Well, the healing I was so craving for the weekend didn’t exactly take place. Things with Hannah remained exactly the same. I’ve decided that I need to just really pray about this and continue to seek guidance from people who have been there/done that as far as motherhood is concerned because it’s quite apparent that whatever ideas I have suck. HAH. I’m trying to make light of this because I’m mentally exhausted. It’s now come down to pulling Hannah from dance because I pay A LOT for her to have this hobby that she used to love. Keyword being USED. I fought her a lot last year and I just decided that lately with her attitude and issues that if she’s going to be ungrateful and NOT even want to dance…why bother?! You know? I paid for September so she’ll at least dance for this month. Then we’ll reevaluate. Her staying in dance is my dream…not hers. It’s hard for me to accept this. But I will. And so after a weekend of arguing over that and a few other routine things I got NO pictures of her. “Mom, don’t take ANY pictures of me. I’m not in the mood.”

Except for this tiny moment on Saturday. “MOM! Get a picture of me and Sassie!”

*sigh*

I know we will overcome this. We will get to the other side of this HUGE mountain sometime (soon I hope) and I’ll look back and be able to make a list of all the lessons we BOTH learned. I’m looking forward to that day.

And then Livie got sick. Her nose started running Saturday evening and by yesterday she had a full on, raging cold complete with lots of this

and only a few moments of this

So to sum this all up? I’m exhausted. Mentally and physically. BUT I’m determined to change this. I’m determined to change my focus and instead of everything being out of focus right now…I’m gonna rotate my lens of life and get this thing in check. I don’t like a hazy view of my life. I don’t like this feeling of not knowing what the fuck I’m doing and wondering if my children are conspiring against me. They aren’t. And I’m not an idiot. I’m not a clueless moron attempting motherhood. I AM a good mom. I will prove this to my girls.

And to myself.

Last night was probably one of the most trying nights I’ve ever had as a mother. When I think of my previous hectic or crazy nights they had to do with screaming babies, or puke, or diahrrea or temper tantrums or homework or most NORMAL things that mothers have a hard time with. But last night was different. Last night was mentally taxing for me. I can’t get into much detail about it but to look at my 7 year old and realize she’s NOT a baby anymore and that parts of her that I can’t control might have to do with me not paying attention enough…or not dedicating enough time…or WHATEVER it is that I’m lacking as a mother…well it shattered my heart. And it’s still shattered today. I realized last night that I will never EVER have all the answers. I’ve always known this…but last night I lived it. I cried. I shook. I looked to the ceiling and prayed. I called The Man. I called his mom. I called my neighbor. I called people that I knew would listen and give me good advice. And yet today, while I feel better, I’m still lost. It’s a very hopeless feeling as a mom when you feel like you don’t know how to handle your child or what to tell them or do for them to make things better or change things. And so with a heavy heart I welcome the weekend because I know that weekends bring healing for me. This morning through puffy eyes I looked in the mirror and told myself that it’s Friday…and that even though I just got lotion in my eye and it was burning (and STILL is 6 hours later) today was going to be ok. And this weekend was going to be ok. And Hannah was going to be ok. We all are GOING to be ok. I trust God for direction…I trust my VERY loved family for direction. And when I look at these pictures I took last night I tear up because I took them in the middle of the chaos….after I knew I had to talk to her but before I actually did. See, she got her new glasses yesterday and she was so excited. She’s been asking for the whole 2 weeks it took to get them in when they were coming in.

She was so excited for me to come home from work to show me and actually didn’t fight me to take pictures of her in them because, after all, they “make her look smart.”

“Take a picture of me thinking, Mama!”

Hannah, you ARE smart and you DO think and I know things are going to get better from here on out. I love you.

And so I thank God for Livie because she’s 1 and a 1/2 and my hardest struggle with her is the fact that she doesn’t sleep and makes my house look like a hurricane swept through. I find myself secretly wishing for her to be like 3 so she could be potty trained and talking and able to do more on her own. But not last night. Last night I embraced her age and her innocence and I will continue to.

She’s been loving the phone lately. She picks it up and says “Hello?” and then she’ll talk and laugh and use crazy hand motions and then suddenly say “BYE!” and put the phone on the floor. Then she’ll start the whole process over again. It’s to die for and so freakin cute. I love her.

Last night was definitely a life out of focus night for me. I get used to our routine and even the normal things that throw me off like I said before I can handle. Sure, sleepless nights because of Livie suck but I’m used to it. Fighting with Hannah to write her spelling words sucks but I’m used to it. And then there are hazy, fuzzy, out of focus nights like last night that derail me. I’m grateful for The Man and his family and my babies for picking me up and putting me back on track again.

Lately, thanks to The Man’s awesome mom, we’ve been getting some freetime together. Movies, dinners, vacations,  parties, bars…we’ve done it all in the past month and I LOVE IT. We used to do that stuff a lot when we just had Hannah but throwing Livie into the mix halted our social lives greatly. We’re getting it back now slowly and I forgot how much I missed it! This past weekend we went to a local pub and fell in love with the band that was playing. You must check out The Space Rockers because they ROCKED! They were dressed up in tight spandex with capes and helmets and crazy hair but OMG they were amazing. They played ALL hip hop LIVE and danced on stage and we all just freakin loved them. SO MUCH. I want to be a groupie and follow them all around Texas. For real.

When we first walked in and I heard Ice Ice Baby I was like ok, these guys are cool. When they sang The Cupid Shuffle I fell in love.  Nelly. Flo Rida. Snoop dogg. All my favorite hip hop songs coming from a group of nerdy white guys dressed in crazy outfits…pure genius. We danced our asses off all night long and took silly pictures and pretended like we were 21 all over again.

I love being a mom to my girls. They are what completes me and makes my life whole and fabulous. But every now and then I like to send them off to Nana’s and have a night out with MORE people that I love and make my life fabulous. Most people go out with a group of friends. Not us. We go out with family. The Man’s brother and sister and cousin and their significant others….This is why I always say that most my friends HAVE to be online. I have an amazing life with my family here. I have a handful of close friends I see here that I go out with or do things with outside from my family. But 90% of the time I’m with my family.

And I love it.

Mondays at work are always insane. I’m sure it’s that way with most jobs where the office is closed over the weekend. So I like to sit here and take a few minutes here and there when I can to remember my weekend and soak it in and share it with you. I’ve said many times on there that I live for the weekend.

And you can see why.  This weekend I got all of Livie’s hair in a ponytail and it was so super cute. I think she loved it even if she DID try to take it down a few times. It’s been a solid 97-101 degrees for weeks now and having your hair up is such a relief.

So she liked it, right?

Hannah being goofy with her friends. Another favorite thing of mine.

Words can’t express how grateful I am that we had the coolest people ever move in next door to us a few months ago and our daughters have bonded and gotten so close. They play together EVERY. SINGLE. DAY and it’s so awesome to watch your babies have a mini social calendar of when they will do their homework and when they will play and whose house they’re going to play at at what times.

Livie getting into the tupperware. Again.

And her cuddling with Daddy when she’s exhausted.

And last but not least a few pictures from our photography session a few weeks ago. I finally put in my order last week of the prints I wanted to get but OMG it was so hard to decide which ones. I wanted to get them all but since I don’t have a few grand laying around to do that, I picked a few favorites which included these 3.

Family. That’s always my favorite thing of all.

It’s finally Friday for me. Each week I live for this day because that means tomorrow is the weekend and I get a break from all things work and stress! I wanted to get good pictures of the girls last night to end this week BUT as we all know, I can’t plan anything picture wise with these kids. If I get good ones of Livie it’s totally by accident because she is on the go ALL. THE. TIME. And Hannah…well we know how she is about me and my camera. It’s a 50/50 toss up with her. Last night she was “not in the mood” for pictures and “was grouchy” (from what I have no idea because in my opinion her life is pretty effin grand) so it was Liv flying solo for picture time.

I had a friend recently tell me that my house looks so clean in all my pictures and how do I do this…well, as you can see from this picture that is not true. At all. Usually when I’m chasing the girls’ around taking pictures I’m kicking toys out of the way as I go so the house looks semi decent. I was about to do the same thing yesterday but then I decided to leave it the way it USUALLY is because hello…I have a toddler (OMG A TODDLER!!!) and keeping toys off the floor is pretty much a distant concept. And to show how she’s NEVER still, I tried REALLY hard to get her smiling. This is what I got.

Smile, yes. Clarity? No. Ah well. Can’t win them all.

So I have to pimp out this site super fast. It’s getuncommon.com and OMG if you have an iPhone or iTouch you can make a case for your phone like this.

Is that not the awesomest idea EVER?! I made one with Hannah’s picture too and The Man’s mom currently has it on her phone. Best idea ever. Yes I know. I plan to make many more and change them out often. I can see this becoming an obsession of mine.

Phone cases and Etsy.

God help my checkbook.