Tag Archives: kids

I’m Jane.

Life being life and me being me, my girls often are left to their own devices.

On a particularly busy morning I had been perfecting my imitation of a chicken with it’s head cut off while listening to Jane and Clara happily playing upstairs but hadn’t actually seen them for hours.

Also, life being life and me being me, I forget things.

I forget that Jane, is still of the age where things are taken literally. For instance, her name is Jane. Not Jane Catherine. Not sweetie. Jane.

Eventually, on that crazy morning, Jane and I did cross paths.  I was letting Storm into the house and as I shooed the wet dog past her down the steps into the basement Jane looked at Storm and said in her best syrupy sweet voice: “She’s such a good dog!”

And I, proud of my little girl for happily playing and getting along with her sister all morning said: “And how about you? Are you such a good girl?”Jane giggle

Jane looked up, defiance and anger on her face and spat: “No. I’m Jane!”

Then she left me downstairs torn between giggling over yet another instance of Jane’s literalness and worried that I may have just received a clue as to what had been going on upstairs all morning.

 

 

This Moment – Giggles and Grins

A Friday ritual.

A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week.

A simple, special, extraordinary moment.

A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.Jane and Ivy

 

If you’re inspired to do the same, leave a link to your ‘moment’ in the comments for all to find and see.

Inspired by SouleMama.

Things to Consider Before Entering A Tough Mudder

Two weeks ago John completed another Tough Mudder race. He loved it. However, I feel it is my duty, as his wife, to warn any potential Tough Mudders of some of the after effects of the challenge.

Inevitably, it has been one of the reasons we do a lot of laundry…John in the mud

It was also the entire reason his foot was swollen up black and blue and he couldn’t walk normal for a week  (it wasn’t broken he had it checked)…Electro shock therapy

And most recently, it has turned into the reason Jane refuses to let me cut her hair…Jane with bangs in her eyes

“But, I no wanna mohawk!” she cries, sad Jane

So, if you are thinking about entering a Tough Mudder, get a bucket ready for those muddy clothes, try to avoid kicking walls and please, for the sake of their vision, trim your kids bangs before the big day!

The Sign

(Sometimes I write entire posts and then for no good reason forget to publish them. This was written at the end of August as we were getting ready for the school year to start.)

Our three girls have been sharing two rooms divided up as a “sleeping room” and a “playing room.” It was a great summer arrangement. They read books to each other at bedtime and woke each other up early to play. It was like a perpetual slumber party and there was no way it was going to work when Ivy went back to school.

And so, with school looming, we have executed another big room rearrange to help insure that kids who need to go to bed can fall asleep and kids who don’t need to wake up extra early stay asleep. Of course, this means Ivy has her own room for the time being and she is very proud of it. Many times I have been called upstairs to see her new improvements.

Then I was called up to look at her door.

On the door was a sign informing me that it would now cost a dollar to enter her room. I chuckled, decided to wait and watch how that worked out for her and went to Clara and Jane’s room instead.

Ivy followed me in while gleefully informing me that I’d have to pay her a dollar if I wanted to tuck her in that night. I seriously replied that while I love tucking her in she’d have to settle for me blowing a kiss from the door if the charge was a dollar.

Ivy left.

Moments later she was back, “Now come see mom!”

If you wod like to com in my room you will have't to giv me a dollar quarter

If you wod like to come in my room you will have’t to giv me a doller Quarter

I laughed and went downstairs.

That afternoon John overheard the girls talking, looked at me in incredulity and said, “Is Ivy shaking her sisters down for quarters?!?” I explained the sign on the door and slowly followed as he went up to investigate. As I lurked upstairs I overheard him explaining mortgages, sublets and requesting cuts of the profit.

I giggled and went downstairs.

Soon I was called to look at Ivy’s door yet again:

please knock

Please Knock

At which time I happily knocked and was welcomed into the new room for the first time all day.

 

Relative Weirdness

On this mornings drive to school Ivy requested number 14 on the CD. Personally, I would prefer to spend my early mornings in silence but that seemed unduly harsh, even for AM me. So earlier than I’d like to be conscious I listened to My Big Sister and heard all about the boy who didn’t want to wear his sister’s hand me down coat. While normally listening to children’s music inspires visions of smashing things (like colorful CD’s) and includes songs that stick in my head torturing me for the next three years until I accidentally sing it all on my own causing me to believe that I finally have lost it. This, fortunately, was Snacktime! by Barenaked Ladies and contains music less likely than most to drive you insane.

(Skip to number 13 to hear it for yourself.)

As the song finished Ivy giggled while declaring that it was “weird” that the boy didn’t want his sisters coat. Even my AM self knew better than to debate in the relative “weirdness” of imaginary persons. Instead I told her that we were lucky because girls can wear most all the clothes boys can but boys can’t wear all the clothes girls can.

Ivy: “What do you mean?”

Me: “Well, for instance, boys don’t usually like to wear skirts and dresses.”

Ivy: ” Uncle Jim does.”

Me: “Yeah…Uncle Jim in his kilt in the snow

“…. but he calls it a kilt.”

From Ivy’s silence I decided she must not have wanted to talk about relative weirdness early in the morning either.

March. March. March. March.

March. March. March. March.

(Here they come!)

March. March. March. March.

DSCN8589-(2sm)

 

March. March. March. March.

(Yes, those are tomatoes on sticks.)

March. March. March. March.


DSCN8588-(2sm)

March. March. March. March.

(There they go!)

March. March. March. March.DSCN8591-(2sm)

March. March. March. March.

(No, I have no idea. But they were very happy and that’s worth two ripe tomatoes!)

March. March. March. March.

Practice Makes Perfect

I went from sleeping to sitting bolt upright in bed with a shout that I”ll not repeat in print. I looked over at John who had been startled into the same position, our eyes met, we both groaned, got out of bed and followed the noise of little feet.

It takes much less than a giant clap of thunder to pull Clara into our bed and we hadn’t made it to the bottom of the stairs before she passed us at a run and was burrowing under our covers.  I checked on Ivy, who wasn’t even wakened by the rain coming into her room, and listened to John and Jane try to come to an agreement on going back to sleep in between the rumbles as I checked the rest of the windows. Jane has never been the snuggling type but the storm was right on top of us and they headed down to our room. Soon windows were closed against the rain, the air was getting thick and hot, and I went to climb into my considerably smaller portion of the bed to fall back asleep…

Then, there was more thunder.

And more lightening

And quaking girls.

And little girls hiding under the covers.

And little girls playing peek-a-boo.

And little girls giggling.

And hot.

And stuffy.

And crowded.

And one grumpy Dad leaving to find a different bed.

And a sad, Jane following him.

And a sad, small girl coming back.

And a sad, small girl wanting to sleep on the couch…

… on her bed…

… on our bed…

…on the floor…

… by her sister…

…by her other sister…

…by Dad…

…by Mom…

… with a cat…

While the other happy, small girl continued to gleefully snuggle into my spot in my bed.

Hours went by.Jane watching thunderstorm

I’m sure that there are proper ways to parent a two year old who is roaming the house during a thunderstorm that involve something more than following them about wishing that this will be the spot they want to sleep. Something more than wishing with all your exhausted body’s might that this time they will actually want to cuddle, so that when the next flash of lightning comes they don’t come looking for you even though they very clearly just told you to “Go away!” Some ingenious parenting technique that calms the two year old enough to lay down with a parent and at least attempt to sleep.

I’m sure there is a proper way to do it.

At four in the morning I can’t figure it out.

The following day after five hours of broken sleep the idea eludes me.

In fact I still have absolutely no idea what to do.

But with more thunderstorms in the forecast I’m afraid I’m going to get a chance to figure it out.

After all, you know what they say, practice makes perfect.

We got up around 3:30 with the first big boom, and I thought, “Dang, I can’t even use this for the One Day One World Project.” Be careful what you wish for. Before we were all back asleep I had my (admittedly poor but cut me some slack I’d only had two hours of sleep at this point) picture. Check out Northwest Frame of Mind  and see what other people were doing between five and six am. 

 

 

 

 

 

Bee-Beep, Bee- Beep, Bee-Beep!

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

The house is on fire!

I elbow John’s sleeping figure.

He doesn’t move.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

….No, that’s not the smoke detector…

It’s the alarm going off- we’re late!

I poke John.

He doesn’t move.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

…I peer closely at the alarm clock, 4:23, alarms do not alarm at that time in this house…

It’s the cell phone!

I poke John.

He doesn’t move.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

…It’s not the phone…

THERE IS A PERSON IN OUR ROOM!

I poke John.

He doesn’t move.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

…Oh – It’s Jane…

She wants breakfast.

I poke John.

He doesn’t move.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

She tells me she needs yogurt.

I look at John…  give up, and get up.

Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep, Bee-Beep!

I follow Jane, toward both the yogurt and the beeping.

It’s the refrigerator door alarm.

Jane appears to have  been up for sometime.Jane in the fridge

Sadly for her I do not serve breakfast at 4:30AM.

The next twenty minutes crawl by in a sleepy, horrible, tangle of whining, crying, and waking of sisters only ending after a terrible game of musicale beds.

Finally, Bee-Beeping silenced, kids settled, I find my way back to my own bed.

I poke John.

He lifts up his arm to make a space and I scoot back under the covers with the sudden, suspicious anger that he was feigning sleep earlier.

But John is warm and his arm is heavy over my chest.  I snuggle in, sigh and barely have time to mentally forgive him before I drop headlong into sleep.

 

And that is an unfortunately true story of my wee hours of the morning this week. Clearly my brain has absolutely no idea how to function at that time. Grabbing my camera as I walked through the house was a minor miracle! I am again linking up with Northwest Frame of Mind  and her 1 Day 1 World project.  Check out who else was up between Four and Five this week.