Write as Rain

I had plans of relaxing on the couch in the late afternoon while J was napping and S was sufficiently entertained by grabbing tufts of balled-up paper. Instead, I spent some time in my messy journal. It was very enjoyable to dream and reflect for an hour. At this point in my life, spending sixty whole minutes on journal writing is quite a luxury. Turning inward for awhile was just what I needed--spinning plans and reflecting on life. Now, with the back of my mind cleared of all the clutter and my latent ideas percolating in organized bliss, I feel content. Shortly (about five more minutes) I will be required to resume the life of crazed spinning--revolving from one thing to the next with barely room to breathe. I think that soaking in thoughts is like walking in the rain: It makes you feel right again. I guess I am feeling grateful for reflective time and thankful for a life full of liveliness as well. If only I could carve out time for yoga each week....ah....then my life would unfold into a lovely balance.

October Blew By

I've been a bit silent on my blog lately due to the enormous busyness of the month of October but we are all going strong with only a few minor mishaps here and there. Adam was sick, the kids were sick, I was sick and every week there was something unexpected to handle so blogging took a back-seat. Mostly our home has been a landing pad for family members visiting; giving me the enjoyable ability play-up how every gathering is now termed October-fest something-or-other..... I created my own event title called: Family Visit October-Fest '09 because it's simply not all that common for us to have house guests for an entire month. It needed to be remarked upon in some way. I briefly considered having t-shirts made and passing them out as each family member left to return to the Mid-west but then I realized that the only person in my family likely to wear said t-shirt is my brother and he didn't visit us in October (hoping for December Nate!)

I've also been very preoccupied with babies: both my own--BTW, I don't ever plan to relinquish the term baby in relation to Jackson even though he's almost three--he will always be my baby. Generally speaking, I call both J and S my babies. Of course, Skye is THE BABY in our house and he knows it-- that child is a serious advocate of attachment parenting--as long as he is being held and his mama is in sight, he's happy. Otherwise he's happy if Daddy has him in the baby bjorn or some other family member is rocking him and if not, well then he's not-so-happy. Anyway, besides my life revolving around my own babies, two lovely friends of mine gave birth this past month and another is about to go through the birth dance in November and another soon after that in December.... so the bounty of babies in my life is never-ending (to my great delight).

I've also made tentative steps towards resuming my path to doula certification, although in a very marginal way. Finishing doula certification continues to be the least pressing goal in my life but I am no less interested in the attempt even if I have very little ability to devote my sole focus on the effort. Hostessing a doula book club meeting at my house this past month was really fun and went over pretty well. Having four women in my home to discuss birth over a five hour period of time(not everyone arrived at the same time) was my idea of a fabulous break from my normal Saturday routine. I realized how much I miss talking with other ladies who enjoy the nitty-gritty and all the other particulars of birth (and yes, not everyone likes to talk about the details of birth but I've discovered a few kindred spirits in this area). I am hopeful that our doula book club will continue in a way that allows me to attend more regularly and that my path into practicing this trade will become clear to me.

Now I will turn to making note of tid-bits of my kids' lives for posterity purposes. J is LOVING preschool, which is fantastic. He talks often of all the activities he is able to do (baking bread, puppet play, story time are fav's). His teacher mentioned that he often organizes his little friends into specific games called Ride the Choo Choo Train and Dump Truck Time. He also likes to cook up meals for his teacher to taste; filling bowls of mush and offering them to her each morning for a "second breakfast" which she finds amusing. The child is pure joy in bundle of exuberant energy. He has also lost his fear of swings and is now considering swinging a most excellent way to spend outside play time...although he still needs a push as the whole leg-pumping concept as a form of independence and height has not quite dawned on him yet. He is certainly very coordinated and capable of leg-pumping but prefers to be pushed as part of the play (this includes requesting the swing pusher to give under-dogs and arm-pit tickles while swinging). He is such a social child and is quite popular among his little preschool class (J & his little friends run up to each other and once they are within a half inch of each others faces they yell adorable greetings). One or another sweet child jumps with excitement upon seeing J and runs over to say HI JACKSON! LET'S PLAY! when we arrive to his room. Once I have his indoor slippers on his feet, he is off scampering away with a wave to me saying "By mommy, I wuv you." It's quite possibly the best decision we ever made to research Waldorf education and pay for him to go to this school.

Skye is continuing to attempt crawling (army crawl is still the modus operandus) and will sway back-and-forth on all fours before plopping back down to an army crawl position. He seems to enjoy food in a general sense(peas are a no-go but acorn squash was a big hit). His introduction into solids has not slacked his desire to nurse at all. This is all new to me since J was so different at this stage of development and I often feel like a first-time parent (consulting books on food introduction and teething's influence on nursing). Teething in the past few weeks has been quite difficult. He has one tiny little tooth on his bottom gums which seemed to take an enormous amount of pain and effort (poor darling). Now he is working on cutting another tooth directly next to the first one. All in all, I am very content that Skye seems to be quite a happy, healthy little baby. Oh and his eyes are still blue-- just like his daddy's. I don't recall when J's changed from blue to hazel....but it seems like they did around this age which makes me think that Skye might keep his blue eyes. If you will follow me along on a tangent as I digress about polytypic genetics--evolutionary biologists have now traced the genetic link for blue eyes back to a common ancestor....which means that everyone with blue eyes is related--in an evolutionary sense, anyway. End tangent. Time will tell if Skye baby keeps his baby blues or not but I find it really fun to see the changes (physical/developmental) as my children grow.

Well that seems to be enough of an update for now. Adam has requested to be ignored in my blogging and facebook world (he's very private) so that's the reason for no newsy bits on his/our life. October is gone and I am ready for the festive/holiday season to begin--Thanksgiving break can't come soon enough for me!
Photos Below: Adam with Skye in the Bjorn, Grammy Rose giving J an Underdog on the swings, Pops holding a sleepy Skye baby, Grandma Penny with the boys and I at the zoo, Adam's younger sister Katie & I

Kitchen Karma

Two of my favorite things to do are bake goodies in my kitchen and dance in the rain in my garden. Happily, this week I was able to do both and J was equally excited about these activities. First, we made strawberry bread together. J is a fantastic sous-chef; he takes directions well and normally does the busy work involved in assembling the dry ingredients. However, not coincidentally coinciding with his two year birthday, he has gradually been working on a burgeoning independence which seems to be peaking at the half-way point to his three year birthday. In other words, lately he has decided it might be more fun to be the Head-Chef. However, someone who thinks that breaking an egg into the batter includes the fractured pieces of the shell, generally does not get promoted from sous chef to head chef! So, after we baked the bread, I gave him a set of unused bowls and utensils to pretend bake with and promoted him to Head-chef. He assumed the role with great authority. I graciously demoted myself to sous chef and found the role to be fun. J instructed me: "Now, OK, mommy-- you pour this into here (he hands me the measuring cup full of air and points to the empty bowl). I do as instructed. He assesses the empty air in the measuring cup and the pretend batter and says "That was very helpful; Thank you." Then he says: "OK, next, let me see... what do the papers tell us?" (he looks at the pretend recipe which in point of fact, was a blank piece of paper except for a corner where he smeared water color over the edge). Once he is sure of the next step, he says "OK, now, Mommy we stir-- here's a spoon. (he hands me a wooden spoon) I say "So, what are we making today Chef?" and he says "Cookies! You like chocolate-chip?" and I agree, chocolate chip cookies are pretty nice, even pretend ones. We commence pretend baking and he says "Mommy, stop now. It is time for the oven.... wait, wait, until you smell it. Then you know it's tasty!" It was pretty fun to reverse roles (especially for J) and cute to hear the language he has picked up from our baking experiences.

Also on the menu this week was a mixed-berry tart (which ended up being a pie instead of my original plan of separating it into tarts). The origin of this idea was not a happy one. I awoke to find that the freezer had not been closed all the way the night before and all of the food was half-way thawed. This included a large bag of free-range chicken breasts that I promptly threw away in fear of salmonella poisoning and the neatly lined-up 6 oz bags of breast milk, which I could not bring myself to throw away immediately because it represented more than nutrients made especially for baby S. It represented freedom for me to leave the house without fear of my infant starving while I'm away. Ugh, this was quite upsetting, to say the least, but when life gives you lemons.....my mom always said you should make lemonade. And when your freezer holds seven bags of organic frozen fruit, now cozily floating in mostly juice, don't lament the state of them, make a mixed-berry pie! So that is what I did and the pie crust recipe I used is the best I've found online to date. I highly recommend it. Go here to find the recipe: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/cooking-live/sweet-dough-for-pies-and-tarts-recipe/index.html
J's favorite shape is a star, so in honor of his fascination of all things celestial, I cut out a star and plopped it on top of the berry pie. His reaction was delightful..."A star...for me, mommy? YUM!" We had a very home-spun baking week that culminated in chicken noodle soup (flavored with rosemary from the prolific bush in our garden). Adam insists that J became sick (and in need of home-made noodle soup) because I let him dance in the rain (in his underwear). I admit to the possibility, but I'm partial to the idea that it's more likely he picked something up at preschool. Anyway, our boy is on the mend already (yay) after a week in which I was feeling very much like a 1950's housewife (without the manic quest for cleanliness--I can't change my colors that much). Next week's agenda will be more like 1970's first-wave feminism....I promised to model a balance to my children... Adam will be doing our laundry while I get some work done. :) Until next time....Ciao-ciao!

This Company Rules

Each week someone gets to win one of these awesome bikes..... all you have to do is post a link and you are in the running! Sweet eh?

Poetry

In J's preschool bag, W. put this hand-written poem:

The wishes of the soul are springing,
The deeds of the will thriving.
The fruits of life are maturing.
I feel my fate,
My fate finds me.
I feel my star,
My star finds me,
My goals in life are finding me.
My soul and the great World are one.
Life grows radiant about me,
Life grows more arduous for me,
Grows more abundant within me.

--Rudolf Steiner

Isn't that lovely? :)

More J-Talk

Scene: Sitting at the kitchen table with J in his high chair (we have not transitioned to a booster seat yet) & S on my lap while eating our lunch.

S began to get fussy & since I had only taken two bites of my own lunch before this happened Adam came over and picked S up to bounce him in his arms. I said, "I think S is tired and wants to go down for a nap." So, Adam starts heading to the bedroom with S. At this point J decided he needed to "coach" Adam on how to put S down for a nap. It was mighty funny!

J said "Daddy, don't forget to sing Lullaby!" and Adam replied "OK, I'll make sure."(side note: Adam plays music on his guitar for the boys before bed sometimes but, to my knowledge, has never sang a lullaby). Then J said "Daddy, don't forget to say I wuv you!" This made Adam and I smile indulgently and Adam said "OK, I won't forget!" Then J said "Daddy, don't forget to give S a kiss." Then he blew a kiss toward Adam and S...spitting out most of his tortilla in the process. It was really gross and really funny at the same time. What a good big brother he has become!

Conversations with J

A few things I want to get down in print before I forget them:

J has been greeting me with "phrases" that I've obviously previously used to greet him when he wakes up in the morning. They make me laugh with glee! He is the reason I start my day with a joyful smile. Here are some examples of the refrains he's been throwing out:

On Monday
Me: Good Morning
J: Good morning, buddy! (this one is my favorite)

On Tuesday
Me: Good Morning
J: Hi, Sweetie

On Wednesday
Me: Good Morning
J: (in a sing-song voice)Good Morning to you, bright sun is shining, then he giggled. This is from a song my mom used to sing to me as a child and I've only sang it to him a few times, smart little monkey! It goes like this:
Good morning to you,
good morning to you.
We're all in our places, with bright shining faces....
Is this not the way, to start a new day?

On Thursday
Me: Good Morning darling, how did you sleep?
J: eh, kinda grumpidity mommy

(Friday is tomorrow so I'll have to update what he says at the end of the week a little later)
*Update.
On Friday
Me:Good morning Cheeky Child
J: Where's the Nukie go? Mommy, you help me find it? (straight to work on friday, not even a Hi Buddy to start my day. Oh well)

This child just fills my heart with warmth. Could I enjoy greeting anyone in the morning more than him? I don't think so.

Oh, ALSO today when he sat down for breakfast I asked him what he wanted....and he said "pinecone." We have a pine cone on our mantle that we brought down from our last mountain hiking trip and he sometimes likes to play with it so, I went over and picked up the pine cone and dropped it on his tray. Then I said, "Are you going to play with the pine cone while I make your breakfast?" He scrunched his forehead and said. "No, Mommy, pinecone juice."
Then I said, "What?"
Then he said "I want pinecone juice!"
Then it dawned on me that he was requesting Pineapple juice. Ha! Of course, we don't regularly have pineapple juice so I said, "Baby, we don't have any pineapple juice, how about just plain apple juice?"
Then he said "That would be delicious. Thank you."
We have been working on table manners. I was very proud!

He also pulls out the polite manners in some really funny situations. He had to get his last meningitis shot this week at the doctor's office. When the nurse asked him to lay down on the table he looked at her, summoned his most elegant pronunciation, and said "No, Thank You. You go away NOW!" It was so funny that the nurse burst out laughing. Then Jackson looked at me, hoping I would throw the nurse out and we could get back to playing and I said "It's time to be brave, my love." After the shot he raced down the hall to pick out a lolly pop(something he never gets to eat at home). While we were walking out to the car, he was all smiles and seemed to think the shot for the lolly pop was a pretty fair trade. When we arrived home he said "Mommy, I was brave and I got a yummmy-nummy! I wanna show daddy." He is the picture of an adorable, happy child and I'm so blessed to enjoy moments like these!

Ahhh, the simple delights of a 2.5 year old are endless. Sometimes they need to be documented for posterity!