Contemplating....

• Food preservation plans.
• The 2017-2018 school year.
• Going for the gold on that beautiful, very functional Etsy chalkboard.
• The ensuing organizational revolution the said chalkboard will facilitate.
• The gray hairs standing at attention and in proliferation on my head.
• Why a houseful of boys involves so much fighting. (Really.) (Why??)
• (And perhaps the complaint should be expanded simply to "children"...?)
• A workable plan toward gutting clutter.
• Why the "m" key on our keyboard only works some of the ti(m)e.

September Food Preservation Notes

Preserving:

• Tomato products: salsa, ketchup, paste, puree
• Other canned goals: tomatillo salsa, watermelon rind pickles, apple sauce
• Drying: greens, celery, zucchini, apple slices, apple leather
• Fermenting: pickles (done for the season), sauerkraut 

Tools:

• Food processor (!!!)
• Food mill 
• Chef's knife, bread knife (so perfect for tomatoes), paring knife
• Prepped-ahead meals (beef heart sandwich meat, lentil soup, ratatouille)
• Epsom salts (for recovery) (me!)

 Ketchup

In years past, I have chopped almost everything by hand - but this year I feel like I've Discovered My Food Processor. (The one I've had for a decade.) (Yeah.)  I've used it for big chopping jobs in the past, mostly for salsa, but this year I've been using the slicing attachment with no reserve.

(It is almost like I felt like I was betraying the art of hand-chopping?) (Very strange aversion.) I honestly think it might be because I didn't like cleaning the food processor when I was done.

But this year?  I am LOVING it.  The cabbage is shredded into such pretty cuts.  The dehydrator is loaded in no-time flat. The fellas line up to help shove zucchini into the chute and are actually, truly  helpful in the process.  Apples are going to be a breeze. It is totally saving my life right now.  Everything is easier.

 Paste | Watermelon Rind Pickles | Ketchup

Another difference from years' past: I have a honed game plan.  I am not writhing in the attempt to wrap my mind around the tomato table. I have a well-laid plan and know how to accomplish it.

First off, our family eats a lot of salsa and ketchup.  Check.

Secondly, everyone loves tomato soup in the winter. (The puree.)  Check.

Thirdly, tomato paste deepens the flavor of so many dishes.  Check.

I love tomatillo salsa. I love having scads of dried vegetables at my fingertips all winter long. I L-O-V-E sauerkraut and we eat it at almost every meal. Check. Check. Check.

I am so pleased.

 
But of course, this involves a serious time commitment.  I spent three 12-hour days in the kitchen over Labor Day weekend; Blaine took Tuesday off too, which was an 8-hour day.

On Monday morning I woke up so sore - my forearms were fatigued, legs and feet sore, just generally exhausted.  In serious need of recovery after the last two days in the kitchen. (With two more to go.)

I took a time-out for an epsom salt bath: forty minutes with Boards of Canada. (One of Blaine's current faves.)  It felt so good to stare and let the music unlock my thoughts.  And I couldn't believe it, but the epsom salts did the job.  My body felt rejuvenated and I felt ready to tackle the day.

Note to self: keep epsom salts in the house from now on.

 The fellas with our two biggest watermelon this year --

Tom Watson: 26 lbs | Orange Glow: 22 lbs

19.5 years this November | 16 years last month | Love him

Blaine.  Old Leroy.  He ran the household and kept kids under wraps all four days.  He gathered ingredients, picked tomatoes, played badminton, administered baths, worked in the garden, and prepped for my ill-timed Friends of the Library Sanding Party. (Tuesday night!) (New children's shelving for the library.)  What a man.

And finally, I do not want to remiss the fact that my youngest is now three years old.  Such a huge change.  My time in the kitchen is so much more focused and lengthy.  I am noticing the difference in a big way. (But just think of all the sweet baby breaks, nursing, nuzzling, in the past.) (Sigh.)

Where was I...

Oh yes.  It has been summer.

A few words.

• Visited Western WA for most of July
• Drove there and back (would do it again)
• Working toward starting doula work
• Garden feasting
• Dehydrating everything
• Watermelons galore this year
• Smitten with that man of mine
• Planning next school year
• Enjoying cool mornings and warm afternoons
• On the Banks of Plum Creek every night with the fellas 

Booklist for boys

 Books my boys have loved:

• Hatchet (et al) - Gary Paulsen
• Woodsong - Gary Paulsen
• My Side of the Mountain - Jean Craighead George
• Old Yeller - Frank Gipson
• Rascal - Sterling North
• Where the Red Fern Grows - Wilson Rawls
• Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH - Robert C. O'Brien 
• Black Beauty - Anna Sewell
• The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
• The Jungle Book and The Second Jungle Book - Rudyard Kipling
• Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
• Little House Books 1-4 - Laura Ingalls Wilder

Future Reference:

• Little Britches - Ralph Moody
• Stone Fox - John Reynolds Gardiner
• Penrod - Booth Tarkington

My older boys are currently 10 and 8 years old. 
All books were absorbed either via audiobook or read aloud.

Ye olde list post

So many thoughts, so little time.  I defer.

• We are still finishing our 2013-2014 school year.  In my mind, I have likened it to a rattle-trap car just barely holding together, huffety-puffety, rolling into the finish line with a bing-bang-pop.  In other words, barely making it.
• It is not unlike the poor guy we saw on the other side of 35W on our way to Luuuuke and Katy's wedding "back in the day": his car smoking and bouncing to a stop, the left front tire missing, him holding on for dear life as his car fizzled and zizzled to the side of the road.  A few seconds later we saw his tire cross all eight lanes of traffic.  (It was hilarious at the time and still makes me smile to think of it.)
• This is exactly what the last bit of our school year feels like to me.  We are bouncing in to the finish line, totally worn out and hoping just to make it to the end.

 A common scene in recent weeks

• I feel like "keeping up with life" (whatever that means) has become almost impossible with four children.  Honestly, I feel like I've been pushed over the brink.  Anything beyond survival is a luxury at this point in time.  Even now I feel a little bit frantic, wondering if I am using my time wisely.  It leaves me feeling off-kilter.
• It is funny, because I look back on past posts and see myself iterating similar feelings.  Overwhelm.  Swamped.  No time for contemplative thought.  And when I read these things, I poo-poo my past self, feeling like things have ratcheted up a notch or ten.  Oh yeah, I tell myself, you ain't seen nuthin' yet.
• Though I do remember from past experience that having a baby in the 12-18 month range (in addition to the extremely active activity level of multiple children) adds a lot of strain.  Not because that age is horrible, quite the contrary, but that they are into everything, have no sense to keep themselves safe, and aren't able to run with the big boys yet.  It makes getting "anything done" very hard.  Bless his little heart.  I keep on reminding myself to hold on and not wish time away.  Things will even out in time.
• I'm working towards being more even-tempered and flexible.  I want my children to remember a happy mama, not a strained-glum-can't-wait-til-QT mama.  I think my fears play on the perception of myself, because I do think I spend most of my day mostly cheerful and patient . . . though the constant push to accomplish my enormous weekly bucket list is always weighing on me, especially in the mornings, and I know it effects my general aura.

 

This scene lasted long enough for a picture 

• The more experience I gain, the more I understand that "for everything there is a season" and constant adjustment is necessary.  I know that, but I'm always surprised to identify that need in my daily, weekly, monthly, yearly life.  Not many rules or routines last for long before becoming outdated.
• So with that in mind . . . my new-and-improved concept of MORNING CHORES and the boys' responsibility in household maintenance.
• Morning chores: morning board, empty dishwasher, fold laundry (Mon/Tues), cat litters (M/W/F), get dressed, brush teeth.
• Household maintenance: before-lunch clean-up, pick-up after play, assigned tasks to help me/us (i.e. picking tomatoes, taking diapers off the line, loading or unloading the washing machine and dryer, etc.)
• I am planning to get more structured in this dept. with a flip-chart peg board that my SIL gave me.  I don't want to constantly remind them to stay on task (it drains my reserves).  My idea is to require morning chores to be completed by 10:00 AM every day, fueled by individual and team competitions - hopefully fueling their enthusiasm for sticking with the plan.  After brainstorming rewards, I came up with special meal or dessert requests for individual goals met and a Friday morning smoothie or eggnog for team victory.

 Jumping off the dock at our friends' family's weekend retreat

• Swimming turned into a bi-weekly event this summer.  I aim for Fridays and stay all day, packing loads of food and water to keep us steady.  It is perfect, because by the time we get home Blaine has had a bit of time to himself and the boys are so tired it makes very a very calm night.  Then they sleep in the next morning and have a peaceful day reacquainting themselves with home.  It is so relaxing.
• The last couple of days have been cold in the morning, beautiful sunny days with no humidity and warm afternoons.  I realized this morning that it is late summer.  I can't believe it!  It seems like it went so fast.  It has been a very cool summer, so it felt like I spent most of the time waiting for it to warm up and actually feel like summer.  We've had a few days with warm nights, and then poof . . . it's almost done.

 On our driveway

• The boys and I went on a good number of walks in the past month.  It is amazing what slowing down does for the quality of observation and depth of appreciation for one's surroundings.  "Driving by" does not do the world justice.  But walking . . . what a difference . . . to feel the breeze playing on the skin, hear the insect and bird life, take in the the scent of the fields and flowers, even getting a better hold on the trees and sky, letting it all seep in.  It is beautiful.
• With two little guys and two big guys, our walks consist of Diego riding bike, Truen walking, Jamie sometimes-walking, sometimes-riding, and Eliah sometimes-riding, sometimes-backpacking.  We have a rinky-dink Schwinn bike trailer that is perfect to fit three of the four boys at a time if need be (Truen is still small enough).  It is perfect.
• Re: the Schwinn.  Buyer beware: it is worth investing in higher quality.
• But nevertheless, it has been a blessing.  I love having a stroller big enough to haul multiple children and the big wheels make pushing it a breeze.  We even went for a bike ride as an entire family this weekend, Blaine hauling Truen and Jamie, Diego biking, Eliah in the backpack with me, to the graveyard a mile from our house.

Posing by the tomatoes

• Two local ladies and I are starting a homeschooling group in our small town.  There are plenty of homeschooling groups in the larger towns around us, but there are a lot of homeschooling families in our area and honestly, why drive a half-hour or more when we can cultivate what we want right here where we live?  In addition to keeping our activities local, we will be keeping our children's friendships local as well, which bodes well for more frequent interaction and visiting.  It's a win-win-win.
• One of the ladies is the wife of the new pastor at the Baptist church in town.  That particular church has a "half-gym" and so we are kicking off our group by organizing a bi-weekly homeschoolers' open gym.  I am so pleased.  A place for my fellas to run off some winter steam (and a five minute drive)!  Awesome.
• Other organized activities will probably follow.  We are planning to "go with it".  Whatever happens, happens and if it doesn't, that is fine too.  It will be very loose and flexible, with people planning activities as the inspiration or need arises.   But I have a hunch: one of the women I am working with is very gifted in organizing activities so I assume that we will have a good start in the near-distant future.
• It will be interesting to see what happens.  We already have five interested families, but I know that is just scraping the surface of the potential.

 Eliah does this funny tight-fist shaking thing that makes us all laugh

• Even as our school year is puttering to an end, I am planning our new school year.  I plan to take September off, reading aloud sprinkled in here and there, then pick up again at the beginning of October.
• This will be Truen's first "official" year: first grade.  I've had him participating at 75% for the last two years, then full-on 100% for our history reading and activities from The Story of the World.  Overall, he's done very well.  When I can sense that something is too much for him, I ease off a bit.  But otherwise, he's been tagging along through pretty much everything.
• My plan is to do a modified version of Year 1 from Diego's first year.  I'm not sure if I will read to him/them separately (everything but SOTW) or if I should still combine everything.  I honestly don't know what to do at this point in time, because I see pros and cons either way.  At this point, I assume that I will attempt to continue a combination approach, then adjust as neccessary.
• I will say though: looking at the initial schedule for this year left me feeling a bit faint.  I'm not sure how to fit it all in, especially with a very LOUD preschooler and a very BUSY toddler.  I don't have much in the way of concentrated time to sit or speak in leisure.  I'm usually trying to make my voice heard above the exclamations and hollering.
• That being said, I have honed in on a few tactics that give me at least a little bit of time.  First and foremost, looking for an opportunity in the morning.  Are they quiet?  Are the younger ones absorbed in anything?  Secondly, snacks.  Giving them food keeps them quiet for a few minutes while I read aloud.  Thirdly, special toys or crafts: things that they don't have continuous access to.  I can sometimes get a good 10-15 minutes of absorption from them, or should I say, Jamie.  The three year old.  Holy smokes.  It will be interesting to see if anything lets up this coming year as he grows and changes.

 Gramma S. shopping the Farmers' Market

• Finally: September.  Harvest season.  I'm already feeling the burn.  I look toward it with mixed feelings, thankfulness for the bounty and the dread of knowing the amount of work it will take to put it up.  It will be interesting to see if next year will be as overwhelming as this year feels.  I'm not afraid of the work, but I do feel strained at the thought of trying to "fit it in".  Eliah still needs me so much, it is hard to be separated from him for the length of time each work day requires.  Likewise, it is difficult to keep the pace with so many interruptions and distractions.  It is hard.  I'm not sure how I'm going to do it.
• In addition, I plan to travel TWO TIMES during the month of September.  This is unprecedented and totally crazy, but I am pleased and looking forward to it at the same time, while simultaneously quaking in my boots. Blaine's grandpa's 99th birthday and a corresponding family reunion??  My dad within driving distance??  It would skewer me to miss either of these opportunities.  I must go.
• Blaine is taking four days off this month (in addition to Labor Day) and I will use them to the best of my ability.  Tomatoes, apples, cabbage are my biggest challenges.

It took me two days to crank this post out.  I think I covered most of my bases.  Much love, many blessings, I think of you all much more often than you hear from me.

Streaming

Long time, no post.  I defer.

• It has been a cold, cold winter.  A very "warm" day gets up to 15 degrees F.  Most of the time it hovers in the range of -5 to 5 degrees.  The coldest night hit a -23 air temp (with something like a -50 degree wind chill).  We had frost on the inside of our windows the next morning and the back door was frozen shut.

 This is what we woke up to this morning --

An ice storm had coated all the south-facing windows.

• I continue to marvel at the way our house is situated: with large, southern-facing windows we are warmed by the sun during the day-time hours and feel down-right snug.  During the summer months the house is shaded by the large basswood in our front yard, which keeps things cool and is so delightful.  But this time of year . . . we are free to receive all the heat the winter sun has to offer.  I am so thankful.
• Another wonderful thing about our house in the winter months is the root cellar.  Duh, right?  But in addition to all our stored goods from last summer's garden, it doubles as a winter refrigerator.  I regularly store 2-3 pots of soups or grains or beans on the gravel floor next to the window, which frees up some major space in the refrigerator.  So, so thankful.

 Funny brudders

• Truen finally looks like a big big brudder, doesn't he?  I've been mourning his little three and four year old selves in recent months.  It must happen when they hit six, because I remember experiencing the same thing with Diego.  Six year olds are just so much bigger, long and lanky.  Those round little faces and bellies are a thing of the past.  I get a little sad about it.
• Truby-ruby has been on a mega growth spurt recently.  He's been amping up on his food intake during meals, eating his entire plate and then asking for more, and has increased the snack demands significantly.
• With all that, Truen and Jamie are still within 5 pounds of each other.  Heh.  Truen weighs 42 lbs and Jamie is at 38 lbs.  Diego weighs EIGHTY POUNDS.  No wonder why Truen and Jamie are always getting hurt.
• Baby Eliah weighs 20 lbs.  The cutie.  He is also 8.5 months old and has SIX teeth.  I was just putting pictures into Jamie's "special notebook" this weekend and noted that I had recorded that he only had five teeth at a year old.  And no top teeth at 8-ish months old.  I knew something was a leeeetle different with this guy.  E-yi-ya.  Slow down, little sucker.
• E-yi-ya has joined the ranks of his brudders and has become an official pest.  He is getting into ev.ery.thing.  Crawling, climbing, pulling himself up on things, walking along the furniture.  He's all over the place and always wants to be where he can't be.  Propping himself up on the space heater, for example.  Or getting into the cupboard and wreaking havoc on the Wii controllers.  He is also just wild about trying to squeeze through spaces where his head just won't fit and will cry frantically as he attempts to head-butt through.
• E-yi-ya.  What a guy.  He melts this mama's heart like butta'.
• Another thing: he's really, really into is fuzz.  We apparently have a lot of fuzz in this house (mostly coming from the diapers as a I lay them flat to hang-dry), because I find wads of fuzz in his mouth multiple times a day.  And he's just so happy chomping on it.  The insides of his cheeks are so smooth and plump.

 The ladies

• You know how things go quiet and then you know you're in for trouble?  Yes, well: it doesn't end after the toddler years.  With my guys, they usually end up tearing around the house butt-naked and hollering and laughing and colliding with each other.
• The week before last Diego and Jamie came racing out of the bedroom dressed as "ladies" after ransacking my closet.  Diego even went and found some lipstick, smeared it on like a clown, then asked me to put his hair in pig-tails.  They paraded and pranced all around, body-slamming each other and wrestling as they went.  Very lady-like.  Eventually Truen joined the game and concocted a very hilarious Bedouin look, complete with scarf and veil.
• These guys.  As I was putting pictures into their "special notebooks" this weekend, it was hard to imagine a future where they would not be together every single day.  They are just such good buddies.
• I also realized that the good times far outweigh the bad.  With the little guys.  In spite of the burn.  It sometimes hard to remember while in the thick of things, feeling the strain of trying to keep life together . . . but honestly.  These are very sweet years.  I have to remember that.  
• Why is it so easy to forget??  Pictures, blog posts, special notebooks, calendars, journal entries, picture emails, Christmas letters . . . all these things help me step back and see the big picture.  To remember that the happiness far outweighs the sting.  It is so helpful do get at these things regularly.

 Jamie's toast "gingerbread boy"

• We've been down and out with a nasty stomach bug since last Wednesday night.  Jamie got it first, barfing in the pack-n-play with the baby.  He had been acting totally normal, then the puke came like a faucet being turned on.  He spent the next two days on the couch, totally subdued, feverish and sleeping most of the day.  He couldn't even keep down juice.
• Diego and Truen both woke up barfing in the night in the early AM hours on Saturday.  They haven't had it quite so bad, though they spent the weekend on the couch and took small naps throughout the day.  Diego had it worse than Truen.  Both boys ate small amounts of yogurt, apple sauce, bland oatmeal, and/or cinnamon honey-toast on the second day.
• Symptoms include vomiting, fever, fatigue, dark circles under eyes, a pale face, bloodshot eyes, and strangely enough, itchy skin.  Jamie has also had funky poop, a whitish-yellow and foamy.
• Diego and Truen are on the mend.  I would imagine they will be moving around tomorrow.  Jamie is moving around, but is still complaining of a tummy-ache, is eating very little, and still has the funky poop.
• The baby and I are yet unscathed (and hoping to keep it that way!).  Blaine too, though his stomach feels funny today.  He hasn't puked though.  We are both amazed that Eliah hasn't gotten it, as he is "all over the place and into everything".  And anything he picks up is immediately shoved into his mouth.
• Jamie has definitely lost weight and still looks a little pale.  The gingerbread-boy-made-of-toast picture was taken yesterday.  I think he looks a bit pale and drawn.
• Speaking of . . . all my fellas have been big fans of the gingerbread boy story.  At some point I realized that I didn't have to actually make gingerbread to get a gingerbread boy . . . all I had to do was cut him out of toast.  It is perfect, because they have all been absolutely thrilled by it and I don't have to stress myself trying to go over-the-top and actually bake something.
• Also: an interesting observation during this stomach bug.  It has felt like a break to me.  I know.  What on earth!?  I've missed a lot of sleep and have been tending sick kids since last Thursday (Blaine did a ton this weekend too).  But it has been so quiet.  There hasn't been any fighting or antagonizing and everyone is so calm.  And everyone took long naps this weekend, which allowed me 4-5 solid hours of working on my own projects.  Awesome.

 Seasonal display with schoolwork

• I bought these ancient Egyptian themed pictures frames at my MIL's thrift store for $.25 apiece.  They must have put them on super-bargain pricing with the thought that no one in their right mind would ever buy them.  But I did! and I gave myself a high-five when I found them.  They fit into our studies so perfectly.
• During the week of studying the middle kingdom of Egypt, I had the boys draw whatever they wanted for the frames.  Diego's is on the left: he drew Anubis, the jackal-headed god of embalming.  "I drew Anubis, Mama, " he said.  I was amazed, because while I recognized Anubis, I certainly couldn't remember his name.  Truen's work is on the right: he drew his name in hieroglyphs.  So cute.
• We are still on track with schoolwork.  We are working our way through The Story of the World: Ancient Times, coupled with my extremely modified Ambleside Online schedule for the second year.  Currently we are reading through The Burgess Animal Book for Children (natural science), Wind in the Willows (literature), Tree in the Trail (geography), Best Loved Songs and Ballads by James Whitcombe Riley (poetry), and Famous Children: Tchaikovsky (supplement to composer study).
• Other various activities include our daily routine with the morning board, counting and sorting coins, Picture Study with the works of "Vin Van Gogh" (as Truen calls him), intermittent copywork, now-and-then kitchen cooking projects, the incorporation of cat litters into daily chores, and inspired drawing or building projects.

 I love that little hand poking out

• I had a whole list of reflective thoughts I have been storing up to post, but wouldn't you know it . . . I can't remember a single one of them.  I evidently need to get at them as the inspiration strikes instead of waiting.  They were there . . . but now they're gone.

Streaming

It's time for a list post to get all caught up......

• Blaine was home from work three days this week, giving us five days at home.  It was such sweet relief for both of us.  He's been working OT for maybe a month now?  We are both burnt to a crisp from a lack of down-time.  It felt so good to be together.
• We can now put swollen lymph nodes and a second degree burn under our parenting belt.  Both Jamie, within a week of each other.
• The lymph nodes: right under the left side of his chin and creeping up his cheek.  Red, tender, inflamed and hot to the touch.  The only other sign of sickness was intermittent green goo from his nose and swollen tonsils.  Other than that, the boy was raring to go.  We weren't even sure if he was sick for awhile at the beginning (Truen waking up with a sore throat confirmed that it had to be something).
• The burn: on the back of his right hand and pointer finger, burnt on a hot stove pipe.  The poor little fella.  We immediately ran his hand until cold water and then applied lavender oil, which took the heat and sting out.  He's been mostly fine ever since.  Since it is at an odd angle, I've fashioned a bandage with non-stick pads and duct tape.  He had two big blisters which have since broken.  Things are tender, but we are amazed at how fast it is healing.
• I am mid-process in healing another cavity.  Strange, but true.
• It was a deep crevasse in my lower-left back molar; the deep part down below was black.  When I first noticed it, it was just a crack but then it got progressively darker and sensitive while eating until I eventually realized it was a cavity.  (It sounds so dumb, but it is the second cavity I've ever had so it took me awhile to catch on.)
• When I healed my first cavity (a brown, tender smudge on an inside molar), I followed Ramiel Nagel's advice: limit sugars, limit carbs, increase good fats, cod liver oil and butter oil (otherwise known as grassfed ghee), grassfed or wild meat, etc.
• This time 'round, I am generally eating like that anyway, so all I did was double my calcium supplement and more than double my cod liver oil intake (I also intermittently remember to use magnesium oil and just got some grassfed ghee to start taking butter oil again).  
•  I know I don't usually take enough cod liver oil (I base my recommendations off the WAPF guidelines) and I have been pregnant or nursing now for the last NINE YEARS.  Holy smokes.  That is a whole lotta output.  My teeth are showing the signs.  I've been taking, seriously, probably a couple of tablespoons per day.
• I don't know if teeth can regenerate, or what . . . but I am so serious . . . the crack is closing.  The black has lightened until is barely even noticeable and the crevasse in the tooth . . . is almost gone.  Un-un-un-un.  I feel so relieved.

 

Four brudders

• I realized last week that I don't have a pumpkin picture for you this year.  We didn't even carve anything!  Oh dear.  Our own pumpkins were a bust this year and we weren't able to go to the pumpkin fest at Blaine's parents' church (they did it on the last weekend of September this year and Sept. is out for us due to food preservation).
• The picture above was taken at Falls Park in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.  We make the trek down there once a year to pick up our beef quarter (or twice a year, if we fly out of FSD) and I swear, we are like tourists.
• Last year we did the Sculpture Walk downtown and this year we went to see "the falls".  The boys beg for me to take pictures wherever we go.  It's kind of embarrassing, but I oblige them with a tender heart.
• I was out in the garden yesterday, picking the last of our collards, kale, parsley, and celeriac.  We had a night down to 4 degrees F and all these hardy specimens were still alive and edible.  Amazing.
• Jamie, Eliah and Blaine were napping while I was outside, but Diego and Truen came out with me (I made them, heh) and I noticed that they hovered and bounced around me wherever I was.  The sweetness, it hurts.  They literally want to be with us at all times.  I hope I am good enough for them.

 Halloween this year:

Diego was a frog, Jamie a bumble bee, Truen a lizard

 And the cutest little baby schicken ever.

• I'm really feeling the burn of four children and the intensity of the baby year.  I'm trying to remember that time is fleeting and to savor the days, but it is very difficult at times.  And that is putting it lightly.  I realized this morning that I feel like calling uncle.  UNCLE!!  This is hard.
• The biggest reason is the lack of down-time.  We all go to bed together, so that is out.  Nap and Quiet Times usually correspond, but a good number of the days my meager hour is diminished to 20-30 minutes, usually due to one kid or another waking up and needing me.  I also usually like to get up earlier than the boys to assure a quiet morning, but at the beginning I needed to sleep in with the baby to ensure adequate rest.  And now....?
• .......Eliah is waking up anywhere from 5:45 AM - 6:45 AM.  In other words, TOO EARLY.  Holy smokes.  He's bright-eyed and bushy-tailed too, totally happy and bursting with energy, ready to bounce out of bed for the day.  So lounging around and nursing for, say, an hour or so while I doze is out of the question.
• UNCLE.....!
• I'm working on cultivating happiness and gratitude though.  I've just accepted my "quiet mornings" with Eliah.  I know I will look back at them with a certain fondness.
• I am also working at maintaining a happy home.  I don't want my own selfishness to color my children's memories of home.  Stress or discontent or irritation.  They all exist, but I want the outcroppings of those feelings minimized so as not to allow them a foothold in our lives.
• Say it and think it and live it.  That's the way it happens.  It is a constant process of working and re-working.

QT is over, so I'm done for the day.  Word from the mutha.

A few notes

I'm posting with a babe snoozing in my sling and three brudders playing beautifully together by my side (knock on wood!).  Loudly, with lots of screeching and bombing noises, but playing together nicely nonetheless.

I divert to a list-post:

• Eliah is the sweetest thing ever.
• He loves his big brudders.  He watches them and is extremely entertained by their activity, whether they are specifically paying attention to him or not.
• Diego has become extremely re-interested in Eliah in the past couple of weeks, probably due to his increased interaction and interest in his surroundings.  He loves to hold him and play with him and would cart him all over the house if I allowed it.
• I was definitely calling Jamie "Schtinky" by 4 months due to my inability to keep the funk out of his neck rolls.  I couldn't keep up with it.  But Baby Eliah?  No problem at all.  Every time I check his little neck rolls, they are as dry and sweet-smelling as ever.  I wonder what the difference is?
• Diego's current obsessions include Legos, ancient Egyptian history, and the 1991 cartoon series of Tintin.
• Truen's new favorite "snee-ack" is eggnog.  He makes it himself with my loose supervision and assistance, eyeballing the ingredients.  The other brothers are big fans too.
• Blaine has been on a reading binge the last few years.  Recent titles include The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, and The Undiscovered Self: With Symbols and the Interpretation of Dreams.  He's reading 'em cover-to-cover.
• I get book reports every night, which is extra super-duper wonderful given the fact that I have very little time to read at this point in life.  It is so nice to have some fresh ideas to ponder.
• I've been very moved by poetry of late.  The snippets of time I do get to read are very far and few between and poetry is the perfect remedy for a starved soul.  It packs a literary punch, with big ideas and emotion in such a small and beautifully composed package.  I am savoring it.
• Annnnnnnnnnd . . . . Jamie got a haircut.  Surprise!

Truby made a magnet monster

and Jamie got a haircut.

I know he's an aside in this picture, but it will just have to do.  I haven't any time to take anything off my camera, if I even had something adequate.

 At 3 months shy of 3 years old, this is the latest "first haircut" we've ever given.  Even so, I was very sad as I lopped off that pony-tail, much more mournful than either of the other first haircuts, and realized it was because of the blonde.  It still shines light in the sun, but it is nothing like that that blonde shaggy mane.

I cut it a couple of weeks ago now and I must say, he was downright tame compared to Truen even last year.  He did very well.  My tactics?  Plop them down in front of the television and offer sweet treats for sitting still.  I've also learned to do an overview of the clippers to familiarize them with their benign-but-scary loud buzz.

Two weeks later...

A list-post is the only thing that will do.

• I haven't left the house more than a handful of times for the last month and a half.  I am going stir-crazy.  This is probably good, meaning that I have some of my interest in life and liberty coming back, but . . . I'm still really tired.  Going somewhere only appeals to me as an emotional outlet.  Otherwise, it is just too hard.  Tired.
• Even the boys are begging to go somewhere.
• I am 12 weeks.  
• Twelve weeks and starting to feel a bit more energy flowing through my veins, but...
• I still get really sleepy in the afternoons.  And I am completely tied and bound to food.  Getting hungry sends me in a downward spiral, and fast.  So "like usual" only way worse.
• I can't believe I get to have a newborn again next summer.  I was re-reading about newborns from my pregnancy book last night with the insight of an experienced mother.  It made me smile and coo and squeal a little bit.  I can't wait to savor those first few days, weeks, months.
• There have been a lot of inquiries about our pregnancy, asking, "I thought you were done...?"  Heh.  And so we thought.  But things got a little murky at the end of August and here we are.  I couldn't be more thrilled, just to be able to do it all one last time.  It makes me so happy.  Squeeze is happy too, feeling like it must be "meant to be".  He has said that he is excited about it with the exception of "all the work".  Always practical, that Squeeze of mine.  And what a lot of work it is.  Especially combined with manhandling 15 acres into submission and maintaining two large gardens.

Gotta go.  That's all she wrote para el día.

A catch-up list

• Various posts keep running through my head.  The one stuck on repeat most recently would have been titled "Things I Thought I'd Never Hear Myself Say as a Mother", with the headliner of "Please get your face out of my butt".  Yes, I've said that.  More than once.
• But(t).  I'm not in the mood.  I'll just do a list-post to catch up on life.
• Jamie is starting to connect words with concepts.  Like today, when he put his fingers in the bottom of the glass sliding door, then held up his filthy little hand and said, "Doh-dee".  It took me a second for it to register, then I realized that he telling me that his hand was dirty.  The sweet little fella.
• Or yesterday, when we were in the garden and he was nervous around the sprinkler.  He kept on backing away and saying, "Cold! Cold!" whenever it veered in his direction.
• Speaking of veering.  I am actively trying to reprogram my nickname for Schtinky.  The time has come for a change, mostly because I don't want him to get upset about it as he gets older.  Recently I've been calling him "Voosy", which is Squeeze's nickname for him, or have defaulted to my new one: "Tsamie".  He answers to all of them.  Schtinky, Stinky, Jamie, Tsamie, Voos, Voosy.
• Our summer has been very hot and dry.  We've had one real rain in the last two months.  All the grass is brown and we are watering our young trees to keep them going.  Ditto on the gardens.  Squeeze runs the sprinkler almost every morning or night.
• Because of the heat, we are going to have AMAZING melons, squash, eggplant, peppers, okra, etc. this year.  It is looking doubtful for the tomatoes, though.  The plants look phenomenal, but it isn't cooling down enough at night and we are losing blossoms, especially on the big juicies.  No flowers, no fruit.  Frustrating.
• This is definitely the hottest summer we have had here.  Squeeze heard somewhere that these are the warmest temps in Minnesota since 1987.  In the past, we've run our air conditioner maybe once a summer, perhaps for 3-4 days, during a miserable run of hot, humid days; but this summer, the a/c has been on for most of July.  Life would be miserable without it, though I am getting very tired of feeling cooped up.  We have enough of that in the winter months.
• My parents and sister are coming for a visit next week.  They will be at our house for a few days, then we are all heading to the Twin Cities for my grandparents' 60th where we will meet up with another two brothers and a SIL.  One brother and a SIL won't be able to make it, so it won't be a complete reunion, but fun nevertheless.

Back to the old grind.  Nap/Quiet Time is officially over.  Goodbye, silence . . . you carressed my ears and mind, but my jaw still hurts . . .

I love my boys. ♥

I am . . .

• Researching homeschooling.  I've hammered out my philosophy and methodology (Charlotte Mason Method / Charlotte Mason), but now I am looking into the reality of putting that in motion . . . analyzing booklists, curriculum guides, others' experiences and brainstorming possibilities.
• Watching Jonsi's "Go Do" with the baby on my back while posting on my blog.  Now that is multi-tasking.  (Loving the bird motif.)  My brudder is EO.
• Prepping for a late Easter celebration with Squeeze's family on Sunday.
• Coddling my left pointer finger after a whack with a sharp chef's knife last week (it slipped on an onion).  Uff.  It didn't bleed much because I was so quick to put pressure on the cut, but I did FAINT 10-15 minutes later as I was attempting to look up stitches in a reference book.  Thankfully Squeeze was in the room and caught me as I tipped backwards.  Un-un-un-un.  He dragged me into the living room and laid me on my back.  Everything I had been thinking about that day was swirling around in front of my eyes like a funnel until I surfaced, which felt like waking up out of a deep sleep.  I heard Squeeze telling the curious boys, "Mama fainted" as I was coming to.  It was the strangest thing.  My finger hurt much less after I fainted.  Odd.  And Schtinky was trying to lay on my head as I lay there. :P
• Cycling again.  After 15 months of respite (and actually, 24 months including pregnancy), I have to start thinking about charting again.  Bah.  Though I do know how lucky I am....
• Busy.  I can't believe how busy I am.  Hardly a moment for contemplative thought, let alone any extras.
• Happy.

Listy-list, full of woe and whoa

• Today was a "Now what??" kind of day.  The type that while addressing one mess/issue/blow-out, another one crops up instantaneously.  Back-to-back-to-back.  Like, what time is it? . . . because what did I just do all day??  Disheartening.
• Jamie's list of words include: Uh-oh, Dada, Hot, Sharp ("ahhwp"), and the names of two of our cats: Toots (sounds like "T-ts"), Kizzle (sounds like "K-zl")
• He is climbing on everything.  Ev.ery.thing.  Everything.  There have been a number of times the past few days that I've had to confine him to the backpack because I'm just not able to hover over him for hours on end.
• He has also started biting in retaliation to being pushed over the edge of reason with his brudders.  I don't blame him, because sometimes they just don't quit.  When we hear the screaming and see the little head wiggling back and forth, we know he's going in for the kill.
• I had to have my picture taken yesterday for a new passport card.  Talk about a blow to my vanity.  Oy.  I just have to remember . . . I don't look like a pale spotty floating head . . . I don't look like a pale spotty floating head . . . I don't look like a pale spotty floating head.  Not usually, at least.  I hope.  Uff.
• I was gone all yesterday taking care of a variety of business and today it was as if our house blew up, i.e. I wasn't home to manhandle life into submission.  We were all starving and there was crap strewn everywhere.  It really is best to stay home as much as humanly possible.
• Truen has taken to hiding food around the kitchen if/when he doesn't want to eat it.  I've been wondering for the last couple of weeks why hunks of chomped-on cheese or scrambled eggs were lying under the table legs.  So oddly, as if placed there.  Of course it was because they were placed there.  Now that he knows I'm on to him, he tried hiding a chunk of scrambled egg behind a cabinet this morning.  Yeah. right.  Like that is going to fly.

In in the midst of all this, Diego just created a surprise tea party for the two of us (his brudders are sleeping) and before that, he was enthusiastically cleaning the algae from his goldfish's mini-aquarium and giving them "special food".  Bless his precious heart.  (Though I cringe at the water-mess that must surely have slopped all over...)

Now . . . to the tea party. ♥

List-posts are easier too

• I realized last week that I really don't like oatmeal, even Eggy Oatmeal, unless it is well-slathered with coconut oil, applesauce, yogurt, and walnuts down to the very last spoonful.  Otherwise, gag me . . . I just can't hack it.
• I have recently mastered Vegetable Beef soup.  What a delight!  I will have to post the recipe soon.
• There is no snow - none a'tall - on the ground in SW Minnesota on December 30, 2011.  Un-un-un-un.  We are having what they call a "dry winter".  My past-self would have never believed it, but I am really pining for snoooooooow.  I feel like it would nourish my soul to see a winter wonderland outside.  But it is just brown, brown, brown everywhere.
• Though this "dry winter" does make moving around so much easier.  It has been so warm that I haven't had to fuss with boots, hats, mittens, scarves, snowpants, etc.
• I have started noticing the tunnel-vision that comes with having more children and older, more active kids.  I hardly have the time or energy to focus on anything outside my own little sphere.  It is the strangest thing, something I'm not quite used to yet. 
• Things like . . . as an extrovert, for the very first time in my life, I am starting to cringe when we need to go somewhere, especially if there will be a large group of people in attendance.  It is so different from my usual mode of operation.  I've never even had inklings of this in the past.  Ever. 
• It is so foreign . . . but staying home is just so much easier.  Calmer.  Safer.  Less aggravating.
• I've been thinking a lot about these changes recently.  I feel like I'm just starting to grasp an understanding of WHY.  I wrote above "as an extrovert", i.e. one who draws energy from others.  I am an extrovert.  Historically, I get my energy from interacting with others vs. my own self.  But that's just it.  I am with my children all day, all night, every single day.  Of course I love them.  But I expend a lot of energy meeting their needs and interacting with them.  And things seem to get wilder the more of 'em there are (how did my mother-of-five ever do it??).
• So as time goes on, I've found that I need down-time.  Time to sit and think and stare.  I need it.  Not just "it's nice", but I absolutely, positively NEED down-time to contemplate life and re-connect with myself.  I feel unkept and ragged without it.
• Strange (and yet so obvious). 
• Interestingly, with this realization I have been cultivating a deeper sense of comprehension and respect for Blaine.  (Time alone is something that is vital to his soul.  Going places with gaggles of people isn't his idea of fun.  He loves to be hunkered down at home.  Etc.) 
• We've been together for 15 years now (married 11 of them) and I am still digging down to deeper layers of understanding.  It feels good.
• Speaking of Blaine, he had M-Th off this week.  We've had a lovely "stay-cation", what feels like the first real leisure we've had since last spring (which may simply be just a state of mind, because we did have a 4-day weekend over Thanksgiving . . . but it wasn't relaxing at all). 
• We've stayed home every. single. day. (big suprise) and have done nothing but basic household maintenance and hanging out together as a unit.  It feels so. good. 
• We missed him today, but we have another 3-day weekend starting now (he just got home).  And that feels very nice as well.
• 10-4, roger that, over and out.

Yadda Yadda Yadda

I don't have much in me today, but I do want to post more often than every week-and-a-half.  That just isn't enough!  (But it is so hard to find the time.)  Anyway, this will be a list-post because it is so much easier and I don't have to worry about cohesion.

• I love prunes.
• Note to self: when confiscating the obscene excess of Easter candy, don't let it sit in the bottom of your bag until it melts and congeals everything together.  Throw it out in when they aren't looking, say, 1-2 days after the fact.
• I got my hair cut when I was at my parents' house in Western WA.  I wasn't too pleased with it at first, since it wasn't at all what I asked for, but I am learning to like it as it grows out.  It was a good cut (just not what I thought I was going to get).
• I'm obsessing over Indian food again.  I ordered every cookbook by Madhur Jaffrey that I could find in our library system.  Next step?  Find the time to read them.  Right.
• We are going to order an entire hog from a local pig ranch in our are.  (Pig ranch?  Is that right?)  It will be an Ossabaw hog and I am going to ask for every last bit of it.  We love pork and the thought of being able to eat a heritage breed with NO ADDED CHEMICALS sounds so wonderful.
• Buying whole/half/quarter animals for food (not to mention butchering chickens) always brings into consideration what being a meat-eater actually means.  Moreso than buying meat at the store, I would say.  I think about that hog, and think about it as a living entity, destined to die and become food for my family.  That I (we) will be eating the entire hog vs. a nameless ham here or a unidentified slab of bacon there.
• I really love bacon.  And bacon fat.  And cooking with lard.  I can't wait to have my hands on some pig fat from a CLEAN hog.  Up until this point, I have only had access to lard from the butcher, which is probably from a conventionally-raised hog, which are some of the most antibiotic, drug-filled "farm" animals in agribusiness.  Poor things.
• We've eaten lettuce, radishes, chives, and scallions out of the garden this year.  That ain't much.
• We had our first truly warm day yesterday.  Actually, it was hot and muggy.  Spring has been a long time coming and now, all of a sudden, it is summer.  At least it felt like it yesterday.
• I might get to see the majority of my family next fall for my cousin's wedding.  Yessssssss.
• I cut off all my fancy long nails, they were too annoying and a lot of maintenance.  I like the way they look, my boys loved having their backs scratched by them, but whaaaaaaat?  I can't believe how much work they are!  Bah.  Back to the drawing board.
• As a result, many of my tender fingertips dried up and cracked open.  Yeeeeouch!  That hurts.  Ladies, is this normal?
• I am finding our home to be more homey and desirable as the years go by.  It is nice.  I like feeling like this is my house, not someone else's house that I just happen to live in.  It seems like I have felt that way since we moved here.
• I suppose it helps that we finally rearranged the living room satisfactorily, where it verges on looking nicely put together.  And with that, we hung our wall-hangings were we wanted them, instead of on the pre-existing nails. 
• It feels really good.  I like looking around now.
• FACT: Our living room (the "addition" that was added in the mid-80's when the home owner was paralyzed in a car accident) is the size of our first apartment, about 600 square feet.  Very nice for children to romp around, but tell me -- how on earth can that possibly look cute?  It is really hard.
• FACT: We've lived here for 4 years next month.  Yowza.  How is that possible??  Has time really gone that fast?  We have now lived here for the same length of time that we did at our house in S. Minneapolis.  And I cried so hard when we left there.
• I'm reading The Pioneer Woman Cooks.  Holy smokes, a lot of her recipes leave me drooling.  (Aside from using way too much white flour and worse, vegetable shortening.  I'd rather use the real deal.  LARD.  White flour can be subbed just as easily, but still.)  I like that the food she presents is so simple, and a lot of what "your average folk" eat (or ate growing up).  And I really like that her recipes are hearty.  Yo, it gets the stomach growling.
• Often, when Stinky is nursing, it is like his left-hand is alive and jealous of my breast, working evil.  Somehow, it is always creeping in . . . fighting for the space, trying to get in his mouth, and he has to decide whether to drink milk or suck on his thumb.  It mostly happens while he is sleepy, so it really is like his hand has a mind of its own, taking advantage of the situation and its hapless prey.  (We're talking about a hand here.  A baby's hand.)  It has made me laugh so robustly that it actually startled the poor babe and diverted the malicious intentions of his rogue left-hand.  Argh, matey.
• I better close up shop . . . this list is getting long.
• I think I'll post some pictures of my boys.  See below, sisters.

blahblahblahblah

Yowza.  Life for me at this moment feels like pure survival.  There is so much to do, so many needs and wants to tend to, and only one of me to go around.  I'm not overly stressed, but it doesn't leave much time for anything else.

So instead of a thoughtful post, a list-post.

• I have had a rash in the creases of my armpits.  What the?  I seem to have finally knocked it out with tea tree oil, but it had been hanging around since before the baby was born.  Annoying.  But at least it isn't on my face.
• I seem to have caught up with Squeeze's need for tidiness.  I feel irritable when the house is strewn with toys or messy, significantly more than I ever have.  My tolerance for messes has always been very high, but since I've started structuring my life more, that level has gone down.  I'm sure it has something to do with the amount of labor I put into, say, cleaning the bathroom, only to have the bathroom sink muddied with tempera paint residue a couple of hours later.  Or, "Didn't I just sweep?!"
• With that in mind, I have incorporated the older boys into the structure more than I ever have.  Sure, I had them pick up, or clear their spot after they ate, but I've amped it up a level.  I have them help put away laundry, vacuum the kitchen floor, wipe up their spills, and pick up (almost) every afternoon.  I think that last one is key.  The toys are strewn everywhere because of them, not me.  They need to be responsible to clean it up.  Daily.  I will help, but it is primarily their responsibility.
• I give them certain jobs, (i.e. "Truen, you pick up the Duplo blocks while you work on the Star Wars guys, Diego") to keep them on task, because they look at the mess and their eyes just glaze over -- they literally have no idea what to do.  A very familiar feeling for me, though it has eased over the years of practice and maturity.
• So then I become a drill sergeant.  They have a hard time staying focused, which means that I need to stay on top of them until the task is done.  It can be fun -- like when we pretend they are robots or "grabbers" (Truen-grabber and Diego-grabber, they call themselves).  Or it can be maddening.  Then they go and sit until they are ready to cooperate.
• This is one of my discipline tactics: I want them to take responsibility for their actions, so I give them choices.  "You can do this, or you can do that -- it's your choice," I say.  In a situation where they don't want to do something I've asked them to do, their choices are as follows: "You can do after-breakfast clean-up, or you can go sit in your bed until you are ready to do after-breakfast clean-up."  Sometimes they, and actually, I should say this is primarily Truen, not Diego, choose to clean up right away, and sometimes he chooses to sit.  Whatever.  Eventually, he bends to my will.  And almost always without a fight.
• I've been making custard quite regularly recently -- it tastes so delicious, like warm, velvety ice cream.  The best one ever was a luscious chocolate with shredded coconut.  Yo.  Delicious.  Like I've said in the past, I want to beat them at their own fight.
• Little Jamie is 6 weeks old.  I can hardly believe it.  He is so sweet, nice and chunky.  Love it. 
• He also has his first cold.  Such a bummer.  The other boys didn't get sick until they were several months old.  I feel like this is just so young and that I am a bad mama because of it.  I could have prevented it.  In fact, I think I'm the one who gave it to him -- I couldn't stop smooching his face this weekend when I wasn't quite sure if I was going to get sick.  I am thankful that it is an extremely mild cold.  Both Diego and Truen were over it in a day or so; Jamie can breathe out of his nose easily and there's been just a bit of cute little sneezes and some wetness under his nose.  Not bad at all.  Thank goodness.
• Another thing about Jamie: he complains all the time.  Seriously.  He regularly gives out those half-strength complaining cries that sound like talking more than crying.  Over nothing!  It is so weird.  And funny. 
• He also gets extremely mad when he needs to belch and he's nursing.  You know - the kind where he is just writhing and trying to nurse, but can't.  Every time, almost without fail, he rages with an extremely angry cry when I lift him up to burp him.  He cries stormily, fights with his body, and then that giant "BUAAAAAAAP!" comes out.  He complains a little more, then goes right back to the breast.  Now that I'm used to it I think it is fairly humorous, though it was a little confusing at first.  It must be just his personality, I guess.  It will be so interesting to watch that develop...

38 weeks

My sense of peace continues. 

I honestly feel like I am over the hump of late-pregnancy despair.  It feels so good.  Instead of feeling grumbly, I generally feel like myself, with the exception of having to urinate with unbelievable frequency.  I'm honestly wondering if the baby has engaged, because of how much I've had to use the bathroom this afternoon.  It has been every 10-15 minutes, with urgency.  I keep on feeling the top of my belly and it does seem lower.  ???

I still have a huge list of things I want to do before the baby is born.

• Dust the entire house
• Hem the new baby's swaddling blanket
• Finish my mending pile (something I only do once a year -- why?!  It's so easy.)
• Complete Truen's baby calendar (DOH.  Though all I have to do is organize and paste in pretty paper and pictures.)

And I can't remember the rest.  These are the most urgent, in my mind.  Dusting also probably happens maybe once a year.  I know.  Gross.

Meanwhile, I'm fine -- totally fine.  Not antsy, not miserable, not wishing the time away.  It feels so wonderful!

The midwife and her apprentice are coming tomorrow for an appointment, as well as my friend who is working on her DONA (doula certification) who will be attending the birth.  She'll be bringing her children Ava and Felix, so the boys are going to have a blast.

On a side note, Diego dreamt the other night that he wanted to marry Ava but couldn't tell her because he was too embarrassed.  He has plans to inform her of this tomorrow!  Cute. ♥

etc.

Things that have run through my mind to post recently . . . nothing much.

• I have finally come to the conclusion that I HATE DOING CRAFTS with young children. It's just a lot of stress, work, and hovering. Though I do like how it comes out in the end and that it pleases them.  Ugh, and I thought I appreciated the artistic process.
• I really, truly adore cabbage fried in bacon fat.
• I'm starting to feel a compulsion to nest. I'm not usually like this, but general disorder and clutter is really getting on my nerves.
• I went out and about 3 times last week and swore I wouldn't leave the house for the rest of December. I was whooped!
• I somehow miscalculated my weeks, and, after looking at the calendar last weekend, realized that I was 36 weeks pregnant, not 37 like I had thought. What's the diff in the end anyway, right?  But it was a major blow to my psyche.
• I am so proud of what good boys I have. They are thoughtful, take good care of each other, and generally listen very well. I see signs of their obedience all over the house; like when I ask them to put something away and, later in the day, I see it set nicely in its place.  I love them! ♥

Remembering to be thankful, thank goodness

I am thankful for . . .

• High-quality kitchen knives, which make everything easier
• Recently perfecting split pea soup, then having the presence of mind to write it down ASAP
• The dwarf lime tree that Squeeze bought this summer, which is blooming in our sunroom and emitting an ethereal scent
• Squeeze, for the fact that while he is logical, he is also very in tune with beauty and "the little things", from sunsets and billowing clouds to making our flower gardens beautiful in both the summer and winter months -- I love that about him
• For the memory of walking down the block from the bus after work on chill autumn nights in the pitch-black, seeing the globe Christmas lights that Squeeze hung from our balcony railing, which he always had lit for me (I keep on remembering that recently -- it must be the feel in the air)
• Little boys who spontaneously tell me they love me with great, big hugs
• Feeling like I finally mostly figured out this mothering thing -- probably in the fact that I have more of a sense of peace about it, knowing that it is a constant adaption vs. feeling rife with questions, wondering how to even do it
• The coming winter
• Daybooks
• Blogs
• Feeling like I've had enough to eat
• The new green beaded bracelet my parents got me for my birthday this fall (the boys call it my "snake bracelet" because the lines of beads are inter-woven)
• The color green, my favorite
• Realizing that I need, then enforcing upon myself, structure -- things are calmer and cleaner when I stick to a regular routine (while it doesn't come "natural", I have found it can be "normalized" -- what a discovery!)
• Figuring things out with a greater depth of maturity and understanding that comes with being 33 (and how much more at 44, 55, 66 . . . ?)
• Area friends who are excited about my belly/baby/pregnancy.  It is so fun to be reminded that being pregnant is a special time -- it is easy to forget in the last couple of months.
• The new babe, which, with how much movement and awake-time it spends bobbling around, I'm wondering if it might be a firecracker of continuous energy and enthusiasm.  ???

Wah, wah, wah, and then some

• 33 weeks pregnant
• I spent last week, in a nutshell, lying prostrate on the couch, totally done in from the previous weekend's labors.
• Which was . . . butchering 25-ish chickens from 10:00 AM to 5:30-ish PM.  We still have 7 left to go.
• Totally done in.  Destroyed.
• I felt (feel) like a complete wimp, but it is hard to argue with a body that won't cooperate.  The next step was the total zap of all optimism and anything vaugely resembling get-up-and-go.  And wondering if it will ever end.
• It was pure survival, that's it.
• I have to remember that my body is being used for something else right now (growing a baby!) and while everyone else was sore, too, their ligaments and muscles are not being stretched like mine.
• Still, hard to stomach.
• Symptoms: PAIN.  First muscles and skeletal frame, them hips and ribs, then settling in my neck, shoulders, and head.  Combine this with the nasty, violent cough that is "going around", which left me crying, feeling like my frontal lobe was being stabbed.  Ugh.
• I'm feeling better, though.  I have a chiropractic appointment for tomorrow, because something is definitely out of whack.
• Meanwhile, life goes on . . .
• Truen says, "She am" and "You am" and "I can't know".  He is so spontaneously affectionate, hugging me and giving me smooches while telling me he loves me, totally out of the blue.  His favorite game is "Mama Mouse & Baby Mouse" or "Mama Rabbit and Baby Rabbit" or "Mama Kitty and Baby Kitty".  So precious.
• Diego is developing into such a helpful boy.  He has gladly taken on tasks like turning on the crab light every morning and is starting to remember to do after-meal clean-up without being reminded (and has always happily said, "Oh yes!" when I do remind him).  He'll gleefully say, "Dooooooo it!" when I tell him the name of the next chapter of the book.  He still wants to marry me; and the new baby, too, whom he insists is a girl.
• Both boys want to name their new baby sister, "Pretty Girl".
• Given the last 4 generations of Borealises, the chances of that are not very likely.  This generation has their one Borealis girl already.  Or could we break the pattern?!
• Not very likely.
• I peed my pants the other day in the midst of a violent cough.  I was on my way to the bathroom, taking a slight detour to drop something off in another room.
• My last urine analysis at my pre-natal appointment indicated I'm not getting enough water.  Great.
• I had my first thought of, "I have to be pregnant for two more months?!!" the night before last.
• Wahhhhhhhhhh
• etc.

Stream of Connie

I'm going to spit out my thoughts in list form, as I have no time for anything more thorough.

• After 12, no . . . 14?! Oh man. After 14 years living in the Midwest, I have finally come to appreciate the snowy winter months. I am absolutely relishing it this year, in fact.
• This might have something to do getting to be home all the time; or perhaps living rurally, where the snow actually stays white and looks pretty.
• I was always so disheartened by how dirty the snow was in the city. And the salty-filth covered cars and buses. Disgusting.
• But I think the biggest influence is living seasonally, in rhythm with our garden. Winter is a time for rest and relaxation, not working outside until it gets dark at 10:00 PM, eating the evening meal, and then collapsing into bed.
• Though I think a lot of our warm-weather labor is due to "setting up shop" with young children and half-of-the-whole being gone 50 hours a week vs. slavery to a garden patch. We have a lot going on over here!
• Writing in list-form is very lazy. I see that . . . as I could be developing all this into much more interesting and fleshed-out thoughts.
• But for a Mama with less than an hour to herself each day, if I'm lucky, this is gonna hafta' do!
• I felt myself becoming semi-unavailable today. It was like my mind was shutting my little guys out; I just needed a break and some distance. Thankfully, they played very well by themselves while I was one-room-over.
• And then I found a book shoved into the VCR. (Hee! I'm pretty sure Diego was pretending he was the mama and taking care of little Truen. I heard him say something like, "And now I am going to play a movie for you!")
• Yes, we do have a VCR. We use it, too. When our old one conked out, Squeeze's dad tracked us down a used one because 1) ours couldn't be repaired, and 2) VCRs alone aren't sold anymore.
• I have found some wonderful VHS tapes at thrift stores -the old 1980's cartoon of Charlotte's Web and Raymond Brigg's The Snowman being the best of the best.
• We don't have a record player, but purchasing a Hi-Fi is on our agenda. Same idea: think of all the wonderful children's records we could get for 25 cents!
• Both Squeeze and I have fondness in our memories for watching records spin. There is just something so intriguing about sound coming out of a needle placed on a giant revolving disc with lines scritched into it.
• Speaking of memory: Diego's new thing is to ask us to tell him stories about "when we were a little girl and boy" every single night as we are snuggling down into sleep. The light goes off, and he's on it: requesting demandingly, "Okay, tell me a story!"
• It has been fun to recall various aspects of our youth -- and also very enlightening. I have been learning new insights into Squeeze's life and who he is and was. I love him all the more, just thinking about him as a little boy. He spent so much time by himself, inventing games and stories.
• Of our boys, Truen is the one who can handle being on his own. He enjoys it, and will even play little ditties on his own while all of us are, say, snuggling in bed or sitting on the couch talking.
• I don't think Diego has ever chosen to be alone longer than the books he was drawn into lasted, or the bursts of creative play that come right after breakfast or when we get home after being out.
• Sound familiar, anyone?!