Gone fishin'

Aidan and Logan are on break from school, so Grandma and Grandpa took the opportunity to have them over for a highly anticipated sleepover last week. Those are always the best kinds of sleepovers, because they get spoiled rotten. It's no wonder they ask to go over there on a regular basis. Man, do those kids love their grandparents and the feeling is mutual for sure. :)


Left: with Grandma at Logan's pre-k graduation, June 2012. Right: with Grandpa, Easter 2009.

Logan has been wanting to go fishing for a while now, and Grandpa even got him a fishing pole for Christmas. With the luck of good weather on their side, they were finally able to put the new pole to good use on their very first fishing fishing trip!

It sounds like they had an absolute blast on their day out. Aidan caught a huge catfish and a small bass, and Logan reeled in a couple of small bass as well. They even baited their own hooks with worms. They talked about the fun the had from the minute they got home to the minute they went to bed. They couldn't even pick a favorite thing about their day because it was all just so awesome for them.

I'm so glad they had this opportunity. I told them they were so lucky to be able to spend such quality time with their grandparents and they'd cherish these memories forever.

I'm also glad the grandparents were the ones to volunteer for fishing duty. I mean, I was a fishing pro (ha!) back in the day, and I may have even hooked my own worms...but to be honest, the thought of touching worms and giant catfish kind of gives me the creeps now. Clearly I've lost my edge :)

And because I don't have any pictures of the boys fishing (you can tell the grandparents aren't bloggers because they were having too much fun to take pictures, ha!), I'll leave you with this evidence of my fishing prowess back in the day. And this wasn't even the time I caught a huge trout with my Mickey Mouse fishing pole when I was 5. I only brag because my parents tell me they didn't catch a single thing. Ha!


True story: this um...lovely (?) picture is currently *still* hanging on my mom's refrigerator. I was maybe 10 or so? With an awesome sense of style, clearly. #throwback

Question: were Mickey Mouse fishing poles the "it" thing back in the 80s or something? Did anyone else have one? Adam told me he had one as well, but it met an untimely end in the ocean. Or maybe we were soul mates before we knew it based on our mutual love for our Mickey Mouse fishing poles? Ha!


Linking up with:

Worth repeating

As the Supreme Court hears cases this week regarding gay marriage, I thought it was appropriate to re-post some of my thoughts on the subject. The excerpt below is from this post I wrote in September 2011.

via

I don't like the thought of a world where my kids are told who they're allowed to love. Obviously I have no idea whether my kids will be gay, but if they are, I just want them to have every happiness they deserve. Simple as that. I don't want them or anyone else who's gay to feel like a second class citizen. Adam and I are teaching our children to have compassion and accept all people equally. To not be bullies, to not make fun of people, to not call people names, to not judge people. Yet that's exactly what these conservative lawmakers are doing.

I don't care what you say, I will NEVER understand how a gay couple getting married in any way threatens my marriage. Was it Howard Stern who first said this? Not sure, but I totally agreed when I saw it going around as one of those viral Facebook statuses. "So let me get this straight... Larry King is getting his 8th divorce, Elizabeth Taylor is possibly getting married for a 9th time, Britney Spears had a 55 hour marriage. Jesse James and Tiger Woods are screwing EVERYTHING, yet the idea of same-sex marriage is going to destroy the institution of marriage?? Really?"

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I sincerely hope that the outcome of the Supreme Court hearings turns the tides on the gay marriage debate and begins to pave the way to equality for all. Love is love and ALL Americans deserve equal treatment under the law.

PS: You can find more of my posts on this subject here and here.

I totally dropped the ball on Easter

Time for another round of mommy confessions. This time, I have to confess that I haven't even given a second thought to Easter until like right now. I think I've had a mental block that it's coming up, and I blame the stupid &@#!% cold weather. To me, Easter=Spring, and it most definitely doesn't feel like spring here in central NC. This time last year, my daffodils were in bloom and we were rocking the t-shirts (thanks, Timehop app for rubbing it in, ha!). At least we don't have snow like so many others, but this is not Easter weather.

So this is where I start to freak out. I don't have a single thing for the baskets, haven't stuffed plastic eggs for Lorelai's party at school this week, haven't bought dye or even planned any time to decorate eggs, haven't thought up clues for the annual Easter morning egg treasure hunt...Oh my. And honestly, my work schedule is so busy this week I'm not sure if I'll have time to run out and shop. I really don't know what I'm going to do and I'm so mad at myself for not planning ahead.

And we literally just now (as I'm typing--Adam's on the phone) figured out who's hosting dinner. Thankfully, Adam's parents volunteered this year because as much as I loved having it at our house last year, right now our house is a total sty and our yard is a complete overgrown mess with not a flower in sight. So bad.

Andplusalso? Which dress am I going to choose for Lorelai to wear? Gah!


If only this were my biggest dilemma right now... Sigh. But at least we already have a dress for her, thanks to hand-me-downs from my sister!


I need to seriously get my butt in gear. Not cool, Becky. This is one of the holidays for the memory books (in my mind) so I want to make it special and memorable with lovely traditions and good family memories.

Linking up with Heather and Megan:

$20 in my pocket...

The boys have been loving listening to Thrift Shop by Macklemore every time it comes on the radio. Lorelai even randomly says "20 dollars in my pocket, Mommy." It's really cute--I just hope they never realize what colorful adjective he uses (that obviously gets bleeped out on radio play) to describe how awesome it is...:)

So they were pretty amused when I told them that I went thrift shopping and got some stuff for them with $20 in my pocket. $15.55, to be exact. I got 2 pairs of jeans for Aidan and a pair of shorts for Lorelai. But best of all? I scored this sleeping bag for $8!


It's so thick and nice, and extra long...and reversible!

The boys each have a sleeping bag they've had out recently since a sleepover at Grandma and Grandpa's, so finding this was perfect timing. Now Lorelai has one of her own and they don't have to share. She was so excited to play in it, she could hardly wait for it to get out of the wash. They set up their bags for a mini "slumber party" during story time tonight, and we're already planning another one for the morning.



Goodwill for the win! (Again and again.)

PS: I'm pretty sure Macklemore made thrifting cool. There was a tween shopping with her mom, and a group of high school boys were leaving as I got there.

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The other injuries

While we've never had an ER visit for any of the kids up until this weekend, it's not quite accurate to say that we've been accident-free up until then.

In July 2009 when Logan was 3.5, he somehow fell off a bike and into the bike petal at daycare and basically had a puncture wound right next to his eye. The director called me in a panic because she just assumed he needed stitches and just knew I'd need to get him to a doctor right away. It was gross and scary because it was a gaping wound so close to his eye, so I admit to freaking out a little lot.



I took him straight to urgent care where they cleaned him up, but they almost sent us to the ER for stitches, since urgent care doesn't do the sedation required on pediatric patients when stitches are required. Fortunately, they were able to use dermabond (lots and lots of it) to close the wound, so our ER bullet was dodged that time.

Almost a year later when Aidan was in kindergarten, he was playing outside and gashed his scalp open on a nail (or something??) underneath the playset. His teacher called me in a panic because she couldn't get it to stop bleeding. By the time I got there, the bleeding had mostly subsided and I got him right to urgent care where he got two staples in his head to close the gash. After the incident with Logan, I wasn't quite as freaked out over this wound, since Aidan was a bit older, not super upset about it, and I just know that scalps tend to bleed a lot even on fairly minor wounds. Calm Mommy award goes to me on that one. :) It still turned my stomach to look at it, though.

But Lorelai still wins the dubious prize for causing the biggest parental freakout (I guess she wins that award x2 if you count the pregnancy scare I had...little stinker!) because of the nature of her injury and the unknown that's involved with head injuries. As much as I cringe to think about blood, etc., I'll take a superficial wound over possible brain damage any day.

But note to the universe: that is most definitely NOT a request for more injuries. Let's see if we can go at least another 2.5 years before we see another ER or urgent care. I need time to replenish my insurance health fund after what I'm sure will be a large ER bill...

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Never a dull moment

Given the perspective that Saturday gave me, I'm not really complaining, believe me. But it just seems like there's a lot more crazy and not as much lazy going on over here. And what happened last week, on top of the school issue we've been stressing about + the scare with Lorelai, just adds to the list of crazy.

With the stress from the parent/teacher conference on Thursday, I was in no mood to cook (reality check—I've just been plain old terrible about meal planning lately), so we took the kids out to Chick-fil-a for a celebratory "We're proud of you, Aidan" and "Yay for the end of the school quarter" meal. Good times.



Then we headed over to Sweet Frog for some FroYo to continue to celebration and family fun. More good times. And for the record, I'm still kind of dreaming about my mango/original tart swirl with strawberry and mango poppers, white chocolate chips, coconut sprinkles and mochi (what is that stuff anyway?!) despite what happened next.



We got the kids bathed and in bed, and relaxed on the couch watching tv for a while. Then we went to bed, and before I could even fully fall asleep, Lorelai cried out. Adam got her and yelled for me to help when he realized that she had thrown up all over herself and her bed. Whomp whomp.

Adam got her bed changed and I got her all cleaned up as best as I could—she wouldn't get in the tub so I did what I could with a soapy washcloth and shampoo in the ends of her hair over the sink (a huge PITA, btw). Got her all dressed and back in bed, but she didn't stay asleep. She called out to me so I came in her room to rock her some more. And that's when she threw up all.over.me. I had a small blanket that I tried to use to um...contain it, but I already had it all over the side of my face, neck, shirt and hands. Decidedly NOT good times.

Another massive cleanup ensued and she finally laid down and was good for the rest of the night. She never had a fever and was perfectly fine in the morning, so it must have been something she ate that her stomach disagreed with. But suffice it to say that Chick-fil-a and Sweet Frog definitely lost some of their appeal the minute it was thrown up onto my face. (You're welcome for that image. "You know you're a mom when"...amiright?)

Anyway, I'm just sayin'...I could totally use a bit of down time in between some of these more "intense" events (I know, perspective. Things could be so much worse, and for that I'm thankful). A few dull moments might be nice. ☺ But then again, I'm a parent, what can I expect?! Ha!

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First ER visit

Most definitely not a good parenting milestone, but one for the memory books nonetheless: we made our first ever trip to the ER as parents this weekend. Ironically, 8.5 years into parenting with two older boys, and Lorelai is the one who finally broke our ER-free streak. :(

After her bath on Saturday night, she was running from the bathroom to our bed at full speed with her towel wrapped around her, and tripped over a shirt on the floor. Her forehead broke her fall into our metal bed frame.

 

This was a few hours and LOTS of ice later. Thank goodness
for the ice because the swelling was SO much worse initially.

I was only a few steps behind her, so I pulled her up immediately and literally saw a dent in her forehead that was black with an immediate bruise. And then it started to swell, BAD. Adam immediately ran downstairs to get some ice, and I frantically screamed at him to hurry because it was huge and purple with a now bloody dent in the middle. It was horrifying.

Adam was beside himself with panic, and we were both legitimately worried she'd cracked her skull based on how hard she fell and how bad it looked. He freaked the freak out (I'm not criticizing. I get it, really) and called 911 for an ambulance before I could convince him we could just drive her to the ER on our own since she was concious and breathing and the blood wasn't bad. So he hung up on 911 (duh! you don't do that ever!) but when they called back, I told them we didn't need it.

Aidan had just gotten out of the shower when this all happened so he walked in to our room to see two frantic parents, and a screaming baby sister with a nasty head injury, so he proceeded to freak the freak out as well. Poor thing was crying so bad, he could barely figure out what clothes to put on.

As we were scrambling to get Lorelai's clothes on, I dialed my mom and handed to phone to Logan so I could finish getting her dressed while Adam held the ice on her. For some reason, Logan took the phone to Aidan who was incoherent (my mom thought it was me crying--I can only imagine the terrible thoughts going through her head with a phone call like that) but I was able to tell her the situation and get her to meet us ASAP at the ER so she could take the boys.

With Adam yelling things like skull fracture, brain damage and brain bleed, it's understandable why Aidan was so worked up and Logan was kind of in shock (I don't think he cried, he just got very quiet). As I begged Adam to calm down, I kept repeating to the kids (poor sweet Lorelai included) that everything was going to be ok. I was saying it out loud for myself as much as anyone else, because I don't think I've ever been that panicked (not including in-utero scares) as a parent that something was wrong. Although I'm still amazed that I was the calm one in this scenario, for the record.

It didn't take much more than 20/25 minutes to get to the ER, but Lorelai was pretty lethargic during the ride, although she was never unresponsive. This was very scary, because even though it was her bedtime, she's never that tired at 7:30 at night. Adam kept telling her to stay awake and she would quietly mumble "ok Daddy." Meanwhile, in the back, Aidan was still crying a little, but Logan was rubbing on his arm to comfort him.

My mom was already waiting outside the ER when we pulled up, so she took the boys home right away. She later told me that Aidan had trouble getting the bad thoughts out of his head to go to sleep. :(

Thankfully, we didn't have to wait long to be seen, and not long after, Lorelai started to perk up. Her pupils looked good and she was chatting almost happily about the Nickelodeon shows they put on while we waited. She kept saying her head hurt and wanted to go home, but wouldn't lay down, because "that's not my bed."

Both the resident and pediatric specialist agreed she was fine--no concussion (she never lost consciousness) or any other kind of brain injury (fun fact: apparently brain bleeds are uncommon in children in falls like this), and they were even pleasantly surprised that the wound didn't even need surgical glue as they originally suspected.

 

The nurse put the numbing cream on this cotton ball and said it
looked like she was growing a unicorn horn. Lorelai liked that :)

They numbed her for a while then cleaned her wound and all she needed was some steri-strips and a band-aid. And a grape popscicle, of course. Absolutely necessary to the healing process. :)

We were home by 10:30pm and she slept soundly until almost 7:45am, at which point she was reunited with two boys who were VERY happy to see that their girl was ok. And who were very willing to take it easy with her and do their best to try to convince her to take it easy for the whole day--a tough thing to do with an active 2.5 year old!

Going in for some hugs. Lots of love and snuggles all around on Sunday.

Of course, in hindsight, part of me questioned going in the first place, thinking we freaked out over nothing. But the resident put my mind at ease saying we did the right thing and he would have done the same if it were his child. Even though ERs aren't cheap, that peace of mind was priceless, since we couldn't see into her brain to know she was okay in the same way we could look at a simple wound. That's why the doctors get paid the big bucks, I guess. :)

As traumatizing as that was for all of us, I know that it could have been SO much worse. I keep having flashbacks and thinking that if she had been just inches off, she could have broken her nose or her teeth. But she's clearly a tough girl--probably tougher than either of her parents were about the whole situation! And very lucky.

In fact, this minor crisis showed me how lucky we ALL are. Lorelai is lucky to have a doting father who would have moved heaven and earth to get her to the hospital faster, if he could. She's lucky to have two older brothers who care so deeply about her. Aidan's lucky to have a brother like Logan who instinctively comforted him when he was upset. We're lucky to have my mom so close and so willing to drop everything to be there for us. And I'm beyond lucky to have an amazing family so filled with love. I couldn't stand it if something happened to any one of them.

The conference.

(...the saga continues)

I shouldn't have been so hopeful. The conference didn't go well. And I cried.

Basically, she fully believed that Aidan deserved a D, from the simple fact that he didn't do well on his oral presentation. Completely despite the fact that his visual presentation was "excellent." Unreasonable? I think so.

She insisted that the whole point of the project was the presentation, which wasn't at all clear based simply on the criteria in the rubric. Only the last criteria mentions the oral presentation, so there was no way to know how heavily it would be weighted. She said if we had questions about the rubric, we should have asked. But I didn't know to ask, since the rubric was clear in my mind! Would anyone else have known based on the rubric or the project information sheet that the whole point was the oral presentation?




Apparently, she docked extra points on his rubric on what I assumed to be the criteria for the written component for lack of facts and lack of organization just because he didn't communicate those facts orally from memory (she kept saying he had to look at his slides). And she didn't believe he spent time on rehearsing, even though she admitted the facts were there in the written work, and it was very organized.

Aside from that, I tried to reason with her that the overall score he got on his rubric of a 3 out of 4 is NOT the same as a 75%/D, so the way she applied the rubric was incorrect (thanks to some helpful advice from a teacher friend on the dangers of applying letter grades to 4-point rubrics: http://www.phschool.com/eteach/professional_development/four-point_rubric_score/essay.html, FYI). On a 4-point scale, a 3 indicates an acceptable level of achievement, whereas a 75%/D does not.

But she wouldn't even consider it. I truly wonder if she believes students who got a 3 on every single criteria, including their oral presentation, all deserve a D as well.

Adam got mad and I got all flustered and upset, and didn't get the answers I wanted or expected. She didn't tell me the class average or show me any example of A quality work...but I guess comparing written presentations wouldn't have mattered since she didn't care about them much. I'm now kicking myself that I couldn't go see him and his classmates present to compare for myself.

So I guess that's that. Nothing I can do about it now, except explain to Aidan that I'm proud of his work, and we'll help him practice even harder for his next presentation.

Tough lesson learned, I guess...but we'll move on.

 

It's ok buddy, only 9 more weeks of school until 4th
grade...um, where things will be even harder. Yikes... 


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I confess: I'm that mom. The one who teachers probably hate.

First of all, let me say a big THANK YOU! to everyone who offered support and advice on Aidan's project grade situation from last week. Our conference is on Thursday and I'm nervous because I loathe confrontation, but I'm ready and hopeful. I'll update with how it goes.

Anyway, I've realized that this debacle is not the first time I've had a problem with the way Aidan's teacher grades, so I'm pretty sure I've pissed her off. :(

First, it was Wordly Wise test questions being marked wrong when they weren't. This was on two different tests that I saw, but who knows what else I missed before I knew to look more closely.

Then it was the grade he got on his last project after their unit on The Mouse and the Motorcycle book. It was a cool project--he had to create a house for Ralph the mouse to live in and write a persuasive letter describing why the house, our house and our city would be a good place to live. He accidentally left the date off his letter which I fully accept was irresponsible, but the rest was very well-written and thought out.

Turns out, each of the five parts of a friendly letter (date, greeting, body, closing and signature) were all worth 10 points equally to make up 50% of the project grade (the actual house was another 50, and he got full points for it). Now, a 90 on a project doesn't upset me in and of itself, but the fact that the date was worth as much as the entire body of the letter is just wrong and goes against the entire spirit of the project.

Based on that rubric, someone could have written a totally off-topic/crappy letter (or not written anything!) and gotten the same grade as Aidan. Not cool! I brought it up with the teacher via email and politely requested that she reconsider taking a full 10 points off. She agreed, and ended up only deducting 5pts.

So I guess I have to confess that apparently I'm that mom. The pain in the teacher's ass, the one who's all up in her business making sure my kid is being treated fairly and getting what he needs/deserves with his education. I'm not trying to be difficult on purpose and I don't think my concerns or requests are unreasonable, but I can totally see why I may not be her favorite parent. But if his parents aren't going to be his advocate and champion, who will?

Please tell me I'm not the only one like that? And that it's not a bad thing?




PS. For the record, I never had to say a negative word to Aidan's kindergarten or second grade teacher. Or Logan's kindergarten teacher (yet) for that matter. There was that one issue with Aidan's first grade teacher, but it's not like annoying teachers is my hobby.

Linking up with Heather and Megan:

A school issue and a second opinion

Aidan's big 3rd grade project for this quarter was a report on a famous African-American inventor. He chose Lonnie Johnson, and using the template provided by his teacher, he created a mock Facebook page with lots of information, after lots of research on Aidan's part. He spent a lot of time googling and reading and then (with some guidance and prompting from me, but not a ton) came up with various pieces of information to put into the template. It's actually a really cool project idea, although at first glance it seemed a little advanced for 3rd grade--what happened to a simple poster?! Here's what he came up with.







I was really proud of the work he did--summarizing what he read, paraphrasing, figuring out what he could put where, choosing images all on his own, doing the vast majority of cutting/pasting/re-sizing/formatting (he's now well-versed in the right-click/copy/paste special, ctrl-c, ctrl-v and ctrl-z!). I did help with some of the more complicated formatting issues and I helped some by typing the words he dictated to me. But in large, the work is his.

Maybe I'm biased (ok, I am, but still...), maybe I'm out of touch with expectations of freaking 3rd graders, but I'm PISSED that he got a 75 on this project. Please, someone give me a second opinion.


"...but little information on Lonnie himself" What?!?!?

Does this project look like it:

• Shows very few details about the inventor or his/her discovery. Does not go beyond basic information. (2 out of 4 on the rubric)
• Shows little organization. Very little time was spent on the project. Very few details are mentioned. Some difficulty interpreting information. (also 2 out of 4)

He also got a 1 out of 4 on his Oral presentation. I don't know otherwise because I wasn't there, but the criteria for a 1 on the rubric says "No understanding of written information. Unable to hear or understand information."

Aidan prepared notecards and practiced several times over the weekend before his presentation so I have a hard time swallowing that 1. Maybe he did mumble or read a bit too much from his slides, but I know he had a good grasp on who Lonnie Johnson is and what he's famous for. He did way too much research for that not to show at all. For this one, I'm mostly just sad that none of the practice Aidan did at home translated to his actual presentation. Maybe he got nervous, I don't know. He thought he did well, but his teacher said he couldn't answer many of the questions she asked without looking at his presentation. Is it really realistic to expect an 8-year-old to recite an entire presentation of facts from memory? That's a real question. Are most 3rd graders capable of that?

My momma bear instinct is raging right now, and I cried along with him when he came home today with this grade. Granted, I'm an overachiever by nature and rarely got bad grades myself (nerd alert!) so I cringe when I see grades like this. But if I thought Aidan truly did subpar work and deserved this grade, I wouldn't be nearly as worked up. Well I would, but for a different reason. I'd be more disappointed in myself that I didn't provide enough oversight or guidance to make sure he did well. But I did this time. And he really tried. And learned. And it looks good, damnit!

I really do welcome any and all opinions. If my mom-bias has clouded my judgement, please let me know. I want to go into the conference with his teacher next week with a clear head and realistic expectations.

Wise Words Wednesday: Set the right example

"Set the right example. It will inspire others."

How appropriate that this was my fortune today (one of many, since I've been eating fortune cookies from the PF Changs catering like they're going out of style...).

This weekend, we hit up the Bojangles drive through for some biscuits. We rarely pay in cash anymore, but we did this time because we needed to make change. I handed Adam the change and had him count it to make sure we didn't get shorted. Turns out, the cashier had given us an extra $20 in change. I made Adam count it twice just to make sure, but before we pulled away, we handed her the extra $20 back. She kind of looked at us like we were crazy, but I'm sure she was grateful.

The boys asked why we gave the money back. Logan actually reasoned that we could have bought the Skylanders figure they had their eye on at Target. We explained to them that it wasn't our money, and it basically would have been like taking it from the cashier who probably would have had to pay it out of her meager paycheck when her drawer came up short.

We said that it was the right thing to do, and if we were the ones who accidentally gave someone too much money, wouldn't we hope they'd do the right thing and give it back? They agreed.

It was a good teachable moment we kind of lucked into (parenting win!) and I really hope Aidan and Logan take it to heart.

PS: another one of my fortunes was this oddly specific and utterly wrong one. But no, I will not let it shake my faith in the power of the almighty fortune cookie wisdom. Especially not after the most appropriate fortune ever. ☺

Let sleeping babies lie

Kids are such angels when they're sleeping, am I right? Even though they're older now, I always love to go in and give my sleeping boys a kiss and make sure they're still nicely tucked in. And breathing. Yes, I still check.

Naturally I want to do the same for my sweet girl, but I confess: there was a long period of time where I didn't actually go into her room to check on her.



At one point last year (maybe more than once? It all runs together in my mind), Lorelai went through a phase where she was such a light sleeper that she'd wake up even if I just barely and almost silently cracked the door to her room to check on her before I went to bed. It was like she sensed my presence.

It got to the point where I'd literally press my ear against the door to try to hear her breathing and whisper "I love you" through the door crack (to no one but me), instead of going through the hassle (for both of us) of getting her back to sleep. It wasn't as simple as just throwing the covers on her and leaving the room. If she woke up, she needed to have a full snuggle/lullaby rocking session before she'd lay back down. And while I didn't always mind it (sleepy baby snuggles are awesome), I didn't want her to get in the habit of waking up every night, and requiring me to put her back to sleep.

So I just let the sleeping baby lie, and trusted that she was covered enough and comfy enough to have a good night sleep. We've never had a video monitor, so it was a bit of a leap of faith for me. Checking on my kids at night is so much more for my peace of mind than theirs. Not gonna lie, it was tough at first.

But thankfully, she's outgrown that phase (knock on wood). If she happens to stir, she easily rolls back over to sleep, so now I'm free to go in and gaze at her sleeping peacefully. I missed it so much.

Linking up with Heather and Megan: