Growing a Baby

I think blogging is turning into my naptime therapy. At almost 35 weeks along, I’m becoming increasingly limited and just when I'm positive I’ve reached absolute maximum discomfort I am proven wrong. DUH, I have weeks to go! Anyway, since I’m doing a lot more nothing than usual and since I never turn on the TV during the day (that would defeat the purpose of quiet naptime) it’s been fun to sit at the computer and take my mind off “How long can this contraction last?” or “Oww” or “Are you kidding me? How am I supposed to walk?” How I envy those pregnant women who glow from start to finish and say the hardest part of pregnancy is giving birth. Last night I laid on the living room couch until 3:30 a.m. and fantasized about giving birth. I couldn’t sleep on my go-to side because the baby was stuck in my ribs, yet laying on my other side cut off my breathing so…what option remains? Ask Rick and he’ll say ‘throwing a fit, snatching random pillows and “stomping” down to the couch.’ Surely, he’s as anxious for the next 5 ½ weeks to pass as I am. On second thought, that would be impossible, but I’m sure he’s looking forward to it. Anyway, as I’m becoming increasingly lame, I’ve noticed a weird catchphrase emerging.

“Mom, why are you so tired?”
“I’m growing a baby.”

“Wow, mom, you’re tired! Were you really busy today?”
"Yes, plus I’m growing a baby. Can you pick that up for me?”

“Rick, thanks for folding the laundry again. Sorry I’m such a lame-o.”
“You’re not a lame-o, you need to hold still.” (I think this is code for ‘It hurts my eyes to see you [insert any verb].’)
"(whine) But I can’t get anything done. It’s pathetic.”
“You just relax.”
“Well, I am growing a baby.”

When I really think about it, that’s exactly what I’m doing, late night fits and all. So maybe today while my nerves are making me limp around like a 90-year old and later when my bruised insides are preventing me from finding anything close to a sleepable position, I just need to let those words ring through my head. I’m growing a baby. I’m growing a baby. Really, that’s big stuff. And probably not pathetic at all, even with loads (get it? loads?) of evidence to the contrary. So maybe I can deal with Tracy-slo-mo a bit longer, especially knowing “slo-mo” will be long gone once little no-name (I’m calling him ‘Jolt’ today, short for [jolt]“OW!”) joins the fam. I do believe I’m finally looking forward to it. And I’ll be able to pick things up myself. 5 ½ more weeks. I think I can... I think I can...

5 ALIVE!

After literally months of counting down, Connor had his 5th birthday!! This is BIG news. I've been asked "Mom, how many more days 'til my birthday?" multiple times a week for...well, I believe my first answer to this question was "94." Needless to say, all of us were thrilled for this anxious kid when yesterday FINALLY arrived!

One of our birthday traditions is the kids waking up to a birthday balloon from their Dad. Connor calls his "my friend 5". And yes, it's nearly as tall as he is.

The Birthday Boy

Everybody! (Picture one more sitting with them!?)

Climbing on the snake at The Mayan--Connor's choice for dinner

Connor & his "Rocket" cake. I suspect this will be the only birthday where Little Einsteins & Bionicles will both make an appearance. He's right on the bridge between little & big. I'll hang onto little as long as I can...

Cake & presents in the 'Birthday Chair', another favorite tradition

Trying out his new bike

Fisher Face

I snapped these pictures of Fisher in a matter of 30 seconds before cleaning him up from breakfast this morning. His 'I'm acting mad or puzzled' scowl (the top one) is my absolute favorite expression and this is the FIRST TIME I managed to capture a version of it!! It's not quite in it's truest form, but a victory nonetheless. Generally speaking, whenever I try photographing him, he immediately abandons whatever darling thing he was doing, runs to stare directly into the camera, and wants to take it from me. Come to think of it, he’s not the only one of my children that does that. Huh. Maybe this explains why I have so many pictures of my kids eating.

Oh, I LOVE THIS BABY.

No Move is Good Move

After the putting our home up for sale for 3 months ago, signing a contingency offer on a beautiful South Jordan home in the perfect location, and wondering if we could bear to leave our neighborhood should our house actually sell, we have taken the house off the market and are staying put! We had to laugh when the kids’ first response was, “YES! We don’t have to keep the house clean anymore!” Right. Because we live in filth under normal circumstances. After quickly pointing out the error of this reasoning, we decided this is one of those bittersweet moments, (Maddie thought soursweet,) but really more sweet because we get to stay somewhere we love. Especially sweet because I don't need be 8 months pregnant and moving. Connor, however, sat frowning on the porch after we shared the news, so I started reminding him why NOT moving will be so great. (“You can stay in your cool new preschool! We’ll still live by the Parkinsons!”) When nothing seemed to help, I suddenly felt concern for my little guy who’s been living with such uncertainty for the past few months and was obviously more affected by all of this than I thought. I put my arm around him and asked what was wrong. His answer? “Brayden still won’t let me play GameCube.” Oh. I guess staying here will be just fine.

Home Sweet Home

"What Time is It?"

If you answered that question by bursting into song (“Sum-mer-time! It’s our va-ca-tion!”) then chances are you have someone at your house between 5 & 13 years old! If not, you've probably at least heard the recent hype for High School Musical 2 because you live on this planet. Well, our kids were counting down to August 17th with the rest of the world and Maddie was one of the millions of kids headed to a fabulous premiere party at a friend’s house where she arrived on the red carpet to be greeted by a life-size version of Zac Efron, sang karaoke, danced the night away, etc. Rick & I even had our own movie night with the boys and since then, I've started to wonder if we've gotten a bit carried away?

Signs your family has HSM2 mania:
1. HSM2 has “premiered” at least 8 times in the last week on your television.
2. You've said no to additional viewings at least that many times.
3. You’ve heard the words, “Aww, if it weren’t Sunday, I’d be watching High School Musical 2” from your 5-year old.
4. Your daughter's room has a wall devoted to pictures of the cast.
5. You have the overwhelming urge to rent Footloose after seeing Troy dance through “Bet On It.”
6. You know all the words to “I Don’t Dance.”
7. You’ve tried doing any of the moves to “I Don’t Dance,” or any other numbers for that matter, and discovered why that needs to be a true statement.
8. You own the soundtrack which plays repeatedly in your vehicle.
9. You think they should have filmed the silly tiki song.
10. You are writing about HSM2 on your blog.

What team?? WILDCATS!!
It’s sad, really.

(How surprised are you that I already threw in a photo?? I am full of surprises.)

Doomed to Fail?

Turns out, blogging may not be the sure-fire solution to my compulsive nature as I had previously hoped. What have I been dreaming about? What will I say in my next blog? I ask you if this is normal? Little moments are there in my mind, building and rebuilding themselves over and over until I can finally sit down to jot them down, which hasn’t happened yet—I’m aiming for this afternoon. I’m going to assume this is a novice problem that will resolve itself once I’m not such a greeny-blogger. If not, then this idea is as doomed to fail as Brayden’s sad little scrapbook.

Scrappy

So there it is, I've started a blog. My latest attempt to keep track of our family as we are growing and changing faster than I am journaling and, frankly, because I'm an anti-scrapbooker. Don't get me wrong, I've tried. The image of having our family preserved on pages so tastefully created that they'd surely bring me to tears for years and years to come makes me salivate. My first child even has an entire 9 months of his life scrapbooked! The problem is that there is nothing scrappy about scrapbooking. It takes compulsive me roughly 4 hours to document a single event. Another problem is that my first child is now 10 1/2 years old with 1 sister and 2 3/4 brothers. If only they had 9 months of their lives scrapbooked...

So I think I'll try "blogging," as the kids are calling it these days. Seems like a casual way to write about what goes on from day to day with pictures thrown in (once I figure out how to do that). Probably a nice compliment to my 'official' journal which seems to be reserved for the deep stuff and, as I discovered last week when I pulled it out to write, only hears from me annually on average. Bonus? My life won't be riddled with guilt because moments are passing me by (or monopolized by layout decisions or rivet mishaps.) Sure, I'll still have lost years and thousands of photos waiting for a good home, but I must start somewhere. Maybe I can flashback to moments of the lost years when I'm hard up for a good story? That'd be exciting. Hey, can you print off your blog and stick it in an album?? Now that's scrappy.