Mommy-fied

As a older teen/younger adult I worked as a cashier in Wal-Mart. Many people might look down on that job. However I have found it taught MANY life lessons. I would laugh my head off (privately where they couldn't see) at these mothers that came though my line. They would have a huge cart full of food, but the hot dogs would be on top of the bleach, the bread under the 10 lbs of potatoes and it looked like a tornado had happened to throw most of it in the cart rather than any thoughtful process of shopping. In the front of a cart would be a child between 1-3 and there would be snot crusted from his nose to his chin and a lot of times from ear to ear where it had wiped the green stuff with it's own tiny, messy hands. All around this little tyrant would be opened packages of cookies, crackers and popcorn chicken from the deli. Often you could hear shrieks of an unearthly, un-human sort coming from across the store. Cashiers would look at each other and roll our eyes. NEVER would my kid...

The Mother would have mascara smeared like raccoon eyes, her eyes would be blood shot and there would be even MORE snot spots on her wrinkled clothing. Her hair would be in a pony tail that was coming out in fuzzy pieces all over her head.

I would watch these mothers come through and the more kids they had the worse they looked. I'd laugh up my sleeve and say NEVER in my life would my child run my life like that.

Three years ago I started to feel sick. Every day I was so tired I could hardly think and I was throwing up at the weirdest times. Yep, I was gonna have a baby. Soon my body started to expand and my cute clothes were all tossed into banana boxes that I will probably never seen again. In 9 months I had a beautiful little boy. Every two hours, sometimes more, I was at his beck and call. My nice top (that I had always been a bit proud of) expanded 3 sizes and fell about 8 inches. Giving me a buddha belly wasn't enough? Thank you, Donnie.

The first night I slept 4 hours in a row I woke up feeling like I could take on the world all by myself.

Kids grow up so fast and Donnie was an angel. Never a problem, easy going and I was able to do most of the things I had before I had a kid. Then he hit about 18 months. I was in Wal-Mart. He got hungry, was tired and honestly is a bit spoiled. I found myself piling cookies, small juice bottles, and crackers into the cart for his majesty to munch on. I didn't really even think about it. We got to the check out lane and my bread was under the potatoes. That's odd...and then I heard a sound from my past...that eerie howl. It echoed around my head like a bad dream. I looked around for that horrible child making that AWFUL noise! IT WAS MINE!! There is my small dictator screaming his head off because I had taken his cookies to pay for them. It all came back in a rush and in a panic I checked my eyes. No smears. I glanced at my clothes...they were neat and pressed, my hair was done. Grant it there was ONE snot spot on my shirt but I HAD tried to get it off. I sheepishly finished up with the 19 something year old cashier. I saw her cast a long glance at my kid and suddenly I wanted to laugh at her. Never say NEVER...sucker. ;)

No matter how many snotty noses you have to wipe, how many times you are up all night with a sick/nursing baby, or the million of other things that mothers do it is all worth it when you see their little angelic faces looking at you with all the love in the world. I love being a Mommy. I will work hard to NOT be a frumpy, scary mess. My mom never was, but I have proved to myself that no one is perfect, not even your little angel. You better laugh at the embarrassing moments and enjoy the fun ones.

They know not what they do

Being a southern girl there are just somethings yankees do that I do NOT understand. When I'm in the church kitchen and it's -20 outside and the wind is howling like a 2 year old who got told "no" I think it's perfectly sane to keep all doors and windows shut tightly...VERY TIGHT. But Yankees don't see it my way. For 3 years I have watched as yankee after yankee will open that kitchen door, LEAVE IT OPEN, walk to their car, put their Bible away and come back. When I ask them WHY they always say the same thing. "I'm coming right back" What they don't seem to realize is that in the 2 minutes it took for them to tippy toe across the ice and battle the wind to their car and back, my hands AND the dish water I'm in have frozen to a solid block of ice. My toes are frostbitten and my nose is red and drippy! It makes no sense to me.

Another thing is the food. Whoever said that ONE meat, ONE potato and ONE veggie was a pot luck dinner? There are supposed to be TEN meats, FOURTEEN potato salads, EIGHT veggies (all deep fried to kill off anything that might be healthy) and then there should be TONS of pies and cakes and cookies and brownies... It just doesn't make sense.

And tea! Why would ANYone want to put HOT tea down their throat unless they had strep or a cold? You drink COFFEE hot and you drink TEA cold and sweet! Put sugar in that tea! I wanna see my spoon standing up, and feel my arteries hardening as i sip! Why can't yankees learn this stuff?

So in my three years in this foreign land I have come to blame all these endearing, frustrating traits on two words that cover all their sins. Bless their hearts they're just STUPID YANKEES.

Hang onto your shirts! I'm going somewhere with this.

So, last night I'm hanging out with a group of teen girls. We've laughed and played and had tons of fun. Then they started in on my accent. Well by george, not to be out done I started teasing them for weird yankee ways, ending it with my endearing term "stupid yankee". We all go on for about 20 minutes or so and I repeated the phrase 2-3 times. Finally one girl about 14 looks at me and says "Why do you keep calling me that? I'm not a Yankee, I live in the country!"

Poor stupid Yankees. :)

Bathroom Blews

Right now there is something controlling my life. It is a vicious little dictator. It demands I only eat certain things, I only DO certain things, only LOOK at certain things, and certainly only BREATHE certain air. If I transgress any of it's commands it punishes me with violent barfing and gagging. This mighty little dictator is only the size of a lime...my very controlling fruit inside of me, called a baby. I'm looking forward to spanking this kid...haha (JUST KIDDING!!)

So I'm trying to potty train Donnie. Just to give you a history on potty training, every dog I've ever had that wasn't potty trained I got rid of in days....so you can imagine how it's going.

Donnie, despite of his rookie mother, is doing okay with it. Last week I tried ALL week to get him to go in the toilet. FINALLY I caught him in the act and we RUSHED to the toilet. He sat there and did his business. According to all the books Mommies are supposed to do this ecstatic, hyper, poo-poo dance to let the kid know that was a totally awesome thing they just did. So, I pull him off the toilet and I committed TWO of the unpardonable sins that the little Lime has instituted into my life. I LOOKED upon the soiled water in the toilet and I inhaled the repugnant fragrance. Little Don is standing there with his hands up ready to clap for his "poo-poo" dance and instead I start hurling with a vengeance. Don has never seen me do this and I can see from the corner of my eye him standing there with his little pants around his ankles, eyes huge and round watching me lose the lunch I hadn't been allowed to eat much of. I think I set him back a few years...

I can see Donnie at 23 in in a therapy session "Doc, I just can't go to the bathroom, my mom..."

The Forbidden Fruit

In my teen years I traveled all over the USA with my family. I enjoyed being part of an Evangelist family. Because my family sang together we were often invited to banquets as the "entertainment." Have you ever tried to sing to a room full of people eating? Better yet, have you ever tried to sing to a room full of BAPTISTS who were eating? Let me tell you, they don't care a twit. If you were Faith Hill, Carrie Underwood, Bono or Elton John they wouldn't care. They MIGHT notice if you were Michael Jackson. Mrs. Smith would lean over and grunt to her hubby..."Looky there Bob! Them preacher kids is wearin more make-up every time I see them! I do declare...Pass the chicken, Dear."

One year we were invited to a new banquet. We'd never met anyone at the church. The preacher had just heard of us from a preacher buddy of his. We got to the banquet hall and we were shown where to set up our PA system. We got all set up and soon the banquet started. True to Baptist form they were all devouring the helpless poultry in fascinating quantities and in rapid time. In the midst of the fowl consumption the guy running the banquet gave us the signal to get up and sing. It's always a big deal to get SEVEN people and ALL their stringed instruments from where you were sitting to the platform. Once you GET to the platform usually one or two of the instruments has decided to come untuned and to avoid dead time dad starts talking.

On this fateful day he decided to tell the story of how my youngest brother came to the Fuller house. Joseph is the youngest and only adopted Fuller kid. Dad's spill on the subject goes along these lines..."The Bible says that the fruit of the womb is His reward. Some people aren't able to bear the reward of His blessings and because of this our family was given little Joseph." Today however dad must have drank something funky or he must have had too much fried chicken. As we were putting the final touches on the wayward instrument we hear dad say "The Bible says the fruit of the LOOM is His reward..." and in mid-sentence I saw something I'd never seen in a Baptist banquet. Every fork was stilled. Every eye was peeled to the front. The chicken in the coop in the back breathed a sigh of relief. They might be spared another day...
And my Dad is just standing there, face red, mouth open and he didn't know where to go from there. And, God as my wittness, the Pastor jumped up from his table and rushed to the front, grabs the mic and says "I don't know this guy! I had him in on a recommendation!" Dad looks at us and says "start playing 'Lord let us weep again'. It's the saddest song my family knew. WHY Dad picked that song I have no idea. We like to NEVER got through it. We sang a few more, sat our very red faces down and believe it or not that's the last time that church ever had us through!

We never let Dad talk again. (well, not for a long time anyway...)

up and coming...

I can't believe how long I have abandoned the world of blogging so long! I am back and with many updates...but all in good time.

I've been so sick all day. I'm 11 weeks pregnant and my "pregnancy updater" says that the little one is the size of a grape. All I have to say is that this is one vicious little grape! (I've nicknamed it the grape of wrath!) I've been so sick to my stomach every day. And at weird, random times I start violently...well, you know.

So tonight I'm sitting in church and I feel it coming. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. Go away sick tummy, go away. Dad Green is preaching an awesome message and I just know I'm gonna barf all over the aisle if I move the wrong way. All of a sudden I feel it coming up. I gracefully move my large caboose up from the pew and try to glide to the back of the church in Julie Andrews style. As soon as I went thru the double doors it was a mad dash for the bathroom. I found out AFTER church that the WHOLE church could hear me galloping like a herd of rabid cows to the ladies room!!! I made it in time and that's all that matters.

Visit with the Outlaws

This last week my parents came to visit! It was so nice to be with them. I haven't seen them in six months! (Seth wants to know if that's a long time?)

My family is an evangelist family. They travel and literally sing for their supper. If they get sick they go hungry. :) So, Monday they're on their way to my house. I'm so excited I can hardly stand it. About 10AM on monday morning my throat started to hurt. It hurt REALLY BAD and every inch of me was SORE. It felt like I'd done 6 hours of Tae-bo and I hadn't done any! It was really weird. By 3PM my parents were only 4 hours away and I was sick. Really, really sick. It hurt to move my EYES! I knew that if I let on that I was sick then Mom and Dad would be afraid of getting it. I decided to put up a brave front and wash my hands a lot.

Mom and Dad got here at 7PM. It was so so so so so nice to see them!!! We grilled burgers on my back porch and then we all went to the cabin where my family was gonna stay. We talked and laughed and we fell into bed late. When I laid down I thought I was dying. I'd not been this sick in years.

The next day, Tuesday, Mom and I hit all the resale shops. I love to shop and I never get to do it, especially with my Mom. It is probably one of my very favorite things to do. I was so sick all I could think was "how many resale shops ARE there in Petoskey??" Even in my death-bed illness I managed to get some good deals though. Not even death can stop me from a good deal. *grin

We got home Tuesday night and I was not about to cook. Mom and Dad scrounged up a pretty good meal. (I'm an awful hostess.) No one knew I was sick yet. I hadn't let on at all which is a big deal because I want everyone to feel bad for me when I'm sick!

Wednesday was a work day. I had to clean some houses and Mom came along. She's trying to make some extra money for a special project she's working on. We cleaned from 9AM until 5PM. We BOTH thought we were dying by this time. We decided pizza would be a good option for supper. On the way home from work my voice started acting funny. It sounded like a was a 13 year old boy going through puberty! By 9PM Wednesday night I had totally lost my voice. There was no hiding it now. Mom broke out the hazmat suits she keeps under the seats of the van and I had to admit I'd been hiding my sickness. It was hard to convince her that I didn't have any evil intentions on getting them sick. No Mom, I haven't been sneaking into your room at night and breathing on you or licking your toothbrushes.

The funny thing is, six months ago when I last saw Mom SHE had totally lost HER voice. She had to whisper the entire 2 weeks I was with her. It seems like Mom and I can't have a visit that one of us can carry on a normal conversation.

Seth was able to put all of this into perspective for us. He said, "God knows just how much a man can handle. He takes care of it for me."

Save Me from Seth!!!

It was a cold and rainy day all day yesterday. Days like that can be depressing so Seth was like a kid in the candy store when a college guy from our church, Josh, called and asked Seth if he could take him to a job interview in Traverse City. That's a town about an hour from where we live. Seth loves to drive and he needed to get out of the house!

Just so you can imagine this better, Josh is 6 ft and 8in tall. He is dark-skinned. His Mom's white and his dad's black. Josh has black curly hair and brown eyes. We live in North Michigan. There aren't a lot of people that AREN'T white up here so he REALLY stands out because of his height and because of his color.

Our sister church in TC is having revival services all week and since Josh and Seth were in town they decided to go to the services. Seth waited for Josh to get done with his interview (which took FOREVER) and they headed to the church about 7:10PM. When they walked into the lobby the church was already singing. Seth and Josh didn't want to interrupt the song so they were peeking through the crack in the wooden double doors. The doors have 18" square glass windows in each door but if you stay in the middle of the doors the pastor on the platform can't see you so Josh and Seth were standing in the center.

All the church was sitting down and they were singing the song "Coming Home" the chorus goes "Coming home, coming home, never more to roam..."

So as Seth was peeking through the crack in the door he can hear the music but that's about it. Suddenly, in the middle of the song the pastor of the church (who was leading the music) walked to the edge of the platform so he can see through the door's glass into the lobby. He was looking very intense. He bent down a little to see better and He mouthed the words "Come on. Come on." and motioned with grand motions for Seth and Josh to come on in.

Josh and Seth are clowns, especially when they feel awkward. It's always awkward to walk into a service late and it's very awkward to have the pastor motion for you to come in when they're in the middle of a song. So, Seth and Josh both decided to be a ham. They bust through the double doors like they were saloon doors in an old movie. Josh was waving like Miss America and Seth had a grin on that any mother would be suspicious of. Everyone in the church turned around and was staring and the pastor just stopped. You ever been watching a movie that all the music and acting just comes to a crashing halt? That's what happened to Josh and Seth. As the doors were swinging closed behind them they realized that the pastor had not been talking to them. He was using the words of the song to speak to his people. He was saying "Come Home! Come Home! (Grand beckoning motions) It's never too late to come home. You can come to the altar and get things right! You don't have to wait for the preaching. Come Home"

Josh and Seth just froze. They became statues glued to the back doors. They didn't even breathe. The piano started up again and the pastor started singing again. Conviction moment over, thanks guys. The church finished singing all 20 verses and as soon as they piano stopped (where it was supposed to this time) Seth and Josh slunk into the back pew.

When Seth came home and told me what happened I was SO THANKFUL I had stayed home so Donnie could go to bed on time. Church is a dangerous place...if you go with Seth :)