Saturdays

I thought you would all enjoy seeing what Saturday mornings look like in Burnstopia...

Children?  check! 

Bed Sweet Bed?  check!

Everyone in their jammies?  check!

Mama?  Only one that's up for the day?  CHECK.

8 Weeks

Holy Moly, t'other Girl is already 8 weeks old!  Wowza did that go fast.

She's already up to 10 pounds and is smiling, which makes her super fun.  The big kids still love her, which is nice, though I sometimes wish they loved her less--my Girl is particularly aggressive in her affection and desire to be helpful.

 

Chris was trying to get some smiles, but they move faster than high speed technology.  

 

She screamed herself purple over the shots, and spent the whole day pretty much as you see her.  Crashed out right next to Mama.  

My days are just a blur, and it's incredibly frustrating.  I find myself having to say no to things I don't normally say No to (like, Mama will you read to me? and NAPS).  I keep hoping that it's just this stage, that once she's on a schedule things will get marginally easier, but that hope is wavering.

 ***

I often wish that I could give my children a better world to live in.  A safer world.  So on this Memorial day I'm thinking a lot about the brave men and women who are actually out and doing something about that wish.  Thank you, keep up the fight.

Eleven

So I've been thinking about the Anniversary in Burnstopia lately, and all I can hear is that guy from Spinal Tap saying, "ours go up to ELEVEN."  I don't know why, I'm pretty tired, so maybe that's it.

This year marks 11 years that Chris and I have been married.  Or as he so romantically puts it, "that I have been putting up with his crap."  Which is true, but still makes me laugh.  What really cracks me up and exasperates me all at the same time is his superhuman ability to SNEAK enormous things into our house without me noticing.  I went down to clean up the basement on Monday, and there was this huge storage cart on wheels just sitting there.  I called him to come down and said, "Dude.  What is THIS and how long has it been in our house?!"  At which point he laughed and said, "I didn't want you to think I was taking advantage of you being incapacitated post-c-section."  At which point I laughed and said, "But you totally WERE!"

Anyway...

We've been having an Honest Week around here, wherein he and I are probably a little too honest about our levels of stress, lack of sleep, frustration and discouragement.  But for all that, it usually brings us closer and makes us appreciate each other a little more.  I have to say, he's much more persistent and tenacious than I thought he was when I married him.  Maybe that's why I expected him to leave me for so long.  I figured, Life would get hard and he would leave.  But he hasn't.  And I haven't.  We stay and we keep working and we keep trying and after 11 years we've built a life together.  Some days it feels like it's built out of straw and the big bad wolf could come along any minute and blow us to smithereens, but I also know that if that happens, we'll dust each other off and build the Life again.  Which, now that I think about it, is what marriage is all about.

 

I tried to find a picture of us together, but there really aren't any.  All of our pictures are of the kids, or one of us with the kids.  Which, in a very genetic sense, is a picture of us together.