Summer

The Third Trimester

Today marks the beginning of the third trimester of pregnancy. I am feeling the desire to clean, organize, and complete various household projects before this little one arrives. I am also feeling rather . . . how does one put it? . . . LARGE.

Miss verified my largeness today, by make the following observation as we strolled about the neighborhood:

"Mom, you're walking funny. I think it's because you have baby brother in your tummy. I think that you need one of those strollers for grown-ups. You know, one of those chairs with wheels that people use who can't walk. Then I could push you. Yeah, that's what you need."

An Update . . .

on the potty training, for all of you out there holding your breath in anticipation. I know, I know, you have scarcely been able to sleep as you wondered how little Master was coming along. You have been picturing him with this look on his face.

Perhaps you had also concluded that, due to the lack of follow up posting on the blog, his mother had thrown herself out of the upstairs window due to the stress of it all.

Well, I am overjoyed to say that *major* strides have been made in the realm of Master's potty usage, and his mother is (amazingly) quite calm about the whole process. The little guy is proving to be a little champ in this area, and he is quite pleased with himself. I am more than quite pleased because he is doing *so* much better than I could have wished for, only 6 days into the process. There is a lot of clapping, rejoicing, and chocolate eating going on around here, let me tell you.

Happy, happy, happy is the Peanut household. Master is the master of the bathroom. Miss continues to be happily encouraging the process. Mr. is home, home, home for the next two days. It all is enough to make Mommy very happy, indeed.

Potty Training Fun, Day 2

I am pleased to say that today was a very encouraging day in the potty training realm. The little fellow is already showing much better control, and seems to be catching on to the concept. His sweet voice crying out, "I go POTTY!" and "I tell MOMMY!" does a lot to lighten the mood and remind me of what a treasure he is, even when we must face unpleasant tasks together.

While I have been concentrating on this effort with Master, Miss has had some special bonding time with Daddy. Yesterday, they went to the Children's Museum in St. Paul (one of her absolute favorite destinations) and out to lunch. Today, she provided valuable assistance with lawn mowing and flower watering before Daddy had to depart for work. She has now launched into her role of head cheerleader for her brother's potty progress, and is very sweetly hugging and kissing him whenever he is successful.

This, of course, may be due to the fact that I have allowed her to participate in Master's M&M rewards for a job well done. Hmmmmm.

California

We've been back from California for over a week, and I am only now catching my breath enough to sit down and write a post. It was a fun trip, though I always feel like I need another vacation by the time we survive the plane trip back to Minneapolis. The kiddos were over-tired, and Miss was overly-nervous about every bump and jiggle on the plane. I must have said "It's okay" 500,000 times in that three hour period.

In order to add to the fun of our mundane life, I have decided to begin the potty training process with Master, so that he *might* have a clue about using the toilet before baby #3's arrival. So far, so horrible. He has no idea what I am asking him to do, and is horrified by having accidents. I loathe potty training. It will go down in my parenting memory as the worst of experiences. It must be done, but I *so* just wish that they could figure it out without my assistance. Oh well, as my grandmother used to say, "Wish in one hand and spit in the other and see which one gets full first."

Here are some pictures of happier times -- our trip to Southern Cal. We met new little cousin D, celebrated cousin L's birthday, and spent a lot of good time with our parents and siblings.

Buzzzzzz

In honor of our unseasonably warm weather, guess who got a summer haircut?

Me!

Mom thinks I look pretty cute. And she thinks my hair is so sweetly soft. She keeps rubbing it, anyway. Someone tell her to stop that.

Just DON'T Do It

DO NOT attempt to try on clothing at Target (yup, that's right, I'm a big spender), with two young children accompanying you to the fitting room. Master attempted to open the door, crawl under the door, and eat the plastic card indicating the number of garments taken into the room. Miss loudly exclaimed her approval or disapproval of the dresses I was trying on, much to the entertainment of the other patrons in neighboring fitting rooms. ("Oooooo, you *must* buy it. You could dance all night with the PRINCE in that dress! You must, you must!!")

Master then topped off the whole experience by pointing at me and laughing hysterically when I had my clothes off. Not good for the pregnant woman's self esteem.

I think I'll attempt to recover by making a snack . . .

Adventures in Hospital Tours

Tonight we toured the hospital where Peanut #3 will be born. The tour was wonderful, because it was brief and to-the-point. The hospital looks wonderful because it has gigantic labor and delivery rooms with private bathrooms (including tubs and showers), and it has great big *private* postpartum rooms. When Master was born, we were placed in a semi-private (translation: *not* private) postpartum room. This was beyond unfortunate, because Mr. could not stay with me overnight. Is it humane to ask a woman to push out a 9 pound 4 ounce baby, and then require her to care for said baby alone, overnight? No, I say, no it is not.

And so, we were quite pleased with our evening tour. To add to the excitement in the air, we chose to bring the children along, as the brochure said that they were most assuredly welcome. And welcome they were, and welcome they apparently felt. We were the center of attention throughout the tour, starting with the waiting time in the lobby, when both of the littles decided to do their best impersonations of baby kittens. At the top of their lungs. We smiled at all of the people staring at us, and quietly urged Miss to give the kitten routine a rest. Master does not respond to such pleas at this point, and therefore was a lost cause. Then, as the tour progressed, Miss designated herself as the official director of the elevator, and bragged to the assembled throng that she is "very, very good at pushing buttons."

Miss also entertained the group by jumping up and down for joy while explaining that she is going to have *another* baby brother. She ended her speech on this point with an emphatic "Goodness, gracious, sakes alive!"

We weren't sure if everyone was laughing with us or at us for having a third baby on the way. In any event, the tour was not dull, and Miss did not want to leave the hospital at it's conclusion.

Catching Up

The last weeks have been full of fun and activity around the Peanut household.

We greatly enjoyed a visit from Grandma and Grandad. Miss was especially thrilled to continue her tradition of looking through Grandma's purse at every possible opportunity. She inspects every *single* item, down to each individual card in Grandma's wallet. She requires poor, patient Grandma to tell her (for the umpteenth time) what each individual article is. Then, she places each item back into the purse, only to start this ritual over again. The unfortunate side effect of this activity is that Miss has been chastising me, since Grandma left town, about the fact that I don't have an Auto Club card. She has recommended that I remedy this perilous situation as soon as possible.

Miss also received her first bike as a birthday present from the grandparents. She was overjoyed and now just has to learn how to peddle it. Being the neglectful parents that we are, we never purchased a tricycle or anything with peddles for the poor child. And so, she has to start at square one. Unfortunately, she isn't a very patient student at this point, and will only peddle for a very brief time before exclaiming, "Give me a break!" or "It's no use!" and storming over to sit on the front porch. She really wants to be able to ride around the lakes, though, so she has some motivation to keep trying.

In addition to the purse and bike excitement, we also enjoyed a day trip to Red Wing, land of shoes and pottery, and various other jaunts around the Twin Cities. A very good time was had by all.

Spring has definitely sprung in the Twin Cities, as was evidenced by the appearance of a lone tulip in my flower bed this evening! I am hoping that more will follow, but I know that many of my bulbs have been dug up and eaten by ravenous squirrels. Annoying little rodents!

The littles are thoroughly enjoying the warm weather, and we are trying to spend a good amount of time outdoors. The simple opportunity to sit on the grass and run around the backyard is beyond exciting to them right now. We are seeing our neighbors for the first time in months, and are enjoying catching up with them. It turns out that one neighbor is pregnant and due within two weeks of my due date. Master is loving the playgrounds at the park, and is attempting all sorts of heart-stopping, death-defying feats on the various equipment. Miss is also enjoying the park, and is loathe to leave for home when the time comes. She made another mom laugh pretty hard the other day, by responding to my instructions to head for home in her usual, dramatic way.

Me: It's time to go, now. You can go down the slide one more time.

Miss: Oh, please! Please! I just can't go!!

Me: Go down the slide, and then come climb in the stroller.

Miss: (*HUGE* sigh) Very well.

Down the slide she went, and then took a sad, sad walk over to the stroller. If only play time could last forever.

A Sweet New Stage

As I ran hither and thither around the house today, picking up toys and scattered objects of various kinds, I paused to appreciate the sounds in our home. Specifically, I was enjoying the sounds made by two children happily playing together. As Master's verbal and motor skills increase, he and his sister are spending increased amounts of time playing with each other.

Lately, they have begun to close themselves into Miss's bedroom, turn on a CD, and just play. They laugh, they squeal, they jump around. They look at books quietly, they play with puzzles, and then they laugh and jump around some more. Miss is the queen of all things imaginary, and she assigns roles to her brother in her various made-up worlds. She creates obstacle courses with books and toys, and they take turns running through them together. I will often open the door to check on them, only to be greeted by Miss running toward me saying "It's OK! We're OK. We just want to play!" The door is then unceremoniously shut in my face.

But, she is right. They are OK. They are having a great time. There is no adult in that room to interfere, to tell them how to play, or to try to direct their activities. Since becoming a parent, I have found myself feeling more and more convinced that unstructured play is really very important for our kids. I am thrilled to see them growing and developing the independence to pursue it. And I am thrilled that I can *gasp* sit down for a few minutes, drink some tea, and listen in from afar.

Some Sun and Some Rain

A day at the park

The weather made the kids giddy. Master tried on Miss's shoes. Miss tried on my flip-flops. Yes, that is Angels gear Master is wearing. No, Mr. had nothing whatever to do with it, and was not home when I dressed the little guy.

This week brought our first warm temperatures and Spring-like days. We are now caught in the midst of several days of Spring rains, but we enjoyed the warmth while it lasted. We were able to visit our local park as a family, we were able to wear shorts, and were able to meet up with friends at Minnehaha Falls to enjoy a day with temps in the 80's!! We had to break out the sunscreen. I am appreciating the change in temperature, big time.

I cannot wait for full-on summer so that we can walk out the door without outerwear, and we can wear sandals. Oh how I love my flip-flops. How I longed for them these long winter months. How lonely they have looked, languishing in the back of my closet. Their day is coming. It is almost here. I can feel it in the air. The littles were like happy puppies set free to play at the park and in our backyard. They couldn't stop smiling as they ran, jumped, and kicked the soccer ball. It will be great to be able to get out with them again.

Go away, rain! We're ready for more sun . . .

A Birthday, A Visit, and Other Fun

We are looking back on the past week with thankfulness. Miss turned 4 on March 19th. She had a great birthday, and it was sweet to see how the most exciting part of it all for her was being called "The Birthday Girl" all day. She grinned and giggled all day long. Her birthday was made all the more fun by a visit from Grandma and Papa. She played, played, played with her willing companions *constantly*, each and every day that they were here. Master also enjoyed all of the extra attention, and perfected the word "Grandma" during their visit.

Of course, this great time led to some sad little critters when Grandma and Papa had to leave on Wednesday night. Miss was especially sad this time around. She vowed, "Tonight, I will dream of Grandma and Papa. And the Children's Museum . . . because I know Cinderella's song. The dream that you wish will come true."

She said it all with such conviction. The girl *believes* that Cinderella must know what she is talking about.

They always keep us smiling. Here they are, playing on the rocking chair together -- one of their recent favorite things to do.

Oops . . . Bonk!

Weatherman Paul Douglas warned the Twin Cities:

Be a little careful this morning, the puddles will have refrozen causing a few slick spots on sidewalks and driveways.

I can verify that this warning should be heeded. Yep, I slipped on the ice and fell as I was walking the kiddos toward the car for a library outing on Saturday. No serious injuries to report. Just a little bit of soreness. Miss was alarmed, Master (who was tucked in my arms, and therefore a passenger on the atomic seat drop) thought it was pretty fun. I was wet in unfortunate places from the ice and snow, and grateful that none of the neighbors were around to see my graceful moves.

Just a little picture of life in hazardous Minnesota.

The Name Game

Seeing as the newest Peanut will arrive in only 25ish weeks, Mr. and I have begun serious negotiations over the little tike's name. We have, in the past, kept the names of our children a closely guarded secret until their days of birth. This was intended primarily to avoid the experience of excitedly telling a friend or loved one our choice of a name, only to have them respond with either a) stunned silence, or b) "Oh. That's . . . . . interesting."

Knowing that very few people are tactless enough to criticize a child's name after he/she has already been born, we have decided to reserve our name revelations until the child proceeds from the womb into the world. Additionally, we have found that keeping the name a secret has added some fun and suspense to the having-a-baby process.

This pregnancy, however, is unique in that we have a third voice chiming in with name choices this time around. Miss has become quite concerned over what we are going to name the boy, and talks about it quite a bit. Mr. and I have encouraged her to give us some of her ideas, but she seems totally stumped. Her first insistence was that we give him Master's name. I told her that we could not do this, because it would be confusing, but she felt quite strongly that two brothers should be named the same thing.

Having finally relented on this notion, her new idea is that the child should be named "Little Teeny Baby Boy." She seems quite pleased with this choice. We do not plan to tell her the name of her brother before he arrives, because she would most definitely tell every living creature on earth and therefore end our fun with the name suspense thing. I just hope that, when our little one is born, she is not horribly disappointed when we do not introduce him as "Little Teeny Baby Boy."

Thought of the Day

“…the child’s most fixed and dominant habits are those which the mother takes no pains about, but which the child picks up for himself through his close observation of all that is said and done, felt and thought, in his home.” ~Charlotte Mason

So very true.

On another note, the littles are looking cute with fresh haircuts. Miss was so excited about the whole thing, that she decided to strangle her brother.


And, our snow is melting, but there are still some formidable piles here and there. We are expecting temperatures in the 40's this week, and I may wear shorts and sandals. It will feel nice and warm compared to what we have been experiencing.

With Piles of Snow in the Yard . . .

What have we been doing?

We have been . . . .

Reading:

For the Littles:

Uncle Elephant by Arnold Lobel

Chrysanthemum by Kevin Henkes

Doggies by Sandra Boynton

Along with a *lot* of Winnie the Pooh from various books. These stories are Master's current favorite. He runs around the house repeating "Pooh! Teeeger! PoohTeeeeeeger! Pooh! Teeger!"

For Me:

A fascinating article:

How Not to Talk to Your Kids: The Inverse Power of Praise by Po Bronson

As my children's current and future teacher, this information on the effect of praising provides much food for thought.


Playing:

Cranium Hullabaloo

Miss's favorite thing to do right now is to set this up and play on the basement floor. It is beyond fun for her, and Master tries, in a very cute way, to participate with the rest of the family.

Listening:

For the Littles:

Frog and Toad Audio Collection

I loved this as a kid, and it is fun to see my little ones enjoying it, as well.

Muppet Show: Music, Mayhem and More

And, of course, the never-ending soundtrack inside Miss's brain.

For Me:

Beautiful and Treacherous Thing by The Spares

And, because of Mr.'s latest interest . . . a lot of Gram Parsons. Which I am enjoying, by the way.


And, Laughing:

Snowy Day Scenes

We've been experiencing some serious snow here in Minneapolis over the past couple of days. Here are some pictures of our day . . .

Poor Mr. had to work at 5AM, and therefore dig out his car at that time. These are his footprints as they appeared hours later.

Our neighbor's backyard swing -- not looking too inviting.

When Daddy came home, Miss got some play time in the snow.

She also helped Daddy with the shoveling.

After the shoveling was complete, Daddy demonstrated a snow angel. Miss decided that she would rather stay dry than attempt such a thing.

Master was restricted to the indoors, but enjoyed looking out and saying "Snoooooowwww" all day long.

He and I enjoyed staying warm together.

A Favorite Picture

Taken around Christmastime, this is one of my favorite pictures of Master. I thought that it was worth an entry, in and of itself.

In the midst of a stressful day, he just always makes me smile.

On Valentine's Day . . .

Some of the things and people I love:

1. Grape Nuts. Those lovely, crunchy, teeny little nuggets are my #1 craving thus far in my pregnancy. OK, and chocolate. But, I'm trying to avoid the chocolate as much as possible, so I'm glad that my love for Grape Nuts is seeing me through.

2. My Community Bible Study class. The littles and I had a great time there today. Miss made some very cute Valentine crafts, and was super-thrilled by the opportunity to eat graham crackers covered with pink frosting. It is so wonderful to be able to attend a good, in-depth Bible study in a setting where the kids have such fun each week.

3. The little *BOY* growing inside of me. Mr. and I had a wonderful time seeing the little guy wiggle and spin around via ultrasound on Monday. It is so amazing to see his development at 12 weeks. We were thrilled to see that he is growing well, and we can't wait for August 28th!

4. Competent doctors. The testing that I experienced on Monday (in order to determine the genetic condition of our little guy) was made so much easier by doctors who clearly knew what they were doing. They were efficient, helpful, caring, and thorough. I love, love, love the doctors at the University of Minnesota hospital, and I would send them all Valentines with chocolates and flowers if I could afford such a thing.

5. Our extended family. We have received support in person and from far away this week, and that has made all the difference in making a stressful situation so much easier.

6. Of course, the littles. They amaze me every day. Whether that be because of a new concept Miss is discussing with me, because of a new word or phrase used by Master, or because they are laughing on the couch while blowing raspberries on each other's tummies. Never knew it would be so much fun to watch them grow.

7. And, my husband.

Perhaps, after all, romance did not come into one's life with pomp and blare, like a gay knight riding down; perhaps it crept to one's side like an old friend through quiet ways; perhaps it revealed itself in seeming prose, until some sudden shaft of illumination flung athwart its pages betrayed the rhythm and the music; perhaps . . . perhaps . . . love unfolded naturally out of a beautiful friendship, as a golden-hearted rose slipping from it's green sheath.

-- L.M. Montgomery

Happy Valentine's Day!

Ready or Not

"Even hearty, winter-weather-loving Minnesotans may get into trouble this weekend; frostbite on unprotected skin is possible in less than 10 minutes."

These words from our favorite weatherman, Paul Douglas, in The Star-Tribune, greeted me this evening as I checked on the weather for tomorrow morning. You see, I am attending a women's book study meeting at our church tomorrow. I am excited to go, because the book is interesting, the women are interesting, and I am looking forward to a little time away from the house after many days of nursing the sick littles.

I am not, however, looking forward to wind chills of -30. Yup, you read it right. The *high* temperature tomorrow is supposed to be -2. In the face of this information, all that I can do is thank the Lord for modern heating systems in our home and in our cars. I can be thankful for my nifty Land's End parka that has been sitting in my closet unused for the last couple of months, but will now come in oh-so-handy. I am thankful for long underwear, thick socks, insulated shoes, and hot beverages. I am thankful that I do not have to leave the house very often in these frigid temperatures, unlike my husband, who must brave them everyday in order to go to work. (Thankfully, he does not mind the cold and actually volunteers to leave the house, in spite of these insane temperatures, quite frequently).

I am reading Little House on the Prairie aloud to Miss right now. I cannot imagine living without heat, and I especially cannot imagine living without heat and with an *outhouse* for bathroom accommodations. When I begin to complain about enduring the cold in order to run to my heated vehicle, I realize that I am truly blessed. And truly spoiled.

I will let you know if I survive the mad dash between the house, car, and church building. Without frostbite. Tune in tomorrow.