Get well cards and unibrows

Miriam's class sent home some get-well cards with Rachel on Friday afternoon. Miriam happily sifted through the pile of cards, apparently taking careful notice of each one because when she'd finished looking through them all she piled them up and pounded the stack on the table to make it nice and neat.

"That was nice of your class to send you cards," I said.

"Yes," she agreed. "There's only one problem. I didn't get one from Xak."

She had actually written down the name of each sender so she could check to see who she got cards from and who she didn't get cards from. I wouldn't say she was ungrateful for the cards she got, because she was grateful, but...sometimes her expectations exceed reality.

"Maybe Xak wasn't at school when they made the cards," I suggested.

"Yeah, maybe," she said.

When I was in grade one I don't think I even knew the names of everyone in my class (not even by the end of the school year). It was a stressful year for me, I was shy, I didn't talk to anyone if I had the option of not talking to them.

Miriam, on the other hand, seems to know all the kids in her class, all the kids in the other grade one classes, and all the kids in all the kindergarten classes. She's a super socialite. Everyone wants to be her friend and that works out just fine because she wants to be everyone's friend in return.

She knows she's cute and funny and smart and friendly and I don't think anything could make her think otherwise, at least at this stage in her life (and hopefully she'll retain that confidence throughout those terrible middle school years (which seem to be approaching quickly all of a sudden (now that Rachel's entering grade four (and I realize Miriam isn't Rachel, but she's only two years behind!)) because she is cute and funny and smart and friendly).

A while ago she came home from school, practically floated off the bus, and ran into the house to announce with glee, "Mom! Guess what! I have a unibrow!"

"Yes, beautiful girl, you kind of do," I said.

"Not just kind of!" she squealed. "It's an actual unibrow!"

"How exciting," I said.

"I know!" she said.

I have a feeling she won't always love this about herself (but at least it's something she can't blame on me because this trait did not come from me (*cough* it was Andrew *cough*) but maybe she'll surprise me and not ever give in to what our society says is beautiful and love every little bit of herself forever. Wouldn't that be awesome? Because every little bit of her is beautiful.

Now to find a book about Frida Kahlo for her...

Maybe it will end after all

To his credit, Benjamin stayed dry last night. He's been good about that for the entire month of May. I'm not saying that he's never wet the bed (because he certainly has); I'm just saying that he's been good about staying dry. In fact, we printed out a sticker chart with 25 spots for stickers and, although we started it on April 21 (and those days in April were a joke because he wet the bed every other day), it's now full of stickers. He had a couple of runs where he stayed dry for a full five days at a time.

So perhaps there is an end to things like potty-training Benjamin.

Zoë, on the other hand, is back to the torturous sleeping schedule she likes to pull every once in a while. She never sleeps well; she always stays up far later than every other baby on the block. That's just her style. But recently she's been trying to outdo herself. She stayed up until around 2:00 on Saturday night, so I had a little chat with her on Sunday about needing to go to bed before then. She laughed in my face and then stayed up until around 3:00 on Sunday night.

Last night she was acting tired on our way home from dinner, singing to herself, and slow-blinking, so I had half a hope she'd retire at a decent hour. But, no. We got her out of her carseat and she stayed awake until 3:30.

I know that eventually she'll max out her ability to stay awake and she'll fall asleep around 10:00 one night and then, for the most part, stay sleeping through the night. Waking up to nurse every two hours, of course, because that's still how we roll. On a good night.

On a bad night she stays asleep for half hour bursts. I suppose, to be honest, she did fall asleep at 9:00 last night. For forty minutes. And then she was like, "Party time!"

But it was so ridiculous because it was lonely, boring party time and she knew it. Every time anyone coughed or cleared their throat in their sleep she'd get all excited and call out, "Oh, hi!"

"It's the middle of the night," I'd remind that sleep-stealing monster Zoë. "No one is coming to play with you. Everyone is sleeping."

One day soon she'll start going to bed at a decent hour. Shoot, I'd take 11:00 or even midnight and call that a decent hour. I'm not sure how many more 3:00s I can take though.

It will never end

We had dinner at the bishop's house tonight (only the bishop wasn't there because he was out bishoping, so his wife was left to host all on her own (thank you)). We ate food, we played games, we visited. The kids played outside and inside and were having a great time...and then Benjamin disappeared. I sent Miriam to go find him; she returned to report that he was in the bathroom and needed help.

I had already drawn the short straw and was holding Zoë on my lap while playing Scum, so I sent Andrew to go check on him.

Turns out he'd pooped his pants, majorly.

He's three years, eleven months, and 27 days old and I honestly cannot wait for this to stop.

Every time I think he's finally potty trained, he goes and does something like this.

Usually I have extra clothes in my diaper bag for him but I must have not replenished my stash after the last time he needed extra clothes (not always for pooping; sometimes just for splashing in puddles) and all I had was a t-shirt for him. I did, however, have several diapers for Zoë.

Benjamin got to wear one of those. He was mortified for a few minutes and hid himself in the basement but later lost all sense of shame and joined everyone upstairs for ice cream.

Before I let him eat I made him have a chat with me. He answered every question I asked him with "I dunno," until I threatened to not let him have any ice cream at all and then I started getting serious answers.

Memorial Day Poetry

Here's a poem Miriam wrote this morning:

Hey, look, it's Memorial Day.
What do you say when it's Memorial Day?
Hooray, there's no school!

Hey! Hey! It's Memorial Day.
Look at the flag. Red, white and Blue.
That's cool.

Houseplants and broken pots

I have been trying to collect houseplants immune to my negligent nature. So far there have been many casualties, but the orchid Andrew gave me a few years (!!!) ago is still alive so I've slowly been gaining confidence.

I sprouted an avocado tree a few months ago. It's still sitting in a jar of water because I'm too nervous to put it in soil because it's beautiful and I don't want to accidentally kill it so it will probably be in its jar for a while... But hydroponics is a thing, right? Hydroponics is even kind of trendy right now, I think, and I'm nothing if not a trend-follower (ask my completely up-to-date wardrobe ("Hello, the early 2000s are calling.")).

Birthday songs and Benjamin swimming

Today I was supposed to help out in Sunbeams (which is Benjamin's current class), because one of his teachers is out of town, but then I was asked to cover singing time for the girl who was covering for the chorister and said yes, completely forgetting that I was already supposed to be helping in Sunbeams.

Because that's the way my brain works.

So after sacrament meeting I asked another mom to help out in Sunbeams (and she was more than happy to—thanks, Lisa!) so that I could do singing time.

We did the opening song in junior primary and Benjamin gave the opening prayer. The primary president welcomed us to primary, glanced at her paper and said, "It looks like we don't have any birthdays here today, so we'll just move on," so I sat down we moved on.

While one of the children was reciting this month's scripture, the secretary, my friend Heidi, leaned over and whispered, "Did you do birthdays yet?"

"Oh, she said there weren't any birthday children here today," I whispered back.

Heidi double-checked her list.

"There definitely are birthday children here," she said.

"Oh, who?" I asked.

"Ummm...Benjamin..." Heidi said.

"Oh, that birthday boy," I said. "My birthday boy. Yeah, I guess we should sing to him."

"Too bad Marcella's not here," Heidi said. "We'll have to remember to sing to her next week."

"Well, her mom's the music director. I think she'll remember her own daughter's birthday," I said.

"Maybe," Heidi agreed, smiling while tilting her head from side to side. "But then again, she might not."

Point taken.

A little chaos

I took the kids swimming on Tuesday afternoon. Andrew texted to say that he was leaving campus about ten minutes before I happened to check my phone for the time (because the clock at the pool has been broken for at least a year now). I texted back that we were "pooling," and made the mistake of not saying "but we'll be leaving soon."

I gave the kids five minutes and then we packed up to head home, where I figured we'd have a quick spaghetti dinner since it was getting rather late. The kids wanted to wait for Daddy outside, though, so I threw on a pot of water to boil and went outside to supervise.

Side note: Zoë can open our storm door, so that's interesting. She let herself outside today while I was helping Benjamin in the bathroom. She and I have opposite opinions on this newly acquired skill.

Anyway, Andrew didn't come and didn't come and didn't come until finally he did come and we went inside and saw that it was nearly 7:00 (he figured that if we were having fun at the pool he'd just stay on campus to get some things done and I didn't get his "keep on pooling" text until after he got home). I was rather relieved when he finally pulled up on his scooter.

"I was thinking make-your-own dinner tonight. We can use stuff from the freezer and leftovers and..." He paused, noticing the pot of boiling water on the stove. "That is unless you had plans."

"Make-your-own is fine," I said, turning off the burner. "It's late, we've got to get the kids to bed; we can do spaghetti tomorrow."

Durham Bulls

Rachel was rather excited for her last rehearsal before the baseball game. She was a little fed up with having to rehearse for things, between the musical and this, but I think both were great things for her to do (and I think she agrees with me).

We made it to the stadium a few minutes before the gates opened. Ordinarily they open the gates an hour before the game starts but due to impending weather they moved the start time a half hour earlier...but opened the gates at the same time, so it was absolutely imperative that we arrive on time since it left us very little wiggle room for getting lost or anything like that. We dropped Rachel off with the choir and found our seats.

Here's Zoë enjoying a bit of the pre-game festivities (her favourite parts of the game were the music and all the clapping):

A new record

Rachel has been concerned about all her "records" being broken by subsequent babies. She really doesn't need to worry, though, because after tallying things up she still holds several records. Zoë is the heaviest now (probably, in part, due to the fact that she held down every drop of milk she ever got (it's got to be the milk because she's not all that interested in food (she's always like "Ew. Tell me why we eat again?")) (hooray for no reflux!)), but Rachel was the heaviest at birth. 

Today Zoë weighed in at a whopping 20 lbs. 15 ounces. She's 29.92 inches tall.

At age one, Benjamin was 18 lbs. 12 ounces and 27.5 inches tall.

Miriam was 18 lbs. and 1 measly little ounce (smaller than Benjamin!!) and 27.95 inches tall (but somehow no one cared that she was tiny; the doctor gave us such grief over Benjamin's small stature).

Rachel was 19 lbs. 12 ounces and 30.5 inches tall.

At birth Zoë was 7 lbs. 2.5 ounces and 20 inches.
Benjamin was 4 lbs. 13 ounces and 16.5 inches.
Miriam was 7 lbs. 1 ounce and 18.9 inches.
Rachel was 7 lbs. 7 ounces and 19.5 inches.

So, Zoë was my longest baby at birth and the heaviest at age one. Rachel was my heaviest baby at birth and my earliest walker (and tallest at age one). Miriam was my lightest baby at age one and my best sleeper. Benjamin was my smallest baby at birth and had the most hair.

And since it was just Zoë's birthday, let's list a few more of her achievements: she's my second-earliest walker (she can take a good dozen or so steps) and my earliest whistler (anybody else out there have a baby who whistles? Just me?). 

Zoë's one!

Time seems to speed up with each child. It's rather cliché to say "it goes so fast," but it honestly does. When I was suffering through months and months of not sleeping, due to Rachel, I would feel almost offended when people would suggest that "it goes so fast" because it felt torturously slow, like I was stuck in some inane cycle: feed the baby, get thrown up on, get pooped on, [rinse, if you're lucky], and repeat! It felt like she would never grow up. She'd never stop spitting up, she'd never learn to sleep through the night, she'd never wean. Babyhood was hard and laborious and lonesome and eternal, or so it felt.

But then I added one more. I was still feeding a baby and getting spat up on constantly, but I was also reading stories and doing little crafts, and going to the park.

And then I added one more. I was still feeding a baby and was getting spat up on even more than ever, but I was also reading stories, doing little crafts, going to the park, volunteering in a classroom, attending dance recitals, and so forth.

And then we added one more. I was still feeding a baby but was blessed to get one without reflux (hallelujah!) and was also reading stories, doing little crafts, going to the park, volunteering in two classrooms, going to soccer practice, being in a musical, shuttling kids to ukulele practice, and so forth.

These kids have filled our lives with so much goodness that time is suddenly feeling more like a whirlwind and less of a never-ending dirge. So even though I haven't had a proper sleep in months, I made the mistake of blinking and all of a sudden Zoë turned a year old!