Photo Journal - Josie Boettcher

Goodness, today was...a day. Ben was feeling some sharp pains in his chest all day yesterday and this morning he woke me up and told me that the pain had gotten much worse and he would have to go to the hospital. Thankfully, he was able to drive himself because with all the kids and school drop offs, I couldn't take him. Having to take an ambulance would have sucked. He was there from like 6am until 1:30pm getting all kinds of tests on his heart. His pain isn't resolved, but at least we know his heart is healthy! The cardiologist says it could be fluid trapped under the membrane of his heart, a condition called pericarditis. Either way, he's home now and is at least reassured that he's not dying of a heart attack.  I did get to visit with Jenny this morning while I was waiting to hear from Ben. It was really nice. Always good to hang out with her! Me and Ollie took a turn holding Jay too. It was the highlight of Ollie's week! And Jenny took this picture! 💗

We had a nice day today. We went to church in the morning, had a couple of hours at home, went to Old Navy and Jenny's for some ice cream, and then had dinner with the Arikoks. Always such a fun time with them! No deep thoughts today, really. I'm feeling a little overwhelmed about all of the summer activities, and making time for mom groups, and trying to set up dinners for home church, and thinking about an Apple watch, and thinking about a smart watch for Jonas. These are not really big things alone, but it always goes this way: I'm doing nothing, then BOOM, I'm doing everything. 😅 It's not a huge deal though. Just a lot whirling through my mind at any given time!

Such a fun day! We had a relaxing morning - well, I did, anyway - and then went on our date to Fado. After our date, we set up the slip n slide and played in the yard with the kiddos for a while. After that, I caught up with Heidi on the phone for a very long time and Jonas went to Nathan's birthday party. We had a quick dinner and I spent the evening trying to get the kids signed up for some summer activities. It's a little addictive for me. I got Jonas signed up for something and then saw a bunch of stuff the girls would like, even though they already have Irish dancing in July! So then I'm contemplating signing Jonas up for a 2nd activity since the girls would have two. THEN I'm like, but what about Ollie? She has nothing all summer! When it all shook out, the big girls just have Irish dancing and Jonas has a week of basketball and a handful of tennis lessons. I might sign Ollie up for a gymnastics class and I might sign all of them up for swim lessons through Hillia...

It's FRIDAY!!! And it is a BEAUTIFUL day. It's 70 degrees with a few clouds in the sky and it is perfect. I walked the girls to the bus stop this morning and then went to visit with Melis and Naz at Fancyburg for a couple of hours. The girls did their usual love/hate thing, but at the end (it's always at the end!) they started playing together really well. We don't have anything else going on today, other than Jonas having his D&D thing at the library. Poor me, I'll HAVE to sit at the library for hours reading my book. 😭 I'm looking forward to a nice, warm weekend! Ben and I have a date tomorrow and we'll all have dinner with the Arikoks on Sunday. Good times! 

It was a pretty typical day. I went to Brittany's this morning and got lots of snuggle time with Luca and then spent the afternoon and evening doing housework, taking care of kids, cooking, and planning. I'm pretty excited about the next two house projects we have. First, we're going to finally finish the deck 😅. We still need to attach the handrail and finish the railing for the steps, among a couple of other small things. We also need to re-stain and repaint everything (since it has already been two years since we applied the stain last...crazy!). While I have the stain out, I'm going to do the playset too, just to keep it safer from the wood bees and to keep it from turning gray and crappy looking. The next project will be the garage organization. There is a LOT to be done there, but I'm working on drawing up plans for the woodwork that will need to be done for shelving, bike/scooter storage, toy storage, tool storage, etc. I kind of thought it would be simple, ...

I was fully prepared to spend the day sitting around the house in my sweatpants. I hate doing stuff on Mondays. I always feel like I need to recuperate from the weekend or something. 😂 But Shannon put a message out on GroupMe that they were going to the FPC and had a free pass for a friend, so I took the opportunity to go. I know, I surprise myself sometimes! We only got to spend about an hour together and she was pretty frazzled with her boys who weren't really being all that rambunctious, especially not compared to some of the little boys I know. *cough cough* But it was still nice to catch up a little and Ollie loved it there so much. She and I stayed a little longer to look again at some of her favorite things. She was so excited that I'm actually considering getting a pass again. I'll have to think about it! 

I started the day feeling incredibly disappointed. It got better, but sometimes the kids are so entitled acting that it just bums me out. We went to Dennis and Hazel's for Easter and had an Easter egg hunt. It's always kind of...neutral over there. There's lots of awkwardness with Hazel's family, but the food is good and the egg hunt is a lot of fun so it mostly evens out. I also have to admit that I love having a reason to get the kids (mostly the girls, if I'm being honest) dressed up. Our church would definitely frown upon spending $70 to get all the kids new Easter outfits and they would stick out like sore thumbs in Oasis...but family loves it! 😅 We didn't really get great pictures this year, but that's ok.  (Max's kids - Emmie and Griffin)

I'm so obsessed with my book right now! I wish I didn't have to do anything other than read. It rained ALL morning, so we decided not to chance the egg hunt at church. I don't even know if they still had it! We hung out at home and then went to Target together. It was actually a pretty fun trip. I wanted to buy a new blouse for Easter and we found a few options for me to try on. Everyone enjoyed my fitting room fashion show and I got something decent to wear.  After that, we went to Riven's birthday party. I was dreading it SO much, but we ended up being one of only two families there, along with two older neighbors. I'm so glad we went. There were definitely awkward moments and I wouldn't call it fun at all, but I was happy we could be there to fill out the party a bit. Six people will do that! There was an egg hunt and some good snacks, coloring, and a photo booth thing for PJ Masks. I also got to reconnect with Kylienne a little. She said, "Hey, we haven...

9:00am - I am sitting down to write this post (and play catch up a little) even though I am stressed out of my mind right now. I'm really hoping that focusing on something else will help to center me a bit. It's not really that there's too much to do. I can handle all of the things on my list. It's just that my physical limitations make everything harder. I'm surveying the house to see what still needs to be done before Ruby's party and feeling incredibly upset about how much there is to clean that I can't do. It means fighting with unwilling children and then still having it done imperfectly when what I want is near perfection. There's just so much little stuff all over the floors! Hundreds of tiny pieces of paper, broken crayons, bits of cardboard (why??), Pokemon cards, craft crap...ugh. It's just too much! I went to see the surgeon yesterday and that was his biggest warning: DON'T DO TOO MUCH. Your stitch might tear and cause a hernia. But HO...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO RUBY!!!! We're so thankful for our sweet Ruby-doo. She brings the creativity, the song, and the unpredictability 😂 to our lives and our family is better off for having her. She turned 6 today and I couldn't help but remember the day she was born... I went to the hospital to be induced and after many hours of foley tubes, and pitocin, and having my water broken, I suddenly felt a big gush. I wondered why all the liquid, now, hours after my water was broken, and looked down to see a huge puddle of blood forming around me. I called the nurse to ask if this was okay, because I started to get a little worried, and within five minutes Ben was suited up and I was rushed back for an emergency c-section. Thank God, Ruby was delivered safely and quickly. Ben held on tight to her as he and she were pushed out of the room so that they could try to stop my bleeding and essentially save my life. I had had a placental abruption and was put all the way under so they could fi...

We got together with Melis and Naz at Selby Park this morning. It's so nice when the kids actually play with each other so that me and Melis have time to sit and talk. Moms need time too!  I spent the afternoon frantically trying to get ready for everything that's happening today and in the next couple of days. I was in the basement moving boxes, getting out Easter stuff, hard boiling eggs, wrapping Ruby's birthday presents, getting out food stuff for the party, getting out decorations, doing laundry, and on and on and on. I ended up straining my stomach and am feeling some tenderness and pain now. But more than the physical effects of it are the mental effects. Did I hurt myself badly? Did I set back my healing time? I've been doing so well and I don't want to go back to having everyone do everything for me again.  In the evening, after I finished cleaning the den (another big mistake), we dyed our Easter eggs. It went more smoothly this year than it did last year....

We have a very busy week ahead: Wednesday - errands, Melis and Naz?, dye Easter eggs, Thursday - RUBY'S BIRTHDAY, visit Brit, birthday dinner and celebration, movie night, Friday - kids off school, Ruby's birthday party, Saturday - Dwell Easter egg hunt, Riven's birthday party, get Easter baskets ready, Sunday - Easter celebrations at Poppop and Grandma's.  It's all fun and exciting stuff, but I'm getting a little worried that I'm falling behind. I haven't wrapped any of Ruby's presents and all of the Easter stuff is just in a big heap on the bed in the back room. I haven't even gotten the Easter box out of the basement so...no decorations this year! I'm not sure if I have enough dye for the Easter eggs and I have no hard-boiled eggs prepared. I haven't planned food for Ruby's party and I'm worried it's going to be awkward. I'm waiting for the netting for the trampoline to come in and the package is running late. I wanted ...

Riven's birthday party was cancelled this morning (EVERYTHING is getting cancelled!), so we went to CT for the first time in a year. It was really great to be there. It was wonderful to hear Gary teach, awesome to hang out with friends, and super cool to hear all of the kids being excited about their classes. I hoped that Ben would leave church in a better mood, but he was instantly grumpy again by the time we got to the car. So disappointing. Once we got home, we got busy with laundry, BBQ prep (we decided to just go ahead with it, since we already had all the supplies), and yard work. Unfortunately, our lawn mower stopped working, so Ben wasn't able to get done what he was hoping to do, but it did leave space for him to run around and play with the kiddos for a while, which they all enjoyed. I spent some time doing a couple of little things around the yard. I ordered a new net and padding for the trampoline, so I removed the old one and then I did a couple of little repairs o...