Week #2 Review

Week #2 Review

Hey, look at that! Two weeks in a row! Again, in no way is this going to continue. Stop your crazy thinking right there.

This week has been a bit more ho-hum overall, but here are a few highlights.

The most fun thing is that Brice attended a pre-release party for the Magic: The Gathering Ixalan set. He got to go at midnight and play cards for four hours-ish and just have fun.

The most exciting and life-changing thing for our family is that all four children love to sleep together—and Ammon slept through the entire night three of the last four nights (the other night, he only woke once, briefly, and once I settled him down, he went back to sleep). This really is life-changing stuff. For a lot of reasons, none of our children have easily slept for long stretches as babies. And that has been fine, up to a point, but we’re so happy to see that he is growing to love sleeping with the siblings.*

We also rearranged a lot of furniture! You know how much I love rearranging furniture! This time it was in the conservatory (which is just our fancy and completely incorrect name for the third bedroom). This is where the kids have taken to sleeping, but it was just jammed with junk and furniture (ever since we had to move everything out of the living room and I discovered how much happier I was with very little stuff in the living room). But now it’s looking much better.

Also, I hung curtain set #3 of 4. And it turns out my DIY skills are even worse than I realized. It was not my favorite experience ever, and it’s possible I cried. But hey, at least I did my math right when deciding spacing of curtain clips. And also, it’s done. Now onto set #4...

We’re doing a 31-day read-aloud challenge where Coriel, Addra, and I each read aloud for ten minutes. It has been good motivation and practice for Addra—I can already see that she is improving in her skills. She’s our little daydreamer, though; she’d definitely prefer to be read to instead of doing the reading. Still, she’s doing great. (Coriel and I don’t actually need the practice, but it’s a good reminder to me to actually spend time reading picture books with the boys instead of just listening to longer books with the kids.)

Brice and I are both learning Italian using Duolingo. He’s way ahead of me. I’m still back here saying things like, “Io scrivo un libro” (at least it’s semi-true?).

We started up co-op again. It was good and fun to be back. There were also martial arts, babysitting, and a branch potluck. Overall, a nice week. I feel so very blessed to have this life that we live. Even when things are rough, we have each other’s love and the love of the Lord, so I’d say the balance is strongly on the side of life being awesome.

P.S. No pics at the moment. Because reasons.

* This whole topic of sleep is maybe something I’ll write about in greater detail at some point, though I’m likely to offend or annoy or cause eye-rolling in probably every single person who reads it, so ... maybe not?

Week #1 Review

No, don’t go thinking anything crazy like, “Hey, it’s the beginning of the new year! Jeanna’s probably going through (yet another) New Year’s Resolution about being more up-to-date on her blog.” Nope, I have stopped making those resolutions altogether. They never end well.

So this is not me turning over some brilliant new leaf and suddenly updating our family blog on a regular basis. This is just an unexpected few moments of me documenting things. And now that the explanation is over, here we go, (drum roll please), the first week of the new year!

1. We have slowly been starting back into regular life, complete with all of the regularly scheduled stuff. Ugh. (But at least co-op got canceled so we didn’t have to do that on Thursday!)

2. I finished copyedits for a project I’m involved in—and I was only a day late! So be impressed. Plus, in case I haven’t mentioned it yet, I’m so excited for this one. Stay tuned for more (ha! like that’s gonna happen!), but just know for now it involves what happens after the fairy tales end! Plus, it involves some people I adore and some stories I love. So pretty much it’s amazing.

3. I cut Addra’s hair again. I want to say something cool about why, but the truth is more like this: 

Me: Your hair is snarly. We have to brush it.  (For maybe the second time the whole week.)

Addra: *cringing the whole time*

Me: We could cut it short again so it doesn’t tangle as much.

Addra: Yes yes yes! 

So it’s pretty much about laziness and pain avoidance. Fortunately, the short style actually really suits her, and she was so so so happy to see how it turned out. I’m still completely muddling through it and making it up as I go along (when in doubt, point cut it some more!), so I’m very happy she liked it too. 

4. Brice was in Utah for a work conference. I love that he gets to go occasionally and spend some time with his sibs, cousin, and parents. He gets to learn work stuff and also get a little parenting vacation. Sure, we miss him, but we also order pizza a lot, so it works out. 

5. We put off Three Kings Day so we could celebrate it with Brice. I’m still not sure what the camels are bringing, though. Man, present shopping is hard.

6. Our friends the Ledbetters are moving away, so we watched their kids for a bit this week while they packed. The first thing their 1.5yo does when she comes over is put on a dress. It makes me laugh. We will miss their family.

7. Slowly but surely our house is going back together after the painting and ceiling fixing from November. This week I put up one of the four sets of curtains I need to! (Granted, I meant to do all four, but household projects are always harder than you think they’ll be. And in some cases, so is drywall.)

8. I discovered that it is indeed really painful to have things shoved under your fingernails! A quite large splinter made its way, suddenly and forcefully, halfway down my fingernail recently. It felt awesome. (This was technically not this week, but I still had to share.)

9. New Year’s came and went. We didn’t even try to stay up late. We are such partiers! I may one day post some comments about resolutions and words of the year, but don’t hold your breath for it.

And now for the obligatory picture dump!

See the red mark? That's how far the splinter went down. Ouch.

Dressed as a princess

Ammon is the prince who is supposed to be hugging her.

Awwww, the hug.

This boy loves having his picture taken!

They stuffed his pajamas full of toy food, which is why he looks all lumpy.
Also, he too loves having his picture taken, but he seems to think that it should always be a super goofy expression. This is the expression he made on purpose for this picture.

Joining in the fun of stuffing toy food down his clothing.

Part 1 of my delightful surprise when I came out of my room one day.

Part 2. At least he put them back in the package?

Addra's haircut and happiness!

Seriously. This is the expression he WANTED in this picture!

See?!?

More ridiculous cuteness. He needed a pic of his fancy hair.

How the baby eats sushi.

What my fingernail looks like now, two-ish weeks later (doesn't hurt anymore though).

Because we're cute!

About a month ago, we (finally!) got some new family photos. Huzzah!

There's this whole big story about the perfect outfits that I gathered and how they each perfectly represented each of our family and yet still managed to coordinate appropriately and actually work together and how it was going to be amazing and how that plan went out the window when I procrastinated and it got cold and all of those outfits were actually summer outfits and then I had to try again to find things we would all wear and sort of coordinate and then how I just gave up and tried not to have a nervous breakdown about it and then it got even colder for the day of the photos and how I really don't like that pink zipper in the pictures ... but I won't bother you with that story.

Instead, I'll just show you some cute pictures! We have about a gazillion, so it was hard to choose what to share, so I'll just post a few of my very favorites, including an individual shot of everyone. Aaaaaannnndddd...

[And it turns out that my baby woke up, so computer time is over, so you'll just have to start with the pics I've got so far, our individual shots! Enjoy!]

Spa!

 Today the girls gave me a spa day:

-foot bath with peppermint foot scrub
-foot scrub with pumice
-awesome toenail painting with about seven different colors
-hand massage with lotion
-fancy hairdo
-makeup
-shoulder massage

I felt very loved.

Conversations with the Doctor

Doctor (every single time we have a doctor appointment for a baby): How’s he* nursing.

Me (unless it’s the first week or two): Fine.

Dr: How’s he sleeping?

Me (lying through my teeth): Fine.

[Alternately: Me: Like a baby.**]

Dr: And how many poopy diapers?

Me (every single time!): (First there’s panic—oh no! Should I be counting these things? Weighing them? Marking some sort of tally? Then there’s a reality check. Hello? You just discovered that he gained two pounds and weighs in some epic high percentile. He’s clearly fine. Why does this matter? Then there’s fear of judgment. She’s going to think I’m a bad mother if I don’t know! Then, finally, there’s the vague reply.) Um, I don’t know. Enough?

Dr: (always pressing the issue!) About how many would you guess?

And then I make up some random number just to make her stop asking.

Except this last time, when here’s what I really said: Just tell me what number I should say here so that it seems normal.

Dr: They usually have between a couple and maybe eight per day.

Me: Okay, we’ll go with six.

And that’s my strategy from now on. What do you want to hear, Doctor? Oh, that’s what you wanted? Well, it just so happens that’s exactly what my kid is doing.

The end.

* Or “she,” of course.

** Which is to say, not very well at all.

I Know You Didn’t Mean It, But ...

Cuter than feral goats.

Look, before I tell you some very honest and sticky feelings, let me start by saying it’s not your fault. If you’ve said these things to me, I’m not mad at you or offended or anything. I probably don’t remember it was you! 

But let me add that I’d love it if you wouldn’t say it in the future. I’ll still love you if you do, but just so you know, you’re going to send me home bawling my eyes out. 

Okay, so what is it that you may or may not have said? You said, “Sure, this stage of parenting, with littles and all, is hard. But when they’re older, it just gets different hard (or even harder!). The worries are different, but at least as bad (or worse).”

Now, I understand you meant to be comforting but also realistic. You wanted to remind me that I won’t always have to be watching my baby to make sure he doesn’t fall off of whatever precarious place he’s climbed onto and crack his head open. You’re reminding me that diapers will one day be a thing of the past. Someday soon I won’t feel like a Sherpa with baby on one hip, three bags on the other, holding a toddler’s hand, and climbing up and down the co-op’s stairs (so many stairs!). I get that’s what you’re trying to do. 

But this is what I hear: “You will never ever get a break. There will never be a moment when you get to relax and feel like you’ve accomplished something good. You will never feel good about parenting. Every time you start doing something well, things will just get worse. You think you’re struggling now? You ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”

This is what it feels like: Imagine a person drowning in the ocean, seeing the shore from a distance too far to reach. She’s sputtering and splashing and terrified and hoping she can somehow make it to the sand so she can just breathe air for a minute or two.

And you tell her, “Sure, that’s nice. But when you get to shore, there are hordes of hungry man-eating goats all over the beach. They’ll take longer to kill you than drowning will, and it will probably hurt more (they have small mouths and teeth, you see). So you might as well enjoy drowning.”

Not super helpful.

Next time maybe try pointing out the breathtaking vistas on the beach. Note that there are a few patches of sand that aren’t feral-goat-infested. Even if you’re lying to me. Even if every square inch is full of teeth and hooves. Just lie, please. Thanks.

Parenting and Courtship, according to the six-year-old

On the subject of parenting:

* When I have kids, I will let them build mattress forts and leave them up for a long time and sleep in them.

* I won’t make them clean their room ever. I will not give them any jobs or cleaning to do. Well ... maybe I’ll give them table jobs.

* I will let them do table jobs after bath so that they don’t have to wait to do baths. Or if they want to read or do other activities first, I will let them do that.

* I will let them stay up as late as they want so I can stay up too!

On the subject of her future husband:

* He will have to be okay with how I run the house. Before he proposes, I will make sure he doesn’t mind if I let the kids do table jobs later.

* I will make sure that he’s like me, that he likes to stay up late and parent like I do.

I’m looking forward to finding out how this all turns out for her in a couple decades.