Sunday Pic: Whew.

What a week! I mean, if you can measure the difficulty of a girl's week, by the damage done to the carpet... you'd get a very good idea of the week that I've had.

Flooding and water damage? Real bad.
Smoke or fire damage? The worst.
Arterial Blood Splatter? Yikes.

But if you are talking about a generally lousy sort of week, I think that red sploshes of Tropical Punch Kool-aide down the hallway ought to register as a "well, CRAAAAP!" sort of lousy. Apparently I was not getting dressed and into the kitchen to fetch Pearl her sippy of "juice" fast enough. She felt she needed to speed things up by bringing me the pitcher. Two weeks ago, I might notta freaked so bad, but I had just spent $149.95 getting the upstairs carpet cleaned. The upside is, I'm thinking that some of the enzyme that the cleaning fella had used on the carpet was still in there, because the red drips were already looking a little faded by the time I got the spot remover out to spray on the mess. After a good scrub, you cannot even see the trail Pearl left.

You can still see the two palm sized brown stains on the floor near her bed from last Tuesday Night's Festivities of Barf. And this is not to be confused with Monday Night's, Wednesday's, Thursday's, or Friday's Festivities. Seriously. Fun parties all. Today is, I hope, the Finale of Festivities. Last night, Saturday night, was all about waking up multiple times, but not puking. That was new. I'm thinking new is good. Only this morning, Pearl seems to be going for the Toddler's Trifecta of Nasty... The three P's of Unfortunate Stench.

Having taken care of the first "P," a.k.a. puke, with great efficiency earlier on in the week ( and on and on and ON), she has decided that she is in charge of removing her diaper herself whenever things get uncomfortable, i.e. whenever she has a load. Unfortunately she still has a spectacular case of the runs. The second "P" is poo, and the basement carpet has now been christened.

And I suppose that I should be proud of the fact that notwithstanding all the vomiting and diarrhea that she has suffered for almost a full week, due to my superior hydrating techniques via the Pedialyte, she had it in her to take care of the third "P" while she was down there as well.

Yay.

A curious side note to this particular party that our youngest has been having, she only ever vomited at night... and almost exclusively during the hours of midnight to five am. So every day we would think that she was on the mend... and every night, whups! No sleep for YOU!

One notable exception: after an exhausted (sleep-deprivation for a pregnant lady is extra un-fun) trip to the doctors office where the guy just told me "yeah... sucks to be you, watch for dehydration." It was beyond my ability to make lunch, so I took the girls to the Drive Thru at a C@rls Jr. to get some happy meals, I discovered that one of the last places you want a two year old to start barfing is while strapped into a car seat, jammed next to her sister, first thing after getting into the drive-thru lunch line after another car has just pulled in behind you. As bad as I feel for Pearl, I almost feel worse for Birdie who got it in her hair and all down her shirt.

You are not interested in what it takes to clean up and limp home after such and experience. Not if you are sane.

Please let this be the end.

As I have no pictures that anyone would want to see this week, I have included the birthday cakes of the Chaos Girls that got missed during my blogging break.

Pearl's second birthday

LaLa's fourth birthday



Birdie's sixth birthday

Floating

Sunday evening we were discussing as a family what we wanted to do for FHE, and Birdie got very excited about using the helium balloons that were still floating around the house (we had celebrated Dadguy's 32nd birthday the day before) in an object lesson. She was very excited about how they floated, being symbolic of the goodness of Jesus, and she wanted to do something along the lines of talk about all the good things that we needed to do to return to Heavenly Father and Jesus. Specifically having everyone guess the incremental things that we needed to do to return to Jesus. We all agreed that she would teach the lesson on Monday night, and that I would help her.

I mostly wanted to be her helper, because it really seemed to me that Birdie was missing a very basic principle of the Gospel. It's a common misapprehension that is often found even in adult understandings of the way that things work with Christ. The idea that we can buy our way into heaven with good behaviour, the concept that if we do it right we can do it ourselves.

We can't. No one can.

Yes it's important to be anxiously engaged in doing good, yes we need to pray and read our scriptures, go to church, help others, be kind, keep the commandments.... but that is not some sort of Godly currency with which we purchase redemption. Naw... the price has been paid. It is by Grace alone that the miracle happens, it is our Intercessor that pulls it off for us.

But Birdie wanted to use the balloons, she was really jazzed by the idea of the steps that we need to take to return to the Father. I didn't want to discourage that excitement, I just wanted to refine the object lesson... to teach more, and to teach a little more accurately. I couldn't quite wrap my head around how to do this without discarding Birdies idea until yesterday afternoon I had to go rescue the Mylar balloon, which had lost it's ribbon and was bopping around the ceiling of the girl's room. We had gotten a Macey's balloon bouquet special the day before, which is $4.99 for one screen printed Mylar and five regular latex balloons of your choice, and since they didn't have any Bionicle (the thing that they have decided is better than Legos for Dadguy's traditional "toy" gift) print balloons, we settled on a Superman. So I managed to snag Superman down, and thought about his floating, inaccessibly stringless state as a sort of symbol of God. I snagged a few, regular blow up balloons in the candy jar, and I was ready.

Here's how the lesson went down:
The stringless Superman balloon was symbolic of God, and one of the latex helium balloons was Jesus. They are both perfect and they look like each other, they both float. But God gave Jesus a string, so that we can tie OUR balloons onto his and via HIS power and goodness we can float up to live with the Father again some day. But first we need to do everything in our power to LOOK like Jesus and the Father, and here is where Birdies ideas came in. Every puff of breath that filled our floppy balloon, and made us puffy like Jesus, was an action or activity that WE can do: like baptism, be obedient, etc...

It was exciting, and I think that the girls have the beginnings of the idea of how it works. Sort of.

After the lesson, Dadguy really wanted to set the balloons free. They were his, and he wasn't really excited about having them hanging around the house for another week or so, losing altitude and getting in the way. So we went in the back yard and let them all go, but as they were floating away, one of them wasn't quite as high as the rest, LaLa hollers "AAAAAAAH! Jesus isn't going to MAKE it!"

Dadguy turns to me and says, "your composing a post right now aren't you?"

Yep.

Abundance

One of the ideas that I have struggled with, a mindset that has plagued my life, has been the idea of "enough." More specifically "having enough." I grew up in a family of six kids, I was kid number four: the lower middle. But worse, I was the girl caught in between the two boys of the family. Maybe not a recipe for emotional poverty to YOU... but for a wanna-be Daddy's Girl...? Well, it always felt like there was not enough. Not enough money, food, time, love, attention, space... insert desirable object or concept here. There just seemed like there wasn't enough.

The problem is, when you live with the fear of "not enough" you start doing ugly, destructive things to combat that fear. Fear of there not being enough food, or special treats can really push a girl into overeating when the treat or the food IS there. Fear that there is not enough attention or love, if indulged in, will often cause a girl to make desperate and stupid relationship choices. This fear, if coddled the way that I have been guilty of coddling at points in my life, can be the justification for lashing out, rebellion, hatred and rage. Wars are fought over the concept of "enough." Without going over all of my personal weaknesses with a microscope, lets just say that I feel confident that virtually every lousy, selfish, ugly, self-destructive, dishonest thing that I have undertaken has a good solid start in that fear, the feeling of there not being enough for me. A sense of living in scarcity.

Many of my first memories are tinged with the feeling of there not being enough. As I grew up and started thinking about things analytically, I bought into the idea that the feelings that I had stemmed from being in such a big family, not so much the economics... because really, we DID always have enough food and OK clothes and cars to drive to get where we needed. Still, the concept and the niggling omnipresent sense of unease seemed to be a no-brainer to place in the doorstep of an overlarge family, the clamor of the needs of so many children, a father working long hours to provide, and a mother pressed to her limits. It was a fairly obvious explanation, and so I started blaming. And even when I stopped blaming, I still held onto the idea that it was cause and effect.

Ahem. I think I was wrong.

I have my own kids now, and as I have watched them enter this world and start their interactions... I am more and more convinced that some things? Some things we bring with us. Some kids come into this world with a pre-disposition to be fearful, some bold, some individuals seem to have a need to be held, and some equate a cuddle with being smothered. And this weakness, this tendency to fear that there will not be enough for me, this is a thing that I brought into this life. It is mine and was mine before this mortal life. Sure, maybe being born into the family that I had been threw that weakness up into sharp relief, maybe even exacerbated it.

And baby... if this is true then I thank God that I was born as I was born so that I might see and understand this challenge as clearly as I do today. It really does come down to an understanding of God. The way that He works, and the way of the opposition.

There is this guy that Dadguy listens to occasionally, podcasts and sometimes on NPR, this guy talks about economics... and has gone as far as to say that God, the Christian God, is a Capitalist. And at first it sounds funny, but when you look further into what this guy says about the idea of living in "scarcity" or "abundance" mindsets, it all makes pretty good sense.

I mean... both mindsets are valid and real ways of looking at the world, but one requires an understanding of the Plenty that is Omniscience, or at least a faith in that Plenty. A belief that it is there, that God wants you to have enough, and that He will provide. The opposite mindset is equally valid... I mean hey, there are children, children on this planet who are right now starving to death. It is easy to say that we must take from those that have, and give to those that have not.

To force, to compel is not the way of the Father and it never has been.

But the world of abundance says that we do not have to force or coerce, there is enough. There has always been enough, and if there truly is not enough? That God will make there be a way for those who have not, to have. Either inspiring a person to create a way, or sending down manna. If you live in the world of enough and abundance... you can do as the Taoist who upon encountering a problem will tell themselves not that they can figure out an answer, but that they simply must remember the answer to this problem. An approach that pre-supposes an answer, and in a way creates a pocket of faith or reality for there to BE an answer. This is not just wishful thinking, this is a powerful way to tap into Deity, it is like unto prayer itself in it's efficacy and reliance on faith to work.

That we have not yet found the way to provide for all children as sons and daughters of God, is our horror and onus, but I will yet put my faith in Abundance. In the end, it is the only real answer, and no amount of the expediency that bases itself in fear and scarcity will convince me otherwise.

On a personal level I have never before in my life experienced so much abundance as I do today. It's a real, physical amount of enough. Dadguy and I have enough time and love and money and space for all but the most unreasonably demanding child in any understanding of the word. But also, in my sense of enough? I am awash with plenty, I swim in it and I send it out the door on a regular basis.

I wish this plenty on you.

Shtuff and Nonshensh

Allllrighty then, it's time to quit reading all y'alls blogs and jot down a wee bit of my own bloggary. My parents just left, they have been here since Sunday, more or less, and the week preceding was spent in a final sprint to get the basement habitable enough for their visit.

Or in other words, get some functioning bathroom stuff going; seal the tile, get a toilet, sink, shower, caulk everything etc.

Also in there I had regular family, church and personal stuff going on, plus Breaking Dawn to read. And the pregnancy. And I got pretty sick in there for a while too. And, and, and...

This has truly been my hardest pregnancy, but how much of the difficulty level is purely physical and how much stems from the demands I have made upon myself, I'd be hard pressed to determine. I do know that it is not an especially wise thing for a pregnant woman to be wandering the hallowed merchandising halls of Ikea, and yet there I was yesterday. Me and at least five or six other visibly gestating gals. Idiots all.

But I got some great curtains and sheers for the family room, plus a keen, round bathmat for the downstairs bathroom, so it's all good. Nesting. You know.

Only now I gotta install them. Sigh.

It's no great wonder to me, with all the "do" that I have stacked up in my daily life, and the constant interruptions to my every breath and action that three young girls can be counted on to bring, that virtually all contemplation and abstract thought has left the building. There is no time (or spare brain cells) to think about the why's and the underpinnings and the politics of being a woman, an American and a human being on this green globe. And I miss it. The thinking. My opinionated-ness. My passion for ideas. It all seems lost in this fog of hormone poisoning, and my meticulous hoarding of personal resources so I can make it all the way past baths, in to bedtime.

Thankfully, after thirty-nine years of life and three thriving offspring, I know in my heart that this too shall pass, and that I will be back to my normal pain-in-the-neck self. As opposed to the pain-in-the-neck that I currently am, which is a kinda surly-languishing-on-the-couch-griping-about-the-dinner-menu sort of self.

Overheard in Chaos:

Birdie to me after I have pulled the plug on computer games for the rest of the day:
"I've HAD it with your leadership!"

LaLa:
"I am feisty and CUTE, huh mama!?"

Pearl every five minutes or so:
"Pika! Pika-pi!" and then as she clenches her little fists, squinches her eyes and doubles over, a hollered "PIKACHUUUUUUUUUU!" If you ever have seen a Pikachu electrical attack? Yeah... sounds exactly like that, with the volume at 10. All she needs is a yellow suit, black tipped ears and some large polka dots on her cheeks.

Ain't life grand?

Project Updates

The Behbeh: Ultrasound this morning... the critter has all the applicable parts that I've come to expect from a baby in utero, with the notable addition of boy parts!

You heard me! A BOY!

Don't get me wrong, I would be very pleased indeed to get me a fourth member of the Chaos Posse, and frankly a girl would make life easier on so many fronts. On top of that my friend Mama D just put up some pics of her brand new baby girl that tweaked my heart something fierce.

... but sometimes a mama knows what she knows, and I have felt the presence of a particular spirit waiting patiently for his turn for several years now, and if he didn't come to me biologically, then I would have to find him some other way. I like this way.

Feels complete.

Now I challenge Dadguy to come up with a better name than the one I have picked out. Sorry Birdie... We will not be naming the kid London.



The Basement: Picking at it bit by bit. Project was interrupted by a family trip up to Bear Lake, a fun-in-the-sun party that I am still not recovered from. Worst sunburn I've had in years.


Dadguy's Project: This project has actually been in the works for quite some time... starting with the gearing up for this specific project, and the others to come like it. A few months back we purchased a laptop and determined that we would also get the newest incarnation of iPhone when they came out. Dadguy was going to try his hand at designing and coding applications for the iPhone, eventually with the intention of selling his creations from the iPhone store. It has been a rollercoaster, a very informative rollercoaster ride. If you care to read up on all of his doings you can check his developers blog for his first creation, Geopher Lite.

Frankly, while I have known that Dadguy was this cool for years now, I am impressed with his vision and tenacity. I think that so much of him, his personality, philosophy and ethics really shines through in this first endeavor, and all the hurdles that he had to jump through. If you have any interest in Dadguy, his projects or geocaching? Check this out.

If you have one of the new iPhones? Go spend two bucks!

Seriously... this newest stint of wing stretching has been great to watch, but hard to live. We have had to give up some family time, couple time... and I personally have had to put in more parenting time in at a physically rough part of my life, with this fourth baby on the way, and in my decrepit state. Oh yeah! And the basement! And the yard! And the church callings! And the family life! GAAHHHHH! The hours have been longer, and the initial financial investment has been significant (at least for our budget!) without any guarantee of a return. The ups and downs have been emotionally rough on both of us... and I wouldn't trade any of it!

And that's good, because it looks like he's just gearing up. It's an exciting time for our family!

Sunday Pics: The Tour Le Grande

Hooookay! Did I promise y'all a tour? I think I may have. I think I may have also pissed off a few of y'all by my reluctance to get to the money shots earlier this week.

Tough patooties. This has been a little traumatic for me, and I am a delicate flower.

If you would like a closer look at any picture, just click on it.

Come with me now, on a magical journey through a series of once magical and echo-ey rooms that are now just rooms. Granted, they are rooms that have just doubled our living space, so yeah... there is THAT magical aspect of them. But first things first, let's head on downstairs.



When you arrive at the bottom landing, if you turn to your left you will see this lovely sight...

Bear left from approximately the middle of this first room and you will see the beginning of the hallway, the door to the media closet, and the entrance to the Love Den of the Dadguy a.k.a. the Gameroom. The cute girlie in pink is just the spokesmodel, pay her no mind.

This shot was taken while the photographer was standing next to the Twilight Zone Pinball machine. That Defender cabinet is actually a Multi-Arcade-Machine-Emulator, or MAME machine. If ever there was an arcade game that was fun? It's loaded on this baby!

On the other side of the MAME is a Magic Sword arcade game... that will probably get sold to make room if Dadguy ever gets his dream-come-true of an Addams Family pinball machine. An event that I am now realizing will likely come to fruition before my own dream-come-true of new furniture. Say La Vee... in the end it will all work out. It better.

Again with the spokesmodel.

So, c'mon with me now down the hall way here...

The first door on you right will be the laundry room. Woooo. Eventually (if the guy ever wants to get paid) there will be a shelf on those boards over the washer and dryer. Eventually.

Here is the bathroom, the second door on your right. Obviously it still needs a little work, but we are aiming for the first of August to have it up and running. The tile flooring was just grouted yesterday afternoon, and needs a coat of sealer yet. Then the tub surround goes up next weekend, and the plumber comes in the week after that to hook up the workings.

We hope.

But this is Reality in Chaos, so we'll see what really happens.

Third door on your right is the currently very over-burdened cold storage. In between the shelving is stuffed a number of pieces of furniture that will be making their way out into the household. Later. When we get around to it.

This shoy was taken from the doorway... but I see no sense in overwhelming your eyes with more food storage and a bunch more crap.

Well heck yeah! Let's get all the ugly out of the way here! This is the first door on your left, it is the closet under the stair, also known as BOO! Dadguy knows what everything here is. I think. Let's just keep moving along, shall we?

Second door on the right is the guest bedroom, sewing room, eventually one of the girls' room. This is the last room of our circle.

This room has the larger windows, and is actually part of what is usually finished as the family room in the model of house that we have. It is situated directly below the front room upstairs.

We actually had to break down a framed and rocked in wall (along the left hand side of the stairwell going down, where the banister now is) in order to get the stairs to open out into the family room in the way that we finished it. Because of the way we chose to do it, we ended up with a cold storage (has no windows) instead of an extra bedroom. But I have been in houses that are finished the other way, and I cannot repent of our decisions. I love the way that we have done it too well (the banister, the archway, the open feel) to feel badly about that lost bedroom.

In this shot you can also admire some adventurous Hollyhocks growing up out of the window well.

So now you turn and realize that the guest room has a door that also leads into the family room, passing along the bottom of the stairs! A loop! My favorite! Yay!

Ooop! I think we are done... there goes that girlie!

The End

Ode To A Carpeted Basement

I had no idea, no idea the the act of laying carpeting in your rooms would vault you from the realms of dreams, into mundane reality. Truly, how could I know? I mean, intellectually I knew that once carpeted we could begin the trickle down of our upstairs life down into the newly formed rooms, but I didn't really know.

We had you framed, your bones showing the basement that you would become... and you retained every bit of imaginary beauty and promise. Then as you lay fallow but for the stringing of electrical and networking tendons, that year or so you never lost your magic. As we slowly, over the years purchased lights and hardware for you, made decisions, and imagined how you would be... still you eluded us in you un-being. The sheet rock and texture gave you a sculptural quality; an almost third dimensional, but still ghost like reality. The finish carpentry delineated you even more, but honestly... you were still in an untouchable, state of non-existence to me! Paint? No, not even close.

Just one afternoon of two men laying a horizontal textured surface, and my lists of all the thing to be done before you would become, has become a list of inconsequentials. A list of nit-pickery nothings.

As I walked down your now padded and carpeted stairs and entered your rooms.... ROOMS! I was shocked to my core that all of the dreams and maybes of your creation had been made reality, and that they had indeed been ripped out of the ether and made into rooms. Empty rooms smelling of paint and new carpeting; They had become rooms, complete and finite. Rooms like every empty room of every new apartment or house that I have ever moved into.

The dreams that had been forming over the years of your planning and creation are now locked in place, like a butterfly caught and displayed in solid lucite.

Don't get me wrong, your empty rooms waiting to be filled and lived in are exciting to me in their own way... the flow of our family life will be forever changed with these additions. But the state of un-being and anticipation is gone now, and I can see how home improvement can be an addiction. The thrill of the chase is over.

It has been ever since Monday, and I still cannot bear to take your picture. You seem naked to me. Now that you ARE and have being, your emptiness seems to need covering, filling, living before I expose you.

Love
-bon

To the Internets: Perhaps this Sunday I will be able to give y'all that promised tour.

Sunday Pic: Progress

Y'all... I hurt. I have tweaked, pulled or torqued something in my upper back/neck/shoulder region by vastly overdoing it yesterday. I cannot turn my head all the way to either side, but I also cannot yet repent, because we are ready. READY! For the carpet to be laid tomorrow morning. Against all odds, we are now ready. Mind you, it didn't have to be this way, this close of a race. The guy that we had contracted to do not only the finish carpentry, but the painting and tile in the bathroom (a series of jobs that he assured us would take one single week and a day to complete?... six weeks later finally completed the carpentry and paint leg-o-the-journey on Thursday and promptly went out of town.

And then the paint dried all the way and we realized. Was not OK. And then we freaked. I believe I used the eff bomb. Several times. I had already paid him.

So Saturday morning we hired the neighborhood uber-sitter and proceeded to roller coat the entire basement with another coat of the white that we had chosen. Not difficult, as we had five and a half extra gallons of the color (mixed and un-returnable) left over, that the guy had had us purchase for the job. Luckily, as anyone who has painted before knows... the roller coating part is the fast and fairly enjoyable part of painting.... it's the masking and cutting part that takes time, is tedious and generally bites.

Ceiling, walls doors and trim were all same color, no carpeting or furniture to hassle with... the job was pretty fast, but it has made all the difference. But then we also had to scrape and shop-vac the entire basement floor in preparation to the carpet coming in. These are not a combination of jobs that a pregnant woman really ought to tackle all in one day. So today I pay. And pay. And pay. I'm betting that Dadguy is paying as well... but as he was up and gone by six-thirty for his church meetings today, it's a little tough to say for sure.

Yeah. Pretty sure he's paying.

He also got the lights up in the family room, one of the bedrooms (what will be our game room), and one of the hallway lights. Looking good, yeah?



Still left to do, but not in this order:

• switch plates
• plugs and plates
• smoke alarms
• cable and network plates
• phone jack plates
• vent covers
• umm... oh yeah... the carpet
• lights in closets, bedroom, hallway, bathroom
• bathroom tile
• tub surround
• install toilet and sink
• doorknobs

holy cow... we are never gonna finish. We will need blinds for a total of five windows too. If we are cool, it will be most all of it done by August fourth when my parents come to visit. At the tectonic pace that we have been going? Not a lot of hope. Sorry Ma... but at least there are no spiders! Seriously... the worst I have seen down there in months has been the 'tato-bug we found trundling across the concrete yesterday, and as he was hustled out by Pearl in her hot, grubby paw... I doubt we will be seeing much more of him!

The color is Behr's "Silk Pillow." This shot highlights the lovely texture.

A preview of the carpeting.

The way that we finished our basement, at the base of the stairs you can either take a left into the family room, or a right into a bedroom. The bedroom also has a door that opens into the hallway which at the arched end attaches to the family room. The floor plan is a big circle. I love circles and loops. Next week I will take y'all on the extended tour of our basement circuit. It'll be fun... if you like that sort of thing!

Sunday Pic: Basement

Piffle dee pfeffernuese. So there is not nearly so much going on in the basement progress as I thought there would be. The guy we have contracted, spent an average of a half an hour a day down there this past week. To be fair we added the equivalent of one doors worth of trim and one shelf in the laundry room to his docket... but the truth of the matter is that we have been in a painting holding pattern since Thursday. As in... my laundry room is down there, and I have thought for sure each day that the painting was starting THAT DAY... so no laundry has been happening. At all.

Hello Mount Washmore!

What am I complaining about? I haven't even managed to fold and put away the four baskets of clean clothes that sit at the foot of my bed.

So... a few pics just as I promised...

I know, the unfinished laundry room. Riveting.

In other news... there is a decided lack of news. All I seem to be able to think or talk about is this pregnancy. I am starting to bore the hoopty out of myself, and it's all just TMI if you ask me. But don't ask me. Because I will share the TMI goodness.

I will mention the fact that I have gone from a woman with the appearance of being six to seven months pregnant, to that of a woman with a mere four month belly... overnight.

Dude... my six year old noticed. The behbeh is still plenty active, so no worries, it's just one of those goofy pregnancy tidbits that no one else really cares all that much about.. Except for me. And mostly because I cannot keep my maternity pants up any more... AND it has heralded my usual pregnancy tailbone/pelvic/hip pinched nerves and pain. And I thought that I was getting out of that party this time around.

Fine... it's worth it, see?

As cute and as goofy as ever.

Sunday Pic: Facepaint

Lazy summer days... a little bit o' decoration.

We accidentally left that Kiki (binky) of Pearls at Grandma's house yesterday. It has been almost 24 hours of no kikis. We've come this far. I think we will just be done.

Next Sunday Pic? I will take you on a tour of the basement progress. The week after that? We ought to be done.

Done

Done.

Or maybe the week after that.
.
.
.
.
.

Or maybe next year sometime.

Birdie's Early Christmasssssss

Last night was a banner night for the Eldest Chaos Girl, a.k.a. Birdie. At nine-thirty PM, she properly formed the sound of the letter "s" and used it while saying several words. She is six and a half, and until now the letters "s" and "z" have completely eluded her, to her deep frustration. She has done it, she has made that breakthrough.

And that breakthrough kept her up until well past eleven last night, practicing her "S's", the same breakthrough woke her up this morning with a hissy sissy snake sound coming out of her mouth!

On this blog, I have only ever mentioned this speech pathology of hers once. In my book, while it is a problem that has stumped her, it does not define her. Up until a few months ago she was dead set against Speech Therapy, and any conversation I had with her regarding her "s's" would leave her panicked and near tears... enter the beloved and wondrous Mrs W, the Kindergarten teacher with the magic touch. She casually mentioned to Birdie during a Parent/Teacher/Student meeting with the two of us that classmate so-and-so in Birdie's class goes to Speech and loves it. Good enough for the B girl, and so with her blessing I started the wheels in motion and got her in to meet with the school Speech Therapist. From that point on, there was no question that she would qualify, it was all formalities. The Therapist had never actually encountered the particular speech eccentricity that Birdie has. I know this is true, because she told me so, AND because she persisted in referring to the sound that she makes as a sound on the inhale. It isn't. Trust me, I have listened to it for five years. It is an exhaled nasal.

Details. Whatever.

In the end, the T's never got all the way crossed, nor the I's entirely dotted until just before the end of the school year, so Birdie never actually got any therapy. They figured that a week and a half (three appointments) would have confused her more than helped, so they just sent home a packet of summer Speech Therapy homework. Which I thought was pretty great until I looked through it, and realised that it was full of endless ways to encourage her to practice making the sounds correctly, and cute little charts to put nifty stars on for the days that she completes her assignments.

GAGHK! She has never been able to make an "s" sound! What do you mean practice? I was back to square one. Only now I was annoyed!

Birdie is a highly motivated little girl who loves to learn. She also has a little friend who's older brother is homeschooled, and thusly the little girl insists on some schoolin' herself. Plus several of the Chaos's cousins are homeschooled. She and LaLa had begun to pester me for some homeschool this summer.

Sigh.

I have NEVER thought of Homeschool as anything I was interested in doing. At best I had planned on supplementing their plain-old public education with art and a few science projects. Only now the pressure is on. Great. So this week we started with "Plants and Seeds." It was gonna be "Wildflowers" but there wasn't even enough literature in the kids section of the local library to even do a full week on "Flowers," so "P & S" it is. Frankly I think it's pretty funny to hear my kids talking about Monocotyledons, Dicotyledons and Disseminules, so we aren't dumbing down the vocabulary for them... but we generally lose Pearl within her first three thwarted attempts to engage us in a good wrastle while we are hitting the books. We lose LaLa about five minutes later as she hits the pantry for a good snack scrounge (although she can still hear every word, and I think she IS still listening). So last night I didn't feel at all badly about continuing our study of how seeds travel even after the younger two had gone to bed. But after a half an hour of study, plus an expedition outside to see if we could spot any winged disseminules (helicopter seeds) in the local maple trees, I started to cast about for something to distract Birdie from the all-seeds-all-the-time focus she has going. So I brought up the "Speech Therapy Homework Packet" that was awaiting her. I figure that it has "Homework" in the title, so it must have a bit of appeal for the Birdster in her current must-learn-everything mode that she is in.

Ayuh. Sure did.

For a thing that has brought her to tears so many times and completely stumped her, last night it was easy. It was effortless. It was immediate and it felt like a miracle. It is the very first step, and today she mastered the "Z" sound.

Had I mentioned that Birdie is a highly motivated little girl? She is motivated. Talking with her today has been like speaking to a stranger. She doesn't sound like her old self. She is going full bore into the land of "correctly pronouncssssed sssspeech." She is sibilance itsssself. She is thinking, and practicing and I swear it's like Christmas around here for her. I am constantly reminding her that this is a process and she will have to practice long and hard before she gets it right every single time. She is undaunted, and digs away at the practice like her life depended on it.

I am so PROUD of my little Bird

Power Puff Chaos

My girls are on a Power Puff Girls kick.... and it fits in kinda scary cute. There is Blossom, the red head who is the leader and kinda bossy, Bubbles the blond with two pony tails is the cute one, Buttercup has short dark hair and is hotheaded and tough.

Except for a little bit of transposing the personality of Bubbles and Buttercup... we have a perfect match-up for my sweet Chaos.

Birdie- Blossom
LaLa- Bubbles
Pearl- Buttercup (she pronounces it Buh-durrr-cup)

I sort of hope they are still into this come October... I'll totally make them some Power Puff dresses and send them Trick-or-Treating! But what really gets me, is that Birdie draws these pictures of PPGs that are dead on. Then they color them in, cut them out and play PPG with them until they are shredded into bits. They are averaging two dolls a day right now. I am too lazy to set up the scanner... but here is a photo of some of the latest incarnations of the dolls before they get colored or cut, along with two of the older, more scotch-taped-together versions.

Poisoning

What is the cosmic logic of this? I get pregnant, and I do this with great faith and high hopes; I also have a pretty good idea what I am getting into, both in terms of what happens to me pregnancy-wise, and what life with a newborn is like. I know that these times and sensations too, will pass. I know also, beyond any question, that this is my last baby... so I might as well find any enjoyment and just roll with it.

And yet...

The fatigue and general malaise of pregnancy combine against me and my ever more pathetic attempts to keep this house and family in working order. The forgetfulness of my overloaded brain drags us further into chaos. The hormones push me closer to the edge in terms of sanity, already an unsteady balance as the mother of three young girls. Everything combines to inform my super-sensitive and increasingly EPIC self, that I am a crappy mother and wife (indeed, human being) who has no business having another child. WHY IS THIS!?

And I know from experience that this is just part of the territory for me. I know that literally one half of an hour after giving birth that the hormones poisoning my blood and body will recede, and I will be astounded at how AWESOME I feel. I will raise my hands above my head and not feel as though I am lifting an extra twenty pounds per arm. I will stand up and hobble my stretched, stitched, bleeding and ice packed posterior over to use the bathroom, tears of joy streaming down my face because this is the BEST that I have felt in nine months. And even as I am slogging through those first sleep-deprived months of ups and downs.... Dude. I am not pregnant anymore!

But here I am. Carrying a basket load of clothes upstairs leaves me breathless and a little faint. The disobedience (a.k.a. normal behavior) of my two year old renders me tearfully frustrated. One single comment from Dadguy breaks my heart, and leaves me sobbing even though I KNOW that he did not mean it THAT way. I cannot seem to force myself to get the dishes washed in any sort of timely fashion, the whole while berating myself for my sloth. They have to get washed, I will wash them, but why or why do I have to turn it into torture?

Again. The world's worst mother, wife and person is busy building a human body here! Aren't you glad I am procreating? Isn't it thrilling?

... and I know better than ALL of this, but it doesn't make it go away.

Blogstipation

For a blogger, too much self editing is like not enough fiber in your diet. Causes an unpleasant back up of things that really ought to be moving on out, as it were.

Unpleasant. That about sums up my attitude, and really? I'm a-gonna just lay my blogstipation at the feet of my messed up, and preggo body. Because, same as my ACTUAL and equally unpleasant digestive constipation? it is caused by hormonal surges and imbalances. And I am not happy about it. Like the kind of "not happy" that would end up with someone getting kneecapped, except that I am PREGNANT, didn't I tell you? I feel so much like crap that I just couldn't be bothered to take that tire iron and actually chase that special someone down to do the deed.

But they upped my meds the day before yesterday, so in a week, you might want to watch yourself. I'm not joking.

Random Thinka-roos

* Hoping for an early and extended nesting experience this time around. This place needs a serious deep cleaning.

* Gagh! What was I thinking? Four kids? I'm gonna die.

* Dadguy is going out of town for four days next week, I'm gonna die sooner than I thought. I wonder if it's too late to reinstate mandatory naptimes?

* Of course it's too late. I'm gonna die.

* This is the best weather we are gonna have all year.... what the heck am I doing inside blogging?

* The smell of the churchhouse hallways makes me nauseous. Not sure if it's a cause and effect, or if it's more of a Pavlov effect. I'm in the cultural hall working out, and I start to feel sick, and run out into the hall so I don't puke in front of everyone. The smell of the hallway drives me right over the edge into yakksville, so I run into the bathroom. Or perhaps I am so used to being ready to puke by the time I'm IN the hallway, that now just the act of walking into the hallway makes me sick. I DON'T KNOW. But it sux.

* I come from a long line of genetic food intolerances and love of fresh fruit. Constipation in not a thing commonly found in my family tree or in my own, personal intestinal workings. Not even much of a problem during pregnancy until nearer the end. Enter this pregnancy. I think I really AM dying. When I run, or jump, or skip rope? I KNOW I am dying.

* Yesterday was my nephew's birthday party, it had a general pirate-like theme. The cake was a super CUTE 3-D bust of a pirate, and the cupcakes were frosted, with a red bit of fruit roll-up across the top for a piratical bandanna. We showed up a bit early for the party, so the girls and I got to help add the M&M eyes, nose and red licorice grins to finish out the smaller pirates. At the end there were still seven or eight frosted cup cakes with no bandannas, and my sister suggested that we go ahead and decorate them as well. Birdie contemplated them for a moment, and announced that these cupcakes could be the "guys who have to walk the plank." We had a good laugh, and proceeded to give the GWHTWTP sad faces, grimaces, and Mr. Bill "O's" of distress.

* It's three in the afternoon and I am ready for another nap.

The joys of 39

Feeling odd, a little contemplative... tomorrow is my thirty-ninth birthday and I just cannot get excited about it. Probly 'cause I'm getting so *OLD. It's hard to get excited when you are so dadgum OLD! Come to think of it... old and pregnant. Where are my Depends?

heh. I amuse myself.

Tonite is Dadguy's church night, which usually means he takes off around 8:30 PM and gets back around 11:00. More often that not the girls go down easily these nights. I simply explain that there can be no messing around, and for some reason they listen. Not so much with Birdie tonight.

She has been up and down innumerable times to go pee one last time, ask for a snack, look for a snuggly, go pee one last time, get a drink of water, go pee one last time. This last trip I was laying on the bed reading a book when she snuck up on me and started picking at my toes. I thought I was gonna have an aneurysm, scared me so bad!

Now, I usually will only tuck her in two or three times a night before I am done, at which time I will simply point in the general direction of her room and say something maternal and loving like, "ENOUGH. Good NIGHT."

Tonight I ask her what is up, and she tells me that she has figured out what she will give me for my birthday.

"What is it?" I ask.
"It's something special that I can give you any time, but I'm going to give it to you for your birthday." She has that secretive little six year old smile going, and I'm a sucker, so I ask again what it is.
"It's what I know you really want."
"Is it a hug?" I'm sure I have got her.
"No, it's more special that just a hug," she is gleeful that I am playing along after hours.
"It's a kiss then?"
"No," she smiles, and I see tears in her eyes as her voice deepens with emotion, "it's the love and the joy in my heart that goes to your heart. It's that special joy that makes us a family."

aaaand now Mama is crying. And Birdie gets herself tucked in just one last time (again) tonight.

Ain't life grand? Almost makes it worth it to be getting so flippin' OLD.

* this is a joke people. Ha ha?

Sunday Pic: Work

So... we're finally getting a little bit o' use out of the kiddos.


The fruits of the first art class with the cousins.


**********
Went to Home Despot and dropped a grundle of cash for most of the stuff we'll need to finish the basement. I say "most" but this is with the glaring exception of the carpeting. We will likely have to put in the carpet next year. Dude. We are going broke.

**********


The tile for the bathroom floor, plus the big white box in the tub is the fiberglass tub surround.




Ten doors, miles of casing and baseboard, and the fixin's for a half banister.



Caulking, sundries, and the primer for the walls. The painting will be perpetrated by my nephew "B" and a sprayer borrowed from my cousin. Let's see how long all of this really and for actually takes. I'm betting our carpenter/tile guy will be done by the end of the week. I'm thinking that the painting may take two weekends (or B's equivalent of a weekend, not sure of the schedule of B's day job) to do. Hmm... it may be time to call Dadguy's cousin (our plumber) to finish off the bathroom early next month! Wheee!

The Behbeh

So I went and did the test thingy... took two and a half flippin' hours what with the screening being a four part process, and then the waits in between each leg of the journey. Thank heavens I had dropped the girls off at my sister's or it would have turned ugly fast. To say nothing of the awkwardness of the fact that The Behbeh wouldn't cooperate, and so they had to scrap the regular ultrasound method and use the "trans vaginal" ultrasound, a.k.a. the wand or the cootchie-cam. Good times.

I am doing the "integrated screen" which means that I will not get the results until a week after a second blood draw at the end of June. But after talking at length with the Geneticist (leggo numero uno of el Journey), the fact that the main thing they were trying to measure via ultrasound, a pocket of fluid at the base of the neck, which in The Behbeh's case was so thin (thin good, thick bad) that they really had to work hard to get a measurement... well, I just ain't a-gonna sweat it. Mind you, I'll go back in for the blood draw, but my initial nervousness is gone. If the screen DOES show anything funky, and I doubt it will... then I will consider an Amnio. Again... I doubt it. Everything's just fine.

And not twins! Just one heck of an active kid! Holy SMOKES! Behbeh was spinning and twisting and flailing about... hiccups and kicks and a few goofy, twitchy karate-like moves. And not one clear shot of it's cootchie or otherwise! Stinker.

I WILL go on record here and say that in my heart, I am convinced that it is a boy. Will not be even slightly sad if we get el girlo quatro, but I really do think we have a boy. Either way... we are covered; I have a slew of both girl and boy names that make Dadguy insane!

I think we are a little overdue for some pictures. Especially after yesterday, when I Yapyapyapped my poor sister's ear off, with practically nothing nice to say about anyone or anything; I am muzzling my crabby-apple self.

Pretty flowers and the lawn's looking considerably better.

Iris and Pansy's making everything smell better and look brighter.

Cutest tushie evah!

I am having a bit of pregnancy fun this go-'round... a few days after seeing those two pink lines, I gave my doctor a call to set up my first pre-natal. Turns out he doesn't deliver babies anymore. Some crap about letting his obstetrics insurance go. This REALLY griped my soul, as this doctor's office is far and gone from where I live... I was only continuing to go to his practice because I wanted him to deliver my last kiddo. Highly inconsiderate of him if ya ask me! So his nurse gave me a few names of some other doctors, and I settled on the one woman doc on the list.

She turned out to be just fine, although her practices' waiting room is about the size of my bathroom, and even though her office is technically in the town two towns up... it might as well be in Siberia, as it takes over 25 minutes to get there. Those of y'all who live in big cities are now rolling your eyes, I'm sure... but hello? Gas? One income family? About to add to that family? YIKES!

Still, I was gonna just suck it up. Then they hit me with the bill, and they wanted it paid in full by the end of the seventh month. The huh? Now, it's not the matter of the money. We pay. But before the services are even rendered? What sort of business does that?

Perhaps I have been soured by the fun we have been having in terms of dealing with contractors, but in my book... you NEVER pay for a service in full, until after the deal is done. Half maybe, but not the whole shebang. You do, and they have no reason to finish the job nearly as well, or in as timely a fashion. Dude, they already HAVE your $$.

Plus you always hear about so and so who's doc doesn't even manage to make it there to catch the baby... and it's some random nurse or intern who takes care of business. Or you have that kid on the front lawn of the hospital, and it's your dear horrified husband does the honors. You get a refund? I doubt it!

Naw... so all that, plus the fact that a week after my first visit with the doc, I realised that if I wanted to get a Nuchal Translucency Screening done, the time window to do it would be closed if I waited until my next appointment to get it set up. So I called the office and talked to the doctor's PA who had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. A PA to a doc who delivers babies. I had to spell it for her.

Granted, this is a relatively new test on the scene... but it is covered by my insurance, and seems like a pretty good idea for a 39 year old pregnant lady to consider. It's essentially an early ultrasound that measures ( I think) a pocket of fluid at the base of a fetus' neck, and can offer a good heads up on things like Down's syndrome, Trisomy 18 and a few others.

Sigh... yeah I know, I will not be handling anything differently if there is a genetic defect in my baby, but this test can also pick up on heart defects... and there are some things that CAN be done in the womb if necessary. Plus, I just want to know. I just want a heads up. And I sure am going on and on for a woman with a muzzle on.

The upshot of all this? I switched doctor's to one who has a practice in this town. An office that HAS heard of the NT test. Yay! And tomorrow is my screening, the very last possible day that the test can be done and be considered viable. I'll let ya know if it's twins.

Today

Why couldn't I stage a blog comeback when I have something coherent to say? Or something better than "blah blah blah, I feel sick," or "wah wah wah, I feel like crap." Gotta wonder about this kinda stuff.



Today

Supple as a reed I will bend
un-offended,
the brittle disappointments
of day washed away.

May I gird myself up with
Thy kindness, and softness;
May I find no defenses
before Thy love and Thy Way.

Knee bent and willing
heart broken and whispered
"God grant me serenity,
courage and wisdom today."