Stepmother

Familiar with Cinderella?

The stepmother is horrible. She is mean and I think you can sum her up with one word "witch".

Well we have a rule in our house, if you throw food on the floor you are out of the kitchen and finished with your food. Boots has been challenging this rule since he knew he could but for SURE knows better. He gets kicked out of the kitchen all the time. Well this week hasn't been that much different. He threw some food on the floor, but I am a little bit more emotional/hormonal than normal and raised my voice "BOOTS! GET OUT OF THE KITCHEN! You are finished with your food, get out now!" I put him out and put up the kitchen gait so he couldn't sneak back in. Natalie looked at me and with a very concerned face and voice said "Mom! Your a stepmother!" I asked her to repeat herself to make this is what she was saying, and indeed it was. I had to apologize and explain to Natalie that stepmothers, or the one she is referring to, is mean and not nice. I am nothing like her. She did teach me that I need to be more patient with the kids though, who wants to be known as the stepmother? NOT ME!

We were able to celebrate a little bit of Brian this week too. He got his Wood Badge. It is a part of Scouting, and he has been training for this for a while. At the ceremony, we all got to participate and all I have to say is, my kids are nuts. I am glad this wasn't a church event because their behavior wouldn't have gone over so smooth!

Now onto my crazy child... This kid needs a cage. He is nuts. He will get into ANYTHING before you can even blink and then he will be gone and moving onto something else. This week he has filled my house with a lot of impatience! One day he snuck in to look at baby sister and while he was looking into her bassinet, he tipped it over and out she rolled. Luckily, I was making my bed and was RIGHT there to save her from the wrath of boots. He just loves her so much! He always gets a big smile on his face "Baby Sister! Oh cute!" while kissing her all over. One day however, he was extremely quick to get into trouble. He had disappeared for only a moment, maybe 20 seconds, and I knew I needed to go see what he was up to. I went in my bathroom where he stood looking like this:

"Doing Makeup Mom!" then he threw the open mascara and eye liner at me and ran away laughing. This is classic. He is so fast, you don't even know what hit you. He was really mad when I had to take it off of him, we are really going to have to work with him on his manly-ness with all these girls in the house!

Not only is he fast, but he is feisty and sassy. I try to put him in time out and he laughs and laughs in my face. He and Natalie have these giggle attacks that last forever and only escalate more and more until I snap. Again, I think they are doing this JUST to tick me off. At night, it takes him 2 hours to fall asleep, and in that time he usually comes out without his clothes on, which always means he has to pee. Last week we were woken up at 5am to giggling in the kids room. As Brian went in to check, boots was up on Natalie's bunk STARK naked jumping up and down laughing. Luckily, Natalie remained sleeping through this event. There have been numerous accidents all around the house, particularly in his bedroom, and I think he is reacting to the arrival of sister. Regardless of what he is doing, it is wearing me out. He is crazy. He is also OBSESSED with Justin Bieber. I know it sounds stupid for a 2 year old to be, but he is. He loves all his songs and can sing along to just about all of them. He also has a second love of Usher and can sing along with him too. He is constantly requesting "Justin bieber, Eenie Meenie" or "One Time" or "Kiss and Tell" He asks for them by name.

We will be installing locks on the outside of the doors, high enough so that he can not reach them. We would just lock the doors from the inside, but of course he knows how to pick the locks.

Going back to the stepmother thing, 3 kids is a challenge. I am not going to lie, it takes a ton of patience and prayers and deep breathing to get through some things. I know I can do it on my own now that Mom has gone home, but I am totally scared! The older 2 are reacting to having someone new around that is taking all of the attention, and although they love her TO DEATH, I think they are desperate for some alone time and love from me. They have no respect for me and that is really hard to deal with. I feel like I am always saying "I am going to call dad!" or "When dad gets home, he is going to deal with this." Natalie gets it and is kinda scared, boots could care less. ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I have 3 kids under the age of 3!! Life is crazy! I am just so grateful that they are so funny and keep us laughing and smiling all of the time. And without a FABULOUS hubs, I don't know how or if I could do it!

BUT on a much brighter note, Courtney is great. We have had 4 nights of drama and no sleep, but for being 2 weeks old I will take it. She eats great and is getting sweeter and sweeter. She no longer fits into her newborn clothes, which shows how large she is! She made it about a week in those!

I forgot to mention something from the hospital. When we were there, there was a nurse there who was from India and she told us that Courtney will be or have good luck. In India they believe that when a baby has 2 cowlicks (is that how you spell that?!) in the back that it means good luck. Well She has on the back of her head, 2 little spiral cowlicks, they kinda make a heart shape. So luck to my girl!

And for me, I got a new calling at church this week. I am really sad to be leaving my ward Young Women, I love them so much. But I am excited about my new calling. I am in the stake Young Women, the secretary. I am working with amazing women and I am so excited to get started on everything!