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Well, I am officially on my own for the weekend. JR is off on a crazy adventure (the Texas Independence Relay which will take him over 200 miles between Gonzales & Houston in the next two days). We have two birthday parties this weekend for a couple of sweet little friends so that will give us something to do. The girls have been awfully high maintenance this week so I am just hoping we make it to bedtime Sunday without a major incident.

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So a few Facebook fans have been working on me since my last critique. My sister has given me the most food for thought. I was giving her a hard time for not reading our website and told her that if she really loved me, she’d read my website! She retorted “if you really loved me, you’d be on Facebook.” Touche. And the next time she talked to me on the phone, she said she’d been to the website and gotten caught up! So with JR gone this morning I logged into his Facebook account and looked at my siblings’ pictures. My sister also has a Picasa album so I had seen most of hers, but my brother doesn’t and I realized I was missing pictures of my sweet little niece. I also went through all 400 of my littlest brother’s photos. That kid is a nut – but always surrounded by pretty girls! So yeah, while I prefer blogs (see a nice explanation here – the comment by Melanie B. provided more food for thought), I accept that not everyone is doing that and Facebook might be a way for me to get to know my siblings better. It’s already been almost 8 years since I moved to TX – a lot can happen in that time – especially if you were only 12 back then like my littlest brother!! Crazy thing is that my parents both have Facebook pages, too, and lots of cousins and a smattering of aunts & uncles. And extended family is something I really do miss being down in TX. I’m not saying I’m ready to sign up, and I certainly couldn’t spare the internet time during Lent, but maybe someday.

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My tag line in emails for the last year has been “we’re just busy with babies.” It’s still true, but Livy is 3 and it’s not as descriptive to call her a baby anymore so I’m thinking of a new tag line involving “my bunch”. I’ve got a site in my RSS reader about ‘baby bunching‘ (having children within two years of each other). Somehow a friend of mine has a friend who is a friend of one of the writers’ friends or something. Anyway, it’s kind of a fun site where people get what it’s like to have this bunch of babies all close in age (though most of their bunches have just two and they are closer to 2 years apart than one – I’m what one might call an extreme buncher!).

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Jen talked about how many people are shocked that she would consider having more children (she has 4 now) in her 7 Quick Takes. Not only is her number getting up there, but she has bunched them much like me. I bet she gets a lot of looks! I get comments like that, too, and last week at Costco, one lady just stopped dead in her tracks, stared at us and muttered, “WOW!” When I walked away she was still staring with her jaw dropped. More than anything, though, people ask if they are all girls, and I usually get comments to the effect of “Oh, poor Dad!” or “Were you disappointed?” People are actually quite shocked when they discover that we don’t consider Violet a missed opportunity to have a boy. While I’m sure boys are wonderful, we’re quite happy with our bunch of girls and haven’t felt disappointed in the least. I hope that people will mature by the time Violet is old enough to understand their questions and not burden her with such ridiculous ideas. And for those who ask if we’re afraid to “try again”, like Livy says – we do still have one more seat in the van and we wouldn’t mind a bit if there was one more princess to sit in it!

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I’m already behind on my homework, but I started a program through the gym at National Instruments called Eating Healthy Every Day. There are five main goals:

1. Eat more fruits & vegetables.
2. Eat more whole grains.
3. Eat more dairy products.
4. Decrease Fats.
5. Balance Calories

I like that 3 of the 5 start with “Eat more . . .” That’s probably why I have issues with the last two, huh?

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Lent has been interesting this year with Livy old enough to start some good discussions. Topics of interest include: heaven, crosses, Jesus, sacrifice, love, dying, etc. Usually, the conversation goes pretty smoothely, but sometimes I get hung up a bit trying to explain these mysteries to a 3-year-old. As we were driving in the van yesterday, I told Livy that Jesus died on Good Friday to save us from our sins and help us get to heaven. Her response “well that was nice.” Yes, it was. How did he die she wanted to know. On the cross I told her. And how did he get on the cross she asked. He was condemned to death by people that didn’t like him. Her response, “well that wasn’t very nice.” No, it wasn’t. But on Easter Sunday, he rose from the dead and went to heaven I said. Now we can go there with him. Her response “when are we going?” Not until we die I said. And then here’s where it gets interesting. Last week Livy said, “Look, Mom!” I turned to see her with a plastic grocery bag pulled tight over her head! I rushed over and pulled it off and without really thinking about it told her not to ever do that again because she could die because she wouldn’t be able to breathe. So yesterday after I say that we won’t go to heaven until we die Livy says, “I know how to die, Mama, I’ll put the plastic bag over my head. Then I will go to heaven and play with Jesus.” Yikes!! That is NOT what I had in mind. So I said that we cannot die for a long, long time, and God will decide when it is time for us to go to heaven. It is our job to be good little girls and not do anything dangerous like put plastic bags on our heads! Yikes!! I have hidden all the plastic bags.

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We had a landscaper come by the house this week to talk about a fairly major backyard makeover. It was really exciting. When we bought this house (almost 7 years ago) we fell in love with the trees in the backyard and the almost complete shade coverage they provide. However, we don’t spend a lot of time out there because we haven’t been able to get grass to grow (even after JR laid all new sod). We also have drainage issues that need to be addressed and are in desperate need of a new fence. On top of the necessities, we are considering a plan that would include a nice grassy play area for the girls (with a sprinkler system to keep it alive), a picnic area, a little prayer corner with a statue of St. Francis and plants that attract butterflies, perhaps a dry creek bed to give the girls a place to explore and maybe a raised garden bed to grow some fruits & veggies . . . the options are endless. We want something low maintenance with native plants that is super durable. Have any of you done anything great with your backyard? Anything you think is just beautiful or super functional? Let us know!

Hope you enjoyed my 7 Quick Takes – be sure to visit Jennifer at Conversion Diary for links to more 7 Quick Takes Friday!

Have a wonderful weekend!!