About Us

Long ago, in the land of BC (before children), I taught eighth grade.  That first year of teaching was so full of absolute craziness that I recorded all of its ridiculous details in an AOL journal entitled "Temporary Insanity."  Time passed.  A nerd in shining armor swooped in and rescued me from the junior high horde.  I married him and moved from one end of the country to the other.  Life was, I thought naively, normal once again.  God saw fit to make it otherwise.  I'm Jeanette, and this is the story of our temporary insanity.

 The Drama Queen catapulted us into the land of parenthood in 2006.  She is a typical firstborn - overachieving, smart, sweet, and very helpful.  In short, she tricked us.  We thought we had this whole parenting thing in the bag!

 In 2007, we were blessed with this handsome little man, affectionately referred to as The Beast.  I had no idea how much a little boy would change my life as a mother.  Our Beast was diagnosed with high-functioning autism at the age of three.  This boy has challenged me and delighted me in more ways than I ever thought possible. 

 Meanwhile, God knew we needed another boy, a boy that could charm his way out of a paper bag and drive his parents to the brink of insanity.  The Spud entered our family in 2008.  Behind that cute smile brims a lot of mischief!

 Life with three kids was definitely anything but "normal."  Despite the exhaustion that mommyhood to three under three brought, I always had this feeling that our family was not complete.  When the Nerd expressed that he too felt that way, we began trying for one more sweet baby to add to our motley crew.  Our Christmas present, Little Sprout, arrived in December 2011.  This girl has spirit and personality plus!  She fills our house and our hearts with joy.

 And thus I decided to continue my journal of "Temporary Insanity," recognizing that for every crazy moment, God gives us a beautiful one too.  It is all about choosing my focus.  (And y'all know I'm going to focus on the crazy, or this blog would be pretty boring!) 

The Nerd and I are in this adventure together for the long haul.  We are navigating this journey of parenthood, struggling to understand and help our autistic son while still parenting and cultivating the rest of our brood.  I am channeling my past years of teaching into homeschooling the littles while I seek to be a better homemaker and wife. 

You will find more of our story as it unfolds in this blog.  I hope you find the posts on autism, homeschooling, and the Feingold diet especially helpful.

We call it "Temporary Insanity," but perhaps a good subtitle would be "Permanent Joy"...