NC Computer Mama

Friday, March 27, 2009

It's Even Scarier

Remember this post where I said that Ainsley looks like Ryan. I have recently referred quite a bit to the fact that Ainsley now looks like my twin.

Ryan was walking past my dresser the other day and saw this picture on it from when I was little. That's me in the middle sitting on Mom's lap.



Let's zoom in for a closer look. Scary isn't it. We are twins down to the facial expression! I think I laughed for 20 minutes when I discovered this.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

How Cute is This?

I took this picture with my phone last night so the quality isn't the greatest...but...How cute is this? And yes, that is a ponytail. And yes, she looks just like me.

Enabling

Lately my thoughts have been directed to how much we as parents enable our children.

I was listening to Focus on the Family the other day and Dr. Dobson was interviewing a woman who was talking about enabling her son to the point of him ending up in prison. The story ends happily as he has found Jesus in jail but it was how he got there that has me thinking. The mother in the interview was talking about how she continued to bail him out of his bad decisions so that she could make up for any short comings as a parent and to help her child not feel any hurt.

Last night I was talking to my neighbor Marci who is a 5th grade teacher. She was telling me about a parent teacher conference that she had this past week where the mother was more concerned with her child's beautiful hair than the fact that he can't read past a 2nd grade level. She says that she finds it amazing how many parents enable their children to get away with things that they shouldn't.

Both of these things have me thinking about how I will be as a parent. My child is still very young so I figured it was irrelevant to me at this point and something to think about for the future. Then I really started taking a look at my everyday with my child. There are little things that I do for my daughter that I should be letting her learn and do on her own. I put the small pieces of food in her mouth instead of letting her learn to pick them up because it's faster. I get her the toy that is across the room instead of letting her get there on her own because I don't want her to be without the thing that she wants.

I think it's natural to want to take as much pain and discomfort away from our children. The trick is discerning when it's the right thing to do and when we should just let our children go. Situations like we have in our family right now with Taylor are times when it's obviously ok to want to shield the pain. As we raise our children in His ways, we will have to continue to seek the Lord's guidance and trust that God will use our imperfections to His glory.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Random Thoughts for the Day

Today I'm feeling really random. Here are few thoughts on my mind right now.

  • Why don't I like cinnamon? It's a generic flavor that everyone likes but me.
  • Why does teething and drool go together?
  • Why does my dog think it's ok to eat the broccoli plants out of the garden?
  • Why can't I spell words like broccoli?
  • Why did I end up with the cutest baby in the world?
  • Why do I love coffee so much?
  • Why don't I use my iPhone as a music player?
  • Why did it take me so long to figure out how to publish my blog posts on Facebook?

So there you go. A bunch of random questions. Does anyone have any answers?

Thursday, March 19, 2009

March Madness

For anyone who knows Ryan and I, you know we don't watch sports. It has become a joke to our small group every year during the Super Bowl party. I have one exception to this...NCAA March Madness. I don't watch college basketball prior to the tournament but come tournament time, I jump on the bandwagon every year. I love it.

I grew up in Connecticut and my obsession with March Madness began with this...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4CxbjRXwhY

This is the buzzer beater by Tate George of UCONN. Start watching at 2:00.

Since that year, I have done a bracket every year. When we lived in NY, I entered the office pool and won 3 of 4 years. Woot! I haven't done that well here, but I still love it.

This year I decided to not enter to win but to enter my dream bracket. Of course I have UCONN winning it. I also have all 4 of the final four teams coming from the Big East. That is almost sacrilegious here in ACC land. But I don't care.

Go UCONN!

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Yeah Ainsley

Ainsley has a new skill. Check it out!

For those of you who can't figure that out, she's clapping

Saturday, March 14, 2009

Week in Review

And what a week it has been. I mentioned in my last post that I was buried. That was halfway through this past week before half the crap really even hit. I knew this week was going to be rough. Actually the past 3 weeks have been rough. As I explain, please forgive me for being long winded. There is a lot going on.

I am still watching Logan 5 days a week in the afternoons. I have found this a whole lot more challenging than I ever anticipated. My schedule just seems so packed. When I originally set this up with Leah and Jason, I really just thought it wouldn't be that hard and that caring for Logan would be the same as caring for Ainsley. I was wrong in that assessment. Logan is a bit more fussier than Ainsley is but that isn't' really the problem. He's a baby and can't be blamed for that. The problem is that he is a baby and I already have a baby. One cries and the other is hungry. I can't hold them both at the same time. They are trying to go to sleep and they are both crying and keeping the other one awake. One of them always gets the short end of the stick and I feel like that is usually Ainsley since Logan is younger and it's hard to let someone else's kid cry. I feel responsible to make sure he is happy all the time because he's not mine. Taking care of both of them makes me not envy my friends who have twins. I don't know how you do it. In addition to that, the schedule is just rough. I drop Ainsley off at 7:15 and go to work. I meet them back at my house at 3:00 after having rushed home from work. Logan is here from then until anywhere from 5:30 to 7:15 depending on the day. In that time, I am on constant alert and usually don't have time to eat lunch or go to the bathroom. To say that my housework is behind is an understatement. Those of you who will be at my house anytime soon, please ignore it. We don't usually eat dinner until 8:30. I go to bed exhausted every night. And to top it all, my child still won't sleep through the night! So on Tuesday night when Jason picked Logan up, I told them that I need to cut my hours back to 3 days a week instead of 5. I am still concerned that I have hurt their feelings and that I have disappointed them but I had to do it in order to be a better mother, wife, and child care provider. So here is a picture of my sweet Logan playing in the exersaucer.


In addition to that, I have been going crazy at work. Remember this post. Well, the first part of that transition went great. Everyone loves the new system. The second part was to run commissions out of the new system. It's money we are paying out so it's important that they be right. I had the majority of that job done before this week and was ready to go, so I thought. Throughout this week my boss has thought of other scenarios that we didn't think of and I ended up re-writing my job 4 times. There were multiple times over the week that I thought I was going to have a heart attack. I actually had to have Ryan come home on Thursday afternoon to take care of the babies so that I could stay at work. After all of that stress, we ran on Thursday and my boss checked each one. With a few exceptions, everything worked perfectly and I got the "Great Job" from my boss. Phew. Now to clean up all the other stuff at work that has been put on hold while I worked on this.

Part 3 of this maddening week is my step father in law, Blu. He has CLL which is a form of Leukemia. Over the past few weeks he and my mother in law, Lonnie have been trying to decide the best treatment options for him as his disease has progressed to the next level. After much prayer and discussions, they decided to go to a cancer treatment center in Philadelphia. They have been up there this whole week while Blu has gotten his first rounds of chemo. To top that off, he turned 65 on Wednesday. Happy Birthday to Blu! Here is a picture of him with Ainsley over Christmas.

Part 4 and the worst part of my week started on Wednesday evening. We were getting Ainsley ready for bed when the phone rang. It was Ryan's 26 year old brother, Taylor, calling to tell us that he had been to the doctor and had been diagnosed with Testicular Cancer. They were doing surgery on Friday to remove the bad one. Are you kidding me? He's 26. He had a scan on Thursday that came up clear so we think that it hasn't spread yet but won't be able to fully confirm that until the blood work comes back next week. He had the surgery on Friday. Ryan, his dad (Bob), and his fiance (Jenny) were at the hospital. His mom was still in Philly with Blu and couldn't be there. The surgery went well but he is in a lot of pain now. The initial pathology didn't come back that good either. It's not the worst case scenario but it's not the best either. We have to wait for the full pathology to come back before we know what happens next. Our church and Bob's office have joined together to provide food for him for the next week. We are asking for anyone who prays to pray for Taylor and Jenny as they go through this next week. It's going to be difficult. Here's a face with a name on that too. This is another picture from Christmas.


So after all of that, I am relieved that the week is over. This little girl has been a wonderful distraction during it all. She's too cute not to be. Here's hoping next week will be better.

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

Buried

I am totally buried in so many aspects of my life so here is a picture heavy post. Enjoy

Covered in peas and carrots. They are even in her eye
Sporty Spice in her brown track suit - my new favorite outfitMy "oldest continuous friend" - Kate

Daddy's girl

Twins are we?





Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Cyber Stalking

I have recently discovered that a friend of mine from when we lived in Winston has been following my blog. Until last night, I hadn't communicated with her in years. Then I find out that she reads my blog. I love it! She told me she was cyber stalking me.

I have to say that this concept is awesome. I am one of those people who love to know about other people's lives. I am totally into voyeurism. It's the reason I love reality tv like Big Brother (I know I shouldn't admit that publicly).

In the past year I have become completely addicted to Facebook and blogs, both mine and others. I find it fascinating to catch up with people I have lost touch with. I have connected with people from high school that I would never have otherwise. People from my college years are in my life again. I have found people from other random places in my life. Even the people that I currently interact with frequently are part of my cyber stalking. I get to know all of these people more due to technology! And for me, it's wonderful.

I recently read an article about the downfalls of this and how Facebook might be ruining relationships that people have because of lack of phone calls and face to face interactions. My problem with that theory is that I would never pick the phone up to call most of these people, but I feel like my circle of life has expanded dramatically.

So is Facebook ruining your life?