that mom. Maybe I’m doing something wrong or maybe I’m just not cut out to be a mom – I know that isn’t true because I know that there are worse moms out there than me. It can just be so damn defeating when you look back on your day and realize your kid is going to remember the explosion. They probably won’t remember anything else from the rest of the entire month, but they’ll remember exactly what you said and what you were wearing because when something bad happens it’s like the memory is burned into their minds. What I need is one of those memory erasers from Men In Black. Turn that sucker on and tell them I reacted calmly and lovely like Mary Poppins.

But you know what? Tomorrow is a new day and a new chance for me to try to be the best mom I can be… and hopefully tomorrow I am. Because what it all boils down to is, that even when I’m tired and stressed, that everything I do is for my kids – I have every intention of being the best, greatest, most awesome mom but some days all I can be is an okay mom. And hopefully they look back and know that I tried my best to give them my best even on my bad days.

Every so often I get that question that you’ve probably wondered or asked yourself. “Don’t you want a little girl?” I know this topic has been covered by almost all of the moms with only one gender of kids BUT here are my feelings on this topic.

Would I have liked to have a little girl? Sure.
Am I going to keep trying until I get a little girl? Hell no.

God has blessed me with the miracle of carrying three very healthy boys through full term pregnancies. I thank him every day for their health and their uniqueness. I was blessed with a bonus kiddo when I met my husband. Another healthy boy who brings his individuality and unique personality to our family. The four of them together brings chaos and disorder to my life constantly. They also bring me a love I never knew was possible to feel.

These boys give me a run for my money. Adding a little girl? Man. She would be one of the most loved, cherished and overly protected little girls in the world, for sure. And with my luck she would be the biggest DIVA in the world. I can guarantee that she would be the worst infant, terrible toddler and absolute nightmare of a teenager to exist. I would love her with everything I have and would finally be reciprocated those feelings when she had her first child.

Seriously though. I love my boys. They teach me new things about myself every day. I wouldn’t change having all boys for anything else in the world. I find myself truly blessed to be considered a #boymom.

So…

Yes. They’re loud.
Yes. They’re messy.
No. I don’t believe that they’re easier than girls.
No. I won’t be trying for a girl.

via Daily Prompt: Invisible

I set about my morning like any other, walking around half asleep, stumbling like a zombie through the house. Grab baby. Nurse baby. Shush toddler. Make coffee.

NEED COFFEE.

We had somewhere to be. Don’t we always have somewhere to be? I used to never be late – I absolutely despise being late. Now I’m lucky if I’m on time. I decided this morning though I was making pancakes. Weight Watchers friendly, kid approved pancakes. Start with making some for the baby. While I cut his up, I start making some for G. While I’m cutting his up, start mine. Except something he does distracts me and I forgot to flip mine. Burnt. Now he’s trying to pour more syrup. Run to grab the syrup. Burn the other side too.

BURNT PANCAKES. ugh. Just mine though. Because despite the fact that I told him I was trying to cook and “please, just eat your breakfast, we need to leave,” he did everything but just eat his pancakes.

I feel like that’s kind of a great description for what my life is during this stage. Burnt pancakes. I’m always so busy being mom and wife, that I forget about myself. And while the pancakes I made were still edible, they definitely weren’t the way they should have been. That’s how I feel. I feel like I’m cruising through this part of life doing all the things everyone else needs me to but forgetting to help myself along the way. And what’s left is a burnt out mama and wife with the individual lost somewhere. Just a burnt pancake of my former self.

I know my family loves me. And my pancakes. But sometimes being loved for more than the things you do for a person is what you really crave in life. That and chocolate. And coffee. I’ve started to try to do more for myself but what I’ve realized is that the only way that my family is going to see me for more than just wife and mom is to do things with them that I LOVE. Go to the theater or the art museum. So that’s my plan going forward. The only way that I won’t be invisible to them as an individual is to make them experience things I LOVE as an individual. No coffee for the kids though. They’re hyper enough as it is.

Trying to get a moment of solitude is pretty much impossible. Maybe if I didn’t own pets… but here I sit on baited breath, hoping O doesn’t wake before I finish pumping or my morning coffee. The dog and cat both constantly seeking attention.

I used to consider myself a morning person. Recently though, I’ve realized I’m just able to wake to an alarm when I really need to. Mornings are hard when there other people depending on you. Especially when none of those tiny humans are morning people either.

I have to nearly drag D out of bed for school every morning. He’s a night owl and absolutely hates getting up. When B is here, he literally will sleep until 10 if I let him. Too bad for him, I won’t. G will scream for me until I come open his door and then he glares at me as though I physically made the sun rise myself. He’ll cover his face back up and tell me “Go way.” Hmmm. Pretty sure you told me to come in here ya jerk. O is hit or miss. Some mornings he wakes up and just babbles and plays in his crib. Other mornings he cries and won’t crack a smile until he’s had time to adjust.

All of these things typically will take place before my morning coffee. So I set an alarm for this morning that I DID NOT want to get up to because O was up twice in the middle of the night. So here I sit, pumping, writing a boring blog, drinking my coffee before all the kids wake up and we have to scurry to get ready for the day…. because today I have to get the two little ones to babysitters so I can chaperone a field trip.

via Daily Prompt: Patience

I feel like patience is one of those things that just doesn’t come as easily to a person as one would like to believe. If it did, it probably wouldn’t be one of the seven virtues, right? I mean, sure, we all pretend like we’re patient … patiently waiting for the new season of our favorite show to start, patiently waiting for the newest version of our phone to be released …. patiently waiting to get through a difficult project at work, or a particularly trying season in our life. We save face and we exute patience to everyone around us, but really we’re anxious about it… even the silly things. We want immediate gratification in all aspects of our lives.

And it never changes.

Want a perfect example? Kids. They are the epitome of having no virtues. Patience? I could create a YouTube video of a new superhero and name him Captain Patience and they STILL would not be able to emulate it.

As a parent, I feel like my ability to have patience is put to the ultimate test on a daily basis. Prime example – potty training.

This adorable photo was taken 8 months ago. G decided two weeks after bringing O home from the hospital that he was ready to be a big boy. Eight months later and we are just finally wearing underwear with our pants when we leave the house. 90% of the last eight months he has spent entirely butt naked or naked from the waist down. I have seen him naked more than any of the other kids or my husband combined. I have dealt with him peeing on my carpet, on my couch, on his bed (intentionally) and in my hall closet which also led to pee in my shoes. Fan-fricken-tastic. I have dealt with him pooping in his underwear, pooping and not telling me so that I can wipe his butt which led to skid marks on my shins, poop on my lap and poop on my furniture. His carseat pads have been washed more times than I can count and I have absolutely, one hundred and ten percent, thrown away a crap ton of underwear.

Through all of this I have done everything in my power to remain patient. He grasped the concept of potty training immediately. He knew exactly what he was supposed to do and where to do it. And he did great. For about a month. Let me tell you, my patience with potty training at this point is receding to be as thin as the once popular, high school jocks hair line. But it’s almost as if he can see that I’m at that breaking point of just letting him wear diapers until he’s in middle school and he’s suddenly deciding it’s time to give mama a little break.

Today he had his first accident, other than while sleeping, in a week. We’ve only had underwear on, every single day, including for sleep and in the car. It’s been a fantastic feeling to see the toddler I had assumed was potty trained eight months ago, finally almost REALLY there.

I will openly admit that patience is not one of my strong points. Having kids has made that abundantly clear and although it has increased my patience threshhold, I still lose it multiple times a day.

Happy St Patrick’s Day! I try to find a way to celebrate every year and this year we found out that we actually ARE Irish. Like I needed a reason anyway, amirite? Having kids though makes the crazy shenanigans of March 17 a lot different than they use to be. This year Mr. B and I are planning on bringing the little ones to the parade tomorrow so I made leprechaun spotting binoculars to get G in the spirit!

Things You Need:

• 2 toilet paper rolls or 1 paper towel roll cut in half
• Green construction paper
• Glue
• Rubber bands
• Paper Clips
• Decorations

I glued the construction paper onto the toilet paper roll and then used a rubber band to get it to set in place.

I then took another rubberband and figured eighted it around the two…

I stuck to a simple decoration of gold paper tape and then paperclipped the top and bottom for extra support.

Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. How’s that for my first “craft” blog post? I had a hard time making these cause I’m a bit of a perfectionist and these are far from perfect.