This is the last time?

A couple of weeks ago, we were visiting at my parents' house.  I was sitting in the recliner when Hollis came in the door, crying.  He climbed into my lap, all sweaty and dusty.  When I asked him what happened, he managed to get out that he'd been riding in the jeep while Ivy drove, and he stood up and she gunned it, so he fell out.

He must have landed pretty hard, because I couldn't remember the last time the boy had come to me for comfort, or openly wept.  I held him in my lap, and it only took a few minutes for him to settle down.

I looked at him, all long bones and pointy elbows and knees.  Before I was ready, I could feel his body switch from "little-boy snuggle" mode to "I feel awkward that Mom's holding me in her lap" mode.  I wondered if it was the last time he'd come to me like a little boy.  I hope he'll still want to be comforted by his mom, even when he's older.

On a somewhat lighter note, what do you bet that Ivy laughed when he fell off, as she peeled out?  We need to have a talk with that girl.

How NOT to go camping with the McDonalds.

Pack four hours for a 24 hour getaway.
Wash and dry all your sleeping bags.
Discover that the cooler wasn't washed properly last time we used it.
Wash the death-smell out of the cooler.
Set tent up in yard, to see if it is still in one piece.  It is.
Realize an hour later that the wind blew said tent over and broke one of the fiberglass poles.
Toby fixes tent pole with a layer of duct tape, a layer of cable ties, and another layer of duct tape.
Leave three hours later than expected.
Realize the car is nearly out of gas, so stop to fill up, making everyone even later, if possible.
Drive for one hour, with kids asking when we'll be there.  How is this still annoying, having been asked so many times?
Try to find a cool spot in the nearly-empty campground.
Park in one, and realize that it's right next to a tiny cemetery.  Awesome!  No really, goth camping!
Realize that the super-cool goth spot is reserved.
Find another two campsites adjacent to one another.
Set up tent in the dark.
Make hamburgers.  With no salt.  Because we forgot that, too.
Enjoy salt-free hamburgers, because food always tastes better outdoors.
Walk a half-mile to the bathroom, where a giant hairy spider awaits.
Realize that we forgot the bag with sunblock, toothbrushes, and toiletries.
Figure out where kids all want to sleep.  Change arrangements a billion times.
Give up and go to bed at about ten thirty(crappy air mattress).
Enter possibly gay rednecks from nearby campsite.  With ZZ Top's Greatest (and Most Obnoxious) Hits.
Listen to them repeat the CD of the Apocalypse infinitely, while popping open many beers.
For about THREE HOURS.
Wish for death.
And again.
Cheer inwardly when Lynn finally asks them to turn down their music.
Sleep for fifteen minutes.
Thunderstorm.  No, really.
Get soaked when the rain cover blows off the tent.
Feed Loch in the car while Toby fixes it.
Wait to be struck by lightning.
Decide to die with the rest of the family,
Try to find one scrap of blanket to cover up with that isn't sopping wet.  There are none.
Feed Loch, try to sleep.  Try to lay him down.  Fail.  Repeat until sunrise.
Pass out for two hours, while everyone else makes/eats breakfast.
Bacon and sausage and pancakes do make the whole thing seem worth it.
Let kids play in the lake, about forty feet from our campsite.
Count to five, to make sure they haven't drowned.  Repeat every two minutes for the rest of the day.
Eat way too much food.  Jello salad:  not a salad.  But good, anyway.
Get into bathing suit.  Play in water with kids for a couple of hours.
Have legs nibbled painfully by stupid fish.
Try not to think about how many corpses have been dumped in lakes, historically.
Put sunblock on, trying to counteract farmer tan.  (Bad idea.  Now instead of brown and white, I'm brown and red).
Walk a half mile to the bathroom.
Drink a bee out of a can of Coke.
Play tag with campfire smoke and chair placement.
Walk a half mile to the bathroom.
Pack everything up again, discovering bag with sunblock and toothbrushes.  It took longer than that, but I'm tired of typing.
Go home, ignore the fact that I need to wash and dry the sleeping bags again.
Fall asleep at eight.
Promise with self never to go camping again.

You Win, Dad.

Spectacles.

They've got my astigmatism.

But aren't they cute in glasses?

 (My apologies for the flash-glare.  We were in a hurry to post pictures...)

A Day in the Life.

Being self-employed from home allows for moments like these.  I have a whole file full of kids with the mannequin.

Ivy likes helping Dad make sure the sleeves look all right in the pictures.

One Last Fling

Bass Pro:  where it's free to straddle and otherwise mildly abuse all manner of expensive outdoor equipment.  At least, no one told us to leave.

Two parents, five kids, and two strollers can have a pretty decent time.

Different Worlds

There was a bit of an altercation today in the sewing room.  I was working and talking to Toby, and Olivia was coating the ends of the boning for me.  She calmly said to me:

"Mom, did you know you have a spider on your back?"

People who have no phobias don't understand that it doesn't give you enough time for rational thought, or a decision-making process.  I didn't say to myself, hey, let's ride this one out and see how HUGE that spider on my back might be.   No.  HECK NO!

I brushed my back frantically, then whipped my shirt off.  Sweet, huh?  Very cool.  Then Toby said I should have stood still and let him get it off me.  The problem is, I have no idea if we were talking about a little harmless spider or one like in this post.

Let's just say my knee-jerk reaction wasn't going to let me stick around to find out.  Huzzah for an impromptu strip-tease to break up the monotony of the workday, though.

Total Eclipse.

No, not Twilight or Bonnie Tyler related.  I was reading a kids' book called "The Moon Book" at bedtime the other night.  It has facts like how big our Moon is, how it might have formed, how far from Earth it is, and so on.

When we got to the section on Solar and Lunar eclipses, I told them when the next solar eclipse would be visible from our area (I was wrong, by the way.  I thought it was 2027, but there are solar eclipses expected in 2017, then 2024 and 2045).  See this NASA map for details. 

Anyway, we were thinking it was in seventeen years, not seven.  Then we started wondering how old we'd all be by then:

Toby and I will be 48.
Olivia will be 27.
Hollis,  24, the age I was when he was born.
Maggie will be 22, Ivy will be 20, and even Lochlan will be 18.

I spend a lot of time wishing the kids were more independent, and able to do things for themselves.  I wish Loch would not need to be carried all the time to be happy.  I get so tired of the constant cleaning and tending and wiping and fixing that five kids require.

Oh, what a difference seventeen years would make.  Will they all be gone from us by then?  I am not ready for that.

It's so hard to enjoy some aspects of parenting in the moment, because there is always so much to be done, and it's overwhelming most of the time.   Here's to having fun with the kids a little every day, not just waiting for when I have time.  Because I never will have time, if I do it that way.

On the other hand, children are a huge compensation for the dreaded march of time.   If we didn't get older, I'd never get to see what kind of people these kids will be.  Maybe it's crazy or egotistical, but I think they will be interesting adults, and I hope that we all still want to hang out with each other as much as possible.  

Tonight, we're taking them fishing.  Because childhood is short, but parenting is forever.

A Whole Lotta Crap in One Post.

We're still recovering from our trip to Utah.  It's strange that even if it's somewhere you want to go, with people you want to see, trips are stressful and exhausting.  Especially with five kids in tow.

On the way there, we were stuck in a huge traffic jam for three hours in Denver, Colorado.  Toby had been asleep next to Ivy, until she peed on him, which is why he isn't wearing a shirt.  I don't know why he's showing off his biceps, but it seems like he does it a lot.

Maybe he's shaking his fist at the cars blocking our way to Utah.  I don't remember.  I DO remember that Olivia stayed awake and talked the whole night.  We are both masochists and cheap, so we try to drive straight through.  I've personally been training for the last eleven years to handle sleeplessness.

The kids were all mostly happy to see each other.  Maggie and Brynn are the best of little girly-princess friends about 95 percent of the time.  Ivy and Todd, are best of hooligan-mayhem friends 50 percent of the time.  Hollis and Olivia did a lot of packing Lochlan around while Toby and I tried to work. 

We haven't seen Dana and Josh and Corinne for WAAAY too long.  Late one night, we ran out to an all-night grocery store and giggled like teenagers while we all bought snacks.  Back at Michelle's, we watched a Rifftrax short called "Shake Hands With Danger."  Oh, good times.  Corinne, I'll be your kitchen wing-man any day.

Ivy modeled the latest in fashionable shark headwear.

We made a required trip to IKEA.   I had to get a picture of the fake buttocks assaulting a chair repeatedly to prove how durable it is.  The chair, I mean.

 
We visited Temple Square with Michelle and Tyler and all our collective kids.  I tried hard to feel the spirit and not just to notice the mullets and stonewashed jeans in the old-school church videos.  All joking aside, it is a beautiful place.

 We even managed to make it home with our little camera, in spite of the fact that Todd found it and used it.

And, shortly following our return, this little guy turned one.  Happy Birthday to Loch.

Appraisal Update.

The bank finally gave us the appraisal value of the house and the 17 acres.  The house is worth enough for them  to loan on, so, barring some majorly unforeseen circumstances, IT IS OUR DESTINY.  Actually, the house is worth more than we're paying for it and the property altogether. 

It all seems kind of anticlimactic, compared to the other thing that happened on Friday, the memorable short disappearance of our fourth child.  Please refer to the preceding post for exciting details.

Life did go on last week, in spite of the waiting game.  Hollis lost his first tooth.  It's been wiggly for nearly a year, so Toby finally just gave it a good hard yank and out it came.  Every time one of my children loses a tooth, I think of how much we all miss Grandpa McDonald and his sneaky small pliers.  He'd ask a kid to show him the loose tooth, whip the pliers out of his pocket, and pull it before they knew what hit them. 

Loch started full crawling this week.  In spite of having done this whole routine four times before, we're (surprise) TOTALLY UNPREPARED for a mobile infant.  He's the first baby since we've been working making bodices, and the sewing room is not a friendly place for a curious little boy.  We're talking grommet bits, loose threads, ribbon scraps, extension cords....Don't worry, we're both getting a little bit of work done while watching him like hawks.

In the next few weeks, we should close on the Ivy house, fix it up a bit, and move. Then, we need to get our current house on the market and sold quickly.   Michelle and Tyler are coming out from Utah for the Spring Renaissance Festival season, and that will be both exciting and exhausting.  Life will definitely be in high gear.

Lost.

Last night, our family attended the ward's Blue and Gold Banquet for Scouting.  Hollis will turn eight and be a Cub Scout next fall, but I'm the member of the Primary Presidency that's responsible for overseeing Scouting now.  The leaders asked us to judge cakes that each family made for the 100th birthday of Boy Scouting in America.

The night started off without a hitch.  We ate good food and watched them hand out awards to the boys who earned them.  We judged the cakes and gave out funny prizes for everyone.  The kids played more or less quietly with the piles of blue and yellow balloons that were all over the cultural hall.

Suddenly, I couldn't see Ivy anywhere.  Toby and I both went into the halls to look for her.  We ran all over the church, checking the bathrooms, the nursery, her Sunday classroom, anywhere she might have gone.  Each time our paths crossed, Toby's face looked a little more sick, and I knew mine was the same.

Where could she have gone?  Surely not outside by herself?  Did I remember hearing the doors to outside open and close a minute before?  I ran into the parking lot, no longer trying to be quiet.

"IVY!"  "IVY!"  It was dark and quiet.  I ran all around the building to make sure she wasn't out there. 

Back into the church.  I found Toby again, and he hadn't found her, either.  I was beginning to panic.  Did she wander off, or did someone take her?  I couldn't even begin to think of the possibilities.  We finally agreed to go disrupt the show, and get everyone present looking for Ivy.  I stood out in the hallway, trying not to be sick.

"Found her!"  Toby called back out the doorway of the cultural hall.  When he'd gone back in to raise the alarm, he found her sitting at our empty table, placidly eating her dessert.  She must have been under our table, or one of the other ones.  She probably never left the room.

Now, I've only seen this happen in movies, but did you know that massive relief can make you weak and dizzy?  I had to go sit down.

Bad Parenting.

The Mag and the Dentist.

Yesterday, Maggie had her second visit to the dentist, to fix some cavities that have been bothering her.  We are so lucky to have a dentist that is both affordable and super nice.  I've been to some dentists that treat kids like animals, and parents like morons.  Our dentist and all his staff are friendly and wonderful to kids.  They talked to Margaret the whole time, and told her what a good little girl she was being, and then let her pick out some cool prizes.  Here's to my kids not being afraid of the dentist, and the fact that Maggie now has no dental red-flags!

Mag likes "princess hair."  So, while it was damp, I braided two little bits in the front and made a crown by crossing them on top of her head.  The picture above shows how cool it looked later, when we took it down.  Love those cheesy smiles!

Ten and Three and Half.

December is gone in a whirl of activity, and I'm not sorry for it to end.  This month, to borrow a phrase from Michelle, has kicked my rear.  A lot.

At the beginning of the month, we celebrated Ivy's and Olivia's birthdays, just one day apart.  Liv is now ten, and beginning to show some interest in being a young lady in addition to a tomboy.  She requested having her ears pierced as her present from Mom and Dad.  She's been perfectly diligent about caring for them, and I've not had to remind her at all.  Only a couple more weeks until she can take out the first pair and try some others. 

When I turned ten, my family was on a Labor Day camping trip.  Mom woke me up, wished me a happy birthday, then cried, since ten is the first of the double-digit birthdays.  At the time, I was a bit embarrassed.  Mom, now I understand.  Ten years ago, Liv was a tiny Charlie-Brown-bald baby girl.  Today, she's an athletic and compact goofball.  I'm impressed every day by her individuality and compassion.

Liv moved everyone up a level of "great."  We became parents, our parents became grandparents, grandparents became great-grandparents, and even great-grandparents became great-great-grandparents.  All the "greatness" is on Toby's side of the family, by the way.  His family produced five generations in the time it took my family to do three.

Sadly, two of her great-great-grandmas are no longer with us, but the last, Great-Great-Grandma Dawna, is still going strong.  She told me if Liv has kids while "still in diapers," like the rest of us, she might get to be a great-great-great-grandma.  (She is an awesome lady.)  (By the way, Liv, no hurry!)

Ivy turned three, another milestone.  Three is more pre-school age, she's not so much a toddler anymore.  We're working on lots of grown-up skills like potty training and keeping clothed.  Ivy is a force of nature, and the mischief gleams in her eyes, but she has a caring side that keeps it from sliding into the malicious.  She loves to listen to "We Are the Champions" and sing along.  She thinks "no time for losers" is "you guys are losers."

Ivy has a very lively sense of humor, and she is what I like to call a "chain yanker."  She calls my sister "Grandma" and my mom "Laural."  She knows perfectly well which is which, she just thinks it's funny.  When Maggie is is the bathroom, she'll stick her little toes under the door and say, "Maggie, can you see my toes?  Come and get them!"  Ivy has an insane mad-scientist raspy laugh, and she uses it all the time.  What will she be like in seven years, when she's Olivia's age?

Loch is now six months old.  He's sitting up and can work himself around on the floor.  It's not crawling, it's more like he's in a wheelbarrow race, but with nobody carrying his legs, kind of sledding around on his chest.  He is beginning to try out a few foods, but he is still very much a mama's boy when it comes to nutrition.   Loch is easily frustrated, and toys seem to only appease him for a moment before they've let him down in some catastrophic way, making him shriek with agitation.

What will Lochlan be at three?  At ten?  Will he be goofy or solemn?  Will he talk all the time like Olivia, or sit quietly with a car and play for hours like Hollis?  Will he love to read?  Will he have a baby brother or sister that he loves as much as Maggie adores him?  Parenting has its ups and downs definitely.  But there's nothing like it to make the future look appealing. I can't wait to see what they will become.

Failure to Communicate.

The other day, Olivia was chewing on something after dinner.  I asked her what it was, and she started signing to me, trying to finger-spell it out.

"C... Is it chocolate?  No?"  At this point, I was trying to remember what we had lying around to eat that began with "C."

"Slow, down, Liv, I can't remember that many signs!"  Okay, she finally drew the next one in the air.

"R..."

More frantic gesticulations...

"Um...Okay, is it a vowel?  Yes?  A..."  Excited nods of assent.

Finally she swallowed her mouthful.  She burst out, "Mom, I can't remember the sign for "P!"

"Livvie!  You're eating CRAP!?!"

(Actually, crepes.  Spelling lesson and discussion of French language followed.)

Well, don't.

Oh, if I could have a t-shirt made with this image.

I can't seem to convince the boy that finger doesn't start with "th."  I adore the spelling, and the picture just slays me.  Check out those motion lines. It's just really...worth a thousand words, isn't it?

That little stick-figure guy won't be putting his thinggr anywhere near a plug hoel for some time.

A Letter to Loch.

Dear sweet little boy:

First, we're all very happy to have you here, and we can't imagine life without you.  You are a source of cuteness and joy in all our lives.

But you are incapable of sleep, and that is really starting to grind us down.  Mom, especially, is weary of feeding you several hours straight at night to keep you from screaming.  The problem is, she can't fully sleep when you are eating, because she has to make sure you remain attached and happy.  Your Dad is tired of having you shoved at him at five AM, with Mom saying she needs SOME sleep before morning.  We're exhausted with the two hours of screaming this then entails.

Last night sucked.  It wasn't all your fault, since Olivia began the festivities with vomiting.  Then the crankiness began as soon as our heads hit the pillow.  We all said things we didn't mean to each other.  You scratched Mom's face and pinched her chest.  Your parents may have told you to just shut up and go to sleep.  Not anyone's finest hour.

I'd also like to address the daytime behavior.  You are happy if one of us holds you, or you are nursing.  Please be informed that this is not healthy for the family income, your chances of attending college, your Mom's sanity, or your physical development.  Studies have shown that nine times out of ten, when Mom picks a fight with Dad, you have been crying.  Give her a break, she's got issues.

Remember a few weeks ago, when you had naps during the day, and slept at night?  By the way, this means a nap longer than ten minutes, preferably more than once a day.  Remember happily watching Mom and Dad work for minutes at a time from the safety of your swing?  Remember lying on a blanket, exercising your little round body and playing "Catch Those Toes?"  Let's see more of that, please.

Love,  your parents.

Uh, Feeling Better.

I don't feel that way all the time. I must admit I'm feeling a bit embarrassed, but I blog about what's going on, and that was going on.

Things are looking up today.

These are some pictures I fudged about on Picnik. Enjoy.

Today.