Rock Chalk Jayhawk!

Tonight we get to watch our Jayhawks again on television. I was excited enough about it that I had Ben take my 38 week picture (well....37 and 6 days) in our brand new KU shirts. It may have been a little bit extravagant, but Ben and I ordered shirts from Kansas Sampler, a sports store in Topeka, and then paid $4 for them to ship them to Indiana. Extravagant...maybe, but worth every penny. 

Hoping for another great game!

All quiet on the western front.

Well...kind of all quiet on the western front.

It turns out that I am going to have a baby on Monday.

Then...as I was trying to rest today while watching a two year old (yeah...there wasn't much rest going on), it struck me that I AM GOING TO HAVE A BABY ON MONDAY!

First I was excited. She will finally be here. I can kiss her little face and hold her tight and tell her over and over again how much I love and adore her.

Second I was a little bit terrified. This will be my third time having a baby and the last time was a little...well...traumatic. Sophie didn't want to come out, then she wanted to come out with her hand in front of her face, then instruments were used, and finally she was free. There was also that glorious moment when they handed me my child and I looked at her and thought my baby has down syndrome which began a rapid succession of thoughts in my mind about how little I knew about down syndrome and my panic that I wouldn't be able to be the mother she needed. Then there was the very reassuring moment when the doctor looked at me and said "She looks like she has down syndrome, but I don't think she does. I think she has dwarfism." Which started another whirlwind of thoughts in my mind and also my campaign to learn as much about dwarfism in the next two days as humanly possible. I like to be prepared.

Sophia, thankfully, has neither down syndrome or dwarfism. The child is three feet tall for crying out loud.

After processing all of this and a few tears (I am pregnant - the tears are a given), I came back to being excited. Sure labor may be rough, but it is only a moment in time and at the end of the day one way or another we will be blessed with another daughter.

Plus, I have a lot of things going for me this time. Because I like to be prepared to spout these off to myself whenever needed I have made a list.

1. My doctor is here. Last time he was on "emergency family leave" for eight weeks beginning the week before I was supposed to deliver. He just got back from Florida for spring break, so he should be rested and ready to go. This is good because he will not say things like "I think your baby has dwarfism." Instead he'll say things like "Well, she looks a little rough...let's see how things look in the morning before we freak out."
2. I like our family doctor. When Sophia was born we had a pediatrician that I had only seen twice before she came to see us in the hospital. She was dead set on Sophie having dwarfism. It was weird.
3. I have lived in Fort Wayne for nearly three years. This has become our home. Last time we had been here for just under a year and it still felt like we were just visitors. Now we say things like "Ah...you so could have gone through that yellow light!"  and honk our horn a bunch. We're Hoosiers now.

So all and all things are quiet...or at least as quiet as things ever are in my house. We are looking forward to spending the weekend with Connor and Sophia, for having those last couple of nights where there are no nighttime feedings, and to not needing to bring eleven million things along on a half an hour trip. 

We are also looking forward to meeting Elinor. We are looking forward to seeing if she looks like me, or Ben, or some combination of the two. We are looking forward to showing her to Connor and Sophia. We are looking forward to little baby coos and little baby smiles. 

Go ahead...judge me.

My parenting this last week or so has mostly consisted of the following:

1. Get home and give the kids a snack and juice. (Juice so I don't have to listen to them whine about how I am making them drink water). 
2. Go outside with the kids and sit in a chair while Connor pulls Sophia around in a wagon. 
3. Repeatedly shout "Run, more running" at them. 
4. Ask Ben what I should make for dinner and then tell him that I don't want to really make any of the things that he names. 
5. Make the kids sandwiches and give them a piece of fruit. 
6. Put on a movie for the kids to watch. 
7. Lay on the couch while the children watch said movie. 
8. Ask Ben if either of the kids smells bad enough to need a bath. 
9. Ask him to give necessary baths. 
10. Roll of the couch and fetch pajamas for the children - or even better ask Connor to get his own pajamas and a pair for Sophia too. 
11. Have Ben put Sophia to bed. 
12. Let Connor do whatever he wants to do and can do quietly for the next hour. 
13. Ask Ben to put Connor to bed. 
14. Crawl into our bed, put on the heating pad, and alternate between shouting "Get back in bed!" and "Go to sleep" for the next twenty minutes until the children are asleep. 

This is what my energy level permits right now. The kids won't know what to do when I actually start parenting them again and say things like "No, I think we've watched enough television over the past couple days, go read a book" or "drinking water is not going to kill you, you don't need juice." Fortunately for them, after Elinor is born, I will probably be so tired that this parenting trend will continue for a while. 

Someday I'll resume my position. Just not today...or tomorrow...or likely anytime in the next couple of months. 

If you give Connor some butcher paper.

If you give Connor some butcher paper, he is going to put signs up all over the house. And chances are, if he puts signs up all over the house you are going to think they are kind of adorable.

And if you think they are adorable you are probably going to tell him that. Then he is going to invent some sort of intricate game that you have to play with all the signs now hanging around the house.

And if he wants you to play some intricate game with him it is probably going to inspire him to make some poison ghost pictures.

The poison ghost picture is going to remind him that he needs to find more pink crayons because pink is the color of poison (didn't you know that?).

And if he is looking for another pink crayon he is probably going to think of all the other poison things he wants to draw and color.

And chances are, if he thinks about drawing more poisoned pink things, he is going to ask you for some butcher paper.

Happy Birthday Sophia!

I rock as a parent. I know this because on her 2nd birthday I did the following wonderful and amazing things for my daughter.

1. I took her to the doctor for her two year old check up - at least she didn't have to get shots. 
2. I took her to get her haircut - which every kid loves. 
3. We didn't give her a birthday party. 

All right, so it was a pretty lame birthday for her, but it wasn't horrible. After all, I did make her a cake and she did get some presents.

 My attempt at a horse cake. Since I had a Dala Horse pan from Ikea I decided to try a Dala horse. 

 Sophia Jane with her new haircut. We took a lot off the back. 

 Connor wanted to show off his haircut as well. 

 Sophia and Connor worked out a system where he helped start all the presents and then she finished ripping them open. 

They were both being really helpful and polite. It was super cute. 

Somehow I think that despite the lack of grandeur for her 2nd birthday, she was a pretty happy little girl.

Happy Birthday to my darling little Sophia Jane!

The Long Shower

Ben gives me much grief about the fact that I take a very long shower. So long that if I am the 3rd person in the house to shower, or if we are also trying to do laundry, I'll run us out of hot water.

What Ben doesn't understand is that a long shower is my escape from the world. My fifteen (or twenty) minutes of quiet solitude.

The second I get out of the shower the chaos of my real life resumes. For example, today:

Me: ***Opening bathroom door***
Connor: "Mom, can you make me chocolate milk?"
Me: "Maybe Connor."
Sophia: "Mom, I want to take a bath."
Me: "You can take one tonight."
Connor: "And it could be like the most chocolate milk ever."
Me: "Maybe Connor."
Sophia: "I want to take a bath now."
Me: "No, you can take one tonight."
Connor: "Can you make me chocolate milk?"
Me: "Yes, let me get ready and then I will make you some."
Sophia: "Mom, I want to take a bath, okay?"
Me: "You can take one tonight."
Sophia: "Okay, I take a bath now."
Me: "Tonight"
Connor: "And there could be so much chocolate in it that you can't even taste the milk."
Me: "Sure buddy, just let me get ready."
Sophia: "Mom, I ready go."
Me: "I'm not ready yet Sophie, let me get dressed and then I will make Buddy some milk, and we will get ready to go."
Sophia: "Mom, I want to take a bath."
Connor: "Mom, can I have more toast?"
Me: ***Deep sighs*** "You should ask your Dad about it."
Sophia: "Dad, I want to take a bath."
Connor: "What?"
Me: "Ask your dad if you can have more toast."
Connor: "What?"
Me: "Ask your dad if you can have more toast."
Sophia: "Dad, I want to take a bath."
Me: ****wondering if it is too late to get back into the shower****

Note to self...work on boundaries with the children.

Sophia's school of things you now know.

Roughly two years and eight months ago Ben and I found out that we were expecting a baby. This was kind of a big deal for us as we had been trying to have a baby for the past three years and didn't seem to be able to make it past about week eight in a pregnancy. Each day that I stayed pregnant was a milestone and each week that passed brought us closer to that sense of relief that we were going to make it this time.

Then we saw the babies heartbeat and breathed a huge sigh of relief. A few weeks later we saw it again and felt even better. A few weeks after that the doctor told us that our little baby was a little girl and that she was doing great.

Two years ago this coming Tuesday, I gave birth to that little girl and held her in my arms and we knew such joy as a family. We had prayed for a child and God had heard our prayer and had given us what we knew would be the sweetest little girl the world had ever known.

And she was really sweet. More than sweet, she was an amazing baby. She slept for hours at a time. Was content to just be held by me. Would look at Ben and I for long periods of time. And was just happy.

This was a completely different experience than Connor when he was a baby. For those of you who missed that grand adventure - here is the recap. Connor didn't want held, didn't want to not be held, didn't want to look at us, would have preferred to be raised by a pack of wild dogs over us, and there was much crying. Lots and lots of crying. By all parties involved. Still we wouldn't trade him for anything.

But Sophia, she was different. She was going to be our good child. She was our reward for all that crying, all that not sleeping, all that pulling our hair out, and all that wondering if we were actually the worst parents in the entire world.

That was two years ago. And since that time I have taken some education courses from Sophia's school of Things you now know. Here are the things the past two years have taught me.

That behind that sweet smile and those beautiful brown eyes is a devious mind that is just waiting for me to leave the gate to the kitchen open. She has been planning on breaking in there to pull everything she possibly can out of the drawers, the pantry, and the refrigerator.

That behind that cheerful disposition is a will of iron the likes of which has not been seen before. Not even Connor in all his glory has the tenacity to stand firmly against our combined forces the way this one little girl can.

That nothing is more aggravating than a two year old sticking her finger out at you and saying "Hush Mommy!" Well..maybe nothing isn't right. It could be slightly more annoying when she instead sticks her finger out and says "Stop talking!"

And that despite all these things, the crying (because yeah, that's back), the hair pulling (What are we going to do with this girl?), and the wondering if we are actually the worst parents in the world (We have it on the authority of a psychiatrists that we aren't), we still find that our initial assessment of our beautiful baby girl was an accurate one.

She loves to be near people, she wants to hug and kiss us all the time, she loves her brother immensely, and is happiest when we are all together as a family. She truly one amazing and sweet little girl. Just with a little extra spice thrown in - so you know - we don't get bored with this whole raising kids thing.

As for the position of good child...well, I would say that one is still open. Did you hear that Elinore? The position is still open.

It's Pyrex.

I did some antique shopping this week and gave in to the urge to buy some cool looking Pyrex. My collection of .....well...three...in no way rivals some of the awesome collections out there, but just looking at these dishes made me want to go to a church potluck.

For a total purchase price of $22, perhaps I have found a new hobby.