Summer with the girls

All summer I have so enjoyed all of this extra time with the girls. On September 5th, they are both starting at a new preschool. It's about two minutes from my house and they will go from 9-12 every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning. It's put on by the methodist church. We went and toured the school a couple of weeks ago and both Ella and Sadie were very excited to walk through a classroom again. Ella more so than Sadie. Before we visited, I asked Ella if she was ready to go back to school. She was pretty unhappy at her last preschool, which is why we worked out this new schedule. She asked me two questions: Will I have to eat lunch at school? No. Do I have to take a nap at school? No. After she got her answers, she was beyond excited. Those were the two things that she did not like at the last school. But Ella loves to be in a classroom environment and she loves to learn and meet new friends. I'm so excited for her. And Sadie definitely needs to spend some time in a structured environment with other kids. Ella is such a good sister, but I see her cater to Sadie a lot because it's easier. So it will be good for Sadie to learn how to interact with other kids her age. And the good part is that I'm not giving up too much extra time with them. They have been spending Fridays at their Nonnie's house. But now it's about the same amount of time, I just get to go into the office three mornings a week, which will be extremely helpful for me my job.

Oh, and in other BIG BIG news...Sadie is getting pretty close to being potty trained. We've been working on it since Thursday and she's only had about three accidents!  Everytime she goes potty she high fives me and says "I TID IT!  YAY FOR SADIE!"  It's the cutest ever.  And Ella even gets in on the celebration. :)  Sadie still can't tell me that she has to pee ahead of time, so I take her to the potty a lot, but we made it through a birthday dinner at La Casona, a couple of trips to Target, and a bike ride without an accident.  So we're getting there.  I'm so proud of my girls.  And they are growing up so fast.

And the last update....Ella starts soccer in August!  We went and picked out her cletes, shinguards, and a ball.  I'm so excited!

Sadie calls them piggy-ponies

Hammin it up

i cannot believe she is 4 1/2!

I'm so proud....

Trip to the beach

:)

Sadie loves to play dress up

Fried pickles...Mmmm

Mr. Wonderful

You know how you usually have that small group of people that you can count on no matter what?  Well, for me, that's my husband.  Always there.  Always happy to see me.  Always happy to talk to me.  Always happy to help me with anything I need.  Always happy to take care of me.  I am so lucky and blessed that he is so good at being exactly what I need.  I'm feeling a little mushy today.  Maybe because we just celebrated our 8 year anniversary or maybe it's the fact that he's been out of town so much lately and I've gotten really good at missing him like crazy.  Or seeing how much his daughters love him and miss him while he's out of town, but are secure enough in his love for them that they are not too affected by it.  But there's definitely a missing piece.  He completely balances us out.  I cannot wait until he gets home.  It will be so nice to have the love of my life sleeping peacefully beside me at night (or at least until the next work trip).

the weekend he proposed....we were so young!

Eight years

Josh and I celebrated our eighth wedding anniversary yesterday.  It was an okay day. It's hard to celebrate when there's a lot of sad around you.  Josh's dad passed away on Thursday, the 19th.  He fought so long and so hard and he peacefully left us here for his eternity in Heaven.  On Tuesday morning, he said he only had three days left.  I don't know how he knew, but he did his best to prepare everyone.  God's hand was so evident throughout it all.  But it's still been a really tough week.  We did our best to celebrate and overall had a nice day.  We were sitting at Chili's last night while my mom watched the girls for us so we could have a quick, quiet dinner together.  We were talking about all of the different stages of our lives the past almost decade we've spent together and which stage has been our favorite. We usually will say that whatever current stage we're in is our favorite.  But right now is hard.  Life, work, kids...everything just feels difficult.  Sadie is extremely defiant, which is a stage Ella never went through.  Ella is a people pleaser.  Even when she would throw a fit, you could hold your arms out to her and she'd just melt in your arms until she cried it all out.  She is so tender hearted.  But she's also learned how to argue and talk back.  She rolled her eyes when I told her something yesterday!  So, that's where we are these days.  But the kids are what keep us going and keep things interesting.  We may be having a hard time right now, but this is still where we want to be.  Please pray for the Park family.

We miss you Ewie <3

 

I really don't like to write about personal things.  Usually any posts that get too personal never make it past the draft status on here.  About a year ago, I started having anxiety attacks...nothing I've been to the doctor about, because I'm scared that they'll prescribe me something and I want to overcome this on my own.  I don't want this to be a permanent thing in my life.  But they can be pretty debilitating.  I clench my teeth every night while I'm sleeping and I have to wear a guard now so that my jaw stays in alignment.  I spoke with my mom and dad about it last year and my mom told me that there were times when she was younger where she would all of a sudden become really fearful, so she memorized Psalm 91.  Well I was at home one evening and we were cleaning up dinner and out of nowhere I sort of started to freak out.  So I went and sat in the half bathroom with my phone and was trying to remember the Psalm that my mom told me to read when I start getting scared.  So, I pulled up Psalm 18 and started reading it out loud to myself:

 I love you, O LORD, my strength.
 The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer,
  my God, my rock, in whom I take refuge,
  my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
 I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised,
  and I am saved from my enemies.
 The cords of death encompassed me;
  the torrents of destruction assailed me;
 the cords of Sheol entangled me;
  the snares of death confronted me.
 In my distress I called upon the LORD;
  to my God I cried for help.
 From his temple he heard my voice,
  and my cry to him reached his ears.
(Psalm 18:1-6 ESV)

And slowly but surely my heartrate went down, the tears stopped falling, and I felt like I could breathe again.  So maybe it wasn't the same one that my mom memorized, but this is obviously the one God wanted me to hear.  He gave me something to cling to in that moment.  So these days I'm pretty armed.  When I start to feel that uncontrollable fear creep up on me, I can read this Psalm and try to keep it at bay.  I can tell you that my anxiety attacks aren't related to anything in my life right now.  Life is pretty good for me.  Two beautiful children, a husband who adores me, a healthy family, a new house....and maybe that's why I have these "episodes" for lack of a better word.  I keep waiting for something terrible to happen.  Because, after all, this is life and it's not always going to be this easy.  I was angry about all these newfound fears at first because my life is so incredibly different now.  But I've come to accept that God put this in my life for a reason.  Maybe this is a time in my life where I need to be aware and cautious and be steadfast in my faith that He will ultimately take care of me and my family.  I'm not always "thankful" for this lesson whatever it may be, but when I start to panic I can remind myself that He is in control.  And He loves me so much. 

Here's a song that I love.  It's by one of my favorite bands Rush of Fools.  If you haven't heard of them, you should check them out.  All of the albums are really good.  The second one is probably my favorite. 

Spontaneity, sort of.

So I got to be spontaneous today!  For five whole minutes.  So Josh is out of town all the time, so he was going to be in Louisiana for the 4th of July. Well my mom found some airline tickets that I could use my rewards miles on and fly out for super cheap and spend the day with him.  So I packed my bags and wrestled over how impractical it was and kept going back and forth about the whole thing.  So, finally I closed my eyes and clicked the button over the word "purchase ticket" and then almost threw up.  I have anxiety issues, if you didn't already know that about me.  Then about five minutes later, the girls and I were in the car headed to Mimi's house so they could have a sleepover.  Josh calls and says that he has to work all night and they're going to be driving home tomorrow....so luckily Southwest refunded me for the tickets.  But I was a little bummed out.  Super excited that Josh will be coming home tomorrow, but bummed out that we didn't get to do something crazy like book a last minute same day flight and go have some fun on Bourbon Street.  Well, there's always next time.....

(I still can't believe I actually bought the tickets....That is so not like me.  At all.)

Random Happenings

Let's see, what's been going on around the Park household?  Not much, really.  Since Mother's day, Josh has been home for about a week and a half.  So we haven't made much progress on the house.  I take that back, we did make some pretty awesome progress in the kitchen.  We bought a new refrigerator, stove top, and microwave.  One weekend when Josh was home, he put them in and they made the kitchen look so much nicer...and part of this century.  I don't even mind my old cabinets anymore!

Oh, and we're spending $950 to have a diseased tree removed today.  Fun.

Did I happen to mention I hate don't love owning an older house?  If we could ever finish fixing things that are broken, we could actually use our money to remove the ridiculous chandeliers and wallpaper so it doesn't feel like we're living in some old person's house......sigh.  We'll get there.  Don't they say the process is the fun part?! (i think someone said that at some point)

Ella and Sadie have been having fun at gymnastics. Sadie cries the whole time if I'm not sitting on the floor with her while she's doing her thing. Ella's a pro. Although, they did a back flip thingy on the bars last week and Ella did not enjoy it much. We'll see if she can conquer her fears and do it again today.

Oh, and it's my BIRTHDAY MONTH!  I turn the big 3-0 this year.  I can't believe I got old and didn't even realize it.  But I think the 30's are supposed to be the prime years of your life, right?  I have to say that the second half of my twenties were the best years of my life.  I'm excited to see what the next decade has in store.  Josh has been out of town so much, so he saved up a lot of money with his per diem and told me I could pick anywhere to go for my birthday.  So we looked at all these different resorts and islands and places and finally picked a place in Belize.  You see, it can't be that far away because I've never left the girls longer than 2 nights and I was ok with leaving for 3 this time (baby steps, people!), but no more than that.  So Belize was pretty close, not too touristy, and not super expensive.  Beaches, rainforests, everything I could want!  And then I backed out.  I mean, I spent so much time researching and deciding and then when it came time to pull the trigger I just couldn't do it.  I don't know, being in a foreign country where there isn't very reliable Internet access or the ability to call and facetime the kids, I just couldn't do it.  So instead we're headed to Austin for two nights.  It's close and I can facetime.  I wish the girls were old enough to enjoy (and justify the cost) for Disneyworld.  I've never been, so when they're a little bit older we'll have fun doing that.  I must really be turning 30 if the idea of going to Disneyworld with my kids sounds more appealing than an oceanside beach resort on the Caribbean.......although after this tree fiasco, if I had booked the vacation I'd be having a heart attack right now, I'm sure! :)

Oh, and VBS is this month too.  The theme is Babylon, so we're studying Daniel.  It is going to be so much fun!  We have been hard at work getting the set ready.  Tracy and I have been making hedges out of crepe paper, glue, and frito lay boxes.  One side of a box takes me about 3 hours.  It's nuts.  I guess that's why we started so early! 4 more sides to go and the hedges will be done. 

Okay, I guess the kids have been playing on the iPad and my phone long enough...we have big day of cleaning and organizing ahead.  Here is life according to my iPhone....

well i'm obviously bad about documenting the houses's updates because i haven't taken any before photos.  but here's the after!

she's the best sunday afternoon napping buddy ever

i love my sadiebug!

i love this girl

sadie LOVED the splashpad!

here's the tree that's going down...it's the gigantic one on the left.  it's rotten at the base of the tree almost halfway through the trunk.  i was too afraid it would fall on my neighbor's house...or my kids...or pretty much anything near it!

and yes, those are mosquito carcasses...josh sprayed the yard with some heavy duty bug killer and he didn't spray the front porch.  so it turned into a mosquito graveyard!  i hate texas weather!

And a picture of a finished side of the hedge

I am almost finished with my first week as a stay-at-home-mom and I am loving it.  And I'm a mostly-stay-at-home-mom who still works on Fridays and whenever I can sneak in a few hours every day at home to keep up.  It hit me about a month ago that next school year is my last year with Ella before kindergarten.  I can't even believe I'm saying that.  This is it for Ella and me.  After this year, everything changes.  I'm dreading it completely.  I wish I could say I'm looking forward to the changes and seeing her learn and grow and enter society, but I hate it.  Around the same time that I started worrying about not having enough time with her, Ella started becoming unhappy at school and Sadie started crying again every morning when I would drop her off.  I was realizing that they weren't happy at school and I wasn't satisfied with only being with them two days a week.  I started wondering if I'd be able to do it.  Would I be able to scale back my hours and still get everything done?  I wouldn't have been able to pull the girls out of preschool while they were happy there.  I've never been one of those moms who thinks I'm super qualified and better at raising kids than the teachers at LHA.  I feel like they are much more qualified (and patient) than me!  But the girls got unhappy for some reason, so we took the plunge.  After talking it through with a few people and getting some suggestions, the girls last day of preschool was last Friday.  It was sad to pick up their pillows, blankets, and everything.  Walking out of that door was hard for me.  This place had taken such good care of my babies for two and a half years.  Wonderful memories and friendships since before Ella could even talk.  I was so grateful for their care and attention to my children.  Needless to say, this week was quite an adjustment.  Monday and Tuesday were terrible.  Wednesday and Thursday were wonderful.  Today, I miss them while I'm at work, but I like being here and having conversations and basically being part of the world again.  But I'm looking forward to Monday again.  I think it's going to work out just fine.  I also think that Monday and Tuesday were a little more difficult because we were starting our second week with Daddy being out of town.  I was a little worn out and they really miss him.  Thank goodness he gets to fly home for the weekend.  It's going to be so great to spend the time with him, even if it is only for a few days.  Bring on this next chapter of life.  So far, so good.