Life has been crazy in a good way lately. It’s a welcome change.
Sure 3 children is still crazy, and we barely have a minute to sit down, but it’s been manageable and fun. We’ve been doing more things and sometimes I can’t believe how different it is from 6 months ago. Six months ago going to church or on a playdate might have been our only activity of a weekend, and now it’s not even our only activity of a day!
Summer’s coming to an end, which also means so is our time as a family of four. Both things that make me think about last minute things we should cross off our bucket list.
One last trip to get ice cream, for example. So on a recent weekend I thought we’d go to an easy place down the road with a large parking lot and plenty of seating. However, the kids found out where we were going, and both objected - they may be little, but they’ve got opinions. They’ll apparently only go to ice cream shops that offer chocolate dip. To be fair, I agree with them, so we headed off to a further ice cream shop (that happens to have the most annoying parking situation) to get our black raspberry soft serve with chocolate dip on the top!
A few years and pregnancies ago, a friend gifted me a copy of The Belly Art Project book - signed and personalized, no less! It’s full of super cool pictures of women with their pregnant bellies painted with all sorts of creative ideas. It’s super cute, and something I always wanted to do, but a few things were holding me back.
First, I wasn’t sure who would do it. Could I paint my own belly? Talk a friend into it? And then if I did, I wasn’t sure what I should paint. So many of the ones in the book are either super personalized or very clever, and I was having a hard time coming up with something that wouldn’t be completely random.
Our new cat is howling and pacing and I’m assuming there are kittens coming, but to distract myself from that let’s recap our weekend! I have a ton of posts in draft trying to explain how we’re feeling lately and what life is like, but I’m having a hard time putting them together. So instead let’s do something easy.
Last weekend we decided to join every other person in New England and go apple picking. Seriously, on my morning team meeting Monday, everyone was eating apple something. My boss had just finished an apple muffin and was talking about dropping an apple pie off at his son’s house, a coworker was debating apple pancakes for breakfast, and I was telling them all about the apple coffee cake and apple chips we’d just made.
There are some things that haven’t changed too much due to our home quarantine. We still get up at the same time, play with the kids all day, and in between manage to clean the house and mow the lawn. Some things might be harder, so we just don’t do them, or are putting them off. Dentist appointments, mattress shopping, haircuts. But then there are other things. Things that are much harder now, but cannot be put off. Things like blood draws for the kids. We have actually put it off as long as we could, but it was finally time to get it done.
While I was sitting at my desk on Friday, a reminder popped up on my phone: “Muffins for moms.” It’s usually the kick off to Mother’s Day weekend, a little treat to look forward to. Cancelled this year, obviously. Of all the things cancelled, it’s the least of them. I can easily get a muffin or something even more yummy, but it was just another little sting. Another little reminder that things are different.
I'm what they call an inside person. Especially in the winter. Give me a book, a fire, and some coffee, and I'll see you in April. Let’s be honest, even in the summer you’re more likely to see me inside doing craft, baking cookies and organizing closets than see me outside at the beach. It’s not to say I don’t go outside, it’s just not always my first choice.
So when it comes to the kids, I'll build a tower with blocks, teach them to make pancakes, or make elaborate art projects. That’s where my strengths lie. But when they want to go play in the snow, I usually let Tom take the lead. He’s one of those people who actually like the cold, so why not?
Four day weekends used to be so exciting. A big opportunity to go somewhere, or do something. The opportunities felt endless and we were always excited and counting down. And then you have two very small children, and you realize that as much as you love spending time with them, four days without a break is a lot. It’s tiring.
Here's what I believe about toddlers, at least two year old toddlers. They don't know how to misbehave, or how to do things to annoy you on purpose. They only know there are things that will get your attention, and things that won't.
And if they're doing something to get your attention, it's because they need you and don't know how to say so.
Language is powerful. Nothing reinforces that more than having children. Suddenly you’re watching what you say around them or how you say it. Aware that they’re taking in everything, and learning from you. Words can also dictate behavior. E learned a new word recently, and it’s completely changing how we spend our weekends.
The word? Outside.
We haven’t had much snow this winter, something that I’d normally be okay with. But the combination of me not having to commute anywhere, and us having a toddler with a new sled to try out had me actually wishing for snow. So of course we got to February with only 5” on record, all of which came with a rain storm which meant it was mushy and gross, and melted the next day.