Welcome, Allison!

Henry and Georgia's new baby sister was born recently. Healthy, as far as I know, and full-term (Eve was a preemie). I'll call the new baby "Allison." It will be decided within the next few days if Allison will be placed into foster care or if the court will give the kids' mom a chance to try to care for her on her own. If you're the praying kind of person, pray that whatever happens is what's actually best for baby Allison.

Still Waiting To Find Out What's Going On

The termination of parental rights hearing for Henry is still set for mid-July. The State is undecided as to whether the trial will include Georgia, Eve, and the new baby. Right now everyone's just kind of waiting to see what the lawyers decide to do about the upcoming hearings.

Oh, and Georgia's dad has volunteered to take a DNA test to make sure he's the dad for the newest baby. Yikes. Well. I guess that if there's any question as to paternity, it's best to resolve that issue as soon as possible.

No Period

I thought I was getting my period. I had a little tiny bit of blood... then nothing. Weird. I checked that my IUD is still in and it is. Don't know what the blood was all about.

Clark is almost 8 months old. I got pregnant with Clark when Elise was 8 months old. So if Clark were Elise, this would be implantation bleeding. But Clark isn't Elise, and I have an IUD, and I need to quit worrying about that sort of thing because it's silly and there's nothing to worry about. Ugh.

Long Weekend

Happy Memorial Day, folks.

Man. Long weekends with four cutie patooties WEAR ME OUT. I love the kids, of course. I like spending time with them. But I feel like a zombie. Actually, zombies look more rested then I do right now.

Biting, Broken

* Clark has turned into a biter already. He only bites my left shoulder while I hold him on my hip; he never bites anyone else or at any other time. It's not out of anger or excitement or anything like that-- he just does it absentmindedly. If I catch him starting to go in for a chomp and say, "Clark!" or "No, no!" he'll stop and smile at me. Clark only has two little teeth and he's already leaving marks on my skin.

* Whenever Elise gets a cut or a scratch now, she cries, "I broke my skin!" It must be very frustrating to be crying out in pain and then have people start smiling at you like you just did something cute.

Speech, Speech!

I suspected that Georgia's speech is delayed. It's clearly not as delayed as Henry's, but her words sound pretty mumbley sometimes, so I had her evaluated at the speech therapist's office where Henry now goes. Yep. Yep. She's delayed.

She's pretty much on target for understanding what other people say, but she's about 5 months behind in being able to communicate with others.

SO

She'll be taking speech therapy 3 times each week, as well. (You'll recall that Henry is now going 3 times per week for an hour each session.) I asked the receptionist if I could just get my own parking space out front, or maybe start leaving a toothbrush and a small pillow in her desk drawer. I think she's considering it.

Ravi Tavi

Elise has been talking for the past two days about an imaginary friend. She is a bubble gum chewing dinosaur named Ravi Tavi. Or so I thought. In a Tyler Durden-esque twist, Elise revealed this morning "Elisey is Ravi Tavi."

She also lied to Henry's doctor this morning and told him her name is Pearl. She's turning into a very weird kid.

Eat It; The Wave

* Clark had his first oatmeal a couple of days ago. He seemed to like it a lot. I make the oatmeal myself instead of buying the baby oatmeal; I just grind the dried rolled oats in a coffee grinder and cook the oatmeal on the stove, making sure to stir it often because it will clump otherwise. That's what I fed Elise, too, when she was little.

* Today was kind of hectic, so dinner tonight included (fake meat) corndogs. I pulled the stick out of the kids' corndogs and cut the doggies up-- you know, hotdogs are a choking hazard-- but I left my stick in my own corndog. Elise noticed this and pointed at my plate, asking, "What's that?"

"It's a stick."

Elise sat and looked at me for a long time. Then, in a confused and rather surprised tone she asked, "Mommy? You eat STICKS?"

* Clark started waving today! He waves mostly for hello. I guess he usually gets kissed when one of us has to go bye bye, so he doesn't get it yet that you can wave good bye, too.

Period.

Looks like I'm starting to get my first post-baby period. Or it's implantation bleeding. Ha ha. (NOT funny.)

Three Little Booties; Georgia's Stats

* Elise, Georgia, and Clark are now all wearing the same sized diaper. Size 4, in case you were wondering. My 7 month old is as big in the waist (and booty) as his two year old sisters.

* Georgia got measured today. She's 34.5 inches tall and weighs 30 lbs. That makes her around the 60th percentile for height and around the 83rd percentile for weight. The nutritionist that I was talking to said that Georgia looks proportionate and not overweight, so the discrepancy in her percentages is nothing to worry about. She said that she looks like the kind of kid who will outgrow that little bit of "extra" weight. Georgia has always been really dense. She doesn't look fat at all, but when you pick her up it's like "Do you have rocks in your pockets or something?" Georgia's biological parents are both very tall and slender, so I bet she will be too.

Elise the Teacher

Elise likes to show Clark baby sign language signs. He'll be eating breakfast and Elise will be sitting next to him saying, "More, baby Clark? MORE? MOOOOOOORE?" and doing the sign with her little hands. We've been showing Clark "milk," "eat," and "more" and Elise is vigilant about making sure that he sees someone doing those signs at the appropriate times. Very cute. It makes me feel proud of her that she wants to help him learn.

Cat Update

Both of my sick kitty cats' blood work results have come back. They're doing better than I expected. Yay!

Beanie, my lady cat with chronic kidney disease, has to have blood work done every three months in order to monitor her disease. That is not cheap, by the way. But anyhow, the values of the stuff that they test her for with regard to her kidneys have held steady, which is really really good because if the numbers increase then her disease is getting more serious. Chronic kidney disease in cats doesn't get better, and the best you can hope for is that it doesn't get worse too fast. So Beanie is doing awesome, basically.

The vet discovered that Beanie does have a urinary tract infection, which is uber common in cats with kidney disease. So she's on antibiotics right now. Another pill she has to take every day. She already takes two pills each morning (for her kidneys), so what's one more?

Man, urinary tract infections are awful. How miserable it must be to be a cat and not even be able to say, "Hey. Um. It burns when I pee. Can someone do something about that?"

My other sick cat, Saucy, was having trouble with some values that they tested for regarding his liver. But this second and most recent round of blood work came back showing an improvement. He's still not out of the woods, but basically the vets are pretty sure he's not, like, in the throes of advanced liver cancer. So, we'll check his blood again in a few months and hope that there's still more improvement and that basically nothing has to be done.

Cats, man. Not as low maintenance as you might think.

Sink or Swim

Henry is hating swimming lessons this summer. We're going to a different place than last year, and plus Henry's age group is supposed to have no parent participation in the pool. I don't think Henry is ready to go it alone yet. During the first class this summer, Henry fell in the pool while his teacher was busy with another student and he had to be rescued by the lifeguard. So yeah. I think we're going to move him into a class with younger students so that Husband can get in the pool with him. It will be less stressful for EVERYONE involved.

Barley

Clark had barley for the first time two days ago. Ate it right up. The texture is pretty chunky compared to rice cereal, so I wasn't sure if he'd eat it. No problem for my chubby cubby! He's not one of those babies that gets overly concerned with texture. Not yet, anyway.

Learning About Plants

A sweet potato that I bought a while ago started sprouting, so I put it in some water in a mason jar, set it on the kitchen window, and decided to use it as a learning opportunity. All of the kids happily check its progress each day, but Elise is most interested in it. She calls it "Elisey's potato plant." She looks at its leaves and the little roots that are growing. If you ask her what a plant needs to live, she will tell you, "Sunshine. Water to drink." My little scientist.

Present Suggestion for a Pregnant Lady

A long time ago, well before I ever thought I might get pregnant, my friend Kelli gave me a sarong as a gift. It is very pretty and while I always liked it, I never appreciated it so much as when I was pregnant with Elise and Clark.

A sarong is the perfect piece of pregnant lady clothing because you tie it around yourself, so it adjusts to your size. And it isn't full of elastic or buttons or anything uncomfortable. I especially liked wearing my sarong as a skirt, because nothing else ever fit me properly around my middle. It's obviously not something you can wear to the office, but around the house on the weekends it was perfect. And the fabric is so light, I didn't even mind wearing it when I was in the midst of my big bellied hot flashes.

Need a unique pregnant lady gift idea? I suggest a sarong.

Clap Your Hands

Clark started clapping his hands yesterday. Super cute. I mean, it's seriously adorable. He gets all smiley and crinkly-eyed and just flaps those little arms until the hands start smacking. I love it.

Pets

I grew up having pets in my home. At different times we had a dog, a cat, a rabbit, three different birds, and various fish. I think my sister had a mouse once for a few days until my mom made her get rid of it. I'm really glad that I had pets as a child.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that kids NEED pets in order to have a well-rounded childhood. But having pets certainly teaches you some valuable lessons. Since most pets have such a short lifespan, children have the opportunity to really understand what life is all about in a gentle but very personal way. Kids can learn about love, companionship, responsibility, respect, sickness, and eventually death. Having a pet gave me the so-you're-trapped-here-too-? camaraderie that I needed when I was mad at my parents and sisters, the understanding that every living thing has feelings, the pride of learning to care for something that depended on me, and the insight that you can only control yourself and can't control other people/things.

I have four cats now. I love them dearly. Our skinny old girl cat, Beanie, has chronic kidney disease. She's been doing okay so far, but the reality of the situation is that at best she probably only has a couple of years left. And our orange boy cat, Saucy, is getting sick now, too. He got some blood work done today... I'm bracing myself for what I'm sure will be bad news when the vet calls with the results in a few days.

The kids are still pretty young. I know that they'll notice if one of the cats is gone, but I don't think they'll immediately understand the finality of the situation if any of the cats dies. They've seen dead animals on the side of the road and I've told them the truth, that the snake (or whatever) is dead. I've said that being dead is like sleeping for a long time and never waking up. But I don't just say that the animal is asleep, because I don't feel like that's honest. I try to be honest. Shots hurt (but they make you hurt less in the long run than if you didn't get them), mommies and daddies disagree (but that's okay and we still love each other), and animals die (but that's just part of life).

Despite all of the pets that I've had and lost, I'm still really upset to think about losing one of my fluffy little fur babies. "Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all," right? But I'm still going to cry my eyes out when I get that call in a few days.

Mother's Day Tears

When we refer to any of the kids' relationships to one another, we just say brother or sister. If we want Elise to hold Henry's hand, we say "hold your brother's hand." We don't say foster brother or foster sister because they really aren't old enough to understand what that means, and anyhow, they've grown up together so they're about as sibling-ish as you can get without the official legal status. There's no talk of "maybe someday Georgia will live with us forever" or "maybe Henry will be your real brother" or anything like that. But still, I think that the kids know somehow that everything isn't perfectly settled in their family life.

Today as I was tucking Elise in for her nap, she wrapped her arms around my neck, looked at my face, and sweetly asked, "Georgia be my sister?"

"Hmm?"

"Georgia be my sister?"

"Do you want her to be?"

Smile. "Yes. I do."

"I want that, too."

Mommy tears. I didn't let Elise know that I was crying, but I was.

Big Boy Bath

Now that Clark can sit up so well on his own, tonight I gave him his first bath in the regular bathtub. I tossed a little rubber ducky in there with him, and he was super happy. Splash splash splash! He looked like a cat pawing at water. Sort of like, "Hmmm. What's this? Do I like this or is it scary?" Then he smacked the water really hard and some splashed up into his face. He got sad about that for a second, but then he went back to exploring. Overall, though, it was a good experience for him. He'll be happy when it's time for his next bath.

A Day of Firsts

Clark ate peas for the first time today. Loved them. He was slow going at first with the solid food thing, but now he loves to eat.

Also, I brushed Clark's teeth with an infant toothbrush for the first time tonight. He chewed on it. The big kids were fascinated with the fact that the baby was brushing his teeth when they were. It was cute.

Time Cover

I guess there is a big flap about this new Time magazine cover photo:

It's a mom breastfeeding her 3 year old.

I don't understand why anyone cares. I mean, fine, critics of this photograph, you don't want to breastfeed your own 3 year old. You feel like that's "too old." I get that. But why do you care if anyone else does it? Seriously. What difference does it make? People are so judgmental about the weirdest stuff.

What I think people really mean when they say, "That kid's going to need therapy because his mom is psycho" or whatever is, "I don't understand that and therefore it makes me uncomfortable." People don't turn into sociopaths because they were breastfed as toddlers. Critics of the photograph, YOU are the ones sexualizing the action, not the three year old. And honestly, as someone who deals on a personal level with kids who actually DO have psycho parents, it's nice to see someone who cares so much about her child that if she is erring at all, she's erring on the side of too much attachment rather than not enough.

Mothers should be able to breastfeed for as long as they want. Loving gay and homosexual couples should be allowed to raise children. And everyone should mind their own f-ing business. Or at the very least, focus their efforts on actually helping kids that really do need help.

Sleep Training Update

Clark has been doing pretty well with sleeping in his bassinet for the first part of the night. Last night he slept in his bassinet from 11:30 until 2:45, with only one brief awakening around 1:30. Not bad. Progress. HOWEVER, at two different points last night both Elise and Henry woke up yelling, "Momma Momma Momma!!!" The big kids don't usually wake up at night-- but they're still awfully young, so every once in a while we have less than perfect nights. I'd say that I get a cumulative total of about 6 1/2 hours of sleep each night. With four little bitties, that's pretty good.

More Goings On

* Clark sat unassisted for about 4 minutes straight yesterday, so I'm officially considering him able to sit up on his own now. Yay! Good job little Babu!

* I weighed Clark Sunday morning and he was two tenths of a pound shy of 22 lbs. Time to get new car seats! I can't carry him around in his infant car seat anymore, as its weigh limit is 22 lbs. We ordered two new convertible car seats online, one for each vehicle.

* Mother's Day came early for me this year! I asked for and received a doormat. Yes. A doormat. But it's really cool! It's an LL Bean Waterhog doormat... and if it saves me even the slightest effort in sweeping our living room floor every day, it will be worth every penny.

* Whenever something surprising happens, Elise now says, "Oh my gosh!" or really it's more like "Omigosh!" It's kind of funny. She knocks over her milk, "Omigosh!" A book falls down off of the shelf, "Omigosh!" Today she used it in a slightly different, but still appropriate, context.

We were at the grocery store and Elise was walking a few steps behind me. I kept an eye on her by frequently looking over my shoulder, but she was occasionally out of my immediate view. Well, as we were walking down the pet food isle, I turned around and she was gone. Gone. GONE. No Elise. Holy shit. So I yelled (not even trying to maintain my composure) "ELISE!!!" about four times in quick succession and then she pops her head out of the bottom shelf of the giant bags of dog food, which she had decided to climb.

I grabbed her and hugged her and told her, "Do you see how scared I am? I couldn't see you and I thought you were lost or that somebody had taken you away from me. If you ever really got lost, I would cry forever. Please stay where I can see you. I love you so much. I was really scared."

And she hugs me back and says, "Omigosh. Omigosh, Mommy. I so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. Omigosh. I so sorry."

I Am This Goose

I've been watching a momma goose for several weeks. No matter what time of day I would arrive, there she was, sitting on her eggs.

She would hold her mouth open, panting in the heat of the afternoon. I understand, momma goose! You want to get up and go anywhere else-- somewhere with shade, somewhere with drinking water, somewhere that you can sleep comfortably-- but taking care of your babies is more important than all of that.

Occasionally she would stand up and tenderly rearrange the pine straw that she used to build her nest. She protected and cared for her four little eggs, keeping one eye on me as I watched her incubate her babies.

Today she was gone. The nest was empty, except for part of the shell of one of her hatched eggs.

Good luck, momma. Good luck babies. I wish you the best.

Wiggle-Crawl

Clark started wiggle-crawling tonight! That's what we're calling it, anyway. It's sort of like an army crawl with his tummy still flat on the ground, except that Clark's arms and legs aren't quite coordinated enough to say that it's officially an army crawl. He rocks his body around and scrabbles with his legs, but there is definite forward movement.

Yay, baby Clark! I'm so proud of you!

DNA Test Results

Got my "genetic ancestry" DNA test results! I actually have had them for about 2 weeks and I didn't know it because for some reason I gave the company an email address that I never check. They email you the results. Anyway, my report was actually quite full of surprises so I'm glad that I did it. Not that it MEANS anything, really. Where your ancestors from, like, 1000 years ago originated has nothing to do with your cultural identity. People move all around. All over the world, as you know. But still, it's cool.

Toofie #2

Clark's second tooth is here! No unusual fussiness or anything. He woke up a little more often than normal last night, but overall his teething has gone pretty smoothly so far.

Make It Work

I took Henry to get evaluated at a new speech therapist the other day. It was good-- lots of insights and information. But the long and the short of it is that he needs to have three one hour sessions every week. Three. Three days each week I need to bring him to the office for a therapy session. The therapist's office is waaaaaaaaay over on the other side of town. Of course we'll make it work. We'll do what we have to do. But holy cow, my days are already busy. This is going to take some getting used to, especially since I'll have Elise and Clark in tow.

Pears and Poop

Clark ate pears for the first time today! He really liked them-- cried when he'd finished eating the pears I'd made him. I gave him some rice cereal after that, but I could tell that what he really wanted was more pears.

Also, I think I gave him a black eye. I was trying to stop the kids' toy box from falling on him, and I accidentally poked him in the eye. Hard. Now Clark has a dark red half-circle under his eye. God. I feel like a rotten mommy. I was trying to protect him and I ended up hurting my sweet little Babu.

In other news, here's how Everyone Poops has changed our lives: Elise now thinks it's appropriate to shout about poop while we're in public. I took the kids into the bathroom stall with me while we were at the mall today. So it was a really big, busy bathroom. I had to go. I couldn't wait. And Elise was kind enough to notice just what I was doing. She shouted over and over again, "Mommy pooping! Mommy pooping! You pooping, Momma! Yay Mommy! Mommy pooping!" On and on and on. Yelling. No amount of redirection or shushing would make her stop. It will be funny to me tomorrow. Today I just feel kind of embarrassed.

Everyone Poops

My new favorite kids' book is Everyone Poops by Taro Gomi. If you don't happen to have a copy for yourself, here it is on youtube:



I checked it out of our library for Elise, since she's still being weird about pooping-- she's trying to hold it in now, I think, and giving herself tummy aches. She loves the book. Hopefully it's helping her be more comfortable with the idea of pooping.

Also, Elise and I were just talking about pooping. She said, "The cat poop in the mailbox."

"Litter box."

"Mailbox, Mommy."

"Our cat poops in the litter box."

"MAILBOX!"

Fine. Okay. It's silly to argue with a two year old. We'll just revisit that concept later.