I buy three bunches of eucalyptus at Trader Joe’s, plus two bunches of golden rod and some purple statice. I don’t usually keep fresh flowers in the house during Lent but we’ve got 8 foot icicles hanging off our roof, 4 feet of snow in our yard. and we’re currently digging out from our most recent snow storm. On top of that it’s been a long dark winter of kids getting sick, temps too low to go out with a baby, and my mind totally preoccupied with the health concerns of my oldest. Instead of the start of a penitential season, Lent this year feels like the continuation of the penitential season I’ve been in since January. I know that eventually I will get there, I will lean into Lent and mortify my flesh and walk the road to Calvary, but for now, darn it, I need signs of life. So I buy fresh flowers and eucalyptus.
Read moreFebruary Portraits
Joey, 7 months.
A lot has happened for Joey this month, he got two teeth, can sit up all by himself, and he has started eating solids. He also got kicked out of our room because we were all waking each other up at night too much for anybody’s taste. He now sleeps in what was Trixie room and Trixie’s crib. It’s the earliest we’ve kicked a baby out of our room and it is so nice not needing to tiptoe around at night or worry about blowing my nose too loudly. Oh, getting more than two hours of sleep at a time is pretty nice too.
Read moreHow a Non-Reader Started Reading
Confession: I can probably count on one hand the number of books that I read between my college graduation and the birth of my first child. And if I was reading very little before becoming a mother, I basically stopped reading altogether after I started having kids. But I wasn’t always a non-reader. My childhood and teen years were marked first by Laura Ingalls Wilder and Anne of Green Gables, and then by The Lord of the Rings, Jane Austen, and Charles Dickens. I remember showing up to my high school job a few minutes late and with a tear-stained face because I just had to finish Great Expectations before my shift started.
The beginning of my non-reading started in college, oddly enough. As a music major a lot of my free time was spent in the practice rooms. I read what I had to for my classes, and that was about it. One of the greatest lessons I learned as a music major was that to get good at something you have to practice, everyday. When I stopped the practice of reading, I got really bad at it.
Read moreHealing
Today I wiped a Buzz Lightyear toy down with Clorox bleach wipes. I washed my 5 year old son’s pajamas and special blanket, and put clean sheets on his bed. Tonight I will bath him with antiseptic soap, we will call it “special soap”, and then I’ll put him to bed in his clean pajamas and clean sheets. I’m grateful for this list of to-dos from the surgery center at the children’s hospital. I know they are meant for keeping a sterile environment, but for me it’s something to do with my hands while I try to prepare my head.
Early tomorrow morning before most of you are awake we will head to the hospital where my son will have surgery.
This isn’t new for us. In the last five years my son has been under general anesthesia 7 times for both inpatient and outpatient surgery. You’d think it would be easy by now. But the reality is it’s getting harder. Johnny remembers more, understands more, he’s scared, he needs more preparation, more reassurance, and well, it’s wearing on me. Not preparing for surgery tomorrow. I think that will go fine.
The last five years are wearing on me.
Read moreA Year of Portraits: January
In an attempt to press pause on the passage of time, and document the way my children change over the course of a year I’m going to take intentional (or mostly intentional) portraits of them every month and jot down of few of the things they are doing or saying at that time. This is my less-intensive version of The 52 Project, which I tired a few years ago and, predictably, did not complete.
But I need to do something, because I’m forgetting things! Stupid things, like whether or not we’re out of milk, but also important things, like when Trixie started crawling, or how long it was that Johnny slept in our bed with us. The other day Alex showed me a video of Trixie shortly after she started talking and I had no memory of her little voice sounding the way it did in that video. Maybe it’s just mom brain, and someday it will pass and the fog will lift and I’ll remember stuff again. But in the mean time, precious things are happening! And with so many tools for documentation readily available I thought I’d better start doing a better job of documenting.
So here I go.
Joey: almost 6 months.
If this baby looks happy, it’s because he is happy. He loves to laugh and smile, and he loves when his older bother and sister play with him. This play always looks too rough to me, and I’m often scolding the big kids to be more gentle, but then I realize that Joey is laughing, so it must not be too rough.
If you had told me 5 years ago that someday I would have a baby that I could set down in his crib WHILE FULLY AWAKE and he would just go sleep on his own I would have laughed in your face. But that is the kind of baby Joey is. Easy, happy, super cute, very chubby.
Trixie: 3 years and 3 months.
She is the middle child, my only girl, and in many ways, the scrappy one. But gosh, she sure is pretty too. When I look at those dark eyebrows and lashes I get excited for Trixie that she won’t share in her mother’s fate of being a near albino.
Trixie is a talker. But you probably already knew that. Lately she has been latching onto certain phrases and using them in a variety of scenarios. Example:
“Joey’s not just any baby, he’s my baby brother!”
“That’s not just any stadium., it’s a soccer stadium!”
“These aren’t just any slippers, they’re my ballet slippers!”
Johnny: 5 years and 8 months
Best big brother ever! Every morning he greats Joey with hugs and kisses and words like, “Hey buddy bum! Did you have a good sleep?” And every night he gives Joey a kiss and says, “Good night, Joey. I will see you in the morning. I will miss you. I love you buddy bum.”
Counting is very big deal right now. Johnny likes to count to 99 (he can’t remember that 100 is what comes next). He also likes to count just odd or even numbers, and he likes to count by 11. “11, 22, 33, 44, 55, 66, 77 ,88 99,” and then “Ten-ty-ten.”
2018 in 12
I love doing a Year In Review post each year. It’s so fun to see everything that happened during the last 12 months, and to see how much everyone grew! (And they grew a lot!) But more than that it reminds me of all the blessings that last year has brought.
J A N U A R Y
I was suffering through the tail end of morning sickness while pregnant with Joey. Alex started his new job as a PA in ENT. (Wow! That means he’s been there a year already!) We got better at playing outside, and at being cozy inside.
F E B R U A R Y
Alex and I took our first ever trip without kids to NYC. We had a great time checking out The MET, lots of yummy food, and Purl Soho!
M A R C H
Winter would not be complete without some good knitting projects. This photo is reminding me that this sweater still fits Trixie and that I should have her wear it (read: bride her with chocolate). We also found out that we would be having a baby BOY!! I started making mental preparations for the arrival of another baby.
A P R I L
Winter last year went out like a lion, dumping a giant blizzard on us right in the middle of April. But spring did eventually come and we went out into it as often as we could. I entered the third trimester, during which I documented my favorite maternity things in this post.
M A Y
We got the garden in and I had so much fun cutting flowers to bring into the house. Johnny turned 5! And the royal wedding got me thinking all sorts of thoughts about marriage.
J U N E
Summer break brought lots of time out of doors - rain or shine. Puddle walks inspired by Peppa Pig, naturally.
J U L Y
I read Hannah Coulter and it basically changed my life. I also waited and waited and waited for my baby to arrive, And then, nine days after his due date, he finally came! Welcome Joseph Terence!
A U G U S T
We soaked up lots of baby snuggles and adjusted to being a family of 5.
S E P T E M B E R
The kids started school! Joey and I got to go to Arizona for the Blessed is She Team Retreat. It was a wonderful time with wonderful friends, including my dear friend Jacqui, whom I have now been on more trips with than with my own husband. : )
O C T O B E R
We enjoyed the last of the warm weather. Trixie turned 3! And Alex and I celebrated 9 years of marriage.
N O V E M B E R
Sweater weather! Joey just loves wearing his hand knits. And I love making them.
D E C E M B E R
While we were in the thick of Advent and getting excited for Christmas, Johnny lost his first tooth! I got my kids matching pajamas and they wore them for about 4 days straight over Christmas., which was fine by me.
Happy New Year to you and yours! I hope that 2019 brings you much JOY!
linking up with Bobbi for this fun post.
P.S. You can get your Healthy Meal Planning Bundle NOW through January 7! Click the banner below for more info!!
Everything They Told Me Is True
My four-month-old has started teething, just as my first born loses his first tooth. I see my baby next to my five-year-old and I think “everything they told me is true.”
Don’t blink.
It goes by so fast.
Snuggle them while you can.
Babies don’t keep.
There is my five-year-old is carrying his tooth around in a little glass jar for safe keeping, until he can place it under his pillow tonight. It’s one of those mind-blown, how-did-we-get-here things. I have a vivid memory of when that same tooth first came in. How was that not just yesterday?
Read moreGrieving Together: A Book Giveaway
I’ll be honest with you, in the constant chaos of caring for three small children, most days I don’t think about our first baby. The one we lost to miscarriage. The one that would have turned seven this month if she had lived. The pain of losing that baby was greatly healed by the birth of my first living child, and has continued to heal with the births of my other children. But just because I have three living children to fill my heart and arms and hours doesn’t mean I still don’t feel any grief over the baby we lost.
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