Long time no see!

Yes, I know I am not very good about posting, but I am going to try to get better. We have a lot going on at the Adams household.

Jackson started his senior year and Lili started Kindergarten this year. We are busy with so many things. (Looking at colleges and trying to get on and stay on track with applications, community service, homework, college visits, homework, grades, gpa's for Jackson ....AND....homework (yes, in Kindergarten), lunches, new routines, new friends, schedules (bedtime is a lot earlier now), and getting over the first few weeks of after school grumpies (school is more challenging for Lili than she thought - she is so tired when she gets home).

Jackson and Lili are both playing soccer this season too. Lili's plays for the Sugarplums, and Eric and his Mom are coaching, and I am team manager. It's so fun to see how competitive these beautiful girls are, I had no idea it was going to be like this. Their first game, they scored 16 goals vs 5 goals for the other team, and Lili scored a hat trick during her first game ever. She was so excited. North Texas Thunder U19 (Jackson's club team) has played two games and played the Labor Day Tournament in Plano . Thunder has several new players this season from Frisco, recruited by Jackson. They are still making some adjustments to the lineups and formations, but this is going to be an exciting season.

My grandparents celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary this past weekend, we all attended a party at the retirement home where Mamaw lives now. It was a wonderful occasion and most of the kids, grandkids and great-grandkids were able to attend. My grandparents have been a wonderful example to us and have definitely shown us what true love is, through good and bad, young to old. I am so proud to be their grandaughter, and strive to have a marriage as successful and bountiful as theirs has been!

I and many of my family members will be walking in the Alzheimer's Memory Walk at UTA on October 2nd. I am excited about this event, even though my fundraising efforts have not been quite as successful as I had hoped. But I think we are going to continue doing this walk on an annual basis, so I guess I will learn more each year and what works and what doesn't.

http://memorywalk10.kintera.org/faf/donorReg/donorPledge.asp?ievent=337022&lis=0&kntae337022=42E735311F8B46B2870BC8BDBEC5B796

Well, that's a lot of news for one day, and I hope to continue on a more regular basis. Lots going on with the Adams Family. Busy but blessed!!!

Moms Busy Mornings

Here is how my Friday morning went:

Up at 6AM, shower, get myself ready. 6:45AM wake kids up. Get Lili into her dance leotard and tights, pull her hair up into a tight ponytail and curl it (even though the poor childs hair won't hold a curl for more than 20 minutes, I had to at least try), blush on cheeks, and lipgloss. Lili is getting her dance pictures made this morning and so she had to be all dolled up. Give Jackson his lunch $$ and try to get everyone shoo'd out the door in time. Forget my phone, run back upstairs and grab it off the charger...head out the door. Lili tells me thank you for buying new tights for her, it's the little things, right? She looked absolutely adorable this morning. I can't wait to see her routines in her recital in two weeks.

Eric took Jackson to school this morning because we also had Muffins with Mom at Lili's school today because Mother's Day is on Sunday. =) The lunchroom table for Pre-K 2 was decorated with handmade placemats, a cute little picture of Lili holding a "Happy Mother's Day" heart, and tissue flowers in plastic cup vases. All so pretty and it made my morning, those few special minutes I shared with Lili before the rush of the day took over again.

I got to work and sat down, breathed a sigh of relaxation because I was at work and I could RELAX now. A little ironic, you could say, but such is the life of a Mommy. It's the little smiles, hugs, kisses, and thank you's that make it all worth it. (I will try to post some pics later today.)

Happy Mother's Day to all my Momma friends.

The Insomniac...

Our little sugarplum has never slept very well for long periods of time, however up until now, she has managed to at least sleep from 10pm to about 6:30 or 7. Sometimes she misses the mark and wakes up about 5:30 or so, but the past several nights have been quite interesting, to say the least. 3 nights ago, I wake up with that Mommy instinct telling me something is amiss. I feel around for my pillows, and find that there aren't ANY in our bed. I nudge Eric and ask him, "what happened to our pillows?". At this point, I hear a faint noise in the corner of our bedroom, and lo and behold, Lili is making a pillow fort. Oh, I forgot to mention that it's 3:30 AM, and she's wide awake. I asked her what she was doing, and she explained that she couldn't sleep, so she was making a fort for her dolls. Well, she wasn't hurting anything, and I know how she gets when she's wide awake, so I roll over and tell her that she needs to stay in our room or go into hers when she is done...because I need MY sleep. =) Anyway, when my alarm goes off at 6:00 AM, she's snuggled between Eric and I, fast asleep. It was almost impossible to wake her up to get ready for school. The next night, she comes and wakes me up about 3:30 AM to tell me that she's going to go sleep with her big brother. So, at least that night, she was only awake for a few minutes, but her poor brother got kicked in the face (accidentally of course) because she decided to sleep Pippi Longstocking style, with her feet on the pillows, and her head at the foot of the bed with our dog Momo.



Centennial High School Titans have played 2 playoff games so far, and they play their first sectional game tonight in Little Elm. Jackson is having the time of his life with all of the team dinners, pep rallies and games. He is back on the ball in school, and got his braces put back on last week during Spring Break.



Needless to say, it's been a busy week and Momma is drinking lots of coffee....can't wait until the game tonight!!!

Respect

Our daughter, L, and our sweet little Shih Tzu Momo have always had a pretty distant relationship. By that, I mean, L loves to hug on him and play with him and squeeze him. He likes to keep his distance because he doesn't like being trapped by the princess. We have explained countless times that if she will just be patient and wait for him to come to her, then she can pet him and he won't run. However, every time he gets near her, she grabs him and holds on for dear life because she doesn't want him to run away. It's a never ending cycle, and we have tried desperately to teach her to respect his space. I think they both learned a lesson yesterday morning.

Just like any other morning, I got up, made the kids breakfast, and we all went upstairs to get ready for school/work. L picked out her clothes and was supposed to be changing into them while I showered, but when I checked on her after my shower, she was still in her pj's, and was trying to coax Momo to come in her room, to no avail. I attempted to redirect her to her clothes, and told her I was going to dry my hair, and when I was done, I really hoped that she was dressed and ready. (Maybe this is too much to expect of a five year old, but she seems to do pretty well 75% of the time...)

So, I dry my hair and turn off the hair dryer, and hear my baby girl crying hysterically. I walk into her room and she is standing next to the door in tears with a little nick near her left eyebrow. Momo is cowering in the corner because he knows that he's in trouble. L immediately jumped into my arms, I attempted to console her but she was crying uncontrollably. After a few minutes, I called for J to come and get Momo so that I could calm L down and find out what happened. It seems that Ms. L did manage to coax Momo into her room, and she attempted to shut the door, but he managed to almost escape. She told me that she held him down and he growled, and growled, and after a bit, turned up toward her and snapped at her. He managed to nick her little eyebrow, and it was bleeding just a little bit. I asked her if she understood what respecting Momo's space means now, and boy did she say YES! (We have explained to her many times that Momo can't talk, and when he growls, it's his way of saying...stop it now, I am losing my patience.)

Our Momo is NOT a biter. He barely even barks, just the occasional yip at the back door when he is ready to come in, or the one bark as he runs down the stairs in the evening to greet Eric when he gets home from work. He's so calm, you would think we give him valium on a daily basis. I only wish I could be as calm as this dog. So for him to snap at L that way, I have to imagine (and have actually seen with my own eyes) that Lili was being pretty agressive with him. I calmed L down, scolded Momo for snapping at her, we got back on track to start our day, and everyone seemed fine, except for L's little nick on by her little eyebrow. (by nick, i mean the size of a tiny piece of rice, maybe).

Jump ahead to Wednesday evening when L and I got home. We walk in, Momo walks up to her and sits in front of her feet. She leans down and calmly pats him on the head, and tenderly pets him. He nuzzles up to her ever so gently and then just looks up at her, as if he is trying to tell her "I'm sorry". This continued throughout the evening, and again this morning.

Some things work themselves out, and I am so glad that my sweet girl will not have a scar, and that Momo and L have learned what respect for personal space means.

Have a great day! It's almost Spring Break! Woo Hoo!!!

Monday Lockdown

So, Monday morning of this week began like any other Monday morning. I got up, stumbled downstairs to start a pot of coffee, made the kids their breakfast, and lunches for Eric and I. Dropped L off at school, took J to the Ortho, then on to school and waltzed into work about 9:45 am after stopping at Starbucks for a java jolt.

So I get to work, check in with my boss, settle in with my coffee, space heater and about 50 unread emails. My plan is to dig in to my emails, and then finish up a project that I started on Friday of last week for my boss. About 30 or 45 minutes later, I hear the crackle of the loudspeaker throughout our offices, and the security guard comes on. "Please go into your offices, lock your doors and remain there until further instructions are provided." Um, excuse me, is this a drill? Apparently not.

So, at first we all kind of peek our heads out of our individual office doors with questionable looks on our faces. We quietly ponder what this could mean for a few minutes, and then find out that one of my co-workers down the hall has a nifty little police scanner app on his iPhone, so several of us head down the hall to see what the deal is. "Shots Fired, police on scene, wherabouts unknown...etc...etc..." Okay, so there has been a shooting in my building and we don't know where the shooter is. EEEEEKKKKK! We all hang around staring out the windows checking out the various police units, swat vans, ambulances, fire trucks, and eventually news crews and helicopters, that are starting to surround our building.

We are on lockdown for over an hour, and then we receive a message that everything is all clear, but to avoid the lobby area east and west exits from the building, we must use the basement exit into the parking garage if we need to exit the building. Apparently, a man shot 2 owners of an investment firm 11 floors below where my office is, and then shot himself.

I make a point to avoid going downstairs for the rest of the day, hoping that all the blood, gore, police tape, and all other evidence of the violence that has taken place is gone by the time I leave. The remainder of the day, everyone in the office walks around in a fog, and I seriously doubt that any serious work is done. No one can believe what has happened, so close and so surreal. Anyway, when I leave the office at 5, I step off of the elevator and to my immediate right, I see police tape and a cleanup crew mopping up and scrubbing blood off of the marble flooring in front of the security desk. This is what I was trying to avoid, but it's right there plain as day: evidence that there was an unstable shooter in our building earlier in the day.

It haunts me on the way home, I can't wait to pick L up from preschool and get home to see my husband and son. Meanwhile, the two men that were shot are in the hospital in stable condition, but the gunman is at another hospital in serious condition, and reports from the news media state that he may not make it. I pick L up from preschool, give her a big hug and kiss. Then I throw the diet down the toilet and make a quick stop at the local pizza place to pick up some pies for my kidlets. They have been asking for pizza for a couple of days, and this was the perfect opportunity to appease them. I didn't feel like cooking after the grueling day, and I wanted to see smiles...and it worked. Eric did not get home until later that evening...I hugged him tightly too.

I thank God that no one else was injured by this person, and that the individuals that he went after were not more seriously hurt. This experience has taught me to appreciate things all the more, and though it may sound cliche, I will cherish every moment with my loved ones.


WOW....I haven't blogged in a really long time. No time like the present, right. Hopefully I will keep this up now. Lots of changes coming in the next couple of months, might as well document them.

Toodles!

Once Upon a Dream!

I am watching Sleeping Beauty for the first time in YEARS tonight. L is sleeping next to me, but I can't bear to turn it off. I don't think I have seen this since I was a young girl, and I forgot how magical this movie is.

Speaking of things I haven't seen or heard of in years, my older sister reminded me today about how we used to take ABC blocks, stick them in our socks, and walk around like we had high heels on. I really do need to teach L some of the things I used to do with my sisters when I was little. I have so many really unique memories of our childhood.

This one's short tonight. Sorry. I have to get back to Beauty. "Once upon a dream....."

Sometimes, things just go your way!

I just received a call from J's teacher. One of the parents that had purchased tickets to the banquet can not go, and his teacher called to see if I would like them. I had gotten over the initial sadness of not getting to go, but this still makes my WEEK! It has been a rather rough week, and hubs and I have both been rather stressed out. I needed a little bit of a boost, and this did the trick!!