Apparently Lex and I enjoy the theme song from Weeds and sing it often, because tonight Sierra sang out, “Little boxes on the hillside, little boxes made of ticky-tacky…”
Anya asked me a question tonight, and I told her I didn’t know the answer. She said, “I don’t know either. We can be I don’t know twins!” This amused me. A lot.
Ummm, yeah, so I’ve been embarrassingly bad about keeping this blog up-to-date over the last few months. I swear, I have really good, interesting, not at all made up reasons, like my recent abduction by aliens and when my brief attempt to live an Amish lifestyle. Okay, okay, can we just say I’ve been so busy enjoying life with the girls that I haven’t been taking the time to write about it? And will you accept my humble apologies for neglecting you, dear blog?
So many things have happened since I became a lazy blogger, where to begin? Well (in no particular order), Sierra turned 18 months in June, but that deserves its own post, which I really hope to deliver tomorrow night. We went on a wonderful trip with my family to the Bahamas in May – Sierra’s first time not in utero. The girls had a fantastic time at the pool and a mediocre time at the beach; neither was a huge fan of the water there. Sierra still tells me that she’s going to “the Hamas” if I ask her where she’s going. Anya finished her first full year of preschool in June and is now greatly enjoying the summer program (and don’t you dare suggest she is going to school, or she will indignantly inform you that’s it’s camp, NOT SCHOOL). Sierra finally got to try out a class at Gymboree while Anya is at camp this summer, and she could not love it more. I had my appendix out on April 30th, which kind of ruined my 30th birthday on May 1st, but such is life. Anya has been having swim lessons with two of her friends. We found someone who would come to the house to do a small group lesson in our pool. I don’t think she’ll be swimming by the end of the summer, but she’s way more comfortable with going under the water and getting her face wet, and that’s a huge improvement for her. We’ve been having tons of fun going to Sesame Place this summer, and had an extra special time going with Lex’s sister, her husband, and their two youngest boys when they came to visit a few weeks ago. In the same weekend, Lex and I went to a friend’s wedding, leaving the girls without both of us (but with my parents) overnight for the first time ever. The only time we had both ever been away from Anya was when Sierra was born, and I had never been away from Sierra overnight before this. I was nervous, but everything went fine. The only disappointment was that we stayed in a hotel room, completely free of early-rising children, and I only managed to sleep in until 7:45 am. My body even tried to wake me at 4:30 am and 6:45 am. Traitor!
There’s been more, of course – so many amazing and funny things happen on a day-to-day basis here – and I’m going to try to do a better job, really!
We went out to dinner with friends tonight. Sierra, oddly enough, refused to taste my cake, even though she had been chanting, “Cake, cake, cake, cake!” up until the time it was brought to the table. However, she was extremely excited when they brought the little (Andes-style) mints to the table and insisted that she wanted one. Who am I to tell her what she will or won’t like? I gave her one. She took a tiny little bite, which she pulled out of her mouth to hand to me, and then took a bigger one, which she followed with an enormous shudder and the exclamation, “COLD! BRRRRRR!”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
I’m just incredibly excited about Baby #3. I know for Lauren, at least when there’s no nausea kicking in (although recently, there’s been plenty to go around), this pregnancy still doesn’t seem real. For me, though, the pregnancy feels very real and surprisingly significant.
Now that sounds funny. All pregnancies are of course significant. But the significance this time around is that I think — just my opinion, and who knows what the future holds — that this is our last pregnancy. That means that I’ve “created life” for the last time; Lauren’s suffering through a first trimester for the last time, and I’m cooing semi-futilely into a belly for what one certainly hopes would be the last time.
I don’t think of any of this as bittersweet, mind you. Rather, it’s just sweet. I think this whole thing is amazing, and if Anya and Sierra are any indication, the kid brewing in Lauren’s belly will be a true treasure. (Also: Huge, smart, lovable, cuddly, and so on.) I am frustrated with all the waiting — to see the first ultrasound, to find out the gender, etc.
Ah, gender. I imagine that once folks know about this pregnancy, I’ll get asked if I hope it’s a boy. The truth is, I don’t hope it’s a boy, but I’d of course be perfectly content with one. I already feel like I have a good handle on girls, though — I’m “good” at rearing them, so another girl in that respect seems a lot less, shall we say, terrifying. Should we instead have a boy, I’ll be spooked about figuring out how to “dad” a boy, but of course look forward to the male bonding element of our relationship.
Last thought before I go jump in the pool: I hate keeping this pregnancy a secret from our big mouth children! Anya and Sierra aren’t really on-board with the whole “keeping secrets” concept, so we can’t tell them just yet, but I’m excited for Anya’s reaction to be sure. (Sierra’s reaction will inevitably involve kissing Lauren’s bellybutton, which is perhaps Sierra’s favorite activity in the whole wide world already.) For now, Lauren and I resort to talking to each other about the pregnancy cryptically (winks, nudges, gestures) when the kids are around.
Very funny article, and a good explanation of why I constantly find myself tired:
Check out this giveaway for a SodaStream start up kit from Intheknowmom.net:
http://intheknowmom.net/?p=6194
Hey, I won the Ergo, so you never know!
Well…..last Sunday, we found out that I am
My tentative due date is March 5, 2011. So far, the only big symptom I’ve been having is fatigue, especially around 2:30 in the afternoon. My first appointment is in a few weeks. We’re very excited, and also kind of terrified of being outnumbered.
Check out this awesome contest to win a free organic Ergo carrier:
http://intheknowmom.net/?p=5531
UPDATE (6/5/2010): – I WON!!!!
This morning, Sierra discovered that she could combine words or phrases with other words all on her own! She’s been saying “Hi, ____” and “Bye-bye, ______” for a while now, but there were a whole bunch of new ones today, including:
Now I’m kicking myself for waiting until 10:45 pm to write this post because there were a bunch of others and I can’t remember what any of them were.
~Both of the girls came down with their first summer colds of the season over the weekend, which made them cranky on and off. On Saturday, I put Sierra down for a nap, and a few minutes later she was crying. I went to see what was wrong, and she told me, “Wocking.” As soon as I sat with her in the glider, she put her head down on my shoulder and closed her eyes, a look of utter contentment on her face. A few minutes later she was asleep and I put her in the crib. I’m grateful that she can put herself to sleep most of the time, but I don’t mind if once in a while she wants to be rocked, because, honestly, I can’t remember the last time Anya asked me to rock her to sleep.
~So much for Sierra’s lovey “Fot” (Spot the dog). Much like Anya, Sierra has adopted a “love the one you’re with” kind of policy. She was a big fan of her Fisher Price Glow Seahorse (which she calls “Baby”) for a while. It’s been a teddy bear this week. Between the two of them, they take a different “friend” to bed every night. Please don’t let this be a harbinger of things to come!
~A few days ago, Sierra woke up way too early and had no interest in going back to sleep. Eventually she convinced me to get out of bed to take her to the bathroom, and during that time she proceeded to sing “Wain, wain, doh away” at the top of her lungs, over and over again. Then she noticed her hat, drying from the previous day’s swimming, hanging on the shower door, and she insisted she had to have it. It was still damp, so, bleary-eyed, I found her a different hat, and then took her to Anya’s room to play (because Anya and Lex were still asleep in my room) while I tried to get a little extra sleep hiding in Anya’s bed. She gleefully ran around the room wearing that hat until everyone else woke up and it was time to get dressed. This child is crazy.
~I have a superpower! Or, rather, my kisses do. One kiss cures all ailments, be it a bump on the head or a scrape on the knee. I don’t like when the girls get hurt, but I do love when they tell me, “All better!” after they get their kiss. Sierra keeps shoving toys in my face, though, and telling me things like, “Elmo! Hurt. Kiss.” I think that’s taking it too far!
~I took Anya to a make-up dance class to cover the one she missed while we were away. I was trying to explain to her what “make-up” meant in that context while we were driving there, and she was having a little trouble getting it, so I gave her a more concrete example involving what would happen if I she bought 6 cookies from me but I lost one and only gave her five. It turns out that wasn’t the right way to go; she understood what I meant, but she got very hung up on what had happened to the other cookie and the conversation just devolved from there:
Anya (for the billionth time): But what happened to the other cookie?
Me: Oy, Anya! IT BROKE!
Anya: How did it break?
Me: Um, I dropped it.
Anya: Why did you drop it?
Me: Because I tripped.
Anya: Why did you trip?
Me: Because you left your shoes on the floor.
Anya: Why did I do that?!?
Me: I don’t know, Anya. You should have put them away. Also, NONE OF THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED.
Anya: Why didn’t you put them away for me?
Me: Why didn’t you put your shoes away yourself?
Anya: Daddy should have put them away for me.
~Anya has effectively ruined the whole Biscuit series for me, which is a shame because Sierra is obsessed with it. The little girl in the books never gets called by her name, and one day Anya asked me what the girl’s name was. I said I didn’t know and asked her what she thought it was, and after pondering for a moment, she said, “Soap!” Now I can’t read those stupid books without cracking up every time I see “Soap” playing with her puppy.
~Yesterday while I was getting the girls into the car to take Anya to school, our neighbors across the street were having some trees trimmed. Sierra was very intrigued by this event, and informed me, “Mawn-moh-muh” (how she says “lawnmower”). I didn’t feel the need to explain that it was actually the trees getting cut, so I just agreed with her, and she went on to make sure I knew that, “Noise…..LOUD!” You can’t say she’s not observant!
~Anya has moved on from Dora to her new obsession, Diego! (Boy crazy already…sigh). It’s actually a decent show, more or less the same formula as Dora but each episode features an animal that needs rescuing. The writers include a lot of information about each animal, so Anya’s been learning a lot about each one, and she incorporates what she learns into her pretend play (she likes to tell us that she is a panda and that her salad is bamboo, for example). Sometimes she’s a little off, though, like when she told us that flamingos eat allergies (Apparently they eat algae). Sierra loves Diego as well, though I’m not sure I love how she chants, “Ayudame!” (pronounced in her own non-transcribable way) over and over. And over.
