Potty training, big boy beds and married life

Long time no write! Thanks for reminding me Beth!

But seriously, lots of "big" things happening in our house lately! Josh is 2.5 and we're venturing down the road of potty training! He's our individualist child who will train in his own time, however, we're trying to get him going on the process.

Tommy and Josh got "new" beds this past weekend - Tommy received the "spare" guest bed that has lived in the corner of Josh's room for 2.5 years and Josh got Tommy's race car bed. Both were very excited about the switch and both rooms seem much bigger!

However, Tommy's room is still very mis-matchy! What he doesn't know is that we'll be re-doing it next weekend when he spends the night with MomMom and PopPop! And he'll come home to a new decked out Super Mario room!

Tonight we attended Married Life Live at our church and it's always such a great night out with other married couples. This MLL Joe was IN a skit - it's always fun to see him on stage. Other than his skit, my favorite (and I'm not just saying it because Beth is reading this), was the listening cone skit - it was hilarious - for those of you who were there - you know what I mean!

Alrighty - g'night all! I will try to keep this updated more often. I really should after all . . .

The start of a tradition?

We FINALLY made it to a beach! After five long years of beach withdrawl, we finally made a short trip to the beach. We didn't even know if the boys would like it - the water and sand, our boys are particular, and it could be great or a disaster!

Our last "vacation" was with Tommy in the winter of 2006. Josh had never been on a vacation, never stayed in a hotel, never drove in the car more than about an hour. This was going to quite an adventure!

We packed ourselves up, borrowed a portable dvd player for Josh (because Tommy had his new Nintendo DSlite) and backed out of the driveway. We picked up the boys from daycare and started on our way on Thursday evening. Me and my peanut sized bladder had to pee only 30 minutes into the trip. Then we hit traffic. Then we stopped and ate dinner. Then Tommy had to "go". Then we got lost. Our 3 hour trek to New Jersey, took us 4 hours. But we made it. We got the kids in bed and everyone was asleep by about 11pm.

The next day, Friday, we got up early, enjoyed the "free" continental breakfast offered by the hotel and headed to the beach! The first few steps on the beach were worrisome - Josh seemed unsure. Tommy seemed like it was "old hat" to be walking on that squishy, wobbly, wonderful beach sand. Quickly Josh realized that it was fun. He stopped every few steps to pick up handfuls of the sand.

Tommy took to the ocean like a fish. Josh liked it, but the waves scared him. He settled in with playing with sand. It worked out well. Joe was in the water with Tommy and I got to play in the sand with Josh.

We packed it up around 2pm and headed back to the hotel for some rest time and play time and baths and showers.

That night, we headed back down to the boardwalk for some fun and games and taffy!

Saturday morning we repeated Friday - early breakfast at the hotel and then hit the beach again. Then we walked the boards a bit, and headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up and checked out.

I could've stayed for a week. It was nice, but short. Joe is already contacting rental companies - we WILL go back next year - for a WEEK!

OC NJ, we'll be back!

If You Give a Mom a Muffin

If You Give a Mom a Muffin

If you give a mom a muffin,
She'll want a cup of coffee to go with it.
So she'll pour herself some.
The coffee will get spilled by her three year old.
She'll wipe it up.

Wiping the floor, she will find some dirty socks.
She'll remember she has to do some laundry.
When she puts the laundry in the washer,
She'll trip over some snow boots and bump into the freezer.
Bumping into the freezer will remind her she has to plan supper for tonight.

She will get out a pound of hamburger.
She'll look for her cookbook. (101 Things To Make With a Pound ofHamburger.)
The cookbook is sitting under a pile of mail.
She will see the phone bill which is due tomorrow.
She will look for the checkbook.

The checkbook is in her purse that is being dumped out by her two year old.
She'll smell something funny.
She'll change the two year old.
While she is changing the two year old the phone will ring. (Of course!)
Her five year old will answer it and hang up.

She remembers that she wants to phone a friend to come over for coffee onFriday.
Thinking of coffee will remind her that she was going to have a cup.
She will pour herself some.
And chances are,
If she has a cup of coffee,
Her kids will have eaten the muffin that went with it.

Written by Kathy Fictorie

Based on If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Numeroff

What a blessed Easter!

This Easter was the first Easter that I truly understood what the timeline was for Jesus' last days were. I really was moved by understanding this timeline.

Good Friday was Tommy's special day with Mommy and Daddy. We did whatever he wanted. Which included donuts for breakfast, bowling and Strasburg! He had a great time!


We attended Good Friday service at church, and while admittedly, I was a bit distracted by an event before service, I still found the service to be moving and amazing. The worship team did an awesome job and the service was perfect.

We then went to Saturday evening Easter Service since we were travelling to Maryland on Sunday morning. The Easter service was interupted for us when I got paged to the nursery for Joshua who wouldn't calm down. I think it was just too much being out late two nights in a row. So I pretty much missed the service, although I was in for the worship team's opening and it was so full of energy and so awesome!!!!

Then Sunday morning, the boys got their baskets of goodies. They boys also blessed us by sleeping in until 8am!!! YAY!

We had some breakfast, and a slow morning, and then got packed up to drive the 75 minutes south to my sister's house. Joshie entertained us on the drive down:

There we ate WELL (Josh had his first Peep ever):

I got to see my beautiful neice and nephews (here's Ellie in picture perfect outfit):

did an Easter egg hunt

and had an awesome time.

Josh even took a nap in his cousin's big boy bed!!

It was awesome three day weekend and we are so blessed!

A work in progress!

We've been updating the house (windows, curtains, some painting, etc.) lately and I've already posted the pictures of the new windows!

This past weekend, Joe and my Dad worked together on hanging new shutters and I have to say, I finally LOVE the exterior of our house - it still needs a lot of paint - all the beige color trim needs repainting, the door and sidelights needs to be painted to match the new shutters, etc. But overall - what a difference! I'm so happy to be done with the drab beige on off white on white exterior with no real color!

Here are some pictures of the new shutters!

And for comparison - before and after next to each other:

Asthma? Small Airway?

Joshie has a chronic cough - for which he has repeatedly been given antibiotics for over the last year or so - which obviously aren't the answer. So we finally got him in to see the doctor that diagnosed Tommy with asthma -

She said that chronic cough is usually one of three things - GERD (we don't think this it but he did have reflux as a baby), small airway (for which there is no treatment other than time - he just has to get bigger and therefore his airway will broaden out), or asthma.

She said she didn't think it was GERD either, and there's no treatment for small airway (which can cause colds to be a problem - duh - seen that!) so the best thing to do is treat it as asthma, and hopefully we'll see improvement.

So Josh started on albuterol (for 7 days to help the inflamation calm down) and Flovent as a maintenance drug (which will take 2-3 weeks for us to see maximum effectiveness).

The first two nights it seemed to be working miraculously fast - unfortunately, that was a flook, because he's still coughing till he gags sometimes. We're hoping that the Flovent will kick in soon and that we've found an answer to his chronic cough.

Here's little Joshie doing his "puff puffs"

New Windows

We were blessed to be able to put in new windows today with a portion of Joe's severance check. And we were doubly blessed because my Dad works for a window company (the best in the business I think - Vytex Windows), anyway, so today was insane. But I think I almost got more work done because I wanted to stay out of their way. They arrived at 9:30am with a crew of three guys. They finished at 3:30pm. They left the house almost how they found it (a few pieces of dirt, but nothing compared to what it could have been!). And look at the difference:

Trying to understand God's message

The last week or so we've been struck AGAIN with illness - first Tommy with strep throat. Then Joshua with a nasty cold and pink eye.

I'm trying to understand what lesson God is trying to teach me - I thought I learned what I was suppose to learn back in February with the stomach bug that hit us. I learned about praising God for all that came out of that - having cuddles with my Joshie Bear, about not letting weight rule my life, about working as a team with my "partner in crime" husband, about letting go and letting God handle it. I thought I did super well and I learned so much from that two weeks of puke.

But now, this week, I'm having a hard time. I talked to my Mom yesterday and told her we were hit again with illness and she said maybe God is trying to teach you something - I told her, yeah, and I learned what I needed to learn in February - she said, maybe what YOU learned, isn't what God wanted you to learn. DUH!

So now I ask, God, what is it that I'm supposed to be learning here?

My favorite song is "Bring the Rain" and it talks about praising God in the storms. I thought I was? But this week has really been challenging me. Big time.

More little blessings in disguise

God works in mysterious and wonderful ways. He truly does. I was meeting with a lady I do a bible study with a few weeks back, and I asked that she pray that I remain close to God - that I depend on Him in good times and in bad. And that I talk with Him daily (which is so much easier to do when you are begging for this that and the other, but sometimes harder to remember to do when things are going well). Anyway, well, He answered her prayer with a stomach virus!

The Durika family got hit with the stomach bug - and hit hard. Joe had it first (see my other blog). Then Josh got it - but when we thought he was better, he got sick again - and again - and again - and again - for 7 days straight. And then things got back to normal - he went to daycare, I went to work. Then uh-oh I got it!

We're finally on the mend and we're all well - thank You God for that! But during that time, I leaned on Him, I thanked Him for the good things and prayed for the bad things. I learned alot about being a mom to Josh because I had him home with me for 7 days (longest time of one on one since my maternity leave with him almost two years ago!). I cared for him, I nurtured him and I mothered him. All the things that I busy myself with usually, had to wait. And even then, I was thankful for that time with my son. God taught Joe and I about disappointment (missing v-day, missing the marriage conference we had tickets for, etc.), team work, and love.

We're all better now, and again, every morning, I thank God for that. It's a little thing to be thankful for I guess, but God appreciates all the thanks that I give (big and little!) And I praise Him for all He's done.

Another thing that God did for me throughout these past two weeks, is that, remember my blog about my struggle with my weight? Well, as a result of all this illness, I lost the weight that I was struggling with. I believe I will maintain it too. But even if I don't, you know what God showed me? That those little five lbs don't make that much difference, and they certainly shouldn't be the reason I'm happy or sad each day. They really shouldn't.

So praise God for tummy bugs and all that a round (or two or three!) of illness can do for a person (both inside and out!).

100 days, Stomach Bug round two and Stinkbugs!

Tuesday was Tommy's 100 day party at school and I was blessed to be able to come for a little bit to enjoy the festivities. He had a great time making crafts, "hash" (like chex mix sort of) and sharing his 100 items (he chose to bring in 100 pictures that he had drawn!)

Joshie started with the stomach bug yesterday morning and puked about

fifteen times by the time it was all said and done. But he seems to be better now after a long day yesterday. He ate some today and has kept about half a liter of Pedialyte down.

He's almost back on schedule today and is napping now. Seems like he'll be back at daycare tomorrow for his Valentines Day party at "school". Now I'm praying that I and Tommy don't get it - so far so good.

While at Tommy's school on Tuesday, there was this whole discussion about Stink Bugs. And I remember my Grandmother asking me if we had stink bugs (she's from PA) and I had no idea if we had them or not. Then the light bulb went off - stink bugs were these nasty looking bugs that I keep asking Joe to kill. And sure enough, I googled them, and then saw this in the boys bathroom (in Tommy's goggles!):

Child Dedication . . . and the stomach bug

On February 8, 2009 we dedicated our children, Tommy (5 1/2) and Joshua (21 months) to the Lord. This dedication meant that we promised to raise them up in the presence of God, and that we would instill our beliefs and our relationship with God, in them. At least, that's my take on it! :-) Basically, we've committed our lives to God and having a relationship with Him, and now we've dedicated to teaching our children this and bringing them up God's love.

The day went well. We went to 2nd service like normal, but my parents joined us. It was nice that the service was part 2 of the marriage series, and this week was about "Lasting Love". After service we went out to lunch and then came back for the child dedication service at 2pm. Josh did great without a nap (he took one when we got home) and the day was very nice all around.

Of course cookies and juice afterwards is always nice too!

Then Monday night Joe got the stomach flu. He is MISERABLE. I can imagine, I've had it three times in the last few years. It's yucky. And I am praying that we don't get it. It would ruin Valentine's Day for the boys (they both have parties at school that they would miss - Josh already missed his Halloween party due to the stomach bug in the fall)). And Joe and I are supposed to go to the Marriage conference at church with Shaunti Feldhahn on Friday night and Saturday. I would be so sad. But cleaning puke off the toilet at 10pm and not getting a good nights sleep for two nights in a row (Tommy was sick with a cold on Sunday night) certainly will lower my immune system. Plus, I'm fanatical about hand washing, and Joe isn't. So he's banished to the bedroom.

I'm hoping I can snap out of the worry about all of us getting sick (and all the cleaning and laundry associated with puking kids) and try to take care of him today.

Today is also Tommy's 100 day party at school, which I'm supposed to go to. We'll see what happens.

Why is my happiness tied to this?

Ok, so I enjoy working out. I try to workout four days a week. And I'm also trying to lose these last 5 lbs.

And I got as low as being 4 lbs away from my goal. Then Wednesday came. I ate excellent Chinese food at a working lunch and then ate a TV dinner for dinner. The next day, it was not good. I figured, water weight from all the sodium. So why, two more days later, have I mysteriously gained 3lbs. And even more so, why do I tie the scale number to my happiness? It's rediculous. I get mad at myself for letting the stupid little number on the scale first thing in the morning, define my mood for the day. Yet, it does, every morning.

And why has there been this shift - 9 years ago when I was over 250lbs, my hapiness wasn't tied to my weight. But I was HAPPY. And now, since I have this "ideal" of being 5 lbs lighter, it encompasses my every thought and it destroys me some days.

Anyway there's this song and I can't remember what it's called or who sings it (lot of help I am eh?) but it's about how God thinks we're beautiful just as we are. Which is true. And I LOVE that song every time I hear it - too bad I can't remember more about it now. I finally heard the song again - it's "Free To Be Me" by Francesca Battistelli!!

I guess I need to pray about it and let go and let God take it over. Not that I would ask Him to remove these 5 lbs, but that I wouldn't let it control me.

Experiments in Blogging

So this is my first blog. I've done blogging in myspace, but this is my first attempt at all out blogging. I like this kind of thing.

So, about me. I'm the wife of one, mother of two. I have a WONDERFUL husband who I adore and who adores me. And together we have two boys! Tommy is currently 5 and Josh is currently 1 1/2. They are very energetic, wonderful, special and unique little boys!

Here are the "men" in my life: