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Happy Blistering, Sweltering, Melt Your Face Off Father’s Day

June 21, 2010 by Kelli

We celebrated Dad yesterday. It was a day meant for eating, sleeping and watching golf, just how Dad likes it. And so we ate, we slept, we watched golf and we enjoyed the day together as a unit. We missed being with our own fathers – two men who are the hero’s that Lee and I look up to with all the esteem that can be given to men of wisdom and stature such as they are. Without either of them in town, Father’s Day seemed a bit lacking this year. But we still enoyed our time together doing what we love to do – playing together.

Of course, what better way to celebrate Father’s Day than to watch the US Open together? And as we watched, Lee got the itch to go hit golf balls. I wanted nothing more than to support his desire to do just that – but I also didn’t want to be left alone with the kids who were threatening my sanity, so we packed everyone up in our (rockin’ hot) minivan and trekked to the driving range. And under the sweltering, blistering sun, we made a memory.

Or, as Landon put it, “We hit da baw hawd.”

This smile comes from hitting the ball past the 75 yard marker.

I really, seriously, truly, madly and deeply love this family of mine.

Filed Under: Family, Kids, Landon, Lee, Life, Sloan, summer fun, Tia Tagged With: Dad playing golf, Father's Day 2010, Kids playing golf, US Open 2010

Just call me MacGyver

June 18, 2010 by Kelli

Alternately titled: Why I owe them some Kotex

Thursday’s are our crazy days. A week’s worth of activities are packed into one afternoon and it requires me to be organized in order for things to run smoothly. Me. Organized. Those two words next to one another are a bit of an oxymoron. In fact, I recently wrote up a product review and giveaway for 5 Minutes for Mom in which I lament my organizational capabilities and I now have three calendars in my kitchen trying to help me stay on top of life.

They’re not really working, if you must know. There’s this funny little phenomenon wherein you must actually look at the calendar ahead of time in order to know what you’ve got planned for the day. Weird, huh?

So yesterday we tore out of the house at 4:35 to try and make it to Tia’s Russian class at 4:45 on time. At 4:32 I remembered I needed to pack a dinner because we would go straight from the kids russian lessons to Sloan’s baseball practice. So I threw some rolls, a few bananas, a package of ham and a chunk of banana bread in a plastic bag and off we went.

About 25 minutes before the end of the kids lessons, Landon grabbed my face and pulled it down to his. “I pooped,” he whispered. He didn’t need to tell me – the smell gave it away. It smelled like death – warm death…you get the point.

And then I realized…I had forgotten a back up diaper. I went out to the car to see if maybe, by God’s sweet grace, there was a diaper under a seat. No luck. And the smell was getting worse. Let’s just say Landon had a bit of a stomach ache yesterday. This hadn’t been the first, or even second, dirty diaper of the day. It was foul.

So I took him to the bathroom in the church building where russian school meets and began coming up with a plan. I swept my eyes around the sterile lavatory, trying to decide what I could do to remedy the situation until I had the chance to get a diaper. Toilet paper and paper towls – surely I could come up with a reasonable solution using those materials. Blast! If only I had some scotch tape and a paper clip!

I looked to my right and noticed on the wall were three small white cabinets. I decided to look inside and see if perhaps there might be a diaper in there – I know, I was reaching. The situation was getting desperate.

I opened the first cabinet and found the jackpot – a large supply of Depends and Kotex. Perfect. I stripped Landon of the death wrap around his bum and cleaned him up, then grabbed a Depends and stuck it on the inside of his shorts. But it wouldn’t stick. In case you’re wondering, Depends are not very sticky on the bottom…just an FYI in case you ever need them. Ahem.

So I grabbed two Kotex, pulled the stickers off the back and wrapped them around his waist, connecting them to the Depends to form somewhat of a diaper. Unfortunately this meant they were stuck to his skin which was uncomfortable and made him walk like a mini-Sumo wrestler for the remainder of our time at Russian school. I then hastily sent Lee a text asking him to bring us a diaper to baseball practice.

And that, folks, is how I have officially become the MacGyver of Mommydom. (MomGyver, if you will)

*groan*

The end.

Filed Under: Family, funny stuff that happens, Kids, Landon, Motherhood Tagged With: MacGyver Mom, Mom's being resourceful, Motherhood

I didn’t know, but now I do

June 15, 2010 by Kelli

I was fifteen when I told my mom that I fully expected to have all boys someday. “Why do you say that?” she asked as she pulled away from the movie theater where I had just finised watching Wesley Snipes slay the bad guys in Passenger 57 (I don’t know why I remember this detail so vividly yet for the life of me I could not remember scheduling a dentist appointment for myself this morning…).

“Because no matter how hard I try, I somehow seem to always end up alone with all the guys.” I said this as if it were a curse. But it seemed to me at the time to be true. Looking back on it, I see more clearly what happened. Yes, a large group of people were invited to see Passenger 57. Yes, both girls and guys were included in the invite. Yes, all of the other girls were smart enough to decline knowing that two hours of Wesley Snipes trapped on an airplane with terrorists sounded about as exciting as a jellyfish sting.

Ah, but in my youth I felt that it was nothing more than a sign from the universe that I was destined to be the mother of a motley crue of little men since I was obviously so inclined to be surrounded by them at all times.

Fast forward six years to my courtship with Lee when I found out the he was one of three boys, his father was one of two boys, his grandfather had all brothers and so on and so on. For five generations this was the pattern. Tucked in there somewhere was a cousin who had a little girl after three or four boys. Needless to say, the Stuart men possess an abundance of the Y-Chromosome. And this seemed to only further confirm what I thought I already knew – I was destined to be the mother of all boys.

I was really okay with this. I didn’t much care. Until, that is, someone made the comment that Stuart’s can’t make girls and that “hopefully I was okay with all boys”. Well, I was but now I had a challenge and in my stubborn little heart I determined that I would create a girl out of sheer willpower.

(I wonder if that is why I was given the most stubborn little girl on planet Earth? Huh…)

I am always careful not to minimize the blessing of a family full of boys. There is a prevailing thought amongst society that somehow a family can’t be complete unless both genders are represented in the children. While I will agree there are specific blessings that come with girls that are different from boys, I wouldn’t go so far as to say that had Tia been of the male persuasion I would have felt any less satisfied or enamored with that child. All boys, all girls or one of each, the fact is kids are an enormous blessing.

But I must say that there are a couple of things about having a girl that melt my heart. They are things I didn’t know I would love. Like cooking with my daughter and wearing matching aprons while we do it. I didn’t know I would love that so much.

But now I do.

Or the simple delight that takes over her face when I ask her to help me make dinner:

I didn’t know I would love that…but now I do.

Of course the boys love to help me cook too. But there is a different feeling that sweeps over me when Tia and I cook together. It’s marked by the fact that deep down I know our cooking together is preparing her to one day cook for her own family. It is more than fun, it is a mission and I feel deeply honored to share that with her.

I didn’t know I’d feel that way…but now I do.

I didn’t know how much fun it would be to see a little girl dressed in tights and leg warmers prance around a room:

I didn’t know what it would do to my heart to have my daughter ask me to help her with gymnastics. I liken it to the swell of pride Lee feels when the boys ask him to play basketball or baseball with them.

I didn’t know how my insides would melt and flow out my ears every time she crawled up into her daddy’s lap and his eyes turned all starry. I just didn’t know.

But now I do.

Of course, I also didn’t know that little boys, when they belong to you, have the ability to make you love playing ball, talking Star Wars and searching for worms in a way you never thought possible.

I didn’t know this…

But now? Now I do.

Filed Under: Family, Kids, Landon, Motherhood, Sloan, Tia Tagged With: Daughters, Little Girls, Motherhood, parenting

Take me out to the ball game

June 14, 2010 by Kelli

Pretend that these pictures are from Sloan’s first game of the season. Let’s pretend that this wasn’t the first time I actually remembered to bring my camera with the memory card in it. Let’s pretend that I’m much more organized than that and that I would never actually forget to put the memory card in my camera until the season was half over.

Nope not me. I would never do that. Enjoy photos from Sloan’s, ahem, first ball game.

Sloan is the only player on his team with a groupie. We can’t decide if we should change Landon’s nickname from Bubba to Mini-Sloan because he wants nothing more than to be exactly like his big brother. This means that whenever he can get his hands on Sloan’s uniform, he wants it on.

It may possibly be the cutest thing I’ve ever seen…

Play Ball!

Filed Under: Family, funny stuff that happens, Kids, Kids do the darndest things, Landon, Sloan, summer fun Tagged With: Kids Baseball, Sloan

Girl and Boy Become Man and Wife

June 11, 2010 by Kelli

It is time to tell you the rest of the story. Grab a steaming cup of hot tea, will you. Sit back, kick up your heels and prepare to swoon. Get your lungs ready because you’re going to heave a sigh of utter contentment in a few moments…

Okay, this story isn’t that great. I might be exaggerating slightly. My wedding was hardly a fairy tale. There were no fluffy white bunnies who tied bows in my hair. Tiny sparrows did not flit about my head whistling in perfect harmony. Clothes-wearing mice did not sew my glistening white wedding gown and my groom did not break out in song when I walked down the isle (just the thought of that makes me laugh).

All of that would have been cool (except the mice part; clothes or no clothes, I don’t like those furry little creatures), but that is not what the day held for me. It was, however, in the immortal words of Mary Poppins herself, “Practically perfect in every way.” I was ready to marry the boy. For eight months I had been his fiancee. I wanted to be his wife. I was ready to be a Mrs. I wanted to walk down the isle on my dad’s arm and say “I do.”

And I did.

I am blessed cursed with plenty of neuroses. But one thing I am not is a girly girl or a perfectionist. This makes planning a wedding very, very easy. I bought the first dress I tried on, because I loved it. I tried on a few more, but I knew right away that the first one was it. It was me. It was simple, elegant and comfortable. I also knew from past experience that I wanted to look natural. I’m not a heavy make up person, because I’m well aware of the fact that too much make up makes me look like a child who played in her mama’s bathroom cabinets. If I attempt the smokey eye I don’t look elegant so much as I strongly resemble a two cent hooker.

And I’d had enough up-do’s in my school dance days to know that my hair in a French Twist makes me look like an ’80’s era creature from Alienation.

I like Daisy’s and Lilies, and I like photographs…and lots of them. So the photographer and the florist were easy decisions to nail down. I didn’t want anything elaborate. I just wanted comfort and familiarity because as much as I wanted to marry the boy and as excited as I was to become his wife, I also wanted to be surrounded by the comforts of simplicty. It made the idea of marriage seem less daunting.

So I stuck with my simple hair, my simple make up and my simple dress. My simple flowers, my lots of pictures, my simple hors de veurs and wedding cake (none of that nasty raspberry filling stuff – nope, white cake, white icing…the way the angels like it). But I felt anything but simple and ordinary. I felt as if I had been adorned by woodland creatures and singing cherubs. I felt…like a Princess.

To be honest, I remember few details about the day of my wedding. I know I was up early all jittery and happy. I know I had my hair done and my bridesmaids (all nine of them) had breakfast with me. I don’t know what time we headed to the church or where everyone got dressed. I do remember my grandmother making me laugh out loud at some point.

“Kelli,” she said, “I heard that you and all of your bridesmaids are wearing thongs today.”

“Uh…Mimi! What?! I…maybe. I haven’t asked them…”

She stared back at me completely confused. And my mom burst out laughing. “They don’t call them thongs anymore, Mom,” she said. “And yes, all the girls are wearing flip flops.”

Sweet Mimi.

I was a bit of a traditionalist when it came to my wedding. I didn’t want to see the boy before the ceremony, I wanted the Wedding March played when I walked in and I wanted hymns sung during the ceremony. Somehow that just seemed right to me. And it all went off without a hitch.

Well…except for the tears. I’ve told you about my penchant toward crying. I don’t get the cute little single tear drop that streams down the cheek like you see in the movies. Oh no…I cry like an ugly gopher. And if I try to hold the tears in I end up bursting like the Hoover Dam.

So mid-way through the minister asking who would give this woman to marry this man, I broke. And I was mic’ed. Then I tried to laugh to cover it up, which only made me sound a bit like a machine gun filled with snot balls. A blushing bride, I was not.

But sobby sobberson’s aside, the ceremony itself was beautiful. My uncle and my high school youth minister, two of the most unorthodox, craziest men in ministry I’ve ever known, led the service and they injected the right amount of humor and sweetness to balance out my crazy. The music was sweet, the boy was sweet (and terribly, terribly handsome in his tux with tails. Oy!) And it ended with me becoming Mrs. Lee Stuart. A name I was happy to take on and I am even more proud to bear today, nearly ten years later.

After what seemed forever in photographs (We had a wedding party of eighteen! We’re not good at narrowing down…) we hopped in our limo and headed off to the reception where we had one heck of a party and a huge surprise waiting for us.

To be continued…

Read the rest of the story here.

Filed Under: blast from the past, Blogging, Family, Lee, Life, Marriage Tagged With: Lee and Kelli Stuart, Love Story, Wedding plans, Wedding Story

Bits and Pieces

June 10, 2010 by Kelli

Yesterday was the big day. Landon got his cast removed. I’ve never had a cast before, but I imagine that had my arm been wrapped in plastic for almost a month I would want to bend and straighten my elbow over and over and rub my hand up and down my arm like he did. It was really adorable. He seemed quite thrilled with his ability to once again move his arm. He now has a removeable splint that he’s supposed to wear while he’s playing (so essentially all day long) for the next month.

Right. Good luck with that. He’s already figured out how to take it off.

I had to take all three kids with me to have his cast removed. I was worried. But they did great. They didn’t freak out when the saw was turned on and niether one of them asked if they could have a cast put on.

I cleaned out the bins of old clothes in the basement yesterday. I filled four oversized garbage bags to be dropped off at Goodwill and a fifth garbage bag filled with clothes that had apparently been home to our mouse family last year. Do you know what it does to someone like me to have to stick her hand in a bin that has obviously harbored small furry creatures? I’m surprised I didn’t go into cardiac arrest. I kept expecting little zombie mice to start crawling out of the box and up my arms. I didn’t even try to see if any of the clothes were salvagable. I just dumped them in the trash bag.

*shudder*

Lee and I are still attempting to keep up with P90X. The workouts themselves, while hard, are not that bad. Finding the time to do them, however, if proving to be a bit of a challenge. I can only get up at 5:00 AM so many days before I turn into crazy-psycho-needs-some-sleep mommy. I figure I’m of better use to my kids awake and alert but slightly flabby than super fit and walking in my sleep.

And finally, to cap off this most random of posts, I will let you know that it appears someone got a hold of my new camera yesterday and took several pictures. I’m not going to name any names, but the evidence is compelling.

To read my latest post for STL Family Life, click the tab on the right or right here.

Filed Under: funny stuff that happens, Kids, Kids do the darndest things, Landon, Life, Motherhood, Random, Sloan, Tia Tagged With: Funny Kids, Kids and Cameras, Kids and Casts, P90X, STL Family Life

I’m looking for Jiminy Cricket

June 8, 2010 by Kelli

Disney makes it look so easy. You wish upon a falling star and anything your heart desires will come to you. But even Jiminy Cricket realized that it took more than wishing for a dream to come true. You have to listen to your heart and follow. Let your conscience be your guide.

Of course, I try not to take theological guidance or direction from an animated cricket, but I do believe there is a nugget of truth buried in there. But from my point of view as a believer, I believe my Jiminy Cricket my conscience to be the Holy Spirit. It is this still small Voice, the Voice of God Himself, that I must listen to. And it is this still small Voice that I often ignore, or worse yet, simply don’t hear at all.

Life is noisy. Bills, responsibilities, work, commitments – all of these contribute to the noise. And sometimes the noise gets so loud that it’s difficult to hear the Voice. But there are moments when the Voice breaks through the noise. Usually these moments are relatively quiet moments – in the still of the morning, or late at night, when the noise of life is in a brief slumber. It’s in those moments that I’m reminded that wishing upon a star is not really going to get me far. I might need to get up and start walking toward the star instead.

Lately, Lee and I have felt stirrings within us. The moments come at different times for each of us, but the thoughts, dreams and ideas are the same. Some of the stirrings require small, but meaningful, planning and action on our parts. For those of you that know Lee and I well you know that planning isn’t, ahem, our strong suit. We tend to fly by the seats of our pants and, while we always have the best of intentions, this means that many big plans get dropped along the way. We’re working on this.

Other stirrings, however, will require a significant amount of prayer, hard work, diligence and faith. And the faith part? It’s a doozy. I have personally never been much of a skeptic. Faith, in it’s simplest form, comes fairly easy to me. I’m not one to question or doubt. In some ways, this is a very good trait. But other times I have to remind myself that it’s necessary to think critically and not operate on blind faith. In other words, I sometimes have to make myself question the concept of faith so that I can better defend my faith. If that makes any sense at all….

All that to say, some of the stirrings within my own soul require a depth of faith that I haven’t yet grasped. A complete, life altering, Here Am I Lord type of faith. It’s the type of faith that may require me to be uncomfortable. I may have to sacrifice some of my comforts. I might even need to let go of some dreams and desires.

Can I do it?

I recently read this post from Shawn Groves. It only further spoke to my already softening heart. If my life were a home movie, what would it look like? Hmmm…

So I’m not being totally cryptic, we’re not considering selling all our possessions and moving to far east Siberia to live in a cabin and start a slavic revival. No need to worry! We are, however, trying to open ourselves up to the What If’s.

What if God called us to far east Siberia?

What if God called us to serve in missions?

What if God called us to go serve a meal to the homeless in downtown St. Louis?

What if God called us to adopt a child?

What if God called us to have another child?

What if God called us to rise in the early hours of the morning and pray over our children instead of sleeping in?

What if God called us to move to small town USA simply to minister to our neighbors?

What if God wants us to stay right where we are and continue to serve those around us quietly and effectively?

What if God wants me to drive my smokin’ hot minivan with pride all the while pouring His Truth’s into my children’s hearts as I shuttle them from here to there?

The bottom line is this: We want to be ready for the What If’s, no matter what they might be. Lee and I each have hopes, dreams, desires and vision. Some of them line up and will be easy to implement – some do not match entirely and will require joint prayer. But we want to stop ignoring the whispers that have grown louder over the past few months. We want to quit talking and start doing. Which takes planning.

*sigh* If only Jiminy Cricket could serve as our family manager…

Filed Under: discipline, Family, Heritage, Lee, Life, Marriage Tagged With: Family and Parenting, Family Planning, Hearing the Holy Spirit, Jiminy Cricket

The Carpenter’s Son

June 7, 2010 by Kelli

On Friday the kids were doing what kids do…fighting.

Well that, and playing outside. At one point I looked out the window and saw Sloan surrounded by several pieces of scrap wood, a hammer, nails, the electric screwdriver and a saw. Um…that seemed like a good moment to go check on them.

“What are you doing, bud?” I asked as I stepped out onto the driveway.

“Oh I’m just making a chair for Tia and me to sit on,” he replied. He balanced a piece of wood precariously on another and raise the hammer high above the tiny nail pinched between his fingers.

“Uh…Sloan?”

“Yeah?” he asked, squinting up at me.

“I think we should wait for daddy to come home before you start hammer nails into boards.”

It took a bit of convicing, but he finally agreed to hold off on smashing his fingers and sawing his arm off. And when Lee got home, Sloan pounced.

“Canwemakeachairdad, IreallyreallyreallywanttomakeachairformeandTiatositin. Pleasepleasepleasepleasepleeeeeaaaase?” Lee agreed to help make a chair…on Saturday morning.

And make a chair they did. When it was all assembled, we threw down a piece of plastic and opened up some cans of leftover paint and let them have at it.

It turned out quite nice:

Yep. We like our new chair…

We like it a lot!

Filed Under: Family, Kids, Landon, Lee, Life, Sloan, summer fun, Tia Tagged With: building with dad, Carpentry, Kids and prjects

As luck would have it

June 4, 2010 by Kelli

Part of my Craig’s List money went toward a minor room redecoration. I never liked the bedding I bought for our king size bed a couple of years ago and last year when we recevied our new furniture it just accented the ugliness of our bedding. So I bought new bedding.

Here’s the thing – I don’t have a decorator’s bone in my body. Which makes the fact that I recently started freelancing for a decorator’s blog slightly humorous, wouldn’t you say? The fact is, I just don’t know how to put together a room. I don’t know what looks good where, how to hang photos, what pieces to use for accents – it’s just not my strong suit. So given that knowledge, I’m pretty proud of the minor changes I made to our bedroom.

Obviously, finding the right bedding was my first goal. As soon as I saw this bedding online, I fell in love with it. I ordered it two months ago and it just arrived yesterday due to back order issues. Just in time for my birthday. Yes, I am 29 AGAIN today. Lee seems to luck out on birthday gifts wouldn’t you say? Last year our furniture happened to arrive the day before my birthday as well.

Remember this?

So here we are, one year later, and my bed is finally outfitted properly.

I also bought new side table lamps since our old ones didn’t match and were not even remotely cute. Behold, the glory of a cute side table lamp:

Many thanks to HomeGoods for being the perfect place for non-decorators like me to shop. And naturally we needed a few accents in the room to pull it all together. Naturally.

Lee’s not overly crazy about the urn. “It’s weird,” he keeps saying. “What’s the purpose?” And I’m all, “Dude, you obviously know nothing about decorating a room…”

Weird urn aside, I like how things are coming together in there. I still need to figure out what to do in one naked corner and I need to re-hang a few pictures that don’t look right and, eventually, I’d like to repaint the walls. But what color? Those are the types of decisions that stress me out.

For now, however, I’m going to rest my head on some cute pillows and let out a sigh of accomplishment because I conquered my fear of redecorating a room!

Now if I could only get my husband to take the suitcases down to the basement as they are totally messing with my Feng Shui.

I feel like I’m living in an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond.

All photos were taken with my new point and shoot, courtesy of my parents. I love my Pentax and the quality of pictures it takes, but the thing is a mammoth and, to be honest, I wasn’t crazy about hauling it around the Zoo with me. It made me nervous. So I’m excited to have a smaller camera that I can stick in my pocket. Thanks Mom and Dad.

Filed Under: Family, funny stuff that happens, Lee, Life, Marriage, Random, shameless self-promotion Tagged With: Decorating a bedroom, Echo Jaipur Bedding

What We’re Up To

June 3, 2010 by Kelli

It’s summertime. And the livin’ is easy…

But I’m not gonna let the livin’ be lazy. My kids get up at the crack of dawn. It’s not unusual for us to be up, fed, dressed and ready for the day by 7:30 – not because I want it to be that way, you see. I would give a limb for them to sleep until 8:00 just once. Heck, I’d be thrilled if they slept until 7:00! So with everyone waking up so early, what on Earth will we do with ourselves all day everyday? This week we started our summer schedule and built in to every weekday is “learning time” from 8:00-9:00.

It looks a little like this:

And Landon usually looks like this because I make him leave the room and play quietly by himself while the older kids work…something he’s not overly fond of.

This time is being spent on their Russian homework, Tia’s English Alphabet (poor girl, we’ve spent so much time on the Russian that she doesn’t know her English letters at all), Sloan working on his summer packet from school, math, reading and writing in their journals. It’s actually going really well. The kids are able to get all of their work out of the way early which frees them up to play the rest of the day.

We set a reading goal for Sloan this summer. If he reads 10 books, we’ll go to Chuck E Cheese. If he reads 20 books, we’ll go to the Magic House. If he reads 35 books in English and 5 books in Russian we will spend the whole day at Six Flags. So far he has completed one book and is chomping at the bit to go to the library to check out new books.

We’ll do that as soon as I pay off our overdue book fines. Ahem…

I think I’m going to like this schedule. It’s tough, for sure. I would much rather let them watch TV all morning so I could play on the computer, but I know this is a more productive way to spend these early morning hours. It means I will have less time to blog, which is probably not a bad thing. It will mean I need to be much more disciplined with my time, which is definately not a bad thing. But it will also mean that I will be able to send Sloan to 1st grade prepared and Tia will finally know the difference between the letter H in English and the letter H (which sounds like N) in Russian. It’s kind of important that I teach her that…

What are your summer plans?

Filed Under: discipline, Family, Kids, Life, Motherhood Tagged With: Kids, summertime, teaching kids