The Mom Life

Wow! The past few weeks have felt like such a blur! What happened to the days of coming home and sitting on the patio while the kids play in the backyard? Yesterday the girls had a dentist appointment. Before we left, I was having a nervous stomach thinking back to the last time I took them. They were both terrified, and you could hardly call Lola's session a "checkup" or a "cleaning." She sat in my lap, squirming and crying. Fabulous. (Carmen is now known for using my sarcastic "fabulous"...ha!) So, yesterday I was SHOCKED at the eagerness Lola showed when she climbed up in that big chair by herself and opened wide to show off her cute little teeth! She LOVED the water squirter and asked for a little extra :-) My favorite part was that Cruz, being the sweet brother that he is, held her hand the entire time! I asked if she needed me to hold her hand, and she told me no! He did the same for Carmen, and our session with the dentist and her

So, I am nearing 30...yikes! I keeep thinking of that movie 13 Going on 30 and thinking, I want to be Thirty, Flirty, and Thriving too! These first 30 years of my life have been great. I've known Christ the last 20 years, created friendships to last the rest of my life, met the perfect marriage complement for me in Seth, and have gotten the privilege to be a mother to 3 very special children. Those are the mountain top moments in my life, the great blessings from the Lord. But, He has also walked me through a few storms during these 30 years. As a kid, the most difficult season I ever experienced was when my best friend, Rebekah (Becky), moved away. I was devastated the day of the move. I am a little embarrased to see old pics from that day, I looked terrible! I was maybe 12 years old, braces, zits, and my face was all red and tear stained. I remember sitting on my bed and looking out the window from my bedroom, staring down the cul-de-sac at her house at the end and cryi

Here's a few things we love... 1. Hugs-We are big huggers :-) Cruz was telling one of my coworkers' son bye when we left school the first week, so he yelled, "Hey, dude!" and ran over and gave him a hug. 2. Sleep-Our girls actually slept til almost 8:30 this morning! It helped that we kept them up til nearly 10 last night, but its nice having kids and a dog that like to sleep in a little later on the weekend. Our rabbit, on the other hand... 3. Decorating-Seth and I love walking down the pillow, curtain, mirror, and picture type aisles in stores! We might not be able to buy anything, but we love to dream and talk about what we'd like to do. 4. Eating-The kids wake up asking, "What's for breakfast?" before saying, "Good morning!" Then, after having eaten dinner, an hour or so later they will ask, "Have we eaten dinner?" hoping that we haven't so they can eat again! I promise we do feed them well :-) 5. Reading-I

So, when someone was at our bedroom door at 7 a.m. this morning, Seth made sure to tell them, "Go back to your bed." Their response: "I need the mean, old witch," referring to me. Me and my girls had fun yesterday pretending that I am a mean, old witch, and they are princesses. One must master a certain laugh that goes like this, "He he he he he he heeeeeeeh." When in costume, I must be wearing Mickey Mouse ears to play the role. Kids have such great imaginations. In other news, our latest Dora episode on DVR shows her as a preteen. That's a little weird for me. Cartoon people aren't supposed to age like us. In the episode, Dora and a few friends are going to see a Shakira concert. Isn't that strange? My girls watched it regardless, but they missed Boots who didn't make an appearance until the very end. Our pet rabbit has proved to be smarter (and more spoiled) by the day. Yesterday Seth watched the rabbit push open the kids&

We watch a lot of HGTV. House Hunters, My First Place, Property Virgins, Divine Design, etc. We love decorating. We have been in our house almost a year and a half and our living room arrangement has changed at least 6 times. But, with it being summer time, I have our yard on my mind today. Let me tell you about our backyard. As it is now, it has a great shape and a pleasant amount of shade most of the time. It is a large fenced in area (if I were any good with measurement and numbers, I'd tell you how big.) and beyond the fence I do know we have land that goes about 75 feet past the fence. Inside the fence we have 2 pine trees near the patio, a medium sized oak that will grow into the fence to the back, and a pretty tree in the left back corner. We have everything we need to put up a hammock, it just hasn't happened. We have my parents' old patio furnature, the chairs I helped spray paint as a kid, sat in eating popsicles, and rested from playing in the yard. The

Here's how it's going so far: Traveling: Seth and I took our trip to Savannah in early June. We drove 10 hours round trip and the drive was a blast listening to The Help. Thursday afternoon we head out for our next big road trip. We will be driving to Fayetville, AR for Seth's cousin's wedding. That's another 10 hour drive, only this time its with the kids. Should be a blast too, right? Changes: Friday our girls were adopted!!! Yea!! So, now they are officially Powells, we don't have any more social worker visits, court dates, and unfortunately we lose a lot of financial assistance. But, its great to know they are ours, and I am super happy to finally get to post pics of them online! Thursday night I signed up to be a Mary Kay consultant. Not really something I had been planning on doing, but with the recent other changes, this could help bring in a little extra cash every month. It could also make me take better care of my skin and try out new th

May 20th Seth and I celebrated our 5 year anniversary and in recent years, I said I wanted a 5 year anniversary trip. Not wanting to leave our kids for too long, but at the same time wanting some alone time, we decided on a quick trip to Savannah. We researched, we planned, then we enjoyed. The 10 hour drive was made fun by listening to the bestselling book The Help. Above is a pic of the B&B from the road then our room. The B & B we stayed at was really nice, right next to one of the 22 beautiful squares in Savannah. To get to our room from the parlor (where we had delicious breakfasts, afternoon snacks, and cookies and milk before bed) we had to go down a flight of stairs outside the entrance, up stairs to the entrance to our building, then up two flights of stairs to our room, the Polaski. The room was really pretty, well decorated, and quiet. The guy at the check-in desk said that the downtown shopping and restraunt area near the river was a short 15 minute walk from

So, my sweet Cruz graduated Thursday night. It was also the end-of-the-year program for some of the other classes at Yellowbrick Daycare. I will start with Carmen and her class. She was looking so pretty in a white dress with green polka dots. We didn't give her any advice on how to behave on stage, assuming she would be ready since they went to the church earlier in the week for practice. When her class stood across the stage she was right next to her best friend Cameron, maybe not the best placement. As they were singing, Carmen started stepping closer and closer to the microphone about 2 feet in front of her. Then she was leaning her head up to it singing as loud as possible. Well, Cameron noticed Carmen was hogging the mic so she started pushing Carmen out of the way to get a little mic time. They were hilarious singing out trying to be heard on the mic while all the other kids stood perfectly in the line across the stage singing quietly. Carmen's green bow was dan

My siblings and I had a pet rabbit when we were growing up in Mobile. My memories of Cinnimon the lop eared rabbit are of him sitting in his cage, eating, and using the litter box. We rarely held him, and I know that at least once he bit Melanie pretty badly. He was definetely cute, but didn't have a great personality to go with his cuteness, so we were okay when he finally left our home to go to another. In April, we brought a Flemish giant rabbit into our family. Smokey could not be any more different than ol' Cinnamon. Smokey licks my hands and face, follows me around the house and yard, and encourages me to keep petting him...with my hand or foot, whatever is nearby at the time. He is good with my kids, letting Cruz and Carmen carry him around. Smokey even lets us hold him cradled like a baby while we rub his belly. With that said, last night I had never been more mad at my dog Bama. Bama and Smokey have gotten along fine. Smokey licks Bamas feet, follows him, a

There's a few things I am going to confess here, that I am sure others can relate to. Working and parenting 3 very active preschool age kids is a crazy life, but I love it. I think I am a good mom, but as you read below, I am far from perfect :) 1. The tooth fairy has been late in our house...as much as a week. Who has cash on them anymore anyways? 2. I make all my kids eat veggies with their dinner, but I usually don't eat much (if any) with mine. 3. I don't mop as often as I should. I will leave it at that :) 4. My kids don't always clean up their room before they go to bed. 5. For me to "cook" dinner means hotdogs and applesauce, or maybe fish sticks and fries (with a veggie side of course). 6. Some days the kids stay at day care until 5:30 so I can come home and clean the house. 7. As much as I wish it were, my vehicle is rarely nice and clean. And don't ever look under the car seats...there's no telling what you will find! 8.

In all my life, I've never known anyone quite like my Mimi. As a preteen, she'd embarass the mess out of me asking, "Are you wearin' a bra yet?" in front of my whole family. She'd rub and PINCH my arm if I sat by her on the couch as a kid. Instead of saying, "You look pretty Ashley" when I lived with her, she'd say, "Well don't you think you look pretty." But in all of that, I knew she loved me. She cared about me and what was going on in my life. Why else would I find her reading my mail and moving things around in my room when I lived with her? She is 97, almost 98. Her days left are few, so I want to grab a hold of every good memory I have of her. Like how the night of my first date with Seth she asked him to look at her sink to fix something. And how she said he was better looking than she thought he'd be. I loved the summer days eating watermelon on her back patio. She would be sure to have the tall white tupperw

There are a few things I LOVE about being a librarian. I love the days I get to put brand new books on the shelves. I love inspiring kids to read things they might not normally read. (Ex. Last week I had a TON of kids check out poetry books after my lesson on poetry.) I love getting to use my scanner. (And apparently so do all my students...I get asked at least 10 times a day, "Can I scan it?") I can't imagine what it must have been like to have been a librarian before they used scanners. Ooooh, and the card catalog. Kids today don't even know what that is. Mine is just collecting dust in the corner of my office area. I am oh so thankful for technology! I love the possibilities that are out there for my library...book club adventures, author visits, literature circles. Fun stuff. I feel so thankful that God put me where I am right now at Purvis. My coworkers are wonderful, my students stinkin' adorable, and my library the perfect place to grow in my care

Adoption stories can be so interesting and touching. I know I like to read about them, and ever since we adopted Cruz, I've noticed that a lot of movies like to use kids in foster care or ones that have been adopted as their main characters. We get a lot of requests from friends of friends who are interested in hearing how the process went for us, adoptiong kids through DHS. There are a lot of positive stories told about international adoption, but our local children are also precious treasures often waiting for the right family. The following is something I emailed to a friend of a friend (who I've never met) who asked us how the process has gone for us. We love telling our story! After we were married for 3 years we decided we wanted to be foster parents. We were liscenced in January 2009 and in February we got a 3 year old boy, whom we were told would just be a fostering situation. Within a month or so we realized his birth mom was not going to get him back and he wou

I was wondering today as I was driving home to grab a movie to return to Rameys before getting the kids from day care, how did my mom do everything she did with 3 kids? Motherhood seemed so easy for her. We all respected her and my dad, and for the most part didn't give them much trouble...or so I recall :) But I am sure there were moments much like I experience now where she must have thought, "Wow, this (errand, appointment, etc.) would be so much easier with 1 or 2 kids. With 3, it's a little bit of a nightmare." Mothers of 3+ kids should get a badge of bravery or something for the challenge they are taking on! I got an easier start, missing the whole newborn phase and some of the toddler phases. But, I have so much respect and am sort of in awe of women who have 5 or 6 kids and make it look easy. What corners are they cutting? Do they use paper plates and plastic silverware? How does the laundry get done and put away promptly? How does the mother ever ge