Blame it on the baby

My hands have been full and my head has been fuzzy. And, lets face it - I'd rather wallow in my disaster of a house and eat several ice cream cones in a row than use my last ounce of mental clarity on the computer. And by mental clarity I mean the ability to put on clean clothes.

So, I blame the baby. But now that she is a whopping 2 months old I've been commanded in no uncertain terms to give pictures and updates (ie. brag a whole lot)of the new one and the old ones.

So, we had a baby on July 18. Emily Michelle (middle name in honor of my awesome sister of glory) was 7 lbs some ounces and was more than 15 inches long. I'm too lazy to look it up. (That's why blogging drains me.) What I do remember with perfect clarity is that I felt wonderful right up until I vomited 7 times. And that Emily is perfect. Perfect!

She nursed right from the start which took away a huge possible emotional stress. She has lots of dark hair and still has blue eyes! This may seem unusual but there are MANY close relatives with strikingly blue eyes. She is very mellow and has yet to succumb to Jacob's many attempts to push her to a nervous breakdown. I think. She sleeps well, but that only means that she goes back to sleep after feedings in the wee hours. (I don't know why they're called "wee" hours. They feel pretty long to me. The waking hours. The sleepy ones are nanoseconds.) Emily likes to stare at the ceiling fan, cuddle and to get her diaper changed. She likes bath time and LOVES her Daddy. She likes me too but in the same way that I love the refrigerator. Which is quite a lot.

Annika and Jacob have been wonderful with her. At least Annika has. They both adore her and always want to hold her. Ironically, she is safest when Jacob is holding her because it means that he's not headbutting, kicking, squeezing, pulling, spitting (yes, spitting) yelling, poking, etc. Annika will sit with her for a long time just staring into her eyes. When Emily is crying Annika likes to comfort her with a sweet rendition of Home Home on the Range. If Emily cries louder, Annika sings louder. If Annika sings louder, Jacob shouts louder. I usually step in at this point.

Jacob is potty-training and doing very well. He jumped right in (no pun intended, he just sometimes literally jumps right in. With his head.) He went straight from diapers all the time to being completely diaper free day and night. This is mostly successful and we just make sure we have extra sheets and blankets and oddly enough, pillows.

Annika started her second year of preschool and starts a ballet class at the rec center today. She has been talking about it for a while. 2 years is a while, right? Unfortunately, the regular dance class was canceled so I had to sign her up for a "Disney Princess" ballet class. Girls (and boys, I suppose) can wear their favorite dresses and dance to their hearts content. Until they trip or the sleeves fall down to far or they trip again. I REALLY did not intend to sign up for this class but Annika was pretty upset about not being able to take a class, but even she knows that its lame. Its not even "princess ballet." Its "Disney Princess" ballet. I wonder if they get royalties. No pun intended that time either. Anyhoo, she's going to wear her leotard/tutu outfit and be the best one there. Suck it Belle! (Actually, we have a Belle dress. And a Little Mermaid dress. And Disney Princess paraphenalia all over the house. Hypocrite, I know.)

So, incoherency over. Here, in absolutely no particular order, are the pictures you really want! (Thanks ElizaB for the superhero and baby and Daddy shots!)

Lost interest there for a while.

So....

Rough pregnancy, lots of doctor visits, lots of pain and now gestational diabetes. Blech. Our current, and probably permanent mantra is "three sounds good." Baby is fine, though, so that's most important. Another bright side is that its been bad enough to justify my hiring a college kid in our ward to come help clean. That will be a hard luxury to give up.

Annika cut her own hair yesterday. We'll go get it fixed this morning. It doesn't look good. Think less than an inch in the front. Ironic since she'll be singing a Rapunzel song in next week's Primary talent show.

Jacob talks like a 3 year old. That might be a slight exaggeration, but not by much. He also likes to lift up my shirt to look at my belly. We're not always alone when he does this. He stopped sleeping well for a few weeks that felt like years and John was actually sleeping on his floor for a while out of sheer exhaustion.

John works really hard to make up for my inability and is pretty much a saint. He planted 102 flowers, 6 tomato plants, 6 cilantro plants and mowed the lawn in one day and a few days later hurt his back. Glad he did all the manual labor first. The back injury meant that neither of us were much use for a good week and had to take turns with the heat pack.

Highlight of the past 6 weeks (or 5 years) was our trip to Hawaii. Without the kids. Lets just say that it was heaven and desperately needed! I'll sum it up with this description: whale watching in bed. Yes, we actually saw whales at 6am from our bed.

Happily, during what has been a difficult time, we are surrounded with a legion of friends who bring dinner, take kids over and over and generally make life happy. We have sweet and relatively easy kids and feel really blessed. We also just happen to feel pretty crappy. But spiritually and emotionally happy overrules physically and emotionally drained everyday.

I'll post pictures of before and after haircuts and heavenly Hawaii next time, and by next time, I mean sometime in the future!

Its a girl!

We had our ultrasound last Friday and saw our little girl! We saw her rocking back and forth as though she was sitting in a rocking chair and she was contemplating sucking her thumb, but giving it some thought. We were completely open to either gender but we were excited to be able to come home and tell Annika that all her hopes and prayers worked. She is pretty excited and likes to ask if she can come talk to the baby. She also informed us that the baby's name is Ariel and that she has 3 nicknames: Emily and Sara, which are the top two contenders and Miriam. So, she's been very generous to us.

Nothing particular

President's Day was celebrated by making raspberry oreo ice cream in our new ice cream maker (thanks Uncle Wally!) And, with a trip to the pediatrician so that Jacob could have the blue play-do extracted from deep within his ear canal. (Annika puts a blob of play-do on her forehead and says, "look, i'm a egypt girl" and I say, "do you mean like the girl in Jungle Book?" and she says "yes" and I say, "I think she's from India" because when putting pink blobs of play-do on our forehead, we need to be respectful of the appropriate culture. Anyway, I think that Jacob was taking the cue from Annika, putting play-do in various facial locales.)

In new baby news, we'll find out gender on Friday and I've started to feel the first tiny flutters of movement. If pure will power has anything to do with it, Annika has willed this child into being a girl!

And in joyful, exciting news... (no, not as exciting as a new baby) John and I are going to Maui! BY OURSELVES!!!!!!!!! My saintly sister is taking kids for the week and John and I will rest and explore and rest and walk and sit and swim and rest by ourselves! We love our children, of course, most dearly, but nary a day passes when we don't take a deep breath and smile at each other and say, "Maui!" We normally couldn't have brought ourselves to splurge like this, but we realize that after baby #3 comes, a chance to get away by ourselves for a week might not come again for years. Thanks Michelle!!!

I'll post some pictures tomorrow!

Thoughtful

I've been seeing the chiropractor (and her massage therapist!!!) for some issues I've been having, much to my relief and almost as much to John's. He's been very loving and giving me frequent shoulder and neck rubs. Apparently, in a sleepy attempt to return the kindness, he woke up the other (early) morning to me sleepily rubbing his temple. He asked me if I wanted mine rubbed (assuming that I either consciously or unconsciously wanted the massage) and I said no, thanks. I was just so glad I could help him.

The thing is, I totally remember this, in a sleepy haze-like way. But, in my version, he asked me to rub his temples and I was just lovingly caring for him.

My freshman roommate woke up in the middle of the night leaning over me in my bed with her extra blanket in her hands. She was tucking me in because in her dream I was cold and needed the extra blanket. When she woke over her sleeping roommate, she sheepishly took the blanket back and climbed back into her own bed.

Another friend on our freshman floor woke up behind our other friend's door. That friend who was awake had been washing her bed before finally going to sleep at midnight or so. She started to close her door to find a sleepy and confused Tanya standing there. "Tanya, what are you doing?" Thinking quick, "I'm...uh...playing hide and seek." And she ran back to bed.

Jacob

Jacob will be 2 on next week. He speaks better than any 2 year old I've ever known. I re-read old blog entries and read that at the same age Annika was learning to put 2 words together. Annika is very verbal and articulate, so I was surprised to see that Jacob was so far advanced. He can put 7, 8, 9 words together and pretty much have a real conversation with you.

"Good morning Jacob!"
"G'morni Mommy."
"Did you sleep well"
"Yeth. I hada good sleep. Need a new diaper please."
"Should we go downstairs and get some milk?"
"Yeth! I like it milk! I want it please some milk!"

Anyway, he's fun to talk to and hear a budding sense of humor as well. Unfortunately, the barest hint of a song from me or from John earns us a "no singing!" from him, although Jacob loves to sing himself. He also loves to dance with Annika or with John and me while he's in our arms. He is very good at somersaults but he doesn't have great spatial judgement and more often than not, he bangs into something or rolls off the bed or couch. He runs with his back hunched over and his arms pumping. He is starting to hit, which is not entertaining but he's paying back Annika for lots of her abuse. He loves playing with friends, tractors, trains, planes, helicopters, and cars. But mostly friends and trains. He also loves to be outside, which is kind of too bad right now in our rainy Oregon winter. Its also too bad as his mother has been stuck on the couch for 3 months. Yes, 3 months. I'm supposed to feel better now, but I'm still waiting.

What? Yes, I'm pregnant. Most of you probably already know by now, but I'm due July 23. I'm really excited and I would show it if standing up didn't make the room spin and me feel as though... Well, you know.

I know this post is called "Jacob", but one funny thing about Annika. She likes to read scriptures with us and she wants to go first. An example of her reading: "And Jesus tells us to nice to each other and we want to be nice to each other and He helps us remember Him and we always be nice to each other. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen." (Which is how we end our prayers.)

Or: "And Jesus tells us to pray and come to church and to pray together and to say amen and to be nice to each other so we all want to be nice to each other and in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen."

Then, one of us will start reading and she is not quite as interested.

Also, her prayers at night or mealtimes lately go something like this: "And help Mommy will grow a baby healthy and strong in her tummy and it will be a sister."

Someone else can be funny today

"Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes."

— Jack Handey

Pictures

I know this is all you really want.

Righteous food

"I don't like the green beans. They are too righteous to me."

"What does that mean?"

"I don't know."