Monthly Archives: March 2012

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Jiggety-Jog

Home again, home again!  We had a WONDERFUL time in North Carolina.  We did so many things.  We ate the most amazing food.  We played.  We napped.  We went to the beach!  (The beach along the Atlantic Ocean instantly makes me feel at home… must be from my formative years spent on the coast in Connecticut and Long Island, New York).  I will detail our adventures here on the blog, so you can be on the lookout for lots of cutie pictures and stories of my children and my awesome niece and nephew and my parents and my sister, and Matt and I too, of course.

We drove straight there on our way there and then broke up our trip into two halves on the way home.  We got home this evening, just in time to make pasta with spaghetti sauce and call it dinner!  And then I went into a cleaning frenzy.  (I’m nearly certain that Matt loves when I do this).  I blame you, Mom, because your house was SO clean and SO welcoming and SO de-cluttered!  My goodness!  It was a haven.  Now, I realize that our experience this week is not how my parents typically live.  Usually, they have lots of cool artifacts from their travels and my grandparents’ travels sitting out to be admired.  But with 5 grandchildren ages 1-4 visiting, those all got put away or hidden, so every surface was gleaming!

I was inspired by my mom.  Our new house is much bigger than our old house, but I still seem to be operating on the cleaning schedule I used back then.  As a result, I have cleaning bursts, then lulls of clutter and dust, then cleaning bursts.  I am hoping for something more… consistent.  Someday, I’ll get used to our new house and figure out all of that.  And someday, my children won’t be small and prone to dumping out every item they own, and it will be easier to pull off.  For now, I enjoy having them home, messiness and clutter and all, and I am happy with my cleaning burst method.  And after enjoying my parents’ home, I went on a cleaning spree this evening in the upstairs!  Our bathrooms are gleaming and the bedroom and hallway floors are all clean.  Ahhh.  It’s ridiculous to sit in a car for 2 solid days, and I needed to MOVE!

Stay tuned for upcoming stories and pictures.  We’re glad to be back.

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Nathaniel and Schnuffi

Nathaniel’s love for ahf-ahf’s is well-documented.  Our little boy is OBSESSED!  Tonight, he fed my parents’ schnauzer some Cheerios.  Both of them were delighted with the game, and Nathaniel’s giggles are to die for.  Enjoy this cuteness!  (I’ll have plenty more stories and pictures of the epic fun we have enjoyed in N. Carolina when we get home and I sort through our camera’s memory card… more to come!)

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Travel

A sixteen-hour drive + 3 young children + exhausted parents of 3 young children SHOULD = disaster.  But it didn’t.  Our trip to N. Carolina went really well, all things considered.  And actually, it went nothing like I expected.

I expected:  Kids who would demand to get OUT of their carseats and not have to sit all day and all night.
I experienced:  Kids who were not thrilled to get back in the car after stops, but held onto the dream of “going to the beach” like it was their traveling security blanket.

I expected:  Fighting kids.
I experienced:  Sincerely sweet kids who had fun in the car and were well-behaved the whole time!  Zach and Rissa got out their travel fun bags and used their travel magnadoodle pens as rockets.  They’d count down, blast off, then re-enter the atmosphere to blast written letters all over the magnadoodle’s surface.  Nathaniel happily snuggled his Ahf-ahf for HOURS.  When I handed him a book, he “read” it to himself.  He recently realized that the text on the page is where the words are.  He can’t read them and he doesn’t know his letters yet, but he knows that written words are WORDS.  So amazing.  So he points to the words and talks to himself.

I expected:  Taking turns driving.
I experienced:  Matt drove the ENTIRE way.  He was carefree and unstressed.  He enjoyed driving our new van.  He was fun and had games in mind to play with the kids.  He explained all sorts of things to them as we passed various things so that they were engaged and entertained.  He was AMAZING.

I expected:  That I would be tired, nap a bit, and catch up on my reading.
I experienced:  That all did happen, but I did not know that Matt’s dad would give me his Kindle as a gift at Nathaniel’s birthday party!  I downloaded the Bible and caught up a bit on our church’s group effort to read the New Testament together this semester.  I downloaded some free books and got lost in a story while we drove.  It was really nice to not have to bring along a bunch of books and to not have to hold all of them.  The Kindle just sat in my lap and I flipped pages with the push of a button.  I miss the written page and the actual feel and smell of a book.  At home, I still prefer to read from paper and ink.  But while traveling, the Kindle was awesome!

I expected:  That I would take my usual family role… the glue that holds everything together.  I would pack everything, I would plan everything, I would make sure everything happened.
I experienced:  This actually happened.  I packed up everything we needed, I brought fixings for a sack lunch on the road, which we ate in the parking lot of a Cracker Barrel in Kentucky.  I made a lot happen.  But then, for a good chunk of our trip, I was out of commission.  See below.

I expected:  To be the mommy and take care of everyone.  And most of all, that I would be healthy and available to my family.
I experienced:  Miserable nausea in the car.  It was me who needed to be taken care of.  I was tired and I had cramps and I forgot that driving through the mountains makes me nauseous.  In one particular tunnel in the mountains of N. Carolina, I threw up all over myself because we were in a tunnel and couldn’t pull over.  Thankfully, most of it hit my own outfit and the door so I didn’t dirty the upholstery or the van’s interior at all.  Ugh.  I’m the mommy!  I take care of the rest of us!  Not get sick and puke all over!  On our way back, I’ll remember that I do fine when I’m the one driving.  No more passenger riding for me in the motion sickness inducing topography!

I expected:  To get to North Carolina and stay with my parents and see my sister and her kids too and enjoy myself.
I experienced:  So much more!  My parents are such gracious hosts and we have had SO MUCH FUN!  And there is plenty more to come.  I love to travel, but I hate the actual traveling part.  I like to be in the new place, not wait out the time it takes to get there.  So now that we are here, it is wonderful.  Even more than I expected.

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Facebook Topics 2

I miss my Facebook friends.  Babies are getting born, birthdays are passing without me knowing it, news is getting announced.  And most importantly, random stuff that doesn’t really matter but is exceptionally fun to read is getting posted.  I’ll be glad to be back when I return.  But I’m also glad to have my life back!

I have more random things I’d post if I were on Facebook.

1.  Nathaniel’s new word is “fa(t) fah.”  That stands for “flat fox,” a stuffed animal that Mochi pulverized the stuffing out of and is now just the stuffed animal shell of a fox.  I love that “fa fah” was the most important word for him to study and learn.  I wish I could climb inside his hierarchy of language importance and watch the thoughts line up!  His interests are so varied and random!

2.  We’ve been getting some awesome family pictures by saying, “DON’T SMILE!” right when we take the picture.  Every kid loves to do the opposite of what you say, and while I don’t want to encourage that concept, it does make for fabulous pictures.

3.  As a result of that picture-taking method, Zach has been announcing his “sad face.”  He tries so hard to make one, but his smile always takes over and appears instead.  I thought it was quite profound when he said, “I’m trying to make my sad face but my happy face keeps destroying it!”

4.  I’m pretty sure that the only thing I EVER do is laundry.  “No, that’s not true, ” I often console myself.  “On occasion, you also make dinner.”

5.  Going on vacation the week AFTER Spring Break is pretty awesome.  We’re home this week while our town is quiet and parking is plentiful.  We’re available to babysit Mochi, who has been such a joy.  I love her snuggly softness and even though it is too hot to cuddle, she still let’s me.  The downside of going the week after instead of the week during Spring Break is that MY CHILDREN ARE HOME FOR 5 DAYS STRAIGHT.  Can you even imagine how difficult it is to pack for our trip while my kids are all here and using everything we’ll take?  It is a bit of a logistical nightmare.  My perfectionist, organized, planner self is NOT happy.  We are also missing 2 weeks of Kindermusik and 2 weeks of preschool in a row because we’ll be gone when they resume.  Bygones.  We’re going to the BEACH!

6.  This spring weather is fabulous.  The former owner of our house is FABULOUS because he left us his patio furniture.  Did you know that when it is warm, you can eat dinner outside????  Yeah, we didn’t.  But we know it now!

7.  We played at Miss Ramona’s house today.  I have hassled Miss Ramona for several years now because her son Sean is 1 month older than my twins and he and Rissa have a “thing.”  Sean was always holding Rissa’s hand and she was always letting him.  I’ve always claimed it is Sean’s doing and Miss Ramona insists that Rissa is just as involved.  Well, I may have to give this one to her.  Today, Rissa sat down on the cart behind the tricycle, smiled her cutest smile, looked directly at Sean and said, “Who wants to drive the tricycle and pull me?”  She even had the batting eyelashes.  I was mortified and immediately told Miss Ramona that she’s been right all along.  They are BOTH contributing to this!

8.  Matt conquered the dragons at work.  He made magic happen, and I really should start purchasing Merlin-esque outfits for him so that he looks the part.  Because he is an electrical engineering wizard.  How cute would he be with crazy glasses and a pointy hat and cape???  I rest my case.

9.  I ran out of How I Met Your Mother‘s.  I’m up to the current season, though I haven’t seen any of it.  Enjoying it reminded me of how much I used to love Friends, and still do.  I wondered if there were other shows that I used to watch that I would still enjoy.  I started streaming Ally McBeal and thought, “Yeah, I’ll probably hate it now, but I remember liking it way back when.”  Wrong.  I still like it.  It’s always embarrassing to come across something you used to love and think, “Seriously, what was my deal?  Why did I enjoy this?”  Hello, ’80s pop culture movies!  But it’s gratifying to realize, “I still like this!  Whew, I had decent taste back then too.  Good for me!”

10.  We’re still in BSG.  I like it now.  I do not love it.  We’re in the “who are the final Cylons they’ve been hiding all series?” section.  I won’t give details, but let it be known that 3 of the final 5 were people I had been suspecting from the beginning.  I know.  Sometimes, I just ruin things for myself.  It would be better to turn off my brain and just enjoy something but I can’t not think.  As Matt says, “But, Sweetie, you think everyone is a Cylon!”  And that’s true.  But not really, because I was sure on 3 of them.  THREE of five!  I’m a little bit proud of myself… but not too much, because I don’t actually care.

11.  Mochi is going home tonight.  I put on my brave face and told our kids, “Well, we’re going to the beach!  And Mochi would be lonely without us, so it is a good thing that her family is coming back to get her because we won’t be here.”  They consoled me with the fact that we will be snuggling Schnuffi in a few days and we don’t need TWO doggies at the same time.  But it is still sad.  Because we love her.  Maybe I can weasel her family into coming over often to swim in our pool IF they bring their dog and I get a snuggle session with her. 🙂  I think they might go for it.

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Special Fun with Gramma

We really enjoyed our time with Matt’s parents during their visit for Nathaniel’s birthday!  You’ve already seen pictures of the kids enjoying Granpa’s train, and we’ve had a lot of Nathaniel fun in the last few posts.  So I thought I’d dedicate a post to the older kids’ enjoyment of Gramma!

Gramma and Zach-a-bean:  a game and a quilt.

   

      

   

Gramma and Riss-Riss:  toenail painting party!

      

   

Gramma, thanks for paying special attention to the big kids during Nathaniel’s big weekend!  They loved seeing you and Granpa and they soak up that one-on-one attention like sponges.  You filled them up!