Livin' the Dream

Last week me and the twibs were making a run to Great Harvest bread.  This is something we started doing recently.  When the kids were babies, if you told me to go to a whole separate store just to get bread, I would have looked at you like you were crazy.  A couple of years, or even just one year ago there was no way I was lugging two (or three) kids out of the car just to grab a couple loaves of bread and then carry them all right back out and strap them in the car seats.  But now it is something we do for fun.  We all walk in, and I tell Dax and Corbie to go pick a little booth and sit down.  Then I grab a couple of loaves of yummy bread, pay for them and get my card punched...but all of that is really just an excuse.  Next comes the REAL reason for our visit.  The free slices of warm Cinnamon Burst bread.  Or more like "hunks," since you can't really call something that is three inches think a "slice" can you?  I grab the bread, slather some butter on it and me and the twibs hunker down for a delicious snack.  We were chowing down on our bread this particular day last week, and Cora let fly an "I wuv you, Mom."  (She says this a lot, at random times during the day...I always smile and say "I love you, too Cors" but don't think too much about it.)  There was an older guy sitting in the booth next to us.  He heard Cora, and he turned all the way around and said to me, "Wasn't that the sweetest thing?  You are one lucky lady."  "I know it."  I said.  And I do.  I am an extremely lucky girl.  Unbelievably lucky. 

I am living the dream. 

Sometimes I do forget though.  A little while ago at work, my boss got promoted, and the girl that took my spot when I went part-time was promoted to my boss' position (and is therefore now my boss).  I really like her so I was glad, but the whole situation made me kind of stop and think how if I wouldn't have chosen to stay home with the kids, that would have been me.  Me in charge of a department of over 50 people.  Me getting recognition and respect (not to mention lots more money).  I was especially thinking about it one day early in January one day when I was cleaning poo off the floor because Cora had decided to take off her own diaper.  Did I really choose this?  But later that day we were outside playing (it was one of those near-50 degree days before winter really came), and I was laying on the grass while the kids all "Zaugg-piled" me (a Zaugg-pile is a bunch of people named Zaugg piling on top of each other).  I was looking up at the beautiful blue sky, all covered with beautiful children who love me, and I realized that of course  I had made the right choice. There is absolutely no question.  If myself seven years ago could see myself today, she would be ecstatic. 

Have you read this article?  It has been making the rounds on Facebook, and it has a pretty good message for us young moms.  Even though I know that I am blessed beyond belief, I need to give myself a break if I don't spend every second of my life in pure parental bliss and gratitude.  Who can feel bliss while wiping poo off the floor?  Not me.  I think the fact that I had to wait so long to become a mother helps me to appreciate it more, but there are days that are loooong and end with me watching the clock and counting down the minutes until bedtime. But I try to be the mom that the kids' birth mothers would want and expect me to be.  They trusted me to do my best with these little people, and that helps me remember and try a little harder to be the mom they would want me to be.

Plus, bedtime is sometimes fun.  Here is Preston reading the bedtime story to the kids...this isn't going to work for much longer!  It will be a sad day when we can't fit all three on one lap anymore.

Last night it snowed again, so we built ourselves a decent sized snowman (sorry the picture is fuzzy, it was snowy and foggy all at once):

That is it for my random thoughts for tonight.  Too bad Great Harvest is closed, I am craving a hunk of Cinnamon Burst!