Veterans Day Weekend

Tim and Jeanine made another supreme effort to get here over the long weekend. The kids had lots of time together, playing games and being silly. We loved each moment we had with them and can't wait to do special cousin time again soon!

Serious Times

These children should not be allowed to play board games. Seriously.

They come from a long line of over-competitive, crazy people that can turn the game RISK into grounds for...well....I am STILL mad about it 9 years later. (Asia was mine, Matt. But I really am sorry for throwing the board at you.)

 This game started out so innocently. I wish I had taken a picture of the clock. It was around 6am. The children were still in their early morning happy period. Everything was fine until someone told Nathan that he couldn't be King Kandy, that he HAD to play like the rest of them...according to the rules. We ALWAYS play according to the rules. We LAMINATE the rules up in this house! We have a folder...just kidding.

All joking aside, this next picture was taken seconds before Nathan flipped the board over in frustration and started to eat all the plastic gingerbread man playing pieces. (We are still missing the blue guy...)

Nothing is quite so embarrassing as watching your children act like you. It was mortifying.

I am going to confession this Saturday.

Funny Face

Our children have made some pretty goofy faces over the years.

None compare to Nate-Dawg.

Halloween

This Halloween was going to be awesome. Joseph was to have a party at school that we were all going to attend. Nathan was old enough to make it down the street, trick-or-treating. Sarah and Thomas had been playing dress-up for weeks, preparing for this night.

We woke up Monday morning with colds.
Joseph did not go to school.
We missed the party.
It looked like we might not even make it out trick-or-treating.
I decided that I would load the kids up with Vitamin C, and do some Halloween stuff at home.

Sarah, explaining to everyone how this all needs to get done.

Scooping them out!

Thomas, showing me what he wants his pumpkin to look like.

T-Rex and Dragon

"Show me your tails!"

Cutest Lobster

Looooooooove

Rapunzel, with our indoor jack-o-lanterns.

Pumpkins with Daddy

"If you have to kill a fly, use heavy artillery."

It turned out to be a Happy Halloween, after all!

Fall, Pernot Style

Too Early

Sunday mornings are always a little hectic at our house. It isn't like the children aren't awake, and we have to rouse them for Mass.

No, they have been awake for so long that they are ready for their first naps by the time church finally rolls around at 8:30am.

This particular Sunday, the children were up and wrestling at 4:07am. By 4:30, they were fed and clothed and sick of eachother. I told them if they couldn't be kind to one another, they would have to go to their rooms.

 They decided to play with Nathan, already sleeping. He was the engine for this ridiculously exhausted freight train.

Yes, this week we had to wake them for Mass.

Naaaaaaaaaaate?!

I realized recently that I spend about 30% of my day looking for our youngest child (and the other 70% thanking God that I found him). Most frequented question in this house: "Have you seen the baby?"

I honestly couldn't find him for about 5 seconds, which is a tremendously dangerous amount of time in "baby years". Some mothers use labor and delivery stories to induce guilt in their children. I will use well-documented data with photographic evidence of the worry these children cause. 

Nathan has a knack for getting into all sorts of precarious positions. See that dump truck in the middle of the floor? He pushes it up next to the stairs for some extra altitude while trying to scale the baby gate. All the babyproofing feats we have acheived over the past 5 years...mere speed bumps for this child.

It is not unusual to find Nathan hiding in a bookcase, behind a couch, under a table, on top of the ceiling fan or in his booster seat at the table...eating! "Who can eat at a time like this?!? I am missing the baby! Oh! There you are!"

 Ok, so most of the time my fear is self-induced by my post-partum amnesia. And yes, "post-partum amnesia" is a real diagnosis that I can use as an excuse until my youngest is in college.

Stories of lost children in my home growing up are legendary. Some are scary. Most are benign. My personal favorite is when my mother "misplaced" one of her babies. 

Mom, with true panic in her voice: "Where is Stephen?"

Me: "You are nursing him."

Mom, chuckling nervously: "Just making sure you knew."

I wish I could say that history does not repeat itself. I wish I could say that this conversation never happened in my home. But it has. Several times. Poor Sarah. She knows I am losing it. She should just be greatful that I am not losing her too.

Our Little Scholar

Matt and I were having a peaceful Saturday morning breakfast. The children were downstairs playing potato heads. We were talking about homeschooling, the children, and how pleased we were with how quickly they are learning in all their different subjects.

 Especially Bean.

 Especially in History.

 That child is marvelous. We just studied the Crusades, Christopher Columbus, and the First Thanksgiving. She is full of small bits of information that blow my mind. She can find the Cape of Good Hope on a map of the world. She can tell/show you what places comprise the Far East. I was telling Matt that sometimes I feel so incredibly incompetent when I am teaching her. She catches on quicker than I do. And she can incorporate her lessons into daily life.   

Lots of giggling downstairs. Sarah brought up her completed Potato head (compliments of the Hayes family) to show off to us.

 Sarah and her Storm Trooper. We put it next to Dad's Chewbacca mug for a nice photo.

 Sarah said, "This is not a Storm Trooper!"

Look Again.

Yup, It's a Crusader.

Boys

The morning of my birthday, the children were sitting at the breakfast table, telling me all the things they would be getting me for gifts that day.

Joseph: I will buy you some new matchbox cars because you don't have enough.

Thomas: I will buy you some blue, blue matchbox cars!

Sarah: I will buy you a new shirt and some play pants.

Thomas: I will buy you a blue, blue, shirt! With numbers on it! And a new set of stairs for your house. Some blue, blue stairs!!!!

I chuckled to myself, thanked the children for thinking of me and had fun imagining where Matt would be taking the children to shop that afternoon while I had some alone time.

He brought all four children to Bath and Body Works.

Joseph was very upset. When it came time for presents in the evening, he said, "Dad didn't let me buy you matchbox cars! I am so, so mad!" Thomas said,"I'm so, so mad too!"

They were going to make us pay.

They practically chucked the lotions and soaps at me, took the gift bags, placed them over their heads and began to play " Fred Jackson".

 Under that helmet, Fred Jackson looks like this kid.

Best Birthday Gift

After the cake was eaten and presents were opened, Matt gave me the best present I could have asked for. He helped me tackle the four children and set the timer on the camera for a family photo.

It was stressful and crazy and we bribed the children with everything but their own, personal steam engine. But Look! We are all sitting in the same spot at the same time!

 V-I-C-T-O-R-Y!

Thank you, Mattie, for the best birthday ever.

Knights of the Round Table

Forgive the video camera. It consistently makes noise when I am trying to record. Like it is trying to refocus...and it can't possibly do it quietly. Hmmm...much like everything else in our home.

Matthew has a love for all things with dry, English humor. Monty Python is at the very top of the list. When we married, I was under delusions that this would fade after time. But he has, much to my dismay, infected the children. Notice how they all cheer for Matt and his cell phone that holds the key to their happiness!

Even if I cannot hear the music above the shrieking and singing and laughing, the behavior of each individual child tickles me pink.

Can't Teach This

We started going to our home parish when I was expecting Thomas. We quickly fell in love. Because our children have always been early risers, we try to attend the earliest Mass possible. This happens to be the 8am service...in which the average age of parishoners present is 78. Our church is old. Very old. No carpeted floor or cushioned pews or crying rooms or anything else that might make it a little more child-friendly. So we improvised. We sat in the very back of church and brought quiet books and cheerios when we first started attending Mass there. After about the third or fourth week of going to the same Mass, the priest confronted us. I believe his exact words were: "I expect you to sit in the front pew from now on. It is important for the children to see what is going on." When we protested and explained to him that, because of the incapacity of our children to use indoor voices or differentiate between church and McDonalds PlayPlace, we have to take our children outside 3 minutes into the Mass, he had very little pity. "I can't hear anything. I'm deaf," he says.

Great.

So we sit in the front pew. Our childrens' collective behavior worsens. Not only do the fireworks continue, but now they sing the Thomas the Tank Engine theme song...during the consecration...in rounds. Joseph has started banging his head on the pew in front of us. He picks up his trusty match box car and chucks it at some poor, innocent women 3 pews ahead. Sarah is peeling her crayons and hiding the wrappers in secret places. I was able to stop her before she could use the shreds of paper as confetti. I can hear voices behind us. I am not concentrating. I am frustrated. I am embarrassed. I am seriously wondering how in the world I could silence these children without sinning in church.

After the Mass was over, we had a receiving line of people who joined up to meet and greet the circus welcome us and thank us for being there. The priest came over and told us how proud he was of the children for behaving so well. Matt and I, looking like we had just spent the night before pushing eachother down entire flights of stairs, just smiled and politely chuckled. We have been sitting near the front of the church ever since.

We brought the children to Mass at a different church a few weekends ago. We arrived late and sat in back. The children were perfect through the whole Mass. People started leaving immediately after Communion, and my incredibly observant Thomas asked "why?". I realized that, because we sit in the front, all Thomas knows is that we don't leave until after the last song. He started getting anxious and with tears streaming down his little cheeks said, "Don't leave, people! Why you leaving Jesus' house?" Tom sees Mass as a party at Jesus' place...why would they leave early?

We can't teach that kind of love.

All of Them

Matt was making popcorn for the children last weekend. They looked so cute standing all in a row waiting for the hot air popper to finish. I haven't been able to catch a "good" shot of the four of them since last Christmas. So as the last kernels were popping, I grabbed my camera and tempted fate. 

"Okay, everyone! Sit on the floor! No Joseph, you are backwards and three feet away from everyone. You HAVE to sit next to your brother! Sarah! You are cutting off Nathan's air supply! Thomas! Open your eyes! Everyone say cheese!"

Got it!

Hunger Strikes

 Big Boy. You'd think he would be eating a ton of food. Negative.

Nathan loves to nurse. And ever since I decided that we would start weaning him, he has decided that nursing is all he wants to do.

He will not take solids from me. He will not take liquids. This child has been in hunger strike mode.
Until I give in to nursing again.

"Alright. Alright. I don't want to starve....because that is what you are trying to do to me!"

Looks like we are gonna make it, after all!

Habits and Such

So Sarah, perfect princess that she is, has a minor flaw.

 Sarah is a nail-biter. She has had this problem since she was two, with fluctuations in intensity and frequency. We have tried EVERYTHING to help her stop, including fancy manicures and bribery of the worst sorts.

True conversation this week:

Me: "Sarah! PLEASE get your fingers away from your..."

Sarah: "I know, my mouth."

Me: "What in the world is it going to take to get you to stop? I will give you anything! What do you love best...besides a real, live pony for your bedroom?"

Sarah: "God."

(Different Mission. Definitely Accomplished.)

Me: "You can bite your fingernails."

I don't think it is supposed to go like that.