The World Through My Eyes

Well, everybody, my husband and I celebrated 8 years of marriage yesterday. We had a great date night while my awesome mom kept our little ones for us. I thought I would share a little 8 year wisdom (yeah right) on my view of marriage. I'm no expert, obviously, but from my own personal experience I beleive there are a few, dare I say, "rules" to follow that will encourage a successful lasting relationship that Justin and I have done pretty well at following. Rule #1: Anything you don't like about the person you are considering marrying is more than likely not going to change after you say your wedding vows. You will not change the person you marry and you will have to learn to live with your differences. In fact, some of the things you do like about your relationship may even stop or become less frequent. It's important that you aren't merely in love with the "idea" of marriage, but that you actually love the person - bad breath, messy hair, no make-...

This post is the full version of the "Hall of Fame Hubby" entry that is in the June edition of The Journey magazine. I was going to wait until Father's Day to post it, but I changed my mind. Happy Father's Day, Babe!! I’ve been married to my husband Justin for nearly eight years now, and it’s hard to believe we’ve been together that long. We married pretty young (20 and 22), finished college two years later and quickly entered the world of parenthood. It has been nothing short of a privilege sharing the joys, as well as frustrations, of raising three children with him. I truly would not want to do this with anyone else. I don’t think marriage gets the credit it deserves sometimes. It has been an honor to be Justin’s wife and watch him grow into a respected Christian man and father over the past eight years. Although Justin has many great qualities and characteristics as a husband and father, his simple kindness and gentleness is what makes him so great! Justin has a...

I think Justin and I have had to clean up a mess of poop in Paisley's bed about 20 times now. It happened again today. I am determined to find her some one piece suits for her to wear to bed so she can't take her pants off anymore, but I haven't been able to locate them yet. Anyway, after I got her all bathed cleaned up and changed her bed sheet, I layed her back in her crib and decided to give her Sidney's Dora doll to snuggle up to. She stopped crying right away and later I went to peek in on her and found her like this. I had to take a picture it was too cute. I never really thought about giving her a stuffed toy to sleep with; maybe that's all I needed to to do to stop her from playing with her diaper contents. This is what I like to see in my sweet little girl's crib. So sweet!! Lachlan loves to make messes whether it's dumping an entire toy box full of toys out on the floor or entire can of formula, he's the best boy for the job. The most recent me...

I went to a psychologist, Dr. Sid Epperson, today to see about getting tested for ADD. My family Doctor referred me to him. The following happenings and situations should prove that I have ADD and do not need a test to tell me this....... -My appt. was at 1:00 and they told me to get there early. I planned to leave my house at 12:40 and didn't walk out the door until 12:50 and then still had to go back inside to get my phone which I could not find and ended up being under the sheets on my bed... yes, I made the bed with my phone in it. So, I didn't actually leave until 12:56. -I had to call on the way to find out where they were located b/c, no, I hadn't even done THAT yet.......ugh!!!!! Luckily I knew right where it was and it wasn't too far away. -I have no clue what time it was when i walked in the door and they just put me straight back and let me fill out my paper work afterwards (since I was late, obviously). It didn't even cross my mind to tell them on ...

Ok, I'm dedicating this post to my brother and sister-n-law who will soon be parents for the first time. This is the beginning of what I'm afraid will be a long running list of rules that you only learn from not-so-pleasant real life experiences. Even after three kids I'm still learning lots of things about raising kids. Some of these I already learned in the past, but I've saved the most recently learned rule for the end, which is really not the end, but the end of this list today. So here it goes. Hope it helps, Jase and Rach, and remember, this list is not to scare you or overwhelm you, but to make your life WAY easier than mine. Consider it the best baby gift you could ever receive, minimizing stress, disasters, and unnecessary spending. Rule #1: Do not under any circumstance leave the following products within a 3 ft. reach of your under 3 years old child.... Vaseline, lotion, soap, detergant, matches, pills, batteries, cereal, oatmeal, sugar, flour, formula,...