Forts

When I was little, much to my mother’s chagrin, I loved forts. Once every few weeks I would build one in my room, gathering every spare sheet, blanket, and pillow that we owned. Then I ‘d crawl inside and make a little home for myself. All the things I loved lived there with me. My favorite books. My most beautiful dolls. My best stuffed animals. I would leave my fort up for days.

I loved the feeling of safety that my forts afforded, the sense that no one could see me or touch me. I loved that there were walls and a roof and they were so close that I could touch them, make sure they were intact.

Lately God has been revealing something to me. My fort building ways didn’t stop just because I grew up. I still build forts. In fact, I’ve become quite the expert.  Only, now, I build them around my heart. And they are made of concrete.

Somewhere along the way, I believed the lie that I am too much to handle, that if people really knew me, they’d run away. Shrieking. If you know me, you have seen this evidenced in my propensity to apologize about everything—like I’m trying to apologize away my very existence—and in my tendency to keep people at arm’s length when it comes to any depth of relationship. Because, I figure, if I don’t let you in, then you can’t hurt the things I care about most. You can’t tear my favorite books or steal my most beautiful dolls.

It’s not such a happy way to live.

And so, in recent weeks, I’ve been working up the nerve to pick up the proverbial sledge hammer that God laid at my feet quite some time ago and start swinging away at those steel reinforced concrete walls. That’s one thing I love about God—He gives us the tools, but He never forces us to use them, only invites.

I have to admit, I’m a little bit terrified—even writing this has been hard. I actually started this particular blog entry weeks ago, I guess as a way to stick my head out of the fort and test the weather. And ya’ll…it’s been a hailstorm ever since. Enough to make me duck back inside for a couple weeks. But I don’t want to stay inside anymore, because while I’m protected from the storms, I also miss the sun.

And so. Here’s to the first swing of the hammer.

~erika

Currently The Jesus Storybook Bible: Every Story Whispers His Name By Sally Lloyd-Jones see related

And update...finally

It has been about 100 years since I've updated. That usually happens when I'm in school and am being bombarded with papers to write and novels to read and needy, weeping children to console. It all sort of leaves me lacking in the imagination department. I, therefore, end up focusing all my brain energy on school work and sanity at home, much to the chagrin of my creative juices.

But, I thought that, for nostalgia's sake, I should probably record a thing or two about my life so I remember something about the last several weeks.

Mainly, I just want to remember these moments of motherhood. My kids are developing and changing every day and I feel like I can't process it as fast as it's happening.

I've figured out that Asher is very right-brained and maybe ambidextrous. He doesn't really talk all that much, although that's been developing quickly in the last couple weeks, but he sings ALL the time. I read somewhere that singing and speaking are actually formed in opposite sides of the brain, singing from the right and speaking from the left. If that's true, then Asher is most definitely right-brained. Just like his daddy. He loves drumming (also like his daddy) and will make music with anything possible. He likes to line things up, but not in an OCD linear way. He has this very creative, artsy way about him. When he lines things up it's never in any particular order and when he's done he'll stand back and scrutinize his work. He also does a lot of things right handed, but usually eats, with relative skill, with his left.

Addison, on the other hand, is my little articulator. All of a sudden she just started talking in sentences and she will parrot anything, which means that I have to really watch what I say! I love listening to her form words and I'm so excited that we are entering the phase where she says stuff wrong and I don't correct her because it's just too cute. For example, when she wants to watch the VeggieTales video Big River Rescue, she'll say, "I watch a river wreck-sue, mama?" OH, I love it! And it's been SO VERY NICE to be able to understand what she needs when she needs it because she can verbalize it. My heart is constantly soupy because she likes to come up and melt it by whispering, "Love you, mama" for no reason at all.

So that's where we are right now. I love this stage. Just like I loved the last one and I'm sure I'll love the next.

New sunglasses.

And here's some videos of Addison being her amazing self. The second one is my favorite. She can usually count, but she forgets the order of the numbers a lot. But she does this thing where, when she's done counting, she has to yell someone's name. I have no idea how that developed, but I love it! A few disclaimers: One - In the first video, Adam's booming voice is VERY loud in the background. He was on the phone with our friend Steve who is in Afghanistan. Two - watching these videos makes me realize what a terribly gross Midwestern accent I have. Our friends Sarah and Jason from the east coast make fun of me all the time. They are right. I'm working on it, but 28 years of Midwestern speech immersion is not making it easy. Three - I really do try to get video footage of my son, but he is much too busy to sit around in front of a camera.

~erika

Haircuts

My husband is amazing. He's sweet and loving and kind and all the things a husband should be.

He is also, shall we say...impulsive. He gets crazy ideas in his head he truly believes are brilliant and need to be carried out immediately. Yesterday, he had one such idea.

We were sitting on the couch cuddling and playing with the kids. Adam looked over and, seeing me playing with Asher's long, foppy hair, said, a little too excitedly, "Let's buzz Asher's head."

"What?" I replied slightly incredulously. "No. Absolutely not."

After several minutes of argument, I began to recognize that crazy look that Adam gets when he's not going to back down. And, being that it's only hair and it will, in fact, grow back, I ceded victory and we strapped Asher in his chair. I did manage to talk him out of the mohawk till summer, though. Small victories are victories nontheless.

So now my 2-year-old son is running around looking like a 7-year-old POW. And he's a little miserable which I'm fairly certain is due to the fact that his head is cold. He also probably ate a half pound of hair during the whole haircut debacle. I'm expecting him to hack up a hairball any minute.

Below are some pics. Be nice and, if you hate it, lie to me. Ok, don't lie. But tell me you hate it in a nice way.

He was not thrilled with the whole experience.

Mom, I hate this.

 Mom, my head is cold.

Mom, I'm not talking to Dad for the rest of the day.

This is going to be a super long post because it's been a hot minute since I posted last. I sort of feel like that girl in junior high who writes everything in her diary, but only does it every other month, so each entry is like six pages long. Anyway...

Since I'm still in school, I tend to measure my year based on my academic calender. So, for the last few weeks I've been on Christmas break. The first two weeks were pretty uneventful, but the last couple have been an absolute whirlwind!

December 17 was Adam's and my anniversary, which I posted about. And it was wonderful.

Then came the whole Christmas extravaganza. Christmas Eve we went to church and then my parents came over. We ate finger foods and opened presents. Then, as Adam and my dad were discussing something man-ish like guns and my mom  was cleaning because she's obsessed, Daniel and I decided to put together the play kitchen I got for my kids. I wanted it to be ready for them to play with when they woke up the next day. I opened the box and, to my dismay, there were approximately seven thousand and six pieces and one page of instructions. Not only were these instructions completely useless to me, consisting of random pictures and numbers such as Z84367 and AA55 (which apparently coincided with kitchen pieces while deceptively looking like prison IDs), the only words written on the page were in French. I looked at Daniel and asked, "Seriously?! This is it for the instructions?" From the corner of my eye I noticed my dad chuckling and shaking his head. About 2 minutes later he and Adam were assembling the kitchen and I was cleaning with my mom.

Addison in her Christmas dress. I have no idea why she's making that face. I think she was in the process of telling me off about something. She's quite a diva.

Cutest boy

With YaYa on Christmas Eve

My mom got Addison a set of headbands and she insisted on wearing ALL of them.

Christmas morning we did presents with our little family, which was an absolute blast. Then we headed over to Adam's parents' for dinner and my parents came there, too. It's SO unbelievably amazing to have two sets of inlaws that are great friends and can spend holidays together. We are definitely one big happy family!

The kitchen. It's little, but they love it.

I don't think he was really awake yet.

Papa and GeeMa got Asher a ride on truck and he was so excited he wouldn't even let me take it out of the box. He wanted to ride it RIGHT NOW!

Opening her new tea set.

That weekend we headed to Detroit to celebrate Christmas with my extended family on my mom's side. That's my Italian side, so we spent the evening eating and yelling and flailing and eating some more. We even resurrected our weird tradition of parading around my grandma's house picking up random props as we go while my grandma plays the piano. I didn't start the tradition. Don't judge me.

We were big nerds on New Year's and stayed in. It was actually quite pleasant. I've never spent New Year's at home with just Adam. We had a romantic little evening and even managed to stay up to watch the ball drop, then regretted it the next day when our kids wanted to get out of bed and we didn't.

The next weekend like crazy people we headed back to Detroit for Maura's little sister's wedding. It was a blast and I got see Maura, if only briefly, which is always nice.

The drive back on Sunday was not a pleasant one. My kids were not too pleased with us for strapping them in the car to Detroit and back two weekends in a row. So, when I went back to school on Monday, I had barely recovered. But, here I am and my school week is finished and I'm headed back to Detroit on Friday. Thankfully, my kids don't have to go this time and we are coming home the same day.

Monday was also the kids' birthday. I feel like sort of a bad parent, because we really didn't do much other than say happy birthday. But we ARE having a party for them on Saturday and, since they're only 2, I didn't think they'd mind.

And that, friends, is the life of our crazy family over the last few weeks. It probably would have been a lot easier if I would have written about this as it happened. But, alas, I just could not find the time. I also, apparently, could not find the time to take very many pictures. My apologies.

~erika

Happy Anniversary to Me!

Adam and I just got back from dinner, which my parents paid for. And my kids are at my mom's. For the night.

Happy Anniversary, indeed. :)