What I Love.

Ivey

-I love hearing, "I want to hold you."  (uness it's said in a whine!)
-I love that a "warm cup" means a cup of warm milk.  Each morning she "needs a warm cup".
-I love that when she realizes you are mad that she has done something, her response is, "I need you to be happy for me."
-I love when she sits at the breakfast table and says, "I need a calzone."
-I love that she adds the word "anymore" to any sentence to add more drama. She always speaks it in a very deliberate, enunciated, Queen of England type way.  For example, "I don't like dinner, anymore!" or "I don't like to play, anymore!"
-I love that tomato soup is tornado soup.
-I love that Snow White is "The White One".
-I love that Monsters Inc is called, "Mosters and Wink".
-I love that, even without an "I love you" from me, she says to me, "I love you, too, Mommy".
-I love her funny use of "why not", that always baffles me to silence.  For example, Me:  "We have to go to the store."  Ivey:  "Why not?" 
-I love that she says "I want to go home", even when we are home.  It means, "I want to get in the car and go somewhere."
-I love that she sings in the car, loudly, as if we cannot hear her.
-I love how she inserts Olive's name into songs, like "Twinkle Twinkle Little Olive."

Addison

-I love the fact that he explained to me 75 times how the Easter Bunny saved us money.
-I love how he is always letting me know when Olive or Ivey might be getting too close to something that may be considered a danger.  Including birthday candles.  On their own cake.
-I love how if I ask if he would like to play a sport, go to a restraunt, eat ice cream, etc., I can count on the fact that he will ask me about the cost in order to weigh it into his decision.
-I love that he can tell me how many pages are in the Hobbit.  And that I've heard it so many times I can remember (317).
-I love that, out of the blue, he will inform me of how many seconds are in 4 hours, or how many feet are in 2.5 miles, or explain to me the long and drawn out way that he can calculate 90 x 617 in his head.  I don't love it as much when it's 6:45am.
-I love that he usually does not ask to do something without explaining to me the educational value of it.
-I love that I cannot tell him "no" or "that is not correct" without him insisting on apologizing for asking or doing it wrong.
-I love that I cannot talk about running errands or starting school at 11:30 without him vocalizing his worry about it interfering with his farm chores.
-I love his concern with if we are using the most affordable insurance company, if the coupons in the magazine he found under the couch are expired, and if we can send in to the drawing on the back of the cereal box.
-I love that he wakes up at 6:30, even though no one else is up until 7:30 or 8:00.
-I love how he takes to the yard, with his Star Wars guns in hand, to battle imaginary foes for hours on end.
-I love how he uses military terms in everyday conversations, such as, "Olive is so ticklish under her chin!"  "It's a good thing it is heavily protected by her enormous head."

Asa

-I love how, whenever something even slightly surprising happens, he responds with a very comical "What?!"
-I love that he lights up when he hears the words "danger" or "destruction".
-I love how he delights in humor.  With a simple pun, I am the funniest mommy in the world.
-I love how his favorite shows are on Food Network and The Discovery Channel.
-I love how he cracks eggs perfectly, pretty much every time.
-I love the energy he has when he is excited about something (but not necessarily his inability to stop asking about it over and over again!)
-I love his transparency.  If he feels it, you see it.
-His heart:  I love the fact that if I get hurt, he is the first one (usually the only one) to run and give me a hug.
-I love that he is protective of me... even telling Daddy that he needs to be nicer!
-I love how he leaves Thank You notes for Santa, the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy.
-I love his green thumb, and the fact that when we go to the store, his biggest treat is if I let him pick out some vegetable seeds.
-I love that he cannot see a machine, building, or contraption without trying to figure out how its made, and if he can make one himself.
-I love that I have no idea how on Earth he makes the Lego creations that he does... and that I am totally incapable of helping him fix one when it breaks.

Olive

-I love how she scrunches her nose and smiles with all her might.
-I love how she picks up her blanket and asks to go to bed by putting her head on my shoulder.
-I love how she cannot see someone lying on the floor without flopping down on them.
-I love how she says "More" and "Down" so delibrerately, and how proud she gets when she does.
-I love that, every time we go in the yard, she sprints straight for the goats and chickens.
-I love how she does not fear the vacuum, power tools, the garbage disposal, or pretty much anything at all.
-I love how she plays peek-a-boo by covering up her ears.
-I love her strong will, her snuggly nature, and her desire to be the class clown.

Scarier than a Meat-a-saurus.

A couple weeks ago, we rented Jurassic Park for the boys.  For the week preceeding the movie watching event, Papa made sure to get the boys really excited about it.  There was an entire week of growling, denying he was growling, and Asa saying they thought it was Papa doing it (but silently wondering if it was in their heads).  Once the big night came, Dr. Hammond delivered.  The boys were on the edge of their seats.  I had almost forgotten what a good movie it is!

Once the movie was over and the lights were back on, their was no question as to the scariest part of the movie for the boys.  The most disturbing, frightening scene of the entire movie was not when the lawyer was plucked up and eaten off of the port-a-potty.  It was not the T-Rex chasing the Jeep, or even the raptures stalking the kids in the kitchen.  It was when the lawyer bolted out of the Jeep, deserting the two children inside.  They were all three sitting there, and when things got scary, he up and ran.  Both Asa and Addison were truly upset that this grown up would jump out and leave the kids behind.  Asa, in particular, was terrified almost to the point of tears.  Why?  Because it's just not supposed to happen.  That's why.

We spend so much time trying to decide what color crib bedding to register for, which bottles are least likely to create gas, and what multiplication cd has the catchiest songs.  We worry about the right age to start going to the dentist, whether or not our 24 hours a day is enough one-on-one time for everyone, if we are being strict enough to get through the 2's and have a decent human being on the other side, and if our kids are watching too much of the Human Planet Series on Discovery.  We stress.  We fret.  We worry.

When it comes down to it, the single most important factor, the only thing truly important to our children, is that we are there.  We are supposed to be there.  We are their constant.  We are their rock.  We are their solid, stable foundation.  Our rules, our punishments, our love, our presence, is stable.  We create their ability to trust, to love, to rely on others.  If we have no cribs or coordinated bedding or video monitor or all natural organic maple syrup, or hormone free milk, or advanced math curriculum, or television.... our kids would be far better off than if they had all of these things, but lacked adults in their life that they could count on to stay in that Jeep.

At around three or four years old, kids start to realize that their parents provide them with all of their needs.  Clingyness, nightmares, and social anxiety are all normal and pop up out of the blue.  For my boys, they would wake up in tears, unaware that their nightmare was just a dream.  9 times out of 10, they did not wake up because they were scared of a monster, or a witch, or an injury... They were scared that something had either happened to one of us, or that for some reason we didn't give them food.  Why?  Because their little subconscious brains began to realize that their very existence depended on the certainty, the trustworthiness, of their parents. To new parents, this should be comforting.  Children love you when you are strict, or when you put the diaper on backwards, or when you don't drive the newest car in the neighborhood.  They love you because you love them.  They develop the ability to trust because they can trust in you.  They form healthy relationships because you show them healthy relationships.

I am incredibly thankful that my boys were able to watch the "blood sucking lawyer" abandon those kids when danger came... and find it unacceptably frightening. What is really scary would be to have a child that expected such a reaction; that witnessed that behavior and have it fail to shock them. Whatever else happens, at least my kids know that they will never be left behind to fight a T-Rex... and a T-Rex takes on many forms.  A bad grade.  A broken heart.  A failed attempt.  A crisis.  All of those things that are etched in our memories from our own childhood and adolescence.  When that dinosaur comes crashing in, no matter how old they are, I hope that our constancy now will help them always remember...

we'll be in that backseat with them the entire ride.

Thanksgiving

Occasionally, I find myself surfing around to the blogs, websites, and support groups that helped me survive my long haul through infertility and recurrent loss. It's sometimes to find resources for a friend, or for me to try to find a little something to use that can help raise public awareness just a little. Tonight was one of those nights. For years, I spent so much time reading and connecting with others who understood. For someone going through it, their day to day lives make them feel like an outsider. They are going through a crisis that no one around them comprehends. However, the blogs and online communities make them feel a part of a group. Their sorrows are shared, their joys are shared, they can chat with people who understand the procedure they had that day, the fears they have, the storm of emotional chaos going on inside of them. Online, they feel, I felt, in a sense... 'normal'.

The house is full of sleeping babies and children. Jeff is asleep on the couch, to the soothing sounds of Conan O'Brian. I try to type quietly, for fear that I will wake up the lightest sleeping baby on the planet. I can hear her occasionally stir in her little restless way... the one that I used to try to attribute to hunger or cold or music or no music... realized I wasn't winning any battles... and started chalking up to personality. Ivey, in all of her silly eccentricity, has decided to camp out in the middle of her floor, GeoTracks filling station to her left (so she can ring the bell on occasion), her ABC 'computer' to her right, and "Here Come the ABC's" in the air. She politely, yet adamantly, refused my attempts to lay her on a cushy blanket. "Sleep on my floor". Asa and Addison are snuggled under each and every sheet out of the linen closet, but in separate beds tonight. They played so hard with their cousin Zack today that they actually fell asleep at a reasonable time for a change, their timely slumber allowing me to feel like I accomplished my new goal of gaining control of their independent bedtime non-routine, although I had nothing to do with it.

I am in the same ponytail that I pulled back yesterday morning. I intentionally wore the same clothes today as yesterday for the sole purpose of reducing the insane amount of laundry we create. I have so many things that I want to do... sew that new mei tai carrier I want so I can strap Olive on my back, thus reducing my dependence on finding the double-seater buggy at the grocery store parking lot... replace the elastic in my BumGenius cloth diapers and convert them from velcro to snaps... file all the paperwork sitting in front of me... put away the laundry that I piled up on the bed.  Why is it that I continue to pile laundry on my bed, thinking each and every time that I will put it away before I go to sleep, not realizing that it NEVER happens and they ALWAYS end up in a pile on the desk or the dresser or the floor?  While I'm on the topic of laundry, why is it that I always want to add something to the wash during the exact times when the washer has decided that it must protect me from the spin cycle, thus locking me out?  I am tired of being told what I cannot do by a washing machine.  I think I have the ability, as an intelligent adult, to make the call of when to open the door on my own.  A while back, I fought this oppression by yanking and pulling and prying the washer door, to assert my power, as the human in this equation.  I was determined to win.  I should win.  Being restricted by this machine for something so ridiculous was striking a cord with my inner self-reliant and authority-questioning spirit.  I gave it one final massive yank and WHAM!  It flew up with awesome force, nailing me square in the forehead.  My head flew back, I let out a pained "Yelp".  I thought it might have caused serious damage.  I wondered if I should get someone to check on me that night while I slept.  So now, even though the washer's frivolous and tyrannical restrictions infuriate me to no end... my reluctant submission
is agonizing, as I am now too intimidated by the door lock to try any more funny business.  It made its point, but I don't have to like it.  I digress.

I need to move the diapers from the washer to the dryer. I need to go down and fully clean in the kitchen instead of giving it the half-attempt "I'll just put the food away and run these dishes" that I did. I need to get the unfolded laundry off the school table, gather supplies to make Valentine's boxes for Monday's party, figure out what appetizer I am bringing, and get our taxes together. I cannot type this, watch tv, or just sit and drink a latte without guilt for what I should be doing, and I can't even go shopping on my own without feeling the pressure and guilt of having someone else watching the kids while I go.

I constantly feel that I do 8 million things poorly. I teach the boys, but not as well as I would like because of the girls. Yet, I feel guilt for not spending the educational time with Ivey that I did with the boys when they were two. There just isn't enough Mommy to go around. But, I thank God that I feel this way. I thank God that I get the chance to. While I am sticking the pacifier back in the 11 month old's mouth in the middle of the night over and over, eating the Kraft Mac n Cheese that Ivey left in her bowl as my lunch, or driving down the road with Greenday blaring out of the front two speakers in order to drown out the whining in the backseat and give myself a temporary oasis, there are plenty of things that I am NOT doing.

I am not skipping church on Mother's Day, I am not making excuses not to attend baby showers, I am not standing in a grocery store explaining to someone I haven't seen in a while that I am not pregnant anymore. I am not spending our savings on medical care. I am not handing a needle to Jeff to give me an intramuscular shot and crying because there are no places left on my backside that aren't knotted and bruised. I am not driving back and forth to the doctor 4 or more times a week, on weekends, or on holidays. I'm not flinching inside as I get unintentionally hurtful 'advice', I'm not obsessively trying to suck up each tiny drop of the medicine in the vial or thinking that if I don't it might ruin my cycle... or that the teeny drop in there probably costs $50. I'm not worried that we won't be chosen for a study or a donor or an adoption. I'm not hyper-stimulating my ovaries to where they feel like grapefruit. I am not comparing E2 or FSH or Progesterone levels from this month with previous cycles,  I'm not staring at a calendar, counting days until I start this drug or that, or wondering how Jeff is going to be able to get out of the office and meet me for yet another appointment. I don't feel hopeless, or alone, or broken. No jealousy.



Tomorrow, when Ivey is yelling "NO!" at Olive for touching her shirt, or Olive wakes up only 20 minutes into her very important nap, or Asa and Addison are slugging it out in the car, or when Ivey, Asa, and Addison are running frantic screaming laps around the island in the kitchen while Olive screeches like a tropical bird with a megaphone, I will be thankful for it all. Thankful for being in over my head. Thankful for each and every one of them and for the ability to stay home and be driven crazy by them... and thankful that my heart is full and that I no longer have an empty space to fill, even that empty space I didn't even know I had.

Mush.

Yes,I should be in bed.  But, I can justify not getting sleep right now by the simple reason that Olive has already waken up and needed assistance six times in the last two hours.  If I were asleep, I would be pulled from an interrupted dream, stumbling around the room, face-planting into the edge of the door as I try to escape and quell the sounds coming from the next room.  At least this way, I am able to jump in there and help the bugger find her paci without all the grogginess.  That child has a sleeping disorder... and it most definitely sucks to be me.  But, that's not at all what this post was supposed to be about.  No more complaining of sleep deprivation or descriptions of our baby's sleep defects in this post.

January of each year reminds people that they could have a clean slate.  People make resolutions that they actually think they can follow, and some do.  Some take a look at their life, their progress, their plans, their wallets, and see how it's all working out.  According to the "plan"?  For me, I always have the same vibe with the new year rolls around.  For the first few weeks of January, my mind wanders towards January 1998 the preceding fall when a seed was planted, rooted, and took hold on me.  I was at UGA, trying to find my place among a ragtag group of friends... some I'd known forever, one I just broke up with, some, well, most, I questioned the sanity of... it was a funny collection of characters in the F3 Menagerie.

I took notice of a guy who I recognized from back home. The guy with the cute smile, sort of Morrison-esque in a way, tight jeans, and the grey ARMY tee shirt.  Could it be?  Yes. He was the long haired pizza boy that worked at Primos back home.  The guy who was way too old (and bad) to date or hang out with (my mom would kill over such things), but the perfect age for my hyper little 14 year old self to use as an excuse to go to Primos.  I didn't actually want to talk to him... I knew that guy was nothing but trouble... but I did want to sit back and have a nice view of him as he worked back there.  And now, that pizza boy was sitting here in the same herd of people who were, for one reason or another, tethered to F3, but this time, he looked like he'd managed to grow past the bad-boy thing... just enough.

The fall of 1997 was pretty fun... I guess it put the fun in dysfunctional for me, as I was a little lost and had absolutely no interest in finding myself in a relationship at the time.  However, there was a party here or a cookout there... and anytime Jeff would swagger into a function my attention focused, uncontrollably, on him.  Through the fall, my interest in this cleaned up version of the bad boy I drooled over long ago grew and grew.  By Christmas, I had a conversation with another F3 frequenter, discussing just how weird would it be if I tried to hook up with Jeff.  Adam's response was, "Not weird at all.  Go for it.", which made me smile and panic all at once.  I mean, I didn't even know if he liked me... but if he did...

January brought us all back to classes and apartments and our psuedo reality. Jeff started spending more time around the apartment... and not the F3 hub, but my actually apartment.  He tried to "work on" my computer (a computer that ended up never working right and we ditched it the first year we were married).  He installed Instant Messenger, so that he could slyly chat with me (while being able to proofread and filter out any stupid comments before sending.  If only such a filter could have been permanently in place.)

We went a few places, but I always wondered if it was a "date".  By mid-January, there was no more denying it.  One kiss can change your perspective, your concerns, your plans... your life.  Leaning against his chest with his arms holding me tight I actually knew that this would be my home.  It felt just like we had been close our entire lives but had been zapped by that memory eraser from Men In Black.  It was was like something "all came back" that hadn't even happened yet.  At least, for me.

In 8 months, he had sold his Gibson SG to buy a ring, we were engaged, and in 8 more months we were married.  But, it all began as we said goodbye to 1997 and hello to '98.... and so I will forever come to a new year and think of how blessed and lucky I am to have found such a fabulous husband and daddy... and how lucky I am to still be just as head over heels madly in love.

We've Come A Long Way

It's a quiet night. I sit here, alone, among a pile of boxes and laundry and half packed things pulled from the backs of closets and cabinets that haven't seen the light of day in years. It is a mess. It is quiet not only because it is in the middle of the night, but because Jeff has taken Asa, Addison and Ivey to his parents' mountain cabin for the weekend. After dinner, I helped him pack up the van with the kids' bags, a pack-n-play, and paintings and pictures to store at his parents' house and sent them on their way. After they had been on the road for about twenty minutes, Jeff realized that Addison had no shoes. No shoes. He had to go for an impromptu shoe shopping trip at 8:30pm with three kids, one of which is barefooted. After helping his dad for a couple days at the cabin, he will head down to my parents' house to start fencing off an area for the goats, which must be completed and ready to go by the time we move.

Olive and I spent the evening with music cranked high, dancing, laughing and packing. Now, it is just me... deep into cabinets that I should have cleaned out years ago. I am not a hoarder. I know that some people have a hard time throwing things away... and although I do hold on to sentimental things, and sometimes I just don't have time to go through the medicine cabinet and pull out all of the meds that expired 5 years ago, I don't find it difficult to get rid of things. I actually enjoy it. But, I do have a quirky pack-rat side of me. I am an information hoarder. Photos, newspaper articles, school papers, year books... I even have every calendar/planner since high school. With a little digging, I could tell you when I had a haircut in 1998. No lie. I journal, I blog, I photograph, I video tape. I can't help it... that is what I hoard. Hey, at least most of it isn't heavy.

As I was knee deep in the process of packing up the bathroom cabinets, I realized that they were full of reminders of just how hard it was to make our family grow. I pulled out these items from various hiding places and laid them out on the counter-top. From high tech to out of my mind crazy, I had it all. Bottles of leftover pills with wacky names like Qing Yin Bai Du Pian, Tang-kuei, and Ba Zhen Wan. Two clear packages of Han-Yak, a substance that deserves an entire post of its own.

In a desperately infertile state, I was told by a Korean acupuncturist that I had to drink a warmed packet of this stuff each morning. To say that it was the most vile thing I have ever and will ever smell or taste is a gross understatement. At one point, I did some research to try to figure out what might be included in this concoction. Among other things, dried seahorses and ground up deer antlers. No joke. It was so completely undrinkable that I developed an elaborate routine to get it to stay down. Of course, I had to hold my nose. I actually had to hold my nose BEFORE the packet was opened. If I smelled it at all, it wouldn't stay down. So, with breath held, I would open the packet and pour it into a cup. After placing it in the microwave, I would run out of the room to take a breath, as the smell still lingered in the air. After warming it, I held my nose and placed it on the counter next to a toothbrush. Then, while holding my nose, I would gulp down the liquid hell and instantly brush my teeth.

I thought this would work, however, I quickly learned that teeth brushing was not enough to get the taste out of my mouth. As soon as I let go of my nose, the taste would overcome me and up it would come. I had to chase it with something, first. I tried orange juice, grape juice, coke... nothing was strong enough to overpower the han yak. Finally, I found the correct method for which to ingest this concoction. After warming the liquid, I would place it beside a half shot of Jack Daniels and a toothbrush. With nose held, I would chase the stuff with JD and then brush my teeth and tongue while still holding on to my nose. Spit in the sink, rinse with water, and leave the room before letting go of my nose. Success. I mean, it was successful in helping me keep that stuff down, not in magically whipping me up some top notch eggs.

Back to my cabinet. There were tons of unopened hypodermic needles, alcohol pads, empty vials which held progesterone or saline or Lupron or some other $100+ per day drug, basal body thermometers, empty LH surge kit and pregnancy test strip wrappers bought in bulk from online medical supply stores, and leftover metformin pills. The amount of money and effort and time and heartache and desperation was all laid out across my counter. To think, I now have so many babies that we have filled this house, the van, and my sanity to their top capacities. A true miracle, for sure. And, as I rake the entire smorgasbord of both eastern and western medical supplies into the big black trash bag, I think of the wild ride of infertility and how God carried us through. I heard Tom Petty singing "You belong among the wildflowers" from the computer speakers and I couldn't help but smile thinking of God's sense of humor and the little wildflower I have sleeping peacefully in the next room.