Thanksgiving Memories

How does a Jabberwocky loving boy respond when his uncle tells him to get ready to catch a ball? By throwing out his arms and saying "Come to my arms, my beamish boy!"

Lucy: My tummy is feeling too full but I'm not done with my pie.
Me: Well, if you're feeling full, maybe you should stop eating.
Lucy: I can't stop! It's pie!

I got several books that told the original Thanksgiving story but there was one clear winner for Lucy, The Very First Thanksgiving Day. She sat and memorized the whole book. It's a poem and she even worked on her rhythm and accents until she could recite it very well - and every one else in the house could too :-) Then she found a feather and completely on her own made a headdress like the illustrations showed on the "Indians, skillful and strong" section. 

Thanksgiving Week

Still no reliable computer for now (it isbordered an on is way though!) but my hands doing a lot better and I miss blogging so I'm going to try just using my phone. But beat with me if this ends up full of typos please.

We just finished up a week full of visitors. First was Grandpa and Gigi. I did a horrible job taking pictures but the kids got spoiled with trips to the pool and I got spoiled by having two extra sets of eyes and hands helping me get through Ikea with all three kids. I don't think I'll be attempting that by myself for, well, years!

Lucy also had her first night away from me when she spent the night at the hotel. When I asked her if she wanted to, she was concerned about missing Jonah too much (they share a room and love to yalk yo each ofher before they go to bed) but the ice cream plus movie combination seemed to help and she was returned to us in the morning, happy but a bit tired from all the fun.

Obviously very homesick

They barely had time to mourn the leaving of the grandparents because Aunt Steph and Uncle Chad arrived to help us celebrate Thanksgiving.

I was a bit worried about getting everything done for Thanksgiving with Norah Jane being only 6 weeks old. Mostly because I had a hard time dropping things. I kept considering ways to make my life easier, but couldn't give in. Store bought pie crust? No! Drop the sweet potatoes? I can't! And three pies for 4 adults and two kids might seem excessive but its tradition. I did use packaged stuffing since my regular recipe requires me to make two types of homemade bread but that was my one concession. But despite that, it was my easiest Thanksgiving yet. I was actually worried that I had forgotten something because it all came together too fast.

 I guess years of helping my mom plus three years of hosting it myself have made it routine. And I didn't have any of last years gluten free worries. Plus, I've got a few other traditions helping me out - Craig takes care of the turkey (with a bit of supervision from me because I'm controlling like that) and Uncle Chad and Lucy make the green bean casserole together. She also helps me make the cranberry sauce so I decided Jonah needed a job too.

He took his job of buttering and making the rolls very seriously. He let me help him roll but then and refused my help with spreading butter or rolling then up. And they actually turned out really nice looking.

Add in a mellow baby and a couple of loving baby holders and, bam, you've got yourself a turkey dinner.

Lucy demonstrating her big sis skills.

The uncle and aunt also took it upon themselves to introduce to the kids the traditional Thanksgiving sport - football. Jonah has a little basketball hoop and a tee and glove that he occasionally plays with but I think football is his new favorite. But even Lucy had fun tossing it around.

But now the relatives have headed out, the leftovers are mostly eaten and its back to our regular routine. Well, almost. Advent has begun and we're doing Christmas schooling for our table time now. I just love this time of year. So perhaps I'll be better at keeping Advent and Christmas simple than I was with Thanksgiving. Perhaps not :-)

Norah at One Month

Dear Norah,

You are one month old today and as Jonah would say "I can hardly believe it!" You were my tag along to the doctor a couple days ago and I remember sitting in the same office about a year ago talking with the doctor about what the next step would be in the journey to making you possible. I was trying hard to be optimistic but it wasn't easy. So sitting there holding you in my arms this time made me want to cry.

Wearing your "because mommy was pretty sure you were gonna be a girl" outfit. 

I may have to blame hormones but I also had to hold back tears when Lucy came up to me a few days ago, rubbed your head and said "Remember before Norah was even in your uterus how I prayed and prayed for her to come. Aren't you glad I prayed?" Yes! I am very glad your sister prayed for you and she wasn't the only one. We just all knew you were missing from our family.

And now that you are here, we all just adore you. Jonah and Lucy love to show you your black and white animal cards and now, as they have recently informed me, they know to wait for a time when your eyes are open all the way and not opening and closing a lot because you like it better that way. Jonah will hold them up over his face and make the right animal sound. It cracks me up and you really do seem to enjoy it too.

 They also love to help me out by talking to you if I have to put you down or by bring me wipes or telling me if you cry when I'm taking a shower. But they both love you so much. And they even have songs they like to sing you.

Jonah's is his own unique version of Skidamarink which goes something like:

Skidamarink a-dink, a a dink, a dink, a-dink, Skaramink a-doo. I wuff you!
I wuff you in the morning and after nap
I wuff you in the morning and underneath the moon!

Lucy's song is one I made up the first verse too and then she expanded:

Norah Jane, Norah Jane
We love you in the sunshine, we love you in the rain

Norah Jane, Norah Jane,
We love you in the car and we love you on a train

Norah Jane, Norah Jane,
We love you in St. Louis and they love you in Maine 
(I tried to suggest Missouri instead of St Louis but that was soundly rejected)

Norah Jane, Norah Jane
They love you in France and they love you in Spain.

They also "fight" over whose name is closet to yours. Jonah's shares three letters and his name and your middle name both start with J. But Lucy's middle name is almost the same as your first. They both think they win.

But how could they not love you, you are so sweet. And mellow. You just go with the flow. Kids screaming and running around doesn't faze you a bit. I'll cringe when you are sleeping and Jonah and Lucy decide to do something like, bang wooden blocks on various items around the house in what Lucy declared to be a "sound experiment," but you just keep sleeping. You've started to wake up a lot more these past few days and like to lay next to them while they play but you still seem to love sleep more than I'm used a baby (hope that sticks around!) and you've starting to get into a rhythm.

Sadly, this last week it seems like you have started to prefer napping in the swing or one your own, either laying in bed or on your sheepskin in the middle of the chaos in the living room. I'm not really used to this solo sleeping thing. And you love to eat and are a great nurser but unlike your siblings, you don't really seem to care much for comfort nursing, at least for now. So when you do fall asleep on me, like this morning, of course I have to let you so I can soak up my numbered tusb (trapped under a sleeping baby) days. I'm wondering if that will change with time or if you will always be miss independent. You do like to snuggle in the evenings though which makes me happy. And at night sometimes you'll start to stir next to me but I just hold out a finger for you to grab and you settle back down. So you're not quite ready for college yet, I guess. Which is good, you have to stay teeny-tiny forever.

I love seeing how you compare to your brother and sister. Most of the time I think you look more like Lucy but every once in a while, you'll make a more Jonah expression. But you also have this funny pouty expression that is unique to you. It's gonna be fun seeing how you change as you get bigger.

Looking a bit like Jonah

You've only had one bath but you really liked it (so perhaps I should do it again :-). You also like tummy time and just lying down in the quiet of naptime and looking around. But you don't like being swaddled unless you are totally overstimulated, but even then, I had better take it off you once you fall asleep because if you wake up swaddled, you let me know you aren't happy about it. It's one of the few times you cry.

Exactly what are you planning on doing here, mom?

Fresh and clean. That wasn't so bad. 

You are really loud, even for a newborn. I overheard Lucy and Jonah playing baby dolls a few days ago and Lucy (as the baby) was making all these grunting noises Jonah asked her if her baby was okay and she told him "Yes, but sometimes babies make loud noises even when they are sleeping"...I think she learned that from you! She's also asked me if it is a rule that you have to kiss a baby when you pick them up. Well, if it isn't, it should be.

And Jonah now wears green baby in his sling quite a bit and if he "starts to cry" he'll start patting him on the bottom. I love how much Lucy and Jonah are learning from you. In fact, even being number #3, I'm still learning stuff by being your mom. And loving it all.

Babymooning

Little Norah Jane just turned 4 weeks yesterday and very slowly we are starting to emerge from our baby moon period. I had planned to really cocoon ourselves away and my midwife was encouraged me to be even more strict that I had planned. For the first week, I literally only got out of bed to go to the bathroom or walk to the couch to sit there for a little while and get a change of scenery. And it was really really nice. The second week I walked around a bit more but I only left the house one time, to see a tongue tie specialist with Norah. (She has a lip tie and posterior tongue tie but as she and i are both doing well with nursing, we'll just be watching it for now) The midwife (and a CST adjustment) were all home visits and we had a few visitors bring meals and chat for a minute but mostly it was just the baby and I hanging out. Craig took over everything plus had lots of fun adventures planned for the big kids. They went to library story time, the magic house kids museum, the playground and even the symphony! I really think this helped our adjustment because I feel great and last week when we went to church, our first big social outting, I was really happy to be there and not just grinning through it while secretly wishing I was at home in bed.

I also probably feel good physically because my thyroids seem to have responded well to my not being pregnant too. And while I know I haven't felt good these past 2-3 years because of thyroid and hormone issues associated with my Hashimotos, I don't think I realized how bad I had been feeling until about 3 days after Norah was born, when I woke up feeling amazing. My two doctors suspected I'd feel better either during the pregnancy (did not happen!) or after and they were right. So while I certainly don't recommend feeling crappy for years so your postpartum period is nice in comparison, it is a nice benefit.

The kids are doing well adjusting too. We've had a few instances of feeling left out or a tad jealous but luckily Norah loves to sleep so far and I've been able to carve out enough one on one time to compensate. And we're starting to get back into our routine which Lucy really enjoys. It's been quite interesting to see exactly what fills up the "love tanks" of both kids. Apparently, Jonah needs snuggling and Lucy needs math. Hers would have been harder to guess but she's very self aware and finally just told me she didn't feel loved because we hadn't done math! Okay, lets do math today, problem solved! Okay, eboughbbad math puns.

My hand is getting better but not back to normal which is okay because our computer is also broken. I'm actually writing this on my phone* which is ridiculous but blogging is my processing so while I'm glad to have one less distraction, I still need to write sometimes. Hopefully i'll have a new computer soon as well as a healed hand/arm but somehow or another, I'm sure I'll be around.

*This should explain the lack of pictures. My new baby is, in fact, quite adorable and I'd love to show you if it wasn't such a pain right now.