Pray for me and my toddler.

Pray for us! Luke is really trying my patience these days. A lot of the frustration comes from the fact that I don't know the best way to handle his disobedience. Each time I am required to make a decision: Is this one to ignore or discipline, and if discipline to what extent? I HATE making decisions and it stresses me out.

Luke's first football lesson

Greg and I had a date tonight and our friends Alli and Damon watched Luke and Ben. Fuller is not quite a year older than Luke and they love to play together. Check out the video Damon made of Fuller and Luke "playing football."

To the aquarium

Yesterday, Greg's parents came up to visit and go to the aquarium with us. Greg got me a family membership to the aquarium for my birthday. Luke really enjoyed looking at the "fishies" and we had a wonderful time with Grampapa and Gramama.

Greg's mom also brought a whole bunch of clothes for Luke for his birthday. Today he had on one of the outfits. He heard me tell someone else that he got it for his birthday (which is not until Sept. 25th) and he started saying to everyone "Happy Birthday to you." Greg taught him that on my birthday and he loves to say it. Of course, I think it's absolutely adorably funny and cute.

Happy Birthday to me!

Greg made my birthday very special. He made me cards from the boys, complete with coloring from Luke and a handprint from Ben. He planned a surprise party where friends and family met us at Kanpai for dinner. I love Kanpai, but it's a sacrifice for Greg to take me there because while he enjoys the taste of the food, he doesn't so much like the way it makes him feel. Janet made a cake and the family came back to our house for cake and ice cream. Luke called to say Happy Birthday and then the family commenced with our Herron birthday tradition of telling the birthday boy/girl what they appreciate about them. It was all very nice and I feel special and loved! Click here to see Alli's pictures.

The grief dive-bomber hits

Tonight, I am missing my mom. My birthday looms and a couple wonderful moms at work have been so involved lately with their daughters having babies. One mom will be out tomorrow because her daughter will be giving birth, and the other one was out today to go to a doctor's appointment with her daughter for her grandson. I sure do wish my mom was around to do some of those things, and especially to be so emotionally involved in relationship with me and my children.

I have to thank the Lord for a wonderful sister, supportive friends, and stand-in moms who take her place in such amazing ways, but I still miss her lots.

The title is an allusion to C.S. Lewis' writings in A Grief Observed where he describes grief as a dive bomber that stays away for a while and then hits with great force all at once.

Luke's new bed

Luke is SOOOOO excited about his "new" bed. Greg took the crib rail off this weekend and put up the toddler bed rail. Luke can now climb in and out of his bed by himself. He's done fine at night staying in it, but this afternoon, I went in their room during naptime because Ben was crying and found Luke in Ben's crib with about four toys trying to make Ben play with them. That was a little frightening, because Luke has no sense that he shouldn't crawl right on top of Ben, kneel on him, whatever is necessary to accomplish his goal. I put the side of Ben's crib all the way, so hopefully that won't happen again!

Me and my boys

Luke is doing such a great job of feeling confident in the pool with his water wings on. What's scary is when he takes them off! Ben sat up by himself today for a few minutes -- that was a first. Can't wait until we can walk away and leave him there!

Ben is eating "solids" and sitting up

Well, Ben ate "solid" food today for the first time. It was hardly solid, just breast milk added to the rice cereal. Actually, more like having some rice cereal with his milk. He seemed to enjoy it well enough. He's also able to sit up by himself for a little while. We can't leave him and walk away yet, but he's getting better!

Word

So the latest meme sweeping the blogosphere is the One Word Meme. Alli tagged me, and this is my first meme ever.

1. Where is your cell phone? Dunno

2. Relationship? Sanctifiying

3. Your hair? Red

4. Work? part-time

5. Your sister? Awesome

6. Your favorite thing? Pool

7. Your dream last night? None

8. Your favorite drink? Vanillacoke

9. Your dream car? Paid

10. The room you’re in? TV

11. Your shoes? Teva

12. Your fears? Pain

13. What do you want to be in 10 years? Surrounded

14. Who did you hang out with this weekend? Taylors

15. What are you not good at? Selling

16. Muffin? Chocolate

17. One of your wish list items? Babysitter

18. Where you grew up? Africa

19. Last thing you did? Pictures

20. What are you wearing? Shorts

21. What aren’t you wearing? Ring

22. Your pet? Cutest

23. Your computer? Addicted

24. Your life? Fulfilling

25. Your mood? Up

26. Missing? Husband

27. What are you thinking about right now? Approval

28. Your car? Van

29. Your kitchen? Outdated

30. Your summer? Short

31. Your favorite color? Eyes

32. Last time you laughed? Tonight?

33. Last time you cried? Today?

34. School? Finished!

35. Love? Unbelievable

I get to tag someone, so I pick Luc Herron, Lyds and Mama Cobb.

Ben rolled over to sleep on his tummy.

This afternoon, Ben rolled over to sleep on his tummy for the first time. He slept and slept too! I finally woke him up because I had put him down about 5:30 and at 8:00 he was still sleeping. I didn't want him to sleep through the night starting at 5:30, that's for darn sure!

Face Time

Can I tell you how awesome it feels to walk in the door from work and have my husband turn off the TV to talk to me!

Greg and I decided when we went to the Boathouse for our anniversary (yummy restaurant) that we would try to institute 10 minutes a day of "face time" now that I'm back at work, since we see each other so little on those days. We had a few rough days at first, because we didn’t have a set time for it, and I was asking him about when we could do it and he was getting annoyed. I imagine it felt somewhat like a parent reminding a child to complete their chores!

Heather had the brilliant idea to set a time. I had to e-mail Greg about that since I didn’t get to talk to him about it (the next time I would see him was the next day in the 30 minutes between when I got home from work and he left -- not great timing, and it would be the same for the next few days, which is why we needed this in the first place!) I didn’t have a chance for him to e-mail me back because the next day he turned off the TV at the time I suggested, we talked about other things first, and then talked a little more about the face time. It’s definitely better now and today it was so wonderful to walk in the door and have the TV go off and Greg seem to enjoy talking with me. I had no idea how much I was missing that time with him with this schedule of ours! Husbands, I highly recommend it, as I am a happy wife!

Matching Clothes

I've gotten kind of into matching clothes for my boys lately. Not really sure why. I just like it. I found a romper for Luke at a consignment sale that was just like one I had for Ben already. And, how can you go wrong with soccer!

Ben hates water and Luke couldn't love it more!

Ben has hated baths since the day he was born. For about five months, he screamed every time I put any part of him in water. Well, I thought we had gotten over that when I figured out how to do it slowly and a couple times since then, in the pool and tub, he's been okay for a little while. Tonight, he screamed bloody murder again when all I did was put his feet in (it wasn't too hot or too cold, I checked). He proceeded to cry the entire time while I was washing him. Poor kid. He's just going to have to get over that one day, I guess.

Meanwhile, Luke loves trying to swim with his water wings on. He has his mouth part way under water, looks and sounds like he's taking water in, but doesn't want help. He also likes to jump off the diving board. He'll do it now without even a hand to hold. Crazy child!

Luke and Sunday School

It's almost time for Luke to go to Sunday school! The new year of classes starts Sept. 2 and that's when they start actually have a LITTLE lesson during that time, so we're going to start taking Luke and going to Sunday school. Not looking forward to getting up earlier, but it's worth it.

Luke's Talking

Luke says the funniest things these days. He's into fixing things with his hammer, but it sounds more like "hanna, f_ck it." That's hard not to laugh at, but instead try to get him to say fix. He loves tunnels, and every time we get in the car, he claps and says, "yay, tunnel!" When we drive into our neighborhood he says, "omost home." It's so fun, all his talking these days.

A new name for my blog.

Okay, I have a new name for my blog. Thanks for all the suggestions, especially from Kaki. They helped me brainstorm. The new name is A Queen's Life. I chose this as it has lots of different possibilities in meaning. What does it mean? As Luke Herron would say, what does it mean to YOU? Just kidding, although you might have some other ideas about what it could mean! First of all, it means simply that my names are the names of former, famous queens, namely =) Queen Esther and Queen Elizabeth. Second, I am a queen, or at the very least a princess, as part of the bride of Christ. Third, I am a mother, which makes me a different kind of queen in that I am responsible for small subjects who must obey my every whim -- will I be a good queen, or an evil one? This blog is as much about my "subjects" as it is about me. And, I live the life of a queen compared to some people in the world (try Bundibugyo) and I want to be reminded to be grateful for that. Thank you, thank you.

New name search

I'm on the search for a new name for my blog. Any suggestions?

New Nephew!

As of 7 a.m. this morning, we have a new nephew! Daniel and Tasha had a little boy, weighing 7lb 14oz and named him Jude Campbell Herron. One of the cool things about that name is that he shares his middle name with his cousin who is closest in age to him (that would be Ben =). He's got hair like Daniel's, but Tasha's hair is actually a lot like Daniel's too, just not quite as curly.

Congrats, you guys! You can see more pics here:

http://web.mac.com/dtherron/iWeb/HerronHarbinger/Jude.html

The worst blogger is coming out.

Now you know why my blog is called blog of the worst blogger -- it's been a little while since I posted anything.

It's been a busy week because my parents have been in town, which was awesome. Luke, Ben, and I pretty much hung out with Dad or Dad and Gini every evening since my Dad arrived, which was last Saturday.

Ben was baptized on Sunday. Greg's dad did the baptism. His words and prayer were so sweet, I ALMOST cried. I did have a few tears and had to wipe my eyes. It was so special. The only thing was that Lydia couldn't be here, because she's in Uganda.

Now I'm watching my current favorite TV show -- So You Think You Can Dance.

Night, night!

The best thing about being a teacher . . .

Yesterday we went to the Creative Discovery Museum with my friend Alli and her son Fuller. Luke really enjoyed it and I was surprised at how many things they had that he could enjoy. He played in water and sand, danced and played the piano, smashed clay, pushed lots of buttons, blew bubbles, put balls in their holes, plus more.

As if that wasn't enough fun, we then went to the water pools between the two aquariums and let the boys enjoy the water, which Luke ALSO loved, of course, being a water baby as he is.

Then, today, we went with Heather and Jonas to the Tennessee Riverpark and walked and played on the playground. It was all great fun! I love summer!