First time for everything

I've reentered one of the only stages of babyhood/toddlerhood that I never miss when over. Usually I miss things. I miss how fragile and dependent newborns are. I miss those first smiles. I miss head holding/rolling/crawling/walking before it becomes the new normal. While I'm excited about and embrace each new milestone, I miss, and mourn, each passing stage as my babies grow up because I love babies and when they grow up it means they aren't babies anymore. I love my kids, too, of course.

But...babies. I love them. Everything is fascinating to them all the time and they're so soft and cuddly and new. (And, you know, really, really exhausting, but still...)

There are some stages I could do without, however, and Benjamin has just entered one of those stages.

Around two o'clock in the morning, Benjamin started fussing. I told myself he'd just go to sleep, but he kept not doing it and instead got more and more worked up. Eventually I woke Andrew up to retrieve Benjamin for me because I simply could not get out of bed and Andrew's been blessed with the ability to sleepwalk. He can get up, get the baby, climb back in bed and be fast asleep again all within a minute and a half. I can't. Not that I fall asleep any faster if Andrew gets the baby for me but at least then I don't have to get out of bed, right?

As Andrew handed Benjamin to me I said, "Tsk. Why are you so fussy tonight? You're supposed to be sleeping, Baby! Ew! And you smell funny. Why do you smell funny?"

"Sorry," Andrew mumbled.

"I was talking to Benjamin," I clarified. "You're fine. Thanks for getting the baby."

"Yup," Andrew sighed, and with that he clocked out and was immediately fast asleep once again.

Ukulele Christmas

We attended our ward Christmas party tonight, where our little ukulele choir performed two musical numbers.

Our first song was Away in a Manger (the arrangement from the Primary Children's Songbook). For this one we had the littlest kids (including Rachel and Miriam (who are on the front row, farthest left and farthest right)) focus on playing the C chord rather than switching to G7. There were so many changes in the song that it was just too frustrating for them. Rachel's been practicing and she's getting better.

When it's cold outside, I've got the month of...

I did no little housework today because we spent the entire day outside (or at least as much of it as we could). It's December 6th and it was—get this—77°F (25°C)!

We pulled out shorts and sandals and partied like it was summer vacation...by hanging Christmas lights on the house (because that's totally what I do during my summer vacation) and gardening (because that's something that must be done year round here, evidently).

Actually, we spent the morning at playgroup and then spent the afternoon outside with the neighbour kids (at one point we had nine kids in our yard (which is pretty good odds considering how many kids live on our street (not many more than nine))).

The boys next door took turns helping me with the lights and corralling Benjamin away from the street while all the little girls played. When I finished putting the lights up they organized a round of hide-and-seek for everyone. They're very gentlemanly and call me ma'am and everything (which truthfully cracks me up a bit but I appreciate their manners nonetheless).

We were outside for about an hour before neighbourhood kids started coming home from school (two hours before Rachel came home from school) and stayed outside until nearly 5:00.

Inflation

Last night we had our Relief Society Christmas Dinner, which was lovely. This morning they sent us all of the recipes, which was lovelier except that I'm not sure my family would ever eat the goodness we consumed last night (which is why it's sometimes wonderful to dine in a room full of grown women rather than crammed around the kitchen table with picky children (and husbands)).

Anyway, one of my friends was asked to give a message about simplifying Christmas. The essence of her message was that Christmas is about building memories and coming closer together as a family and drawing nearer to the Lord. I agree with that message 100%.

However, there was a little bit of her message that rubbed me wrong. She told a story of her mother's childhood. The family had had a difficult year financially and so for Christmas they really had to budget for things and instead of just getting whatever they wanted, the parents gave each of their seven children $10 to spend "on everyone—on each other, on their parents, on their friends."

"Only ten dollars!" my friend exclaimed. "Can you imagine only having $10 to spend on everyone for Christmas?"

And, actually, I can. But my friend and I come from much different backgrounds.

However, as I pondered this story it sat more and more uncomfortably with me. This evening it finally dawned on me why. The answer was a single word: inflation.

So I pulled up the CPI Inflation Calculator and gave a few numbers a whirl.

Now, I don't know precisely what year this story took place, but I can take a few guesses:

Having $10 in your pocket in 1960 would equal having $78.90 in your pocket in 2013.
Having $10 in your pocket in 1965 would equal having $74.14 in your pocket in 2013.
Having $10 in your pocket in 1970 would equal having $60.19 in your pocket in 2013.
Having $10 in your pocket in 1975 would equal having $43.41 in your pocket in 2013.
Having $10 in your pocket in 1980 would equal having $28.34 in your pocket in 2013.

I hesitate to go much farther delve farther into "the past" than 1960 or much farther into "the future" than 1980 since my friend is just a few years older than me and I'm fairly sure our parents are close-ish in age. I don't know how old her mother was when the story happened, however, only that there were seven kids at home ranging from high school to younguns.

I guess my point is that stories like this tend to feel a little hyperbolic to me—like walking to school uphill, both ways, in the snow, with no shoes! My point is that her mom wasn't given $10 today; she was given $10 decades ago (unless my friend accounted for inflation but didn't tell us—in which case 1980: $3.53; 1975: $2.30; 1970: $1.66; 1965: $1.35; 1960: $1.27 (and that would've been difficult to budget)). I think having only $10 to spend in 1980 would've been very difficult as well. But having anything between $50 and $70? That sounds fine to me—generous, even, since teenagers have the ability to make money on their own and little kids aren't expected to buy elaborate gifts for their siblings (is anyone expected to do that? I hope not...).

Granted, it would've killed her narrative a bit to throw in an "after accounting for inflation" clause, but I think it's a necessary part of the story because the question of spending $70 on your family for Christmas versus spending $10 on your family for Christmas is huge, at least in my eyes.

The point of her lesson wasn't entirely lost on me; I did appreciate her thoughts on simplifying Christmas. However, I just couldn't get that little detail out of my mind. Sometimes I can't stop myself from wondering about these things. Sometimes they make the lesson of the story less applicable to life (such as in this instance, at least for me). Sometimes they make lesson of the story more applicable, such as the story of President Monson misplacing a five-dollar bill during The Great Depression.

The story is good all on its own (you should read it), but what if I told you that:

Having $5 in your pocket in 1930 would equal having $69.92 in your pocket in 2013?
Having $5 in your pocket in 1935 would equal having $85.24 in your pocket in 2013?
Having $5 in your pocket in 1940 would equal having $83.41 in your pocket in 2013?

The "Five-Dollar Miracle" isn't a cute story about a little boy who lost a little pocket change. It's a story about a hard-working and now desperate young boy who lost nearly one-hundred dollars (I'm going to assume President Monson didn't have $5 in 1930 since he was born in 1927; it seems more likely this story would've taken place between 1935 and 1940).

That changes the story for me quite a bit because...inflation. It's mind-boggling.

A boy and [someone else's] dog

Benjamin's love of dogs is as intense as the girls's dislike. They see a dog, they scream (with fear), they run (far, far away from it), they cower behind me (and I...don't like dogs either). Benjamin sees a dog, he screams (with joy), he runs (toward the dog), and gives it a great big hug.

He's especially fond of Cody, who belongs to one of our friends. We were over there for playgroup today and he was waving at Cody from behind the sliding door. When Cody came inside Benjamin started panting and signing dog while running over to greet him. He just loves Cody!

Immunizations, Benjamin at 18 months, Miriam at 4 years

With the recent measles outbreak in Southern Alberta, as well as many reports of whooping cough outbreaks the past few years, vaccination has been a hot topic. Hotter than usual, at least.

We're pretty keen on immunizations at our house, having dragged our family around the world. For one thing, polio, a disease of the past in many places of the world, is still alive and well in others (which means, essentially, that it could potentially make its way back to places it has been eradicated from). Egypt—a place we called home for two years and where our second child was born—hasn't exactly eradicated polio yet. For another thing, we weren't nearly comfortable enough with the medical system to trust they'd be able to treat any horrible disease we could've contracted. I'm not sure I'm that confident in the medical system here to think doctors/technology can just "cure" us of these terrible diseases scientists have painstakingly created immunizations against in order to protect us from ever contracting the disease.

We plan on returning to lesser developed countries in the future so we need to keep our immunizations current. You probably want to keep your immunizations current as well because you never know what germs are stowing away in that airline passenger's cough. I'm just saying...

Anyway, having moved several times in the past eight years has meant relocating our medical records time and time again. This is kind of a hassle.

Different places have different immunization schedules and before a couple of days ago I didn't know there was a reason for this. But, honestly, that's because they are "different countries with different populations." The doctors within those countries do their best to create a schedule to ensure the best possibility for herd immunity and so forth.

I did question this once when we lived in Egypt. We were there on a student visa and were never granted permission to work so we were living off the savings that we'd managed to scrape up while Andrew finished his undergraduate degree. Having a baby there was relatively inexpensive—our insurance covered everything but our $50 deductible (yes, you read that right). However, they wouldn't cover "routine care" which meant well-baby visits would be entirely out-of-pocket (who dreamed up this insurance plan?). The vaccination schedule our doctor put us on was a little more rigorous than the one we'd seen in the States. Our doctor wanted us to come in every single month. Every. Single. Month.

The cost wasn't astronomical, but it would've ended up being about $100 per month just to see the doctor, not including the shots, since we weren't able/about to go to the "local" clinic and had to use a private doctor.

Decorating for Christmas (Bah! Humbug!)

This year we've been slowly decorating for Christmas, emphasis on the slow. I can't emphasize enough how Benjamin is into everything, always. Those of you who've had tiny tots probably understand.

We did drag our Christmas boxes down from the attic and hunted through them to pull out the most important and exciting decorations we own: the nativity and the advent calendar. We actually have several nativities. We put the Ghanaian one on a shelf in the living room, as well as the ones from Israel. One from Italy went on the mantel. And I still had two left to set up somewhere (and others that are still boxed away).

The two that I had left to set up were made up of so many little parts and I had so many little hands flying to "help" that I was looking for a way to get out of the mess, and quick. Then I spied the advent calendar and inspiration struck.

Our advent calendar is a little cabinet filled with drawers. Working quickly, I filled each drawer with a character from the nativity, told the girls they could take turns opening the drawers. Every day they'd find a piece to "their" set for the year and would be able to arrange it however they'd like.

Decorating time was over. It was now personal time.

Can you bake a pie?

Give me a week and I might just be able to—bake a pie, that is—because wasn't it a week ago that I finally cooked up our Halloween pumpkins and turned them into goo? Yes, it was.

On Monday I finally got around to making pie crust (using this recipe: grating frozen butter—genius). The kids "helped," of course, which might explain why this process took a week.

For a minute...

Some moments in time are so very sweet. Just yesterday I had one of these moments in my house. I think we often have these moments in our house, but this moment was particularly sweet.

My friend Marian was over. She's the primary president. I'm the secretary. And we were trying to hammer out next year's budget. We were so absorbed in excel spreadsheets that we were mostly ignoring our children, who were running around the house playing. They were playing quite nicely together, which was part of the reason we were able to ignore them so well.

Suddenly, peals of laughter shattered our concentration. We turned to look at the children who were clustered around an air vent. The heat was on and Miriam had gotten out some feathers. They were setting the feathers on the vent and letting the hot air blast them up above their heads, and they were doing those sweet baby belly-laughs that kids seem to grow out of too soon.

Marcella is two. Benjamin is one. They're just old enough to find that sort of thing hilarious (or as Miriam would say, EL-arious). Miriam, at four, is just old enough to find that sort of thing fascinating and was working out all sorts of scientific methods and hypotheses to test before the air turned off.

It was one of those moments when you think to yourself, "There may be feathers all over the house and I'm sure I am going to regret that later (especially when Benjamin finds both the honey and the feathers and does his own experimenting)* but right now? This is perfect."

*Curse you ability-to-climb-on-the-table, and no-more-napping! A pox on both your households!

All she wants for Christmas is to lose a tooth

Yesterday morning Rachel woke us up to look at her teeth: they're loose. Finally!

Not all of them, of course, but her wee little central incisors are finally starting to wiggle around. A bit.

This girl has been waiting for this to happen since she started kindergarten. She's the last of all her friends to lose a tooth. Everyone in her school class, everyone in her primary class, everyone in the whole entire world has lost a tooth...except for her.

I remember feeling like that, too, and was acutely aware of everything going on in my mouth. I actually announced in the middle of grade one that I must've lost a tooth because I had new teeth growing in—my six year molars. My teacher said it was impossible but she wrote my name up on the tooth chart anyway. Turns out she was right. Those new molars weren't replacing anything; they were just coming in.

Rachel's pretty aware of her mouth, too—even though her class doesn't keep a chart of who and who hasn't lost teeth in any given month—and we've been putting teething gel on her gums where her molars are breaking through because she's been complaining about how terrible it is.

But this wiggling thing? This is new. And she's ecstatic!