Thursday, December 26, 2013

How did the Holidays go so quickly????

I guess this year it has been hard with the holidays and everything to be as enthusiastic as I normally am.  My mother used to call me "Holiday" because I have always had a childlike enthusiasm and light about the holidays.

These last few months have been a big time of change for me and I guess I am still trying to rekindle my happy light that has been squelched by exhaustion.  While in some ways I felt like I was going through the motions,  I am grateful for my kids though because they made things so much fun!! We did have some beautiful memories and here are all the pictures from Corn Maze to Christmas Day!
Hopefully by next year I'll have my holiday spirit back!  Oh I haven't mailed out the Christmas cards either :p  They are coming... hopefully before June!

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Real Men Wear Tights!

On Sunday the kids and I were heading to church in El Paso.  The LDS church has a choir show for Christmas every year and my mother enjoys it.  In the car I broached the idea of Harmon doing a jazz class and he scoffed at me.  "Mommy, only girls dance".  Oh no he didn't!!!  So that is how 5 hours later he ended up here...


It just happened to be the Russian Ballet was in El Paso and so after church I took my mommy and the kids to the Plaza and we all attended the ballet.  It wasn't just Harm's comment that made me so impulsive.  Because of my father's stroke my mother hardly gets out of the house and it had been decades since she had been to the rest theater.  At the box office I shared with the lady why we were attending so last minute (it was just starting when I got there to buy tickets) and so she discounted the tickets for us and got us unsold orchestra tickets.

To be honest the kids struggled a little during the second half but they did wonderfully.  I remember as a child my parents used to take me just like I took them and I used to get a little anxious too.  Still they loved the show!  My mother got out of the house for something very special and my boys learned male dancing is "AWESOME" (as quoted by Harmon).

The best part of it though was after the show we met a lot of the cast and they all asked little Rachey if she was going to be Clara one day.  She said "No, I want to be the Rat King!"

Friday, December 20, 2013

"I don't wanna go to Heaven if I can't get in..."

This morning I was listening to my usual picks on my iPhone while I was wrapping gifts and organizing paper work.  I had been thinking about a song by OAR called "Heaven" and Callum asked me why I wouldn't want to go to Heaven and I tried to explain to him that my interpretation of the song is that I don't want to go to Heaven if it is someone else's cliquey place like it is some social club only certain people will go too.  Needless to say I had a very stumped four year old and so I changed the subject quickly...


I'm sure this is the first of hundreds of these conversations with my kids.  It came to mind more today with the whole Duck Dynasty thing and a random recent conversation.   I was talking to a friend and we were talking about what school we were going to next, I mentioned one place and I got the look.  She was concerned the whole Mormon thing, though the Jewish thing would probably be okay.  We talked and I don't think that will be a big deal but it did remind me of what I went through as a child.

My family was interfaith jumble, and dramatically different cultures as well.  My mother was Puerto Rican, born right in Old San Juan.  My father was raised in a small town in Texas with like maybe a hundred and fifty other people it seemed like.  Both places are very beautiful filled with beautiful people.  My paternal grandmother and grandfather did not attend my parents wedding because she was Hispanic.  When I was born I was given my Maternal Grandmother's name (my 1/2 sister carries my Paternal Grandma's name) and because of that as a small child I was really hated by my maternal grandmother.  It got so nasty that my mother and father couldn't leave me with her for 5 minutes alone.  I still have nightmares.  That was the first time I realized what it was like to be hated for something you never did wrong.


I went to private school, including a parochial one.  Even though I was not of that faith most everyone didn't care.  I loved learning their faith and I loved my own faith.  My parents always wanted me to be the ultimate person to decide faith.  It was loving people like this old Episcopalian priest who knew I was pretty much Jewish at that point but still encouraged me to take full part in everything and have faith in God.  I am grateful for the school my kids attend right now.  Everyone jokes about my kids being the spice in the school as the little Jewish Mormons.  Everyone always been so supportive of me as well there knowing what we all went through in the last year.  They are true Christians in my book.

Eventually my kids are going to see the other side of the world I so fiercely block for them.  Chris worries a lot about my occasional cussing slip but I worry more about the first time they are told they are not going to Heaven or the first time they learn of events like the Holocaust.  I have been so blessed to be surrounded by such great diverse friends in my life who love me for who I am and so when I see the world so divisive it breaks my heart.  I am not condemning anyone, my husband loves Duck Dynasty and I think the DD family is neat in many ways.  I understand that with the Robertson father, in his heart those are his beliefs, but they are not mine.  We need to start becoming a people who loves first and condemns last in my opinion.  Faith, culture, religion, are wonderful things when celebrated but not used as a weapon.


When I was younger I wanted to change the world but the world is not black and white.  Art Spiegalman's Mause was criticized because of the simplicity.  The innocents were mice and the evil ones were cats.  The world isn't that way and changing the world for better is not so simple.  One thing I am doing is looking more into my heart trying to take a hard look at who I am.  There is always personal room for improvement.  I can't change the world but I can affect my sphere of influence, which is namely my kids.  I want them to learn to love people and to stand up for good even when it is difficult.

I met one of my heroes recently.  Her name is Mimi Gladstein and she is just an amazing women.  One of the neatest things she has done, is choosing the quotes for the wall of tolerance at the El Paso Holocaust Museum  They are amazing and the words I will just continue to try to live by the rest of my life.  They are why I felt like I wanted to say something tonight.



Saturday, December 14, 2013

Bigger, wiser, kinder, and stronger...

How do you handle it when time becomes your biggest enemy?  That is how I feel these days.  I love my children so much but it is hard to see how quickly they are growing up.  As they grow we face new challenges.  About 3 years ago my biggest challenges was potty training, temper tantrums, bottles, and finding pacifiers.  Those days are over.  Now our problems are just as challenging but very different.


Bickering:  I am ready to put the sign on the front door and say "Twins for sale $1 OBO".  They are finally having a major sibling rivalry.  Its like if Cally picks a fruit by the foot and Rachel picks a fruit roll up than Callum gets angry and Rachel and demands I give him a fruit roll up.  Harm is above the fray these days and has turned into my mini peacemaker.  Thank Heavens!!!  Now I just need to help my Twinkies through this before I lose my mind.

"OH THE DRAMA!!!":  I blame myself for this in part because I have theater degree after all but I think Harmon gets this from Chris because he is the man in the family and the boys are the ones picking the habit.  Harmon gets so upset if I tell him he has to wait to watch a movie or delay going somewhere because something came up.  He will scream: "Just be honest I'm never going to ever get to do it" and than he slams his bedroom door and locks it.  Callum is starting to do the same thing.  Note to self, the locks are going next house.    


Drama Part 2:  Now Rachey is funniest.  She gets a slight scrape and she acts like the lady in the theme song from Mystery going oh no while waving a scarf.  The worst is chores.  This I blame on myself.  My father raised me to be a princess so I never did chores growing up.  I think I coddle Rachel too much so I need to work on that because now the slightest chore elicits fainting spells.

Peer Pressure:  The hardest thing I have had to contend with is explaining to the kids that just because they have a friend who watches something or acts a certain way that doesn't mean they get too.  I know I am strict mom but I think that being strict with things like entertainment, manners, honesty, chores, etc. are very important.  I feel bad being hard on them when they have friends with their own iPads and gaming systems.  They get to do a lot of that, like when we are at appointments the boys play Angry Birds and Rachel loves Strawberry Shortcake.  I'm trying to teach them to stand up against peer pressure but also be more understanding that the kids are not gonna grow up like I did making mud pies in the back yard all day!


When I first was pregnant I stalked message boards and read a ton of books.  The best thing I ever was taught was when my kids and were in early intervention and our wonderful family counselor Deryl taught me about the "Circle of Security" in a six week parenting course.  It taught the following:
  • Always be: Bigger, wiser, kinder, and stronger.  
  • When possible: follow my children's needs.  
  • Whenever necessary: be ready to take charge.  As challenging as parenting gets I try to remember what I learned in this course and apply the principals.  
Hopefully I will end up with well adjusted great adults who can take care of their mother who they drove crazy.

Can you hear me now???

For those who have kept track of our baby Cally and his random Brooklyn accent we have some new updates.  It has been frustrating because we have had so many diagnoses and half of them have been down right false.

So Chris decided that we should try one last suggestion to improve his hearing loss which has always been between 30% and 40% since he was an infant.  It was a simple idea so I was very supportive.  We got tubes placed in his ears.  It wasn't a big deal.  We would have done it sooner but to be honest he never had an ear infection so it seemed silly.  He did have some fluid though and now it is gone.

So there is nothing left to do but wait.  So far his speech is not different at all but we keep hoping it will improve as he continues speech therapy.  If not I do worry a lot because we are out of options besides leaving it alone and getting hearing aids.  He will have another hearing screening in April and than we will know where we stand.  Chris' concern is teasing and I'm already seeing kids tease him a lot.  I'm grateful he hasn't caught on yet.  I worry how much he loves music.  The world is a wonderful place to hear things and I don't want him missing out. We are still hoping the easiest solution ends up being the right one!

Ghost Hunters and Cursed Homes...

One of our favorite sales staff is a character.  He once proposed us getting ghost hunting meters so people could see if the resale home they were buying was haunted and perhaps that would motivate them to get a new construction home.  Easy to say that marketing gimmick never came fully too fruition.  I learned through experiences ghosts are not a worry but cursed properties are.


Since moving to Mesilla we have had problems with everything in my cute little blue home.  The septic tank started coming up through the back yard.  All the appliances except the dishwasher needed replacing.  The plumbing is finicky.  There is no heat in the master bath and we had HVAC issues with the swamp cooler all summer.  The final straw we joke was when our cat learned how to open the front door a month ago and a half ago.  It was time to move and this time we are building because I have never ever appreciated a home warranty more than I do now.


So as of Thursday we signed the final documents and we now own an acre of land here in Mesilla.  I'm happy to have heat next winter and better air conditioning this Summer.  For those who keep count this will be our fifth home in Las Cruces and our third build.  It is going to be the eighth home for Chris and I since we married seven years ago...  The kids keep making me promise we will live here forever but honestly I think forever is not gonna happen.  So I'm promising them five years!

It is hard to admit I kind of failed into making this home more of a home.  We still haven't unpacked 2/3rds of our stuff and only painted half.  I am proud of myself that I did do this house on my own and that is the first time I have ever done that with out someone like my sister or Chris helping me each step.  With 3 kids that was a hard point for me but I did it and we are leaving the home in May better than when we came.  So it isn't a failure as much as a life lesson.


I'm already having fun working with our wonderful trades and vendors in designing this home. Many of them have been long time dear working friends and everyone is rooting this will be the house we stay in.  I sure am!  As for the next home I don't mind any ghostly visitors but I can say I'm glad it won't be cursed and if it, it will all be covered by warranties!

Thursday, December 26, 2013

How did the Holidays go so quickly????

I guess this year it has been hard with the holidays and everything to be as enthusiastic as I normally am.  My mother used to call me "Holiday" because I have always had a childlike enthusiasm and light about the holidays.

These last few months have been a big time of change for me and I guess I am still trying to rekindle my happy light that has been squelched by exhaustion.  While in some ways I felt like I was going through the motions,  I am grateful for my kids though because they made things so much fun!! We did have some beautiful memories and here are all the pictures from Corn Maze to Christmas Day!
Hopefully by next year I'll have my holiday spirit back!  Oh I haven't mailed out the Christmas cards either :p  They are coming... hopefully before June!

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Real Men Wear Tights!

On Sunday the kids and I were heading to church in El Paso.  The LDS church has a choir show for Christmas every year and my mother enjoys it.  In the car I broached the idea of Harmon doing a jazz class and he scoffed at me.  "Mommy, only girls dance".  Oh no he didn't!!!  So that is how 5 hours later he ended up here...


It just happened to be the Russian Ballet was in El Paso and so after church I took my mommy and the kids to the Plaza and we all attended the ballet.  It wasn't just Harm's comment that made me so impulsive.  Because of my father's stroke my mother hardly gets out of the house and it had been decades since she had been to the rest theater.  At the box office I shared with the lady why we were attending so last minute (it was just starting when I got there to buy tickets) and so she discounted the tickets for us and got us unsold orchestra tickets.

To be honest the kids struggled a little during the second half but they did wonderfully.  I remember as a child my parents used to take me just like I took them and I used to get a little anxious too.  Still they loved the show!  My mother got out of the house for something very special and my boys learned male dancing is "AWESOME" (as quoted by Harmon).

The best part of it though was after the show we met a lot of the cast and they all asked little Rachey if she was going to be Clara one day.  She said "No, I want to be the Rat King!"

Friday, December 20, 2013

"I don't wanna go to Heaven if I can't get in..."

This morning I was listening to my usual picks on my iPhone while I was wrapping gifts and organizing paper work.  I had been thinking about a song by OAR called "Heaven" and Callum asked me why I wouldn't want to go to Heaven and I tried to explain to him that my interpretation of the song is that I don't want to go to Heaven if it is someone else's cliquey place like it is some social club only certain people will go too.  Needless to say I had a very stumped four year old and so I changed the subject quickly...


I'm sure this is the first of hundreds of these conversations with my kids.  It came to mind more today with the whole Duck Dynasty thing and a random recent conversation.   I was talking to a friend and we were talking about what school we were going to next, I mentioned one place and I got the look.  She was concerned the whole Mormon thing, though the Jewish thing would probably be okay.  We talked and I don't think that will be a big deal but it did remind me of what I went through as a child.

My family was interfaith jumble, and dramatically different cultures as well.  My mother was Puerto Rican, born right in Old San Juan.  My father was raised in a small town in Texas with like maybe a hundred and fifty other people it seemed like.  Both places are very beautiful filled with beautiful people.  My paternal grandmother and grandfather did not attend my parents wedding because she was Hispanic.  When I was born I was given my Maternal Grandmother's name (my 1/2 sister carries my Paternal Grandma's name) and because of that as a small child I was really hated by my maternal grandmother.  It got so nasty that my mother and father couldn't leave me with her for 5 minutes alone.  I still have nightmares.  That was the first time I realized what it was like to be hated for something you never did wrong.


I went to private school, including a parochial one.  Even though I was not of that faith most everyone didn't care.  I loved learning their faith and I loved my own faith.  My parents always wanted me to be the ultimate person to decide faith.  It was loving people like this old Episcopalian priest who knew I was pretty much Jewish at that point but still encouraged me to take full part in everything and have faith in God.  I am grateful for the school my kids attend right now.  Everyone jokes about my kids being the spice in the school as the little Jewish Mormons.  Everyone always been so supportive of me as well there knowing what we all went through in the last year.  They are true Christians in my book.

Eventually my kids are going to see the other side of the world I so fiercely block for them.  Chris worries a lot about my occasional cussing slip but I worry more about the first time they are told they are not going to Heaven or the first time they learn of events like the Holocaust.  I have been so blessed to be surrounded by such great diverse friends in my life who love me for who I am and so when I see the world so divisive it breaks my heart.  I am not condemning anyone, my husband loves Duck Dynasty and I think the DD family is neat in many ways.  I understand that with the Robertson father, in his heart those are his beliefs, but they are not mine.  We need to start becoming a people who loves first and condemns last in my opinion.  Faith, culture, religion, are wonderful things when celebrated but not used as a weapon.


When I was younger I wanted to change the world but the world is not black and white.  Art Spiegalman's Mause was criticized because of the simplicity.  The innocents were mice and the evil ones were cats.  The world isn't that way and changing the world for better is not so simple.  One thing I am doing is looking more into my heart trying to take a hard look at who I am.  There is always personal room for improvement.  I can't change the world but I can affect my sphere of influence, which is namely my kids.  I want them to learn to love people and to stand up for good even when it is difficult.

I met one of my heroes recently.  Her name is Mimi Gladstein and she is just an amazing women.  One of the neatest things she has done, is choosing the quotes for the wall of tolerance at the El Paso Holocaust Museum  They are amazing and the words I will just continue to try to live by the rest of my life.  They are why I felt like I wanted to say something tonight.



Saturday, December 14, 2013

Bigger, wiser, kinder, and stronger...

How do you handle it when time becomes your biggest enemy?  That is how I feel these days.  I love my children so much but it is hard to see how quickly they are growing up.  As they grow we face new challenges.  About 3 years ago my biggest challenges was potty training, temper tantrums, bottles, and finding pacifiers.  Those days are over.  Now our problems are just as challenging but very different.


Bickering:  I am ready to put the sign on the front door and say "Twins for sale $1 OBO".  They are finally having a major sibling rivalry.  Its like if Cally picks a fruit by the foot and Rachel picks a fruit roll up than Callum gets angry and Rachel and demands I give him a fruit roll up.  Harm is above the fray these days and has turned into my mini peacemaker.  Thank Heavens!!!  Now I just need to help my Twinkies through this before I lose my mind.

"OH THE DRAMA!!!":  I blame myself for this in part because I have theater degree after all but I think Harmon gets this from Chris because he is the man in the family and the boys are the ones picking the habit.  Harmon gets so upset if I tell him he has to wait to watch a movie or delay going somewhere because something came up.  He will scream: "Just be honest I'm never going to ever get to do it" and than he slams his bedroom door and locks it.  Callum is starting to do the same thing.  Note to self, the locks are going next house.    


Drama Part 2:  Now Rachey is funniest.  She gets a slight scrape and she acts like the lady in the theme song from Mystery going oh no while waving a scarf.  The worst is chores.  This I blame on myself.  My father raised me to be a princess so I never did chores growing up.  I think I coddle Rachel too much so I need to work on that because now the slightest chore elicits fainting spells.

Peer Pressure:  The hardest thing I have had to contend with is explaining to the kids that just because they have a friend who watches something or acts a certain way that doesn't mean they get too.  I know I am strict mom but I think that being strict with things like entertainment, manners, honesty, chores, etc. are very important.  I feel bad being hard on them when they have friends with their own iPads and gaming systems.  They get to do a lot of that, like when we are at appointments the boys play Angry Birds and Rachel loves Strawberry Shortcake.  I'm trying to teach them to stand up against peer pressure but also be more understanding that the kids are not gonna grow up like I did making mud pies in the back yard all day!


When I first was pregnant I stalked message boards and read a ton of books.  The best thing I ever was taught was when my kids and were in early intervention and our wonderful family counselor Deryl taught me about the "Circle of Security" in a six week parenting course.  It taught the following:
  • Always be: Bigger, wiser, kinder, and stronger.  
  • When possible: follow my children's needs.  
  • Whenever necessary: be ready to take charge.  As challenging as parenting gets I try to remember what I learned in this course and apply the principals.  
Hopefully I will end up with well adjusted great adults who can take care of their mother who they drove crazy.

Can you hear me now???

For those who have kept track of our baby Cally and his random Brooklyn accent we have some new updates.  It has been frustrating because we have had so many diagnoses and half of them have been down right false.

So Chris decided that we should try one last suggestion to improve his hearing loss which has always been between 30% and 40% since he was an infant.  It was a simple idea so I was very supportive.  We got tubes placed in his ears.  It wasn't a big deal.  We would have done it sooner but to be honest he never had an ear infection so it seemed silly.  He did have some fluid though and now it is gone.

So there is nothing left to do but wait.  So far his speech is not different at all but we keep hoping it will improve as he continues speech therapy.  If not I do worry a lot because we are out of options besides leaving it alone and getting hearing aids.  He will have another hearing screening in April and than we will know where we stand.  Chris' concern is teasing and I'm already seeing kids tease him a lot.  I'm grateful he hasn't caught on yet.  I worry how much he loves music.  The world is a wonderful place to hear things and I don't want him missing out. We are still hoping the easiest solution ends up being the right one!

Ghost Hunters and Cursed Homes...

One of our favorite sales staff is a character.  He once proposed us getting ghost hunting meters so people could see if the resale home they were buying was haunted and perhaps that would motivate them to get a new construction home.  Easy to say that marketing gimmick never came fully too fruition.  I learned through experiences ghosts are not a worry but cursed properties are.


Since moving to Mesilla we have had problems with everything in my cute little blue home.  The septic tank started coming up through the back yard.  All the appliances except the dishwasher needed replacing.  The plumbing is finicky.  There is no heat in the master bath and we had HVAC issues with the swamp cooler all summer.  The final straw we joke was when our cat learned how to open the front door a month ago and a half ago.  It was time to move and this time we are building because I have never ever appreciated a home warranty more than I do now.


So as of Thursday we signed the final documents and we now own an acre of land here in Mesilla.  I'm happy to have heat next winter and better air conditioning this Summer.  For those who keep count this will be our fifth home in Las Cruces and our third build.  It is going to be the eighth home for Chris and I since we married seven years ago...  The kids keep making me promise we will live here forever but honestly I think forever is not gonna happen.  So I'm promising them five years!

It is hard to admit I kind of failed into making this home more of a home.  We still haven't unpacked 2/3rds of our stuff and only painted half.  I am proud of myself that I did do this house on my own and that is the first time I have ever done that with out someone like my sister or Chris helping me each step.  With 3 kids that was a hard point for me but I did it and we are leaving the home in May better than when we came.  So it isn't a failure as much as a life lesson.


I'm already having fun working with our wonderful trades and vendors in designing this home. Many of them have been long time dear working friends and everyone is rooting this will be the house we stay in.  I sure am!  As for the next home I don't mind any ghostly visitors but I can say I'm glad it won't be cursed and if it, it will all be covered by warranties!