Duck Duck Goose

We had Ian and Maya here for a couple of days. They just went home this evening. Earlier today I took all the kids, including the two of them with me to teach boot camp. When we pulled into the parking lot Maya asked, "Why are we at the church?" I told her "This is where we do boot camp." She looked a little unsure and asked, "Can I play duck duck goose?" I told her "yes."  "Can I sing Twinkle Twinkle Little star?" I said she can sing it all she wants. She gave an enthusiastic "Yesss!" While we were there, Lilly took Maya in the nursery bathroom with her to keep her company while she (ahem) went poop. Having two kids in a locked bathroom is never a good idea, so when I discovered them I asked Maya to please unlock the door. I asked her why she was in there while Lilly was going to the bathroom. She looked like someone who had just been rescued. "I don't want to be in here anymore." I told her I didn't blame her and let her escape. Lilly told me she was keeping her in there because she (Lilly) was scared. They were fun to have.

Christmas

Christmas is over, the tree is down, the lights are put away until next year. Now I can breathe a sigh of relief and sit down with a clear, not crazy head to compose this blog. I think the kids had a great Christmas. We keep it simple, but Santa made sure he brought at least 1 big gift for each of our older kids (he seemed to know that Emilia was content sucking on wrapping paper). Rachel got a camera and Carson got a t-ball set. The biggest, most impressive gift however was Lilly's. She got a guitar. It is the envy of all the other kids. It is not very often Lilly gets the best thing. Even if she does end up with something better than Rachel, it doesn't seems as good to her as what Rachel has, perhaps because she is so used to Rachel having the first, best things. But here, the guitar was the clear winner. Carson is at the perfect presents age because he thinks everything is amazing. His favorite gift was the gun Rachel got him from the dollar store. All my kids really are young enough that Santa can get away with doing Christmas pretty cheap. At one point Rachel and Lilly opened a box of art stuff at the same time and both exclaimed "Whoa!" I asked them what the present was and Rachel said "I don't know." Lilly also got an ice cream maker from her cousin Asher, which she loves. She was telling Elizabeth about it and said "This is the present I got from my special friend, Asher." Then she kept asking me if we could go get some "whupped cream" so we could use it.

We have a few developing Christmas traditions at our house. By Christmas Eve, I am tired and not at all interested in cooking a big meal, so we go out. Just us and the kids, and usually Uncle Cody. On the way home we look at Christmas lights. Then we set out cookies and a note for Santa, and it is off to bed (for the kids anyway). So far we have been lucky. Our kids sleep in Christmas morning. This year they did not even stir until almost 9am! Christmas morning we spend at out house opening and playing with presents. Then the real fun begins for the kids. We head over to Nona and Papa's house to play with cousins and open more presents. Then they play, play, play until late into the evening. Finally, we roll their over-sugared, over-stimulated bodies back home and try to put them to bed. The day after Christmas this year, I was anxious to get the house back in order, so I sent the kids to their rooms to get dressed and start cleaning. Then it occurred to me that post-Christmas is one of the very rare times we have nothing going on, and there is no rush to get back to life. I called the kids back up and said "I changed my mind. Go play with your new toys!" We had a wonderful, laid back December 26th. And the house even ended up clean by the end of the day. Good lesson for me.

I was spoiled this year. Shelby got me season tickets to Shakespeare Festival. I have to admit I suspected that was what I was getting. A receipt came in the mail a couple of weeks ago for the tickets. I opened the envelope just enough to realize that I may have spoiled a surprise. To cover up what I had done I threw the envelope away and pretty much talked myself into the fact that I was not getting tickets. The truth came out on Christmas Eve, and Shelby was pretty disappointed. I wasn't though! I am super excited. I also got a lot of chocolate and some stinky cheese. Spoiled spoiled spoiled!

Just a quick non-Rayl anecdote. We have Ian and Maya at our house today. Ian just asked if he could have a hot dog. I told him we didn't have any hot dogs. He said "How about ketchup?" "You want ketchup? What are you going to put it on?" He shrugged and said "I don't know." He settled on a carrot.

I dropped Emilia yesterday. See, I could keep this to myself. Nobody needs to know except those of us who were there, but I can't help myself. The whole thing was so surreal. I got her out of bed to nurse her one last time before I turned in for the night. I was just going to sit down when she curled up in a ball and rolled right out of my hands. She landed on her stomach/face, and seemed only slightly shaken. I have heard her cry harder after being mauled by Carson. Here is the interesting thing. I did not panic. Had the same thing happened when Rachel was a baby, I would have probably broken into guilty sobs. As it was, I just let out a surprised shriek, picked her up, and nursed her back to sleep. I am not sure if my calm manner is a result of having had so many little babies survive small trauma, or if my semi-conscious thought was, "Well, it isn't as bad as heart surgery, and she survived that!"

Cry Baby

Emilia loves noise. It has been an acquired taste for her. In the beginning, anything above inside voices would make her cry. Now she seems lost without the chaos. We dropped all of the kids off at aunt Summer's house except her. On the way there she did not make a sound, but once the car was empty she started talking to herself. Talking progressed to complaining, which progressed to full-on hysterics. The only time she ever cries in the car anymore is when she does not have company. My perfect little baby is no longer sleeping through the night. My theory is that she is hungrier now. Somehow just nursing is not doing it for her anymore. We have been feeding her cereal in the evening and she gobbles it up, which makes her my only child ever to actually like baby cereal.

Lilly's preschool class made gingerbread houses at our house last week. All of the moms came to help, but Lilly wanted nothing from me. She wanted to do it herself, which is great. I believe independence is an important part of building a child's autonomy...in theory. In practice, it took all of my self control not to jump in and make her gingerbread house for her. There was no order to Lilly's gingerbread house, no vision. At least not my vision. Of course the point was that she got to be creative and have fun, which she did. And her gingerbread house was just as beautiful as a house designed by a 4-year-old could be. It looks like I might be making my own gingerbread house this week.

On the way to karate yesterday Rachel got discouraged when she could not get her seat belt buckled. She exclaimed "All the bad stuff in the world happens to me!" I might not be mother of the year, but I happen to think Rachel has a pretty decent life, so I took her claim pretty personally. "Oh Really Rachel? There are people in this world who don't get to eat every day. There are people in this world who are so sick they can't get out of bed. There are people in this world who don't have a house to live in. Now do you really think all the bad things in the world happen to you?" There was a brief silence before she said "yes." There is no reasoning with a 6-year-old.

Over the last few months we have had someone elaser's kids to play over at our house more days than not. On the days we do not have extra kids, my kids are at other people's houses. I love this coming and going of children. Our house is full of laughter and chaos. But there are times it makes me feel slightly frazzled. I was contemplating this feeling earlier today when a thought occured to me. It is not that I am overwhelmed with these children and the friends and families they belong to. It is almost like there is so much love, service, and consideration going around amongst these families that my finite little heart wants to explode! The thought instantly made me smile. We are so blessed!

Oxy Clean

To further demonstrate Rachel's complete faith in any commercialized item, I have the following story. Rachel asked me if I have a thing called Oxy-Clean. "I DO have Oxy-Clean!" I am sorry to admit I felt a little pride in actually owning one of the hundreds of commercialized items she thinks are necessary to our daily life. The next day I used what was left of my Oxy-Clean, and threw the bottle away. Rachel saw it in the trash and read me the riot act. "Mom! Why did you throw it away?" "I'm sorry Rachel, but it was gone." "Well, you have to get more! We NEED Oxy-Clean!" I asked her if she felt like she needed it because of all the laundry she has to do. She gave me her coy little smile, and let the subject go.

Lilly ate a hot dog yesterday. This is her first meat in months, so it was kind of a big deal. She was offered mac n' cheese or a hot dog. She said she wanted a hot dog and asked her if she was sure. "It has meat in it" I said. She told me "I don't want the meat, but I do want a hot dog." I said, "But the hot dog is meat." Again, not quite understanding she told me "I do want a hot dog, but I don't want meat in it." We went round and round like this until finally she ended up with a hot dog. After she was half way through she showed me the hot dog and said "mom, there is no meat in this!" Apparently a hot dog is processed enough that it no longer has the taste, texture, or look of a piece of meat. I do not know if the hot dog lunch is the beginning of the end of Lilly's vegetarianism, or just a fluke. 

My little boy is growing up. He is talking a lot now, and I can even understand most of what he says, although it is still a guessing game sometimes. We even get complete sentences and phrases such as "Hi Lilly! Daddy's here!" The girls went to a basketball game with Shelby a couple of weeks ago, and I kept Carson with me. To ease the pain of not being able to go, I took him through the drive through to get a burger (one of his favorite things). He was still crying about being left out, and was not amused with my offer of a burger. I ordered one for him anyway, and when I tried to open the bag to give it to him, he cried even harder. Assuming he wanted to take it out himself I handed it back to him. Between the tears and agitation, he was having a hard time getting the burger out, which only made him cry harder. I finally pulled over, took the burger out of the bag and unwrapped it for him. When I handed it back to him, it was like someone flipped a switch. The tears stopped and he gave me a very appreciative "Thank you Mommy!"

I know it seems like every other day I am writing about a doctors appointment for Emilia, but here it is anyway. She had her 4 month checkup yesterday, which aside from getting her immunizations was a total waste of my time. I had no concerns, no issues, nothing to discuss with the doctor. Both Dr. Hanks and I were thrilled at the monotony of the checkup. Emmy's only very minor issue is that she is not rolling yet. I am not worried. She gets nowhere near the floor time her siblings did for fear that she will be mauled.

Christmas Lights.

Emilia had a checkup with her cardiologist yesterday. Her heart is perfect! Not only that, but she weighs 12 pounds, which puts her in the 25th percentile. For my babies that is gigantic! She is "talking" a lot, and is very social. While Dr. Womack was listening to her heart she was talking his ear off. He had a hard time hearing her heartbeat because of the disruption. We finally put up a crib for her and she loves it. It is nice for her to have a protected place where she can move around without getting mauled. She is still the favorite kid at our house.

Up to this point in our married life, Shelby and I have never put up Christmas lights outside. We have always had the best intentions, but then the season gets busy, or it gets too cold outside, and we just let it slide. We were not able to get away with that this season. Our neighbors put theirs up the other day, and it was all Rachel and Lilly talked about for days. "When are we going to get Christmas lights like Amber?" or "I wish we lived at Amber's house." When we finally did put them up Rachel said "I want them on every last tree just like Amber." Darn neighbors. They are up now, and I think they look great. Every night when we turn them on Carson about has a heart attack. He looks out the window and yells "mismis ligh, mismis ligh!" I love that my kids are at the golden age for Christmas. Everything is so magical and exciting, yet their expectations are still pretty low as far as gifts go. Rachel is starting to want a little more expensive gifts, but Lilly and Carson still want very little. This point was illustrated by the following conversation I had with the girls.

Me: Rachel what do you want Santa to bring  you for Christmas?
Rachel: An iPhone and a computer!
Me: Umm..Santa doesn't bring a lot of those to kids.
Rachel: Why not? He knows how to make EVERYTHING!
Me: Lilly what do you want for Christmas?
Lilly: Umm...a coloring book!

We put up our Christmas tree last night. Rachel was telling me not to forget the star. She said, "I know! The person who didn't say the blessing at dinner gets to put the star on top (pause for effect). Hey, I didn't get to say the blessing!" I think Lilly giggled throughout the entire process. Carson spent the evening trying to put his own lights on the tree because that is what Shelby was doing. At the end of it we all sat down to hot chocolate and rice crispy treats, and Shelby and I told them about our own Christmas memories.

For the life of me I cannot remember if I have mentioned Rachel's boyfriend. His name is Walker and he is very sweet. She refers to him as her boyfriend, but I am not sure that he is aware of this. His mom does boot camp with me, so they spend a lot of time together while we are exercising. The two are joined at the hip when they are together. Last night Rachel told me we should do boot camp every day so she could see her friends. I asked her which friends she was referring to and she said "Walker.." "Is that it?" I asked. "Umm, yep."

Ok, two quick funny stories. I was watching Lilly bite her nails with a rather disgusted look on my face. When she noticed me she said "I eat my nails." I told her I thought that was gross and she said "Not snails. Snails are gross. I eat NAILS."

We have really stepped up our family scripture reading lately, in part due to Rachel's insistence. On Wednesday night Rachel and I came back late from karate, and Shelby was on a conference call. It had been a long day, and it was bedtime. Rachel reminded me about scriptures and I told her we were going to skip reading that night. She said "No mom, scripture power! You have to be strong for the family!"

Virus

I have been getting a lot of guff for missing a couple of weeks of blogging. I just want to explain myself. Our computer caught a cold and died on us (again. I blame the kids). Thanks to my awesome brother-in-law, we now are virus free. Now for catching up...

In my last blog I forgot to talk about Rachel's birthday party, and I think it is worth mentioning. First of all, I am no great birthday party planner. Lilly's birthday party was a giant, unorganized water balloon fight that turned into all of the kids chasing Cousin Isaac with water balloons. For Rachel's party the weather was lousy so we were limited to what we could do inside. To fit with her pirate/princess theme (pirates for the boys, princesses for the girls) we had a fort building contest. Then we played two rounds of sardines, and a couple of rounds of good old fashioned hide-and-seek. She had an awesome cake thanks to my friend Amber. The bottom tier was blue with a pirate ship molded out of tootsie rolls. The top tier was a princess theme with a cool princes crown made of white chocolate on top. Now here is the part worth mentioning. We invited Rachel's primary class, one girl from her school class and all of her cousins between the ages of 3 and 7. Twelve invitations were sent out, plus a couple of verbal invitations to neighbor kids. Every last invitee showed up and probably half of them brought younger siblings with them. We had a grand total of about 25 kids. It was madness. By the time the party was over my house nearly literally looked like a hurricane had passed through. A good time was had by all, so I consider it a success!

Rachel asked me a couple of weeks ago if she could start going to the "big dragons" karate class instead of the younger class she has been attending with Lilly. Last night was her second time trying out the big kid class. She did so well! Compared to the other kids in the class she is tiny. There are a couple her age, but some of them are as old as 10 or 11. Rachel really held her own. I asked her how she felt about it later and she said it was scary because the kids are so big. She loves it though, and wants to keep going. I was very proud of her.

I have been working with Carson on dressing himself. He is resistant at best.. The girls were able to sort of dress themselves by this age but I have not been as good at working with Carson on it. I think there are a few reasons for this. Because he doesn't talk as well I still think of him as younger than he is. Plus I have a lot of kids now and it is so much easier to dress him myself than to convince him to do it. Today I successfully bribed him with the promise of playing at a friend's house. He did great with the exception of putting his pants on backwards, but I will take it!

Emilia is unanimously the favorite family member among the kids. In fact she is the preferred form of entertainment at our house. This means that during her waking moments she has between one and three children constantly in her face. I have already mentioned that Carson's favorite way to talk to her is by growling at her (loudly). I worry that she is going to be overwhelmed by this, but she loves it. In fact she prefers it to solitude. If there is nobody up in her face she starts to complain. When the kids are in her personal space she has an amused look on her face. Not quite a smile, but close.

Lilly has a new friend. Her name is Elizabeth and she lives across the street. The two of them are quite the mischievous pair. All of the sudden Lilly has forgotten a few basic house rules. Specifically that cat food does not belong anywhere but the cat dish, we don't lock doors, and the exercise equipment is off-limits. I do not think it is Elizabeth's fault. The two of them just seem to like to get into trouble together. The other day Elizabeth was over and needed to use the restroom. Lilly showed her where it was, and a few moments later we heard way too much giggling in the bathroom. When we went to check it out, Lilly told us "we tried to go at the same time but it didn't work."

Sea Blue

If I do not blog about this now, I am worried I will forget. Lilly does a co-op preschool with a couple of other pre-kindergartners in our neighborhood. It was my turn to teach today, and the kids and I had the following conversation:

Me: "Allison, I love the color you are using on your balloon picture!"
Allison: "It is called 'sea blue'."
Lilly: "Hey I saw that movie once!"
Elizabeth: "I have that movie!"
Allison: "Well, I don't have that movie, and I don't want it!"

With the onset of the cold weather, I have been parking my reading chair in front of our pellet stove to get my daily book fix. A few nights ago Carson woke up around 10pm soaked with pee from head to toe, and very upset. He was beside himself while I changed him, and when I was done he led me to the reading chair. We sat down and he snuggled up to me, then pointed to my book and demanded "Read!" So I did, silently to myself while he sat with me. It was a tender, peaceful moment, one that he has repeated several times since (minus the peeing part). I know Carson loves me, but Carson loves everyone. Sometimes I think he loves me no more than he does anyone else, so whenever I can get a little extra snuggle time with that boy, I take it. 

We have begun getting "primary answers" from our girls when we ask them questions. No matter the topic at hand, the answer always seems to be church related (Heavenly Father, say our prayers, follow the prophet, love "our chother"). For example, at the store the other day, one of my kids threw a candy wrapper on the floor. I thought I would use it as a teaching opportunity on cleaning up after ourselves. "Don't throw garbage on the floor at the store," I began. "When you throw garbage on the floor at the store, who has to pick it up?" I was going for something like "the store workers" but Lilly yelled out an enthusiastic "Jesus!"

Rachel got the last of her immunizations yesterday. I chose not to tell her we were going to get shots until right before we left. She was not happy and refused to go, which made me realize I should not have told her until we were actually at the doctor's office. After her initial fit, she seemed OK, and even went into the exam room without a fight. I should pause here and point out that we have been working with Rachel on finding a better way to get what she wants other than crying or throwing a fit. This usually translates into "Please can I..." or "Please can you...". As the nurse and I were preparing her for the shot, the reality of it all sunk in and she began to cry and say "I don't want a shot, I don't want a shot!" As a last attempt she finally looked at the nurse and begged "Please can I not get shots?"

I wish I had something great to say about Emilia, but things are much the same as they were last week. She sleeps, eats, poops, pees, and occasionally smiles. I was holding her the other day just for fun (something I do not get the opportunity to do as much as  I would like), and I had a flashback to when she was in the hospital right after her surgery. She had just come back to the PICU and she was lying in her little bed, all sprawled out and pink, with tubes going every direction. I remember thinking then that she looked so small and fragile and out of place. To look at her now you would never know any of that happened. I squeezed her tight, and kissed her chubby, well-fed little cheeks. I love that baby.

Spelling Game

On the way home from boot camp last week Lilly and I were playing the spelling game. I would give her a word and she would tell me what it starts with. Some letters she has down pat, but others are a little tougher for her. When we got to the word "Dad" she was unsure. Finally she wrapped her arms around herself and said "Dad starts with LOVE!" I spent the rest of the morning thinking about how sweet and precious my Lilly is. When I shared the story with aunt Merry however, she said "It sounds like you got played. She didn't know the answer so she got out of it by saying something cute."

On the subject of Lilly, I think we have the world's youngest vegetarian by choice. She will now officially not eat meat of any kind, not even a McDonald's hamburger. Mostly I am proud of her for making a moral decision and sticking with it. Most adults struggle with that. But the other part of me finds this to be incredibly inconvenient. To ensure she is getting enough protein, I have to be really thoughtful about our meals. We keep plenty of peanut butter, eggs, and cheese on hand. What really gets me is her insistence that I don't eat meat either. I want to support her, and meat is not my favorite anyway. But you know how it is when someone tells you that you cannot have something, and then all you want is that thing? Sometimes I sneak meat when she is not looking, but I am trying to decide how moral that is on my part.

Carson loves Shawn the Sheep. It is a claymation show that he watches on Netflix. My favorite is when he sings along with the song at the beginning. Or at least  tries to sing along. Since he does not talk very well or very fast, he mostly just gets basic sounds out. It is so cute, and sometimes I turn it on just to watch him sing along and pump his fists in the air. But as soon as I start giggling he turns to me and says "Out, Mom!" He is starting to say some cute things. He insists that I call him "Carson" or "boy". The other day he wanted me to do something and I said "sorry Charlie." He gave me an offended look and said "Nooo! Carson!" as he pointed to himself. He has also made it clear that I am neither a boy or a girl, but a mom.

Kindergarten has been a little on the rough side for Rachel and I. They have a system in her class where if you are on your best behavior a popsicle stick with your name on it stays in the green pocket, but if you misbehave your stick moves to the yellow or red pockets. At the end of the day you get a green card to take home if you stay on green. Rachel has never been moved from green, which is great for her teacher but less great for us. I think she uses up all of her best behavior in class, and when she comes home she just falls apart. This past week has been a total turnaround though. She has been fantastic at home. I asked her this morning why she has been so great and she told me she said a prayer about it. I asked her what she said in her prayer and she said she asked Heavenly Father to help her be nice for me. Kudos to Rachel's primary teacher!

Of all my babies, Emilia has been the least concerned about eating. She could take it or leave it, and getting her to nurse for what seems like long enough to me is a stressful chore...that is until now. It used to be I had to works to get her to eat every two to four hours. Lately, it is two hours on the nose, and she eats until I cut her off, either because I am out of food for her, or I have other things to get done. I am sore, I don't have enough milk, and I am spending all of my time nursing... I love it!

A quick note about Halloween. Rachel chose to be a witch, I don't know why. She made a good one though. I think the most appealing thing to her about it was painting her face and hair green. Lilly chose a wolf costume. I can only assume this was to help her get over her fear of wolves. So far it has not worked, as she still will not go downstairs by herself. Carson was a fireman because that was the costume we found at Goodwill that fit him the best. He sure was cute. Trick-or-treating for Carson was about a 20-minute ordeal. At that point he was content to go home and eat his take of candy. Rachel could have gone all night, and she was fast! We kept having to reign her in. Lilly would have liked to go all night if it were not for the dogs. No matter the size or temperament, she is terrified of them. She quickly ran up to the first "dog house" unaware, but as soon as she saw it, she turned around and ran back just as quickly. After a few houses with dogs, she began announcing loudly to the houses before knocking "No dogs allowed outside!" If she knocked, and no dog came, just to be sure she would ask the home owners "do you have a dog?"

Pictures to come!

Princess Mom

As we were walking out the door to walk to the bus stop Rachel said, "Mom, I don't know what I want to be when I grow up. Can I be a princess? A princess mom?" I told her I thought it was a great idea and asked her how many kids she wants. She happens to want 10, but does not think I should have 10 kids because it would be "too many for you." I said I thought her plan sounded great but there are two things she needs to do first. She jumped right in and said "go to college!" I said "That is the first thing but the second thing you need to do before you have kids is get married." She quietly took this in, and then asked me "is it when I am done with college and walking down the stairs, my husband will be there?" I think she was picturing a husband as sort of this college graduation gift. I so love our walks to the bus stop.

While we are on the subject of Rachel, she competed in her first karate tournament on Saturday. She did well, considering this was her first tournament. She was up against five other kids, three of which were much older than her. She came in fifth place, and I was worried that she would be disappointed. But here is the great thing about competing when you are young. She has no idea what fifth place means. All she knows is she got a ribbon and a trophy and that is all she needs to be happy!

On the day of the karate tournament, Lilly got the stomach flu. I was running when it started, so Shelby called me to tell me that she threw up but felt fine now. When I got home, she was in the bath because she had thrown up again. You have never seen such a cheerful sick kid. I came in to talk to her and she presented the following monologue: Mom, I woke up and came upstairs and dad said "Hey Lilly Bug!" and I said (in a higher pitched tone) "My tomach hurts." And dad said "Want to watch a movie?" and I said (same high pitched tone) "yes" and he cuddled me up in a blanket and then I threw up on the couch." As cheerful as she sounded during this monologue, I know she felt lousy because anytime she was sitting still she would fall asleep. She got over it pretty quick and was herself by dinner time.

Carson loves Emilia, and Emilia loves Carson. He will spend as much time as I allow talking to her, and she just smiles and smiles. He is never rough with her anymore, but sometimes he still growls in her face. I am sure he does it because he thinks Emilia finds it amusing. She does not find it amusing, but she does find it frightening. Whenever he does it she gets this terrified, shocked look on her face. Overall I think they are going to be good buddies.

We officially do not have to see Emilia's doctor for weight checks anymore. She is now over 10lbs, which is a huge milestone. We were supposed to be done with these weight checks about a month ago, but she had a couple of weeks of stagnant weight gains. As of Monday, her heart sounds "beautiful" and her weight is right on track of what my other kids were at this age. I know it seems small but she is in the 10th percentile. For my kids, this is very normal.

Mud Puddles

At boot camp Wednesday morning, it was raining hard enough to create a nice sized mud puddle in our driveway. Carson and our neighbor's one-year-old, Trevor, found this to be very entertaining. It seemed like a perfectly innocent little boy thing to do, so I did not stop them. After boot camp I changed his pants and shoes and assumed he would be good to go for the day. I was getting myself and the house ready to go for our very busy day when Lilly said to me "Mom, I have a bad word for you." Curious to know what Lilly considers a bad word I said, "OK Lilly, what is your bad word?" "Carson is playing in the mud puddle." She was right, that was a bad word. I got his pants changed once again and sent the kids outside to get into the car without me. This was, of course my mistake. Carson walked outside and ran right out into the mud puddle again. At this point I was out of shoes, out of time, and very nearly out of pants, so I let him live with damp feet.

Pretty much everything Lilly says cracks me up. We were in the car the other day and she had a discussion with herself that went like this: "Where is the baby's blanket? Oh, it's back here. How did it get there? Maybe it walked. Oh, wait...I put it back there."

Our renter moved out last week and left us with a huge mess. She left couches, beds, dressers, clothes, and bags and bags of garbage. Shelby went to clean it out on the busy day that Carson spent playing in the mud puddle. I volunteered that evening at the Ronald McDonald house. This was something I really wanted to do because we stayed at a Ronald McDonald house in Salt Lake and had a very good experience. I wanted to reciprocate. On the way home I called Shelby and he asked if I could stop by the rental and help him load up a couple of the big things. It was late and the kids were tired and hungry, but I couldn't leave Shelby with that big mess, so we headed out. By the time I got there, no more that 30 minutes later, there were three neighbor guys helping Shelby load up the last of the stuff. I had time to fill one bag of garbage, and by then the whole place was cleaned out. They just saw that Shelby needed help and jumped in. It just goes to show that when it comes to service, you always come out ahead.

Knees and Toes

I had an exceptionally intense lower body workout last week, and the next day I volunteered in Rachel's class. Towards the end of the day we sang a song about letters starting at the top. Throughout the song we are required to touch our toes several times, which considering my sore bummy was a real struggle. The song went on forever! I kept thinking "surely this is the last time I have to touch my toes." Rachel must have noticed my issue because she finally leaned over and whispered "Mom it's OK if you want to just touch your knees."

We had a cool morning at boot camp last week. One of the ladies who comes asked Carson where his jacket is. He ran inside to find it and came out with a life jacket, which he insisted on wearing. Every boot camp since he finds that life jacket and brings it outside with him.

Lilly's new thing is to tell us nobody likes her whenever she gets reprimanded for anything. Usually we just ignore it, but I finally told her the other day "Lilly stop it. Nobody in the world is as well liked as you!" And that is the truth. Lilly makes friends easily wherever she goes. She is sweet and fun and really funny. I think this is why it pushes my buttons when she says nobody likes her. The truth is everyone likes her! I sometimes have a hard time coming up with stories about her for the blog because nothing she says is anecdotally funny, but everything she says cracks me up.

What a good baby Emilia is getting to be. I put her to bed at 8 last night. I woke her up to feed her before I went to bed and did not hear a peep from her until almost 8 this morning. She is growing out of her "fussy in the evening" phase, and she smiles all the time. There is a sweetness about that baby, and I am so excited to see how it plays into her personality as she gets older. I was feeding her and Carson started crying in the other room. As soon as he started, her face scrunched up and she whimpered a little. I wonder, is it because it hurts her little heart, or just her little ears?

Potato Soup

We decided to toast marshmallows the other day in our back yard. Being the good mother that I am, I made each of my kids eat all of their dinner before they could even entertain the idea of toasting marshmallows.  All three of my kids dislike potatoes to varying degrees. Lilly does not love them, but will eat them, Rachel will eat them when threatened or bribed, and Carson gets a disgusted look on his face whenever we sneak one into his mouth. Because dinner was potato soup, it took a little coercing to get them to eat up. Carson's last bite contained a chunk of potato, and after he ate it I sent him outside to the fire. About 30 minutes later we noticed something in his mouth. It was that darn chunk of potato. We told him he would not get any marshmallows until he swallowed it. A couple of minutes later he came out from inside the house and said "Tada!" The potato was gone, but the circumstances surrounding its disappearance were suspicious. We asked if he spit it out in the garbage and he said "yeah!" At least he is honest.

Rachel was asked to give a scripture and a prayer at primary last Sunday. While we were discussing this she asked if she could say the prayer by herself. I said "sure...what are you going to say?" She responded "umm...that Lilly feels better, that Carson isn't mean anymore, and that daddy doesn't spank us hard." Luckily they asked her to give the talk instead at the last minute.

We had Ella and Cora to our house to play yesterday. Despite the 2 year age difference, Lilly and Ella are pretty well inseparable when they are together, and Lilly goes out of her way to sort of take care of Ella. I asked Lilly to get the mail and she said "sure! Oh, wait, let me put on my shoes." A few minutes later I heard the garage door open. I looked out the window to see Lilly leading Ella to the mailbox. Ella was wearing one flip flop and one water shoe, I am sure the only two shoes Lilly could find besides her own. While Ella was here she had an accident. I was cleaning it up and asked Lilly to go find Ella some of her clothes to wear. When I went downstairs, Lilly was tenderly dressing Ella, and doing a pretty good job. I jumped in to help, and they both kind of pushed me away. Lilly obviously had it under control and wanted nothing to do with my help.

Emilia had her two month checkup yesterday. We have been seeing the doctor every week since we have been home, and she has been gaining weight like crazy. This two month appointment was supposed to be the last for a while, but Emilia lost an ounce since last week. Nothing to worry about really, but now we have to come back for a weight check next week again. I am going to be so glad when we are done with the doctor stuff for a while. Other than that, she is doing great. She has slept through the night every night for more than a week! Emilia is very sensitive to loud noises, more so than any other baby I have had. This has been an unexpected blessing in our house. Since I cannot as readily raise my voice, I have to talk much more peacefully to my children. I can also use her sensitivity as leverage to get my kids to stop fighting. "Please don't fight, it upsets the baby" works pretty well since they all love her and do not want to be the cause of her unhappiness.

Lilly was playing with the baby the other day and all of the sudden Emilia got hysterical. Lilly came into the kitchen with a very concerned look on her face and said "mom, I bit the baby." I was a little confused because first of all she told me what she had done, but also because it seemed so out of character. "You bit the baby?" I said, in a disbelieving tone on the verge of anger. Lilly started sobbing "It was an accident!" At first you might wonder how you can accidently bite a baby, but I instantly understood what had happened. With all of my babies I look at them and think "I love you so much I could just eat you up!" I am sure this is what Lilly was thinking. She loves Emilia so much she doesn't quite know what to do with all of her feelings, so she bit her.

Wearwolves

Lilly watched about 12 seconds of a very old and very poorly done wear wolf movie about two months ago and she still refuses to go downstairs alone. It is a real problem for us and her since her room, clothes, and all other belongings are down there. We have tried and tried to convince her that wear wolves are not real, but she remains a believer. The other day I was trying to get her to go downstairs and get dressed. I was in a hurry trying to get out the door, and was a little flustered when she refused to go by herself. Finally I told her without really thinking "Lilly, wear wolves only come at night." So now she is still scared, and is even more convinced they are real.

I am not great at taking time to hang out with my children. I always have the next thing on my checklist in mind. The other day I was putting a movie on for the kids and I saw that Princess Bride was on TV. My kids have never seen it, and even though I had dinner to make I decided to sit down and watch it with them. What a great movie! Rachel loved it, and giggled a lot. Lilly was done with it after Wesley kills the giant man-eating rat. She was mad because she "didn't want him to kill the big mouse." The rest of the movie she occasionally would ask "why did he kill it mom?" Leave it to Lilly to root for the animal, no matter how disgusting and dangerous it is. There are limitations on her sympathy though. She was appalled to learn that hamburgers are made from cows. We talked about this a lot while we were shopping and she determined never to eat cows. On the way home we stopped at McDonald's to get dinner for everyone and I told her she could order something that was not made from a cow, but it was her decision. She said "Umm...I think I will have a burger."

I think Rachel might have her first crush. There is a boy in her karate class named Caleb who is very cute. After class yesterday she stuck to him like glue until I practically forced her to the car. He seemed to quite enjoy her company as well. As we were walking to the car she told me "Mom, I like that boy."

Rachel is growing up. We had a friend of hers over to play the other day. She lives just around the corner so we walked her home. Out of habit, while we were walking I reached for Rachel's hand and she pulled it away. After we dropped her friend off, I asked her about it and she said she just didn't want to hold my hand while Olivia was here. On the way home though, it was just fine. I understand, but it still breaks my heart a little.

We are having a hard time getting Carson to eat. He is picky, but more than that he is easily distracted. Dinner is the worst. Every couple of minutes he gets down from the table to do something. And when he is at the table, he spends most of the meal preparing his food with pepper, salt, or whatever other condiment there is on the table. The other night I told if he didn't eat he would have to go to time-out. That stubborn little boy got down from the table and sat himself in time-out! I forgot how stubborn a two-year-old can be. Carson is the official door-shutter/opener in our house and if anyone even tries to shut a door without his help it is a serious issue. Whether it be a car door, the front door, or the door to the refrigerator, he re-opens said door so he can shut it himself. I picked the kids up from the sitter the other day and when I knocked Lilly opened the door. Carson threw a fit, and before I knew what was happening he pushed me back outside and closed the door in my face, all so he could open it himself.

Emilia is doing great. She is a little fussy during the day, but she sleeps like a champ at night, so I will take it. I usually only have to get up with her once, and sometimes not even that. A couple of times she has slept through the night. She is filling out and even smiling at us some. Shelby has loved all of our babies, but newborn is not his favorite age. He is not one for just holding a baby. For whatever reason though, he likes holding Emmy. And he has a magic touch with her. In the evenings when she seems inconsolable to me, he can calm her right down.

How Babies Are Made

So I know you all are thinking I have given up on blogging. Not so. My latest blog has been on my mind for a couple of weeks, I just haven't had the time to write it. I do not mind admitting that there have been moments over the past few days that I have truly thought raising 4 kids was not possible. I was ready to pull my hair out! Then I was gently reminded by Shelby that I have felt this way after the arrival of each of our children, and that things will get better. He was right. Life already feels manageable, and I do not even remember what it was like before Emilia arrived. Bringing her home from the hospital was really like starting from day 1 again. Plus she had a few extra needs that she did not have when she was first born. The most difficult of these was a complex feeding plan that involved her having a feeding tube leading from her nose down her throat into her stomach. We had to feed her with a bottle as much as she would take and then gavage the rest through the feeding tube. The whole process took forever! We all hated the feeding tube, but Emilia hated it the most. She kept pulling it out. Finally we ran out of tape to retape it to her and gave up on the feeding tube. We got the OK from the in-home nurse when she came to weigh Emilia. When we left the hospital she weighed 6lbs 15oz. Now she is a whole 8lbs, which may not sound like much but we are thrilled. Every day she is more like a normal newborn baby. She rarely seems in pain, and is even almost entirely nursing now. She is a sweet and precious baby and we love her.

Lilly asked me if I went to the doctor and he cut a hole in my tummy and put the baby in there when I was pregnant with Emilia. When I told her that is not the way it works, her next question was of course "Well then how does the baby get in there?" I was just about to tell her that I am not ready to have this conversation with her when Rachel piped up "No mom no. There are eggs inside your body and one goes up into your stomach and it um...pops." I am sure by "pops" she means "hatches". I think her slightly vague explanation is perfect for now.

Last Thursday was Rachel's first day of school. You have never seen a child so excited. We bought her a princess backpack and two new outfits that she picked out herself. One was a blue t-shirt with blue leggings and the other was a sweater dress. Both were very cute but I found myself thinking "what if the other kids don't like sweater dresses? And what if they don't think princess backpacks are cool?" Rachel will be well-liked no matter what because she is a great kid, but this school thing is hard on parents! The first day I tried to talk her into letting me take her to school but she wanted none of it. She was going to ride the bus no matter what. I took her to the bus stop in the morning and waited with her. "Are you scared at all about the bus?" I asked. "No." "Are  you scared about kindergarten?" Again she answered "No." Finally when the bus pulled up, she was off. It was all I could do to get a kiss good-bye. When she got home, she told me all about her day. I understood very little of what she was saying, but the general sense I got was that it was a success. she made two new friends, but did not remember their names. She also liked her teacher but did not remember her name either.

While I was gone, the kids and Grandma found a cat face spider living outside our sliding back door. The thing is huge, the biggest spider I have ever seen around here. It has been there for weeks, and has only gotten bigger. They named it Elly, and every so often we see her through the glass door come down to her web to eat her latest catch. We all think it is so cool. I have never seen a spider live and eat this close up before, and since it is outside, it does not bother me a bit. It reminds me of Charlotte's Web.

Carson is so good with Emilia. Sometimes he can be overly affectionate. And often tries to give her her pacifier even if she is already eating, or sound asleep. He thinks she should always have it. He is also a little overly attentive and could use to give her some space. But with all of this it is clear that his intentions are always unquestionably good. Today he was singing her "Wheels on the Bus" which is his favorite song. Since he really cannot say most of the words of the song it was mostly inarticulate sounds along with the hand gestures. So sweet!

Going Home

It's official. They are letting us take Emilia home. She gets discharged from the hospital tomorrow morning. She is coming home with a near clean bill of health. The only extra issue we have is a feeding tube she will have to keep in for a week or two. Emilia takes a bottle, but eating requires a lot of extra effort on her part and she wears out fast. What she will not eat from a bottle goes into a feeding tube that runs from her nose into her stomach. It is not ideal, but it could be worse. After nearly two weeks of being in the hospital, I am anxious to get her home and to get back to life!

We feel incredibly blessed, not despite this event but because of it. We have so much to be thankful for that we have recognized because this happened. First of all, we are grateful that we live in a time where a condition that was a death sentence a few years ago is a relatively easy condition to repair. There are children in this hospital who will never live a normal life because of their health problems. We are thankful that Emilia will have no lasting effects from this. We have a lot of friends and family that love us. I always knew this, but I did not realize truly how many friends we had until they all rallied together to help us through this time. Holy cow, you all did so much! And you all did it so willingly. It eased the burden. We are thankful for the volume of people who jumped at the chance to love and care for our other children. We had more offers here than we have kids! We are thankful for the health we and our other children have taken for granted until now. More than anything we are thankful that in a few hours we get to take home our baby, and that we have the chance to love her and watch her grow and live her life. I want to thank every person individually who helped us through this, but there are too many of you. Please know, it meant the world to us. We love you all!

Recovery Room

We have now been in a recovery room since Saturday the 13th. Apparently Emilia was up a lot that night crying her heart out, just like a newborn likes to do. I take it as a sign that she is returning to her normal self. Mostly she has been happy and peaceful, unless the nurses are getting her vitals or she has a wet diaper. Emily is her daytime nurse, and she says it is the nurses fault she doesn't like having a wet diaper because they change them so frequently. She has gotten used to them being dry. As a peace offering Emily is sending all the size one diapers home with us!

Tomorrow the doctors will do a swallow study to determine if Emilia still has the ability to eat normally. If all goes well with that, and if her echo looks good, we will be able to go home Wednesday or Thursday. Yay!

Yesterday Eileen and Nathan visited (Shelby's Grandma and her boyfriend). They have offered to let me use a spare care of theirs while I am here. After walking here from the Ronald McDonald house this morning, I am looking forward to having a car to get around. They will bring it by later today. My cousin Jade also came to visit and was nice enough to drive me to her house for dinner last night, and then drive me back to the hospital. It was good to be around her and her family. She has two little girls, a three-year-old and a 10 month old, and both are adorable. I love being around kids when I cannot be with mine. I am once again blown away by the kindness of others during this whole ordeal.

More Progress

Yesterday Emilia was awake a lot, and even seemed pretty happy. They were going to take out her breathing tube yesterday morning but the X-ray showed she still had a lot of fluid in her lungs. Finally last night her surgeon said "just take it out!" They did, and she has done great breathing on her own. Apparently the reason the X-ray looked so wet was because she was laying on a gel pillow. The moisture was showing up in the X-ray!

Pam has been Emilia's nurse the past two days, and she is a lot of fun. She laughs a lot, and seems to really like our little girl. She says we can hold her later on today after she gets one of her chest tubes out. This is the moment I have been waiting for! We have not been able to hold our little girl since early Sunday morning and it is killing us!

Nawlene is home with Carson now. We got to Skype with him last night. He seemed thrilled. It only made me miss him more. We sang him "Wheels on the Bus" which is his favorite song. Nawlene will stay with him until Shelby comes home on Sunday. The girls are with my parents heading to Fort Bragg. My mom said Lilly told her last night "I was missing my mom, and my sister was missing my mom, so we just hugged each other." Hearing this was both heart-warming and heart-breaking. We miss our kids, and I am still a good week or more from seeing them. Lucky Shelby will see Carson on Sunday and the girls when they come back on Tuesday.

Emilia Update

Our little girl did great through the night. They tell us the first 12 hours are the most critical and once she has passed the 48 hour mark, she is pretty much out of the woods. Today they have taken out her catheter and one of her IVs. They think by tonight or tomorrow they can remove the breathing tube. Earlier today the nurse put a tube down her nose that goes right into her intestines, and they have begun feeding her that way a little bit at a time. These are all great improvements. She is also being given a solution of glucose and electrolytes, as well as some fats through her remaining IV. The fluid looks just like Mountain Dew. We joke that Emilia is already following in Shelby's footsteps!

Emilia is much more aware today, which is bittersweet. It is great that she is waking up, but she looks so uncomfortable. She cannot cry because of the breathing tube, but she can make all the same facial expressions she would if she were crying, it just comes out silently. This is heartbreaking for us, but again it all means she is healing.

I have felt surprisingly calm through this whole ordeal with our baby. Shelby and I were discussing why this is, and I think there are a multitude of reasons. For one, we have really felt everyone's prayers, and been comforted by them. I also think it is my personal blessing from Heavenly Father. The biggest reason is this. I felt inspired to have this baby, and I know she is an integral part of our family. She must come out of this OK because for whatever reason we need her.

Emilia's (and our) Big Adventure

Starting Friday, August 5th Emilia slowly started to lose her appetite. By Saturday morning we were starting to get a little concerned. After talking to the after-hour nurses at Treasure Valley Pediatrics, we decided to just watch her for the afternoon. Around 5pm she was still not interested in eating, and she had not had a wet diaper since earlier that morning. We took her to urgent care to be on the safe side. The doctor at urgent care sent us to St. Luke's in Meridian just to be on the safe side. The fact that she had not peed was cause for concern that she may be dehydrated.

Once we were at St. Luke's, the nurses tried to draw blood and put in an IV so she could get fluids. Apparently it is hard enough to find a vein in an 11-day old baby, but poor Emilia was so dehydrated, finding a vein proved to be almost impossible. After poking and prodding, the nurses finally called two transport nurse practitioners who specialize in babies. These ladies were amazing, and I felt instantly reassured with my baby in their hands. They were able to place the IV, and they decided to keep us overnight to monitor Emilia. At this point Shelby and I assumed she had a tummy ache, and they would hydrate her and send her home in the morning. Shelby stayed home with the girls and Carson and I stayed at the hospital with Emilia. Around 2am I got up to try and feed her, but she still wasn't interested. The nurse that was taking care of her noticed at this point that her breathing was labored and called the respiratory nurse. He was stumped and called the on-call pediatrician, Dr. Koplan. She immediately made the decision to send Emilia to St. Luke's in Boise to see a specialist. It was not until this point that I got nervous that something was really wrong with our baby. The same nurse practitioners that took care of Emilia in the ER transported her to Boise. In Boise they determined fairly quickly that it was her heart. This was around 5am. I finally called Shelby, which I wish I had done sooner. Watching Emilia being stuck and poked and intibated was not fun to deal with alone. Shelby called his dad who more than willingly came down to stay with the other kids. A couple of hours later they determined that Emilia most likely had a coarctation of the aorta, which is a fancy way of saying her aorta is too narrow, and her heart was having to work too hard to get blood to the rest of her body. This is why she did not want to eat. It took too much effort for her body to digest the food. While the condition is fairly common, it is not a surgery they perform in Boise, so they flew Emilia and me to SLC while Shelby drove down. And guess who transported her to SLC? The same nurse practitioners. It suddenly occurred to me that they had been on shift for close to 20 hours at this point. I asked them if they work the longest shifts ever and they told me they had grown attached to Emilia and had requested to take her. This gesture was incredibly touching to me, and only one of many very kind things people have done for us during this crisis.

Once we were in Salt Lake, we were told we would meet a lot of people, and they were not lying! The doctors and nurses have been fantastic. Michael is the nurse who has been by our side the most. He has a light hearted nature, and seems very capable.

I told Melissa Millward what was going on and word spread like wildfire. Our ward has been amazing. They have taken over our garden, chickens and home more than willingly, all the while praying for us and Emilia and even putting her name on the prayer roll at the temple. Everyone truly loves us and is concerned for us.

My dad came down to our house the morning we left to get the kids. We only had an hour to get them and us ready for this trip, knowing we would be gone at least 10 days. My dad bathed and dressed the kids for us and took them to church for the day. It turns out we have more people willing to watch our kids than we have kids! We were going to send one to Sarah, one to Summer, and one to Chris and Felicia. Summer more than willingly took Carson, and then Sarah insisted on taking both Rachel and Lilly.

Nawlene and Cody drove down from IF to SLC just to be with us during this ordeal, and have taken great care of us. Cody got us a hotel room at the Marriott for our first night here when we had no place to stay. They would both be with us at the hospital every second if we needed them to.

Sara Fry about had a heart attack when she got my message telling her what had happened and that we were going to be in SLC for a while. She went out and bought us a huge amount of fruit and other fresh food, along with snacks for Shelby. Not to mention volunteered us a place to stay while we are here for as long as we need. My cousin Jade also offered us her home. In fact she went way out of her way to contact us and let us know she would help in any way she could. I even have a friend from high school that upon hearing about our ordeal offered us his relative's homes.



On August 9th, at 1pm Emilia went in for surgery. We are anxiously awaiting the results, but have every reason to believe she will come out of it without complications. We love this little girl and want nothing more than to take her home with us very soon. They anticipate a 2 week recovery and then she will be just like new.

The "Fella-gator"

I took Emilia to the doctor for her first checkup. Everything looks great. She has lost a few ounces but other than that she is perfect. She now weighs 6lbs, 11oz and is 19.75 inches long. This puts her in the 25th and 35th percentile respectively. I forgot to bring her PKU slip so I had to take her back later that afternoon for the PKU test. When we got there Lilly said "Are we going to ride on the fella-gator?" It took me a few seconds to realize she was asking about the elevator.

Carson asked me for a drink yesterday. I told him to go upstairs and get one himself, and he did. A few moments later I heard him rustling around upstairs only to have him return with a bottle of canola oil. He was so excited because he thought he had found juice. We tried to explain to him that it was not juice but he insisted. Finally Shelby let him take a drink. Shelby asked if he liked it and the stubborn little thing nodded and asked for more!

Rachel has been into the game "what would happen if..." It is driving me crazy! In the last two minutes she has asked me the following: "What would happen if... you never drank water, you never stopped drinking water, you held onto the end of that fan and spin round and round, a bird was on the end of that fan and spins round and round, you didn't eat for one day, you didn't eat for 10 days, and you didn't eat for 100 days?" One of the problems is I am not always sure what the right answer is.

Just to once again showcase Lilly's tender heart, she has been very concerned over my treatment of Emilia. Emilia does not like her diaper changed, and cries when I do it. Lilly keeps telling me to stop it. If I don't, she plugs her ears because she can't stand to hear her little sister cry.

Baby Emilia

We are officially the proud owners of a brand new baby girl. Emilia Jean Rayl was born at 4:46pm Tuesday July 26, 2011. She is 6lbs, 14oz, with ten little fingers and ten little toes. She has a full head of dark hair and perfect skin. We love her already.

While we were in the hospital having little Emilia, our three other kids were at "cousin camp" at the Larson's house. Cousin camp is two days of cousin fun that included running through the sprinklers, playing games, swimming, and singing at the nursing home. I thought our kids would miss us more than they did. When we came to pick them up they were not quite done with the festivities. We gave Rachel and Lilly the option of coming home with the parents they had not seen in two days and a brand new baby sister, or to stay a little longer and have aunt Sarah bring them home. Neither child hesitated. Both chose to stay. My feelings were not at all hurt by this. I am just grateful for awesome family members who rallied together to make my kids feel loved while we had this baby.

Shelby brought the three kids to visit the hospital on Wednesday. All three kids were immediately enamored of little Emilia. Each one took a turn to hold her, and Rachel and Lilly had a tense argument about which one of them would change her diapers. They both seem confused about the gender of the baby. They keep calling Emilia "him". When we got to cousin camp to pick the girls up Rachel proudly gathered all the cousins together to "come see our new baby." She was a hit. Carson loves her too. He has been walking around the house saying "baby, baby, baby" ever since we got home last night. He has been very sweet with Emilia and even keeps a safe distance from her. He will look and touch, but he doesn't maul her and doesn't try to pick her up. This morning Emilia was crying while I changed her diaper and Carson even gave her his precious blanket. Rachel has been through adding babies to the family before and is adjusting fine. Lilly however has been in constant need of cuddling. I don't think she makes the connection that the reason she feels the need for extra attention is because of the baby. Within a couple of days she will be fine.

So far Emilia has been a piece of cake. Last night we headed to bed around 11pm. From 11 to almost 1am Emilia cried to be fed every few minutes. This was the first time she gave us any real trouble. Finally a little before 1, we gave her about an ounce of formula and she was out. I did not hear from her again until after 5am. I fed her again and she was out until 8am. We got some great sleep considering we have a newborn in the house!

I would like to take this time to recognize all the friends and family that have supported us over the past few days. Thanks to Summer who so willingly took all of my kids for two whole days. She can say what she wants, I know that was not easy. Thanks to Sarah for visiting me TWICE at the hospital and bringing me Blizzards. And for generally keeping an eye out for my kids at cousin camp. Thanks to everyone who called and checked up on me while I was in the hospital, and over the past few weeks as I have been getting ready to have this baby. Thanks to my boot camp friends who brought me food and checked up on me. And thanks to everyone I forgot to mention. I feel very loved.

A special thanks to my awesome husband who stayed by my side during the crazy moments of this pregnancy, and never left my side during the birth of Emilia. He has been at my side ever since. I have not had to lift a finger since Tuesday morning! There was never a husband who cared so well for his wife. I would not want to do this without him.

The "Only Child"

Last Monday Aunt Sarah called and asked if Rachel and Lilly wanted to come spend a couple of days with her and the cousins in Fruitland. I am sure her motivation was to give her very pregnant little sister a break. When she asked I thought "that is really nice of her, even though I am doing fine." We decided to plan the sleepover for Wednesday. By the time Wednesday rolled around I was thinking "I CAN'T WAIT!!!". So for two days it was just Carson and me. Boy did he eat it up. That boy has no memory of being one-on-one with a parent for more than an hour or two, and he was loving it! I loved it too, but one thing I have taken for granted up until now is how much my kids entertain each other. With no sisters, I was his sole source of entertainment. I have never had to spend so much time entertaining a two-year-old, and was not entirely sure how. I learned this. When in doubt, chase him around and wrestle him to the ground.

Rachel and Lilly had a great time with their cousins, but Rachel came home with a couple of interesting personality changes. As I have said before, Rachel looks up to her cousin Brady with a great deal of admiration. Prior to her trip to Fruitland she could eat both sour cream and ketchup by the spoonful. These are two condiments that Brady will have nothing to do with. We had nachos on Saturday and she refused the mountain of sour cream she usually eats on hers. Then on her corn dog yesterday she said "ketchup is too sour." This from the girl we usually have to monitor when it comes to ketchup consumption. Also, she is all of the sudden "too big for PBS kids" because Brady doesn't watch PBS kids. It all could be worse. If she is going to model her behavior after someone, Brady is a really good example.

Shelby was trying to get Rachel to cuddle with him on Sunday, but Rachel just wanted to tease him. Finally he gave up and went upstairs. When he left I explained to Rachel that even though dads are a lot of fun to play with, sometimes they need hugs just like moms. Lilly was listening intently and when I was finished she announced "I am going to go cuddle with daddy." I know Lilly, and I know she was worried about Shelby's feelings being hurt. So in an attempt to make him feel better, she was his best buddy the rest of the day. A couple of weeks ago, one of our baby-sitters mentioned to me in passing that they slaughtered one of their cows. The next time we had this particular baby-sitter (usually a big favorite at our house) I told Lilly "Guess what, Kayleen is coming over!" She seemed unusually serious when I told her this. After a few seconds she said "Can you tell her not to kill any more of her cows?" Lilly is just so tender-hearted.

Rachel and Lilly like to tell me things. If one starts on a story, all of the sudden the other one has something very urgent to share. It has caused many a fight at our house. Carson jumped in on this while we were eating breakfast this morning. The girls were fighting over telling me about Toy Story, when all of the sudden Carson shouted "Mom!" When I looked at him he paused for a moment trying to think of what to say, then held up his little fingers and shouted "Two!" Since he cannot really speak in sentences yet, this is the extent of his contribution to conversations.

The Substitute

Last week at church Rachel had a substitute teaching her Sunday School class. When I asked her who the substitute was, she told me "Sister Ugly." I seriously doubted her, but she insisted. "No mom, that is what she said!" Finally I let it go, but I asked someone about it the next week and they said it was Sister Dudly. I can surely see the confusion.

Speaking of Rachel, I have been taking the kids swimming quite a bit lately. They love it! We have done swimming lessons, and I really do not want them to lose what they have learned, so even though it completely wipes me out I take them as much as I can. Lilly is hesitant, and prefers to stay by the stairs where she can hold onto the edge. Rachel on the other hand is a fish. It took her a couple of times going to the pool but she is quite brave. We went with the cousins the other day, and she really kept up with the big boys. I was very proud of her.

Carson has started to use real words to try and communicate with us. This is a huge milestone, however some of his words sound exactly the same. For example "outside," "ice," and "eye" all sound like "I". "Truck" and "shoe" both sound like "chu". So it is hard to tell if he wants his "shoes" so he can go "outside", or if ran over his foot with his "truck" and needs some "ice". My very favorite thing he says is "tada!" He says it anytime he accomplishes any small task from clearing his bowl to throwing away a diaper.

One of my favorite things about Lilly is how funny she thinks everything is. She got the idea to hide under her covers when I come tuck her in. She thinks it is hilarious that I can never figure out where she is. Of course it doesn't take me long to "find" her. As soon as I say "where is Lilly?" she bursts out laughing. This has been going on every night for weeks, and she still thinks it is just hilarious. She amuses herself as well. One of her favorite things to say is "Silly me!"

Rachel can be the tiniest bit manipulative and Lilly can be a little too eager to please. This is a bad combination at times. It has come to my attention that when I send the two of them down to clean their room, Lilly cleans while Rachel tells her what to do. Rachel has convinced Lilly that this is a fair trade. I think Rachel may have even convinced herself. Yesterday I made Rachel clean the room alone and it just about killed them both. Rachel was beside herself because she did not want to do all the work, and Lilly was beside herself because she hated seeing Rachel beside herself. Lilly is generous to a fault at times. I love her for it.






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Lilly's Birthday Month

Lilly is officially four years old, and boy did we celebrate. A few weeks before her birthday we had a family birthday party with all the cousins. This birthday party set the tone for celebrating over the next few weeks. After the first party Lilly was telling anyone she could find to listen that she is now four. I would correct her and tell her she was not four yet, but she insisted. Finally her real birthday rolled around. Brock and Ian were staying at our house, and we spent the whole day doing "Lilly things". We played in the morning, then went to McDonald's for lunch. At home we ate hot dogs for dinner and roasted marshmallows outside. To make it more of a party Grandpa and Cody came over. We finished the evening off with way too many presents. But this was not the end of Lilly's birthday celebration. A few days later we had Lilly's first ever "friend" birthday party. Lilly chose a water party theme, so we just told everyone to wear their swimming suits and sent them out to play with the hose and sprinklers. Then we decorated cupcakes and did presents. All three parties were a success. Lilly deserved to have a big deal made over her. Now that Lilly is four there are two responsibilities that she must take on. The first is to stop sucking her thumb. The second is to cut her own pancakes. Anytime either of these subjects come up, Lilly goes into denial mode. She claims "But I'm not four yet!" After three birthday parties and a month of celebrating, I don't think there is a more legitimate four-year-old out there.

I woke Carson up from his nap the other day. He opened his eyes, looked up at me, and honked my nose. Carson in perpetually teasing people, and it is darn cute. One of his favorite "jokes" is to pretend to put his pants on his head. He also likes to pretend to be what I assume is a monster and chase the girls around the house while he roars. The girls love this as well. He has also started saying the blessing at meal times frequently. He mostly just repeats the last thing we say. The blessing is very important to Carson. We always say one at dinner, but frequently I forget at breakfast and lunch. Carson NEVER forgets. He always says "Mom!" until I pay attention, and then folds his arms to remind me. In fact when we have pancakes, he likes to say the blessing every time he gets a new one. I forgot how much I love a two-year-old. Everything he does cracks me up. Except when he tells me "no" which is of course his favorite new word.

Around midnight the other day, Carson woke up and decided to play. He went downstairs to enlist his sisters in his playtime. They brought him upstairs to us, and after about 20 minutes of fighting with him, we assumed he had given in and gone back to sleep. At about 2am he came into my room and took me downstairs so I could turn the TV on for him. Lilly was up as well. Apparently the two of them had been playing together for a couple of hours. Inside I thought it was cute, but I put an immediate stop to it. Both of them were a mess the next day for lack of sleep.

While I was cleaning out the office the other day, I found a rough looking framed picture of Jesus that had seen much better days. I was going to put it in the DI bag, but Rachel gave me a lecture about throwing out pictures of Jesus. She was shocked. "You can't throw away pictures of Jesus, Mom! He made this world for us and he saved the day!" This was not the end of her lecturing. Over the next few hours she kept telling me about the picture and what she was going to do with it, then she would end by saying "You can't throw away pictures of Jesus." Then when Shelby came home she told on me! "Mom was going to throw away a picture of Jesus!" I have learned my lesson, and Rachel is going to hold on to the picture for safe-keeping.

PB&J

Lilly is the peanut butter and jam queen. She would eat a peanut butter "hamich" with every meal if I would let her. She settles for one at lunch every day, but she does not take it well if it is not a lunch time option. Yesterday I started to get the bread and peanut butter out when she said to me "Mom, I don't want a peanut butter hamich for lunch." I made her repeat herself to be sure I heard her right. "Well then, what do you want?" I asked her, still a little unsure. "Umm...how bout a cheese quesedilla?" So cheese quesedilla is what we had. This may be the start of a new lunch time obsession for Lilly.

As I mentioned, Rachel is really into commercials lately. At dinner the other day, she asked me if I knew what gas tax is. I do know what a gas tax is, but I was interested to know what she thought it was. She said "you eat it, and then you don't have any gas. I saw it on TV." It did not take the two of us long to determine she meant "GasX", the anti gas medication.

The girls are really into running through the sprinklers lately. It has been an incredibly cool spring/summer, so the opportunity has been rare so far. Every day though, Rachel still asks "is it a good day to run through the sprinklers?" It could be pouring outside and she still asks. Well, today it is hot so I let them turn the sprinklers on. Carson is not sold on the whole run-through-the-sprinklers thing, but he is not one to be left out. The girls put their swimsuits on, and I asked Carson if he wanted his too. He said "Yeah! Yay!" and ran downstairs. I told Rachel to go get him and again I asked him "do you want to put your swimsuit on?" Again, his response was "Yeah!" and he tried to run away. I grabbed him and started putting his trunks on. He screamed and fought me the whole time. Once he was dressed I tried to take him outside but he was still screaming and crying and pointing to Lilly. It wasn't until he tried to take his trunks off that I realized what he wanted was a swimming suit like the girls have. Since he has no memory of wearing a boy swimming suit, the girl style one's are all he has known. I was tempted to give in and let him wear one of Lilly's, and I would have done it if it weren't for the fact that they were playing in the front yard. Who knows what the neighbors would think of me? Anyway, he got over it pretty quick once we turned the water on. At that point all of his energy went into avoiding getting wet.

College

Rachel keeps asking me if she can go to college and what they will teach her when she goes. Of course I am tickled to death that she is already contemplating college, and have tried to encourage her. Yesterday she asked me if when she grows up she can be Santa Clause. I told her I was not sure how one becomes Santa Clause, but that it was a possibility. She thought about this for a moment and asked me "Is it they teach you how at college?"

One other big thing to Rachel right now is commercials. Anything she sees on TV, she tells me about and asks if we can get it. She is especially susceptible to the marketing techniques of infomercials. In truth she is an absolute sucker. I was boiling eggs the other day when she told me she had a better way to cook eggs. She proceeded to tell me step by step how to go about it using a new gadget on TV. I pretended to think it sounded really cool.  At the end of the conversation she paused for a few seconds and said "So, can we get it?"

All Lilly has been able to talk about for the last two months is her birthday party. We are still a couple of weeks away, but had a family birthday party for her, Brock, Owen, and Lidia on Sunday. She told me all she wanted for her birthday was a dress and a doll. Nonna covered the dress, and all the aunts and uncles went in on the doll. It was newborn looking doll complete with baby carrier. She named it Allison Wonderland. Lilly loves the doll, but she is generous to a fault, and her big sister takes advantage of this any chance she gets. No sooner did everyone leave than Rachel talked Lilly into letting the doll sleep in her room so Lilly can "get some rest." I put a stop to that and sent the doll back to Lilly, but Lilly stuck up for her sister. "No, no, mom! She is going to keep her so I can rest!" I guess Rachel was very convincing.

Having the baby doll around has been fun for Carson too. He carries it around every chance he gets, and if it is lying alone somewhere he makes a point of picking it up and giving it to Lilly. Carson has also officially added the word "baby" to his growing list. As tender as Carson can be, he can also be pretty rough. If there are big boys around he alternates between staring at them adoringly and punching them in the face. Oh, and he thinks that anything an older boy does is hilarious. I am so thankful for the big boys in my life who set good examples (shout out to my nephews)!

The Meat Cat

We had chicken for dinner again much to Lilly's dismay last night. While I was preparing it she asked me "is it a girl chicken or a boy chicken?" I said "I am not sure, but I think it is a boy chicken." Lilly said "Yes!" along with a fist pump. I guess she has decided eating boy chickens is OK. When we bought the chickens as chicks, we always referred to them as "meat chickens". A while after we clarified the sex of this particular chicken, she came in with what she thought was very exciting news. She kept telling me something about our cat that I did not understand, and then as a grand finale she said "so we don't need to eat the cat because it is not a meat cat!" I guess Lilly now thinks all of our pets are in danger of getting the axe.

While we were getting in the car yesterday, I told Rachel very sternly that she needed to hurry and get buckled up because we were late. She said cheerfully "well, then I better get my fastness on!" I am assuming getting your fastness on is like getting your groove on. Rachel is getting too cool for her own good.

Carson loves toy cars, trucks, and tractors. He calls them his "che". I am not sure what that is supposed to be, but he is always saying "Che! Che!" when he sees these toys. When he plays with them he runs them into each other and says "whooo, whooo..." He is such a boy. We can now get him to stay in his big boy bed for the most part, but last night he came into our room while we were sleeping. I had just gotten back to sleep after caring for a throwing up Lilly, and was pretty out of it. I only vaguely remember telling him to go back to bed. That was the last I thought of it until later I awoke with a start. Somehow I knew bed was not the place he ended up. I was right. He was in the kitchen opening and closing cupboard doors. I have no idea how long he was playing unsupervised, but I am guessing he had a very good time.

I love it when my kids play outside together. For the most part. Tuesday is my clean the house day, and yesterday I worked it over good. Then today while the kids were outside playing they covered themselves in slimy mud. I would love to be the kind of mom that laughs it off, but all I could think was "oh, my nice clean bathtub," and "now I have to do MORE laundry." Then I had an idea. My parents used to hose us down after a long day of playing outside to avoid tracking mud and dirt into the house. So even thought it was only about 60 degrees out there, I had them strip down while I squirted them with the hose (much to Rachel's delight, Lilly's indifference, and Carson's dismay). Maybe it will be a deterrent the next time they want to play in the mud...but probably not.

Our Over-The-Hill Party

Our neighbors had a yard sale today, so I gave the girls each a dollar and told them they could buy whatever they wanted. Lilly chose 4 toys that were .25 each: A kazoo, a guitar key chain, a Dr. Seuss puzzle, and a wand. Rachel chose a bag of over-the-hill party favors. The mother in me wanted to talk her out of it, thinking it would be disappointing and less practical than a toy, but the free spirit I try to be at times decided to back off and let her make her choice. Turns out she picked a great item. The kids spent the afternoon playing with the decorations. Shelby and I were planting the garden when they came out and told me they had a surprise for me. I went up to find a nicely set table with over-the-hill napkins, plates, and forks, along with matching confetti and a banner. We had ourselves a little over-the-hill lunch party.

I think Lilly might be a future vegetarian. A while back we got meat chickens to raise and butcher. We thought it would be a good experience for the kids, and it was. However, Lilly was traumatized when she realized we were killing the baby chicks. Of course when we actually got around to killing them they were big, ugly chickens, but she was still upset. We tried to be subtle when we did the butchering, but inevitably she would catch wind of what was going on and lose it. "Please dad, don't kill the baby chicks, don't kill the baby chicks!" Lilly feels this way about all living things, ants and worms included. The other day we had pork for dinner and she said she wasn't having any because she didn't want to eat the baby chicks. I explained that the meat we were eating was not chicken, but that it came from a pig. BIG mistake! Apparently Lilly is just as opposed to eating Wilbur as she is to eating chickens. She would go nowhere near the pork. Tonight we had pork again, but I made a point of referring to it as pork, and not pig meat. She ate it right up.

Carson is turning into a mini Shelby. He is so darn cute about it, too. When Shelby is in the garden, or mowing the lawn, Carson likes to be right there. We were at the park the other day, and he kept pulling his sleeves up, just like Shelby does. He will also stand at the back door with his arms folded across his chest while looking out the window (one of Shelby's nighttime traditions). And while he is walking around the yard he does it with hands-on-hips, as though he is inspecting everything, just like Shelby does. When we pull into the driveway at night or into the parking lot at CCS, Carson always shouts "Daddy!" And anytime Shelby walks out the door without inviting Carson along, Carson flips. He is still indisputably a mamma's boy, but he is crazy about his daddy.

Eye Water

Lilly was telling me about a dream she had that was scary. She told me she cried, and then she paused for as moment before saying "and my eye water came out." Apparently we have never discussed tears before, which is funny considering how often they get shed around our house.

Rachel and Lilly were having a hot debate about boogers while we were driving to karate. I heard Rachel tell Lilly "and you can eat boogers." I was instantly filled with dread "oh, no" I thought, "Rachel is going to be known as the bugger-eater!" We have focused a lot in our house on nose-picking, and when it is not appropriate, but never discussed the fact that one should NEVER eat their boogers. I hollered back to her "No Rachel, we do not eat boogers." She responded innocently "why? I like them!" Lilly, not wanting to be left out of the conversation said "Can we eat burgers?" "Yes Lilly, you can eat all the burgers you want. Just no boogers!"

Felicia and Chris had their baby. They stopped by our house a couple of days after with baby Jude so the kids could meet him. Of course Lilly and Rachel loved him, and were thrilled at having a little baby at our house. I was curious as to how Carson would do with little Jude. Although Carson is pretty tender, he is not as maternal as the girls are. I asked him if he wanted to hold the baby and he said "yeah!" We sat him down and put Jude in his arms and Carson was mesmerized. He would give Jude kisses and stroke his face. After a couple of minutes I asked if we could give Jude back to Felicia, and he gave me a decisive "no." I tried again a couple of minutes later and the answer was once again "no." I don't think he took his eyes off the baby until we gave him back to Felicia.

The Baby Shower

I took the kids to the store with me to pick up some ingredients for a cake I was making. The cake was for Aunt Felicia's baby shower. When Rachel asked me what we were getting I said "stuff for Felicia's baby shower." Rachel looked confused and asked "is it you are going to buy her baby a shower?"

On Wednesday night Lilly had a horrible cough. We could hear her hacking in her sleep. Eventually she came upstairs to our room crying. I cuddled her and gave her a drink while she tried to explain her chest hurt and she couldn't breathe. Then I put her back to bed. A few minutes later, we could still hear her crying downstairs. It was heartbreaking! I brought her upstairs and put her on the couch to sleep. I was rubbing Vick's Vapor Rub on her chest and telling her how sorry I was that she didn't feel good when she said "It's OK mom, I think I am going to be just fine!"

Rachel had to get shots for Kindergarten yesterday. She knew that was why we were going to see the doctor, but was strangely excited about it. When she asked me questions about what it was like, I was honest but not too descriptive. I think all she absorbed from her questions was that I would take her out for ice cream afterwards. This is all Lilly absorbed too because for days she has been whining that she wants shots too. Just Rachel and I went to the appointment, and while we were waiting at the doctor's office I asked her if she was scared. She looked at me like "why would I be scared?" She got a total of three shots, two in one leg and one in the other. After the first shot she gave me a shocked look and started to cry. After the second one, the nurse switched to the other side, and Rachel lost it. She became hysterical and screamed "No! No more shots!" The nurse quickly gave her the last shot before Rachel bolted off the table. Poor Rachel was inconsolable. I think mostly her feelings were hurt that her mother and this nice lady would do something so awful to her. On the way out, she just kept saying "I wish we hadn't done that." It was pretty heart breaking. I got her the world's biggest vanilla milk shake knowing she would never be able to finish it. Mostly I got it out of guilt for subjecting her to so much torture. When we got home, she assured Lilly that getting shots was NOT fun, and she should not look forward to it in the future.

It is beautiful outside today, so I took the kids for a walk. There is an older couple named Paul and Marylin who live on the street by ours. I often see them walking in the morning while I am out running, but they have never met the kids. They were outside when we walked by so we went to say "hi". Carson immediately ran up to Paul and put his arms up to be picked up. Something about older men really appeals to Carson. I am sure it made Paul's day. In fact, mostly I think it makes people feel good. The only concern I have about his friendliness is that it would be very easy for someone to walk off with him.

A Regular Lady

On Mother's Day I asked Rachel what she wants to be when she grows up and she told me "I just want to be a regular lady." I asked what a regular lady is and she said "someone who is just home with her kids. I am going to have three and name them Rachel, Carson, and Lilly. And I am going to let them play all day and be loud and I will never get mad at them." I told her that I hope she has really well behaved children. I can see why she finds that life so appealing. What five-year-old would not want to stay home all day and play with other kids, especially when said five-year-old can be the boss?
Last night, the girls were giving us the business about going to bed. Lilly often gets out of bed when Rachel beckons her and goes into Rachel's room to play. Rachel's idea is that as long as Lilly is the one out of bed, she can't get in trouble. Her response to "Girls, go to bed!" is always "I'm in bed, Lilly isn't." We called Lilly into the living room last night and I told her if she didn't go to bed I would spank her bottom. Shelby said "and after she spanks you, I will spank you." Lilly seemed completely unaffected by the threat when she looked at me and said "Daddy spanks hard and you don't." Now that I know, I will work on it.

Carson loves to listen to music with me on the computer. It is our cuddle time. Lately every time I either sing or move to the music he says "noooo!" I wonder if I should be concerned that my 2-year-old already finds me to be embarrassing. Carson has added "ball" to his regular list of words. He still mostly says "no," "yeah," and "please". Occasionally we get a "Lilly," "up," and "daaady!"