i heart faces {motherhood}

For those of you that visit here regularly, you probably remember this picture from a few weeks ago.

I can't help but use it for this week's challenge at I Heart Faces - Motherhood.

Let my reposting just be a credit to how much I truly love this photo of my grandma and my daughter.

My grandma became a mother nearly 54 years ago.

She's a mother of three,

grandmother of seven,

and is now great grandmother to one, with another due in August.

Motherhood is a journey that, once begun, truly never ends.

cutting a house in half and a picture of dirt

Big things are happening around here.  Big things like splitting apart our old home and moving it out of the way so that we can start moving dirt.  It didn't happen over the weekend as originally planned, but Tuesday brought me this.

It's sort of like looking into a doll house, with all the rooms missing their back wall.  Except life size, and not as cute.  The guys used this doo-hickey thing, which I'm sure has a more technical name than "doo-hickey thing", and (insert best white trash drawl here) done broke our house in half.

The good ole' double-wide was moved in halves to either side of my driveway as a sort of holding area, so that now when I look out the window, this is what I see.  Don't mind the glare on the glass, as I actually took this picture looking out my not-so-clean window, during the peak of sunlight, and the glare was unavoidable.  Plus, I think it's more realistic with the glare there.  Sometimes photo flaws really tell the story.

I can honestly say I don't mind the view.  I'm so glad it is out of the way so we can start working on pushing dirt to build a pad for the new house.  And look, a picture of the dirt, just for historical purposes.  Just a picture of dirt to you, but it means so much more to me.  To think that by this time next year, I'll (hopefully) be typing from that pile of dirt, except with a new house around me.

you capture {outdoors}

The more pleasant weather of Spring has inspired me to pick up my camera and experiment again, hoping to learn something along the way.  I've been meaning to participate in You Capture since the beginning of the year, as a way to force myself into taking at least a picture a day.  However, it took until now to actually get my act together.  I think I felt even more inspired because this week's theme is the outdoors and that's where I'm most comfortable shooting.  So, Laci and I set out on our own little photo walk (just around my mom's beautiful yard), and captured what we saw...guess I like things close up these days.

And because no post feels complete without my little partner...

molly & laci

This is Molly.  She's a beagle, which is basically a hound dog rolled up into an adorable little package.  She howls like a hound, stinks like a hound, and droops like a hound.  She was an adorable puppy, and even at her ripe old age, she's still pretty cute, just more gray, and more saggy, and more droopy.  Which is where we're all headed anyway, so I won't judge.

She wasn't a huge fan of Laci in the beginning.  Only recently has she learned that it is better to just roll with the punches sometimes.

Punches sometimes come in the form of a one year old who insists that she can, and will, pick you up despite the fact that she hardly weighs more than you.

Other times, punches come in the form of a one year old using you as a bench.  So, you close your eyes and pretend that you are being gingerly patted, instead of beaten in the head.

And only occasionally, the one year old decides to be sweet and kisses you on the head.  Then it doesn't feel so much like rolling with the punches, it feels like rolling in the clover.  And rolling in clover is a pretty good thing, as any beagle would know.

about my mom

May is here, the month of Mother's Day, although I really think Mothers deserve an entire month, not just a single day, of recognition.  And with that in mind, I want to talk a little about my mom.  I love my mom.  She is a fantastic mom, and grandma, and we have a fantastic relationship, and I am so thankful for all of it.  And because I love her and she knows it, and because I think she's fabulous and she knows it, I'm going to tell some stories about the things my mother does that drive me crazy - things she allows my daughter to do, that are really harmless and sort of funny, and yet, they drive me crazy because they make more work for me.

Like yesterday, my mom gives an M&M to Laci just as we are leaving to go home.  I don't mind if Laci eats an M&M, or two, or even fifty.  What I do mind is that she holds the M&M in her hand halfway home, and yes, M&M's DO melt in your hand if you hold them long enough.  A melty M&M isn't so bad, unless you're one year old.  So, halfway home, as I'm driving, Laci has a meltdown because there is chocolate all over her hands and it is obviously going to cause some sort of physical harm if not removed immediately.  After explaining to Laci that I can't do a thing about the melting chocolate while I'm driving, I decide to hand her a baby wipe and tell her to wipe her hands.  Which she does, and much to my surprise, gets most of the chocolate off (I'm watching her in the rear view mirror, which I do all the time lately, and it isn't very safe for driving because I forget to watch where I'm going).  Then she proceeds to wipe her shoes, which is fine with me.  Then she proceeds to tear the baby wipe into 50 tiny little pieces, which I don't mind either, except that she wants to hand the pieces to me as I'm driving.  And I think to myself how amazing it is that I haven't wrecked my car yet with all these distractions.  Once home, I set Laci free from the her melted chocolate torture chair and attempt to wipe the chocolate out of the nooks and crannies of the carseat so that next time we go for a drive, she won't have chocolate all over her bottom (which, incidentally, has happened before).  Obviously, this isn't a terrible event in our lives, and I can even find humor in it, but really?  Did she really need that one blue M&M for the trip home?  Or do you think maybe she would have been just fine without it?

Or there is this morning's incident.  At brunch.  In a restaurant.  I'm arguing with Laci about having to sit at the table instead of running around and my mom puts her on the ground and says, "Now you stay right here."  Really, mom?  Do you really expect this 20 month old who is crawling out of her own skin to stand still in the restaurant?  Did you really think that was going to work?  Well, it did, for about two minutes, then Laci and I went for a walk outside.  Then my mom and Laci went for a walk outside.  Then Aunty Beth and Laci went for a walk outside.  Then it was time to leave because brunch was over and Laci still wanted to walk.

Or there is the time in Costco when my mom lets Laci out of the cart so she can walk with us.  That is, until Laci decides she doesn't want to walk WITH us anymore.  So she takes off in the opposite direction and when I grab her arm, she flops on the floor like a fish and proceeds to scream and writhe on the floor.  That shopping trip ends with me carrying Laci under my arm like a football.

Or there is the EVERYtime Laci asks for something and she gets it, just because she is little and cute and no one wants to tell her "No" except her daddy and me.

I think you get the theme here.  I love telling these stories, because it shows that grandparents really do spoil their grandkids and I really don't mind.  Really, I don't.  Because Laci loves her "mommom" and "bopbop," as she calls them, and I would hate for her to grow up without knowing them.  But sometimes, I don't think "No" is the worst thing you can say to a baby.

It makes me think about how I'm not always the mother I thought I was going to be, and it makes me think about how hard my mom has worked at being who she is.  And I think about what kind of grandparent I'm going to be, and I will most likely never say "No" to my grandchildren either.  It will be their parent's job to say the "No's" and I'll just say "Yes" to everything.  Even melting M&M's in the car, and running through stores, and freeplay in restaurants.