Family Vacation -- Cabin on the Little Manistee

Where have I been?

Honestly, I couldn't even tell you.  We've been around but we've been caught up just doing life and somehow the blog has fallen by the wayside.  It's not that I haven't wanted to post, but things like my etsy shop have taken precedent or ya know, raising kids, keeping the house somewhat tidy, etc etc etc.  And then, I got so behind it felt like I couldn't just jump right back in.

But, here I go.

We recently got back from our Summer Family Vacation in Michigan!  I know, what the hell is in Michigan?  Well, my Dad's entire family is in Michigan and his parents own a beautiful cabin on the Little Manistee River near Irons, MI.  I went there a number of times while I was growing up, but it had been 13 years since I had had the opportunity to go.  My parents generously decided to fly not only my family out, but both of my sisters and my brother and his wife too so that we could enjoy a week together.

We had such an amazing week despite the fact that both of the girls ended up sick.  Rory ran a 103 degree fever for the first three days and Ryan followed with a similar fever the last few.  Seriously, it's always something right?  They literally had not been sick since we had traveled to California in February.  Honestly.  I had lots of help though and Josh and I still got to spend some time away from the kids.  Thanks fam!

As you can see by the photos, we kayaked, we went to the lake, we drank, we ate loads of ice-cream, we Josh fished, we hot tubbed, we drank, we ate ice-cream , we tubed down the river, we ate ice-cream (sensing a theme here?) , we made S'mores, we sat on the porch and drank coffee, we watched home videos galore of previous years at the cabin, and most importantly, we ate ice cream, we spent lots of time together.

There are three things I came away from the trip knowing.  One, my parents are the most amazing people.  They are always willing to give of themselves and continually make sacrifices for each and every one of us kids.  Two, my kids have the very best aunts and uncle I could ever ask for. My siblings (sister-in-law included) love to love on my kids.  Josh and I are basically non-existent to Ryan when they are around and that is a very great blessing.  And three,  Josh and I are going to have to work very hard to work off all the beer and ice-cream we consumed on this trip!

Life In Residency // "Single" Mom of Two

It's been quite some time since I have updated y'all about life in a surgical residency.  Life is no longer like it once was while we were in medical school, things aren't constantly changing anymore, and for that I am thankful.  But the monotony of residency can begin to take it's toll on even the most independent of spouses and physicians alike.  Josh edges nearer and nearer to the end of his PGY1 year every day.  This has truly felt like the never-ending intern year for us because of his preliminary year last year.  And while we are so thankful for his full time position, we are both more than ready to finally leave intern year behind us, 2.5 months to go and counting.

Josh has "easier" months and harder ones.  He has months where he operates almost daily and months, like this month, in the ICU where he won't really see the OR.  The days do change for him in terms of his hospital setting but for me, my days with the girls are rather predictable.  No matter the service he is on, he leaves before the kids are awake and more often than not, he gets home after Rory is asleep and sometimes after Ryan goes to bed as well.  He works most weekends out of the month and it's not uncommon for some of the only weekend time that he spends with us to be at the hospital for a quick lunch in the cafeteria.  There are many many days where I do this parenting thing completely solo.

I know I'm not a single mom.  I don't claim to be.  In fact, I know a number of single moms and my hat goes off to them.  They not only do it on their own 24/7, but many of them also bring in the sole source of income for their family.  Luckily, we have Daddy to bring home the bacon, even if that means we rarely see him and that he makes somewhere around $12.00 an hour to operate on people and keep patients alive.  #residentsalary  Josh regularly tells Ryan that he's going to work to save lives.  Her two year old interpretation of that is that he "eats fries."

The girls and I spend our days as a threesome.  And while there are many great moments with my children, there are also countless others in between where I feel like I am on the verge of losing my sanity.  Between tantrums, missed naps, rough nights, sister fights (I swear it already happens), refused meals, teething episodes, diaper blow outs, endless messes, grocery store meltdowns, and not nearly enough time to myself, I have certainly had days where I feel resentful of the resident family life and the fact that we live across the country from any of our extended family.  Some days it feels as though my arms aren't big enough, my patience isn't long enough, and my coffee isn't strong enough.   If I need a Mommy break I have to call a babysitter and pay her about as much to watch my kids hourly as Josh makes as a physician.  When I think about it like that, it's just not worth it and I reserve the babysitter use to the occasional date night with Josh or really fun things like dentist appointments.

When my kids are sick, or heck, if I'm sick, I don't have anyone to call to come help me.  There would only be rare circumstances where Josh would be able to come home if I called him at work.  And that's if and only if he's not in the operating room and could actually answer the phone or respond to a text.  The one benefit of this resident life is that it has created in me a certain amount of motherhood resiliency.  There are no longer many things that phase me.  I've found things that help me cope like coffee, mom friends, and wine.  Not necessarily in that order.

What I do know is this.  Residency is tough, and it's also a long haul.  I could not have known the reality of the medical profession life when I entered into it.  Nothing can prepare you.  Every part of life is a season and I try to remember that.  I'm sure there will come a day when we have more money and I have more help and I'm also sure that there will be parts of residency that I miss very much, just like there are parts of medical school that I miss.  What I'm also positive of is that Josh works extremely hard for this family and Ryan and Rory, despite how much he works, know that their Daddy loves them very much.  He just has to go to work a whole lot.  Ya know, to eat fries.   Or something like that. :)

Easter Sunday 2016

We had such a good Easter Sunday.  I was a little worried because as per usual, Josh had to work overnight Saturday night.  I knew it was possible he wouldn't be home on Sunday morning for the surprise of Easter baskets and he'd also be sleeping most of the day after working all night meaning he'd miss church.  I know I say it about almost every major holiday, but it really is tough to be away from all of our family.  I prepped the girl's Easter baskets and set everything up the night before.  I get WAY too excited about the thought of Ryan's excitement but when you are a stay-at-home mom, it's the little things in life.

Thankfully, Josh did make it home just as the girls were starting to stir and he was able to witness the finding of the baskets.  Ryan's excitement lived up to my expectations although she was definitely most thrilled about the jelly bean filled eggs and the fact that we let her have some treats for breakfast.  Rory was content to take it all in for her first Easter.  But I will say that both Gumby and Pokey have made excellent teething toys and were the big highlight of her basket.

After, I scrambled around getting myself and the girls ready for church which is absolutely no easy task.  We left the house covered in plastic eggs, fake pink grass, and half eaten jelly beans and made it to church only 10 minutes after the start of the service.  I basically call that on time when you are a mom of two and doing it solo.  It was a beautiful day by Massachusetts in March standards and we were able to spend some time in the backyard playing after church.  It took about 207 pictures for me to finally get a couple of decent ones of the girls in their Easter dresses.  They sure make me work for it these days!

We even got Dad to join us outside for a bit at the end of the afternoon.  I made hamburgers for dinner and we treated ourselves to ice cream from a local creamery for dessert!

It was a beautiful and low key Easter and we were so thankful to celebrate together as a family of four.  I hope everyone's Easter was equally fun and that you were able to spend some time thanking  Jesus for sacrificing Himself to be the Savior of the world.

Family Trip to CA

A few weeks ago, the four of us traveled to California for a week long vacation.  This was the first time since we moved to Massachusetts, almost 2 years ago, that Josh was able to visit family for an extended amount of time and also the first time that most of our families got to meet Rory.  I was SO excited to go to the West coast for awhile, but I knew that traveling with both kids would likely prove to be a bit of a challenge.

If I had had it my way, we would have flown during the morning/mid-day hours.  But, as it turned out, we had to fly in the evening.  It wasn't a red-eye flight but it might as well have been because the girls bedtimes are so early that it was basically time for them to sleep soon after we departed.  Dealing with two young and tired children on a six hour flight, even with two adults, is nothing short of a challenge.  We took turns passing Rory back and forth as she had to be held the entire time.  Ryan did eventually fall asleep, but would wake often and be disoriented and upset which would then usually wake Rory too.  We all survived the flight but we were certainly ready to get off the plane!  Basically, it seemed like one child was constantly awake and therefore Josh and I couldn't sleep at all on the flight.  We landed at about 9:30pm in CA which felt like 12:30am to us and at that point Rory was wide awake.   Our long flight was followed by a two hour drive to Bakersfield and then a certain 5 month old was up for the day at 3:30am! Poor Mommy!!!  It was at this point that I wondered why on earth we decided to travel with kids.

But, we had a great week with all of our family and friends.  Ryan had an endless number of people to entertain her to the point where I was a little worried that it might be a challenge transitioning back to being at home with just Roars and Mom.  She got to play with all of her cousins multiple times and  our friends Kevin and Julie (from medical school) and their daughter Ryleigh even made the trip from Fresno to see us on Valentine's Day.  Ry and Ry are only about 5 weeks a part and were both born while we lived in Redlands together.  It's hard to believe how far we've come since we met them during the guys first year of medical school in England.  They got married, we had three kids between us, and Josh and Kevin are now physicians.  My how far we've come!  They'll always be Mooshoo and Rafiki to me (haha Jules!) and maybe someday we'll all live together again in a place like Grenada.  We can dream Julie, we can dream.

Rory and Great Gramma Catie

Our girls and their boy cousins, Jacob, Cole, Caleb, and Austin!

2nd cousin Benham!

Rory and Isla (My friend Drea's newest babe)

Austin and Roars

Ryan and Ryleigh

The biggest surprise of the week was NOT Josh's surprise 30th birthday party that I threw for him, but the fact that Rory spiked a 103 degree fever the day before and really threw me for a loop.  Had I not already ordered food and a cake for 30 people, I would have canceled the party.  In the end, she was okay before we had to fly home (Praise the Lord) but she likely had Roseola and it was not a good time.  Josh's party did happen and he truly was very surprised.  I hardly have any pictures from the evening but it was so nice to see so many of our friends and family at one time.

Dr. Scurlock and Dr. Scurlock

Josh and his older sisters.  (Joshua Scurlock M.D., Brooke Holmes R.N., Kristin Chisum PA-C)...over achievers. :)

I can't thank my parents enough for allowing all of us to stay at their home for the week.  I know it's not easy to play host to the four of us AND my two sisters who also came into town for the entire week as well. We feel so blessed to have all of them and all of Josh's family too.  Everyone really made it a priority to spend time with us and we appreciate it so much.  A week really isn't much time at all but we are thankful for it regardless.  My Mom insisted that we take a large family photo the evening before we left.  At first I was a little frustrated because I felt like I had so much to do in order to get ready to leave.  But of course, I'm happy she had us do it.  It's so rare that we are all together these days and I know I'll always be glad that we captured this moment in time.

The one family photo quickly turned into a reason to take multiple group shots.  But you know me and pictures, I'm definitely not complaining.

Josh's Mom and brother Andrew.

Of course I asked that we take a couple of our own family pictures, since it's actually almost as rare that the four of us are captured together too.

And apparently we should have stopped after one family photo because this photo shows that meltdown mode had officially been reached. Kids...I tell ya.  This is real life y'all.

The flight back to MA went much smoother than the flight out West.  So I suppose it's possible we'll attempt flying again in the future before the girls are like 15 years old. :)