Dreaming Big

Two posts in one day is a world record for me, but my memory is crap so I gotta post this stuff while it's fresh in my mind...

Overheard tonight at dinner:


Cade: I'm going to be a PILOT when I grow up! Brad's dad is a pilot, but he only flies for Delta.

Me: That's great, Cade! I think you'd be a great pilot. You're really good at electronics.

Cade: Yes, I'm very, very smart at electronics.

Me: Drew, what are you going to be when you grow up?

Drew: A robot!

Me: A robot! Wow! That's awesome! What do robots do?

Drew: (walks around like a robot)

Cade: Maybe you should be a rocket ship driver instead. Or a bus driver, maybe.

Joshie's First Tooth!

Joshie got his first tooth yesterday! I have yet to be able to capture it on film, but I have a bunch of really bad outtakes. I'll spare you posting them and wait until I get a good one...

Cade is so proud of Josh's new tooth that he constantly has his finger in Josh's mouth so he can "feel Joshie's big boy tooth". Which is really pleasant for Josh, I'm sure. Cade wants to know if Josh can eat big boy food now, specifically Chick-Fil-A nuggets and also wonders when he is going to get around to standing up on his own.

Cade also noted that Josh is doing all kinds of new things this week, including "looking out the window of the van for the first time". Get ready, Josh. Now that you can see out the window of the car, you'll be enjoying a whole new world while you spend most of your days schlepping your big brothers around town.

Already? But I'm Not Ready!

I've done a good bit of whining about Josh's constant fussing and his inability to sleep for long stretches. The good news is that he's finally starting to outgrow that. The bad news: he's also starting to outgrow me.

For the past few months, his "off switch" when it's time for sleep is to snuggle up on my shoulder with a pacifier and Lamby, his soft, plush lamb blanket. But within the past week or so, he has decided that he no longer needs my assistance going to sleep and, in fact, prefers to do it on his own. His Lamby alliances have switched to Paul, a little blanket with a frog head (like a smaller cousin of Lovey) that was given to him by his godmother. Paci has been replaced by his thumb. This is awesome now but will suck (haha)when I have three kids who are finger/thumb suckers in braces because you can throw away the paci, but you can't cut off the thumb.

More than any of the other boys (probably because I know he is my last), I have savored the quiet time that Josh and I have before each nap and bedtime when I shoo the other boys out of the room, crank up the white noise machine, and rock my sweet baby to sleep.

But of late, he'll only snuggle for a very few seconds, but then arch away and can't seem to get comfortable or settled enough to sleep. What he wants is for me to love on him for a very few minutes and then put him in the crib so he can settle himself to sleep.

Most moms (including me, up until a few days ago) would do anything for self-sufficient sleeper like this. So why I am so bummed? Because my big baby starts kindergarten in the fall, my middle baby is all set to play soccer this spring, and my small baby doesn't want to snuggle with me anymore. I'm not ready for this.

Poor Drewbie

As a middle child, Drew frequently gets the shaft. Two examples from the past week:

Aaron took the boys to the park, where he and Cade proceeded to run ahead along a little trail. Drew, unable to keep up, literally dropped to the ground, curled up in a ball, and said sadly, "Oh...I'm a Lost Boy." He IS on a Peter Pan kick right now, but still...Aaron said it was pretty heartbreaking.


And the second example - Conversation overheard while getting ready for the day this morning:

Aaron: Hey guys, let's get ready! Cade, put your school clothes on - you're going to school. We need to hurry - Mommy has a meeting and she's taking Josh with her.

Drew: Where am I going?

Aaron: Uh...to the meeting with mommy, I guess.

Cade (to Drew, while pointing his finger in Drew's face and gritting his teeth): Yeah. And DON'T SAY A WORD while you're there.

Just so you don't feel too bad for him, he was actually getting dropped at a birthday party, not going to the meeting.

No Rest for the Weary

Today is MLK Day. Historically, neither Aaron nor I have had this day off from work, so we were pretty pumped about the extra three-day weekend this year and looking forward to some relaxation. Fortunately, we have our kids to keep us on task.

Coming downstairs this morning to find Aaron flopped on the couch relaxing with a cup of coffee, Cade barked, "DAD! Stop laying down on the job!"

And the Rocking and Rolling Continues...

Our first real family dinner conversation where everybody participated and was actually talking about the same topic and responding to the previous person's comments. See the synopsis on Atlanta Parent.

Rocking and Rolling

I am on FIRE today and am so excited I just have to post and share my joy. Baby has finally gotten on a decent schedule where he takes two (long!) naps a day and is in bed by 6:30 for the night. It has opened up a whole new world for me - I feel like I'm starting to get back in the groove of things.

So why am I so happy today? Here's what I have to be thankful for:
-My cleaning lady came this morning and my house is clean from top to bottom.
-I'm working on an awesome work project that I love and had a great meeting with a colleague this morning about some exciting other new opportunities.
-After the work meeting, I had time to make three stops of errands on my list before I had to get the kids from school. Bonus points - they were all returns, which means I actually got crap OUT of my house instead of bringing more in!
-My kids had Stay-N-Play, which means they ate lunch at school and I didn't have to mess up my (clean!) kitchen.
-The two youngest took a nap, which means I got quality one-on-one time with Cade - yay!
-The baby slept and the boys entertained each other so I had time to make not only tonight's dinner, but tomorrow's as well (chili). This is a lifesaver because Cade has choir at 5 pm on Wednesday's and scraping together dinner after that is always a nightmare.
-My hubby came home early and children are still either sleeping or occupied, which means we might get to ACTUALLY HAVE A CONVERSATION!
-Since he is home early, dinner will be early, and I will have time to run to the gym.

I am so happy I could just cry. Life is good. And yes, you may address me as "SuperMom".

Drew's Mystery Ailment

Yesterday Drew woke up from his nap and he couldn't walk. He was fine when he went to sleep and when he woke up, he stood up and fell over. Not really in a brain-failing-to-communicate with legs kind of way - it was more like a putting-pressure-on-the-leg-collapses-it kind of way. He proceeded to spend the rest of the day getting around by either crawling (on the stairs or carpet) or slithering like a snake (on the hardwoods). If it wasn't so pathetic, it would have been comical.

For his part, Cade was quick to take advantage of Drew's handicap. This next sentence is really long, but it exactly describes what happens, so stay with me here. Prancing around in his underwear after bath, Cade filched a quarter out of Drew's piggy bank and proceeded to dangle it in front of Drew while doing a dance and then shove it in the top of his butt crack/underwear waistband and race down the hallway laughing hysterically while Drew slithered behind him crying. There's nothing like a little brotherly love/stripper dance to finish off the day.

I searched the offending leg for broken bones, scratches, bruises and bites - there were none. I pressed him for an explanation and he claimed that it started hurting when a crab crawled up from the beach and bit him. Not helpful, given that we haven't been near a beach since May. He also claimed that the area in pain was his knee, despite the fact that he was crawling around on his hands and knees. We did a "faking it" test (read: bribed him with candy to walk) and he failed, leading us to assume that the injury was, in fact, legitimate. I gave him a dose of Motrin for what I assumed was inflammation of some sort and sent him off to bed, thinking he would wake up better.

Only he didn't. In fact, in the middle of the night, we found we heard a thud and found him half-asleep, crawling to the bathroom, moaning "Water! Water!". Hmm. Can half-asleep people fake injuries?

Off to the pediatrician's office for me in the morning! But not before a stop at the preschool to drop off Cade, where three different people informed me that either their children or others they knew also woke up one day unable to walk. Diagnoses ranged from MRSA to a bacterial hip infection that required a month in a wheelchair. Awesome.

At the doctor's office, we were treated to not only a visit with the pediatrician, but also xrays and blood work, plus Josh barfed all over me for good measure. The children enjoy ganging up on me like this. Three hours later, we still had a gimpy leg and no diagnosis. Our pediatrician agreed Drew was not faking it, but couldn't make a diagnosis and told us to wait it out through the weekend and come back on Monday if it wasn't better to discuss specialist referrals. This was awesome too, because it gave me the opportunity to wonder what kind of specialist referral he had in mind - ortho? neuro? oncology? Given a lack of definitive information, my imagination loves to run wild.

Back at home, the children were climbing the walls and it was a fairly warm, sunny day, so I packed Drew into the stroller/wheelchair, strapped the baby into the Baby Bjorn, and coaxed Cade into walking next door to the park. Drew limped around at first and then began (gimpily) chasing friends from the neighborhood around the park. By suppertime, he was a new man and pretty much recovered.

Normally, I would be mad that I missed bible study and wasted an entire morning that included signing a waiver that I wasn't pregnant (x rays) and conducting a physical restraint in the presence of needles (blood work) at the doctor's office. But on this day, I am so grateful that my son is apparently healthy again and I can avoid the dreaded specialist that I don't even care.

A small reminder that nothing should ever be taken for granted, especially not the good health of our children.

Cade Does Laundry

Earlier today we came upstairs to hear Cade crying hysterically. Why? Well, he climbed into the laundry hamper. Unfortunately, Drew then proceeded to tip it over and run away. It landed with the opening flat against the nightstand, trapping Cade in the hamper. Stellar parents that we are, we started cracking up so bad when we saw him that neither one of us bothered to help him. The visual picture was so priceless that as he was screaming, I shouted to Aaron, "Wait! Let me take a picture first - this is totally blog-worthy!" And the story really is much, much funnier with the visual. But in the end it seemed as though we should free him sooner rather than later, so I missed the photo-op.

I'm hoping that this will teach him a lesson and prevent him from continuing his habit of climbing into empty giant Rubbermaid storage containers. On the inside covers of said containers, there is a picture of a child climbing into them with a giant "NO" circle across the child. This is to prevent suffocation. Other children might be deterred by this, but my children simply use it as a idea springboard for this and other equally ridiculous and dangerous activities.

On the bright side, at least the laundry hamper had air holes.