The Watermelon Incident

There's always a surprise when I upload photos now...Jacob helps himself to the camera when I'm not around. And here is what I find. You have to look closely to see what this is, and at first glance it will appear that the watermelon is simply resting on the couch, but I promise you, it is not. That is the coffee table with a blue waterbottle (top off) on it, and then a whole watermelon balanced on the waterbottle. WTF? 

So I had no idea that this episode even took place until I saw the photo evidence. What was going through Jacob's head, and where the hell was I when this was happening? Oh right, I have three kids now so this is just what it's going to be like...complete chaos all the time.

Dear Jacob: July 2011

Dear Jacob,

    I didn't actually plan to be writing a letter to you right now.  I planned to be in a crazy cycle of nursing a baby, changing diapers and sleeping.  But we are still baby-waiting here so I find myself with a lot of time and a tiny bit of motivation to do this thing, so I'm going to try to pop it out because you really deserve some recognition.

    I looked back to see when the last time I even wrote a letter to you was, and surprisingly it was just this past January; that's not so bad considering our crazy year.  But remember when I diligently wrote these letters each month?  That is going to have to be a thing of the past now that I'm going to have three kids.

    Anyway, the reason I'm saying you deserve this is because the last time I wrote, it was all about how much you were driving me crazy.  And now, six months later, we have returned to having a spectacular relationship.  Snuggling, hugs, kisses, hand-holding. A lot of that is because of the baby.  You love babies, and you love the idea that we're going to have a baby in our family again and you're constantly wanting to 'hug' the baby or 'kiss' the baby.  We've been having less fights about your clothes, and you've been a little more open to help in deciding which shirt matches which pants.  You still make annoying noises, but you're better about calming down when I prompt you.  We've been getting to spend a certain amount of one-on-one time with each other lately and it's been awesome.

    You are an awesome big brother.  Not always perfect, but lately you've been the best big brother I think I've ever seen.  Tonight at dinner Sabine stubbed her toe and started to cry, but before I could make it over to her, you'd scooped her up, put her on your lap and held her to you, rubbing her back.  You talked to her in a soothing voice and then helped her finish her dinner.  Sometimes I can't believe I'm witnessing a seven year old.  Also at dinner tonight, we had swiss chard from the garden, and you said, "Yes, swiss chard!  I love swiss chard!"  I think it's so cool that you like to eat things like that.  Each night for dinner we've had at least three or four things from the garden, isn't that awesome?  Cucumber, squash, zucchini, lettuce, snap peas, bush beans, garlic, broccoli, peppers.  One night everything we had for dinner, except for one ingredient, came from the garden.

    Last week in Sabine's letter I wrote about how I'm learning that I like you guys better when just one of you is around.  Something else I've been realizing is that just like in any relationship, my relationships with my kids come in waves.  Sometimes we have a rougher go of things, and then times passes and suddenly things are swell again.  Experienced mothers are always saying how you don't love one child better than another, just differently, and I'm totally getting to the point in my mothering experience where I can grasp that.  I'm also realizing that these waves in our relationship are natural, and sometimes one child's wave is up, while the other's is down.  So that while I may not love one of you better than the other, I certainly find that at any given time one of you is more in my favor.  And I'm ok with admitting that.

    Another thing we've been doing a lot of lately is weeding the gardens together.  It's just something that we both find very cathartic; maybe in your case the word is 'fun' or whatever.  But either way we sit together in nature and get to chit chat.  It's a very peaceful time for us.  We've baked together lately, which is something you've always loved to do.  Basically anything that involves housekeeping is right up your alley; laundry, dishes, vacuuming.

    These days I've been so anxious and antsy about waiting out these last days of pregnancy, that I've been dragging you and Sabine around from park to park and constantly running errands, that when we are home you are so happy to just veg out and play pretend things with Beanie.  Right away when school ended it was Play-Doh you were both really into.  Crafts are always a favorite.  Then one day you asked to bring the train set up from the basement (where it spent this whole past year ever since Daddy re-did the hardwood floors).  It had to be cleaned and disinfected (mice in the basement this winter) so you spent a couple of mornings doing that before playing with it, and ever since you've been sooo into building train tracks all around the house.  You guys like to paint out on the deck some mornings.  And you're into building giant block cities and furnishing them with a variety of Schleich animals.


    And baseball.  Still one of your favorite things.  You played little league again this spring, but what you really love are the Yankees.  We don't have cable so you either watch the live coverage one the computer, or listen to John Sterling on the radio.  You love to talk anything baseball with Daddy, and I'm amazed at the amount of facts you retain about the sport.  In the spring we went to visit Steve and Danielle and while we were there you and Daddy took a day trip to Sky Dome in Toronto to see the Yankees play.  I'd say your current number 1 activity is playing wiffle ball with Daddy in the backyard.  You and Sabine fight over who's going to get Daddy's attention when in the backyard.  She wants him for pushing on the swings and you want him for pitching balls.

    So right now it's summer and we're having a great time.  I'm so happy to have you back to myself after a long year at school.  You really enjoyed school, and I think it did wonders for you, but I'm still holding on to the hope that some day you can homeschool again, at least for one more  year.  You had ten kids in your class, in the one-room schoolhouse you attended.  I came in to your class a lot to help out, and I got a lot of experience in terms of being an involved parent in the school system.  I had to be persistent, and a little pushy at times, in order to be able to come in and get my time in your classroom.  So I feel like it was a really good learning year for both of us.  I feel like so much happened this year, so much growth took place and so much change.

    This coming school year is going to be something.  The new baby will bring lots of change.  I wonder if you're going to have trouble going back to school because you'll miss the baby too much.  But either way, things are going to be good because you're going to get another chance to show what an awesome brother you are.  I'm worried how the dynamic will change with you and Sabine though.  I know our relationship will change and takes on new shapes, but I hope we can still return to these times of calm and peacefulness, at least for a little bit.

Love,

Mommy

 

  

  

Day 17: The Two-Straw Method

I bet you felt so sorry for Sabine in that last photo, so sad looking, waiting for her taste.  So I have to offer some resolution with this next post.  Eventually the fighting over whose turn it was become so bad, that I had to go get another straw and adopt the two-straw method.  They look like they belong on Happy Days.  Aww.

Seriously though, those shakes were four bucks a pop and I wasn't about to get them each one of their own.  Once you establish the "I want my own" precedent, there's no going back.  I hope this doesn't turn them to a life of anti-sharing when they grow up.  Forced into years of only getting half a serving, my adult children will go through life hoarding their food and hiding away stashes of goodies.

Day 16: Longing for a Sip

After West Virginia we hit Hershey, Pennsylvania and took a tour of Hershey Park.  Jacob got a milk shake in the food court and Sabine was sitting there patiently awaiting her turn.  They were so darn cute I couldn't help but take a bunch of pictures.

Day 14: Goodbye Pictures

Before we left on Saturday morning for our long journey home, we took come cousin pictures.  Here is everybody under 10 sitting on the front steps.

Day 12: 2nd Cousins

This was taken in the afternoon when everyone was getting up from their naps.  Emma came in to help us wake up and get going.  Jacob snuggled with her for a while before she got sick of it and started to cry.  I love the pictures I took of them then.  I love Jacob's big lashes and Emma's big cheeks.  I actually think she looks a lot like her mother here.

Sabine keeps asking me if she held Baby Emma, and I'm pretty sure she did, but I guess I didn't get any pictures of that.  Oops.

Day 6: Do you think it was his 100th day or something?

Ok, so I missed a few days, or a week.  I sort of forgot to take in account that we were going out of town for a while during vacation week.  So I'll just pick back up where I left off, there's no use trying to catch up on a whole week's worth of posts.  Now it's Wednesday again, so I can just pretend that the days in between didn't happen.

Here's a photo of Jacob with all the things he came home with on his 100th day of school!  Yippee.  Must they do this to us?  What do we need with all these stupid papers that come home everyday?  But seriously, this is not the kind of academic work I expect Jacob to be doing in school.  Putting 100 stickers on a sheet of paper?  A bookmark, a certificate, special 100 day glasses...I do like the school Jacob is in right now, but I don't think I'll be sad to have him move on at the end of the year.

Day 4: Baby Mally

This is Jacob playing with our friend, Mallory.  Sabine calls her Baby Mally. This is the way Jacob was with Sabine when she was a baby, and I think it's so cute that he's this way with Mallory too.  He is really into babies, which is adorable.  I will be in luck come July.

Day 2: Valentines

 

So here I go with another round of pictures a day...I'm trying to decide how long I'm going to pledge to continue this stretch for.  I want to say until the new baby is born because I know that will probably be the last time I'm near the computer for a very long time, but that's almost five months away.  Maybe until I see the first flower sprout up from the ground?  We'll see.

Anyway, these are Jacob's valentines that we made for his school celebration.  No way was I going to buy them from the store. We try to make as much homemade stuff as possible.  I think they came out pretty cute.

Cast-Offs

Remember back in December when Jacob had a loose tooth and a cast on his leg at the same time?  I never followed up with that post, so I will now that I'm trying to get back into posting more regularly.  At the time I wrote about three big things happening in that one week.  I wrote about Jacob's tooth being the third thing, but it was really just a cover for my finding out I was pregnant.  Anyway, that's sort of the reason why I stopped posting, there hasn't been much time or energy to spend on the computer.

So here's some pictures of Jacob in his cast, and then a picture of him the day his tooth fell out.  His tooth did not fall out the same day as Christmas, but it did fall out the same day that he got his cast off.  So I thought that was kind of funny that both those things happened within a couple hours of each other.  I sent him off to school on a Monday morning with all of his teeth intact and then picked him up a few hours later to get his cast off, but there was no longer a loose tooth.

  

Dear Jacob: January 24, 2011

Dear Jacob,

I wish I could jump ahead into the future so that I could establish if all that nagging I did back when you were seven was really necessary.  Because it seems that's all I do right now, and I feel very badly about it.  You see, sometimes it's just so hard to be in the same room, scratch that, the same house as you.  You are so annoying these days.  I don't know how long it's been like this, a year?  It definitely became unbearable when you started school last fall.  The way Beckie puts it is that you (little boys in general) spend so much of the day 'toeing the line' in school, that when you come home, you just have to let out all that pent-up energy.

But why does that energy have to be in the form of the World's Most Irritating Sounds?  In order of frequency, here are the things you do:  Repeat random syllables in a high-pitched sing-song voice, clap your hands (loudly) in a random pattern (is random pattern an oxymoron?), laugh in a maniacal way that makes me have to stop what I'm doing to go investigate what you've gotten into, make gun-shooting noises, stomp your feet.  The list goes on.

For entire minutes in our house the only thing that can be heard is me going, "Jacob, pllllease!"  Followed by your continuation of said random phrases, followed by my going, "Jacob, pllllease!" again, and on and on and on.  If I were to actually leave the room I'm in to look you in the eye and tell you to stop every time you do sometime like that, I would never get anything done.  As it is I can hardly get any stuff done because I spend so much time with my blood pressure sky high that I can't focus on my task at hand.

Just in case I am being too vague in my description of the annoying stuff, as I type this you're getting so far under my skin that I can't think of a good metaphor for how far under my skin you are.  Here is what you are doing:  Creeping around the corner of the doorway to peer in at me, for what reason, I'm not sure.  But without taking my eyes from the screen I can see that you have put on your coat, with the hood pulled up and the little neck tabs pulled across your chin, and also, you have your little goggles on.  You are giggling because then you creep past the doorway and you don't think I have seen you, and perhaps you think you are getting away with something because I would not approve of you wearing your coat in the house?  How many times have I told you about peripheral vision?  I don't have to be looking at you to see what you're doing.

I won't even get started on your interactions with Sabine.

Also, it's like you're testing the power of words or something.  You say stuff sometimes that doesn't mean anything, I can figure out why you'd be saying it, it's not true.  Today, "Sabine, I have a razor, I could cut you."

WHY?

Is it because you are on your way to becoming a psychopath?  Or do I not need to worry about that?  Because if I knew that threatening to kill your little sister is a normal thing, then I would have a lot less nights where I lie awake in bed.  Is it because you are bored?  If so, that sort of sucks, but at least I would know the reason and I could assure myself that when it is not zero degrees outside, your cabin fever would wear off.  Is it that you are testing the power of your words?

All these things I could understand, but maybe there is some reason only a seven year old boy can internalize, yet not be able to come up with the words to express why it is a necessary part of development.  Maybe there is a purpose, and if someone, or if Future You could tell me, then maybe I could live with it without really understanding it.  Right now all the crazy behavior seems so meaningless.  If some expert could tell me to have faith, that there is a reason, I will take that.

Also, I'd like to know if I am damaging you in some way when I stand there above you screaming, "Why are you doing this?"  Because in these moments I truly expect you to give me an answer; when people tell me that you're seven and you don't know why, I just can't accept that.  When I tell you that you are acting crazy, am I negatively influencing your self-esteem in a way that can't be repaired?  If it can be repaired, is it enough that I apologize when I need to and that I can admit when I was wrong?

I really just wish that you could give me an answer as to why you do these things.  That would be the best thing for our relationship; if you could just tell me why.  I could be so much more understanding.  If I have a reason for something, I can deal with it.

All my complaining makes it sound like I don't enjoy having kids.  But then I go upstairs to get into bed, only to find my two cherubs asleep in my spot, snuggled in with their arms wrapped around each other and it all sort of seems worth it.

Love,
Mommy

They Come in Threes

That's the line, right?  Things tend to come in threes?  Last week, in the course of 24 hours, three big things happened.  The last one isn't such a big deal though, unless you're a seven year old kid.

A week ago on Friday afternoon I was at a complete stop on our road waiting to cross a lane of traffic in order to take a left-hand turn into our own driveway.  There were several cars behind me who were also stopped, so I guess the jackass in the big pickup behind all those cars decided he didn't want to wait in the line of stopped traffic.  He pulled out into the left lane, facing oncoming traffic, and proceeded to pass the entire line of cars.  I began to take the left turn as he was passing me (but of course I didn't look behind me before I turned), and I didn't see him until just after he'd slammed my front left bumper and kept on going, swerving back into the right lane to avoid a head-on collision.  And kept on going.  And going.

I was in shock because I couldn't believe that someone had hit me, and in even more shock that he left the scene of the accident.  It took me a minute to remember what I was supposed to do, and then I realized oh yeah, call the police.  All I could do was describe the car, he'd been going too fast to catch the license plate, and no one else who stopped had gotten it either.

About 15 minutes later when Zach had gotten home, I was in the driveway showing him the damage when a saint disguised as an ordinary citizen pulled in the driveway and produced the license plate number of the pick-up who'd hit me.  He'd followed him about 4 miles down the road before catching up and getting close enough to read the plate.  Then he drove all the way back here to give us the best pre-Christmas gift ever.

With the license plate number the police were able to get the guy and slap him with a bunch of tickets.  He's 19, a local college student (everyone had said, oh it must have been a college student) from the school down the road, and was driving an unregistered vehicle not belonging to him.

Anyway, we're all ok, the kids were in the car with me, so it could have been much, much worse.  A few feet more and I might not be here, or Jacob, or Sabine, because I figure he was going about 50mph.  But MY KIDS WERE IN  THE CAR WITH ME.  I am so pissed that someone could, and would, do something like that.  We knew it was only a matter of time before one of those ass-hole drivers that we see on our road all the time would come to affect us personally.  Now we have a real incident to refer to when Jacob wants to know why he's not allowed to go in the front yard.  I'm surprised that I'm not more shaken up about what could have happened, but maybe all the other things going on have kept me too busy to think about it that much.

The same night as the car accident, Jacob was on the kitchen counter and decided to jump off onto the floor.  he landed with both feet, but flat-footed.  I think most everyone knows the difference between landing properly and landing with your whole foot like that.  The impact rushes up your whole body and shakes you, almost like getting the wind knocked out of you, but in a vertical way.  In the middle of the night is when he started crying about pain in his foot but we just assumed it was growing pains like he usually has.

The next day it was still hurting him, so we gave it another night and then brought him in for x-rays on Sunday.  They didn't find anything, but that night into the morning brought even more pain so we took him to see a specialist on Monday afternoon and it was decided that there was, in fact, a small break.  He's got a cast now and is getting along pretty well.

The last thing that happened is that over the weekend Jacob presented us with his usual, "I think I have a loose tooth," which is usually wishful thinking on his part, because he'd never had a loose tooth before, and had been desperate for one.  But when I stuck my finger into his mouth to feel it, I was totally grossed out by a definite wiggle in the bottom left toother! 

I actually feel like he got a little cheated on the loose tooth thing because he's been waiting for so long, and now it's kind of overshadowed by the cast.  Two childhood rites of passage at the same time! 

It was hard explaining to people what happened to Jacob's foot, that's the reason we eventually settled on the jumping-off-the-counter explanation, because as best we can figure that's when it happened?  But I almost wish I could use the car accident as the reason, it would be easier to explain why both these things just happened to occur on the same day.  And I've been privately joking with Jacob that the car accident must have shook him tooth loose.

Anyway, I remember the Christmas when I was seven, I was waiting for my two front teeth to grow in and I thought it was so cool that I could sing that song, All I Want For Christmas is My Two Front Teeth.  Jacob keeps asking when his tooth is going to fall out; with his luck of late, I wouldn't be surprised if the tooth fairy and Santa Clause showed up on the same night.  I'll just make sure we don't leave the tooth anywhere near the cookies.  Santa would never forgive us if we accidentally fed him a lost tooth!

Incase I never get around to the baby book...

Jacob had his 7 year well-child visit on Monday.  It may be some time before I get around to updating the baby books, so for the record, he was 45 pounds, 46 1/2 inches.  Oh, and of particular note was that they couldn't complete his hearing test because he had too much ear wax.  Ew!  I felt like a totally negligent mother, but as the doctor was flushing out his ears with water, she told me that it looks like he has really narrow ear canals.  Guilt reduced, but I was sent home with the gear she used and was given a thorough lesson so that I can flush out his ears at home.  Yay motherhood.

This is the life...

Laying in bed this morning, I pretended to still be asleep as Jacob and Sabine were snuggling with each other.  I had been working on teaching her to say, "I love you" and she's finally gotten the hang of it. I heard Sabine say the magic words, "I ofv ouu, JeJe." and little parts of my heart started shooting all over the place.

After a little bit they found out I was awake, or rather, they didn't care whether I was or not and just started climbing on me.  Each arm was filled with one of my kids as we laid there chatting with one another.  Hands down the best part of being a mom.  Then Jacob said aloud what I was thinking, "Ahh, this is the life!" he exclaimed.

Day 93: Apple Picking

We went to an apple orchard one day last week after school. Jacob was so excited to go apple picking; we go at least once every fall. We were admittedly going a little early in the season, but this year's crop isn't a great one and isn't going to last a very long time. So there were only one kind we could pick on that particular day. And the pickings were slim. We had to get creative and climb the trees in order to get any apples.

Zach was with us this year, and he's the one who actually started the climbing method. Jacob followed his lead. Click on the picture to see Zach in the tree...

Day 91: Fall Ball

Jacob is playing Fall Ball this year. He had the regular season in the spring, which was his second year, and this is just a short season, about six weeks long. Anyway, Nate is also playing Fall Ball, but this is his first team baseball. The boys ended up on different teams, but happened to be playing each other in the season-opening game. They also both happened to get #1 (mostly because they're on the tiny side and needed the small size). We thought it was funny that Nate (a Red Sox fan) ended up on the navy team, and Jacob (a Yankees fan) ended up on the red team, opposite of what they would have preferred.

We tried to orchestrate this photo with the two of them backs to the camera, yet with their faces toward each other, scowling as if they weren't really good friends. But they couldn't figure out how to turn their heads without turning their bodies, and then also remembering to scowl was difficult. Still, pretty cute pictures.

Day 90: Protective Gear

This is Jacob (in case you couldn't tell) during the sanding of the floors. What a mess that was and thank God it's over! Zach's dad came up a couple days to help out. Thank you again to him. We're slowly cleaning things up and moving furniture back in. Today we got our living room back into shape, but slightly rearranged. We almost switched the dining room and the living room, but ended up not doing so. And thank you to our moms for helping out with that process!

When we first moved in to our house we had a newborn and things we in a lot more disorder than they are now. I've always sort of felt because Jacob entered the world into a house of chaos, that the chaos naturally spilled over into the way we were with him. I feel like he didn't have a lot of routine and that's carried over into the rest of our years with him. I'm hoping that the disorder of the past few weeks (which coincided with him starting school) won't mark the rest of his school career. I'm hoping I can calm down soon and get to a point with the house where I feel like it's done and then concentrate on all the things I've volunteered to do for his school.

Day 80: School's In

Jacob started school today. It's the day I've been dreading for a long time. He was so happy and excited, and I know he's going to do fine. It's me I'm worried about. I'm so sad without him, the house is too quiet, and every time Sabine asks for him I have to tell her that he's at school - which feels to me like the 'S' word. Also, I feel like my big dream of homeschooling him is over, like all that planning I did was for nothing. We're just like every other family now.

I cried all day yesterday - when he was getting his Chicken Pox shot, when we were talking about what he wanted in his lunch, when we were tucking him in. In the middle of the night, when we got up this morning, I cried. And then again when we were dropping him off, and on my walk home from the school with Sabine. And each time someone called on the phone to check in and see how I was.

But now it is time to go pick up my baby and I am so excited! I am going to get there early and sit in the parking lot juts waiting.

Day 75: Leaving for Home

Before we left on Friday, with everyone gathered nearby, we took the opportunity for some group photos. Here's the one of us I like. Click on the photo for some more, which will bring you to my flickr page.

Day 74: Buried Treasure

I think this was our first day at the beach. We did the obligatory sand burying and I gave Jacob a shirt under his head to be comfortable, as well as the hat over his face to block the sun. The Yankees would be proud?