Birthday August 24, 2010

Today is my birthday.  I am 36 years young.  I feel like the 36^th year of my life is going to be great.  Why would this year be a great year?  Well, because 35 kind of sucked and I am determined to make 36 fabulous. This is going to be a great year because this year I am going to take the time to work on myself, find my own personal happiness, set some goals and create at least one hobby that is fulfilling.  It is wonderful to make your life all about your kids, but not so wonderful when you lose yourself in the process.

In honor of my plan of fulfillment for my 36^th year, I have started by giving myself a pretty cool birthday present.  This present I gave myself is very uncharacteristic of something I would do, but I knew when I saw it that I had to sign myself up.  I will be spending four days in the Carmel Valley at a place called Saddleback Mountain campground participating in a Bhakti Yoga Retreat.  I will go by myself to this retreat, run by my cousin Ryan and his lovely wife Natasha, where I will set up my own tent and camp, eat only gluten-free “raw” foods, do hours of yoga each day, meditate, hike through Big Sur and have group discussions and of course enjoy some free time.  It is uncharacteristic of me to go do something like this by myself; camp by myself, do yoga for four days straight, and eat raw gluten-free foods which will most likely mess with my digestive system that is used to burritos, pizza, pasta and Starbucks mochas, to name a few gluten filled items that fill my belly each day.  I will be experiencing things I have never experienced before.  I have done some yoga in my day, but never with any intensity and purpose. 

I really got a lot of my inspiration to do this when my good friends Lesley and Willie and their kids visited us from Belgium last month.  Lesley was telling me how each one of her upcoming months are filled with something that she is doing for herself to better her life and make her happy.  I thought, why aren’t I doing anything that is just for me?  And then the yoga retreat email came across a few days later.

To prepare, I had 3 weeks to get in shape.  I signed up to take yoga classes and I have taken two to three yoga classes each week.  The day after I took the first yoga class three weeks ago, every muscle and tendon in my body from my neck down to my shins were screaming at me.  My sedentary body was rebelling against my attempt to better myself, yet I did not give up.  The next day I took the kids on a walk in the triplet stroller.  The day after that my pain and agony was worse.  Pushing those three kids in the triplet stroller in my hilly neighborhood is a major workout; we are talking pushing about 70 pounds in kids and 30 pounds in stroller.  I was very sore for an entire week.  Then I overcame the initial pain of trying to get my body in a little bit of shape, and have felt great the following two weeks. 

Refocus, Rebuild, and Reinvigorate my life.  The yoga retreat will be a kick-start to a great year. I will not be bringing my laptop, but I will be journaling (by hand – yikes!) while I am there for a future blog on the experience. 

Namaste.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.

School August 15, 2010

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There is so much I want to say, but I will only report on Ava’s first day of school and our outing today.  It was a long, difficult summer with four kids to entertain each day, at different stages of development and all with different needs and personalities.  Those of you who are a blog follower know that miss Ava Rose can be a handful, and this summer was no exception.  Ava loves school. She loves to learn and to be busy each day.   It is virtually impossible to overstimulate or overbook Ava, or even tire her out.  So, with seven weeks off of school, we had our challenges.  I don’t think I was able to meet Ava’s needs this summer, as she wasn’t able to meet my needs as a mellow, complacent, go-with-the-flow kind of kid.  So, when school started we were all elated.  Ava turned into a different girl this last week with the start of school.  She was excited to go to school at 7:30 each morning, excited to learn, and excited to ride the bus home with her best friends Kendall and Lauren.  On the first day at school Ava received an award for good behavior.  Momma was proud.

Yesterday we had such an excellent day.  We got up in the morning and took the kids down to Sacramento to go to Funderland, which is an amusement park with rides, as well as Fairytale Town.  Chris and Ava packed a lunch, we grabbed the traveling potty seat and off we went for the day.  My kids, who never miss a nap, were going to miss their nap that day in order for us to be able to stay all day and have fun.  Molly, Nima and Ronin met us there, which was awesome.  First of all, it is very expensive taking four kids anywhere.  Within an hour we had blown through 20 ride tickets and $30.  In the end we spent about $50 on rides.  My kids LOVE rides.  They are not scared or intimidated by anything.  When we were on the choo choo train waiting to depart, all Violet could do was stare at the dragon rollercoaster and plead with me in her own language to take her on that instead.  Chris and I didn’t believe her at first, since this is quite a fast scary ride for a two-year old.  We must have asked her 10 times if she really wanted to go on this ride and she said yes.  Ava and Preston wanted to go also. So we went and they loved it.  I can’t wait to take them to Disneyland and Marine World.  We enjoyed a picnic lunch in the park and then headed to Fairytale Town.  Fairytale Town is a place with slides and farm animals, all within the theme of a fairytale.  It is really a cute place and my kids loved it.  A successful day, which always feels like a huge accomplishment for Chris and I taking four kids under 6 out on the town.

Meanwhile in triplet land, we are potty training.  I thought I knew my kids so well, and who would be the best potty trainer, and who would be the worst.  I predicted Elsa would be a super star because she is really the first to do most things in our house.  She is the leader of the pack.  I predicted Preston would be a miserable failure at potty training because he seemed to have no idea when his weenie was shooting pee all over the place like an automatic sprinkler.  I even called him “clueless”.  I figured Violet would fall somewhere in the middle, but could possibly be scared of the potty since she is scared of a lot of things in life these days.  I was very very wrong.  

On Wednesday morning, the first day of school for Ava, I decided spontaneously that we would potty train and see how it went.  We were in the bathroom from 9am to 12am that morning.  Preston was a super star on the potty.  He peed in the potty about 10 times because he thought it was fun.  Violet waited two hours and then she peed without any problems or issues.  Elsa on the other hand, was a disaster in the bathroom.  She refused to go on the potty and felt more comfortable just peeing on the carpet.  Then she said, “I did it, I pee on the carpet!  I show daddy!”  I said, “no Elsa, that is bad to pee on the carpet, you have to pee in the toilet.”  But she refuses to do it so I put the diaper back on her and decided that I will try again in a few weeks.  Preston and Violet are still doing really well with the potty.  It is very hard potty training three kids but when I get through this challenge and I don’t have to buy diapers anymore, I will be a happy mommy.

Until next time, the mothership is signing off.