I have several friends whose blogs I follow, and it’s a great way to keep up with them and their families even if we don’t see each other or talk on the phone very often.  The neat thing about the Internet is that you can also follow families you’ve never met, but they feel like real friends. I follow a couple blogs like that, and one of my favorites is MckMama’s blog, My Charming Kids. She has four kids under the age of five, whom she photographs beautifully, along with musings on life, parenting, and following God’s will for her and her family. Literally millions of people, without ever meeting her, have stormed Heaven with prayers. We prayed first when her baby Stellan was in danger of not being born alive, and then after five months of no heart problems whatsoever, having some reappear and landing him in a couple of hospitals for five weeks.  MckMama is back home, and back to the beloved “blog carnival” she calls Not Me! Monday! and this week I’m joining in. 

 

See, the idea is that you blog about things that most definitely did NOT happen around your home in the past week (or however long its been since your last Not Me! Monday! post) even if those people who were involved (or not) might say otherwise. Sometimes, even though a certain event did NOT happen, the description might be followed by a photograph that would also say otherwise.  (Remember all photos are clickable so you can view them bigger) It’s tempting to project a facade of perfect parenting, but it’s supposed to be very therapeutic to share about the funny mishaps that, of course, DON’T happen in real life. Are you starting to catch on?  You can head over to MckMama’s blog to read what she and everyone else have not been up to lately.

But first, a few things that have certainly not happened around our always calm, organized household:

 

 We did NOT just take down our Christmas tree because Siena loved the lights, or because her grandparents visited for a Merry March Christmas celebration . No, we took it down soon after this picture was taken, when she was not even three months old.

 

 

 

Besides, even if we HAD just taken down that tree, it wouldn’t have been a Christmas tree. It would have been an Easter tree, with egg ornaments and a lamb on top.  Not that we had an Easter tree – we didn’t. We only had a Christmas tree, which has been carefully stored in our garage for months now.

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[singlepic id=55 w=150 h=240 float=left]  One thing that did happen last week is that I finished my temporary work  as an address lister for the 2010 Census. That DID  happen. What most definitely did NOT happen was coming home to find that my husband had strapped a toy to our daughter’s foot. Because that didn’t happen, Siena did NOT scoot in circles trying to reach that toy like a dog chasing its tail.  That would never happen in our home. Ahem. 

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No, we treat our daughter like a baby, not like a dog. And if our baby happened to be on the grass getting her picture taken and a dog came to check her out? Well then I would of course either shoo the dog away or pick my baby up. Never in a million years would I wait and see what happened, just in case it made a cute picture.  Never.

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I would also stop her right away if I saw this about to happen:

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And finally, after a long day of playing, Siena always goes down peacefully for a nap when she’s awake but sleepy – but before she’s cranky – just like the parenting books mandate. She never is allowed to fall asleep nursing, and never is so tired that she’s rubbing her eyes (because that, of course, is a sign that it’s “too late”). Our daughter is never overly tired. When she *first* exhibits any sign of sleepiness, I’m always right there to observe them and respond accordingly. I would never, ever, be in one room while Siena’s in another. And even if I were, I’d never be in that room long enough for anything like this to happen in my absence:

 

Whew! Feels good to get that off my chest. You know, because none of it would ever happen in my family. ;-D