Stay at Home Mom: Coping with Daddy working 3rd shift.

I know something different works for every family but HB working 3rd shift is the best fit for ours besides a few tiny hiccups.

HB works 3rd shift doing security work at a local brewery.
Most of the time this is actually ideal for us.
He's gone while we're asleep and gets home early enough to get one on one time with Kai while being awesome and letting me sleep in a little.
Then I get up and we're able to run some errands or do something fun like go out to lunch before he has to lay down.
I don't drive because it gives me anxiety attacks after being in a couple of awful car accidents so either he drives or I walk lol
Next summer we're going to get bikes so that'll make things easier. 

Being able to let HB sleep during the day without Kai waking him 100x's has become an art form that I've near perfected!
School has been a godsend in that area as well though not too much since he currently just works weekends.

Back when he was working overnights during the week and Kai wasn't in school it took some finagling to keep her happy AND quiet.
Biggest thing that worked was building a tent!
I had no idea little ones loved tents so much.
Apparently everything is better in a tent lol

But its MY Birthday too!

So my birthday is Christmas. December 25th.
I haven't met too many people with the same birthday as mine.
I've met people that claim their birthday is on Christmas but turns out its on like the 23rd or 26th. (fibbers lol)
I can't count how many time upon hearing when my birthday is someone always comments "Awww man that's gotta suck!"
Jeez Thanks.


Now that I am a Adult and a Mommy Christmas is usually an internal power struggle because part of me wants to just relax because its my birthday! The other part of me knows that I need to make sure everyone is happy not just me and that I can relax later.

I even had this problem when I was younger as well.
My parents would be pushing me to get a move to go to my Grandparents and I would be dragging butt because I wanted to stay home and watch my new movies or play with what I had gotten. 

This year though HB totally stepped up more and helped make it both an Awesome Birthday and a Great Christmas :)
In past years he's always been working during the day and couldn't help much aside from presents.

As far as presents go he hit a home run there too. He got me a copy of one of my all time favorite movies and a Kindle Fire HD.

I know Christmas is always going to be a juggling act but for right now I think we've got it all figured out

I'm determined to stick to it!

In years past I have only halfheartedly made New Years Resolutions and have NEVER kept them (my bad lol)

Welp this year I plan to do better and stick to my resolutions. I'm not going to do anything like... This year I'm going to the Gym every day.

Pffft yeah right.
I'll manage about a week tops and then start making excuses. I know me, I've seen me do it!

This year I aim to keep my goals small and easy.

Resolution #1
I'm going to try really REALLY hard to contain my temper better.

Resolution #2 Any day that the weather is permitting I will at least walk around our block. Preferably I'll jog or run.
When the weather sucks I will go up and down the stairs 5 times.

Resolution #3
Try really hard to eat better and tone up

I'm limiting myself to 3 because I don't want to go nuts with them lol
I am determined to stick to these no matter what! (unless I break a leg then no running)

Gaming in a Galaxy far far away (Star Wars Saga PS3)

Recently we have started venturing into letting Kai play video games with us.
I started with Mario Bros 3 on the original Nintendo.
She likes it and isn't too bad at it but she wants to play games like HB and I do.
We generally play games like Dante's Inferno, Diablo, Borderlands or something of that ilk. SO definitely not games you want a small child playing.
So I introduced her to the New Super Mario Bros and Donkey Kong on the Wii.
Unfortunately she's having some difficulties with the sideways nunchuk even though we found her a smaller pink one to use. 
Most of the time I put her in a bubble in Mario Bros and have her float behind me :)
She gets frustrated with that after a while though and wants to actually play. 

Thus leading us to trying out Lego Star Wars The Complete Saga on our PS3. 
(I know we have too many game systems) 
We introduced Kai to the awesomeness that is Star Wars when she was freshly hatched lol 
So she already loves just about everything Star Wars especially the Ewoks (so CUTE)
Any-who she seems to really like the Lego Star Wars but she likes watching HB and I playing it. 
I think right now she looks for reasons to say its too hard just so she can watch us play it lol

I have to say that we are really enjoying the game and its awesome kid friendly fun!
There are even some cute funny little clips along with the game play. This is the first Lego game we have tried out and we are very impressed with it.
I can say for sure that we will be getting some of the other Lego games for us to play as a family. 

So we highly recommend the Lego video games for younger kiddos. 

Spiders do what?

So Kai came home from 4k the other day talking 100 miles a minute about her afternoon at school. All the usual stuff, playing with her friends, snack time, her teacher Miss Amanda. 
Then out of no where she says "I learned about Lady Bugs, Crickets, Spiders and other little critters! Spiders are so COOL!"
That made me stop because just the day before she called Spiders "Creepy little things" and now they're cool?
What? O.o
I absolutely HATE spiders. They are my top phobia bar none.

So I turned her and said "What? How are they so cool?"
She stops dancing and says " Because they live webs! And they make their homes with their butts!"
Me "They use their whole butts?"
Kai "No not their whole butts. Their hhoollee (she sounded it out) butts"
She started putting her pointer and thumbs together to make a tiny hole.
"They do it with tiny hole butts"
Me "Are you sure they don't use their whole butts?"
She looks at me like I'm slow "Nooo Mommy. They use their tiny hole butts"

I finally get what she's trying to say and start to giggle.
"Do you mean they use tiny butt holes to make their webs?"
Her eyes get really wide and she starts bouncing "YES! They use tiny BUTT HOLES to make their webs!"
With each bounce after that she yells "Tiny Butt Holes!! Tiny Spider Butt HOLES!"
HB and I died right there bahahahaha

Little kids come out with the funniest stuff.

A Holy Hell of a Day

Saturday was a hell of a day. 
To start it off I over slept and was rushing to get ready to go help my Dad and Uncle clean out my Grandparents house so that it can be sold later next year.

I take a moment to check my Facebook feed just for the hell of it.
I see one of HB's cousin's asking for prayers for another cousin that is also HB's best friend (Robbie) from birth.

I immediately message that cousin and the older brother of the other cousin to find out what happened.

Found out Robbie was in a bar fight and the guys cheap shot him to the back of the head! When he went down something happened and his heart stopped!
Thank God a girl I'm friends with was there and she's a trained EMT. She did CPR and saved him.
He was in a coma for half a day and they really weren't sure he was going to make it.
I had to call HB at work to tell him what happened!
I still went to my Grandpa's house to help clean because I knew there was nothing I could do.
I prayed the entire time I was cleaning and was constantly checking my phone for news.
He finally woke up at 1 and has improved every day.
He was discharged yesterday afternoon to go to his Dads.
I was so scared we were going to lose him.
I had no idea what HB would have done if Robbie had died.
Robbie has been there for him through everything. Through his Dad dying, his brother's suicide and through their cousin that was like a brother passing away.


I spent half the day worrying about the possibility of losing a great person from our lives and the other half going through 60 years of memories cleaning out my Grandparents house. 
I was completely torn between the past and the present; and they were both painful for a while. 

The person started improving and has continued to get better.
And I was able to sift through the memories laughing rather then grieving for what has been lost.
Going through all the things in my Grandparents house was so crazy because I was literally watching the chapters of the 26 years of my life come to a close with them both gone now.
I can only imagine how hard it was for my Dad and Uncle who were there too.

Saturday screamed something I already believed that life is too short. Whether it is 26 years or 88 years.
The one thing that matters is all the memories you can create in whatever amount of time you have.

Helping with Loss and Depression (HB's first post)

Hello everyone, Kai's Dad here, for those of you that don't know me my name is Charles. I'm going to apologize right now that my first post is going to be a bit on the depressing side.

Now I've always been pretty pessimistic but the other day it reached a new low. When I got the message at work that Kai had woken up from coughing so hard she threw up and was having a hard time breathing my very first thought, even before I could consciously think about it, was that the doctor had missed something the last time we took her in and it was something fatal. The thought was so powerful and overwhelming (and completely irrational) that I almost started crying at work.

Now as screwed up as I may be for instantly going to the darkest thought imaginable, it got me thinking, why in the heck would me mind do that to me?

My response to that is this; contrary to popular beliefs, time does not heal all wounds. I'm not talking about physical wounds, though anyone with a serious injury can tell you some effects will remain no I'm talking about emotional wounds, the kind that many people face everyday at the loss of a loved one, close friend, etc. Neither me or Kat are strangers to tragedy, with probably about a dozen or so people close to us that have been taken away whether it's because of accidents, illness, or suicide (Don't get me started on suicide.)

People that have truly touched our lives leave an imprint that never goes away. In my experience the hardest part about losing someone is finally accepting that they are gone forever, that you can't just pick up the phone and hear their voice, or go online and write them a message is devastating. After that, things get easier because you know they're gone, but that doesn't mean the pain goes with it. To this day there are days where I get sad and miss my dad even though he's been gone almost twenty years now, or my brother who killed himself over ten years ago and the pain is as fresh to me now as it was all those years ago, and the only thing that's changed is how I cope with the pain.

One last thing I'd like to say before I end this post is that grief and depression are a terrible burden that so often times can seem to be unbearable. I encourage everyone reading this that are going through some kind of pain or loss to reach out to those close to you to help ease the burden, there is always someone that cares about you, even if it seems like there isn't and you feel nobody else will understand, then message us here at The Why of Kai because we understand and sometimes all it takes is a chance to vent to someone. Finally, if someone reaches out to you please don't just turn them away or downplay their feelings, be supportive and do what you can to help; you never know when your kindness could save a person's life.

Now since I don't want to end on a completely depressing note, I will allow you all to determine what my next post will be. I can do a post related to gaming (We currently own a PS3, XBox 360, PC, Wii, Nintendo DS.) Or I can tell a story from my past or present so you all can get to know me a little better. Post a comment or message us with what you would prefer, otherwise I'll just post something at random.

Thanks for reading.