There Are No Words.

(Only numbers.)

Home... Where the Biscuits Roam Free.

It appears that my son has gone and potty trained himself while I wasn't looking. I heard the toilet flush earlier today, and I walked in there to find this:



He's got the whole thing figured out, and I really haven't done anything other than buy him a couple of potty videos and praise him when he uses his big boy potty. Now, he's moved on to the real toilet, and he'll just run in there to go during the day whenever he's got his big boy underwear on. Pretty much my only role in the whole process right now is the designated underwear-taker-offer. So, I gotta be quick, or he'll climb up there and pee with the darn things still on.

We've attempted to take him out of the house without his diapers on, and we kept asking him if he had to go, but he kept saying "no". When Chris took him to the park, he had an accident, so I think the method to use outside of the house is where you just sit him on a potty every 20 minutes or so whether he says he has to go or not.

Ezra has always been a very tidy kid. If he spills ANYTHING, even water, he straight up freaks out. "oh no! oh no! oh no! oh no!" He won't calm down until you go get a napkin and then let him clean up his spill. I think this has really helped with the potty training bit because he doesn't like to be wet, so he runs right to the potty every time.

I'm so proud of the little butt-butt, and his biscuits look off-the-charts CUTE in those little Sesame Street undies. I pretty much can't keep my hands off of them during the day.

Who needs to eat so much sugar when something as sweet as this is running around your house?



chomp. chomp.

A Better Way.

Do you know why I really like you all? Because when I talk about doing crazy arse things like eating nothing but cayenne pepper for 10 days, you all are kind enough to say, "Hey, Earth to Emery! Howz about, instead of eating NOTHING for ten days, you just eat, um, HEALTHY??" And then I'm all... "Oh! I would have never thought of that, thanks!" as I loudly smack my gum and vacantly twirl my hair around my index finger.

yes.

So, plans have changed around these parts. Starting today, I am soda-free. I am drinking mostly water. (Also allowed- a cup of coffee in the AM.) Starting today, Chris and I are going to steer clear from gross snacky foods and things that contain High Fructose Corn Syrup or Partially Hydrogenated Oils. Did you know that many European countries have completely banned the use of partially hydrogenated oils in their foods? And yet, here in America, it's hard to find any foods that aren't LOADED with it. Yikes. Apparently, it's cheaper to manufacture foods with high fructose corn syrup and partially hydrogenated oils, so that's what we get! Thanks, food companies! You're slowly killing us, but it makes me feel all warm and gooshy inside knowing that, at the the end of the day, you're saving a penny or two! Yay for you!

no.

I'm done with it. So, we're going to eat less sugar and more fruits, veggies, and water. Simple.

I will let you know how the progress is going. I am most looking forward to FEELING BETTER, as Flo and Skylana have attested to. I'm sick of feeling tired and burnt out all the time. Having no energy and depending on caffeine for a "pick-me-up". I'm SO ready to start allowing my body to function as it was made to. And, last night I dug the YMCA schedule back out from underneath the pile of mail by the phone because I'd also like to start being active again. I need to get my heart pumping a couple of times a week.

Thank you all again for helping Chris and I come to this decision. If it hadn't been for your advice, I probably would have started the cleanse, and then given up on it after one or two days, and become completely discouraged. I feel SO much better about this choice- taking steps towards a healthier diet and lifestyle- and I know I will absolutely love how it makes me feel.

Stay Tuned for the results! And, anyone care to join me?

Not to be Confused with Memorial Day.

It occurred to me this morning as I was sipping at my coffee and watching my elderly neighbor decorate his lawn with copious amounts of little American Flags that I have NO CLUE what Labor Day really is. American Flags? Really? I started thinking that maybe the holiday was in honor of some heroic American battle fought ages ago and that I should take a moment to pause and reflect on my personal freedom? The flags waving across the street threw me for loop.

This, coupled with the fact that Chris and I had a discussion last night about whether it was actually Labor Day or Memorial Day, left me feeling like a subpar American citizen. The only reason we figured it out was because I knew my dad and brother's birthdays were near/on Memorial Day, and I knew they were in May. So, Labor Day it is!

To celebrate Labor Day (not to be confused with Memorial Day) we took Ezra to the lake so that he could feed the ducks, but the ducks were nowhere to be found, so we settled for the playground instead. The boy played. It was hot. So we went to the mall, like good little Oklahomans.

As we walked into the mall, I felt all happy and gooey. The mall, she has a way of doing this to me. I turned and told Chris about how the mall made me happy, and then I had a sudden realization as to why this might be. It's because of all the shopping PEOPLE. As a stay at home mom, I don't interact with people very often. I'm at home by myself, or Ezra and I go to a park and there may be a few other adult humans there, but we all sit on separate benches and smile at eachother's kids without speaking. Playdates are great, but still it's only one or two adults interacting. I don't have many opportunities to be in large groups of PEOPLE. Where you can listen in on other's conversations or people watch or wander through the crowds and enjoy the hum of activity all around you. There is something so comforting to me about being surrounded by lots of people.

Ezra played at the fountain with a pack of adorable little boys for awhile. All the little boys were sharing coins with the other kids so that they each had a chance to throw one in the fountain. They reminded Chris of a mini pack of "Jets". Like from Westside Story.

Ezra is so friendly and sociable. I love to see him interacting with older and younger kids- trying to speak to them in his jibber-jabber language and imitating every little thing they do. This age has been a complete JOY.

In the car on the way home from the mall, I asked Chris what Labor Day was. He told me it was just a day that was designated for resting- for taking a break from work. I told him I didn't think so. He told me, yes, it was in fact true. I told him he had to be wrong because of the flags. He looked at me like I might be crazy.

When I got home, I googled 'Labor Day' and found out he was right. A day reserved entirely for NOT laboring. (Wouldn't it be crazy to go into labor on Labor Day?) So, in honor of the holiday (the holiday that is not to be confused with Memorial Day), I'm going to go get me a cold Bud Light from the fridge.

God Bless America.

Dreams in Boxes.

I often feel like there is just too much of me to fit comfortably into my skin. Too many thoughts, too many dreams, too many possibilities for one little human frame to contain. And sometimes I can almost feel my bones ache from the effort of framing in so much raw potential life. Ever since I was a little girl, I have felt that my story was meant to be large. It was meant to be told for many to hear; whether it be through song or written word or spoken word. I have always felt this gravitational pull towards leadership, towards the public eye. I believe in HONESTY and OPENNESS and VULNERABILITY because people (young people especially) are STARVED for these three things. Absolutely STARVED. They learn early to hide, to stuff, to glossify themselves-- never allowing too much humanity to shine through their eyes because society has told them (without telling them) that their vulnerability is the same thing as weakness and that they should be AFRAID of it. Like it was a plague or something.

And so, as a result, there are millions of songs that say "Ooh baby I love you yeah yeah", and not nearly enough songs saying "I am lonely and scared and feel like I'm operating with no safety net." or "I'm weak and tired and I need other people to help me." or "The American Dream feels less like an ideal and more like a coffin for my soul."

(heh heh. I like that last one. Quite dramatic, no? Perhaps I feel a song coming on?)

I have longed to do big things that could affect people from ALL walks of life and encourage them back towards vulnerability and living honestly. Un-squelch-ifying themselves, if you will.

I say this unabashedly. For years I have tried to squelch these dreams and feelings and inclinations towards big things because I thought that it was just coming from a place of PRIDE. Something in me that craved attention and affirmation. Something that was too good to be true. So, I started to box up some of my bigger dreams and I stuffed them on a shelf in the deepest places of my heart. And the boxes? They've sat. They've collected dust. And I'd nearly forgotten they were there.

But something is stirring inside of me. Something that has led me back down to the storage room to shake and prod at the things I boxed away so long ago. Like discovering a stash of old toys up in your parent's attic. "Ahhh, I remember these!" you breathe as you pull each toy out one by one and smell the years of confinement idleness on them. Something is whispering "This is how I've made You. You are not being prideful by being who I've made you to be." Something is encouraging me to air out some of the musty dreams, throw back some of the drawn shutters, and prepare myself for the "something greater".

But, at the same time, there is also a sense of "not just yet". A sense of this time in my life being more about pouring the foundation and less about the fancy architecture. Twice in the last two weeks I have heard people speak about the eagerness of young people to go and DO, DO, DO! We feel we must make things happen, must figure out who we're going to be for the rest of our lives so that we can switch on the cruise control ASAP and just follow the charted the course for the next 50 years or so.

In both cases, I've been encouraged to focus less on the WHAT and more on the WHO. As in, don't freak out so much about the job or the house or the degree or the 50 year plan... Allow this time to be a time of CHARACTER BUILDING. A time of shaping WHO you're going to be rather than WHAT you're going to do.

This is ringing so true with me lately. I know I have big dreams in my heart, and if I had my way, they'd all come to pass TOMORROW. Yet, I also know that I'm not quite the person I would need or want to be in the midst of those big dreams. I've got some growing to do, some learning to acquire, some experiences to collect, some character to form before I'm really ready for those things.

So, for now, I wait. I wait and I trust. But this time, I don't stick the boxes back on the shelf. I bring them out. I look. I put each dream in my palm and shift the weight of it back and forth between my hands. I display them. I speak of them. I begin to believe in them all over again. And as I do these things, I start to believe in myself again. And down in the corner of the very last box, I find HOPE.

And, along with hope, joy.

I took this picture awhile ago
after reading sufferingsummer's dare,
but then was too chicken to post my own shots.
So, here's one of them. **Blech! squirm! blush!**

Cleansing.

The hubby has been talking about starting a "cleanse" on the 2nd of September. Drinking nothing but lemon water with cayenne pepper and maple syrup in it for 10 days straight. He's doing it along with some other guy friends. It sounds like it would be good to do for me as well, but I am SUCH A WIMP when it comes to fasting or not eating for long periods of time. I've never done anything like it before.

I know that it would be good for me to do something healthy for my body... I've never been one to watch what I'm eating. I eat mostly junk. I've never dieted or gone any amount of time eating healthy. All of my friends seem to eat/cook pretty healthy and organic, while I can't seem to stop eating Hot Pockets and drinking Diet Coke. I really want to change this, but the thought of completely rearranging my eating habits feels really overwhelming, so I just never do anything about it. Maybe something like this cleanse would help me kick start a healthier lifestyle? I need something drastic to shake me out of my patterns, usually. This cleanse seems like it could be just that.

I think it would help me if I knew that the benefits of the cleanse would be worth the sacrifice of not eating for a while. And, (just like Operation: Grow Hair!) I would need a healthy dose of accountability to get me through it. Like, oh, I don't know, telling THE INTERNET I was going to do it. And then letting you guys know how the progress was going.

So, here's my question for you: Have any of you ever done a "cleanse" before? Was it WORTH it? How long did you do it for? Did you feel better after doing it? Or is all of this "cleansing" stuff just hype? A fad? A waste of time?

And, would you help me get through it if I committed to doing it by listening to my experiences and cyber-slapping me in the face when I speak of quitting and eating pie?

I eagerly await your testimonies or thoughts. I'm still not sold on the idea, so I'm anxious to hear what you all think.

Word.

Computer Cramps.

My hard drive is FULL. I resisted my first urge that told me to calmly lift the eMac off of the desk and throw it out of the window into the backyard, and instead told myself a joke about how it should wait an hour before it goes swimming. Get it? Because it's FULL? So it shouldn't swim due to....the cramping...and whatnot?

Nevermind.

I have a little external hard drive that my mommy got me for my birthday after I nearly drowned Chris' laptop in Decaf Hazelnut Cream Coffee a couple of months ago, but once I hooked it up and started talking about moving files over on to the external hard drive and deleting them off of our computer's hard drive, Chris got nervous. He says that he's pretty sure that external hard drives are the first things to kick the bucket- and if all of our files are on there, then we'd be really screwed if and when that were to happen.

So, now I'm in a pickle. What are external hard drives FOR if not to make room on your computer's internal hard drive? Am I missing something here? Do I need a row of 6 external hard drives sitting next to the computer so that I can backup my files 6 TIMES "just in case" before I move them off of the eMac?

It's times like this that I start really missing 35mm film. There is nothing worse than that feeling you get when you realize some very important files have evaporated into thin air and you can never get them back. A few months ago I realized that I have NO pictures of myself from when I was pregnant with Ezra. They have all disappeared somewhere. Didn't get transferred onto the new computer or didn't get burned onto a CD along the way. The only evidence I have are the 3 or 4 crappy pictures that I printed to stick in Ezra's baby book.

And, a couple of days ago, I went to find the little video I'd edited together from Chris and I's wedding, and that has vanished into thin air as well. Poof! Gone-o! Sniff.

So, any advice? What do you all do to protect your files while not crowding your hard drive?

How could my computer be TOO FULL for precious moments like this one? Ezra spitting in the sink after brushing his teeth, momma looking on and looking ill, and the POINTIEST little butt ever made that we finally coaxed into big boy undies for the first time last night! Does my computer have NO HEART?!

Ezra's New Kicks.

Lord help me, I couldn't resist.

(For now) Just One Little Monkey Jumping on the Bed.

On the drive up to Kansas City, Chris and I were talking about the whole "having another kid" issue that seems to hover in and out of my thought-life oh, I don't know, every single waking minute or so. I've never been one to let others pressure me into anything, but there's something about having your first kid that can feel like you've accidentally just pulled the 'start lever' on an assembly line, and then it BROKE OFF IN YOUR HANDS.

It is pretty much assumed by everyone around you that you will have another child in the very near future after giving birth to your first. This is totally and completely natural for people to assume, because, hey! That's pretty much how life goes! Most people don't see the point in dragging out the "parenting a baby/toddler phase" of life- it just makes more sense to get it all out of the way quickly so that your kids will be somewhat close in age and you won't be changing poopy diapers when you're 60, right?

Well, that may be true, and that's really all well and good, but then what happens when having another baby is pretty much not even a faint blip your radar screen and your first born son is suddenly old enough to operate the DVD Player without any assistance? What then??

I always talk about how I refuse to parent Ezra out of a place of fear, because I know that kids can sense those kinds of things from their parents, even when we think we are sooo super sneaky and good at hiding things from them. It's like a sixth sense. They just know. So, in this same vein of logic, I have a real issue with feeling the NEED to have another baby ASAP simply because I'm afraid of my kids being "too far apart in age", or simply because I'm afraid of spending too many years of my life trapped in the "baby phase".

This was a huge personal revelation for me. I suddenly felt all the (self-imposed) pressure of having another kid lift off of me. Through a simple conversation with my husband I realized this:

I am the kind of person who becomes overwhelmed pretty quickly. The thought of having a toddler and a baby at the same time just seems like it would be too much for me. I know I would be able to handle it just fine if it were to happen that way, but I'm realizing that I'm one of those people who would MUCH MUCH MUCH RATHER spread things out a bit. Like, waiting until I have a kid who's a bit older (4? 5? 6?) and then tackling the baby thing again. Because, big picture, I know I want to have more than one kid. But, for me, it might be nice to saunter along the "raising kids" time of my life, rather than feel like it's a mad dash to have them and raise them quick enough to where I'll still "have a life" again after they are grown and gone. Think of it! If I were to have three kids- one right after the other, in 18 years, they are going to all be out of the house one right after the other too. What a whirlwind! I've finally realized that I'm more of a gentle breeze kind of gal. (Not that raising kids, no matter how far apart, can EVER be considered a "gentle breeze", but you get the point...)

So, for now, for today at the very least, I'm content with this plan. To wait. To wait until the time feels right, just like I knew when I was meant to have Ezra. If I'm meant to have more kids, I know that I'll know it. Maybe God has other plans in store for me. We've talked about adoption. And to be honest, the very thought of that being a possibility at some point in my life stings my eyes with instant tears of joy and wonder. Can you even imagine? Literally saving the life of another human being? A human being who is too vulnerable to defend themselves?

If that's what God has for me, I'm open to that. After all, He's got a track-record of being even wilder than my wildest of dreams.

More Pictures of Kansas City than you can shake a stick at.

Our trip to Kansas City started out very difficult and painful because the housing situation wasn't exactly what we'd expected once we got there, and I don't know if you know this or not, but trying to keep a toddler entertained allllll day loooong BY YOURSELF in a city you've never even seen before is not the easiest of tasks- especially when you have no home base to return to for naps and relaxing time. By the end of the second day, I was in tears- telling Chris over dinner that I was packing up my stuff and driving Ezra and I back home first thing the next morning.

The guys were in the recording studio all day everyday, sometimes not calling it a night until 2 AM or so. So, Ezra and I were on our own to wander (aka drive aimlessly) through a town I'd never been in before. It was just way too much for me, but the day I meant to head home, my new friend Alissa called and graciously arranged for a nearby family from her church to take us all in for the rest of the week. Um, HOSPITALITY MUCH??

They took us under their wings and we immediately fell in love with these amazing people who opened their home up to strangers and fed us good food and took us swimming and drew us maps of the city so Ezra and I could explore fun places. If it weren't for this family, our trip would have been a disaster. Because of them, it ended up being really hard to leave.

We all had a blast, and the guys got everything recorded just in time. We plan to make many trips to Kansas City in the future... That town is insanely COOL!


The cookies are bigger in Kansas City... the minimum allowance up there is approximately the size of your own face.


These are two of our new most favoritest people on the planet earth. (Check out Jon's website here, and maybe buy an album or two or three or a gajillion because his music is just that good.)


Good times are sure to be had whenever Uncle Joel is near!


Contemplating the fountain.


"I'm not so sure about this, momma. That there water be real high."


Feeling little.


Bravery! And joy!


Soggy socks and soggy shoes, Thunderstorms out of the blue.


Union Station. One of those amazing buildings that makes you feel dizzy even though you're standing solidly on the ground, looking up. Just staggering. I read a billboard there that said the previous Union Stations only had to be destroyed by floods THREE times before they finally decided to MOVE IT TO HIGHER GROUND. Ha.


Eating at a restaurant where a little train brought you your food. Ezra's head only exploded two or three times.


I've never seen him get so excited. This kid was as passionate about the trains in this restaurant as his momma was about her rootbeer float. Ecstasy!


Many, many park days. Many, many blue plastic slides to conquer.


The family that we stayed with the last few days just happened to have a large tub filled with awesome old toys. I owe this tub of toys my very SANITY.


Swimming at the country club with dad.


Leaps of faith.


He doesn't look like me at all. Nope, not one bit.


We found this at the MALL of all places.


We tried to snap a family photo before being booted after the ride was over. You can see Ezra asking for "Oon Moo?" (translated: "One more time? One more time?")


The family that singlehandedly saved my trip to Kansas City from being a total disaster. Aren't they cuuuuute?


Kansas, she is beautiful.