Oh the Bliss!

My pal Karen (I link to her blog a lot because she has really thoughtful, intelligent, thorough posts on current themes in most women's lives, and I like that) recently wrote a great little piece on the book Fifty Shades of Grey. I was one of the ones "in hiding" (which I took no offense to because I'm in hiding regarding a lot of current events/fads etc.) because I didn't know what she was talking about at first. After reading her post I recalled a few friends maybe mentioning it here and there, or comics parodying the book, and me not knowing what they were talking about but smiling and nodding. This is not a book I want to smile and nod at. I like the challenges Karen put out there for us as believers to be ready with a biblical defense. So when ladies in my small group or in the line at Trader Joe's or on the soccer field (Ben's, not mine) start talking about the book I will have an opinion based on the Bible, not on what I think - which is always...

(Well that's a sad title.) I never posted the afterthoughts of saying goodbye to our little Nicolas... It's taken me this long to figure out what to share, what not to share, who to share it with etc., but sweetie-pie people, people who prayed so hard, and gave so much, and loved him even though they didn't know how long we'd have him, are asking about him. So I'll do my best to answer...  How did saying goodbye go?  How is he doing?  How are we doing? Will we do it again? When? I LOVE talking about him, and fostering, and adoption (though I don't know nearly enough of that aspect -yet) so if I don't cover it here PLEASE ask!! Also, I realize this post is longer than most of you are willing to read in one sitting, so I highlighted the answers if you want the Cliff Notes version - and not any of the juicy details, you instant gratification junkies you. Saying goodbye was easier than I thought it was going to be , and I totally give credit for ...

Can someone please give me an iPhone case? I can not tell you how much time I've wasted on Amazon trying to pick one out. I've been looking for MONTHS. If there were only two to choose from I'd be fine, but there are THOUSANDS. Click on one and five more "you might be interested in" pop up. Why, yes, I AM interested, thank you. Then, five MORE pop up. Then five more, then five more, then five MORE... Hours, people, I've wasted hours. I am super indecisive. It's the same reason I hate shopping. There are too many types of EVERYTHING! That's why I've had a personal shopper (Read: Mother-In-Law) pick out all of my clothes for the last 9.7 years. Mother-in-law! Who would've thought, right? But she does a pretty spot on job of picking out clothes for me from her "special stores" (read: garage sales) and I don't complain. I digress... Here are my requirements for iPhone case: ~ Nothing lame. Oh, you need more? ~ Noth...

I boiled a cat's head.  It was an accident, I swear, I didn't mean to! I thought it was a rabbit's head, which in my mind somehow makes it okay. But boiling a cat's head is NOT okay.  My son made me do it?  I mean, My son made me do it!  We were at our favorite park which has a little creek running through it and sometimes when I'm feeling kind of cool, I'll let the kids walk down near the creek. Every now and then, when I'm feeling really cool, I'll let my kids walk in the creek. But yesterday I must've been feeling like Ultimate Cool Mom because when Ben found a skeleton head of a "rabbit" it was MY idea to bring it home.  ---There goes my "my son made me do it" defense---  I had visions of playing the paleontologist I had once longed to be (that's not true) with my kids as we uncovered the truth about this poor little dead rodent. Then we uncovered that it wasn't a rodent. After three hours of boiling t...

First we had this Then we had this And today we have this... Addison got her thumb nearly ripped off in the slamming of a bathroom door (ahem, Troy may have played a part, cough cough). It was so nasty I didn't take a close of picture of it. And while Addison LOVES to show off her new little splint thing, protecting her numerous stitches and itty-bitty break, she does NOT like to talk about what happened. Her thumb looks like a robot thumb, thus her self-dubbed new name "Robo". Shout out to Mark who swooped in to save the day - again- when he rushed home and took Addison to the ER for me. I'm SO glad he was able to do that because from what I hear it was pretty gruesome in there. We spent the evening treating Addison like the princess she was born to be. I told Ben not to look so peppy. . . odds are he's next.

We were lucky enough to have Daddy take a half-day at work on Friday, so we headed to the La Habra Children's Museum. I used to go there when I was little and let me tell you, not too much has changed. :-) It was such a fun time with our little family. My favorite part may have been the meal we had prior to the museum. We stopped at what we thought was a little taco place but when we walked through the door it turned out to be a big sit down restaurant. We had already gotten all the kids out of the car so we felt committed. It was SO good! And the kids were lovely as well, which - I'm fairly confident -makes food taste even better. Would someone please teach this girl how to properly use markers already? Seriously, does she ever have supervision? Husbands are working hard these days. I hardly know of a wife who would disagree. Extra hours, weekend stuff, its some tough times trying to get everything done AND be a present husband and dad. How Mark has two and a half jobs and sti...

I have an idea who you might be, but I have no idea when Nicolas will go "home" with you, so I thought I'd write you a letter now to be sure I get everything down before I blink and he's gone. Here is my list of do's and don'ts for this precious gift, (you know he's a precious gift, right?) please follow this list in it's entirety. Don't let him take more than one bite of food at a time. Have him sign "more please" when he's finished chewing. When he's done eating, have him sign "All done", he can sign because he's super smart, did you know that? Practice what noises different animals make. Have him play Simon Says with you. Play different music and dance with him, he is a great dancer! Take him to the park every day if you can. He loves the swings, but don't let him stay in the swings the whole time you're there. Don't let him snack the whole time you're there either, make him run and climb and play...

Have you ever said to your kids, "I bet you'd take better care of your toys if you only had one."? I've said that countless times, but I shall say it no more! I was talking with my older boys last night and telling them how disappointed I was in everyone's attitudes yesterday, including my own, and explaining that how we had acted was not who God wants us to be. That scary, selfish, yelling mommy? Nope, not who God made me. But I was finding myself acting out of those characteristics more often than living out the qualities God has graciously given for me to live in because of the Holy Spirit living in me. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self control... I was hardly showing any fruits of the Spirt in my parenting which is incredibly tragic. What's my deal? What is it that triggers the wrath of Monster Mom? Mess. Everywhere. Mess. TICKS. ME. OFF. Clearly I failed in teaching the concept of cleaning up after ones self ...

What is UP with wheat field pictures???? Good grief, they are everywhere. People get engaged, BAM! Let's lay in a wheat field and snap some shots. People get married, WHAM! What's more romantic than frolicking in some dry brush? Album cover needed for your break out solo career? Nothing says, "I play really good music" like a portrait taken in tall grass and shrubbery. (Throw in some feathers and you're sure to have a hit.) Oh I know, (last one I promise), let's put a couch in the middle of the wheat field and get the whole family to pose like this is totally normal because doesn't EVERY family spend their sweet time lounging around in a big ol' sea of golden grain? ***I'm sorry, so so sorry, if you and/or your family have taken such pictures, and/or been the photographer of such. I truly am not trying to make you feel lousy, and I still want you to send me your Christmas cards, I just am ready for the next great photo backdrop.*** I think the rea...

It's been almost three weeks since Nicolas came home to us. Home... I wonder if he feels like it's his home? I don't know, but what I do know is how gracious and merciful our God is. I know many, many people have been praying for him and for us. I know this because he has changed, our hearts have changed, in only ways that God can do. People adapt, get used to things, but God radically changes, and redesigns. Nico claps his hands now. And dances with us during our crazy dance parties. He sleeps almost the entire night without crying out more than a brief moment maybe once. He puts his shoes away where they belong. He comes to me when I call for him, and he clings to me when we are in new places. Those may not seem like a big deal because moms we know live to see their little ones clap their hands. We all flip out and call grandma when the baby points to it's nose on command for the first time. But when you're a baby growing up in an adult world then you don't h...

I wish I could show his picture. He's super cute, with big brown eyes and mismatching ears. He's huge - younger than Mia but the size of Troy. Addie calls him "Honey Bear" which is really rather fitting. Tonight I was holding him in church and as I sang the songs and heard our God's name worshiped I cried, could this be the first time Nico has heard the Lord's name adored and praised instead shouted and cursed? From the moment we got him I've been telling him how important he is, how much Jesus loves him, how needed he is, how precious he is, how safe he is. I'm kind of blown away by it all right now, but I knew I just had to get something down so I wouldn't forget these first feelings. Precious.

Mia got her cast removed yesterday and received a clean bill of (leg) health. (Head, chest, ears, nose... not so clean and healthy.) We went to Frapys to celebrate! It was directly across the street from the doctor's office, so how could we not go? I felt a twinge of guilt bringing my obviously sick brood into the public like that, but there was no one else in the place, due to the lovely rain, and I personally wiped down every surface we touched with germ fighting wipes, then encouraged the bored-out-of-his-mind worker to do the same. Then we went home and the girl took a looooooooooooooooooong HOT bath. Congrats Mia! May you stay cast-free for years to come. :)

I walked into my boys' room and found it a total mess. SO FRUSTRATING to find the pile of clothes that I just folded sprawled across the floor. I wanted to rant about how they obviously have too much stuff if they can't take care of their things. I held it in though (for the most part) because moments earlier I had walked into my own room and saw this : I think that's one of the hardest parts of parenting for me, seeing my own flaws in my kids. When they react the way I do, and not in a good way, I cringe. When they make mistakes and they are the same ones I've been making for years and I want to shake us all up and scream GET IT TOGETHER MAN!! But I don't because they're my flaws and my mistakes too. Recently I had bought into a lie the enemy was telling me that no matter what I do, no matter how hard I try with my kids, they will still grow up with issues, and blame me, and secretly think I'm crazy. I love my parents. I think they did a lovely job raising...

(Is it wrong that I'm posting about Mia's birthday before I post about Addison's?) Mia, you turned TWO today. Turning two, in my book, means I get a free-pass on the whole birthday shebang. The first birthday I throw a party for everyone else's sake, and the third birthday (and every birthday after that) you will be well aware of so I have to do something big-ish. But turning two is -and I'm so sorry if this bursts your little two year old bubble- not that big of a deal. You won't remember it at all. So I didn't go crazy trying to make you feel crazy about today. BUT, I did take lots of pictures to document this day so you will have proof that while I didn't bake you a cake - or even have you blow out two candles (what kind of mother am I????) I did really, really care that it was a day that marked the end of quite possibly the cutest year of your life. You received your awesomest present first and you immediately fell in love. Then Troy got super sick a...

Sometimes I think I'm really hard on my kids, one in particular. Lately I've been trying to discern what is really important and what is really not that big of a deal as far as issues to take up with them. More and more I think about my own parents and how I think they were really good at knowing the difference between heart issues and surface issues. I got my belly button pierced and wore really really dark lipstick and gigantic hoop earrings. I'm sure they thought it was the most disgusting, stupidest thing to do, but they didn't make a fuss. Jason got tattoos and they didn't go on and on about it. Darren, wait Darren was perfect... Just kidding! I'm sure Darren did some stuff too they could've harped on for days but instead they realized there were greater things at stake in our lives than whether or not my lipstick was a light enough shade or my shoes were tied with a keyring. Some things they did care about; the words that came out of our mouths was a b...

It finally happened, a cast has been placed on one of the Fitz-kids. Mia, of course. She'd already had a rough day, by noon she had a goose egg in the middle of her forehead because she ran from me instead of to me when I called for her and she smacked her head on a wooden beam on Ben's bed. That's what we like to call a "natural consequence". Then, minutes before I needed to walk out the door for my CPR certification class, Mia fell off the couch. And she cried. This cry was different. It was a "I broke a bone" cry. This cry kept her/me up most of the night. In the morning I knew I needed to take her to see a doctor but I wasn't sure to where. The pediatrician didn't have an x-ray machine, urgent care couldn't cast it if it needed it, so a friend suggested I go straight to a pediatric orthopedic doctor, so that's what we did. It took half the morning for me to figure that out. The other half of the morning was spent at the DMV waiting ...

I've got a good blog a brewin'... it's about the funk I was in last week when I was all doom and gloom and whoa is me. But then I went to church - collective sigh ahhhhhhhhhhhh - and our pastor, conveniently enough, was just starting a 9 week series titled "Encouraged" based off of Romans 15-16. And guess what? I was. So I want to blog about that and more. And if you, or someone you love, needs to hear some Truth and be encouraged then I encourage you ( heh heh heh.. .) to come to Compass Bible Church and be fed. Or you can watch online . Or you can listen via podcast. So many ways to catch this gem of a series! But do catch it. God's word is so good, and more than able to pull me out of a Debby -downer funk. In the meantime, I know how ya'll love your pics-fix. Here's a photo the awesome Hannah took, and I thought it was lost fo-eva but I found it in some random desktop file. Isn't it SO CUTE???????? An oldie but goodie... My girls, my girls! Oh...

The Best Gift Winner in my book is ME because I gave Addison the most awesmest brush in the world! What's that? An awesome brush? Yes. It's awesome because it holds secret magical untangling powers. I don't know how it does it but it does. It boasts of it's awesome de-tangling powers, calling itself the Knot Genie , which is a daring thing to do unless your product really works. It really works! I saw this little beauty on a favorite website of mine, Zulily , where I got a great deal. Addison tries very hard not to complain while I do her hair, but the tangles she gets sometimes are out of this world, so I know it's not feeling good when I'm brushing. Pretty much every time I brush her hair is ended with, "I do NOT like it when you brush my hair." Which I was fine with because I have a feeling, compared to other hair-brushing battles I've heard of, her reaction is pretty mild. But I did want to do something to help my poor, rat slept in, dreadlock...

Ben was the first of three surprises. (Addison was the only "Mark and Sarah's" planned child.) It was about 16 hours of labor, the first 10 I "tried" to go without an epidural... I'm no Wendy Wilson people, so got the shot and slept for a few blessed hours. When I woke up I spent 3.5 hours pushing... about 3 hours of which were totally unnecessary - but what did I know? And then he was born... He was born at least 40 years old, just like Mark, so every birthday until then will just be a stepping stone to get him to the age he's really supposed to be. Ben is fantastic, really, I LOVE having a 7 year old Benjamin! He's really enjoyable because he gets super excited about things, and he has the best smile and the brightest eyes and greatest facial expressions. He loves math, and won an award for it last trimester at his school. And he loves Legos. Did I say loves? I meant LOVES LOVES LOVES LOVES LOVES legos! He is the SWEETEST BROTHER EVER - to Mia. No...

I read this (from a 147 blog ) and it it struck me, so I'm posting it here. "While Katie (Davis) was home we were talking about November being "orphan awareness month". Her response was "there is a month reminding people that there are orphans??!" the look on her face showed that she was SOOOO perplexed. It was a sad reality for me that we have to have a special "Orphan Sunday" for believers to acknowledge all of the orphans in the world." I am SO grateful to live in America and to be an American, but good grief, sometimes the things we Americans do, don't do, or need reminding to do, just gets to me. Sometimes I feel like we. have. no. clue. Like when I get frustrated with my kids because they don't take care of their stuff and I tell them there are children who have nothing and it goes in one ear and out the other because that statement really doesn't register with them. Why would it? Every single person they know has every si...