The Snuggie

I just saw a commercial for this....

They call it a Snuggie blanket (one size fits all).
Well, you can call it a "snuggie" all you want but that my friend is a
mu-mu blanket dress.
If it comes with sleeves and a neck hole, you can't call it a blanket anymore-
it's crossed over to a mu-mu.
Ain't no way around that one.
Seriously, who would wear one of those-it's just so weird to me.
Put on some socks and a sweat shirt it you're cold.

Oh my!

"Darling, you just look simply fabulous!"


"I love what you've done with your hair!"

Couped up but making it work

No telling where I'll find these two

(after ducking out of Syd's room for 1 minute to throw clothes in washer, I come back in to find nobody, the faint sound of giggling, and these two playing in the closet with the door closed. I guess the closet is as good a place to play as any other.)


My make-shift fort, born out of couch cushions and pillows.
They totally dug it.

Flying Daddy's remote helicopters.
This is like her favorite thing to do.

playing ball and reading.
(this is the second set of pics where neither girl is dressed or out of pj's. I'm noticing I care a lot less about clothes and hair in the winter. Probably because we leave the house a lot less frequently.)

Joined at the hip.
Their always doing something.

I put this tent together all by myself. Uh huh, yeah, I'm the bomb.
I was hoping to put it in her closet, but it turned out to be a tad bigger than I was expecting. But goodness gracious this thing (which I got on clearance in the summer and have been saving) has been so much fun. Sydaleigh slept in here a couple of nights, we do hide and go seek-it's been a much needed distraction from the fact that we don't leave the house most days because it's too darn wintery outside.

My peeps

These girlies are fabuloso.
Gosh we have fun together!

If I only had a brain

I just went upstairs to transfer the clothes from the washer to the dryer.
Except when I opened the washing machine lid-there were no clothes inside.
Yup, that's right.
I ran the washing machine
and forgot to put in the clothes.
Smart.

Renew Your Soul '09

with Liz Curtis Higgs.

Wow. Wow wow wow.
What a joy it was to be able to attend this ladies conference this weekend.
My heart came home so overflowing, so light, and so renewed.
I don't think I've laughed so hard, for so long, in such a long time.
I knew I was in for a good time when they opened the conference with the clip of Dancing Queen from Mamma Mia! That set the mood right there baby!
Laugh and have some fun.
And we did!
We're talking hours worth of laughing.
Oh how I do love to laugh.
Liz loved to laugh. And she was incredibly funny on top of it.
It's so refreshing to be around people who love to laugh and enjoy life. Who can have fun, cut loose, laugh at themselves when they need to, and just look at life with the utmost joy.
That woman was filled with all kinds of joy!
And it was so refreshing.
I came away with a lot. These are some things that touched my heart, made me think, made me laugh, and just left me feeling good...(in no particular order from the weekend)

"Why be gray when you can be silver, or platinum!"

"Don't give the mirror power over you. Don't look at yourself expecting to see a problem...instead look at yourself in the mirror and say....TA-DAAAAAA!!!!!!" ( with your arms raised in the air of course-how fun is that!)

" If you can't remember to say TA-DAAA!, say SHA-ZAMM!" ( oh yeah)

"God loves us just the way we are. We are His creation." (from the smallest to the largest, from the shortest to the tallest, bad hair days, bad face days, bad heart days, He loves us all. I never get tired of hearing that truth.)

"After God made man He said, "it is not good." (buah hah ha ha hah ha!!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness I laughed so hard when she said that!!!! Of course she finished the verse :) )

The gospel of Mark is a very intense, edge of your seat, what's gonna happen next!? kind of book, "instantly! and then, suddenly, immediately!"

"Embracing someone is much different than giving them a hug."

"It's even more important to be home for your kids when they're teenagers than it is when they are toddlers." (good to know-since I'm not quite there yet :) )

Lavish is a very special word meaning "to give in great amounts, or without limit."

Wretched is a chewy word. (chewy? what a way to describe a word!)

"When you hear a baby cry 'whaaaaaaaa', that must be what we sound like to God sometimes. Thank goodness God doesn't respond to us like that"
(there were a couple of darling little babies doing just that during the conference. Liz graciously stopped and pointed out how great it is that the moms came out with their babies, rather than staying home because of them. Loved that! Rather than giving them "the eye" b/c their babies cried, we gave them a round of applause. Sometimes moms need a round of applause! So much more uplifting!)

All you have to do is turn towards God, and He'll be there to do the rest. He never takes His eyes off us. He runs to us with His arms open. Embraces us. Welcomes us home. (Luke 15:11 prodigal son)

"You can not out-sin the grace of God." (Amen to that!!)

John 8-woman caught in the act of adultery brought before a crowd and Jesus to be stoned to death. During this story is the only time that Jesus writes anything, and we don't know what he wrote! He stands up, after writing in the sand, and says to the people, "All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone." "She was guilty of her sin, but she didn't have to pay for it-Jesus paid it for her." (again, love that. I know this, but I never tire of hearing it over and over and over and over again! Jesus paid for it all.)

"Grace is not the license to sin-it's the freedom to live life full tilt for God"

"The duh-ciples" (ha ha ha! seriously, who thinks to say these kinds of things?!) "the disciples are just like us, they didn't always say or do the brightest things" (true that!)

"Satan condemns, he accuses. None of which God does to us."

"We don't necessarily want people to know about church, we want them to know about Jesus" (Another awesome point. No doubt the church is important, but it will always be made up of sinful people. We need to keep our eyes on Jesus first, who is perfect.)

"Why do we complicate the Bible when Jesus makes it so easy?!"

"The concept of forgiving yourself is not in the Bible. To say that you can't forgive yourself is saying that God's grace isn't good enough."

"When insults or hardships come our way we assume it's from the enemy. Look closely. Is there a way to use this hurt or hard time to witness, to make ourselves draw closer to God"

Cool weekend, cool woman, cooler message. Hope hearts are changed because of it. I know mine was. :)

"Daddy, two princesses!"

Always happy times when Daddy comes home.

Oozing with love.

Making history

I am proud to announce, that on this day in the Brooks house, my Sydaleigh has...

gone poo-poo in the potty!!!

HALLELUJAH!!!!!

It was truly a thrilling moment.

Sydaleigh posing with her candy bar, new Belle and Aurora princesses,
and new Cinderella purse- her, "I poo-poo'd in the potty" presents.

Good job baby! So proud of you!!!!
(the first poo poo in the potty is a monumental occasion-I'd give her a trophy if I had one. That's how big this is for us.
This is big.
BIG!)

High Five!!

If we seek Him, even with the faith of a mustard seed, He is faithful to meet us.
If we take one baby step His way, He'll take five.
If we take one more, He'll take ten.
He will never abandon us in our quest to know Him more.
He never tires of the journey.
He holds our hands through every question, every doubt, every fear.
HE is the faithful living God.

(you go girl!)

"What's the big idea?"

Sleeping so cozily in her bed.
Butt perched high in the air.
Dreaming of all the wonderful things babies dream about...

until BAM!
Sydaleigh busts onto the scene,
"Wavery! Wavery! Wake up!"...

She jumps into her bed.
"Huh, wha wha what's going on?" ...

"Oh, it's play time. Okay, I'm awake now!"

Sisters are good for so much.

What's next?

Where do I start.
Mad?
Okay yeah, definitely mad.
Ticked, PO'd, you name it, I'm 'it' right now.

Isaak informed me of an article he received at work last week concerning what the new Obama administration is seeking to do in our health care system.

I hardly know where to start, or what to write, as all I can think of at the moment is a profanity laced outcry to the man that the nation voted for in an effort to see change brought to our country.

Change?

Seriously?

Is this guy for real?

God I hope not.

There's lots of talk going around his administration about "sacrifice".
Really?
Well, easy for you to say- sacrifice means NOTHING to the one not losing anything.

So who's being called on to "sacrifice" first??
Oh let me see, could it be the military?

You betcha!
(it's not like we don't make enough sacrifice for goodness sake)

Lets face it, he certainly can't pick on and single out the "middle class" to make sacrifices.
He made promises to them left and right throughout his campaign.
The "middle class" need a break-can't ask anymore of them.
But the military doesn't fit into a social class except that of being "the military".
Nope, can't call us "middle class", even though we make less than the median income among all U.S. households.
We're still just the military.
He can screw us over and no one will care-nobody likes us anyway right?

So frustrating.
We can't afford to make this sacrifice.
Unless you want to pay my husband more, you're gonna have to find another means of mustering up some dough to solve your budget crisis.

The fact that he's even suggesting doing this is outrageous.
Pray to God Congress doesn't pass this...praying to God...

take a gander at this article

Okay God, do your thing

A few years back when I was still living in Florida God gave me a vision.
It was a great vision. Right up my alley. Just what my heart had been searching for.

It's truly beautiful how intimately God knows us.
He knows us better than we know ourselves.
He believes in us more than we could feebly give Him credit for.

And yet, knowing all these things, knowing that God believes is me, will hold my hand, and has called me to do this because He is confident in the abilities He gave me......
I still doubt.
I still get scared.
I still let fear stop me from moving.

Fear of failure.
Fear of rejection.
You name it, I've thought of a fear to back it up.

But no matter what excuse I gave to God, or how many lies I allowed myself to believe, God kept pushing, He didn't give up, but kept quietly reminding me of the plan He set before me.

All I had to do was move.
One step.
It's not very hard.
"Come on-you can do it! I'm right here with you! Trust me."

"Trust Me. "

"Trust Me."

"Don't believe the lies."

"I'm telling you the truth-trust Me."

So...after almost four years of hesitating, making excuses, being afraid of nothing, I took a step.

I moved.

The only thing I could do I did.

I closed my eyes and jumped,
and I landed in His peace.

Now, it's up to God to open the doors, to grant favor and acceptance for me to move again.

I know the next step will be bigger, and require more of me, but that also means more of God too.

I'm excited to work with You on this! We make a great team, so it's your turn God, go do your thing....

Starting '09 strong

Less t.v.-more one on one time.

More one on one time with Isaak, the girls, God, and myself.

That's what I'm striving for in 2009.

I hit a rut at the end of '08, with all the holidays, Isaak being gone, sickness running rampant-
it started getting too easy to turn on the t.v., lay down on the couch at the end of the evening, and zone out.

But I'm back on track.

Whew! It feels good!

Me and Isaak are doing at home date nights twice a week after bed time.
I'm exercising every day during naps.
I'm connecting with The Man every afternoon, reading my Bible, preparing for the weeks "Got Questions" group, reading and brushing up on the material for that.
And doing personal reading of my own.
I always want to be reading something, from now on.
Right now I'm into Sacred Marriage by Gary Thomas (recommended by Bekah!) and A Case for Christ which we are diving into for our "Got Q's" group.

So yeah, that's kind of where I'm at right now.

Buuuuuut, I will still be watching me some Lost when it comes back on next week. I can't go with out my Lost, uh uh, no way, gotta have it, need to watch it, best show in the world!!

3 year well visit and re re check-up

(because I like to remember everything)...
Sydaleigh, as of being 3 years old, weighs 31 lbs and is a little over 3ft tall.
Marvelly, at 10 1/2 months, is finally 16 lbs, and 27 in. tall.

Not exactly what I was going for this morning

What do you get when you have...
a baby who just ate 8oz. of formula,
hasn't burped yet,
and is coughing from a new cold she has....

.....you get projectile spit up...

...in your mouth.

That would be my mouth.
My mouth was actually open when Marvelly projectile spit up all over me this morning.

What kind of luck is that?!

I'd say that's some pretty nasty luck.

Just nasty.

Reality of parenting

You know your kids have completely taken over when...

...inside your purse sits eleven of their spoons, a sippy cup, two sippy cups lids, two rattles, an extra pair of panties, tights, pants, two bibs, two extra pairs of socks, a paci, a rubbermaid container for oatmeal, two rubbermaid container lids, a teether toy, a cinderella play phone, crushed graham crackers, and your cell phone that went missing over a month ago, only to discover it was buried in your purse the whole time but was completely unseen due to the fact that it was covered with the above named items.

Found my phone.

Little bit more snow

It hadn't snowed here in a few weeks and we were starting to go through withdrawals, when all of a sudden we got blasted with some on Friday. It's starting to melt, two days later, but we made good use of it.

Sydaleigh hit up our hill again to do some sledding

and then her and Isaak set out to make a snow friend

a hockey helmet, batteries for eyes, and a plastic carrot for a nose makes
one fine looking snowman, oh yeah.

Cheerios delicious

A week I do not wish to repeat

Where to begin...
well, at my last Sydaleigh poop post she was, well, pooping-not in the potty, but still in fact pooping.
Little did I know, that would be the last poop I' d see from her for the next five days.

Five days.
Five days and no poo.

A lack of poop has never been a problem with my girls.
On the contrary, we are usually overflowing with it-literally, overflowing, with poo.
It's disgusting.
But with this whole potty training business Sydaleigh got really confused and protective of her poop this week.
She didn't want to go in her pull-ups,
because she wanted her special "I poo pooped in the potty!" Cinderella purse prize.
But she wasn't comfortable going on the potty-it's new, ya have to sit down, ect.
So every time she would 'try' to go on the potty she'd get "functional constipation" as the Dr. put it.
Serious.
"Functional constipation"-
who knew there was an actual medical word for that.

So, five days goes by, I'm racking my brain, and everyone else's brain I can get my hands on, trying to think of ways to 'move things along' (if ya know what I mean).
I heard a horror story about a nearby neighbor who's son actually had to have surgery for not pooping for two weeks.
Surgery.
Surgery to remove poop.
My gosh can you imagine the horror.
"So, what did your daughter have to have surgery for?"
"Oh ya know, to get the poop out."

So the Dr. finally threatened the emergency room if she didn't go using the last trick up my sleeve, but thankfully we didn't even have to go there, because she went.
Hallelujah!
We have had so much drama in the pee pee department with Sydaleigh, with all of her UTI's, her VCU testing, I was having serious anxiety at the thought of her now being traumatized in the poo poo department.

But on a super high note (despite the fact that she pooped), she is successfully potty trained in the pee department. After one week, she now only goes in the potty, doesn't have accidents during naps or when she goes to bed for the night. She wakes up dry every time. Yay!
I knew she would get it quick in this area...now we just need to tackle the 'other' area.

This little light of mine

I'm gonna let it shine,
let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.

"Let your light shine for all to see..."
Isaiah 60:1

Never thought I'd see the day

that a movie would actually replace Gone With the Wind as my number 1 most loved movie of all time.
But that day and that movie has come.
It is Mamma Mia!
It has taken the coveted "favorite movie of all time" spot.
The more I see it the more I love it.
LOVE IT!!!
It just has everything I love in a movie-
singing, dancing, young love, old love, a mothe's love, friendship, and more and more and more.
It's so fabulous.
So, I'm sorry Scarlett, number two isn't a bad spot, and you're still my most beloved heroin. Perhaps if you and Rhett had busted out in a duet you'd still be number one. And until the day comes where I see some long lost video footage showing a musical number, Mamma Mia! takes your place.
No hard feelings I hope.

She's

my little star

Not entirely sure what happened, but we had a good laugh

Sydaleigh wakes up from her nap, goes to her potty and pees.
I go downstairs to feed Marvelly and Isaak follows.
Everyone is downstairs but Sydaleigh.
Ten minutes or so go by an my "Mommy radar" starts going off.

"Hmm, what's Sydaleigh doing upstairs? I have a feeling she's doing something," I think to myself.

So I ask Isaak to peek upstairs and check on her and this is what I hear...

"Umm, honey, Sydaleigh finally pooped."

Say what???

Care to elaborate on that?

So I mosey on upstairs with Isaak where we find Sydaleigh locked in the bathroom-
and her Poop in the hallway.

Uh huh.

Her poop
in the hallway.

We unlock the bathroom door, where she was hiding, to also find
poop remnants all over her potty
and little pieces of toilet paper stuck to them.

hu huh hu.

Not sure exactly what happened.

I'm guessing that she had to go poop, couldn't make it to her potty in time, tried to go in her potty after she went in the hallway, and tried to clean up-hence the little pieces of toilet paper.

Poor kid.
After me and Isaak cleaned up after Sydaleigh we had to laugh.
I mean the whole situation just lent to be laughed at.

I loved that she tried.
Even though she didn't quite hit the mark.
Unless she saw a mark on the carpet and was going for that.
It was definitely a very memorable poop incident that's for sure.

She did it

I am proud to say that at the end of our second day of "no turning back potty training" Sydaleigh successfully peed in the potty four times today. And the last three times needed no prompting whatsoever, she just went straight to the potty all by herself.
I'm stunned at her progress.
This morning started out so rough.
That is one strong willed child.
I finally made her go 'all natural' today after she deliberately peed in her underwear.
She was crying from the discomfort of holding it in, told me "I don't like you right now", which she has never said to me before, but finally, after two long agonizing hours of her sitting on the potty this morning she finally gave in and went.
That was a long two hours.
I tapped into a new level of patience I didn't know I had in me.
But what a sweet moment that was.
Sydaleigh was so proud of herself for doing something new.
And I was too, to say the least.
We were NOT giving up!!
I'm not sure how she'll do tomorrow but today was a success.
A sweet success.