J-O-B

I get to raise these three kids with a loving husband and a Lord and Savior who loves me. How blessed am I?

July Camping Trip

Music is by Michael Gungor. Song is entitled, "I Will Never Stop".

2 Concerts in 4 days?

How I knew that I was no longer at a David Crowder Band concert; the first t-shirt I saw someone wearing at the Indigo Girls concert read, "I love boobs." And it was worn by a woman. Enough said? 2 concerts in 4 days. Worlds apart and yet both groups were highly talented musicians. I couldn't get myself to raise my hands however when I was singing along to "Galileo" or "Closer I am to Fine" after raising my hands to the Lord at the Big Ticket Festival (Christian rock extravaganza in Gaylord, MI). Sorry Indigo Girls, only Jesus gets me to raise my hands and worship Him.

I'm Sorry Hair

I feel I need to apologize to my hair after finding my old passport and my new passport picture together. I'm sorry hair. It was the 90's and I didn't know any better.

Lucky 13

In a very "Say Anything" kind of a way, my boyfriend Jeff stood at the end of my driveway holding this sign. A dozen roses were laying on my bed with a card that said, "look outside your window." So from my childhood bedroom, I looked down from the second story to see my future husband on bended knee. I am so glad I answered yes to this question. I love you Jeff. Happy Anniversary. Let's go for another 13 ... and more! (And yes, I have kept this sign for 14 years stored in a box in the basement. I guess I'm more sentimental than I thought. My kids loved hearing the story of how daddy proposed until he mentioned the part where we kissed!)

The big 8!

My "mini-me", Zoey Elise, is turning 8 today. I decided to go through the albums and scan some pics of our very smiley red-head. Now I'm feeling just a tad nostalgic. O.K. to be honest, my feelings are bit stronger than a tad nostalgic. My babies are getting so big.

You Know You're A Mom When ...

In honor of the Mother's Day we just celebrated last week, I thought I would list some tell-tale signs of how you know you're a mom. Enjoy then share some of your own!

When ...

You do the nose wipe with your bare hand and wipe it on your sock.
You run down the steps in your jammies with your boobies in your hands.
You wear entirely too many ponytails.
You can take one look at your kids and know their sick.
You've learned to look away when your kids fall. Trust me. They'll cry less if they don't think Mommy just saw it all.
Your middle name should be legally changed to "Enabler".
Your nose can now rival a bloodhound. Every smell has met their match in you.
You've hand washed your panties only because you ran out of clean ones. And then used the hair dryer to dry them.
You save all the good fruit for your kids then realize you really should be eating more too.
Your kid spits something out in your hand and having nowhere to go with it, you pop it in your mouth.
You tell your hubby "not tonight" 'cause your hair looked really cute when you went to bed and your hoping to skip the shower in the a.m.

Random

Here are some random thoughts if you were jonesing for my next post. Just kidding. I may have a healthy self-image but I'm not foolish to believe that people are actually awaiting my next post.

I've had a zit for so long on my chin, I may name it.
It would have been gone weeks ago if I would leave it alone.
I bought a pound or more of sour gummy bears and ate them all in a day and a half.
I actually hid them from kids.
Speaking of hiding candy, Jeff hid Starburst jelly beans in his truck.
When I asked the kids who they thought he was hiding it from, they said from me.
Smart kids.
I think people should monitor what they put on facebook more.
For example, pics of you in your bathing suit, bad idea.
I don't care how hot your bod may be.
Also, don't invite people to dinner or an event if you're not willing to invite all your fb friends.
Seriously. There is a box that says compose new message people.
How do high schoolers deal with this?
I'm 36 and still sometimes feel left out.
That's it folks.
Randomness concluded.

Our 1st Baby

Happy Birthday to our beautiful Paige Elizabeth! I can't believe you're double digits. The big 10! And check out her black hair. I can still remember my OBGYN asking Jeff if he needed to be suspicious of the mailman. Oh, and he said this while I was still in stir-ups and he was working down "there". Nice. :)

Self Confidence

Alright ladies. This post is for you. I just went to party where you got your tummy wrapped. Why? Well, I told the host I thought I could make it, it sounded silly, and yes, sadly this is my "problem area." About ten women got wrapped and sat around talking about how fat they were and how time was stealing their good looks. A couple women even said that they wouldn't tell their 8-10 year old daughters what kind of party they were going to because they didn't want their little girls to think about weight and self-esteem issues yet.

Let me remind you, YOU were once a little girl. You were a little girl who used to twirl to music and thought you were beautiful and thought that that freckle on your big toe was the cutest thing ever. You believed your dad or mom when they said, "You're special. You're extraordinary. You're beautiful." You believed them even when you had a poodle perm, braces and the beginning of acne. And now look at you. You have birthed, nursed, and loved your very own children and you no longer can see your beauty.

Move closer to your computer screen. I'm going into mommy mode a minute. I am putting my hands up and holding your face in my hands and I am saying, "You are beautiful and special and SO worthy of love." And please, guard your ears and eyes from whomever or whatever that says you are not. Guard YOURSELF just like you guard your own children.

The Zoo Crew by Paige Guikema, age 9

My family is a zoo.

My Dad is the giraffe - tall, hungry and easy to find.

My mom is a lion who cares for her cubs, but unfearful.

My sister is the spunky wolverine - fierce, but silly.

My brother is the monkey - loud and always snacking.

And I'm the cheetah - wild and up for an adventure.

The Monkey Who Had Adventures by Zoey Guikema

Written by Zoey, age 7, second grader.

There wons (once) was a monkey named Phill.
He wonc (once) flingd (flung) poo. Then he got erested (arrested) for flinging poo.
He stad (stayed) in there for 100 years. He was hongry and tired.
Then he got out of galle. (jail) to see his grandson and he was happy.


The end.

Alright, Alright Already

Yep. Blogging has officially become a chore on my "to do not" list. Let''s just say that the Guikema family is happy to have the month of February in the books. What promised to be a month of fun, turned into a month of poop. Seriously. Literally. Grossly. I have never talked about this subject so much in my whole entire career as a mom. We've experienced diarrhea, constipation, enemas, laxatives, and that's all for the youngest and smallest member of our gang. The principal at my girls' school even had a "meeting" in his office with Zach to discuss why people need to poop. (This was a hilarious conversation and quite effective ... if you know what I mean!) After the dam broke, Zach went to his room to get on his pajamas and without any encouragement from me, he folded his hands together and said sweetly, "Thanks God for helping me to go poop." Now who could get mad at a kid like this? Oh wait. I have gotten mad at this kid many times over the past month. :)

We had to miss out on going to the Dominican Republic with eight other members from our church because Zach was hospitalized the same weekend we were to fly out. My go to line when asked how we are doing is, "we are profoundly disappointed." Ultimately, the health of our children will always be the most important thing to us as parents and we made the right decision but that doesn't make it any easier to understand.

We have appreciated everyone's love, encouragement and commiseration and I even found that the Sunday school lesson that I taught this week was perfectly designed and timed for the teacher. Who knew a second and third grade curriculum could teach this old lady a valuable lesson? The lesson was all about prayer and learning the ways that God answers our prayers with a yes, no, or wait. When God says no this lesson writes, "God's 'no' will not always make sense. Sometimes you'll think, "Why did God say 'no'? I can't understand it!" Sometimes you'll be able to look back and say, Oh! I see why God said no and sometimes you won't."

Faith isn't always about agreeing with God's answer to our prayer and I think He honors a relationship that is honest and includes some respectful rage. I'm pretty much done raging and am looking forward to this spring and a renewing of health, nature, and hopefully, faith.

What I Know (Now that I'm Older)

- Tan underwear may be practical for wearing under white pants, but they ain't sexy.
- When you live in the Forest Hills/Ada area, the likelihood that your child will have a play date with the child of your husband's urologist (aka - vasectomy doc) is highly probable.
- You can feel skinny and the scale still knows the truth.
- Your tail bone will hurt if you go sledding AND you're over 30.
- Some kids are easier to like than others. I know this from my own kids and from countless play dates and school visits watching others.
- Eating dessert every night and saying you're on a diet is nonsensical.
- When your gym instructor wears a sports bra to teach a class in you can either be offended because it's inappropriate, or just jealous because her boobs don't jiggle.

Christmas Cards Display

Here's an idea for how to display all the great Christmas cards you get. My sister-in-law Amy found this idea in a magazine and it suggested you take cute paper and cut it to just the right size and "wallpaper" some clothespins. I had cute little clips so I skipped this step. Just find some cute ribbon and you're in business.

Is this thing on?

Alright people. I know I've been a slacker blogger now that I joined the newest obsession, facebook, but I still like blogging because it gives you the chance to not write in the third person (Laurie is ... ) and you can write something longer than two sentences. :)

So here's some funnies for you to laugh on and for goodness sakes --- leave me a comment already.

Zach is under the impression that God IS the sun. (He must like listening to Sara Grovers, "You are the Sun ... shining down on everyone. Light of the world ..." So when he sees the sun (which face it, is darn rare here in Grand Rapids) he will actually talk to it. This morning he said, "Hi God. How you doing." Then he asked me why God/Sun was following him all around the house.

He likes to talk about Barack Obama and when I asked him how he knew who that was he simply answered, "He won the competition."

Since Santa brought us a 2-liter of Mountain Dew and we finally opened it, Zach likes to ask for a sip sometimes. However, he calls it "Mountain Burp". I like it, it's catchy and accurate.

After losing something again in the house, I stormed around asking why people couldn't just leave MY stuff alone. I told Zo she was on my poop list and she quietly came up to me later and tried to pay me off with money out of her piggy bank. Apparently this girl thinks she can buy my love. :) I laughed and told her to keep her money and that I loved her.

Stage Fright

I love this video for so many reasons. The first being the first three seconds I started taping before I realized my kid was crying and looking like he was in serious pain. I then quickly turned off the camera, started making goofy faces at him, and called his teacher over to give him some love. The rest of the program went on without a hitch (on his part but tears came to the adorable girl on his right so she went to the teacher's side to sing.) I also love the way Mrs. Boot (Zach's teacher) talks to the kids and the kids' incredibly sweet voices. And the last thing I love is that my kid has rhythm (check out his clapping) and that when he claps, he must stick his tongue out of his mouth.

I have changed most, if not all of my expectations of what my child should do up on stage from child #1 to child #3. I know not every kid loves to be the center of attention with 60 pairs of adult eyes staring at them while they "perform." And I know that some of the best moments come when you least expect it. (Like when Zach kept telling me the whole ride home how much he loved me. I think he needed some bolstering after the performance.)

O.K. the quality of the video isn't great (not sure why ... still playing around with both the new camera and iMovie) but trust me when I say, the first three seconds were priceless!

That's a Gaggle

This is a whole lot of Guikemas with one on the way. (Nope, I'm not pregnant just ate too many peanut butter balls this year.) Hope you are all doing well in blogsville. (Check out the new jammies from G & G.)

Buddies Kim & Steph

Hello Digital

Our first digital video camera and clip. Enjoy & remember this isn't high quality entertainment ... or video for that matter. :)