New Year, New Resolutions

It's time to buckle down. The baby is now 10 months old and not only sleeping through the night but on a regular nap schedule, so it's time to get back to my blog! Hopefully, this year I will do a better job of recording all the sweet (and not so sweet) nuances of the day-to-day life I share with my great husband and 4 adorable kiddos. Accepting how quickly time is passing is very difficult for me, but at least if I write it all down, it will be easier to revisit once my babies are grown. I was nearly brought to tears on Sunday when, during a family trip to the mall, I discovered the boys are now too tall for the play area. Granted, it is a nasty, germ-infested cespool and I should be grateful they can no longer beg for 15 minutes of running over the younger kids, but it is another marker that their toddlerhoods are behind them. We spent many hours when they were younger passing the morning at the mall, eating Chick-fil-A biscuits for breakfast, browsing Gymboree, and bribing them with the promise of 15 minutes of play area time at the end.
Speaking of time passing, we have had a busy coupla months! The time from Halloween until mid January is always a whirlwind for me, but this year in particular it was hopping! Halloween and its many festivities give way straight into Jackson's birthday (and the ensuing party at home, treats for the school, etc.), followed by Thanksgiving, Holiday shopping and decorating, Christmas (including teacher gifts for being the room mom for 2 of the classes, Christmas cards, baking, packing, etc.), and then coming home in time to take down Christmas and plan Sam's party in ONE week. I'm exhausted just listing all that! Toss in karate lessons twice a week, ballet once a week, doctor's appointments, elementary and preschool drop-off and pick-ups, and volunteering at the schools, and you have one crammed schedule!
Jackson chose a Star War Lego theme for his party this year, and after making his personalized invitations and creating/cutting out 25 character masks, I designed and made the mashmallow fondant cake, complete with chocolate legos and fondant light sabers, bought lightsabers for all, and designed tags for the bags full of sweet tart lego candy we send home with each child. Food included "Vader Potater Chips," "Yoda Soda," "Wookie Cookies," and "Hoth Chocolate." The kids and adults all had a great time, and I was forced to face the fact that my eldest is now 6 years old. Jackson continues to love school and excel, being selected as the highest reader in his class and chosen for an advanced reading program. His teacher has declared him to be sweet, consciencious and compassionate, although a bit too meticulous at times. He runs into my arms each day at the bus stop, and I love sweeping him up for a huge hug and kiss. It won't be long until he will be far too embarrassed to allow such a thing, so I am doing my best to enjoy it all now! Legos can occupy him for long periods of time, and he continues to be a fabulous big brother to Sam, Olivia, and Claire. He lost his first two teeth in December, and man, the tooth fairy had her work cut out for her. I can't even IMAGINE how hard it was for her to sneak in his room at night and pull out the envelope with the tooth without waking Jack OR Sam, and it must've been NEARLY impossible to put the crinkly bag of legos and dollar bill BACK under his sleeping head. I know that when I went in to check and see if she had visited, he was VERY quick to pop up and search for his goods. I think it took 4 tries and about 2 hours. Needless to say, it was a late night.
Christmas was filled with activities, like a family outing to see the James Center Grand Illumination, a gingerbread decorating party at the Rife's, a karaoke party for adults at the Borchert's, a night of popcorn and hot chocolate in pajamas as we took in as many of the tacky lights as we could stand, and a visit to the Children's Museum to see the Legendary Santa. We trekked to Williamsburg to spend a quiet weekend with Aunt Leah, Uncle Anthony, and Kinzie, and spent 9 days at Mimi's and our cousin's in Roanoke. We have had several good snows, and even missed a few days of school when we have blissfully hunkered down, lit the gas fireplace, and watched movies. Our elf on the shelf came back the night we were at the Grand Illumination and we found him on our Christmas tree when we got home that night. We found him each morning in all kinds of silly places, except a couple of times when it was either too windy for him to fly, or he decided to stay because we had been so bad he was giving us a second chance and wanted to be able to give Santa a GOOD report. *Snicker*
Sam has now turned 5 and his party was a Mad Scientist theme. I had ONE WEEK to pull it all together when we got home from Roanoke and it was a desperate dash to collect 14 white men's dress shirts and get them sewn in to little lab coats for all the guests. Ordering the science supplies from Amazon was easy, and Lowes was kind enough to donate 18 pairs of kid sized goggles so we could wear authentic scientist outfits. We made homemade lava lamps, played with instant snow, made water gel and a tornado, a yeast/peroxide volcano, and a diet coke/mentos geyser. We predicted and tested sinking versus floating, and the cake was an active volcano, complete with dry ice to create smoke coming out the top and sparklers for the fire. By the way, I had NO IDEA dry ice was such a pain in the toosh to store. When I picked it up on Friday for the party on Saturday, I was told it might dissipate before the party even started. I had to purchase 10 pounds of pellets, and store it in two coolers, tucked with towels and newspaper! The food included "Lime Slime Jell-o," "molecular structure cheese ball station," and "acid and base salsa and chips." The kids were sent home with their lava lamps, lab coats, goggles, and Pop Rocks. For once, they were actually engrossed in an activity the whole time, and it wasn't a free-for-all of wild kids running around my house! The Deeter cousins spent the night and the kids were in heaven! He now has his first loose tooth, which I CANNOT believe, and is starting to amaze me with his ability to read and do math. The doctor and nurse were very impressed at his 5 year checkup, not only because he continues to be in the 95- off the chart percentiles for height and weight, but because he knows far more than the average 5 year old. We figured out today, he'll be a karate Black Belt at 8! Crazy!
Olivia is a bundle of energy and so very loud! We have decided her only volumes are ridiculously loud and asleep! I'm not sure if it's just her personality (from her father's side of course!) or a conditioning from no one listening to her most of the time, but man it can make you crazy. Good thing she's so stinkin' cute so we haven't had to lock her outside in the cold...YET! We discovered last week, after months of her SWEARING there was a little girl in her ballet class named "Kikkidy" (and my proclamations that there is NO ONE NAMED KIKKIDY!) that there is a girl named "Kennedy" and she was confused! She also continues to love school and cheer for the days when she goes (just Tuesdays and Thursdays). She can now write her name and is starting to pick up way more street smarts than we are ready for!
Sweet Claire is now clapping, waving, and saying "Mama," "Dada," Nana" (banana), and "Nighnigh," (for night - night). She eats all sorts of things, preferring to feed herself to anything spoonfed, and is crawling military style and on all fours. She pulls up, cruises, and has just begun pulling things out of cabinets, baskets, and tabletops as quickly as she can get there! She still loves peek-a-boo, and nothing more than spending time with her 3 adoring siblings!
So there you have it! Can't wait to see what 2011 has to bring for our family!

Olivia, tonight, when served her dinner of soup and side of "Pirate's Booty" popcorn, said "Daddy, I didn't want any PIRATE HEINIE!" Haha!

And Sam, asking for "Eye of the Tiger" to be played on the Ipod said, "I need to work out my arms a little bit!" He also told me (as I tried on clothes to clean out my closet), "Oh, yeah, that's a keeper! You should wear that on a date!" Way beyond his years!

Sam's soccer party

We had Sam's end of the season soccer party at Cici's pizza last night. I was trying to cheer him up earlier tnd his week while he was struggling about all the attention Jack was getting, and I said "Sam, you have your soccer party this Sunday."
"Mom, what's a soccer party?"
"Well, it's when you get your TROPHY and you get to eat pizza with your soccer friends."
"OOOh! I should get a REALLY BIG trophy cause I scored lots of goals! Remember that really cold game when I scored ALL the goals?!"

Modesty doesn't visit our house much! ;-)

Jack is six, and Claire is 8 months...

Jackson's sixth birthday was Saturday. There were two solid days of festivities, starting with his celebration at school on Friday. He PROUDLY wore his birthday crown, accepted his birthday paddles and kiss from his teacher with blushing and shy smiles, showed off the poster we made covered in pictures of his family and favorite places and things, and ate light saber chocolate chip cookies with his friends. I took him Subway for lunch, and we chatted and enjoyed a rare time together with one-on-one time. Saturday morning at his soccer game, not only did he score two goals and get some bonus time on the field, but his teammates chanted "BIRTH-DAY-BOY!" over and over while he was on the field. His party was a Star Wars lego theme, and about 16 of his friends came to play and share in the fun! The kids played with light sabers, wore Star Wars masks, ate party foods like "Vader Patater chips," and "wookie cookies," followed by cake, ring cupcakes, and edible lego candy blocks. It was an all-around great day!
Last night when I was tucking the boys in to bed, I asked Jack if it felt different being 6. He said, "I don't know" with a shy giggle. I said "Well, you're practically a grown-up. Are you going to start growing a beard?" He laughed and said "NO...YOU are!" I said "WHAT?! I'm a GIRL!" And he started calling me "the bearded lady." Those kids!
He has his first two loose teeth...the same bottom two front teeth that Claire is just getting. Sigh, the circle of life I suppose. While brushing his teeth last week, I discovered that he had the new teeth all the way in already, so it won't be long now. And we get to call him "Shark Boy" temporarily for his multiple layers of teeth!
We had his first teacher conference last week, and his teacher adores him. Not only did he score a 99 on his pals test (when the benchmark is around 50!) but he was placed in the highest reading group! His teacher said he is very sweet, concientious, and attentive. She also said she wouldn't be surprised at all if he was identified for the gifted and talented program! Yay Jack!
I've been making Olivia wear a pull-up to bed for a while now because despite her ability to stay dry, she seemed to discover that peeing in her bed resulted in being moved to MY bed, and started wetting the bed every night. That particular morning when I laid out her clothes she said, "Silly Mommy! I alweady HAB panties on! I wore dem wast night and I keeped dem NICE and DWY!" She's so full of herself!
Sammy has had a hard time the last week or so with all the attention being on Jack's birthday. I think it is a combination of feeling like he's being left behind (now that Jack is in kindergarten and rides the bus and has friends Sam doesn't know and has loose teeth, etc.) and being jealous of all Jack's birthday fuss, but he has been a little sensitive lately. But man that kid can make me melt when he sings "O beautiful, for spacious skies..." and when I join in, he always says "They had that song when YOU were little, too?!"
Claire has one tooth all the way in, and another about halfway. She smiles her little toothy grin all the time, and has remained so pleasant despite her first little runny nose and cough. She is crawling, pushing herself up to sit, and trying all kinds of new solid finger foods. I have yet to find a food she won't eat, from a variety of baby foods and cereals, to fresh fruit, bread, and other snacks. She is pure joy all day long. I am so going to miss having a baby in the house.

How'd you get home?

Last night at dinner, Ryan was telling me / us about his day at work. He had a big presentation, and said afterwards he just "crashed." The boys continued listening until he finished talking and then Jack said "How'd you get home, Dad?" Confused, we said "What?" "How'd you get home, Dad? After you crashed?"
So literal! We explained that he didn't crash the CAR, but he was so tired he wanted to crash his body into the couch! Gotta love the way kids' minds work!

Olivia's twang

I don't know where it came from, but I don't want to forget that Olivia says "Sam" like it has three syllables..."SA-YA-AM" or the way she sings "We are the Champions" more like Chee-yam--peee--yuns." That girl, she is a piece of work!

Sam at school

Yesterday I was able to chaperone Sam's 4 year old class trip to the Fire Station. It always surprises me to see how different my kids are at school than at home, and that my fears of misbehaving are completely offbase. Sam was a perfect angel. He was quiet, attentive and raised his hand. He was polite, genuine, and respectful. But more than anything else, I was amazed to see his natural leadership traits emerge. When we arrived, the kids were told to have a seat on the couch. Sam ended up smack in the middle of a "girls" couch and I took his pic with 3 girls on each side! He decided he wanted to sit with the boys, and as they saw him coming, they made room for him. As the group was told to move to the next area of the fire station, Sam was ALWAYS right up there, leading the group to the next location, and there was a feeling that the other kids were waiting for him, EXPECTING him to lead them forward. I see great things ahead for that kid. And I can't wait to see what will happen next.

Time marches on

Claire is 7 months old today. SEVEN months old! I can't believe it! She is still too cute for words, smiling anytime a smiling face looks her way, and her dimples exploding out of her cheeks! She scoots around quite well, is eating baby puffs all by herself, and drinking water out of a sippy cup. She babbles in the cutest ways, always trying to communicate with the big kids, who still delight in her every move.
Her two bottom teeth are just popping through her gums, and I am starting to mourn the loss of the gummy smiles, the newborn/young infant stage. I see pregnant women, and I feel jealous of the new life they feel inside, moving around, kicking, hiccuping and squirming. The excitement of wondering when the baby will come, what will the baby be, who will the baby look like? And although I think we should stop having kids now, with two perfect boys, and two beautiful and sweet girls, it makes my heart ache to think that phase of my life is over.
Each year, I see such changes to our routine and to my kids. This year, with the addition of kindergarten, I am running all the time. I feel most days like there's not even time to enjoy being home, for the kids to play with their toys or run around outside. There is school, and homework, soccer practice, ballet, and karate; back to school nights, girls night out, and Ryan's basketball. There is just never a break from the rush rush rush. Such a contrast from a few short years ago when going to Target might be the big outing of a three day period!
Taking Olivia to the children's museum without her brothers was bittersweet. She ran from place to place, playing wherever SHE wanted without me calling out for them to STAY TOGETHER, and we'll go where you want NEXT. She seemed to enjoy it, but she didn't light up the way she does when she shares those experiences with the boys.
The other day in the car, I was listening to the radio and the boys were talking in the back. I heard Jackson say to Sam, "SO, how do you like Mrs. Ray's class?" Sammy said "Good. I like the centers." And then I couldn't hear anymore over Olivia's bellowing "I DO CENTERS TOO! AND I LIKE GOING OUTSIDE! BOYS! BOOOOOOYYYYS!" I hope they are always this close.