Birthday craziness!

What a weekend!
I was extremely dreading this past weekend. It's when we had originally planned to share the news of Eyvan's upcoming arrival. Sadly it didn't go that way so it made for a somewhat sad weekend for me.
My family though has this way of making me smile so that all the sadness is quickly replaced with happiness so I don't focus on the unfortunate things, but on the blessings in front of me.
I had an awesomely wonderful weekend surrounded by my Hubby & 3 little boys. I got lots of hugs, kisses and birthday wishes. I was told at least 50 times that I'm the "best Mommy ever!" It can't get much better than that can it??

I spent a lot of time thinking about Eyvan though of course too. Missing so many things...

So a weekend of movies, playing with Lego's (yes that's what a Mommy in a house full of boys does on her birthday!) :) and even a breakfast in bed! I got some very wonderful handmade cards from my kiddo's too! Can't wait to share a picture of my birthday present! We had to order it though and it can take 4-6 weeks to arrive...

Now looking forward to J.D.'s birthday weekend! I love having our birthday's so close together!

How I keep from feeling like I'm running around crazy..."Grand Central Station"!

Sometime we have so much going on or so many things I'm required to remember that I feel like I'm running around like a chicken with my head...well you know. Anyways I've tried thing after thing to try to help me stay more organized. Pocket calendars, day planners, wall calendars...etc nothing worked they were either too bulky, too small space to write, no space to hold important papers and so on. I finally came up with this system! "Grand Central Station" consists of 2 calendars - 1 dry erase magnetic board w/ cork board at the bottom to hold extra papers & 1 regular wall calendar w/ a storage pocket for overflow that wont fit on the dry erase board.


So far it's working well. We are now into month #2 of this system. It's nice to be able to write important things down on the side "notes" section as well - like phone numbers, clinic names (for Grannie), and upcoming birthdays! I've been able to use the cork part to tack school calendars, box tops, money for special things, party invites and much more!

I wish it were a bit more orderly and organized, but it works for us so it's okay!

Sadly I guess this wasn't full enough as 3 new event dates had to be added after this picture was taken(this morning).

The tenderness and love of my children never ceases to amaze me....

Aydan just sat starring out the window yesterday afternoon. Over and over again he would go stare out the window looking for something. I never stopped to ask what he was doing - the house protecting Mommy inside me just kept reminding him to be careful with the blinds.
Again today he kept looking out the window. Finally he went grabbed his coat and told me we needed to go outside. I asked him why (I was sitting in the floor and he was standing in front of me) and he proceeded to put his hands on my cheeks and say "We need to go find your rainbow. It's raining and I can't find your rainbow for you. We need to go look!" Aydan has for 2 days been searching for Mommy's rainbow. He wants me to see my rainbow! My 2 year old , 2 YEAR OLD has such a desire to make others happy. He has such a tender heart at such tiny age. We've one time searched for a rainbow together - the weekend after we lost Eyvan. It's been 7 weeks since then, but the first thing Aydan thought when he saw that it was raining was that we needed to find my rainbow. Sadly even though we looked we of course could not see a rainbow, it's just too cloudy outside right now. Though I now can't wait until the next time we can look for a rainbow together.
Aydan doesn't understand who Eyvan is or why Eyvan is special to us, but he does understand that Mommy likes to see rainbows because of this little Eyvan person we keep speaking of. Someday as Aydan grows he'll begin to understand everything and why rainbows are special to me...until then we'll just keep looking for them - just because we can!

Aydan is one wonderful, special & loving little dude that I'm proud to call mine! :)

Going grain free!!......???

Earlier this week J.D. and I decided to have our family go grain free (while at home/school/work). This is in an attempt to get our family to start learning healthier eating habits. It's just too easy on a busy stressful night to go in and throw a hamburger helper or a Mac & cheese in a pan. For me it's super easy to go grab some crackers, dry cereal or a slice of bread when I'm hungry during the day because my eating time is limited and bread keeps me full longer. Our kids have gotten a bit too addicted to cereal & and snack products too.... So we think it's just time for some change!

Of course if we go out to eat, our kids go to birthday parties or we hang out at a friends house we will be fine eating these things, we are just taking the ease of grains out! :)

So far, so good! Monday evening we had coconut chicken w/ broccoli, Tuesday - meatloaf w/ carrots, Wednesday - grilled pork chops w/ sweet potatoes! Thursday - rotisserie chicken w/ green beans & mashed potatoes(We threw random fruits in there too.) Lunch has been easy so far for the boys because they already love taking things like yogurt, ham, cheese, boiled eggs, salad, and all sorts of fresh veggies/fruits with them anyways - so I just increase the amounts of those things and take out the crackers & bread. Dylan has been the only one to complain about it and his only complaint was no more sugary cereals... It's been a bit harder on Aydan's breakfast/lunches/snacks because I'm still required to feed the daycare kids a grain & fruit with breakfast, 2 components from any of the groups for snack, and something from each group for lunch. Luckily I don't HAVE to feed Aydan all the same things as daycare so I have been able so far to switch Aydan's breads out with either a protein or veggie without to much notice taking place.

To the results - This is only day 5, but so far I have noticed I feel a bit more clear headed. My memory has gotten somewhat back to the way it used to be. (Keep in mind about 75% of my food each day used to be grains.) both Tuesday & Wednesday my energy level had increased due to the extra protein, but yesterday was a low energy day due to lack of sleep and allergies. Today is off to a better start.

So I guess for now I will say it is all still a work in progress. We are loving the new menu though, and missing a few "staple" foods around here. It takes time to get used to it and we'll all survive!

"Magic" #7

I've been waiting for today...because today marks 7 weeks since Eyvan returned to Heaven. I've been watching the calendar, counting the days & weeks. Not that anything special occurs today. It's been more like a survival thing. I wanted to make it 7 weeks. I made it 7 weeks! I felt like if I could make it that long with out getting depressed that everything really would be okay. I've accepted everything that happened though at this point it all seems more like a really bad dream than like reality. We are now doing pretty well with everything though. We still miss Eyvan, I'm sad our family never got the chance to take a trip with baby Eyvan in tow, never got the chance for a family hug or movie night all piled on the couch together even though we hardly fit(but I sure do love my family "suggles"!). ......Someday, someday!

I have continued to keep writing in Eyvan's journal. This has been good for me in helping me get my feelings out at the moments I need to without having to bother anyone else. Plus gives me some time where I can feel like Eyvan is close to me, so I can just talk to my baby - about life, the weather or whatever works at that time...

I know it will slowly get easier over time. I know that over time the number of times I think of Eyvan each day will slowly lower. It makes me sad that this will happen, but I will never forget. We are lucky though because God gave us 2 days each year to celebrate Eyvan's life. I look forward to our due date so we can do some special things to celebrate as well as Eyvan's Heaven "Gotcha Day". I still have a bit of time to plan both, but both will be fun family days all Eyvan-ish! :)

We told the boys a little bit about Eyvan, Aydan doesn't understand at all, Ryan understands very little, but Dylan understands it & occasionally asks a question or two. He actually teared up a bit telling me he wanted a baby sister. That's something Dylan has told us before - he wants a little sister. Who knows, he may have one! If not - then he has another brother which is wonderful too!

It never used to bother me when people would ask if we were going to "try for a girl". Though now it really bothers me when people ask if we WERE trying for a girl. NO, we weren't! I don't like people thinking of our baby's life for something as un-important as a gender. Our baby was/is more than that. It never mattered to me whether our baby would be a girl or boy. I've loved being a Mommy to my boys I would have loved to have another, it would have also been wonderful to put some pink in our house - but it didn't matter! We just wanted our baby, a happy healthy baby - which is what we have we just don't get to meet yet. Our time will someday come though. We are content with God's choice to keep Eyvan though and we are thankful He allowed us to call Eyvan ours. It has all been a wonderful blessing(in a somewhat twisted way). I'm proud to be able to say we are a family of 6!! I like it! Not that 5 wasn't nice, but 6 is wonderful!

Now I'm just needing to work on getting some new pictures of the boys so that we can update our picture wall in the living room. I cannot wait to have Eyvan's picture join that wall... Time to go frame shopping!