A Touch Of Tyrell

I've been feeling a little nostalgic lately. The stress of real life is really stressful 😆 and a few times last week I found my mind in another place.  I was camping. With my Dad, brother, and sister. My entire being begged to be in the mountains, in the forest chopping things with our rusty hatchets, playing cards in our tents because it was raining, and carving our names into Aspen trees. Drinking the purest water from the spring and gorging myself on little debbie snacks. Swinging on the rope swing and riding bikes on old logging roads. Building forts and shooting targets.  I longed to be eating at one of my dad's favorite all-you-can-eat Asian buffets. With him, of course. Eating platefuls of egg rolls with sweet and sour sauce and all kinds of funky jello salads in a dimly-lit restaurant.  I was taken back to the time my mom took my sister and I to the hot springs. Just the three of us. No babies. She even let us pick out our own bags of candy an...

I feel like sometimes, when life has squeezed all of the juice out of me, it squeezes a little more just to make sure.  On top of (voluntarily) having three kids 😅 and (voluntarily) selling our house 😅😅 and having two birthdays a week a part, the last week of school, and the entire family getting sick (pink eye, boogers galore, sneezing, sore throats, I completely lost my voice for a day and sounded like a smoker for a week) I felt like I had been completely squeezed of all juice.  And then life gave me a big ole squeeze just to make sure I could feel it.  I most definitely can feel it!  I know that a lot of the "hardships" I'm experiencing right now are from my own doing, but a few big ones aren't and that's really hard. I can only control how I react. Adult-ing is hard.  So it's always when your spouse can see he needs to bring you home a "soul repair kit" 😘

I love my kids. I just think they're the coolest.  When discussing the possibility of Everett having a birthday party he said he wanted a party and wanted to play Legos, have a water gun fight and an egg hunt.  So we invited a handful of his friends and had a birthday party on his birthday.  While the kids were having a water gun fight, I hid the eggs all around downstairs.  I think they had a lot of fun... especially when Jake joined them.  Instead of birthday spankings, Everett was going to be squirt by each of his friends. Lucas was a good sport and lent his support.  When they were sun-dried, they found their eggs full of candy and played a few rowdy rounds of duck-duck-goose.  We were running out of time so we skipped playing with Legos and went straight for presents and cake. But first, enjoy these group pictures. Jake is a mighty funny guy... as you can see :) ...

Everett is SEVEN.  He is intelligent, emotional, SO sweet, fun to talk to, bossy, caring, nervous, and has a million dollar smile.  I'll never get over how much I love this kid.  There is something special about him! Despite our efforts, he's an indoor kid... at least for now. He'd play the iPad or Xbox all day if he could. He wouldn't eat or pee all day and just play his games right through his bodily discomfort... but thankfully he has a mom that won't allow it :)  When he's forced to be outside 😅 he's on his bike or playing with some of the kids on our street (Rhett, Caleb, Kevin, Tova, or Abby). I've felt a lot of guilt knowing that he'll have to make all new friends in a new neighborhood.  He seems to have a lot of friends although he isn't necessarily outgoing or super social. He's just a nice kid so other kids want to be his friends... so I shouldn't feel too bad that he'll have to m...