Not Forgotten

I wince at the number of days, weeks, months that have gone by since my last blog post. But, the 'blog update' guilt cloud hangs over me not so much because I haven't shared with my readers what is going on in the Galbreath home. It is more painful knowing that because I've kept all these sweet moments and stories of my children to myself, they may just be forgotten in the days to come. A very scarey realization for a mother -- that no matter how large God created her brain, she simply cannot tuck away every word, laughter, hug, facial expression, and "first" in a mommy memory vault. Hence the common phrase I hear, "please say you wrote that down!"

So here I go, onto my virtual journal and scrapbook, so that these sweet sweet days I have with a full of life two year old and a stunning and sensitve four year old .. are .. not... forgotten.

Of Carter -- I do not want to forget that

- He asked me last week as we were saying his goodnight prayers, "When is God going to start praying to ME, Mommy?"

- It takes him more than twice as long to get over one of Kelsey's spankings or time outs as it does Kelsey herself.

- He has become somewhat of a clepto, uh, I mean "collector" I honestly do not understand how he runs around with the contents in his pockets -- coins, leaves, sticks, ROCKS, bottle tops and other 'treasures' (aka trash!) I thought this was going to be a short lived phase but he's hanging on pretty well at this. You'd think the child has no toys to play with the way he covets an old rubberband dropped on the floor of Target. (PS he is dying for a metal detector from Santa so he can pick up even more lost treasures!)

- He can flat out HIT a BASEball! And the fact that we ended up in the ER with a bloody nose from a flyball did not stop him getting back on the field again the same week. He got his first in the park homerun this season and batted a double left handed! (yes Phill is that dad/coach that suggests to his 4 yr old that he switch hit in a game) His focus during a TBall game makes us so proud!

Of Kelsey, I do not want to forget:

- The way she looks randomly at Phill out of the corner of her eyes smiling and says, "You awesome Daddy."

- How she likes to instruct, teach and conduct an audience. She just needs a small stool or box to stand on and people to obey her commands and listen to her. If Kelsey is singing, it is very important that you not join in until told to do so. She does love to hear herself sing.

- When I tuck her in to sleep, her #1 delay tactic is to say, "Mommy WAIT, " I come closer, "Tell me something Mommy" That is code for her wanting me to tell her all the things that she is going to do when she wakes up. The next few minutes (or longer) consist of her asking me if she can take bunny ... and baby... and pillow.. (all the items in her bed) to the places we will go. She will not truly let me leave the room unless she has said, "night night" on her own terms.

- She is still a very picky eater. But a game of family 'I Spy' at the dinner table has done wonders as she has to take a bite before she takes her turn. She gets so excited as to what she picks in her eye spy game that her turn goes like this, "I Spy with my lil eye ... sumfin that is PINK ...... (we try to start a guess) .. MY SHIRT!!!"

- Potty Training has been fun with Kelsey. Yes I said "fun" and "potty training" in the same sentence. She has really taken initiative in this and has been especially good at going #2 on the potty. However, her amusement stems from the surprise shape of her creation in the potty. This week she came running in from the bathroom saying, "Mommy, I poopied a SNOWMAN!!" Yesterday she told me she pooped a rock at school. Whatever works, right?

Ahh, now my mommy brain is a bit unloaded and hopefully I can go forward and be better to update the blog regularly. The next post will have more pictures -- I promise!