what i wish for

I don’t have especially high expectation for my kids.  By that I mean, I don’t expect them to be doctors, rock stars, or award-winning journalists.  All that would be wonderful but what they decide to do with their life is neither here nor there to me.   

I do want them to find their passion, though. Maybe they’ll be taking orders and waiting tables by day, but as long as they are doing something that matters to them, that makes them happy, that gives them peace by night?  I’ve done the only job I’m supposed to do here.

And I want them to think for themselves.  So while this may look like a kid wearing a brown paper bag and pretending to be a Superhero, this was the first time he took something and created his own something with absolute no guidance, or goading, from me.  He’s starting to think for himself (and for Curious George) and I like that.

saving the world from evil

with his monkey side kick

a super hero team

Go forth and be a Superhero, my little monkey.

overheard

“mine needs some more water”

“MINE needs some more water”

“mine tastes like beer”

“mine tastes like COFFEE”

“mine needs more water, now it tastes like better beer”

“mine needs more water, tastes like coffee“

+++++++

“see Mama these are my keys”

“I see”

“this one is for the Michael’s store, and this one for the grocery store, and this one for the beer store, and this one for the wine store!”

+++++++

While listening to their play I feel like Steve and I are cracking open a bottle of wine every day and drinking from the bottle.  Like we have shelves of beer in the fridge that we are regularly reaching for.

Honestly, I don’t drink THAT much.  In fact, I hardly ever drink.  I might have a beer once every three or four months, and when I do drink a beer I drink ONE.  Something Steve finds remarkable not being the one-beer type, he prefers several in a sitting so tends to drink even less frequently than I do.  Plus there’s that whole training for a marathon gig that sort of lends itself to a more prudent lifestyle.

I might have a glass of a wine every couple of weeks, and again, I’ll have ONE glass.  I get so sick, so quickly, that even if I wanted to be cracking open that wine bottle at 4 pm everyday (and admittedly, there are weeks where I would love to do that), my body is an evil traitor and I can’t be a normally functioning person the following day what with the pounding heachache and revolting stomach.  No thank-you.

So clearly they are imitating someone else.  I suspect it’s Grandma.

wordless wednesday::family craft

family craft

Anna-bug

It’s time for a baby update, wouldn’t you say? 

why don't you save me?

This sweet babe of mine is so full of smiles and giggles and love that I often forget she’s there.  Literally.  I’m actually surprised that I haven’t left her on the beach or something.  I honestly can’t tell you how often I go “oh crap!  Anna!” and there she is, just hanging out on her own, playing with her toes.  Yet when she sees me, or anyone for that matter, her smile lights up the world.

emitting light!

Yes, THE WORLD.  She’s my baby.  I can say it.

My little bug barely cries.  Or maybe she cries like a normal baby and my frame of reference (~ahem~ Hi! Claire!) just isn’t normal.  She cries when she is hungry or tired and far as I can tell, that’s basically it.  I can even get her to sleep on the beach, and then I read a book or knit.  When we went camping last week at one point she was asleep on my Mom’s dog’s bed.

Thankfully we remembered she was there before the dog decided he wanted to go to bed.  That would have been an awkward conversation: “Hi Steve! um, yeah, those weird indents on Anna’s head are from when the dog tried to sleep on her. Oh, you know, she was in the dog bed and, you know, I forgot.”

seriously, is she not edible? I know!

So there’s the forgetting thing (Anna, it’s not you, it’s me.  I’m losing my mind.  I mean, I actually had to look up Claire’s birthday the other day.  I seriously couldn’t remember.  Like, I had no idea.  What mother forgets THE DAY HER CHILD WAS BORN?  Sadly for you, yours does.  Except I know your birthday, it’s April 14th, I just don’t always remember to move you from room to room and then I’ll walk into the kitchen and it’s all “Anna!  Look at you sitting there on the table in the bumbo!  Right!  That’s dangerous!  Let’s move you!”.  My mother forgets my birthday.  Let’s blame her, ok?  ok.), but besides that these last four months have been perfectly joyful.  I’ve actually enjoyed them and honestly I can’t say that has happened to me before.  In fact, I desperately dreaded the first six months of Anna’s life what with the agonizing breast feeding, and disjointed sleep and the crying that I thought I might go insane.  Yet there was no reason at all the dread it.  And let’s face it, there is a very good chance I’m going to forget it all anyway.

once again, left on the kitchen table

I think the success of these last 4 months was two-fold.  One, Steve is in a good place and that makes an enormous difference to my own mood.  Two, it’s just Anna and me all night long, and that means there is a lot of baby cuddles, and more importantly, SLEEP.  Blessed, beautiful, sleep.  Admittedly it’s basically an open bar for Anna, any 4-month’s old version of utopia but I don’t care because I am sleeping.  In my bed.  I don’t have to get up and mess with a nursing pillow and try to put a baby into a crib without waking up the baby and then starting all over again for several hours every night.  Why I didn’t do this with all my babies I’ll never know.

And did I mention that she’s been breastfed exclusively?  ok, I admit this has been more me just proving that I could do it than anything else since I have this third go at it, but I have done it and god dammit, I’m proud.  I’m learning to let go and let other people do things.  Surprisingly, Steve can parent Callum and Claire without my constant hovering.  Go figure.

At some point she’ll have to sleep in a crib, and she will have to drink from a bottle, and Steve and I will once again have to act like we’re married.  But until then I plan to soak up all those smiles so she doesn’t  keep the part of the world that is supposed to be sleeping up with all that light she’s emitting. 

peace

You’re welcome world. 

all the beaches

About the only thing I can do with the kids that isn’t ridiculously stressful is go to a playdate at someone’s house, or go to the beach.

I go to the beach a lot.  A ridiculous amount really but there is something about the beach that always grounds me.  It always clears my mind and refreshes my outlook.  I can sit at the beach, literally, all day.  If I could figure out a way to bring Claire’s bed with me so she could nap I’d be that person.  

And I am that person who is tripping over two screaming, tired and hungry kids at the end of the day because I pushed it too far and now I must pay.  Why must we always pay?  Why?  Does God hate us?  I walked over and then away from Claire today who was in a heap at my feet screaming for me to carry her.  I couldn’t carry her (I was carrying beach crap!  And Anna!).  I’m sure that got some stares.

Speaking of stares, I also find it annoying that all the tourists are here.  Apparently I don’t like to share the beach unless you’re a friend of mine because that way there are less people around to judge me when my two-year is losing her mind.  The rest of you people should go home.

Thankfully so far I’ve remembered to bring Anna home with me.  It’s incredible how often I forget she’s here.  The sweet little babe of mine needs to start making some noise!

rathtrevor beach

long beach

north end of qualicum beach

This is really just random filler until I write a real post.  But there were words, and pictures so you just stop complaining.  And judging.  And staring.