A week of birthdays

At my prenatal appointment last Friday the midwife made a comment about my weight gain being a little higher than what it usually is between my appointments. My excuse? Four birthdays in five days. I think that's a pretty good excuse. Marc and I had ours, then three days later was my dad's, then two days after his was Hugh's #2. And, actually, I just made one cake for Marc and me to share. Maybe next year we'll have our cake be whatever Hugh has for his cake. It is kind of a lot of cake and ice cream crammed into a short few days. Or figure out some other celebratory treat. Like, maybe this.

Here's the triple-layered chocolate cake with a Nutella-based frosting that I made for Marc and me. Notice the little hands trying to reach for the cake...

Just a few minutes later, after I had left the kitchen, thinking I had pushed the cake far enough away from the edge for those little reaching fingers. Our clue that something was up? Ben appeared from around the kitchen counter, with fingers in mouth and eyes glittering with pride/joy/mischief. I was just grateful he didn't pull the entire cake down to the floor. Funny boy!

I didn't get any photos of it, but we made mini Nutella cheesecakes for his birthday. For as active and energetic as he is, it was really hard to grasp that this birthday was his 75th. If I didn't know better, I'd guess he was at least ten years younger.

For the last few months I've been showing Hugh, the lover of trains, this picture of a Thomas cake that I found on some website a while back. (Wish I could remember where to give proper credit.)

I had decided it'd be fun to make it into an ice cream cake. The one thing I failed to take into consideration was the time limits for decorating an ice cream cake, without having it melt into a runny mess. It didn't help at all that as I was doing the first stage of layering the cake and ice cream, then rushing it into the freezer that the freezer would decide to not turn on for more than 20 minutes. I turned the temperature down to its very coldest, but nothing would budge that darn freezer to blow its freezing air onto my Thomas masterpiece. In that time, Hugh's poor cake was turning into a very sorry-looking sight.

It was all very sad and I felt incredibly disappointed at my inability to take the perfect cake from my imagination and turn into the perfect cake for my newest two-year old. But, I laughed it off and just felt relief that Hugh is too young to care and would love it in all of its ugliness. The good news is he blew out his two candles with perfect precision and was clearly pleased with his efforts!

I love this photo of Hugh, with his little hand ready to catch any cake or ice cream that might fall off his spoon.

The funniest part of Hugh's birthday was while we were eating his cake. Both boys were so busy eating that neither was really aware of the mess that blue frosting was making on their hands and faces. At one point, Hugh looked up at Ben and saw this:

Then, with a giggle, Hugh said, "Ben's face!" and then laughed some more.

What made it particularly funny was that Hugh had no idea he looked as ridiculous as Ben. So, Marc took a photo of Hugh's face and then showed him the photo. Realization is starting to sink in.

After having ice cream cake, we took the boys outside for birthday gifts - tricycles and lawnmowers. We got them each their own, to eliminate as much discontent as possible between the two boys.

A big happy birthday to my little Hugh! He is such a spunky little guy, with enviable dance moves and the most adorable raspy voice. He brings a contagious joy to our family and I feel so blessed and lucky to be his Mama.

Feeling blessed

This weekend, with my birthday and Mother's Day and spending it with my two little boys and a very squirmy little girl rolling around inside me, has made a lot of tender emotions come floating to the surface.

I've been thinking of my Mom and wishing I could remember the moment I entered the world. And, now expecting the arrival of a new little baby girl and feeling what she may have been feeling 34 years ago. Thinking about my birth and the celebration of Mother's Day back-to-back has made my heart fill to overflowing with love for my mother and all the love and sacrifice that has come with being her daughter.

Then, in a talk my Dad gave in church today on mothers, he briefly mentioned the sorrow and pain that followed the loss of our little twins and the indescribable joy we now feel with the miracles that have since filled our life. Sitting there, even while trying to keep the boys from hitting each other with their trucks, my heart filled with joyful emotion at the truth of that statement.

And, I was reminded of just three Mother's Days ago, the first after our loss, when the pain was so intense still that I begged Marc to escape for the whole weekend. I couldn't bare the thought of showing my tear-stained face to people at church who were there celebrating motherhood and not wanting to hear all the well-intended comments about how I really was a mother, too. In an eternal sense I knew I was, but it was much too overwhelming to have to face anyone who knew what we'd gone through and were still going through.

I'm honestly in awe, like completely-left-without-any-words awe, at how we've gone from that painful weekend away three years ago to being where we are today.

Just the thought of close friends who are still in that painful place I was in not too long ago makes me shudder at the thought of re-visiting those painful places in my heart. I am not without hope that miracles and healing will follow every pain and sorrow that we each experience, and I am anxious to see those dear friends a few years down the road with the same joy we've been so blessed to enjoy.

I will be the first to admit it - I've blessed far beyond what I deserve. Blessed to have joined a family headed by a father and a mother who have loved each other for the last 50 years. Blessed to have been promised the eventual raising of the twin daughters I first loved with a mother's love. Blessed by the selfless sacrifice of a courageous birthmother to receive the gift of our sweet Benjamin. Blessed by the miracle arrival of our feisty Hugh, who was so clearly meant to come so soon after Ben. And, now blessed with another unexpected miracle that just adds to the feeling that I've been blessed beyond my wildest dreams.

Clearly the deep valleys of sorrow that were carved in my heart from the tears and disappointments of past experiences, have now been filled with overflowing joy that cannot ever be adequately expressed with words alone. Truly I am blessed. And, I hope I can live a life that constantly reflects the gratitude and awe I feel for these precious blessings.

The Latest

I can't believe three weeks have passed since I last updated. My time has been consumed by a few different things that have required more of my full attention during my few moments of down-time.

There was preparing (and stressing over) a talk I gave at a women's conference for church about a week ago. While I definitely learned a lot and gained some new perspectives from my studying and preparations, I'm so relieved it's now behind me. Thankfully the nightmares of showing up without a talk prepared have also ended, too!

Then, there's the car-searching. Marc jokingly commented today that I've roughly spent $2000 worth of my time in searching for our next car. Not sure where that figure comes from exactly, but I think I have to agree! We've been really close to sealing the deal with three different cars and three different sellers, but for one reason or another all three have fallen through.

The most recent was just this weekend. And, it was the closest we've been to finalizing everything. We found a car we really liked and we got the price down to something we felt more comfortable with. We got a loan approved and got all the other necessary paperwork prepared from our credit union to take with us to the dealer yesterday. As of Friday night at 10:30pm we were all set to have our new car home with us the next day.

Then, just before coming to bed Marc did some searching online about the most common complaints/problems with the specific year of the car we were about to buy and found that the number one problem was a very expensive one (like $7000 expensive) and one that, according to other owners' experiences, could possibly happen with this particular car within the next three thousand miles.

Our discussion led to other concerns about the car in general and its ability to meet our family's needs, lasting until sometime around midnight-thirty. In the end we decided we didn't feel good about buying the specific car we were set to buy, nor about buying that make/model of car in general. So, the search has started over from step one, but we feel so much better about the direction we're headed in and feel like we gained some real clarity from our almost-buy. I'm just hoping the real deal will happen in the next few weeks, so the nightmares will cease of not having a car big enough to bring my baby home from the hospital.

Since we had made plans to have my parents watch our boys yesterday while we bought our car, we decided to keep that in the plans and spend the morning together. It kind of just happened to work out nicely that it was also our birthday. We drove an hour away to the next biggest city where we visited a friend in the hospital, enjoyed some retail therapy at some of our favorite stores, and found a cute little Italian place that served us some of the best pizza we've had in a while.

And, if that doesn't sound like the perfect way to spend a birthday, it gets even better. We ended the day with dinner out with my parents, where the boys thought we had possibly died and gone to food heaven. Ben was so thrilled to have his pick of eating whatever he wanted off any of the plates sitting in front of him, while Hugh couldn't get enough of my pasta and Marc's fries.

With over-stuffed tummies we still ended the night with a three-layered chocolate cake with a nutella-based frosting that I made the night before. Although, between the six of us, we barely ate the equivalent of a single slice, which means lots of cake for tonight and the next few nights to come!

All of that to say, life is busy. Life is good. And, life will be even better when we have our new family-sized car found and bought and ready to hold three precious bundles of joy we get to call our children.

Bed transition - Success

So, after the ups and downs of our Saturday night attempts to get Ben settled for the night he ended up sleeping through the night and woke up at 7:05am.

We decided we'd try to remain as consistent as possible with our routine on Sunday night and wait on trying anything new at this point. After gently explaining to Ben that it was time to sleep and he needed to stay in his bed, as I got up to leave his room he literally ran after me and slipped his little fingers around the door to keep me from closing it. It is SO hard to be firm in moments like this, but we've learned from experiences with Ben that consistency and keeping with a schedule really works for him.

I carefully moved his fingers from the door and reminded him again that it was time to sleep. I closed the door and stayed there for less than a minute to keep him from coming all the way out, but as soon as I heard him leave the door, I went and paced the living room sure that he'd be out any minute.

Then, Ben started crying and then Hugh started crying, which on the first night we learned that when Hugh started crying (twice) it was because Ben had climbed into the crib with Hugh. But last night we thought Hugh was just upset because Ben was upset and we were sure Ben was going to attempt to come out any minute, so we just waited for a little while (maybe 15 minutes).

At that point it sounded like Ben was saying "down", so Marc went in to check on him. He had climbed into the crib and was crying from there, all while Hugh had laid himself down on the far end and was already fast asleep, even amidst Ben's crying. Marc got him out and laid him down on his bed and told him it was time to sleep and then came back out. Again, we fully expected Ben to come out, but after a minute of protesting it got quiet and we didn't hear a peep from him for the rest of the night. That was 7:45pm and he ended up sleeping until 7:15am this morning. I went in to check on him a little later and he was snuggled up on his bed with his blanket and his two favorite stuffed animals.

We were able to understand better after last night that Ben climbing into the crib with Hugh must have been Ben's way of telling us of some fears and insecurities he was feeling with this transition. I felt some terrible mother guilt once I saw the whole situation from his perspective. I really felt like crying and was determined that we'd approach this whole bed transition more gradually and give him time to feel secure with the change.

Well, if we thought last night went smoothly, tonight was a piece of cake. We did all the normal stuff - scriptures, prayer, storybooks, songs, cuddling - and just when I was about to get up and leave, Ben patted his pillow and begged me to stay, so I sat down next to him and ran my fingers through his hair and sang him two more verses of his favorite lullaby, telling him over and over how much I loved him. He calmed right down and after making sure he had Elmo and his sock monkey in each arm, asking if he was going to go night-night with Elmo and his sock monkey, he even giggled a little. I wasn't sure if it was enough, but I left him at that point and was totally shocked that he didn't follow me to the door, he didn't cry and we didn't hear anything from him at all. That hasn't ever happened - even when he was in his crib.

I don't know if the coming nights will go quite as smoothly, but I've decided it doesn't matter. I think my mind made a way bigger deal out of this whole transition than it needed to. I'll blame it on pregnancy and my fear of never sleeping again once July comes, which I see now is just silly and ridiculous. I clearly value my sleep - and I value my kids' need for sleep and my role in helping them get the sleep they need to be happy - as well as the sleep I need to be happy. BUT, even more than that I've come to realize through this whole situation that I value providing a feeling of safety, of security, of love. And, coming to that realization (even if a little delayed) is the greater sign of success here.

Bed transition - update

This is for those of you who are interested, as well as for my own attempts to keep track of what we're doing that works and what doesn't work. Our first night of transitioning Ben to a big boy bed was a bit of a long night. I slept pretty good the first part of the night, until about 1am. That was when I heard the boys' bedroom door open. In my half-sleep disorientation, I jumped out of bed and ran through our living room and down the hall, hoping to get to Ben before he stumbled into something in the dark. And, luckily, in the process I didn't stumble into anything myself! He had barely closed the door behind him when I scooped him up and took him back to his bed. He was being really talkative, which was making it really difficult to get him settled down. I had been hopeful that it'd only take me 10 minutes before he'd be fast asleep and I could go back to the comfort of my own bed. Not so lucky.

I made five attempts to leave his room, when I thought he was asleep enough not to notice, and before I could get to the door, he was awake and making his way to the door with me. On that fifth attempt I had to use the bathroom so bad and was so tired and uncomfortable from laying down next to him in awkward positions, that I left him and hoped he'd just stay put. I was really surprised to come out and see that I'd been in there for two hours. That was when I decided to ask Marc to take a turn with him.

I tossed and turned the rest of the night, waiting for Marc to come back, but he ended up falling asleep with Ben until morning. I guess being non-pregnant made a difference in the comfort level.

Thursday night we repeated the bedtime routine from the night before and we both laid down with Ben expecting it to just be a 10-minute process. But, since he'd had a three hour nap that afternoon he wasn't nearly as exhausted. After 10 minutes Marc had to get back to a work project, so I stayed with Ben until he fell asleep. An hour and a half later I emerged from his room, admittedly a bit annoyed and impatient that it took him so long to fall asleep. But, that night he slept through the night and didn't come out until 6am when he woke up.

Friday night I let Marc have a turn laying down with him, which ended up taking about an hour. But we were both starting to feel like it was becoming a bit of a game and making Ben more distracted and dependent on us being there than we wanted him to be. So, we decided it was time to switch things up a little for our routine tonight.

7:00-ish - baths are done, scriptures are read, prayers are said, and snuggle time begins.

7:17pm - We say good night and leave the room.

Between 7:24 and 8:26pm - Ben comes out 25 times and Marc patiently and stoically takes him back to bed. There were about a dozen other moments when he opened the door and shut it again on his own without coming all the way out. By around 8pm he was getting a little fussy, a sure sign that tiredness was starting to hit.

9:00pm - After a half hour of complete silence I went in to put him in his bed, because I was fairly sure that he'd fallen asleep right by the door. In the process of carefully pushing the door open, he woke up and became really frantic when we tried to continue what we'd been doing of laying him down and leaving the room.

So, I caved and laid down with him. As soon as he realized I was laying down with him he wiped his tears and leaned in to kiss me and then cuddled his face right up against mine. I hummed a calming lullaby and within ten minutes his breathing was heavy enough that I thought I was safe to leave. Before I could get to the door he was up and running towards me, totally in a panic.

So, I went back and laid down with him again. I kissed him on the forehead and whispered, "go night night, baby." He then very sweetly brought both arms up and around my neck and pulled me close and would not let go. So, I stayed and cuddled him back to sleep. Again, when I tried to leave, he woke up just as I got to his door. So, the next time, I put his sock monkey in one arm and laid his Elmo next to his other arm. And, rather than laying down, I just sat next to him. It was obvious that he was exhausted by how quickly he was falling asleep. It was just that his radar of being left alone was on a high alert.

9:45pm - On my third attempt to come out, he woke up again, so Marc took a turn going in with him.

10:25pm - Marc emerges without Ben waking up. Success! Well, kind of, I guess.

I'm not really sure what this means for our night tonight, if he'll be so zonked out that he'll sleep through the night like he has been or if our efforts were more traumatizing than we intended and he'll wake up in a panic at some point. And, at this point, I'm really not sure what our plan will be for tomorrow night. But, somehow, someway, we'll all make it through this transition successfully. Hopefully sooner than later.

The First Night

So, a month or so ago I posted about Ben's attempt to climb out of his crib. With how tangled up he'd gotten in the process, we sensed that he was too timid to make another attempt. We decided we'd buy ourselves a little more time to figure out what our next step would be for him. Today we suddenly ran out of time.

Nap time came and everything was going just like normal. Both boys in their cribs, babbling away, which usually ends up in both eventually settling down and falling fast asleep. After about 15 minutes Ben was the only one still babbling, so I guessed that Hugh must zonked out and Ben would soon be on his way.

And, it was right about then that I heard his bedroom door open. I immediately covered my mouth in shock and to stifle the laughter as he came running out, with a huge grin on his face clearly pleased with his accomplishment. Then he turned right back around and ran back into his room and shut the door. A minute or so passed and then Hugh was awake and crying. Ben had gone back in and turned the light on and done something to arouse Hugh.

I took Hugh to my bed to get him back to sleep while Marc worked on getting Ben settled. Since he still takes 2-3 hour naps consistently we know he isn't quite ready to give up his naps completely. Anyway, to make a long story short, after getting Hugh back to sleep I spent the next two hours trying everything I could think of to get Ben to fall asleep, eventually leaving him in there alone, only to have him climb out at least a dozen times before I finally gave up.

By late afternoon, I think we had both morphed partially into monsters. Lucky for us both that my parents got back home today and were kind enough to take both boys to the playground down the street for a little while. In the meantime, I rearranged the boys' room and set up a temporary bed with one of our camping pads and brand new monkey sheets I bought a few weeks ago. I tried to make it look fun and inviting, but was totally dreading our bedtime routine tonight.

We did everything like normal, but Ben was so tired and was clearly having a slightly harder time than normal getting settled down. And, since we put Hugh's crib away and moved him into Ben's, there was some confusion about who was sleeping where and why. Ben kept trying to climb into the crib with Hugh, so we laid down next to Ben to help him with the transition. He was so tired that within 10 minutes or so he was totally out. Hugh was still wide-eyed, but seemed content to settle himself to fall asleep on his own.

That was two and a half hours ago and we haven't heard a peep out of either of them at all. But, I'm very cautious in my optimism! Not sure exactly how the rest of the night will go... if either one will wake up disoriented and scared, or how much sleep we'll all end up getting tonight. But, this marks the beginning of the transition I've been putting off. And, just to be prepared, I'm heading to bed early tonight!

The extra exhaustion of illness

This last week has been exhausting. I mean, life in general right about now is a little on the exhausting side - two active toddlers coupled with being six months pregnant. But, when illness strikes, exhaustion takes on a whole new meaning.

It started last Tuesday when Ben woke up from a four-hour afternoon nap (which is quite a bit longer than normal) and was extra cuddly. I noticed his little body was generating more heat than it should and just let him rest in my arms while we watched some Curious George. As soon as Marc was done with work for the day, he took my place on the couch while I headed into the kitchen to get dinner started. Within maybe ten minutes Ben was throwing up all over himself, the couch, and Marc.

Before bedtime he had thrown up one more time and his fever persisted. But, fortunately, he was holding water down. The night that followed was long and uncomfortable for the little guy. We took turns responding to his cries and with each check on him, that darn fever wasn't showing any sign of breaking. Finally, by the time morning arrived his fever was gone and he was mostly back to his normal, active self.

We initially felt relieved that Hugh wasn't showing any sign of being sick. Then, Thursday morning came with Hugh feeling feverish and miserable all the day long. No appetite, no interest in anything, no energy whatsoever. He would accept water to drink, but shook his head in refusal to anything else we offered. Maybe that was the secret to the absence of any vomiting.

Friday morning, and throughout the weekend, both boys seemed back to normal health again and I was relieved their episodes were relatively short-lived. I was more than a little shocked when I went to drop Ben off at his Early Start playgroup on Monday morning and while helping him get settled, I found myself catching his unexpected vomit in my cupped hands. Luckily we were standing by the sink, so I dumped and when back to catch more as he continued to heave over and over again. I felt so terrible. He had been a little more clingy that morning, but I attributed it to him waking up earlier than usual and just having a harder time getting started.

After getting him cleaned up, I brought him back home, where we spent the entire day snuggled on the couch and his little body refused to hold down anything I tried to feed him. Hugh kept himself busy with an old cell phone, pretending to talk to BaPa and GG, no doubt wishing like I was that they would hurry and come home from their trip to visit my brother and his family.

Today, once again, the morning greeted us with two little boys who seemed back to normal health and activity, but I'm feeling a little skeptical and on guard, just in case tomorrow morning comes with another unwelcome illness, bent on knocking us down once and for all.

On a somewhat related note, I did notice that Ben is just starting to cut the first of his two-year old molars. Is there any chance that vomiting/fevers are related to cutting molars?

Some thoughts on politics

WARNING: This is the first (and very possibly the last) blog post regarding politics. I don't claim to be an expert nor am I a professional political commentator by any means. But, I do have a few thoughts I thought I'd share (which I might fully regret).

There are some who might be surprised to know I'm a total political junkie. I regularly check the top news sites and go straight to the political section. But, I rarely mention anything related to politics on here, and I rarely engage in conversations with friends about it either. Let's just say I value the relationships in my life more than getting into a heated debate over some political topic or figure out there.

You might be interested to know that Marc and I aren't registered with the same political party, and yet I feel most comfortable in my discussions with him about politics. We talk openly about our positions on different issues and there are times when we don't agree. But, we know how to be respectful of each others' opinions and I really appreciate that about our relationship. In fact, I think having us see things so differently has actually helped open my mind to consider other opinions than what I might normally consider on my own.

I've had some moments in recent months when I've wished there were more civility and respect among different supporters of different candidates. I've read a lot about the different presidential candidates currently running and there is a lot of garbage out there that tries to support one candidate solely by trashing another. I really dislike that part of the political process, even though I know the arguments that claim to support its role in the overall game. I guess it's one thing for the candidates themselves to find the need to distinguish between themselves, but I wish more supporters would leave the trash-talking to the politicians.

Marc sent me a thought-provoking article written by someone a couple of years ago, who addressed this to a certain degree, quoting a well-respected leader of my Faith (from a few decades back). It's well-known that a large majority of the LDS population is Republican, but I am always grateful for the reminder that there is room for people of all backgrounds, all opinions, all political parties who are seeking to be one in following Christ, regardless of who we support for the office of President.

One of my favorite quotes from the article is this:

"Strive to develop a maturity of mind and emotion and a depth of spirit which will enable you to differ with others on matters of politics without calling into question the integrity of those with whom you differ. Allow within the bounds of your definition of religious orthodoxy variation of political belief. Do not have the temerity to dogmatize on issues where the Lord has seen fit to be silent. I’ve found by long experience that our two-party system is sound."

If you're interested in reading the article you can find it here. (Within the article itself there are links to other articles referenced that are also worth reading.)

And, if you're still reading at this point, head over to read what my friend Jessica wrote about her thoughts on Politics. I could have just re-posted her blog post and called it my own.