What the What? It's March?

Let's start this thing off with the obligatory mother-son selfie: 

 Aaaaaw. :)
It's been a wonderful month. I have a beautiful family. I just love them. Ya know? Cody has done awesome with his ABCTE exams and we are looking forward to the new school year and him getting his first teaching job. Caius is sleeping so much better most nights. Which means he is getting up only once at night. Instead of every two hours. Can I get a Hallelujah?! Atrion is getting healthier every day and is having some fun at school. He's having a lot of fun playing with his little brother too. That's so special to me.

I have also been enjoying the occasional perusing of Pinterest. I have decided to avoid the DIY and the recipes section because that makes me feel like I actually have to put to use what I pin, whereas if I look up humorous pictures or inspirational quotes- the Tada! I have accomplished my goal. I have laughed or have been inspired and I can easily share it with Cody with a tap of the button. I love technology. This quote below is a gem. It just states exactly, simply, how I feel about marriage. So many people get divorced and it's because they stop choosing each other.

 I choose Cody everyday and he chooses me. This is something we realized in the past two years. We have to renew our commitment to each other every day. Sometimes it's as simple as asking "What can I do for you today?" or taking a moment to do something sweet for the other. Cody and I leave notes on our bathroom mirror for each other and it's always nice to see a new note on the mirror and know he's thinking of me. I hope this isn't coming off as self-righteous, because we are far from perfect and don't have everything figured out, but I loved that quote and these are my thoughts on it.

Next up is the fascinating discovery that my ears are still pierced! I haven't worn earrings in years but my sister got me these cute ones and so I decided to test them out. SO cute! These are from Paparazzi. She also gave me the scarf and I love it too. I don't love my hair though. Or my weird eye. But I do love my accessories! :)

 Going to DI is always exciting. Out of everything in the store Caius found these two lonely pumpkins in the holiday section and then walked around sticking random things in them. We ended up with a plastic cup, an action figure, and almost a ceramic duck but I draw the line at breakables.

 When it was time to go, we walked back around and put the items back where we found them, but he really didn't want to to let the pumpkins go. An old man was laughing really hard at him when he threw a fit about putting them back. I just love an audience when I am trying to parent, don't you? I'm like "My kid is totally spoiled and this is totally expected and the only thing I can do is let him throw a fit. But go ahead and enjoy your day with his blaring scream rattling your ear drums."

My mom's birthday was on February 28th and everything worked out that we could go as a whole family to visit her. It's rare that Cody's schedule fits everyone else's unless he's on Day shifts. Which he was AND he got Friday off because he worked overtime the day before. It was great. Nate had Halle for the weekend and I got to pick her up from school. We had dinner at Prasai's on Friday because Sushi-Ya was too packed. And actually, me and Cody took our food to go because Caius was ready for bed and started doing the whiny kid thing that everyone loves. The food was good though and I love this picture.

 We lounged around a lot on Saturday. My mom opened her presents and was fed breakfast in bed. I made her a lemon cake with cream cheese frosting. It was pretty good but a little dense because I made it wrong. Next time. Next time. That night we got BBQ from a new place in town and Nate and Vanessa brought Scattergories. We had a ton of fun playing and being loud and riotous. Vanessa is Nate's girlfriend and she's an awesome person. She's the Diet Doc in Twin Falls. She has a lot of energy and its very contagious. She was even sick as a dog and still very exuberant.

Atrion has days we refer to as "Jammer days" when I'm too lazy to make him get dressed and he just doesn't feel like it. I love this picture because Caius usually wants to be where his big brother is.

 Whilst visiting with Nate and Vanessa they talked about intermittent fasting. That's basically where you don't eat for an extended period of time each day. They take aminos to help protect muscle gain and allow the body to burn fat instead. I hope I'm getting this right. If you want more info, go to leangains.com. Anywho, I was intrigued. I have never liked breakfast and actually have a mild contempt for it because it's too damned early to eat. But I still have to feed my kids and I don't want to cook anything so frozen french toast sticks it is. When we got back home, Cody and I bought some aminos and started IF. We don't eat anything from 7pm to 11am the next day. Let me tell you....it's hard. We can drink water and anything that doesn't go over 5 calories. I have the aminos for breakfast and I feel GREAT for a few hours. Then 9:00 hits and my tummy is grumbling and I get a bit hangry. (That means hungry/angry for you people who have never experienced this...also you're weird, Just sayin').

 I sat down at 10:52 and stared at my plate of food like a dog balancing a treat on it's nose. Then my alarm went off (Set to the tune of I Can't Fight This Feeling Any Longer) and I devoured my lunch in .06 seconds. Then I got a tummy ache. Then I felt fine. Also, no truer thing has ever existed on Pinterest than this picture below.

 Oh I forgot about the best news! We have a big box! It's amazing. I am not sure why we have never had a big box before but it's the only thing a kid needs. Hours and hours of fun. Plus they draw on it and tip it over and jump on it and I could care less. Pretty fantastic!

 Me and Caius sat in the box for a long time. I make awesome faces. So does he.

 He loves me.

 After being sick for the past week it was awesome to be able to go outside and enjoy some nice Springlike weather. Caius busted out of their like it was prison and headed straight for the trampoline.

 Atrion got sidetracked by his buddy Chuck the ladybug. I named him Chuck after Atrion told me it was a boy.

Once Chuck was safely relocated to a nearby tree, Atrion commenced with Operation: Middle Earth where he is every character from Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit. Sometimes I am a character, usually a bad guy, and sometimes Caius is a character, usually Gollum. Atrion found a pretty awesome stick to use as Gandalf's staff and Caius followed him around saying "Dee! DEE! DEEEEEE!" which is his word for "please" which means "Give me that or I'll scream". 

 Atrion relented. Seriously, this kid. If he wasn't so cute....

 They meandered around the lawn Middle Earth for the better part of an hour, slaying giant spiders and ridding the world of various types of evil. I believe the trampoline was Weather Top. If you have no idea what any of these things mean, then Congratulations! You probably aren't a complete nerd....but we can't be friends. Just kidding. sort of. I would like to note that Atrion has only see parts of the actual movies and most of his knowledge of LOTR comes from the LEGO video games of the same name.

MY mom surprised me by coming to visit after she had a relaxing day with her friend. She brought me Lobster pasta because she is the best and she loves me. It was delicious. I love talking with my mom because she is so wise and I feel so cozy when she's near.