On Being a Girl

When I'm feeling like I need a little attention, there's a story I like to tell my husband to elicit the level of pity and appreciation that I'm seeking. I like to tell him about how, when I was in 6th grade, we participated in a school dance (bad idea #1). But instead of causing any sort of problems once we were in the gymnasium, the teachers handed out our dance cards and set us free to get them signed (bad idea #2). Of course there were girls who instantly had lines forming around them, and others of us who milled about, breaking out in the cold sweat of humiliation. After a decent amount of time, the teacher announced that those of us who had not yet filled up their dance card should gather in a specified area, where they would be matched up by the teacher (HORRID idea #3). Of course I was one of those kids. I think I blacked out after that moment because I remember little more about that experience. But I do think that the dance card day was one of the defining moments of my life, and it (obviously) wasn't a good one. I know I wasn't the ugliest girl in the class. I was extremely shy and quite tall, which is never a good combination for an elementary school dance. But I knew one thing that day: that I was the girl who would never be able to fill her dance card.

I'm not telling this story to gain sympathy (unless you're my husband). I'm hoping to explain the reason why, when the radiologist told us we were having a baby girl, I felt equal parts surprise, excitement, and anxiety. I'd been raising boys for 5 years, and knew some things by that point: their feelings did not get hurt easily, if they did, they were over it in 2 minutes, and their self-worth was not 100% dependent upon what I and everyone else in the world thought about them. Simply put, I was scared to have a girl. I know how much I was influenced (good and bad) by the people in my life. I know what it meant to have a bad hair day for school pictures, and a bad hair year for the entire 7th grade. I know what it was like to have your best friend move on to a new group and leave you alone and scared. I know what it is like to go through puberty, with its dizzying array of physical and emotional changes. I know what it's like to be a girl.

It's with this in mind that I want to address my beautiful, perfect Lila. I want her to know that she is the most amazing baby. She knows what she needs to do, and she just does it. She's not afraid. She's not intimidated. Chicken enchiladas? Bring it on. A loud vaccum? I'll crawl toward it and check it out. Some strangers talking to me in the supermarket? I'll throw a smile their way. She survives the bumps and bruises of learning to crawl and stand with a smile. She tolerates her overbearing big brothers all day long. She has pure, untainted confidence in herself and her abilities. I'm telling you, if there were a dance right now, she'd have her dance card filled first.

I pray every day that I can know how to keep her this way. To help her realize her limitless potential and keep her from being brought down by self-doubt. She is powerful. She is beautiful. She is capable of doing anything she chooses. And she has a big, mean mother to beat down anyone who stands in her way.

Lila: Constantly in Danger and Constantly Eating

Here's the thing about Lila. No, I wasn't going to say she looks great in a tutu, even though she does. And yes, those are the leg-warmers we won from the now defunct Mormon Lady blog. But that isn't wat I was going to say either. The thing about Lila is that recently she became mobile. I wouldn't say she is crawling, per say. She is scooting/rolling/belly-crawling/pulling herself up onto things. And the thing about all of that moving, is that it also requires a lot of eating.
Here is Lila trying to eat a microphone:

She doesn't know that she can't eat it. She doesn't care. If she can put it in her mouth, she wants to eat it. If you are holding her and try to eat, she actually opens her mouth and tries to eat the food that is in your mouth. It is a little bit disturbing and a lot hilarious.

Here is Lila being caught with a bag of peanut butter ritz:

Doesn't that face look kind of guilty? What, me? No I wasn't eating anything.

When you try and feed her, if you are lucky (and fast enough) you can get away without her stealing the food and the utensils from you. But sometimes we just give up and let her feed herself.

You might wonder why in that picture Lila has a big rash of some sort on her cheek. Well, that brings me to our next thing about Lila. She is not a whiner and not scared of anything and thus likes to put her life in jeopardy on a regular basis.
The day we took those pictures she had crawled out the back door and landed on the doormat. Earlier this week she was saved from rolling down the stairs by Noel grabbing her legs and hanging onto them while Amy was in the shower. Granted, the reason she was at the stairs was because Noel had opened the bedroom door after being told explicitly NOT to open the bedroom door and leading her to the stairs.

Here she is making a break for freedom.

Today, Amy set her down to go lock the gate at the top of the stairs (to prevent Lila from falling down them again) and Lila pulled a lamp off of our night stand onto her head. And then later tonight, I turned the tub on to fill it and went to tell Noel it was time to get into the tub and Lila crawled into the bathroom and pulled herself INTO the tub. Luckily I hadn't put the plug down yet, so she just got really wet. Why a I admitting to all of these things? Does Child Protective Services read this blog? Crap. Nevermind.

No, Lila, you can't eat that toy.

Festival Weeks

The first week in February is sort of a festival week in our house. February 8th is our wedding anniversary. February 12th is Amy's birthday and February 14th is Valentine's day. Wait...did I get all of those dates right? Anyway - I think of it as my sink or swim week. If I hit all those dates and am successful, I'm golden. If I mess up (and their have been many years that I have) there isn't a lot of opportunity for redemption.

Things have been a little trickier since we moved to Oregon. Last year, Amy was pregnant, and we had two small boys, so it was pretty low key. This year was no different - we have a young baby now, and two small boys.  So there were no hot dates lined up. So since our anniversary was going to be pretty low key (we did get a baby sitter and go to dinner from 4:30pm - 6:30pm like a really boring old couple.) I decided to stop at the local Trader Joe's and get Amy some cute flowers and a treat. And when I got home, Amy had bought me the EXACT same flowers and the EXACT same treat.

If that isn't true love, I don't know what is.

Our kids are old enough that they want to celebrate Mom's birthday too. So it is more of a family affair and not very glamourous and awesome. 

The boys picked the cake - pink with purple flowers. I think that is the exact cake I made last year. Our boys have a pretty narrow vision of what girls like. 

Amy got a:

Painting. And a:

Lamp. And a:

Mini-Dyson. We have an addiction...

Valentine's Day was more about the kids than us. And let's be honest, more about the candy than anything else.

And we are still eating the candy. I almost finished off the cinnamon lips today and just opened the last of the peeps. Thank goodness Easter is coming soon.

So we made it...it may not have been my most successful festival week ever. But I think we had fun.

Amy is pretty amazing, and I am pretty lucky to have her. Here are 25 things I think are amazing about Amy:

1. She's gorgeous.

2. She is the most amazing mother. Even though our kids are a handful, she genuinely thinks they are mostly charming and funny.

3. She believes in me, even when believing in me means believing that I am going "write a novel" which I have been talking about for at least 9 months and that I have written 2.5 pages of. Not kidding.

4. She loves the same TV I do.

5. She doesn't judge when I eat nachos and then ice cream and then a bowl of cereal and then a peanut butter sandwich and then some cheese every night. 

6. She is the best piano player I have ever met. She can play ANYTHING. Seriously.

7. She plans family home evening every week and our kids love it.

8. She has impecable taste in clothes and design.

9. She makes me laugh. Every day.

10. She is a realist and keeps me grounded.

11. She brings me home Diet Cokes when she runs errands. 

12. She keeps our house immaculate...and every time I have a day off I realize how you pretty much have to clean ALL DAY if you want to stay ahead of the avalanche that is little boys. 

13. She is one of the most accepting people I know. She doesn't judge, but she gives super wise advice.

14. She is super super smart. Seriously. Way smarter than me. Or you. She could do my job with her eyes closed.

15. She hears the spirit loudly and clearly. Every major decision in our life that has been unexpected and wonderful (moving to Portland, having Lila) has been because she was tuned in to hear that inspiration.

16. She makes delicious, healthy dinners that are not obnoxiously healthy. No organic swiss chard or crap like that.

17. She laughs at my jokes. And doesn't get too annoyed when I think that I am the funniest person in the room. 

18. She is a great activities director for two little boys who have very different taste in activities.

19. She reads to our kids EVERY day. And our kids see her reading every day. And our kids love reading.

20. She could be (and was) an incredibly successful teacher but made the choice to stay home with our kids.

21. She is a loyal friend to her friends.

22. She puts up with me having weird hours and travels and doesn't complain.

23. She proof reads all my blogs and fixes the numerous errors (I apologize in advance for anyone who reads this before she proof reads it.)

24. She inspires me. To be healthier, to be more spiritual, to be more patient with my kids.

25. She is the best thing that has ever happend to me. My life is infinitely better because of her influence in my life.

Curious

Here are some alternate titles for this blog:
Just Shut Up Already!
The Birds and the Bees
Bindi Bingham?
Why Grandma is a Bad Influence
One Dad, Two Moms and Two Zookeepers

It all started the other day.  My 5 year old asked, as we were driving in the car, "What's the thing called that happens when you like someone?" and when pushed for further information said, "I don't want to say it!" real embarrassed-like.  Josh and I looked at each other and raised our eyebrows.  Would we really have to have the sex-talk with our 5 year old?  With all the love in my heart, I passed it to my husband to handle.  He had a long, private conversation with my Jonah, who, come to find out, was asking about falling in love.

Ever since then, he's been obsessed with love and marriage and being an adult, and he talks about it incessantly.  He NEVER. STOPS. TALKING.  And I don't mean he asks a question, I answer, I ask a question, he answers. . .it's a nonstop assault of words.  I actually found myself saying today, "Stop talking about Bindi!  I'm done talking about Bindi!" just to get a reprieve from his latest scheme to, at the ripe old age of 18, move to Australia.  "Where's Australia?  Is it in North America?  Is it in South America?  How long does it take to get there?  Is Bindi a real girl?  How old is she?  Could I go to her house?" He's moving to Australia to marry Bindi the Jungle Girl and there's nothing I can do to keep him from talking about it. (And don't get me started on why my TV-ambivalent son (if he really is my son, since the whole TV-ambivalence thing makes us question it) will only watch Bindi the Jungle Girl.  Could there be a more annoying show/person?  Crikey!)

He's also super obsessed with marriage.  I think it's tied to his desire to be an adult, like, yesterday.  First, he wanted to marry his cousin, Bella.  He loves his cousin, Bella, but I think in his 5 y/o mind she's the only girl he knows and, therefore, was his only prospect.  He also asked if it was okay if families just have dads, and we responded yes, thinking he was referring to single-parent families.  Then he asked if he could marry his best (boy) friend from school, Reece.  Today, he remembered he had an actual girl friend at school named Katie but "I want to marry someone with the same color skin as me."  Seriously, how many "special" conversations is one mom required to have with her son in such a short amount of time?

On top of everything, today, as we were walking home from school, he used, "What the hell??" so confidently. . .so matter-of-fact-ly that it would seem he may have said it once or twice before.  We're supposed to ignore those things, right?  I asked him about it, but then dropped it.  Later, when he said it again, at the dinner table, I couldn't let it go.  "Where did you hear those words?  Did you hear them from kids at school?"  "No."  "Did you hear them from me?" "No."  (p.s. Yes.)  "Who did you hear them from?"  And he says, "Grandma says them."  I really should end the blog here and watch my mother and mother-in-law die of embarrassment from the implication that he learned his swear words from them.  But if you know Jonah's grandmas, you know that there are no two people on earth who swear less than the two of them.  But man, was it funny.

Luckily I still have a 4 year old who makes very little rational sense at any given time.  Though he did have a gem today.  "Mom, we're going to be a dad, two moms, and two zookeepers."  "WHA. . .???"  "Well, Dad's a dad and you're a mom and Lila will be a mom and Jonah and I will be zookeepers."  Sometimes I wish I was the zookeeper.  *sigh*

And here's a couple of pictures for those potty-mouthed grandmas:

Josh got Lila dressed today.

Looking real bored at the Children's Museum.

This is much harder than it looks.