Just Play In The Rain

April showers...

Bring May flowers....

Here in east central Texas, we've been hit with our April showers.

Thankfully, it hasn't been a torrential downpour, but it's been enough to bring the Texas sized bugs and muggy weather back.

Our family was spending a nice warm, humid day outside yesterday when a sudden downpour hit us. 

Normally, I would have grabbed the kids and made them go inside.

Yesterday, I let them play in the rain.

I let them get barefoot, splash around in dirty puddles, and play in the mud.

Their squeals of laughter and joy warmed my heart.

As a "neat freak" who hates messy kids, this was out of character for me. 

But I realized yesterday that there was beauty in the "dirty rain", the "dirty puddles", and the "icky mud". 

I have a few friends going through some rough times in their lives right now, and my heart aches for them.

I have this thing where I take on other people's emotional pain as my own.

But as I watched my kids squeal and laugh in the rain yesterday, I couldn't help but look at it as a metaphor to life.

To some people rain is miserable, dreary, and a nuisance....

But a child can take that and turn it into absolute joy and happiness....spreading it to those around them.

Watching my kids so happy and free in the rain yesterday made me realize that as much as I dislike the rain, there was still some beauty to it...the beauty of my adorable kiddos enjoying the little droplets of water falling from the sky...

Ahh Texas...

Hot, humid, mosquitoes, FIRE ANTS...

Yet, it's the place I'm most happiest though.

A friend of mine told me the other day that we are always drawn to the place we call "home".

Texas is by no means perfect (although we claim perfection a lot)....

But the thing that makes so happy here is that it's familiar.

It's my home.

My family's here...

My roots are deep here...

I love it here...

 Scooter rides to school in the morning....

My baby D had her dance photos last weekend.

All year long, I've been telling Nick that this is her last year in dance.

I want to put her in gymnastics full time...and go "all in".

Then I see her in her recital costume...

She looks gorgeous...

Happy...

I watch her twirling around....

In that moment, I realize we are going to be dancing for a very long time....

 And that's ok with me...

Poor Nick...he's gonna be fending all those boys off...

The Mattis Chronicles

No one told me parenting would be easy.

In fact, when I excitedly shared my news of my first pregnancy with people, a few of them (to include my own mother) shook their heads and told us we should have waited a little longer.

Lots of people told us that we should have enjoyed being newlyweds a little longer before we got preggers....but it happened.

Thank the good Lord that Dannika was/is a SUPER easy child.

She is an angel child....

Dannika Jane can do no wrong.....well...maybe just a little....

But I DO understand what an easy going baby, toddler, and (now) child she is.

Then came my son...

People have told me many times to blog about my day to day shenanigans with my son.

The reason why I haven't is because then my blog would have to be titled "Adventures of Mattis".

Seriously...

Every day is a freaking "adventure" (aka parenting challenge) with him.

Don't get me wrong...I love this little joker with all my mama bear heart...

But there are days when I scratch my head, look up at the sky, and ask God, "Why me?"

So here are some of Mattis' most recent escapades that have made parenting...well...difficult...

A few weeks ago...

I was cooking dinner and realized it was awfully quiet in the house (which means the kids are up to something).

I called for Mattis, and I heard splashing coming from the kid's bathroom.

Low and behold...

Mattis was dipping his pacifier in the toilet, putting it in his mouth, dipping it back in the toilet, etc.....like his paci was a dang french fry in ketchup!

I almost died......I threw his paci in the sink, cleaned him up, and gave him a little bowl of goldfish to eat peacefully in the living room while I finished cooking.

When I looked to check on him, he had brown stuff smeared across his face.

I grabbed a baby wipe to wipe it off, and realized it smelled horrible....like poop...

Then I realized he had a dirty diaper.

My first thought was, "how did he get poop on his face?!?"

Then I realized he had poop all over his hands, and was using those poop covered hands to eat goldfish.

Yes...he was digging in his poopy diaper, while simultaneously eating goldfish with his poop fingers and rubbing his face...

BTW...he got pink eye a few days later.....

Then there was that time I was touching up baseboards in our house with white paint.

I was so busy concentrating on painting that I didn't realize...

He had stepped in my paint tray and stolen my stir stick.

I had little white foot prints ALL OVER my house, and a 1 1/2 year old covered in white paint....

We were at the playground this week...

He had spent some time playing on this little railing and walked away.

Of course when he saw another little kid on it, he walked straight up to this kid to "talk to him" about "his property".

The kid was obviously older than him and refused to move.

Mattis proceeded to hit him.

The parents of this kid were sitting on the other side of the playground and witnessed this "hit".

Luckily, they understood Mattis was WAY younger....

This kid seriously keeps us on our toes...

As much as I would NEVER trade him or have it any other way...

Some days....

when he has poop smeared on his face...

I say things like...

"Why can't you be like your sister?!?!"

Hockley Oil Ranch

Two weeks ago, Dannika went on her very first Kindergarten field trip!

 Two reasons why this field trip was so awesome:

1) They went to the Hockley Oil Ranch in Hockley, TX.

 This was a field trip my little sister and I went on when WE were in elementary school!

I couldn't believe they still did this exact same field trip!

I was SUPER excited for Dannika to go!

2) Nick only had one class that day, so he requested to be excused from his professor to chaperone!

Can you imagine being a college professor teaching under grad being asked by a student if they could be excused to chaperone a field trip?! 

I'm sure he got a kick out of it, and he graciously allowed Nick to chaperone

 I know that with our life as a military family, Nick wouldn't have many opportunities to chaperone a field trip, so this was super important to me.

Also, Dannika got a whole day with her daddy without her bothersome little brother....

And me :(

I was so excited to pack their brown bag lunches!

I decided to spruce it up :)

All ready!

Nick kept me updated throughout the day with pics of the field trip.

She had such a blast, and I am so grateful that Nick had the opportunity to enjoy the day with her!

We know these days are few and far between, and we have definitely embraced this duty station and assignment to the fullest!

Yes, Another Easter Blog

I'm sure many of you are basically ignoring any blog post you see on your feed with the word "Easter" in the title.

And like most of my blog posts, this one is truly for friends and family who care about my family's day to day shenanigans. 

We've spent the whole week bouncing around from Easter parties, Easter egg hunts, and Easter bunnies.

This is the first year that Mattis (our youngest) kinda "got it", and it was lots of fun for us to watch him participate in the Easter festivities. 

Here is our annual cheesy(and creepy) mall Easter bunny photo!

I was certain this would be the year that Mattis would freak out, but as you can see in this photo, he was clearly excited about his chance to sit on the lap of this creepy bunny.

She had an awesomely fun Easter party at her school, with a clever Easter egg hunt to make it fair for every one.

Each Kindergartener was assigned a number, and all the Easter eggs hidden had numbers on them.

They could only hunt for eggs with their numbers on them, and each kid got 13 eggs.

It was genius.

And then our awesome neighbors hosted a huge Easter bash, complete with a mini bible lesson on the true meaning of Easter, Bahama Buck's snow cones, arts and crafts, water balloons...you can't beat that!

Mattis had absolutely no problem figuring out this whole grabbing Easter egg ordeal.

We BBQ'ed a lot this weekend.

My parents came down with some of their friends, and we smoked ribs and grilled chicken quarters.

It's so nice to have my parents just a drive away. 

We opted not to do Easter baskets this year.

We got both the kids new bikes (well a tricycle for Mattis), and we got Mattis his very own Pottery Barn "Anywhere chair", and Dannika a new cover for hers. 

Our annual good Friday tradition of dyeing Easter eggs..

Every year, we lug the kids to a community egg hung (usually a church sponsored event).

I attend these things to support our church more than anything.

I quickly reminded every year, however, how ridiculously immature parents can be.

 We took our kids to one on Saturday where our church had over 75,000 eggs (YES...SEVENTY FIVE THOUSAND!).

Unfortunately, Dannika was pushed and shoved by greedy parents hoarding plastic Easter eggs with cheap candy in it for their own kids.

Dannika made out with a whopping 4 1/2 eggs....she picked up a broken half shell of an egg.

Thank goodness we have a child who doesn't get too upset over things like this.

She was just happy she got a couple.

These community Easter egg hunts, however, always make me question my faith in humanity.

And our kids on Easter Sunday.

This was the best I could do with trying to get both in one shot. 

With that, I leave y'all with this...

"He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification." Romans 4:25
I am proud to be the daughter of a King, and proud to serve a Risen Savior!
Happy Easter, y'all!

Grace and Compassion

You know those people who tend to have what I call "diarrhea of the mouth"?

You know those people who say what's on their minds regardless if it's appropriate or not?

They say out loud what EVERYONE else is thinking?

Yeah, that's not me.

Although, I do feel that maybe in my younger, less mature years of life, I suffered from this disease...diarrhea of the mouth.

As a Marine, this disease came in handy when it came to standing up for myself or my Marines in front of higher ranking people. 

It also got me a lot of ass chewings.

But, hey...at least my point was made, and I stood up for someone. 

As I got more mature (and wiser) in the Marine Corps, I learned this thing called "tact".

Which if used correctly, saying "F*&^% you" to someone using "tactful and professional sounding words" is actually a lot more powerful than spewing out anything and everything under the sun.

Since getting out of the Marine Corps, and finally moving back to Texas, I've become a way happier, peaceful, and optimistic version of myself. 

Gone is the girl who hated the world, the Marine Corps, Massachusetts...

Gone is the girl who just saw the negative in everything. 

I've mentioned before that people close to me have noticed even my Instagram (@domesticatedcombatboots) and Facebook posts have become seemingly more cheerful and upbeat since moving back here to Texas.

Last night, my happy, peaceful, and optimistic version of myself temporarily left me.

I won't go into detail over the incident, because frankly, it's none of my business...or anyone else for that matter.

But I lost it on a person last night.

I was defending a friend who I felt was treated unfairly and wrong.

I defended a friend who ended up in a predicament because of "untruths"....I won't say "lies" because I don't know the whole story. 

Something tells me though that the whole story isn't the full truth anyway. 

I said hurtful things and hurled insults. 

I said things that felt liberating when I said them, because I said everything that everyone else was thinking.

I even got a few "attaboys" and "thank you! someone finally said it!"

But the minute that feeling of liberation went away, I instantly regretted the way I handled the situation.

I woke up this morning feeling awful, and I had this pit in my stomach.

 I have this personality trait where I tend to take on the burden of people's pain and sadness...especially people I love and that I am close to. 

I had said some pretty mean and nasty things to someone who is probably experiencing deep pain of their own...a broken person.

I was ungodly, and looking back, I wish I would have shown more grace and compassion towards this person rather than let my temper and anger take over me. 

I prayed this morning for everyone involved, and prayed for myself. 

I hope that the next time I see this person, I'll have to courage to apologize for being a jerk, and not showing more grace. 

Hopefully, through that, this person can see God through me....