You never get used to it.

Letting a child cry themselves to sleep is always trying. Even if you find a way to distract yourself there is a sort of tension that won't ease until they stop crying. Once you realize that it is over and probably will not start up again it is like realizing that you have been holding your breath and a palpable wave of relief washes over you. No matter how many years or how many children you have made it through you are never used to it.
I let Levi cry himself to sleep tonight because he was so tired and wouldn't let himself go to sleep. I usually just let him do whatever he wants in the evening because it is just me and him and as long as he isn't fussy I see no reason to make him go to sleep before he gets picked up by his mom, but tonight I had Dono as well. Dono is not a problem but he riles Nathan up and is one more munchkin running around the house. So Levi was being fussy and I had my hands full with the other two so I decided that it was time to be the mean aunt and to make him get the sleep that he didn't want. I was surprised it only took 20 min. or so but I still felt like a cad. When I got him out of the crib to go home he had a super wet diaper and I felt even worse but he smiled at me as I changed him and I just melted my heart. You never get over it.

"You never can tell with bees"

So here is the picture: there is laundry in the washer and dryer, dishes are done, living room and Nathan's room are picked up, Levi is asleep and Nathan and Dono are watching a bit of Winny the Pooh before Nathan takes his nap. Last time that I had all three boys it was a nightmare, mostly because my son was in rare form that day, and I don't mean that in a good way. So all this good behavior makes me think "hey, maybe it isn't so bad, I could do this!" which is a really dangerous way of thinking. I need to keep in mind that this is the oddity and that what happened last time is far more likely an occurrence than this is. If these days out numbered the others at all I would be in serious trouble.

I could have done it so I feel like I have accomplished something.

Daniel and I were both sick yesterday and Nathan was not. When we got sick I had Levi here as well. Nathan woke up from his nap just as I started throwing up and while Daniel was lying in our bedroom trying not to. Brennen came and got Levi about 30min later. I am going to brag on myself for a moment so don't feel obliged to read all of this.
I got Levi a bottle, Nathan a sippy cup of milk, made Nathan some toast because he asked for it and it seemed to be the least offensive option to me, and then burped Levi and changed his diaper, all in that miserable half hour. Both the boys were very sweet, they usually are, and were also were lower maintanance than they usually are which was good because I was hanging on by a thread when Brennen left with Levi.
Once we were down to one child Daniel and I tag teamed keeping up with Nathan while the other took a bathroom break, to put it nicely, just trying to keep it up until 6pm which is Nathan's bed time. Daniel called his mom and she came and got Nathan at 5:55pm so at least he wouldn't be exposed, knock on wood, to whatever we had. I feel like we really accomplished something here. I couldn't be happier that Kathy picked up Nathan but it was great to realize that we probably would have made it on our own. It is moments like this where you don't feel that you are an exemplary parent but you do feel like you are doing all right and I will take doing all right any day.

Smart Two Year Olds are a Wonderful Problem

Nathan started school this fall. His class meets on Tuesday/ Thursday and has 8 students under two in it. Nathan is the oldest in the class and the first two days of class all went well. The third day Nathan was coming down with a cold and so he cried until they called me to pick him up 45min into class. That day I just stayed there with him encouraging him to participate and trying to be in the way as little as possible. The next class he was still not feeling well, the cold lead to an ear infection but we were on antibiotics, so I went with him to school with the intention of staying the whole time so that he wouldn't just be left there not feeling well but also so we wouldn't get out of the habit of going to school. That Wednesday night he had trouble in his class at church and they went and got Daniel out of his class. On Thursday they called me because, once again, he wouldn't quit crying. On Sunday when we took him to his bible class and he once again started crying we knew we had a problem. The next Tuesday the pattern repeated its self again and I had had enough.
Nathan has never been a clingy cuddly child. He has little problem with strangers or strange places. Give him a minuet and some interesting toys and he would be fine anywhere. This child calling for Mommy seemed totally foreign to me. That is when it struck me, I have a very intelligent son who likes to have things his own may and he had discovered... THE POWER OF TEARS! Two year olds by nature are very manipulative, it is why they survive to adulthood, and Nathan was drunk with power but mommys, though they may be slow, are not dumb and I was onto his shenanigans.
I talked to his teacher and explained what I thought was going on and she and I agreed that we would refuse to cater to the tears for one week and then see how he was doing. Daniel and I also got his Sunday and Wednesday night teachers on board for a full fledged group effort. It only took Nathan moments to feel the difference when I dropped him off. There was no "poor baby" from me or the teachers it was all "I'm sorry, but you are fine." He has not had that kind of trouble in class since then. He has better days than others but the crying for longer than it takes to realize that Mommy is not coming back has quit.
Mommy 1 Nathan 90 (these numbers were estimated and will not hold up in a court of law, Nathan's score is probably higher)

Maybe Nathan will be a lawyer when he grows up.

How Do You Go to the Bathroom When You Have a Two Year Old

Nathan has reached a new level in ability to get in to things and it has thrown me for a loop. The other day...well, a few weeks ago, I was exhausted so me and Nathan went into his room, at the time he couldn't open doors, and I fell asleep in the corner. When I woke up I realized that Nathan now could not only open zippers, but he had also had mastered the ability to twist open the cap of the baby powder and the room was now looked like there had been some selective snowing.
A few weeks after that I was paying some bills at the dining room table and Nathan was going in and out of his room. I though that since he would "check in" periodically that I was keeping a close enough eye on him. Nathan comes up to me grinning from ear to ear and rubbing his hair and that is when I realized that he had covered himself in Vaseline. Hair, face, clothes and I later found the stool, comb and car in his room, all smeared with Vaseline.
By the way, wipes work very well to remove Vaseline but not so well on Desitin.
A few days later, you would think I would have learned by now but no, I am a bit thick headed, I was feeding Levi and it got a little too quiet in the other room. I did know enough by this time to realize that that meant trouble. As soon as I could I went in his room to see what he had gotten into this time. That is when I learned that Desitin is really hard to get out of carpet, out of shoes and off the hands of a child. This time I caught on early enough that the damage was minimal.
But it did not end there... I feel like a terrible parent as I admit all this.
He learned how to open doors, that was the beginning of the trouble on this day. I was in the kitchen when I heard the splashing of water. I ran in the bathroom, which he could now open the door to, and found him using his sandal to scoop water out of the toilet and pour it on the unopened(thank you) package of toilet paper I had set in the hall to put in the bathroom. TOILET water.... ewwww! I put him in the tub, his clothes in the washer, dried off the toilet paper package, and mopped the floor. Am I a negligent parent? It just all happened so fast. We have now gone a week or two without and incident but I still feel a bit jumpy. How do you take time to even go to the bathroom when you can't leave them alone for a minuet.

All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go

I just spent the loveliest week in the mountains. It was cool, almost cold at night, the air was fresh and crisp with just a hint of pine, and there was nothing much to do but take it easy and hang out with Nathan. I found myself going to bed at 8:30 several nights in a row. Who does that? Not me! Nathan got to play in the creek, go for little hikes and see his first deer which he said baa at. I guess deer and sheep look a little alike, right? There were no bears, no injuries, and it was all relatively uneventful, the way you want it to be, until...

Friday morning I was up at 3:30 am, unable to sleep. I often have trouble sleeping the night before a trip and we were planning to leave for home at about 6:00 am Texas time. Nathan was restless too because we were sharing a room and I was moving around too much. At 5:30 I woke up my Mom and Dono so that we could pack up the car. By 6:00 we had said goodbye to my aunt and uncle that had come in last night, the boys were in the car, all the groceries and luggage were in the car and we began down the "driveway". (for lack of a better word to describe the short dirt path between the cabin and the bridge to the road.) We stopped short once we could see the bridge because where the bridge should have been there was only a horridly swollen creek. If I were to stand in the creek on a normal day our bridge would be about waist high on me and the creek would be just over my ankles. On the lovely Friday morning in question the creek was about a foot an a half above previously mentioned bridge. So my moms little Honda Accord was probably not going to make it over without drifting down into the creek. So we backed up, ate breakfast and checked on the water level every hour or so. It was going down, slowly, and all we could do was hope that it would go down enough that we could get out before the rain storm that was supposed to arrive around noon got here. At about 12:00pm we decided to make a go for it. The water on the bridge was only mid-calf by this point and they had had a back hoe through to clear out some of the debris further down. My uncle, in his truck, went ahead of up so that he could haul us out if we drifted away. Very reassuring...not. But we made it and as we headed into town we could see the storm clouds moving over the mountains. We were 6 hours behind schedule and wouldn't get home until 12:30am but there was no going back. It just felt good to be on our way home...finally.

Work Camp!

Work camp was like a reset button for me. I had forgotten how much I like working with that age group and then the added bonus of working with the spectacular group that I was put with was the cherry on top. We painted a house in three days and, for the most part, with only the 10 kids in our group. And, wow, did they work. The heat index was in the 100's most of the days and it rained on us twice but neither of those things slowed our kids down a bit. The were spectacular painters, scrapers, spotters and best of all encouragers. I can't wait till next year but I must confess I had forgotten, since it has been about 8 years since I did this, how physically taxing it is. My goodness, I am getting old.

I have been feeling a bit worn down lately mostly because our busy stressful life, as much as I do love it, can start to feel like a treadmill. The same problems, the same meals, the same routine each week. I am happier than I have ever been but I am the type of person that thrives on variety and new challenges and new environments so the little foray into something new refreshed me gave me the perspective to appreciate my everyday life all over again.

Meanwhile...I need to get some rest because I feel old and worn out. When I did work camp in high school I didn't have to clean houses and chase a 1.75 year old the next day. If I am remembering correctly it was summer and I was carefree and slept... ah, youth is wasted on the young. (I have always wanted to have some place to say that... he he he!)

The Twenty First Century... I want to go to there.

I have a dream, that one day I will be able to communicate with a world wide web while in my living room. That one day I will be able to send small textual messages from my phone to others phones when I am unable to make a call. That one day I would be able to combine my phone and internet capabilities in one place that perhaps even has a screen that responds to my mere touch. But that day is not today.

You may have noticed that I have been absent for a while. The internet that I had access to is no longer available and since I either am chasing my son or at home that means that I only rarely get to check my email and perhaps Facebook. I feel as if I have moved into the dark ages. If it wasn't for the fact that I have a cell phone I would probably have a technological deprivation break down and start sending smoke signals from my patio. And last week only confirmed my fears. It was me vs. the phone and it didn't look good for me.

While I was in Abilene last week I had cell phone issues the start of which was my fault. I had forgotten my charger and so my phone started dying. I had a small freak-out because we were not even sure that we could afford for me to be out there so Daniel said that buying another charger was out of the question, but I called around and my cousin helped my out by letting me borrow one of his old phones. It was pretty cool at first but the phone was a little too sophisticated for me and I kept hanging up on people; in the end I had a phone so I was happy as a bird with a french fry.
Cell phone- 0 Kara-0
Since the phone was a smart phone ATT realized that I had "upgraded" so they upgraded my plan for me. This is a bit of a mess because I am on my parents plan so I had to call my dad and explain to him what had happened and get him to fix it. If I can't afford an extra charger I most certainly can not afford a data plan. As I explained before I don't even have texting on my phone, so data plan? I don't think so.
Cell phones-1 Kara-0
Eric hunted around and found me a old razor that they had lying around. It didn't hold a charge but I could keep it plugged in and it was not too fancy for my simple tasted and phone plan. So I went on my merry way happy as a puppy with a chew toy until Tuesday night. I went to the restroom, you might see where this is going, and plop, right out of my pocket, from which I have never had this happen before, and directly into the toilet.
Cell phones-2 Kara-0
The next morning I realized that I no longer even had my original phone to make one last dying call. In the middle of things I had left it at Eric and Em's house.
Cell phones-3 Kara-0
I finally descended into a full panic, a complete, irrational, straight up panic. I ran to Walmart, bought a charger, went to Eric and Em's house and let myself in when no one answered the door, found my phone and went back to where I was staying where I used the last bits of my phones battery confessing my $15 purchase to my husband in hysterics. He was very kind to me and I realized that I probably had not gotten enough sleep lately. I went in, plugged in my phone and took a deep breath.
I think the cell phones still won.

Spring Break

      Apparently in the outside world it is spring break and I find it strange how for the first time in my life it has little effect on me. I am not teaching school nor do I have school aged children so this spring break will pass virtually unobserved in this household. I don't know if I should relish these scant years where this once revered week will pass unnoticed or be sad that I am leaving behind an era of my life.
      I never did the whole spring break vacation while I was in high school and college but I did look forward to it. A whole week to catch up on sleep and homework that I had put off. Not that I ever did the homework but I often had good intentions and set for myself lofty goals. While I was teaching I had similar plans; catch up on sleep and grading that I had put off (not that that happened either). So perhaps this would feel more momentous if I had some crazy history of fabulous partying or wild vacations or even lofty goal reaching. Or maybe I should look at it as if I have entered a stage in my life, while I am home with my children, where every week it spring break. I at least have the same goals that I had every spring break: catch up on sleep and housework that I have put off (not that that ever happens). I guess some things never change.

Nap Wars

Nathan has been having some troubles with his naps. I assume it is because he is reaching an age where he will change to taking only one nap but meanwhile he just doesn't want to sleep but is quite tired. So he gets more and more hyper and I get more and more exhausted until I put him to bed happy or not and listen to him cry which increases my exhaustion until he falls asleep and by then I need a nap too. I worry that this is a vicious cycle but so far he has been a much happier boy when he wakes up and seems to bear no hard feeling towards his oppressor so I think I will do us all a favor and go take a nap too.

Cooking for Two and a Half

I never learned to cook for less than four. Which is a problem because my family consists of two and a half. When I cook for Daniel, Nathan and I there are always tons of leftovers that Daniel "gets" to take for his lunch for the next week or two. The result is that he ends up resentful of several of my dishes due to over exposure.
While I was working we got ezmeals which gives you recipes and grocery lists that are supposed to work for two and they often did. Daniel was the one cooking at that time and it made such a difference in our tendency to eat out. But I don't cook that way, I cook cheaper than they do, and I like my cooking so no more ezmeals now that I am home.
I believe that I have found a solution to my over cooking though and it is ingenious. I have started providing others with a week of meals for a weekly fee that is less than they would spend eating out. Am I good or am I good. Daniel gets more home cooked meals because I don't resort to hot dogs or leftovers as much. I just keep a small portion of what I make for them, for us, and send off the rest. I do get "cooked out" if the meals that I choose are all really intensive prep meals. And there are fewer leftovers for Daniel to take to work but that hasn't been a big problem as of yet.
I guess my conclusion is that if you don't know how to cook for two, find more people.

How to get things done... a quandary

When I am cleaning houses I can clean a three bedroom 1600 sq.ft. home in just over three hours. It takes me 30 min. to clean two bedrooms and a bathroom, dusting, vacuuming, scrubbing the tub, toilet, sink, and mopping. I like to think that, when it comes to cleaning, I am pretty quick. But last Monday when I was trying to clean my house it did not go so smoothly. It took me four hours to clean my bathroom and bedroom alone. FOUR HOURS! I should be ashamed to publicly broad cast such atrocity's. But Nathan wanted to pick up the Scrubbing Bubbles, then he wanted to pick up the Windex, then he somehow grabbed the razor that I had moved from the side of the tub, that almost gave me a heart attack, is there no place safe? One thing after another. I would wipe down the sink, take something from Nathan and try to put it somewhere safer, wipe down the tub, take some thing from Nathan and try to put it somewhere safer, rinse, lather, snatch, repeat. Again and again. I will say that he was far more helpful in cleaning the room because as I took things away from him I would put them up so though it wasn't as organized a process as I would have liked I was making progress. So four hours later the bedroom and bathroom are clean and I am exhausted. Was it worth it? It sure felt like it when I sank into my beautiful bed that night. Maybe next time I clean I should hire a sitter, it would be cheaper than hiring me.

Climbing is Nathan's official sport

Nathan has taken to climbing. I guess it has always has had an affinity for it. When he was just a year old he started perching, and I do mean perching, on this butter cookie tin that was in our living room. He would put his feet one by one on the edge, not the middle, and try to stand up. When you are only 1.5 ft tall being 5" off the floor is a big deal. So the other day he climbed up on the small filing box that is in the corner of the living room. He was so excited bobbing up and down on the box reaching for the things that he could now get to. He would climb up and down and I would move things out of reach and it was all going well 'till he took a tumble and busted the inside of his upper lip, don't ask me how. Mouth injuries bleed a lot you know; so 5 min. later he is feeling fine and ready to go but he is still bleeding and I am trying to make sure that he has all his teeth in between bites of Popsicle which I am hoping will help stop the bleeding. I had been mopping up the blood with a damp washcloth and now he wanted to wipe everyone face with it which was just icky. Did this deter his climbing ambitions...of course not. I was in the kitchen just days later on the phone with my mom. Nathan was running around the living room and I could just barely see the top of Nathans little head going this way and that over the bar that separates the kitchen from the living room. Now I can not see more than the top of his head because the bar is about chest high. Suddenly Nathans little face comes up over the bar grinning at me and as he is as proud as he could be. I was in shock. You know when you see something that your brain doesn't believe is possible and your mouth feels that it needs to state it just to see if it sounds better out of your head. Out it comes to my mom who, if you remember, I am on the phone with, "Nathan's head just came up over the bar." Just like that; my mom, quickly assessing the situation, says that she will let me go and gathering my wits about me I run into the living room just as Nathan begins to explore the new range of his reach. He had used the a fore mentioned butter cookie tin to get on the chair under the bar and from there he climbed on the back of the chair and tada! we are looking over the bar. So how do I put a stop to this dangerous escapade? I have no idea. So far it has not happened again and so I am just keeping my fingers crossed. So the real question is... what is next? Everest?

I dreamed I was talking to my Pa. We were sitting in those old office chairs that are smooth brown leather; the ones that are almost wider than they are tall with the studs around the edge and casters on the feet. He was behind me and I was turned around leaning over the back of my chair with my knees drawn up. We were just chatting about finances and I didn't agree with him but didn't say anything about it that wasn't important. He didn't look like Pa, but he did. He was smaller and his hair was white. He wasn't as gruff as I remember Pa being. We were just being together. The first thing I remember us saying was...

“It is nice to own a home.” I was a little wistful

“ Until you are on your way to the hardware store” He replied with a smile. I smiled too. “That is why me and your Grandma need to move somewhere smaller. Less to keep up with...” He talked about perhaps renting. He talked about a little grey house.

“I think she doesn't want to move because the house reminds her of you. She really misses you.”

“I know” he replied softly.

“I like going there because it reminds me of you. I miss you too.”

“I know.” He replied even softer.

He looked thoughtful and I could tell I was about to go. My mind kinda started racing thought all the conversations that I wish we had been able to have while he was here. There was so much that I wanted to talk to him about; to ask him about his life. “How did you come to know Christ?” I asked quickly as my dream faded. “Your Grandmother...” was all I got and then I was awake.

I have been crying ever since, when I think about it, when I talk about it. It has been 5 years since he died and longer than that since he was kinda gone due to Alzheimer's. He never forgot who I was when I saw him but I never really got past my sophomore year in high school for him even though I was out of college when he passed away. Somehow it is like loosing him all over again. I don't understand it at all. It was so real but not like I didn't know he was dead. It is just like I got a glimpse of him as he is now, where he is now, and got to take a moment with him. He wasn't sad, maybe wistful, and I wasn't sad until I woke up. It was like we were just hanging out on a sunny afternoon talking about whatever happened to come up. It wasn't like it would be if i saw Pa again it was like it should be.

The Monday

It has been a Monday. I called the father of the child that I keep sometimes at 10:30 to see if I was off in thinking I should have him today and found out that the dad was not feeling well and so he was staying home and Eli was just going to be staying with him. That changed my plans for the day making it a bit more relaxed. I called my mom at 12:00pm to check the plans that I had with her. Those had been for me to bring my son and lunch at 1:30 so that I could head to my Dr. appointment. She was going to have a meeting that was canceled so I headed over there a bit early and got Braum's for us to eat. After a nice lunch I headed to my appointment which was as pleasant as those yearly ones can be. When I finished I called my mom and found out that Nathan was still asleep so I told her that I would go my Carter Blood Care to give blood before I came to get Nathan. I went to one location to find out it was closed so I headed to the location that is closer to my mom's house. I got there got all checked in and was fillin' up the bag when my phone rang. I got the sweet lady who was putting up with my crazy veins to hand me the phone. I called my mom back, she was the missed call, and found out Nathan had grabbed a lamp and she wasn't sure is he had burned himself or shocked himself and that she needed me there as quickly as I could. So now I am looking at the needle in my arm trying to figure out how to bleed faster. The phlebotomist was concerned because I looked tired but really I was just stressed. I told her about the phone call and she started trying to give me hints to get the blood flowing. So I finished up, grabbed a juice and downed it as I climbed into the car rushing all the more because I hadn't put my coat on and it was just above freezing. Just as I put the key in the ignition my phone rang again. It was my mom and she said that Nathan had calmed down and seemed to be okay, there was no hurry. This is the moment when I flopped back in the car seat and just tried to take a deep breath. Mondays.

Rainy days make for wet shoes

I am trying to figure out why I am so tired today. I had a cleaning job this morning that went really well. Not a highly active job, just lots of dusting but not much square footage. I am really excited about this job. I like jobs where I feel like both the client and I are truly benefiting from my work and I believe that this is one of those. When I went to go pick up Nathan Kathy suggested I get some errands done while he stayed there a bit longer. So I went by the bank and to Walmart. I did the fastest comparison shopping I have ever done. It is trickier than it sounds because you have to show the checker each add as they ring up the items. The rain let up just as I ran everything to the car but I realized that I had forgotten the milk and had to run back in. I picked up Nathan and went home. That is when I encountered the puddles. I stepped in several puddles today. Actually I mostly stepped in one puddle several times while I carried my groceries and son in from the car. But there was also the puddle between the car and the mail box and the puddle between the car and the front door and the puddle between the car and the back door. I need to rethink where my car is, or where my doors are or perhaps when I leave my house.
That is when I realized that I have to go back to the grocery store. Maybe I will tomorrow.

I am that obstinate

I have strange preferences about funerals. I have been to many, many funerals. For friends, family, family friends, family of friends and so on. But it seems that many in my generation have not grown up going to funerals. Many of them were left behind when their parents had to attend them. My husband can count on one hand the number of funerals that he has been to. My parents either had nowhere to leave us or felt, as I do, that it is good for kids to learn how to act appropriately in that kind of situation. The point of all this is that I came face to face with my feelings about funerals today. I had to decide if my ideals were worth taking my baby boy to a funeral in the middle of what would normally be his nap time. There were so many ways I could have justified it to my self. "I will start teaching him this when he is older." "I would if it weren't nap time.""This is a silly thing to stand your ground on, are you kidding me? You are just being obstinate." Also I could have left him with any number of willing people, I did get several offers to keep him while I went. So I had to decide how important this was to me, are my feeling about funerals worth the inconvenience?
In conclusion I took Nathan to a funeral today. Yes, I was the crazy lady on the back row with the restless one and a half year old. No he did not behave the whole time but he did very well for the first little bit. I think he learned something but I did feel a bit ridiculous pacing around the atrium with my very restless, napless, teething, drooling, chewing on his vest, kicking off his shoes but very precious baby boy.

It all begins...

I have thoughts... that is where blogging starts right?
I am a "stay at home" mom but the post office keeps trying to deliver this certified letter to me and they have yet to find me at home. That might give you a hint as to why I have included quotation marks around my title.
Mondays are my free days, my laundry days and I also on occasion keep a precious four year old boy because I could use the income and his parents need someone on random Mondays. I have also started trying to get together with a friend of mine who is having a difficult pregnancy mostly to hang out but sometimes to try to do some small things to help her out. Did I mention that she lives 45 min from me? This week she came to see me and next week I think I will have to cancel because I will have Eli and I also have a doctors appointment. Also on Mondays I deliver a week worth of dinners to my best friend who is paying me for the privilege of my cooking and my time to comparison shop. There goes my free day... when am I going to go by the post office to get that letter?