jumbly

I don't seem to be blogging much lately. I have lots of random little tidbits to tell you all, but I never seem to have a FULL blog post on one subject.

Let's see, I stopped giving Miss L pureed baby food and just like magic, she stopped spitting up. (me= THRILLED) So, even though she's not even 8 months old, she's eating table food 3x a day and she's loving it. (As is anyone who ever holds her. heh)
 No call back from the specialist yet about her cortisol level and endocrinologist appointment.

I know it has not escaped your attention that I have a 2 year old and a 3 year old in my brood. I would just like to say one thing on the subject: I do not recommend this. Take note. (sometimes I wonder if it would have been easier if they were twins. I do not know...)

Yesterday, I took my 5 year old, 3 year old, 2 year old and 7 month old to the mall to play and eat lunch. Again: I do not recommend this. 
Thank goodness some of our friends were there, or I would have really been a goner.
(PS- Dear Mall,
It's oppressively hot outside this July. Please turn your frickin' air on so it's not 80 degrees inside. I sweat enough, just chasing around these kids, I don't need your help.
Love, I'm Not Coming to See You Again Anyway. )

Is it just The South, or is it ridiculously hot this summer where you live too? I mean, I live in Alabama so it's ALWAYS hot in the summer, but this humidity combined with 95+ degree temps is just too much. We had a heat index of 108 the other day! I can't even stand to go outside because I can't breathe!

I finally am going to make an appointment with a dermatologist. It seems I'm reading about people with melanoma everywhere I turn and I have a couple of moles I really should have gotten checked out months ago. I just have to psych myself up to make the call first. Why do I hate to talk on the phone so much?

Miss L is pulling up now. You know what that means for sleep.

She's only on her knees here. She seems to only be able to get to her feet at 3AM. I guess she takes advantage of all those night wakings to practice. You know, she slept through the night for the first time EVER the night before she learned to pull up. Isn't that just... hilarious? hahaha, ah... ha?

Feelin' sorry for myself Friday

* Dudes, my two year old is driving me to the brink of insanity! I know 2 is a hard age, but this is BEYOND that! I have had two year olds twice before and they were not like this. How in the world will I maintain my sanity until this phase passes?! Please! Tell! Me! It! Will! Pass!

* The baby is a proficient crawler now. She is also pulling up to her knees. She is also putting everything into her mouth and I am spending most of my day trying to keep her from ingesting things like carpet fibers, stray goldfish, and little toys that belong to big brothers.

* We got great news on Monday that we could start weaning Miss L off her b/p meds for the hemangioma. The only bad news from that appointment is that they don't think her eye lashes will grow back and that we needed to get more blood drawn for a repeat cortisol test. (it was slightly low last time) I was pretty confident that her level would be fine.
I was wrong. They are still low and now we have to go see an endocrinologist. I am very worried about what this might mean for her. It took all I had not to cry on the phone with the nurse. (stupid pms)

* I've been breastfeeding for a LOT of the last 5+ years and I am starting to get tired of it. Miss L is being very frustrating with her biting, and impatience and distractedness, so that is not helping. I was actually thinking about quitting, but now that I know her cortisol level is low I won't even consider it.

* PMS. Enough said. 

* Miss L will not stop spitting up. Combine that with her constant drooling and that makes for a lot of laundry, a lot of carpet shampooing, and a baby who keeps slipping in her own wetness when she crawls on the hard floors. Gross.

* I am missing family and wishing for some familial support but I am frustrated because the only way I can be closer to family is to leave this place that I love. I don't know how to reconcile my need to be closer and my desire to stay in a place that is, by pretty much all accounts, perfect for us. 

* When I was expressing my frustration to my husband this morning - about the two year old - he stopped me to ask if I was "done feeling sorry for myself yet." and mentioned that he would love to be home instead of going to work. We all know that if HE was alone for 10-12 hours EVERY DAY with these 4, and did all that *I* do, he would be throwing up that white flag in a short amount of time.
Also, does he not realize how stupid he is to say this sh*t to a woman who is obviously frustrated and emotional?

So, I am whining to you instead. All done now. Maybe I can focus on the positive stuff, now that I've gotten that out of my system for the moment.

It's never too late for you, Erica!

From Erica: 

1. What's your favorite kid's show? And by "favorite," I mean the one that doesn't make you want to shoot the TV when it comes on.
I like Sid the Science kid a lot, although it just makes my kids ask more questions so sometimes I wish they would stop watching...

2. What genre of books do you like to read the most? Fiction. FOR SURE. I love "beach reads" because they are easy to get through and are pure entertainment, if not good literature. I do love a good novel too though, but my poor mommy brain sometimes needs an escape that doesn't involve thinking too much.

3. How in the world do you find time to blog with FOUR kids?
Well, I like to do it so I try to make time for it. Sometimes it takes me 3 days worth of nap times, but I do try to make the time!


Question #5 revisited: 
I looked up middle child characteristics, because I was interested but it has been a long time since I read about it and yesterday's question got me curious.  Source link
characteristics:
flexible
easy going
social
peacemakers
independant
secretive
life is unfair
strong negotiator
generous
The middle child will demonstrate the greatest variety of character traits, but they will usually be opposite of their older sibling.

Actually, I do have a lot of those characteristics so maybe my birth order did influence my personality to some degree. In that same extent, O actually does not have a lot of those characteristics, but he does have some. Perhaps I just feel empathetic towards him because of how quickly he became an older brother. ? 
The last line really spoke to me. My older sister and I could really not be more different.

Answers 1- 5

From Shelly: What is your dream vacation (money is no object)? Give me one with kids and one without kids.
Without kids: Somewhere tropical. I'm partial to Cozumel, Mexico, but any place tropical would do. A private house on the beach, and lots of money to eat out at yummy places, plus my own personal bartender on the beach. Add a lounge chair, my Kindle and an umbrella, and I'm in Heaven!


With kids:  Disney maybe? But they need to be older! It was really fun taking them to the beach, but it was hard with their ages. Maybe if we had a few more adults to help, we could do that again.


From Jess: If you could live anywhere in the world, and afford a similar lifestyle to what you have now, where would you live?
I actually really, really love where I live and the only place that I would rather live is closer to family.  Unfortunately, there are not a lot of options in places that are REALLY close to most family, but we actually have been recently talking about the possibility of re-locating. It would have to be the perfect situation though, more money, closer to family, and a nice town, low crime, short commute. Perfect, basically. (because we don't really WANT to move, we just want to be closer to family, and where we live now has everything we want EXCEPT family.)


From Misty:   Do you ever see yourself returning to work? Yes

If so, what kind of job would you like to have? Good question. I'm still trying to figure it out myself. Something that would allow me to drop the kids off, pick them up and volunteer for their classroom/field trips.

Describe your favorite 'date night'. It's been months since we went on a date. Usually we just go out to dinner. If I had all the time and money in the world, plus super trustworthy babysitters, we would go somewhere like a play or concert, out to eat, drinks or dessert after, maybe dancing (D hates dancing so probably not) or just out for a nice walk under the stars.


From Swistle:  Now that you're done naming babies, I'd love to know some of the names on your Still Wish I Could Use list---names you couldn't use because of your surname, or because D didn't like them, or because they didn't go with the other kids' names, or because they weren't as good as the other names you thought of, or just because four babies isn't enough babies to name!
Good one! We couldn't use the "d" names because both our names and our firstborn's name start with d and we didn't want to start a trend we couldn't commit to. The others were just ones that got vetoed by D, or for rhyming or surname reasons. He is very picky and hard to please. heh
 
boys:
Derek
Drew
Levi
Cole
Colby
Zeke
Zane
Lane
Wes

girls:
Lucy
Cora
Mae
Dara
Corrine (Cori)
Darby
Darci
Ella
Emme



From Giselle:  What number are you in birth order, and how do you/do you think it has shaped you into the person you are today? Do you empathize more with your child of the same birth order? What is D, and do you think it plays into your marriage dynamic? Does he empathize more with his birth order match in your family?
I have an older sister and a younger brother, so I'm the middle child. I don't know how it has shaped me, or if it has. I feel like most of my personality traits were just born in me. Although, I never did like being in the middle. I felt left out a lot, and specifically intended to have an even number of children so I wouldn't be in the middle. (I changed my mind on that a bit, after I had #3, just because I wasn't sure if I wanted 4 kids, but we had always intened to have 2, 4 or 6.)
I guess I don't have a middle child, since I have 4, but I feel O has a lot of the typical middle child characteristics, and I do empathize with that.
D is one of 4, but he is also an identical twin. Of his mother's 3 pregnancies, he and his brother were the 3rd, so does that make them middle children? I don't know... He doesn't really have empathy for much, so I'm just gonna say no on that one.

Questions?

I've been trying to think of something to write, but everything seems too boring or disjointed. So, maybe we'll have a question and answer session. You ask questions, I answer. Go.

Random Thursday, baby edition

- Miss L is growing so fast it's making my head spin! Just this week she learned to go from crawling to sitting, and won't quit doing it. She is trying to pull up on low things as well, and so I had to lower her crib. I had to buy her a new carseat, and ditch the baby bucket. I just went through her closet today and moved her up in sizes. She's wearing 9-12 and 12 months now. Still my little chunky girl. She's eating about half baby food/half table food, in addition to nursing. She's starting to sleep a little bit better. (this week anyway...)

- I'm an aunt again. My baby brother just had his first child, a boy. My first nephew! (I have 3 nieces) He's so sweet. Of course, we live very far away, so I haven't gotten to smother him with kisses yet. But, thanks to Skype, I got to meet him virtually.

Isn't he sweet?!

- TCP is having a pretty good sale on their baby/toddler clothes right now. I scored a lot of summer stuff on clearance (for next year) and a lot of it was $2.99. I got 24 things for only $97! Coupon code JULY2010A is good for 20% off if you're headed that way. 

A fave from today's little bargain shopping expedition: 

I mostly ordered separates: skirts, tanks, shorts, tees. However, I couldn't resist this dress, since I wanted it months ago but didn't bite at the $17ish price tag. I got it for $7.99 after coupons. :) It was the most expensive thing I bought.

- I just bought school supplies with my first born baby. I guess he won't appreciate me calling him my baby anymore, now that he's almost ready to start Kindergarten. My baby is ready to start Kindergarten. Kindergarten. 

My gut gets a small twist every time I think of it. Luckily, he's not nervous - he's ready. (and I'm very glad he is excited!)

Beach pics

It didn't occur to us BEFORE our trip that we had never taken a family vacation, just us and the kids. Ever.
We've gone to see family, but not actually taken a vacation unless you count the day trips to museums, zoos, etc.
We had certainly never spent 4 nights at the beach with 4 kids, five and under, and 2 adults! It was challenging in a lot of ways. For one thing, none of the kids can really swim by themselves. Secondly, the 2 year old is in very, very difficult stage and made enjoying our vacation harder. Relaxing is not the word I would use, but we still had a lot of fun and I'm still extremely glad that we went to the beach before any oil hits it. I can only imagine that it will get easier as they get older, and we plan to go back - for sure!

It was absolutely stunning.

This is the view from our balcony. You couldn't ask for a better picture to wake up to. 

I tried taking family pictures on the beach on our first morning there. Some of the pictures of the kids turned out great, but our family pictures were way too grainy. Sometimes my camera does that when it's on the timer. We never did try again, but oh well. 

We got to do lots of fun stuff while we were there! We spent the first couple of days without leaving the resort. They had a huge pool, a kiddie pool, a huge hot tub, and a great kids splash zone.

(Holiday Inn Sun Spree)
The next couple of days we went to Gulf World, played goofy golf and then spent more time at the pools and beach. By the end of the trip we felt a lot like this:

It was a great vacation and I can't wait to do it again sometime soon!

Escapism

* I went to see Eclipse last night with some girlfriends. For those who think it's drivel, well, I don't need to hear it. It's still enjoyable, eye candy, entertaining drivel. So there.

* I went to Target on Sunday for some dishwasher detergent. They have the kind I like there. I came out with 3 dresses, a shirt for each child, ice cream, several dollar spot bribes items, and dishwasher detergent.

* Don't hate me too much, but we're going back here soon:

(That's d @ around 14 months old in Destin, FL. )

We haven't been to the beach since O was 5 months old and I had just found out I was pregnant with C. We had plans to go in October, but we feared it would be too late (DAMN YOU BP!) so we cancelled and when they told us that they were oil free and didn't expect it soon, we changed our plans to go this week instead. I am so excited! I promise pictures!

Silent Sunday: My Blessings in Pictures

parenting

I just want to say, and I know all of you know this already, that parenting is like... really, really hard. Duh, right?

Before we had kids, I didn't fathom the stress they would bring!
The frustration!
The anger!
The uncertainty!
The worries!
The fighting and whining and accidents and sickness that seem never ending.
Looking at your spouse across the room and wondering when you'll get to connect on a real level again, and wondering if it will be too late.
Making important decisions when you don't even know what you're doing. (and hoping the kids don't realize you're making this up as you go along...) 
The self-sacrifice required and always, always, being last to get what you need.
(Obviously, and more importantly, the love and joy and happiness. But we're not talking about that right now. )

There is no real story to this post, but I just needed to say it. I've been feeling lately, acutely, that this shit is hard.