1. I had every intention of writing a blog post last week, honest. At least one. But we decided to go a second round with illness at the end of the week, instead. Late Thursday night Noah started running a high fever. It went up and down all weekend, and on Saturday Aria caught it, too.
2. Early in the week we had calling and funeral for Andy’s aunt, who passed away from cancer on Noah’s birthday. It was extremely tough, but we all made it through. The kids did well. Our empathetic little Aria did great until mid-funeral, when she saw both me and her aunt, Kelly, silently crying. She studied my face, studied Kelly’s face, and burst into loud sobs. We were in the back of the room, but I still had to step out with her to help her get calmed down. She feels deeply, that one.
3. Even though last week felt like it lasted a month, and this week has been fairly tough, too, we have had some good times. We attended a TinCaps game (the local minor league baseball team) with Andy’s coworkers, and had a wonderful evening. I went to another Nickel Creek concert – there’s just no downside to that. It was glorious. Jo, myself, and most of our high school girlfriends went out for coffee at the best coffee shop around. Every time I spend time with those ladies I leave feeling overwhelmingly grateful for the many, many wonderful people God has surrounded me with.
4. I took the kids to the zoo for a short visit on Tuesday. We were already in town, so I figured we might as well make it a bit fun. We had a great time watching the sea lion feeding show and then visiting the petting zoo. I was amazed to watch Aria let herself into the goat pen with complete confidence, go get a brush and proceed to brush every goat in turn before returning the brush. She’s never been in the petting zoo. Apparently she feels some ownership.
   

   We stopped in the gift shop and the kids each got a stuffed animal. They were both thrilled, but Aria had reached an unpleasant point of exhaustion wherein having her picture taken was quite offensive. I did it anyway.

5. My book club met on Monday, and we were discussing this book. If you haven’t already, do yourself a huge favor and read it. This was my second time through it, and won’t be my last.
6. Bonus, since I didn’t post last week: I owe Nicole Scherzinger an apology, because I have seriously underestimated her. I watched her as a judge on The Sing-Off, and found her vapid and inarticulate. Based on her performance there, and the career she had made for herself as the lead singer of a group not worth hearing, I was fairly certain she was all looks, no musical chops. Incorrect. Check out this fantastic performance (don’t just listen – watch her act).

{I did write this post on Friday night, but then my website went wonky on me and wouldn’t post. So here’s Five on Friday on Saturday. Close enough.}

You may or may not remember me; my name is Katy, and I blog at this address. Sometimes more often than others.

It’s been a busy three weeks, and I just haven’t been able to swing the blogging. I’ve missed posting. I’ve had all sorts of thoughts to share with you all, including an entire “What I’m Into” post for June, but I haven’t had the margin to type it up. But here I am, covering three weeks in one, and promising that I do intend to put up that What I’m Into post soon. Probably before I do the July post. 😉

1. This month we’ve gone on many long walks around our town. Fast, long walks are the perfect time to catch up on my favorite podcasts. Since I love to learn, I have a lot of favorite podcasts, so I need a lot of walks.
   

   Check out these cool old houses I had no idea existed. I hope they get repaired soon so they don’t get too dilapidated to fix.

2. We’ve done a lot of swinging…
   

   The kid who is not mine is Aria and Noah’s cousin, Aiden. He is sixish months older than Aria, and a really sweet kid.

   and sliding… 

3. Unfortunately, that picture where Aiden is drinking out of a sippy? Aria drank out of that sippy, too, and then we all came down with a cold. That was the beginning of the overwhelm that’s kept me from writing. The kids and I got over it pretty quickly (thank you, essential oils!). But Andy got it pretty badly, then immediately also got pinkeye, went on an antibiotic, and got even more sick. He’s still coughing pretty badly, but otherwise he’s on the mend. I’ve started coughing again, as well, and not done as well at essential oiling myself, so I’m not kicking it this time like last time. I’ve got to get on top of it. Noah got some of the infection in his eye, but we’ve been treating it with breast milk (yep, breast milk in his eye), and it’s working wonders. Noah’s birthday was Wednesday, and he spent the entire day sleeping off a stomach bug. Are you catching on to the fact we have been living in a medical state of woes?
4. We intended to have a big 1st birthday bash for Noah last weekend, but we were so busy/sick we gave it up and rescheduled for this weekend. This week we’ve had two deaths in Andy’s family, so we’ve given up the big birthday bash altogether. We’re going to settle for a couple small birthday parties with immediate family on each side (his and mine). I feel badly for Noah that his birthday party has been blown to smithereens and he spent his first birthday sick. The more rational part of me recognizes that it makes no difference to him. He turned one, he has zero comprehension of birthdays. Really I feel badly for the rest of us (read: me), who don’t get to have the fun of his big party. Here’s hoping next year runs more smoothly.
5. Noah has now been to the chiropractor several times, and his last time did not require an adjustment. He has started warming up to chiropractic care. Which pretty much means he doesn’t cry much. We don’t go back for a month now, though, so that’s plenty of time to forget and have to start over again. By the last appointment in his series, Aria informed me that she wanted “him [chiropractor] to do my back! My back is boken!”. So I informed Lee, and he obligingly adjusted her back. The tool that made Noah cry made Aria giggle, and she did quite well. She went around for the next couple days telling people “The chiopacter did my back…see?!” before turning her back, leaning over awkwardly, and looking over her shoulder to gauge whether they were appropriately impressed.
6. Work for me has been cray-cray (as my sister would say). Andy and I have the welcome problem of both being consistently overly-busy at work. Job security, am I right? (And when I say “at work”, I don’t actually mean at work for me, since on a daily basis I go zero miles before I start working.) I enjoy that my job (marketing for non-traditional programs at a university) allows me to engage in many different areas of interest. But sometimes the learning curve is steep, and my limited hours can make it feel overwhelming. When weeks like the last few happen, I feel as though I’m treading water as hard as I can just to keep my head above the waves.
7. Despite the busyness and the illness, I’ve managed to squeeze in time with most of my close friends in the past few weeks – my lifelong bff, my college roomy, and some of my other best friends from college. Each visit has been a welcome respite from stress. Right now my high school girlfriends are trying to work out a get-together for the next couple weeks. (Actually, it’s more accurate to call them my since-grade-school friends, because we were all homeschooled together from the time we were kids – some of you didn’t know homeschoolers were ever together, did you? Just shot your “homeschoolers don’t socialize” stereotype to pieces, didn’t I? Sorry/not sorry.)
8. We got this fantastic couch. It’s going to be a bit tight in our current living space, but it should fit our needs perfectly in the new living room once it’s done. I am looking forward to the increased seating! We got a great discount on the piece, because Andy’s recliner, which came from the same store, has broken and is no longer available for a replacement. The whole thing worked out perfectly, because Andy’s chair has served its purpose, but it wasn’t going to fit into the new living room well, and I don’t like the look of it anyway. We used it for four years and then got a store credit in the amount of the entire price of the chair.
   

   It comes with six pillows, but I was able to choose different fabrics without increasing the price. The change does push back the delivery date, but that works just fine for us, since we don’t have our new space ready, anyway.

9. I’m enjoying my new Fitbit bracelet. There are some minor tracking problems, but since they cause it to under-count my activity, rather than over-count, I don’t mind too much. The last week or so has been a wash exercise and calorie-tracking-wise. I’m at peace with it. It’s where I am this week, but it won’t stay this way.

Okay, I think you are basically caught up on our goings-on. The next week is an eventful one, so I’ll have plenty to tell you next Friday! In the meantime, I’m going to start pulling together that June What I’m Into post. Maybe I’ll even get it up this week. That’s probably delusional, but a gal has to have her dreams.

1. Last week wasn’t the relaxing time I was hoping for. Ironically, though, I think I got the rejuvenation I needed from my annual work retreat, which took place Monday. It’s a full day of working. I never work a full day, so you would think it would wear me out. But it’s strategic planning, and I thrive on that. And I love my coworkers and would hang out with every one of them just for fun…which is basically what the retreat feels like to me. Add to those factors that a full day in a meeting means a full day of my wonderful mother taking care of my kids, and you can see how I might leave work feeling refreshed.

   

2. Noah is 11 months old. He says “Hi”, and mimics the sound and action of my kisses (you know, that exaggerated “mmmm-muah!” sound you make with little ones). He will be walking on his own any day now. Last week he started taking his first steps holding hands, and this week he loves to do it, and balances by himself a few seconds at a time. He has a temper. He gets angry when he is disciplined, and when I set him on the floor and he prefers to be held he slumps right over with his head on the floor between his legs and hollers. It’s ridiculous, and I like it.
3. Aria talks nonstop. Like, nonstop. I get overwhelmed by it at least once a day. She speaks in full sentences now, and I love to hear how her mind works. She likes to be a helper, priding herself on “my do it for you!”. She loves to read. Every night she takes a book to bed with her and looks at the pictures until she falls asleep. She is becoming very familiar with her many books in that way, and sometimes she “reads” them to me by narrating what she focuses on in the pictures.
4. Last Saturday I took the kids in a pool for the first time. Aria didn’t want to get in at first, and Noah found the water too cold. I helped Noah slowly adjust, and then he happily floated around in a baby floaty for more than an hour. Aria eventually decided it was safe to get in a raft, with her shoes on (they’re waterproof). Then she decided on a more exposed raft. Then the water, with her Puddlejumper and shoes on (they had to come off, though, because it turns out they float) and her uncle holding her. Honestly, I think the appeal of hanging out with Uncle Dave is what got her in the water. She adores him. After lots of going back and forth between me, Dave, and the rafts, she ended up quite comfortable in the water. By the time we got out she was blowing bubbles and letting go of me to float on her own. I was proud of her. Unfortunately, we were all in the water, so I don’t have any pictures.
5. The Tony Awards aired Sunday, and Hugh Jackman took the opportunity to remind us all why he is universally loved. His secret? He has no ego. (Okay, yes, the fact he is phenomenally talented and ridiculously good-looking doesn’t hurt.) How many superstars can you name who would agree to do this? And he doesn’t just do it. As with everything else he undertakes, he nails it. (CBS must be keeping a tight reign on YouTube, because theirs is the only video of this I could find, and it’s bad. Sorry about that.)

I got my Quarterly Book Riot shipment. It contained three books (yay! even though one is a romance novel…) It also contained an “I Read YA” button, a pouch that looks like an old library card, a deck of cards that features pictures of great writers, and two free months subscription to Oyster, a new ebooks subscription service. That’s the thing I’m most excited about, other than the books. Oyster is supposed to be like Netflix for ebooks – unlimited reading. That big red thing is a poster detailing the ten reasons we should read romance. I already recycled it.

1. This is a week full of anniversaries. Today, of course, is the 70th anniversary of D-Day, which is so huge I don’t even know what to say about it. Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of my best friend’s wedding (and there was nothing about it that even faintly resembled that movie). That was a beautiful day, and they’ve had a beautiful marriage. They’ve had tough times and ups-and-downs, of course, but they have grown stronger and closer and more understanding over the years, and I am proud of them. Wednesday was the one year anniversary of my grandfather’s passing. That day is bittersweet, because I am grateful he was released from his ailing body and mind, but I miss him. All this to say I am feeling a bit introspective this week.
2. I took most of the week off from work. I worked some extra hours in the last couple months, which enabled me to save up time off. I’ve been feeling worn down, and this week I didn’t have too much pressing on my plate either at work or at home, so I decided to let things go. I did a great job of that – I worked only as much as I had to for my employer, and only as much as I felt like in my house. I’ve recently decided to do a hardcore decluttering, and I did some work as I felt inspired. I went through the drawers in the kitchen, the cabinets in the bathroom, and all the kids’ toys. We have a growing pile of items to sell or give away. I’m pondering holding a garage sale at the end of the month, but I haven’t talked myself into committing yet.
3. This week was the beginning of the library’s summer reading programs. I took the kids to the toddler session on Thursday morning, and we had a good time. We sang songs, played some games, and listened to a story. It was all educational, of course. Aria wouldn’t participate–she just wanted to observe. That’s how she learns, and I expect she’ll do it another week or two before she’s willing to join in. Interestingly, the only time she did get involved was to help pick things up when there were activities that made a bit of a mess. I was amused looking around the circle and realizing that, for the most part, it was the moms who were doing all the wild motions and singing the strange songs, while the kids just looked on. Who’s training who here?
4. Noah has been sleeping back in our bed for a couple days because he’s having congestion issues at night. I can tell it’s a food reaction, but I’m still searching for to what. His breathing is less labored when he’s against me (which is how we got started with this situation to begin with), so I haven’t tried to put him in his own bed. Overall, though, I think he’s starting to do better with being separated from me in various situations and sleeping in his own bed some. Other Noah news – this week he started walking while holding hands! He sometimes will walk holding just one hand, and he is pushing himself up and standing straight on his own some now, as well. Walking is so close!
5. I feel as though I am searching for the rhythm of life for this season (both the literal and the figurative). Even after a week off I find myself feeling worn down and vaguely frustrated with the way our days are going right now. I haven’t figured out what needs to give, but I’m closely observing, thinking, and praying. I trust things will fall into place when they should.