Takes the Cake

Ok, so this morning we had a story that by far takes the cake in the Freyre house! I was in D.J.'s room making up with him after disciplining him, and within a few minutes Kyleigh, Jonas and Landon were all in there with us. I'm cuddling with D.J. when all of a sudden i hear the door shut and Kyleigh says with a big grin on her face, "I locked us in!" I look at her thinking she must be joking, and say "no you didnt....did you?" kyleigh: "yes I did, see!" as she tries to open the door. Sure enough it was locked ( if you havent figured it out yet, the door locks from the outside, why they did it that way, I dont know, but after this you better believe it will be fixed!) So  i sit, and digest the fact that I am locked in a room full of only toys, with four kids, my infant is alone in my room, and there  is a pizza cooking in the oven... every window in the house is locked and all the main doors are locked as well... this is what we call, "screwed!" So im not gonna lie, i was a little freaked out, because when you dont have the money to fix a door if you bust it down, its not the best solution! But i had very little time to think of something and absolutely nothing but plastic toys to use to try and get us out. So, i decide to climb out of the window and try to use a neighbors phone... not sure what good that will do because of course today is the day that my husband is at Virginia tech for the day, with our only spare house key... My neighbors across the street are out, and so i venture on over to Faye, my elderly next door neighbor. I use her phone, but no one could help... she calls another neighbor, Jimmy, who is also elderly, to come and try and help us. Mind you, i havent officially met either of these neighbors yet, so im feeling pretty bad that the first time i meet them is under these circumstances! :P he comes over, and the poor man climbs through my son's window. At this point, Jonas is hysterical, Hayden is screaming in the other room and the timer on my oven is going off...and has been for quite a while now. In the end, he is able to get the hinges off the door and let us into our home, PRAISE THE LORD. However, im ruined for the day because now my stomach is in knots, our pizza was burnt and the kids are extra wild as a result. Oh Lord... thank you for good neighbors, and thank you for nap time, im counting down the minutes because im going to need that time to recoup!!

Christmas

As I'm sitting here feeding my plump little girl, with her rolls and double chin, watching her chow down on her rice cereal, the thought crossed my mind that there are millions of parents around the world that, rather than stare at a healthy fat baby, they are staring in desperation at their starving, sickly thin babies. At that moment, the line, "as we dream, by the fire" sounds from the radio, and my mind wanders to the cold reality that we are so blessed in this country while millions are suffering. We have songs that sing about our warm cozy sweet memories by the fire at Christmas time, as we watch the snow outside, free to enjoy it because of our well heated homes. Millions around the world are starving, freezing and begging for even a bite of food or temporary relief from their unbearable situations. And we are preparing for a holiday that has turned into nothing more than a time to put ourselves in more debt, accumulate more unnecessary items, and suffer more unneeded stress. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE spoiling those I love like anyone else, nothing is sweeter than watching my babies' faces light up on Christmas morning at the sight of the mountain of gifts under the tree. However, the more I grow spiritually, and the more i become aware of the grave situation around the world, I can't help but feel overwhelmingly guilty. The point of this "holiday" is the birth of our Savior. The greatest gift of all. Christ was born so He could give up His life to provide us with eternal hope, joy and peace. To pave the way, the only way, to be with our Father. And His one command before he left was, "Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you." Matthew 28:19-20 Here we are, enjoying not only the temporary pleasures in this life, but knowing that the eternal treasures are awaiting us. He also told us to love, to care for the broken and lost. THAT is the meaning behind Christmas, not the presents, the music, the traditions, but to share Christ's love and reach a dying world. We may not be able to help the situation many are in in this life, but we can be God's vessels to help them find peace in the life that really matters.  It was heavy on my heart this morning and I thought I'd share! I pray we can keep this perspective, though contrary to popular belief, Christmas is about CHRIST, and about sharing His precious gift! 

Never Leave Home

As a stay at home mom, I really struggle with cabin fever sometimes. Its a lose/lose with four little ones, because staying cooped up at home with them all week makes you crazy, but trying to take them all anywhere might send you to the nut house. So I generally try and only go out alone with them maybe once or twice a week. However, lately I'm beginning to wonder if we should EVER leave the house. The past few times I've taken them to kids cove have been horrible... they have been whiney, grouchy, and super clingy. they literally sit there and hang on my legs pretty much the entire time. I have no idea what that's all about, but the worst is when I attempt to take them to the grocery store, and today was no exception. I had the whole morning planned out. I had fed them their snacks, they were in great moods, and I was so sure it would be a decent trip out. We had 4 stores to go to if it worked out, but we only made it to one...Walmart. I pulled into the parking lot and had our usual pep-talk. "Stay  by the cart, don't touch anything unless I tell you to, and LISTEN. If not, you WILL be getting spanked." This was of course followed by, "OK MOMMY!!!" So off we go into the store, and for the first 5 minutes, they did everything I told them to, even had their hands on the cart. I thought, "yay! this is going to be ok!" Then all of a sudden, Kyleigh was complaining about her shoe... and while im looking at something, she decides to take it off in the middle of the aisle...then yells that she cant get it back on. I sigh, put her shoe on and tie it, meanwhile D.J. is pulling the cart with Landon and Hayden away from me. I get up and go retrieve the cart ( with a screaming and highly annoyed Landon) walk 4 steps only to hear, "MOMMY!!! I really need to go to the bathroom, my tummy hurts! I've gotta poop!" Mind you, we were just at her Daddy's office for like 30 minutes, but no, she waits until I am alone at the grocery store with four kids. So we rush to the bathroom, and D.J. says he needs to go too. I stand outside the door with the babies while they go potty...tick tock tick tock... I hear about 6 flushes, then the hand dryer keeps turning on and off, on and off, on and off... so I open the door and D.J is standing there with his pants half way down his legs and says, "I need to wash my hands!" So i button his pants and let him wash... more time goes by...and after waiting about 15 minutes Kyleigh finally emerges and takes another 7 minutes to wash her hands and come out. Ok, so we are about 40 minutes into the shopping trip so far and I have a bottle of lysol in my cart... not doing so great. We are SLOWLY making our way down to the grocery part of the store and my kids are hanging on both sides of the cart, which is good in the sense they are staying with me, but bad because every person we encounter is ticked off that we are blocking the whole aisle. So I try to have them walk on the same side, which creates a huge argument over who gets to walk in front. we finally make it to the groceries and my kids are running around me in circles "play fighting", with lots of kicking, punching, giggling, and "hi-ya-ing". I keep telling them to calm down, but I'm speaking to deaf ears. Then its" mom can i have this?" "I want this" "Can we get candy" "Can i get a car?" And Landon leans back and decides to put his fingers in his sleeping sisters mouth, thus waking her up. Then I can't find the coffee Dave wanted so I make a call to him, During which i turn around to find Kyleigh pulling the shopping cart down the middle of the aisle, running into everyone along the way, and Landon is throwing things on the ground, both from my purse and the cart.  Rather than continue in extensive detail, the next 20 minutes consisted of lots of running down the aisles, screaming, kicking, laughing, knocking things over, taking things off the shelves, ripping bananas off their bundles, dipping their hands in the huge boxes of nuts and tossing them in the air like confetti, attempting to climb into the egg area ( i caught him just as his one leg was in there), laying and crawling along the floor, jumping off of benches, and climbing onto a worker's stool. As we are checking out, and I had finally had enough ( especially with the fierce "you are a sorry excuse for a mother" look in the cashier's eyes), I then quietly informed them both they were getting spanked when we got home. So what happens? The chaos turns to crying...no better yet, WAILING. The two big kids start wailing, Hayden was already crying, and just as the bag of lollipops gets put in the bag, Landon starts screaming. yep, I stood there, in front of a very busy Walmart with four embarrassingly loud crying children, my face was burning with humiliation, the people behind me were laughing and staring in awe, and the cashier couldn't even look at me when she handed me the receipt. I push my sobbing crew all the way out to the parking lot, (discovering along the way that at some point Hayden lost a sock), loaded them up, and counted the seconds until we were home. I may never leave my house alone again with my kids... That or I'm packing Ritalin.