holy cow. i never write in here, which is odd, because i update my livejournal all the time. weird. anyway, updates:

• john is home from iraq for good! he got back on the 18th of october and it has been wonderful! we're on block leave right now until dec. 2nd.
• i'm pregnant already! lol. fertile myrtle, i know. what can i say other than God is Great and has decided to give us another little blessing.  i'm due at the end of july. technically i haven't even missed a period yet, but i've taken two HPT's and they were both positive.
• we're in the process of turning our back bedroom into a family closet and our big walk-in closet will be the nursery, which will only be used for naps for the first bit, but i like having somewhere seperate for the babies to nap so the rest of us aren't waking them up or distracting them from sleeping.
• at this point in time, the plan is to have a home birth. i don't want to go to womack for anything quite honestly. i don't really see a need for me to be there since i'm not sick or high risk. i've always felt like they were wasting their time and 'man-power' on me when it should have been going to someone who really DID need all the fussing and interventions. i think they only way that i would give in and go is if i were having multiples or something, or of course if i needed to transfer while i was in labor because something wasn't going right. i have the name of one midwife- who used to be a midwife at womack actually- who does homebirths. i'm going to try and get in contact with her and see if she will come on post and how much she charges and about getting together to interview her and all that. i've read a bit about her and she sounds pretty dang awesome. she was also a speaker at Day of the Midwife this past May.
• the boys are both fantastic. the cutest thing they've said lately is 'delicious'. i'm assuming john's mom taught them that word while we were in oklahoma since it isn't a word that either of us use really, but it is SO cute to hear them say it. i can't believe they are going to turn 2 and 3 in just a few months. that is wild. it seems like i just had Ephraim, and now he's over 30 pounds and i can hardley wear him anymore and he doesn't even really WANT to be worn anymore. they've gotten so big that i sold my awesome Phil & Ted's stroller on craigslist and bought a wagon to pull them around in. sigh....where does the time go?

 

oh xanga....how i've neglected you! i've just been more livejournal-y lately. really, i'm always more livejournal-y. *shrug* what can ya do?

so- as i wrote in ashley's xanga- i feel like i have just come out of some weird mommy tunnel. i was looking through old pictures of me and thought "where did that girl go? i used to be so spontaneous and fun and easy going. i miss my brightly colored hair and funky clothes...." though i don't want to go as funky as i once was...cause truly i have grown out of that somewhat, and secondly wearing little plaid pleated mini skirts is just not practical with two small children. so- about 4 weeks ago i dyed my hair back to red. i need to have my roots done and brighten up the rest of the color (red is SUCH a freaking chore of a color but i love the effect.) clothes, i still want to have a little quirky edge, but more through use of shoes and accessories. my real change in clothing is that i am sick to death of 'casual' wear. i still need to be practical, but i'm so sick of jeans and t-shirt and rib knit tanks and flip flops. i'm a grown-up and i want to look like one. a fabulously chic one. lol. so i'm sort of in a rebuilding period you might say. this is a web cam pick from when we were talking to john, but at least you can see my hair:



the news with john is that he has been extended and probably to the 16 month point instead of 15 because they are being replaced by some reserves unit and who knows how long it will take for them to get mobilized and get over there. but he should be home by thanksgiving. *rolls eyes* i am beyond sick of this stupid deployment. i mean, it sucked before, but i could semi-handle it. now ever since the extension has become 'official' i feel so tired and burnt out and depressed and i'm having the hardest time shaking it. i don't have many people to hang out with these days since i left all my groups....i mean, i do of course, have friends- jen, sarah, lisa, and i met a wonderful lady down the street named joana who has a son a few months younger than canon- but it's kind of like, if you don't have that central message board to talk on, it's hard to make official plans to get everyone together. kwim? i did start a meetup.com group for AP parents in fayetteville, but that is kind of slow to get off the ground. we are having a playgroup tomorrow though. i'm looking forward to talking with the other ladies.

welp, it's about 9am and i haven't even gotten dressed yet. i need to jump on that and get some breakfast and get the kids up and get to cleaning. the house is completely disgusting since i've entered into my funk. i just can't find the motivation to stay on top of things. i have got to figure out how to snap myself out of this.

well, nothing to update really. john still doesn't know what is going on with when they are supposed to be coming back and if they are *really* being extended or whatever. he said if they are, then his date to come home for r&r is march 13th, but that of course is IF they get a decision which of course no one with the power to make it wants to make.

can i just say that gentle discipline is really hard for me? i mean, it is something that i whole heartedly believe in, BUT not coming from a gentle home what so ever and not really growing up around any family that practiced that- i've never really seen it modeled in real life before, so i feel like my attempts are just grasping at straws and i never really know how i should handle things since the only things modeled for me were screaming and spanking/hitting. how do i show that something has made me upset without actually taking it out on the boys? how do i get those emotions out in a positive way? for example, i hurt my arm at the gym monday and so i needed to clean the kitchen but had decided that since i couldn't move my arm i'd skip the kitchen so i could just rest and see how my arm felt tomorrow. but then i got up and went to bathroom during which time canon opened the baby gate to the kitchen and opened up the refridgerator. when i came back in the room, ephraim was stading in the refridgerator pulling everything off the shelves (which really wasn't a huge deal cause most of it needed to be thrown out anyway) but canon...sigh...canon....had throw ALL of my eggs (about 18) against the floor. the kitchen floor and even some of the carpet in the living room was COVERED with yolk and broken shells. not something i wanted to see when i couldn't move my arm. the boys were both covered in egg. i will say that i was proud of myself for not being even tempted to spank him, but i did do an awful lot of yelling and then afterwards i felt HORRIBLE. canon is so young. of course he doesn't understand what a huge and disgusting mess that is and how hard it would be for me to clean it all up with my arm being messed up. i felt like such a jerk and promtly apologized to canon for losing my temper and that i was sorry that i yelled at him and that i still loved him. then i got to thinking- how SHOULD i have handled that? obviously he needs to understand that it is NOT okay to throw eggs everywhere...but ....i don't know.....sometimes i just feel so inadequate.

lately he and i have been having lots of talks that go something like this "canon, it's okay to be mad at momma, but it is NOT okay to throw things at me." "canon, it's okay to be frustrated because ephraim is trying to take your toy, but it is not okay to push him down."

how do you help a non-vocal 2 year old (he'll be two on monday) to express himself in a more positive manner?