Easter

A happy memory from this Easter 2014.

I gave the kids each a pack of balloons in their Easter baskets, and Layla was happily playing with a pink balloon that her daddy blew up for her.  I told her she could take her balloon outside and play with it, only to watch the wind catch it and take it away as she watched.  Hurrying outside to see if I could rescue it, I saw it bouncing patiently by the high chain link wire fence across the road.

I told the kids to stay in the yard, and scurried across the street, with Caroline on my hip.  The balloon swooped and darted out of my reach, pausing for a moment and then gusting on, bumping and skipping as I jogged and then ran after it with Caroline giggling away.  It made me smile how she was laughing.

I thought I had it cornered by the dumpsters; it sat quietly and then leaped up and out of my reach at the last minute, taking a long and high hurdle up over the dumpster, and then onto the school roof and disappeared.  With my hand shielding my eyes, I stood watching as the kids yelled excitedly from fifty yards back until I eventually saw it bounce gracefully over the roof edge on the other side of the school.

Hustling down the pavement I ran, the sun shining brightly on my baby and my flip flops, the calls of the children growing fainter as the distance between us increased, and was pleasantly surprised when I rounded the corner to find the balloon waiting patiently, bouncing gently about a yard away, shielded from the wind that had initially blown it there.

Two quick steps and I snatched it up with my free hand and then turned the corner and gave the tightly held balloon a jubilant thrust up into the air, waving it triumphantly at the children lined up on the sidewalk waiting about a hundred yards back who jumped and cheered in excitement.

The breeze was cool, laced with spring warmth, and the sun shone brightly and cheerfully on us as we walked a happy walk home, my girlie and I, to return a pink balloon to an rejoicing Layla.

Things

Today Layla came and put her arms in my lap and put her chin on her hands.  "Is it Fries-Day, today?" she wondered aloud, with the little expression she gets where she talks out of one side of her mouth.

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Today it was "a little bit warm" - warm enough, declared the boys, that they were hot!!! All three were running around in the back yard with their shirts off while their mother eyed them dubiously through the window as she was making supper.  She thought they were perhaps a bit zealous in their rabid summer wanting.

Israel and Zion and Layla brought in "flowers" for their mama from the backyard.  Israel carefully arranged the first batch in a nice little vase...and Zion was INSPIRED.  ;)

The two on the edges are from him.  Then he wanted us to have candles on the table for supper and selected five.  Then he wanted to put options for drinks for supper on the table - we could choose between regular V-8 juice and an orange Apple and Eve blend.  Then he wanted to put the candles into paper bowls.  Then the brothers came in and Gabe got all inspired to burn things and was lighting and relighting the candles.  Then he wanted to take a candle out to the sidewalk to burn and I said yes.  The boys kept running in and out of the house busily as I was nursing Caroline on the couch and after a bit I got a whiff of something made me think that I had probably better eyeball the activities outside and sure enough the boys had a nice little leaf fire burning busily in the middle of the sidewalk leading up to the house.  It was speedily doused with water and a small cup of sand (that Zion ran to fetch) and the boys cleaned it up.  And we just won't talk about the little project that went on inside after that that left a burnt spot on my tablecloth.  Nope.  Just - public service announcement here that the candles are on hiatus for an indeterminate amount of time starting today.

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You know the movie Mr. Peabody and Sherman?  Zion has heard of this movie and thinks that it is Mr. Pee-Bottom and Sherman.  Cackle of laughter.  I have not corrected him; instead I just keep asking him about it.

Today, Layla buried her head in my lap and then enthusiastically declared, "I yuuuuv YOU, sweetie!!" :D

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Israel, concernedly to Layla as she brought out her clothes to go outside in the falling snow, "Layla, you don't want to do that - there's going to be a wizard today!"

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A common sentiment of Layla's lately: "Mommy, you're yittle!  You're my yittle mommy and Dad's my big daddy!"

Excerpts of Life

When interacting with Caroline, Israel often says, almost in an expression of awe, "She is sooo PRECIOUS!!"  This morning after he said that he added, "I think she is the most preciousest one we've had for ever and ever!!"  After a little thought he added fondly, "Layla is pretty precious too..." :)
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Tonight I took a quick trip into Walmart to pick up a prescription, and took an eager Zion along with me, as it was "his turn".  I usually try to pick them up a little doodad when they come along to make it special, and Zion snatched up a cheap laser pointer matching his older brothers and a box of chewable Jolly Ranchers.  As we came out of the store and began walking quickly to our vehicle, I felt the cold night air on my face , and looked down at my little Zion trotting along beside me in his green coat with the hood up, his treasures tucked close to his chest, and I felt his little hand slip into mine and hold on and I squeezed his hand and felt my love for him so intensely.  I love to have him little.  I'm going to miss his littleness and can hardly BELIEEEEVE that he is turning six this year.  Even though he's not the baby, he is still the baby of the boys.

Zion calls Dorito's "Burritos", and tonight he informed everyone, "I'm going to get some more Burrito's," and then burst into a round of "Joy to the Burrito..."  that his mama thoroughly enjoyed.  His brothers were very disturbed at this misprounciation and hastened to chastise it with great displeasure ("Mom!! If he goes to school and calls them Burritos everyone will make fun of him...") while their mother shook her head at them and rolled her eyes and told them to lighten up.  Seriously peoples around here.

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Caroline has been doing A.M.A.Z.I.N.G lately in terms of going to sleep and staying asleep.  Tonight, though, she woke up at some point after I laid her down.  I nursed her mostly back to sleep, but her eyes were open when I took her into the bedroom to put her back to bed, and she was kind of looking around.  I thought, oh, she's up, and then had to lean in and kisskisskisskisskiss those sweet precious cheeks as she leaned her forehead tiredly against my face...and then her eyes drooped shut...and she fell fast asleep from her mommy kissing on her.  Awwwwwwwww sugar baby......

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Zion: (with bemused interest while gingerly feeling his nose) "When I put that clothespin on my nose it made water come out of my eyes!"

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I haven't blogged in....errrmmm...FOREVER largely because I felt like there wasn't much to say there for a few months that didn't involve ragged looks, throwing hands up into the air, and scurrying away from clinging screaming two-year-olds.  And rants about sleeplessness.  Lots and lots and lots of rants about sleep interruptions.  No worries.  My mom got to hear all of it.  ;)  Poor mom ears...

For a few months, especially Caroline's bedtime was waaaaayyy skewed to late late late night/early morning for far, far too long, and at the same time, Layla went through this thing where after we would get her to sleep, she would wake up during the night and be out of her gourd and off her rocker and all that and screaming inconsolably with fury and rage a for a good hour and a half to two hours.  And I would try the best I could to figure out what ON EARTH she was trying to communicate (things that included that she forgot to kiss the kitty cat goodnight or that she wanted to get out of bed) and then take care of the issue or deal with her fury when I denied her the option of getting up for the day at 4 AM and then I would lay in her bed with my eyes closed while she whaled away on me angrily...and then eventually it would all be over and she would be sweet and sleepy and cuddly and curl up next to me and go back to sleep.  Two hours later.  And then in the morning she would wake up and be all grouchy and clingy and during the day and then she also went through a stage where she would fight going to bed tooth and nail.  So after getting to bed at 1 or 2 with Caroline, I was up for two hours in the middle of the night basically every single night for FOREVER with the two year old - not to even mention the baby, who, by the grace of God is (once she gets to sleep) a woooonderful sleeper who sleeps soundly and does not wake up easily.  But you see how days and days and days of that run together along with the typical first-months-newborn-survival life make one sort of cross looking.

I honestly think a lot of Layla's waking has had to do with her having to pee in the middle of the night and not understanding the source of her discomfort.  But gradually, for whatever reasons, this behavior has finally mostly stopped.  Some nights she will sleep all night without waking enough for me to have to go in, or if I do have to, she often settles back to sleep pretty easily.  And Caroline gradually, over a series of weeks, readjusted her sleeping schedule and now falls asleep around 8:30 or 9:00 PM.

The Night

It is one of those nights.  Those horrible, exhausting, fraying nights that begins when the toddler alarms (as is often the case) right as I am starting to drift into a wearied mother-fresh-off-the-time-change exhaustion.  I dutifully peel myself out of bed and go into her room, where she sits up swaying tiredly in her bed, truculent and difficult.  We run through the gamut of her "needs", where she demands (PJ's unzipped, PJ's off, grapes, cookie, tissues located outside of her room, no I do not want you in my room, I want you) as I lay in her twin bed, tired, eyes closed, toddler demands and the occasional blow raining down steadily on my mother body.  Instead of drifting to a quick end, as is often the case, it continues.  For a long time.  About an hour and forty-five minutes into it, she is finally quiet, but still awake, tossing restlessly beside me, and I suddenly just can't do it anymore.  The night will soon turn into dawn and I have slept through none of it and I suddenly develop this resolute desperation for my own bed in my own room and I sit up abruptly and tell her, not un-gently, "Mommy is going to sleep in her own bed now.  You stay in your bed."

        And rage erupts in the wake of my speedy and unexpected exit and now I am dealing with a roaring toddler coming over into my darkened bedroom where the baby sleeps, and I have just had it.  She comes over, I return her firmly to her bed, warn her, leave, she comes back over, roaring. I, furious and desperate for sleep and peace, am ADAMANT that she remain in her room, and set her back into her bed.

       She roars that she wanted a tissue because she has snot.  I wildly march down the hall and grab a tissue that I fling into her room.  She shrieks in fury because she had wanted to get the tissue.  At 3:45 AM.  I return to my bed.  She bangs the door open into my room, crying loudly.  I place her back in her bed, deliver a very stern rebuke, and she shrieks anew for the bear she had spotted on the floor in my bedroom.  I march across the hall, grab the bear, toss it on her bed, and she screams at the top of her lungs that SHE WANTED TO GET THE BEAR!!!!!!

       I just don't know how to communicate the emotions of these moments.  I feel wild-eyed, half-crazed, a desperate woman craving the solitude and silence of her dark, still bedroom.  I cross back to my bed, scoop up the baby who has of course been woken in this process and is bleating tiredly, and nurse her, my heart beating quickly, my breaths shallow and quick.  Sometimes being a mother is just overwhelming.  The tireless need for you that continues around the clock some nights; the clutch, the suck of your life-blood.  Especially wearing when it is accompanied by noisy tears that won't be silenced and noisy demands that won't be satisfied.

       The door bangs open again and the small furious shadow framed by the lamp light from the other room hurls a small cloth bear across the threshold and then quickly retreats to her bed to weep out her fury.  I know across the hall she is sobbing wildly and brokenheartedly although I can't hear her, but my emotions are at full fray and numbed.  The fan whirs noisily in my bedroom and the cool air rests lightly on my arms and the darkness is like a cool calming cloth on my face.  I long with all my heart for sleep.  My husband half-sits in the bed beside me, groggy.  We both know that it is of no use for him to offer his presence to this girl of ours - she is fueled with mommy-only gasoline in the middle of the night and anything else sets off an explosion.

       The minutes tick by.  The husband has settled back into his sleep, and the baby's suckling has slowed, along with my breathing.  The door is slowly pushed open again, and light spills into the room, and I see her shadow, slow and sad, creep across my floor.  She comes to stand silently at my side as I sit, cradling the baby in the bed, and wordlessly takes my hand in hers in a tight grip with both of her hands and presses it to her face in a gesture that is both tender and vulnerable.  She stands there silently, her face buried in the back of my hand, a hiccuping sob escaping here and there - and all my resentment and desperation is gone; melts away just that fast.   She just can't help herself, her mommy-neediness, and she loves me desperately and it makes her so sad when I just can't take it any more.  And my few minutes of solitude and quiet have regenerated emotional energy and I am ready to deal with the understanding that this is part of what makes her up, and this is part of our stage together and right now she just needs me, and that we love one another, her and I.

       It's so messy, this mothering thing.  The sticky tentacles of need and necessity that wrap little humans to their mothers - especially some little humans.  I beckon her into our bed and she climbs in and waits as I return the baby to her bed.  She turns and tosses and wiggles like a puppy circling...and eventually sleeps pressed up tightly to my back...and so do I.  Another night in the life of a real-time parent.

Bat Burps

Zion just polished off some chocolate milk as he was sitting beside me, then gave a small belch.  "That was a bat burp, Mom," he said seriously.  "That's what bats do when they get some air inside them."  He hopped along behind me, following me into the dining room.  "Do you think another name for bats is 'flappies'?" He flapped his arms like bat wings and nodded to himself.  "Yes, that is another name - 'flappies'." He hopped busily off leaving me to furrow my forehead in confusion as to where all the bat love came from randomly.

Lists

Things I don't want to forget:

1.  Sitting with Layla in my lap feeling her soft cloud puff of hair against my face and feeling her happily walk her fingers on my arm, from my shoulder down to my wrist and then back up to my neck.
2.  Holding a relaxed but alert Caroline on my shoulder, with her head warm and soft and bumping gently against my jaw and cheek as she looks around with wide eyes.
3.  Zion scrunching his little nose happily when he asks me a question he already knows the answer to, just because he wants to hear me say it.
4.  Israel's wide-eyed happy exuberance and innocent joy.
5.  Gabe's gentle and shy hugs, and the way he sometimes grabs me and hugs me tightly when I don't expect it and how I'm always startled by how wiry and boy-ish he is, instead of childish, and how his hands don't feel soft any more, but harder and more grownup and it's kind of bittersweet.

Things that make me happy:

1.  The feel of a cold, wet cat nose against my nose, and the whispery fluff of cat fur on my cheek.  I never thought I would ever get to have a cat again since Tim is allergic to them, but a stray cat adopted us this summer and we warmed up to her and she warmed up to us and now she mostly lives in the house after TIM basically invited her in because he was worried about her getting cold (!!!) and we think she is pregnant and we're all excited about kittens and she is so friendly and cuddly.  And Tim went and got on Singulair and now the cat doesn't bother his asthma at all and he loves her and keeps telling me that Kitzi is such a good cat. :)  I consider this a direct gift from God to me for us to actually get to have a cat. :)
2.  A hot bath in the tub with the whirlpool jets running.  Heavenly bliss.  This often feels like my solitary break in the day...my luxury.

Things that have been very hard this month:

1.  Caroline got hit pretty hard with RSV which caused bronchospasms that caused a very scary cough.  When a chest xray seemed to show a change in her heart size, the pediatrician sent us up to A.I. Dupont Children's Hospital that night for them to evaluate her, and also to check her for possible pertussis.  I was honestly terrified that she had pertussis, and it was a massive relief to find out that she did not, and that her cough that mimicked a pertussis cough exactly was just bronchospasm, and that albuterol helped immensely.  Praise God.  The chest xray ended up to be a fluke, but it was discovered that she did have two viruses at once - RSV and rhinovirus, and so the month of December involved very little sleep for her parents, as her stuffed nose and cough kept her up into the wee hours of the night for weeks.  She was actually not diagnosed with bronchospasm until we came home and she was continuing to do her heart-stopping cough where she would cough and cough and cough and seem to run out of air and turning red and this thick mucus would be coming out of her mouth and her head would be lolling and she would be struggling to breathe in and this would be going on for over a minute.  Terrifying, I tell you.  I called our pediatrician a little before midnight that first night back in tears, because SOMETHING was not right, and she surmised what might be happening and told me to give her nebulizers every four hours to prevent it, and it helped enormously, but meant nights camped out on the couch with Caroline directly underneath a cold mist humidifier, ready to scoop her up and out if she started coughing, and with my alarm set for the nebulizer.

2.  At the same time all of this was going on, Layla started doing this thing in the middle of the night where she would wake up disoriented and probably having to pee but not understanding it yet.  She would throw massive and long temper tantrums in the middle of the night - say, 4-5 AM.  Overwhelming and so frustrating and confusing to know how to best handle them.  Tim and I would tag team in the middle of the night where he would go out to sleep on the couch to watch Caroline and I would go back with Layla.  Then, she also started doing them with the onset of bedtime, and everything was a struggle: to get her into pajamas, to get her to stay in bed without one of us there, to get her to lay down.  And then she would basically scream her head off in outrage until she fell asleep.  This also for weeks.

With these two things, you can understand how Christmas felt like something to survive this year.  I really tried to keep my expectations low in terms of Christmas-activities-to-accomplish, because I love to do all the "things".  I made party mix and molasses crinkles early in the month...and that was about that.  I got the tree up after repeated impatient begging from Israel (the boys were so cute and hyper and excited and racing around the house.  They eagerly helped me lift things down from the attic and put the ornaments on themselves.) and I got Christmas shopping done and wrapped everything all at once the night before our Christmas.  The boys also put up the little Christmas village in the window and arranged it just so and cut out stars and a moon (and later sun and clouds) to hang up at the top of the window and it looked so neat and I wanted to get a picture but didn't.

I feel like just as memorable as Christmas is, for me, almost more memorable is my Christmas wrapping experiences of the past few years.  A few years ago, Zion was two and still often up late and finally I gave up and wrapped all but his gifts with him there, and he "helped" by putting tape on the wrapped presents. :)  And then last year I had another mega-wrap night the night before our Christmas, and the boys were warned to stay in their room and not come out, and Tim helped me wrap after I begged him to and he did just a staggeringly impossibly terrible job (HA!!!) of wrapping but I didn't care at all.  Somehow, wrapping gifts for him is like math for me.  Just so confusing and mind wrinkling.  And this year included Caroline and another mega-wrap session in the wake of a crazy month.

But I "got-er-done".  We had our Christmas morning mayhem,

and our Christmas breakfast

(also more simple this year) with the beautiful stack of pancakes made by Tim

- actually Tim made the entire breakfast, with the exception of me whipping up the pancake batter for him - and then we had our pancaked-crash afternoon and then a visit from out of state/country friends Janelle and Jessica

and then finished up the evening with a "snacky" supper

and our annual viewing of Nacho Libre. :)

We went to VA the next morning, which was Christmas Day, and had Christmas with my family and then my extended family the next day.  We came home on Saturday.

Things that have been a blessing this month:
1.  People who were praying for us during Caroline's sickness and afterwards.
2.  Our church family who brought meals to us for a week just to help lift some of the burden of life.  Like, seriously.  This was a month of WORK.  Like, WOW.  Phew.

The good news is that in the wake of Christmas, Caroline is completely better and going to sleep much much earlier, usually before midnight, and then sleeping until 9 or 10, and Layla has gone down with almost no fuss or even none at all, and has slept all night.  I was hoping the time away might "reset" her, and I reeeeally hope it sticks!!!!!

And here's where the photo onslaught begins. :)

Here's a view of the fixin's.

Happy Caroline girl in her carseat watching all the activity. :)  She smiles a lot and coos a lot.

 Layla got a Dora undershirt and undies and INSISTED on wearing them and only them for a good while.  Here she is listening intently to the heartbeats of her new dolls. :)

 Gabe buried deeply in his new comic book.

 Partaking of delectable breakfast fare while wearing your Dora goodness.

 This one.  Amused shake of head.  Sometimes I will find Zion hiding behind a chair in the living room playing with Israel's legos.  This day, Israel was the envy of the group with this used V-Tech texting toy I found for him.  I walked into the living room and saw no one, but heard gadget music coming from behind the chair by the window and found this Sneaky little Sneakerton busy busy busy.  

 Zion and Layla enjoying the concept of a toast with their fizzy grape juices.

VIRGINIA

We got to Virginia at around 2 PM on Christmas Day.  The kids helped their Grandaddy decorate the snow scene with the lime mixture that turns white and takes on a snowy texture.  Everybody got a chance to pour.

 Layla taking an apple break in the living room. :)  Cutie.

 Dad and his good dog, Maddie.

 Oh look!  It's the Sneaky little Sneakerton hard at work again, this time behind Grandma's couch, with the same delightful toy.  Cackle of laughter.  :D

The Christmas Feast.

Presents.  Look at Layla's delighted little face. :)

Layla LOOOVED this gift.  It was supposed to be a Belle (from Beauty and the Beast) costume.  She felt just beeyoooteeful in it, and tripped around in her little shoes for a long time with just a look of delighted awe on her face.

Snoozing Caroline.

 Layla helps Grandaddy make the popcorn for the traditional nightly popcorn and juice snack that occurs at Grandma and Grandaddy's house every night.

These days, it's a squeeze to get everyone around the kitchen table. :)

The next day, Israel was keen to get started on his new science kit.  Thankfully he had a good Grandaddy to help with such endeavors.  This project was very exciting and got brothers running to see.

 Gabe was not to be left out of the science goodness and had to do one of his own projects from his kit.  This one was cool too. :)

Caroline just said...snore.

Grandma giving Caroline a bath getting her ready for the evening.

Layla fell fast asleep on our drive over to her Great Grandma's house for supper.

She was enamoured of the chalk board that hangs on the wall there and it kept her busy for quite a while.

Downstairs to the basement to open presents after supper.  There was a strange man there carrying a very sweet baby that looked familiar.

 The fam.

 The boys eagerly waiting for the next gift installment. ;)

My uncle Lowell, cousin Calvin, Grandma, and Mom.

We stayed one day longer than we had planned, so that Tim and I could get a night out on the town doing exciting things like hitting up discount stores ;) and going out for Indian food.

Moxie cat.

The boys had a GREAT time hammering away at this iced up water to give the birds a drink.

Caroline smiling away at her Grandma.

When I went upstairs to get the kids ready for bed after we got back, I found them having a great time in the boy's room.  Gabe was laying in bed reading, and the other three were having a great time taking turns climbing onto the dresser and jumping off into a pile of blanket on the floor.

Home again, home again.  We ended our day playing a new game from Nana Carol and Grandpa Norm called The Treasure of Skull Rock.  Very exciting pirate game.  So exciting that only Layla and Israel ended up brave enough to snatch the treasure rocks out of the treasure chest. ;)  Everyone else took an additional day to warm up to this concept.

A good time was had by all!! Thank you, family and friends, for all your blessings to us this month!!!