Ranting, With Bonus Belly Pictures

Last night we were at a wedding with lots of people we know from around town but don't really see that much outside of weddings/high school reunions, etc. They all asked the standard questions, "So how many kids do you guys want? Are you having any more?" And other than a single solitary woman, everyone acted various levels of shocked/HORRIFIED when told that we are trying again and that we want at least four kids.

Now, I know the AVERAGE is two, but that means that at least half of the majority of the crowd that is NOT quite average has MORE than two, right? So it makes me feel kind of irritable to be treated like some kind of SOCIAL ANOMALY. Especially when people act all worried about how we're going to AFFORD all these kids and how we're going to have ROOM for them and such. I think that's our business, folks! Also: not everyone believes that they owe each of their kids a private bedroom, a brand new car at sixteen and a fully funded college education! I don't think I'd do some of that stuff even if we could afford it.

People tend to act especially shocked when told that you're taking any kind of fertility drugs when you've already got kids. Like just because you have two- and ONE OF EACH, in fact!- that you're being kind of greedy or crazy to try so actively for more.

All that to explain why I was looking through some of my old pregnancy pictures, trying to cheer myself up again about possibly being pregnant. Then I thought, what the hey, let's let everyone take a peak at pregnant Sarah. Misery loves company.


I'm about six months pregnant with Addy here. And rocking some REALLY sexy pajamas.



On bedrest for Adelay, so about eight months along. Bedrest with her was MUCH easier than with Eli. Probably because I wasn't quite as huge, and also didn't have a toddler running around being cared for by other people while I watched from the sidelines and felt guilty!



About five months along with Eli here. My face hasn't gone totally puffy yet. Although I do look frighteningly pale... I think this was right after my knee surgery, so I'd probably been spending a lot of time indoors.


Getting bigger. Seven or eight months here, probably. Belly button hasn't popped yet.



...AND there's the belly button. This was about a week after I'd been allowed up from bedrest with Eli, and I was still recovering from that wicked inner ear infection thing that had me throwing up every time I moved. So if I look really giddy for a nine months' pregnant woman, I'm probably just so excited to be WALKING and wearing NORMAL CLOTHES and not PUKING UP MY GUTS!

Let's Just Forget THAT Happened...

Wow. Yesterday was just a beating, you guys. I woke up to pain radiating through my left side (that would be from the overachieving ovary) which stayed with me all day. I could barely move without wincing. And of course, now that I might be in the beginning stages of GESTATING, I felt weird taking the prescription painkillers which were given to me for my usual post-ovulatory pain. PSA: Tylenol Extra Strength doesn't do crap.

Later, I needed to grocery shop, which is always a treat with two kids anyways. Of course on this particular excursion Addy decided to have the sort of screaming fit which inspires complete strangers to whisper amongst themselves about "kids these days." The scenario was as follows: Addy is playing with her chap stick while sitting in the basket of the cart. Eli keeps turning around, enviously staring, grunting and pointing at the chap stick and occasionally trying to wrench it away from her. She momentarily allows him to hold it, then suddenly snatches it back and screams at him "It's mine! You share!"

Repeat this a few times and I'm losing my patience, so I instruct her to just hand the chap stick to me, and tell her I will return it to her in the car where her poor little brother can't be driven insane with it. Addy complies without incident, but about five minutes later she must suddenly relive the injustice and trauma or something, because she bursts into hysterical sobs, begging incoherently for her chap stick and screaming at me that "Is mine! You share, Mommy! You share my chap stick!"

Snot and tears are all over her face, and at this point I can't push the cart any farther for fear she's going to tip it over with her manic flailing. Everyone in a ten yard vicinity is staring at me. I pick her up out of the cart for her own safety, sustaining a few wild kicks and jabs in the process, and put her down, where she promptly crumples to the floor. "I! Want! My! Chap Stick!" she weeps into the filthy tile.

Now, everything in my psyche is screaming, "Give her the ever loving chap stick, you moron! You have placed yourself in a lose-lose scenario here, and the best thing you can do is cut your losses and spare yourself further humiliation." But the smidgen of parental wisdom that was left rattling in my brain intoned, "You had a perfectly good reason to confiscate the chap stick, and regardless, you cannot give in to this kind of behavior. If you cave, all she will learn is that you're more worried about being embarrassed in public than about sticking to the rules."

So I gathered up my resolve and continued pushing the cart. She followed behind me, sobbing and stumbling like a sloppy drunk, ranting at me alternately to "Gimme my CHAP! STICK!" and "Put me back! Put me back in the CART!" I would stop every minute or so, bend down so I could meet her eyes, and tell her as calmly as I could manage that I would put her back in the cart as soon as she could settle down, but that the chap stick was staying in my pocket until we got to the car.

It literally took about ten minutes (or it could have been a YEAR, for how slowly time dragged on) before she finally calmed down and put up her arms to be lifted back in the cart. Once settled in, she sniffed and asked in a shaky, piteous voice, "See the fishes please?"

So off I trudged, my face as red as it's ever been, to show her and Eli the fish tanks. Looking at her, gazing at the goldfish and softly exclaiming over the colors, you would never have guessed that two minutes earlier she had been behaving like the most appalling brat I'd ever seen.

Later into the shopping trip, Eli grabbed his milk cup from me and arced it backwards all over his sister, the groceries, and the floor of the shopping center. But really, that was just icing on the Exploding Cake of Doom that was this day. So was the woman behind me in the check-out line who lectured me about allowing Eli to suck his thumb because "it's such a hard habit to break. You should have started him on pacifiers instead." So was three of the grocery bags breaking while I was bringing them inside.

Ah well. Today is a fresh start. My side doesn't hurt so bad anymore, and I have a wedding to go to tonight! Without children! Should probably decide what I'm going to WEAR now... Is it sad that the few wedding-appropriate dresses I own are all MATERNITY dresses?

Two

I had my mid cycle ultrasound today. I did ovulate on my own already, probably yesterday, so I didn't need the hcg shot. That was good. I uh, I ovulated TWO eggs, in fact. Or at least there were two very large follicles visible.

So um... Trying not to assume TWINS here. Doctor assured me that two follicles doesn't necessarily mean both eggs got picked up by the fallopian tubes. Or that even if they did, both didn't necessarily get fertilized. But still. She said my odds are probably one in ten of having twins. Normal odds are one in seventy. So that's... considerably HIGHER. Ahem.

The bright side is, I'd be getting two kids for the price of one in terms of pregnancy. And pregnancy is not that fun for me, so, score!

Beginning To Feel It

Um, wow. So forget what I said about the Clomid not really affecting me that much! Today is day 14 of my cycle, so, you know, I'm either ovulating today or I'm very CLOSE to ovulating. And today? The hormones are killing me. Slowly and painfully. I'm irritable and snappish. I'm ravenously hungry. I've had a throbbing tension headache on and off all day, and it's beginning to feel like someone is tightening screws at my temples. I'm also extremely dizzy and lightheaded all of the sudden, which is a fairly common side effect, but I thought it either occurred or it didn't- I didn't expect to be perfectly fine and then wake up one day with a case of vertigo. I just feel fuzzy and disoriented, kind of like when you're beginning to feel the effects of alcohol. But not in a fun way. I was looking up at a shelf in our closet and almost blacked out.

Also, the drug has apparently erased all the grammar I ever knew, because I had to look up when to use "affect" and when to use "effect" in the above paragraph. I'm still not sure I've got it right.

Grr. I'd better be pregnant this cycle. I do not want to do this much longer!

Numbered

First: I am so proud of myself. Because I finally took down the outdoor Christmas lights. On this, March 11th. Clearly, I am ALL OVER my to-do list.

Second: How can I be so astonishingly lazy about things like this yet be driven crazy if the ENTIRE house doesn't get dusted once a week? It's like there's some kind of... priority glitch in my brain. Perhaps there's a pill for this?

Third: I made cherry cobbler today. It was pretty darn good. I'm really rocking the fruit cobblers lately. But I still burnt my last batch of cookies. And the one before that, and the one before that. Cookies. They are my Everest.

Fourth: I am trying to enjoy a drink or two every night until Thursday (last day when I could possibly be ovulating.) Then it is all over for me, my friends, assuming the Clomid works. This sucks particularly since we have a wedding to go to on Saturday. But I never feel comfortable drinking if there's even the possibility I might be pregnant. So, I am currently downing a vodka and orange juice. Which explains my laziness about segue-ing my paragraphs!

Fifth: Tonight I got together with a couple of my friends and the conversation, as is inevitable, turned to pregnancy and birth. We were all telling (or more accurately, RE-telling) our respective birth stories, and it came out that of the three of us, I was the only one who in the end found that birthing was not QUITE as bad as I had expected. Everyone else thought, much worse.
And it's not that I thought labor or delivery was FUN or EASY or NOT excruciatingly PAINFUL. But I was amazed in the end that wussy old me got through it without losing it completely, without even wanting drugs (at least, not the second time. I believe the first time I suggested an epidural at nine and a half centimeters, and was greeted with a hearty laugh.) I also realized, upon re-hearing their stories, that my labors, up until transition/pushing phase at least, sounded much less painful and exhausting. I think I may have really lucked out in this department so far. So here's hoping that trend continues!
What do you think? If you have given birth, was it better, worse, or about what you expected?

Me and You and Our Friend Blue

-I think the hormones from the Clomid are starting to kick in. I feel, most of the time, more warm and fuzzy and sentimental than usual, but then when things take a turn for the absurdly awful (such as on Saturday,) I can feel the stress taking over every nerve of my body. Like PMS on steroids. I was feeling so crazy angry, too, which is unusual for me. Not even angry at the dog or Addy, per se, but more just at the UNIVERSE. At the mud, and at the rain for making it muddy, and at our yard for being low and soggy, and at the physiology of a toddler's body which makes accidents inevitable, and at myself for not orchestrating things better so none of these events would have occurred, let alone SIMULTANEOUSLY. Also, I'm still feeling sick and sinus-y and tired, and so I am mad at my body for not getting well faster.

-Speaking of not being well yet (nor are the kids, but that's another story,) can I just say that I MISS working out so much? I'm sorry, I know that's barfy and contemptible, but my body feels all pent up and restless and desperate to exert some actual effort beyond refilling sippee and coffee cups and refreshing everyone's cereal bowls. I don't know, maybe that's the Clomid too, but I am longing for the day when everyone feels well enough (or at least is not horking snot around too obviously) to go the Y again.

-And speaking of the Y, in the ten days or so that I haven't gone, I have lost five pounds! Since I haven't been eating any differently (if anything my diet has consisted of MORE processed crap) I can only assume this is muscle. So it really sucks that you can lose it that fast. BUT, let this comfort those of us who have been working out for a while and felt nothing was happening. Obviously some of that fat is at least getting CONVERTED into muscle, even if the scale isn't showing much change.


-Have I mentioned yet that Adelay is now the proud owner of a multitude of imaginary friends? Generally it's the Disney Princesses (blech,) specifically Cinderella, Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty (or as Addy calls her, Shake-a-booty.) There is also a magical horsey/unicorn who makes occasional appearances. Nothing gets you more brownie points than playing along and including these invisible friends in whatever you happen to be doing.


-Eli has grown frighteningly obsessed with Blue's Clues. He quivers with joy and chuckles uncontrollably when he hears the opening song, and as soon as the credits start appearing, he goes toddling across the room at breakneck speed to find a grown up to turn another episode on. This morning he was in bed with me, and I woke up to see him smiling toothily in his sleep. He kept giggling softly, then sighing in pleasure. I have no doubt that there was an episode of Blue's Clues reeling through his little brain. Yikes. Methinks it might be time to cut him off cold turkey.


-And who's THIS? Why, it's David, whose thrilling entry into the world I was privileged to witness about six weeks ago. You vaguely remember my wild, spastic delight over that, right? And look at him now! (Actually, this picture is two weeks old, but you get the idea.) Look at those bright eyes! Look at the tiny HAND waving! And oh, but you should feel him curled up on your shoulder! I have honest-to-God physical reactions every time I hold him, and I'm not even really a huge newborn fan. He's is SO SWEET! I want one. Preferably without the annoyance of pregnancy, kthax?

Not My Day

Isn't there a saying that deaths always come in threes? Does it also apply to just crappy events, period? Because if so then THIS SAYING IS TRUE I TELL YOU.

Exhibit A: Enormous dog gets it into his head to snake his way under the deck, that's SNAKE as in ON HIS FURRY BELLY, through the mud. Requires being hosed off- lucky for him it is warm today.

Exhibit B: Toddler decides to follow her mom onto the deck, presumably to observe the somewhat spirited washing of the dog, and mysteriously wearing her snow boats in the sixty degree weather. She suddenly gets a look of panic on her face and proceeds to pee (a lot) into her boots and in a giant puddle in front of the back door. This necessitates putting the now wet dog back on his chain in the muddy yard so I can strip down screaming, urine soaked child and put her back in the bathtub she just got out of ten minutes ago. I then have to retrieve dog, who is now freshly re-mudded, and rinse and dry him again, using three bath towels in the process and splattering my clothes. Let dog back inside, rinse puddle of pee off of deck, and put filthy towels/muddy clothes/peed in clothes into the wash to soak. Rinse off boots and leave on deck to dry.

Exhibit C: Son awakes with horrendous diaper explosion immediately following my return indoors. Screams and flails for ten minutes as I try to clean him up, all the while being lectured by Adelay to "leave him 'lone! He's crying! Leave him 'lone! Be nice, Mommy!"

Name That Furniture Item!

A few updates on the remodel: I DID of course get the kitchen and the rest of the house cleaned up, and it didn't even take a year. It just felt like it. Then I quickly got a picture of the view from den to kitchen before anyone came along and messed up the acceptably tidy vision you see here:


Alas, a sassy three year old managed to find her way into the shot. Three year old then helped me demonstrate these lovely new (to us) ottomans/coffee tables/storage units which my parents handed down in lieu of our wobbly glass topped coffee table.


I'm really quite in love with these... things. I don't know where my parents got them originally, but if you're unhappy with your current coffee table (glass needs wiped on an HOURLY basis, for example) or your den needs more storage space or you sometimes wish for a footrest near your sofa, then LOOK NO FURTHER.


The tray tops flip to convert to a micro suede ottoman, and inside is roomy storage (we are using one for balls and the other for spare towels which we use to wipe our dog's muddy paws off when he returns from the backyard- these towels' previous location was "thrown somewhere on the floor by the door.") They are sturdy, but are not difficult to move around, so you can pull them up closer than a coffee table would normally be. You can also easily move them into another room for vacuuming. The... things also work well as extra seating in a pinch, at least for small kids who aren't worried about lumbar support.

Just don't try to figure out what they're called. Stools? Footrests? Large fabric covered boxes? Help me out here. (And also, try to avert your eyes from that mystery spot on the sofa cushion in photo #3. Yikes. I hope that's just weird lighting.)

Am Sick. But Clomid Seems To Agree With Me.

So everyone in our house is currently battling with/recovering from some mutant variety of cold/cough/flu, with the exception of myself, as I feel merely run down and achy and tired, but am not wheezing and hacking and dripping mucus all over the place like some sort of Typhoid Mary NOT THAT I AM BOTHERED BY ALL THIS MUCUS EVERYWHERE NO SIREE.

I am slightly bothered by the fact that for the last three nights in a row, Eli has awakened at two in the morning sobbing inconsolably for "Coos! Coos coos!" No, not that healthy, more exotic variation of rice. This is his name for Blue's Clues, with which he has rapidly become obsessed. And turning it on is the only way to get him to settle back down in the wee hours of the night, when his fever has spiked and my ability to think rationally has done the opposite. So for upwards of two hours, I have sat on the couch holding him, staring at Joe and Steve and Blue and Green Puppy and Magenta, dozing off repeatedly only to be awakened with a start by Eli's sudden yelps of protest as the episode ends and the screen returns to menu. I fumble for the remote, hit "enter," then proceed to let my head fall backwards into the cushions again.

In better news, I feel, if anything, more balanced and normal since starting the Clomid. I even feel (somewhat!) patient and zen about things that generally really irritate me (such as having watched all three of our Blue's Clues DVD's at least ten times apiece in the past week.) In a weird way, I feel more like myself than I have felt in the last six months. So maybe that miscarriage really had me screwed up hormonally, and the drugs can, if nothing else, get me in a more healthy state. Not that I've been raging and wildly moody up until now, but I've noticed in the last few months that I can get a tad more worked up about things than I used to.

I would just like to say, though, that I am very tired of talking on the phone to various pharmacists and nurses about my freaking hcg injection. When you're on Clomid, you're supposed to go in for an ultrasound mid-cycle to make sure you've ovulated promptly. Since this has been a problem for me in the past, the doctor gave me a prescription for an injection that I'm supposed to take with me to my upcoming appointment. If the ultrasound reveals that I haven't yet ovulated, I get this shot to make sure I do so immediately. Apparently this injection is not something my pharmacy fills for very often, because the first pharmacist was all baffled by it. "You know this is a SHOT, right?" she asked. "And it's really EXPENSIVE?" Yes, I knew, I assured her. "Well, we're going to have to order it for you. We never carry this. It might take awhile to get in. And your insurance isn't going to cover this, you know. Are you sure you want us to go ahead?"

What the...? Why would I bother taking the Clomid at all if I weren't going to follow through with the full treatment? Did she think I had asked for the injection as a little something extra just for fun, and didn't technically need it? And who just gives random strangers medical advise based on the supposed expense of a drug FOR WHICH THEY HAVE A PRESCRIPTION? FROM A DOCTOR? I just looked at her as though she was crazy and said, "Um, yes please!"

But then it didn't come in, and didn't come in, and two different suppliers were out of stock, and I was calling the dang pharmacy every day inquiring as to the status of a tiny, sixty-dollar vial of hormone cocktail which I may or may not even need based on my ultrasound. Fun times.

But. It is now in my possession, all but two of the Clomid tablets are in my bloodstream, and all that's left to do is actually REMEMBER to bring the hcg with me to the doctor's office!

Cleanliness Is Next To Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

I've been wondering a lot about what is normal, in terms of tidiness, in the houses of other people with small children. I am kind of a neat freak, but I am not a person who relishes wasting literal HOURS of my day if there is no point to it whatsoever. And that is kind of how the picking up the house routine at the end of the day is beginning to feel. I still believe the actual CLEANING serves a purpose, that purpose being to help me feel in control of my environment even on the crazy days. So I will probably try to stick to the schedule I currently operate by in regards to actual household chores (that being, Mondays: dust, Tuesdays: vacuum, Wednesdays: clean bathroom, Thursdays: mop and dry dust main areas of house again, Fridays: dust mop the bedrooms and vacuum living room and den again.)

But its all the OTHER stuff that's killing me. The kitchen that needs swept up every day, sometimes every HOUR, the toys and general detritus that seem to just follow the kids around the house, the stacks of laundry waiting to be put away, the dog food that gets scattered around the utility room every time Fonzie eats. Tidying sometimes feels like a losing battle. I'm beginning to think I should just seriously leave the toys alone unless they're in my way for vacuuming. But on the other hand, does that make it difficult for the kids to play? And for me to function? I remember being little and, having let the playroom go from pleasantly messy to absolute chaos, feeling the urge to run away and play outside rather than even face it. So I don't want to create THAT kind of situation for myself, either.

What do you all do about tidiness? Is there a system in place, or rules about picking things up before bed? Bear in mind that my kids are young enough that only one of them is at all capable in terms of picking up after herself. And she'll do it, when asked, but more often than not I skip that part of the routine in favor of doing it myself- in a tenth of the time- once she's gone to bed. Is that a bad habit? Or do you do that too?

Here Goes Nothing

Gulp. Am about to take first dose of Clomid. Oh God, please not quadruplets, please not quadruplets, please not quadruplets...

Also, yes, I have noticed that my last three posts are more like Twitters. Son is still acting OFF, daughter hasn't napped for a week, and husband is deathly ill now, too. I have to prioritize. So that I can remember to take my FERTILITY DRUGS. GAAAH!

Sometimes They Are Cute

There are illness and tantrums, yes, but there is THIS to counteract them.

The Maniacal Laughter Is Coming From My House

So, as of two AM today, Eli is TOO sick!

Suck it, Dr. Useless.

Free To Good Home (Only One Is Housebroken)

Wow, the kids are making me all KINDS of crazy today. Eli has been so screamy and obnoxious and unsleepy and unhungry and weird lately that I finally gave in and made him a doctor's appointment today, thinking he might have an ear infection. First, though, I had to go to the Y, feed the kids, shower, and pick up Breanna from school. Eli decided to have multiple throw himself on the floor, fling his head against the concrete and scream kind of fits when I went to pick the kids up from the childcare, because he has gone from loathing the daycare when he was an infant to loving it so much that he is now loathe to LEAVE it. The daycare worker shook her head in wonderment. "He is awfully angry lately, hmm?" Indeed.

I got home, then found three free Happy Meal or Extra Value Meal coupons to McDonalds in the mailbox (courtesy of Jim emailing corporate and complaining about not getting the correct food the last time we went, which to me seemed a bit... well, it got me free food, so I guess I can't complain.) Now, I KNEW Eli was already coming a bit unglued, but I was exhausted from wrestling him all the way from the basement daycare to the car half a mile away, and a quick easy meal sounded wonderful. So I pulled back out of the driveway and went to the nearby McDonalds. I only drove through, so it didn't add THAT much time to our total car trip, but Eli was a mess by the time I got us home.

I fed them, scarfed my own food, and took a quick shower, then put Eli down for a short nap before we had to leave again for Breanna. He only got about a half hour of sleep though, so by the time we picked her up and headed for the doctor's, he was grumpy again. By the time we got OUT of the doctor's, he was beyond grumpy. Breanna said that she could hear both kids yelling and clambering around the entire half hour she was waiting for us. What she couldn't see was that they were playing crazy circus games of crawling behind and under the exam table, trying to rip the blood pressure cuff off the wall, and throwing the little wheeled doctor's chair back and forth across the room. I was literally just running around like a crazy person, trying to restrain one child while the other wriggled away from me to find more (loud, embarrassing) mischief to get into. I was hissing and issuing threats and trying to enforce time-outs on my lap and just generally flailing around uselessly. Also, Eli chose that time to have a giant poo and of course I had left the diaper bag in the car. So imagine all of the mayhem PLUS bonus Lysol and Feces aroma.

By the time we got out of there (leaving rolls of shredded tissue-y exam table covering paper in our wake,) the doctor had sympathetically patted my shoulder no less than three times. Also, did I mention that in order to get Eli's weight, I finally had to get on the scale WITH him, then be weighed alone, to subtract the difference? Nothing like unexpectedly getting weighed when you've just eaten salty fast food and are bloated and PMS-y.

Anyways, he's still screaming. And flinging food and toys and himself all over the place. Even though he DOESN'T have an ear infection, or any other sort of malady. Well, other than being an infant. Glad we got to pay seventy dollars (thanks for changing our insurance, husband's workplace!) to find that out.

A Birth Story Of Sorts

Yes, the room is done at last. Well, SUPER close. I still need to get something on the windows (ideas are welcome!) and there are a couple pieces of trim that we have to buy and stain, to fill in the spots where Jim tore out the old radiators. But we went ahead and put everything back anyways, because SOMEONE was getting mighty impatient to have the dusty love seat out of the KITCHEN. Ahem.

It was not done on Monday after all, or Tuesday or Wednesday either. Got CLOSE on Thursday. And finally finished Friday. But it was worth the wait. I should really have taken more before pictures of the room, what with the water-stained ceiling tiles such as you might see in a dingy middle school cafeteria, the paneled walls and the narrow doorway that I could barely fit through when pregnant. The knocking out of the dividing wall was probably the best part of the whole project. Made the kitchen AND the den look so much bigger.




The wreckage that was our kitchen. Also, though you can't see it in the picture, imagine every single solitary thing in this room covered in a quarter inch of plaster dust.



The doorway being mudded. And sanded, and r-emudded, and re-sanded. Lather, rinse, repeat.



Jim and his friend Jamie working on the inside of the door. That plastic sheet did little to keep the dust at bay. And then at last, drum roll please....



Finished product. The red turned out nice, huh?



Desk area. I probably should have hidden all the cords a little better. Also, there at the floor you can see where it still needs trimmed up. But still. Vast improvement on old desk area.



More couch area.



This is where it steps up to the kitchen. I was going to take pictures from the desk area looking into the kitchen from the den, so you'd get the full effect of the new and improved wide doorway. But alas, the rest of our house is still a WEE bit untidy and disorganized, and I was too excited to post these pictures to wait until I got the whole kitchen cleaned. So those will follow in about a YEAR when I finally get the floor clean! Until then, I'll be busy lying around on the couch staring in disbelieving wonder at the gorgeous room that has somehow landed in our yucky old den!

Young At Heart

I find I am very childish about some things. Last night, I was so excited about the work going on in the den that I genuinely COULD NOT sleep despite physical exhaustion (and a glass of wine,) and the feeling was very reminiscent of Christmas Eve Jitters such as I recall getting when I was SEVEN YEARS OLD. Slightly embarrassing.

On the other hand, it's kind of fun to be that sort of a person. Difficult, given that it also means I'm highly impatient (hello, another reason that pregnancy sucks for me,) but fun because I still get pretty genuinely whipped up and giddy about lots of things. Not Christmas anymore, sadly, since it now involves a lot of WORK, but about birthdays and vacations and babies (BABIES!) and other people's new pets and most of all HOME IMPROVEMENTS. Last night, when I saw how much progress the guys had made in just one evening, I had to restrain myself from hugging them both and/or jumping up and down. In actual fact, I may have jumped a little. More of a bounce, really, though. Hardly noticeable.

So anyhoo, they say it'll be done by tomorrow night. Painted and trimmed and everything. I'm thinking Saturday we'll get everything moved back in and cleaned up, and then by Monday we'll be all ready for a nice President's Day party!

A Sign

As the carefully chosen cycle approaches when we will begin trying again for Baby #3, I have found myself growing more and more apprehensive and thinking of more and more reasons why I'm not ready yet. The den still isn't quite done, and how will I handle the stress of construction while on Clomid and feeling extra hormonal and stressed out already? Or while pregnant and cranky and exhausted? And speaking of exhausted, how will I EVER nap with two little kids around all day? Especially since one of said children's idea of a nap is now to merely lay in Mom and Dad's bed watching The Diamond Castle and reading books and singing and then popping up OUT of bed about twenty minutes later looking for Mom MOM MOM! I mean, I well remember the I've-been-run-over-by-a-truck, I-would-sell-my-soul-for-another-hour-of-sleep kind of exhaustion that pregnancy brings, and let's just say I'm not getting any EXCESS of sleep here as it is, so this fear of tiredness is way up there on my list.

Another fear is running out of space and then not having the money to add on (since moving is definitely tabled until the market gets WAY better.) Fear of lines at the bathroom and no storage space for clothes and a cramped kitchen while I'm trying to cook- all those little things that are manageable, sure, but on bad days can kind of eat away at your happiness.

Then yesterday in church, the message was about letting go of fears that are holding you back and giving freely of yourself in whatever it is that you are called. I didn't hear an audible voice or anything, but I felt a little nudge in my heart that this message was for me regarding the area of our family. I KNOW that we want a large family, I KNOW that I am emotionally ready for another baby, and I KNOW that we can afford it, though it may mean less eating out and more buying of generic brands in bulk and that sort of thing. But I FEEL afraid. So I prayed that if this was a message to me, telling me to release those fears and go ahead as planned with baby making, then to please let there be some clear signals in the coming days.

Well, today I picked up my friend's daughter for her after school, something we had discussed last week, so that she could go to a job interview. Her daughter is eleven, and her school is literally about a minute from our house. The afternoon went really nicely; Breanna had a snack with the kids, and then asked if there was anything she could help with. I told her I was going to put a dessert in the oven and then try to get some cleaning done while the kids were playing in the living room. She mentioned that she loved baking, and I was all, "Hey! I HATE baking! How 'bout you follow this recipe right here and I'll go change sheets and empty trash cans?" And she did! And it was awesome! There was blueberry cobbler for snack tonight, and I never had to stir or mix or clean up a thing!

When her mom arrived, she told me excitedly that she had gotten the job. However, she was now going to need someone to pick up Breanna and keep her after school until five thirty or so, three days a week. That someone will be ME, and I couldn't be happier. Breanna is great with the kids and says she wants "babysitting experience," and she loves to cook, which is my least favorite thing to do! So basically, I'm helping them out, and in return I'm getting a free mother's helper, more or less. I mean, I'm not going to use her for slave labor or anything, but I can definitely see the possibility of, say, a few months down the road when I'm presumably pregnant and tired, actually getting those afternoon NAPS! And she could go with me on errands and help corral the kids, and... Yay! (I will make sure she has peace and quiet to do her homework when needed, too, rest assured.) So it seems one of my fears is, if not entirely put to rest, at least quieted.

Then also today, my husband's friend from out of town who is a contractor called to let him know that he has the end of the week off work, and he would like to come stay with us and help Jim until the den is finished! Which means, by next week, the den will actually, really and truly be DONE! Even though this probably puts a dent in any Valentine's Day plans, this feels like the best gift anyone could give me. Now it will definitely all be back to normal around here before I get pregnant. I could just about cry with relief. Plus, we won't have to pay anyone (since the guy says he won't accept it) and Jim and his friend will get a chance to reconnect and spend time together! This is SO awesome! Check another worry off my list.

So, are these the signs I was looking for? Maybe, and maybe also just coincidence. But it's good enough for me.

To Whom It May Concern

Kitchen. Stop getting so gd filthy every day, defying my nightly scrubbing. You are sapping my will to live. (Floor beneath high chair, I am looking at YOU.)

Head. Stop aching constantly, for no conceivable reason, and in spite of all the water drinking I am doing to help you out even though I don't really enjoy chugging water. You are making me worried. And cranky.

Hair. Please PLEASE stop being so frizzy and dry and unmanageable. I only wash you every other day, I rarely use a hot iron to tame you, and I recently got about five pounds of you thinned out. I lavishly apply expensive condition and even let it SOAK instead of rinsing immediately. So just give in, okay? Lay down and relax for awhile.

Hands. Stop cracking and splitting around my fingertips, causing me no small amount of pain during totally routine activities such as opening car doors and zipping coats. Your delicate, fragile act is getting real old. You'd better toughen up, because all that dish scrubbing and hand washing? It's not going away any time soon. Deal, my friends.

Coffee. Also, Wine. Thank you, my friends. Many thanks. My gratitude to you is immeasurable, and my reluctance to give you up (see, ttc next month) is not insignificant.

Double The Fun

This is so, so, SO premature, but here's the thing: we are probably going to start Clomid in four weeks, which even at the low dose I will be on does increase the likelihood of twins, so... I keep finding myself staring off into space contemplating twin names. Wondering if they would be a boy and a girl or two of a kind. Wondering if my body would ever recover from that pregnancy. Wondering how reasonable/possible it would be to attempt to exclusively breastfeed two babies while caring for a four year old and a two year old, even if the four year old were in part time preschool. Wondering if it's possible to give birth to twins without a c-section, of which I am terrified (mainly due to a VERY bad experience with spinal anesthesia when I had knee surgery.) This concern is so great I've been dreaming about giving birth to twins naturally.

So, again, I REALIZE I am jumping the gun and overthinking and borrowing trouble and all that, but do you guys have any words of comfort related to the above subjects? Or, failing that, some really great name ideas for two boys, two girls, or one of each?

*Also, I want to say, I realize that I'm making it sound like twins is my worst fear, which obviously would come across pretty, um, crappily to those of you who already have them. Don't get me wrong, I think IN THEORY twins sound adorable and fun too. But ideally, the twins would come FIRST. Then any singletons you might have. When I try to contemplate adding twins to our existing family, my eyes start getting wide and panicked. When I imagine taking a preschooler, a toddler, and two newborns anywhere out of the house together, the idea overwhelms me completely. When I envision two high chairs, two exersaucers, two cribs, etc., I feel like our house would be overtaken completely by kid stuff and I should just give up trying to pretend grown ups live here too.
So yeah, I guess the idea has me a little freaked out. But I sincerely apologize to any of you with twins who are feeling a little miffed by the TONE of this post. I of course can also envision lots of lovely things about twins, but those things don't have me panicked. THESE things (see above) DO have me panicked, so those are the ones I am asking for help with.
Thanks in advance!

Snow Bunnies

These shots are from Wednesday afternoon, when it was still about ten degrees out and we were knee deep in snow. It was Eli's first go at playing in the snow, and boy did he have fun. Unfortunately it wasn't good packing snow, so there was a lot more throwing of snow into the air (and face) than there was snowmen or snowball fights.

Addy's favorite thing to do that day was get handfuls of snow and lick at them delicately until her face was an attractively red, chapped, slobbery mess, and Eli's was to crawl determinedly through the snow like a mushing sled dog, planting mouth first more often than once. Still, despite his painfully beet-red face and eyes streaming from the cold, he screamed in protest when I finally took him inside, worrying about hypothermia and cold burns. It really is a thankless job, trying to keep your kids relatively safe from themselves.