Sick Day

Just the other day I was thinking to myself "We made it through the end of "flu season" without the flu running through our house another time!"

And then I gasped and wished I had never thought that thought....that was like last week.

Monday night Titus started throwing up...

I know, I know that was a dangerous thought...but what can you do?

And then we were holding tight and I was hopeful maybe for the first time ever only one of us would get the flu...

And then Wednesday night at church I was just setting down the girls' plates of food and Faith threw up.

Wrong once again. There is nothing worse than your child throwing up except your child throwing up in public when you left the diaper bag at home with your other sick child.

So, I did what every self respecting mom who is the primary puke cleaner upper at their house does. I covered Faith's bed with two sheets, a towel over her pillow, a puke bowl, and a towel on the floor covering the carpet next to her bed. And then I repeated the process for Grace. Wait...I thought Grace wasn't sick yet. She's not. But, I've found if I take the time to perform these precautionary measure she is 75% less likely to puke in the middle of the night. And she didn't.

However, in the middle of the night I rolled over and knew in my heart by morning I would be adding myself to the sick list. But, even though I feel like junk- I haven't puked...yet! Being sick as a stay-at-home mama is miserable. So, my kids are getting a healthy dose of Disney Junior & PBS. Just what the doctor ordered.

One bit of comic relief for the morning was an interesting discussion between Grace and Faith trying to figure out why Faith got sick because she didn't eat too much sugar so her body should be healthy...

Bring on the SPRING! Surely, I can get an amen from all the other SAH moms out there, right?

Thankful

I am thankful for...

tiny vases

that hold tiny bouquets of flowers from my Gracie.

I am thankful for...

new gravel

so I can coax my three children to the van without getting covered in mud. Hip Hip Hooray!

I am thankful...

for Grace's gorgeous curls

and that she didn't cut them off during rest time.

(Instead she gave this poor puppy a haircut of his own)

I am thankful for...

daffodils

and the fact that they mean Spring is finally on its way!

I am thankful for..

sleep

and the fact that my lactose free baby is now sleeping through the night again!

I am thankful for...

sweet smelling clean children

after bath time. I love when bath time is done, its one of my least favorite tasks. (And shortly after this picture Titus came down with the stomach flu so I am doubly thankful for a clean non puke smelling child!)

Today, I am so thankful.

First Official (& hopefully annual) Humiston Family Holiday

St. Patrick's Day was on a Thursday so we got to enjoy doing "green" activities with our play group. Fun!

However, I failed to get the standard "my 3 kids in matching green outfits" picture. I was tempted to stage one, but decided that was ridiculous and not worth my time. If I'm being honest I was feeling a bit of mommy guilt. One of the super cute moms in our group showed up with her 18 month old daughter in an ADORABLE outfit complete with tutu (with clovers) and they had on matching gold shoes! I arrived realizing I had forgotten to even dress Titus in green (opps!) and the girls had simply picked out a shirt they owned that was green.... It made me feel very guilty as I compared my one-child mom self to my current mom self. But, then I reminded that every mom has her own thing she is good at and mine just isn't matching holiday shirts. (Please refrain from looking back to my children's Valentine's day outfits!)

Here is Grace with Titus (Go Bears!), Ruthie, & her friend Sophie. Her and Ruthie are sporting matching green barrettes so that counts, right?

Here Faith is enjoying playing in the gym at play group. I really had to talk her into wearing green at all. She is very opposed to wearing blue or green clothes as these are strictly boy colors. Luckily I remembered this outfit which is mostly purple so it passed inspection. She really wanted to wear pink, like every other day, but Grace kept telling her if you wear pink on St. Patrick's day you will get kissed. Which made her cry! Now you know how I might have been distracted from dressing Titus in green...
The craft for the day was very cute. We cut green peppers to make a clover shaped "stamp." I thought it was very creative.
So.....you may be wondering why this post is entitled "First Official Humiston Family Holiday" Well, I'm getting there hang with me.

Almost a year ago we were reading an Arthur book about Christmas. (No, I don't think it was at Christmas time) In the book one of the characters says his mom is very sad because of his parents' divorce. To make a long story short another character suggests they make up their own family holiday instead of celebrating Christmas. While I obviously don't support skipping celebrating Jesus' birth Grace caught on to the idea of having a family holiday and thought it sounded like a great idea. And so the idea of having our own official Humiston family holiday was born.

Because Jeremy's Papa was Irish and we've never had any special St. Patrick's day traditions we decided our holiday would be on March 17th in honor of our Irish heritage. We had lots of fun coming up with different activities that were connected to our family.

Picture on the Stairs: My Grandpa & Grandma Holst always took pictures of all the cousins on their stairs each holiday. Since my Grandma's house was damaged in the fire the staircase no longer exists. But, we used this photo op as an opportunity to talk about them and I think will be fun to compare as the kids grow over the years.

Grace took this picture of us.
Block Challenge: Our kids' block set is full of family history. Jeremy made them from wood From Grandpa Don & Grandma Kay's walnut grove. This is the same wood Grandpa Rick made their crib from. We loved talking about this.
We "branded" some of the blocks with this family logo that is on the back on their dining room chairs (made from the same wood!) It is a picture Grandma Kay drew of a cardinal.
Mom & Faith's creation
Daddy & Grace go tall.
It all falls down!
We also had a big breakfast for dinner in honor of Jeremy's Papa. Whenever he would visit Papa & Nana in Michigan Papa would make a huge breakfast for him. After that we made popcorn in honor of my Pop-o and Mom-o. Whenever I would go to their house there was always popcorn every evening. We ate our popcorn while watching a movie, one of our family's favorite things to do together. It was a great evening and fun new tradition. We are hoping this is something we can do each year and will become part of our kids normal growing up experience.

So, maybe it is okay my kids didn't have matching green shirts after all. ;)