This one's for you, Tad.
I feel spread thin. The expectations on me just being a wife and a mom to four boys are enough to weigh me down on any given day. But then you have those days when the stars align just right, and an evening that was supposed to move at a tolerable pace is sped into super warp speed! Hence my story of "Cluster Night" at Elijah's school...
Much like electives in high school, Elijah is able to pick an "Enrichment Cluster" to study. This period he has chosen the SPACE CLUSTER...pretty neat! So, he gets in the car one Monday and keeps mentioning something about a "digidome". I keep correcting him and call what he is talking about a "planetarium"...we eventually both just give up and move on to something else. I start dinner. Elijah comes in saying that he has to be back at school for "Cluster Night". I knew they were having this, but in the past they didn't have an activity for Kindergarten, so I hadn't put it in the plans. I text his teacher, and sure enough...it starts at 6:30pm. It's now 5:45pm, perfect. Tad walks in the door and I explain our new plans. We scarf down dinner (tasting takes too much time...chew and swallow, chew and swallow, kids!) I have a PTO meeting at 7pm across the street from the school, so we are going to have to take separate cars. I am Treasurer of our PTO which I think at most schools is bestoyed upon an organized and detail oriented parent who has a PhD in Accounting...I don't think I ever balanced my checkbook...ha! So, I have this notebook with all my PTO stuff in it, and it's on nights like tonight that things like this decide to go missing. My mood quickly escalates from "gosh, darn, where is that silly notebook" to "*&*!" @%&$*?@##!" I search the bookshelf, the car, the filing cabinet, heck, I search the laundry basket!...nothing. I was seriously about to call in sick when I hear "Mom, is this it?". My sweet Elijah found it...on the bookshelf. I send Tad off with the 2 older boys, and tell him I'll meet him there...I have to freshen up. Now, if you know me, you know that make-up and hair that is brushed aren't top priorities...but I at least change out of my shirt which is full of spit up and apply some deodorant. By the time I get to school, I'm late. I park and realize my only options for child carrying are an umbrella stroller and a 20 pound baby carrier. I strap Joel into the stroller and hook the carrier under my arm. My bag with the infamous notebook and my diaper bag are toted on my shoulder. In order to walk, I can only use one hand to push the stroller while the other holds the carrier...this makes it very difficult to steer the stroller! The gate is closed to go directly into school so my quickest point of entry is manuevering between the dumpster and the fence...I manage. OK, almost there, just have to go across the blacktop to the first of 3 sets of doors I am going to have to try and open in order to get into the cafeteria.
I'm out of breath.
As I make my way across the asphalt, my dear sweet friend Jennifer sees my distress and comes to my rescue. She takes the stroller and we get to the cafeteria with no problem...thanks Jenn! I get into the cafeteria and there in the middle of the floor is a ...."digidome" ! It's like a big balloon that you sit in and the sky is projected on the roof. It's about 7 feet high and 15 feet wide. It's inflatable. It's closed. The teacher on duty outside of the "digidome" announces my arrival to the teacher on the inside and they unzip the small crawl space I am now supposed to enter through while carrying a 2 year old and a 20 pound baby carrier. I stick my head in...it's absolutely pitch black. Parents and students line the perimeter...I can't see them. I sheepishly say "Tad?" hoping he is close to the opening. "Back here". He and the boys are at the furthest most point of the dome...I can't see them either. I begin stepping over parents, teachers, students...
I'm out of breath.
I sit down, apologize to everyone, and check my indiglo watch...6:45pm, perfect. The teacher goes through her lesson of constellations and the phases of the moon. This "digidome" thing is really neat! I look down at my watch again...7pm. I now have to excuse myself from the dome in reverse fashion in order to get to my meeting that I am now late for. I wait until the last possible second and begin my trek back across the dome. I exit...somehow, and head over to my next engagement. That night when I got home, Tad and I were recapping the events of the night. He thought my dome experience was pretty funny. In hindsight, I did too. I don't pretend to have it all together, but nights like that don't do me any favors in at least hiding the fact that "I'm a hot mess"...
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
dominic turns 4...
So, Dominic walks out of his bedroom on the morning that he turns four. Tad and I had decorated our vast living/dining/kitchen combo with streamers, a banner and special "Happy Birthday" greetings in hopes of capturing a moment in his memory of how much he means to us and how special we hope to make this day for him. He looks around, smiling at first...my heart swells at the thought of his heart swelling. I can't wait to hear how he "feels". Then, it starts. His smile turns more sour...he plops on the couch with a pretty large bottom lip. "I told you I wanted Batman for my birthday." He runs to the bathroom, looks in the mirror, and comes back to the couch..."and I don't LOOK four!"
I sure hope the whole day isn't like this...ha!
After an explanation of how your birthday is different from your birthday party(which is all about the bat) as well as an overly detailed recount of his birth story...he changes his attitude...whew! We drop Eli off at school and go grab one of his best buddies, Nathan, and return home for some almighty BIRTHDAY CHOCOLATE CHIP PANCAKES! The boys play for a bit here, then we go hang out at another friends house so he can play outside and I can chit chat (playdates are all about the mommas).
Typically birthday dinners around here consist of your favorite meal, close family, and a homemade cake. I was having a hard time looking around and wanting to cram any more people or festivities into this apartment, so...we went out! We had been asking Dominic to pick where he wanted to go for about a week, and with a little nudge from his seafood loving daddy...he wanted fried catfish.
Granny came to join in the celebration!
He opened a couple presents...luckily they were Batman themed! Then it was time for dessert. Our waiter took it upon himself to do the candle and singing thing...Dominic had the most genuine smile. It took a little coaxing, but there it was. This time my heart swelled, and I was sure this time his was swelling too. Our buddy was the center of our little world and he knew it.
Happy Birthday Dominic!
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
march madness....
March has slipped away without me doing what I set out to do with this darn blog...document! So, without further ado I will recap the month of March in abbreviated fashion...
I don't have adequate pictures yet, so text will have to do for now.
March began with Mardi Gras season. For the Patellas this consisted of not doing one Mardi Gras related thing. I have loosened up a lot with having 4 kids, but lugging a newborn to a parade is just not something that sounds like a good time to me. The boys celebrated at their schools with little parades and such...that will have to do for this year.
Two weeks into the month, and we have the privilege of celebrating the wedding of Marie and Jeff. Marie is one of my oldest and most wonderful friends...the kind that you can just pick up where time left off and not skip a beat. You know I love this girl if I'm willing to walk down the aisle for her 4 weeks after having a baby!!! It was such an honor to be a part of this event, plus it threw me back into the fast lane. At 4 weeks Abram ate lunch at Commander's Palace, dinner at French Market Cafe, visited the Roosevelt hotel, rode in a limo, and partied at the Audubon Tea Room...we have a lot to live up to after that entrance into the social scene. All joking aside, I loved watching Marie make the most important decision of her life so far...while wearing a stunning gown =)
The boys finally got to go to a parade! We met the Gooch's and Cabiro's out for the St. Patrick's Day parade in Metairie. Abram slept, Joel dug in the dirt, Dominic threw a football with Tad, and Elijah was front and center trying to score as many beads as he could...
Tad is still trying to find himself in his new position at work. At the moment it feels like he is the "go to" guy for a hodge podge of projects and tasks and he is a little out of his comfort zone. This is where growth happens and he is doing a great job trying to keep on top of everything they put in front of him. I am honestly so proud of how much responsibility and faith his coworkers and boss put with him...they know he'll do his absolute best. My boys have a great role model.
The end of the month was a little bit stressful. Not sure if that's the right word, but stress was definitely a factor so we'll go with that. The house hunt is beginning to seem never-ending. The townhouse we are currently in is great, but it's not our permanent home...With half of our belongings/furniture in storage, we don't have the means to really get and stay organized. This can be a little frustrating with 3 kids worth of toys and school stuff, 1 husband worth of husband's stuff, 1 wife worth of wife's stuff, and 1 baby worth of baby's stuff. We re-evaluate our search criteria almost daily ("do we really need running water?" "are walls absolutely necessary?") and this actually led us to a property we had skimmed over a couple months ago. A friend of ours mentioned a house for sale in their neighborhood (we get a lot of this), I check it out on the web, and honestly didn't feel like taking on a project. This house was kind of ugly outside and needed lots of updating inside...sigh. But after a little nudge from Tad and countless pokes from Justin (yea, yea) I decide to look at the house with an open mind. The lot is huge, we'll be two houses away from some of our favorite people, the house just needs a little color updating outside, all the floors will need to be redone inside and every single wall will need a coat of paint...i start to get a little excited. I have learned through this process never to actually get excited...there's too much that can go wrong to get emotionally attached to any prospective house. We do however pray very hard over this house and both of us feel a sense of excitement...we decide to put an offer in. We go back and forth a bit, but we actually have the house under contract! woohoo! The next step with buying a house is inspections...so we scurry to get them scheduled on Tuesday before Tad goes out of town on Wednesday. Tad and a guy named Donald inspect every nook and cranny of this 3000 sq ft house...along with this marathon inspection comes a video inspection of the plumbing (ya'll are more than welcome to borrow it if redbox is down) and a termite guy. I anxiously await the verdict, and eventually just show up at the house to hear the summary myself. The inspector finds 2 things we should be concerned about...mold and termites...sigh.
March ends with us believing we had found a house for our growing family to stretch out into...a place to end this chapter of our story. We have a lot of thinking to do. We have a lot of praying to do. Well, that's the end of the month...have to wait until April to see what happens...April holds a big decision...stay tuned.
I don't have adequate pictures yet, so text will have to do for now.
March began with Mardi Gras season. For the Patellas this consisted of not doing one Mardi Gras related thing. I have loosened up a lot with having 4 kids, but lugging a newborn to a parade is just not something that sounds like a good time to me. The boys celebrated at their schools with little parades and such...that will have to do for this year.
Two weeks into the month, and we have the privilege of celebrating the wedding of Marie and Jeff. Marie is one of my oldest and most wonderful friends...the kind that you can just pick up where time left off and not skip a beat. You know I love this girl if I'm willing to walk down the aisle for her 4 weeks after having a baby!!! It was such an honor to be a part of this event, plus it threw me back into the fast lane. At 4 weeks Abram ate lunch at Commander's Palace, dinner at French Market Cafe, visited the Roosevelt hotel, rode in a limo, and partied at the Audubon Tea Room...we have a lot to live up to after that entrance into the social scene. All joking aside, I loved watching Marie make the most important decision of her life so far...while wearing a stunning gown =)
The boys finally got to go to a parade! We met the Gooch's and Cabiro's out for the St. Patrick's Day parade in Metairie. Abram slept, Joel dug in the dirt, Dominic threw a football with Tad, and Elijah was front and center trying to score as many beads as he could...
Tad is still trying to find himself in his new position at work. At the moment it feels like he is the "go to" guy for a hodge podge of projects and tasks and he is a little out of his comfort zone. This is where growth happens and he is doing a great job trying to keep on top of everything they put in front of him. I am honestly so proud of how much responsibility and faith his coworkers and boss put with him...they know he'll do his absolute best. My boys have a great role model.
The end of the month was a little bit stressful. Not sure if that's the right word, but stress was definitely a factor so we'll go with that. The house hunt is beginning to seem never-ending. The townhouse we are currently in is great, but it's not our permanent home...With half of our belongings/furniture in storage, we don't have the means to really get and stay organized. This can be a little frustrating with 3 kids worth of toys and school stuff, 1 husband worth of husband's stuff, 1 wife worth of wife's stuff, and 1 baby worth of baby's stuff. We re-evaluate our search criteria almost daily ("do we really need running water?" "are walls absolutely necessary?") and this actually led us to a property we had skimmed over a couple months ago. A friend of ours mentioned a house for sale in their neighborhood (we get a lot of this), I check it out on the web, and honestly didn't feel like taking on a project. This house was kind of ugly outside and needed lots of updating inside...sigh. But after a little nudge from Tad and countless pokes from Justin (yea, yea) I decide to look at the house with an open mind. The lot is huge, we'll be two houses away from some of our favorite people, the house just needs a little color updating outside, all the floors will need to be redone inside and every single wall will need a coat of paint...i start to get a little excited. I have learned through this process never to actually get excited...there's too much that can go wrong to get emotionally attached to any prospective house. We do however pray very hard over this house and both of us feel a sense of excitement...we decide to put an offer in. We go back and forth a bit, but we actually have the house under contract! woohoo! The next step with buying a house is inspections...so we scurry to get them scheduled on Tuesday before Tad goes out of town on Wednesday. Tad and a guy named Donald inspect every nook and cranny of this 3000 sq ft house...along with this marathon inspection comes a video inspection of the plumbing (ya'll are more than welcome to borrow it if redbox is down) and a termite guy. I anxiously await the verdict, and eventually just show up at the house to hear the summary myself. The inspector finds 2 things we should be concerned about...mold and termites...sigh.
March ends with us believing we had found a house for our growing family to stretch out into...a place to end this chapter of our story. We have a lot of thinking to do. We have a lot of praying to do. Well, that's the end of the month...have to wait until April to see what happens...April holds a big decision...stay tuned.
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