Important Guests… September 22, 2007

I realized yesterday that I have the three most important guests that I will ever host in my home Right Now!

They are 5, 3, and 1. They liked my home so well that they just decided to stay, given, they didn’t know how to walk, so leaving would have been rather difficult, but seriously, these boys, these crazy, sand-covered, bug-loving, silly-story-telling boys, sweet wonderful boys are the very most important guests that I will ever have the privilege of hosting in my home.

September 13, 2007

If I had to illustrate my boys’ personalities, I would do so with the following:

1. The Captain… off exploring, and keeping the ship in line

2. The Adventurer… curiously running up to the edge of the cliff, and then cautiously calculating, until he makes a decision, and then it is all or nothing.

3. The Caboose… never one to be left behind, anxiously keeping up, my littlest guy often finds himself going in the same direction as his brothers, but not usually on the same track.

They are wonderful and sweet, and about as easy to keep up with as a fish in the water.

Bugs January 20, 2007

There is nothing quite like boys and bugs.

When Conner was two, he found a dead bumble bee on our back steps. He thought that it was sleeping, so he went and got him a little blanket. When the poor little bumble bee didn’t wake up, he thought maybe he was thirst, so he got a cup, filled it with water, and poured it all over the little bee, and then covered him back up with his little blanket. He wasn’t a big talker, but we understood and watched the whole thing. At nap time, we carefully helped the baby bumble bee to ‘fly away.’ We were so proud of his compassion, and he was so proud that he had found and helped the little bee. The depth of his sweet,thoughtful actions did not miss our gaze or our encouragement.

He has gone onto capture countless lady bugs (which he used to call butterflies), and even let a snail or two crawl on his hand. Last summer he found a dragonfly in the swimming pool. We carefully fished him out, though when he finally dried off, he flew right into my face and land back in the pool again.

I think that one of the funnest things about having boys is how much time they will spend carefully bending over some little ant or rolly polly, or if they are really lucky a praying mantis. They watch so quietly capturing each move, each little detail, until it turns and crawls, walks, slithers or hops their way, and then they run with all the furry in the world, laughing with squeamish uncertainty, endlessly relaying stories about how a worm “all most got me!” Oh I cannot wait until winter is passed and it is bug-watching time again!

Joy January 15, 2007

It was a Monday. Not that this fact has any significance, but it was a Monday. We’d played games, watched a cartoon, done 3 loads of laundry, changed the sheets, and made it half way through a megalith stack of papers. The family room was strewn with random books, a gigantic pile of old magazines, which my boys were cutting into tiny pieces. There was an overflowing pile of laundry on the couch, and a vast array of paper stacks. Sprinkled all about the mess were little yellow chunks of play dough. I had spent 24 minutes on hold while making mac and cheese, only to be hung up on by the “Customer Representative.” He probably heard the mayhem in the background and decided he’d really rather not take my call. But I digress.

We gobbled up lunch, just in time for nap time. But half an hour passed, and found my littlest guy fed and sleeping. My bigger boys (2&4) were having a marvelous time scooping water in and out of a pan in the sink. I was making chocolate chip cookies, only because my chocolate craving was so fierce that I was about to eat the whole bag of chips, and I figured it was now or never on the cookies. An hour later, my boys were washed and changed into their Spiderman suits, and we danced around the living room, waiting for the cookies to cool. We munched and laughed, and nap time finally arrived, with out any argument, 2 hours later than it normally did.

“Oh, how wonderful for you,” you might sarcastically say. But I’m not quite done.

I have spent parts of the last 4 years wondering if it would ever get easier. There have been a long succession of days that could not end soon enough. Would my house ever stay clean for just one whole day? Would it ever get easier? Would I ever not be so exhausted?

No. The day of the clean house has not yet arrived. In fact, I am wondering why I thought it was so messy when I had only one little infant sitting quietly in his seat. If only I had seen the future…

Yes. It has gotten easier. Yes, I have gotten less exhausted. It is a gradual shift, where the unbelievable becomes a normal day, when the mayhem is unwittingly transformed into peace, and suddenly it isn’t so hard anymore. Ironic, I know. I have more children, more tasks, more responsibility, and yet there is a certain peace that God has transposed into our lives. There is a joy sometimes quite, sometimes much more pronounced, that has come to fill my heart with deep love and contentment. And so it is, that there is a day that comes when nap time is almost a hindrance to all the fun that is had, and no longer a desperate attempt for an hour of sanity. Know, in the midst of seeming despair, that joy will come, and with it, a deep enjoyment of your children.

How screaming babies lead to short shorts and no underware. January 15, 2007

It was a day. Ethan, 2 months old, cried the whole 90 minutes it took me to make one of Rachel Ray’s 30 minute meals. Apparently her time table doesn’t account for screaming infants. Conner (4), and Tobias (2) were off having a great adventure, getting into all sorts of mischief. As the oven timer went off, I called my husband to tell him dinner was ready, and ask what time we should pick him up. “How about 5:45?” He asked. “Ok… what time is it right now?” I asked. “4:45,” he replies. Yes it really is one of those days. I was so eager for it to be over I had sped it up. Thankfully he realized this, and we agreed to meet at the Children’s Science museum in 15 minutes. “Quick boys, we’re going to Explora! Change your clothes and grab your shoes, I’ll meet you in the van!” And we were off. I threw foil over our dinner and launched the double stroller into the van. Ethan kept screaming until I buckled him into his car seat. Then the perfect angle. Who knows. Someone had turned on all the lights in the house. Someone needed shorts. I couldn’t find my shoes… finally we did make it to the Museum, about 20 minutes late. With all the energy in the world we BURST out of the van and into Explora.

The lady at the front desk looked a little funny as we careened through the doors. Me: No make-up, a cock-eyed ponytail, and a top that really should have been changed. Conner’s shirt was not only inside out, but backwards. Even better still, he had put 2-month old Ethan’s pants on, and was wearing them as shorts. I have no idea how they buttoned. Tobias had on clothes that were all his, and amazingly they were all going in the right direction. However at some point in the afternoon, he had shed his underwear and put on a pair of oversized shorts, that kept falling down to reveal a very nice round little bottom. Ethan, the man behind the insanity, was quite content, happy as a lark to be out of the house and buckled into the stroller. Conner and Tobias were also the picture of happiness, Conner with the pants he hadn’t worn in 3 1/2 years, and Tobias, with his waistband in his fist, or around his ankles, should he forget. And really, I was happy too. A laughing, frumpy somewhat dirty, wreck of a mother, having the time of my life with my sweet little boys. Yes, I am a mother. I can always tell on days like these.