it's just not in me to blog every day

i thought blogging would be easy to keep up with, but it's not. i don't understand how anyone can have the time to blog every day...if they have two toddlers running around the house. maybe that is why people post their status on facebook so often - it's a lot quicker to post one sentence and you can do it from anywhere with your phone! it's been a month since i have posted anything and too much has happened in that month to give a summary. i'll try and give some hightlights...

the boys have a new baby cousin in atlanta, Charlotte McLeod Sutherland, and michael and i went to visit her when she was a week and a half old. she is adorable and so much smaller than either of my boys ever were!..... henry turned TWO on October 18th. we did not have a party for him, but we took him around town to see family and we celebrated all day with him..... michael and i celebrated our 7th anniversary the day after henry's birthday...... i took the boys to the zoo by myself. it was fun, but pretty tough at times. i'm sure with practice it would get easier, but it's a lot more enjoyable to have someone else with me!

henry is talking all the time now. most everything is easy to understand, but he gets so frustrated if i don't know what he is saying. he loves everything about crawford and wants to do everything crawford is doing. with that being said, crawford now wants to play by himself a lot b/c henry doesn't always play the way he wants him to! henry has a little temper...a lot like mine. i am working on controlling mine more every day. some days i really fall off the wagon, but most days i can catch myself quick enough to lower my voice and change my tone. i can honestly tell it makes a difference to the boys. in our community group we are reading a book called "Loving Our Kids on Purpose", and it has been the perfect time for me to read this book. thank you Lord! His timing is amazing and never coincidental! As always, I think this book has some very profound messages in it, and one sticks with me right now. Love and Fear do not go together, therefore do not try and discipline your children out of fear or with threats. instead, love them all the time, even when they do wrong. obviously that doesn't mean i can let them do whatever they want to, but if i am loving them all the time with the way i talk to them and the way i interact with them, then they will notice and react accordingly. no matter what, our job as parents is to love our children and support them, not to mold them into what we think they should be.