I am SO Blessed!

I love it how you can be having "one of those days"... (you know, the kind where your running low on energy and patience and running high on emotions, tears, and frustration ready to boil over at any second) when all of a sudden something out of the blue pretty much smacks you in the face with how blessed of a life you truly have. Today, I had one of those moments. I went from having that feeling that I just wanted to pull every last hair out of my head to having a deep rooted appreciation for my life.

Ansley had her first homework assignment and it was to draw a picture of her family. I had her sitting at the table working on it and the puppy goes to the bathroom in his crate about the same time that Eli slams a door which caused a glass vase to fall off a shelf and shatter while Ansley comes up and is tugging on my shirt saying "Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. MOM-EEEEEEEEE."

At this point I'm ready to scream. "What?" I turn around and ask Ansley. "Mommy is trying to clean up this glass so you guys don't get hurt. Will you PUH-LEASEEEE just wait a second." I hurt her feelings. But she went back to the table and waited.

When I finally got the glass cleaned up, I went over to see what she needed and she told me she needed help making some stars because she didn't know how to do it. At which point I tell her she didn't need stars because she was supposed to be drawing picture of her family... not stars.

This is where I got God pretty much smacked me upside the head.

"But Mommy," Ansley said, "I have to draw the stars that Wyatt plays with in heaven! I need you to draw them for me!". As I looked at her picture of our family, this is what I saw...

She explained that our family was on the ground because that is where we live and we are holding hands because we love each other. She said that Wyatt lived in heaven on a cloud and was playing with the stars (that I drew for her), but that we were going to send him a red balloon because heaven was too far to hold his hand too, but we wanted Wyatt to know that we love him so that's why we sent him the red balloon with all of our hugs and kisses in it. Oh, and baby Seth is so small and he wasn't allowed to have a nose because he is "so so little". However, Ansley informed me that baby Seth can have a nose when he is bigger like Eli.

Wow! Could a mother's heart be any more full? What a sweet and thoughtful little girl I have. I am truly thankful for my family and I'm blessed to have those trying moments where I want to pull my hair out because that means I still have three of my children here to love and take care of. These children of mine are the reason I get out of bed in the morning and I need to take better care to remember that when I feel myself getting frustrated.

On a different note, today was Ansley's very first picture day at school. The picture will go in the yearbook and I can't wait to see it! She looked soooo cute this morning. I even let her wear some make-up because according to her "she had to look like a beautiful princess for the picture man".

This sweet looking little Eli has been stirring up all kinds of trouble lately. I know, how could a face like this...

... stir up any kind of mischief? He looks like such an angel... oh wait... this is more like it...

Anyways, I think this cute little monster has hit his terrible two's a little late. Or maybe I just got lucky and he skipped the terrible two's but is moving on the trying three's a little early. What's funny is that Joseph and I can't help but laugh when he's being a stinker, because he looks so darn cute doing it! Here's an example of his handy work. He took away baby Seth's pacifier and decided he was going to "make baby Seth pretty".

I stopped him after the first sticker, but he had a whole pack ready to go. And he kept trying to sneak them on Seth when I wasn't looking.

Speaking of cute, guess what Eli and I saw across from our yard this morning after dropping Ansley off at school. DEER! And I happened to have my camera! Picture one is of the deer just standing there. Picture two they start running off, and in picture three, you'll see why they run away!

Don't worry, the deer were too fast for Mr. Gunny!

For good measure, this is always a great way to end a post...