Out With Old

Forget the old way.  We've got a new way to shop

and nowhere to put the groceries.

Never Enough

He is obsessed with her.  He can't get enough of her. 

He can't stop calling her name (baba) over and over again when he sees her.

He just can't stop grabbing her and touching her and trying to hold her.  He just can't get enough of her.

Proof

My four year old nephew, Liam, is about as sweet as they come.  Here's proof (that's Theia in the picture):

Melts my heart every time I see it.

Staright Face

He had a run in with a black magic marker, as is prone to happen when you're Joey and you play with things you shouldn't.

And then he acted as if he just couldn't figure out what was on his hands

and face.

 He pretended innocence,

but he couldn't keep a straight face.

On Loan

Tikvah has a new friend, on loan from Xandra.

She watches over her (literally) and keeps her from being lonely at naptime,

while also being very stylish with her heart nightgown and hair accessory.

She looks like she just can't wait for Tikvah to get up and play.  It'll be a few months for that and I'm pretty sure she won't be on loan anymore by then.

The Entertainer

Our dinner times were rather drab before this guy came along.

There was no one to stand up in the high chair, climb out of his seat, dump food on his tray,

put his bowl on his head,

and cackle maniacally afterward.

He's quite the entertainer.

Secrets

Wouldn't you like to know the secrets

they're telling her?

Not Invited

There's a party in my bed

and I wasn't even

invited.

A Sizable Crew

When Tikvah was about 2 1/2 weeks old, I bravely made my first venture out of the house with all five kids.  We headed to Fargo to play at Lindenwood Park with the Hermunslie and Gonser cousins. 

Everyone took turns swinging, usually together.

Evie and Aliyah

Laney and Liam

Joey

Theia and Cora

Aliyah was having a tough morning and spent a significant amount of time like this

on a park bench alone.

Uncle Josh was there and gave the kids a great ride on this sway fun toy.

The Aunties (minus me) made a run to McDonald's for some lunch and the whole crew,

the sizable crew,

like the size of a small daycare (two five year olds, three four year olds, one three year old, one two year old, two one year olds, one infant and one newborn (boy that's confusing!))),

enjoyed a picnic lunch together.

Rough Nights

Looks like she had a rough night, doesn't it?

I know I've had a few since she's been born.

Unfortunately, only one of us makes up for it during the day.

Teamwork

Joey and Theia

Priceless

Happy Father's Day, Joe.

This is the sixth time we've celebrated you as daddy, although the first time to five kids.  Last time I looked, Xandra was just a tiny baby.  Now she reads, rides a bike and looks forward to a sixth birthday and the start of Kindergarten. 

Having been apart these past months, has made me so aware of how much I enjoy sharing the journey of parenthood with you...it's wonderful and challenging and the best thing we've ever done together.

On behalf of our kids and myself, thanks for each one of these memories.  They're priceless and precious, each one.



 Happy Father's Day to the best dad I know.

Don't You?

Joey has decided to rearrange Grandma Mary's kitchen. 

 

The pop cans in the trash can under the sink makes them so inaccessible.

 

It works so much better to have them in the drawer with the sippy cup lids and Saran Wrap, even if it means you can't close the drawer.

I think the milk jug on the step stool is a nice statement too.

Don't you?

 

The Weekend

Joe is working in Bismarck these days.  That means, as we live with Grandma and Grandpa just outside of Fargo, that we only see him on the weekend.  Needless to say, it's everyone's favorite time of the week.  There's the pig piles,

 

the Sunday night popcorn, sometimes with cousins,

sometimes without,

platypus, bandicoot, porcupine, binturong and kinkajou videos on You Tube

 

and lots of other fun snuggling, playing and hanging out.

Popping Up

Somewhere in the mist and the haze of newborn days our good friend David stopped by to take a break from his military jetsetting ways.  He came bearing gifts, as he is often prone to do when he visits us.  This time his gifts were Kinder Eggs. He had to hand deliver these candy eggs he bought in Germany because it is illegal to mail them in the United States.  Look up the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act of 1938 to learn more.  These eggs are really quite cool as they each have a little toy, often much larger and cooler than what you would imagine would fit in a plastic egg.  Our eggs contained the spirograph pictured below, a girafffe, car, cloth frisbee, magnifying glass and more.  The kids loved them and the chocolate wrapped around the plastic egg was a hit too!

 

Aside from the excitement of the contraband Kinder Eggs, we hung out, he taught Xandra to play our new Seven Wonders game (I think she's got a ways to go, but she fondly remembers David because of it), held the baby,

and then took off with Joe to the much quieter and calmer abode of their friend and former teacher, Mrs. Hoerer.

 

We never know where Mr. David will pop up, but we're always glad when he does!

Writing It Down

I have a friend, who, when I sometimes mention what is happening in our life will say, "I hope you're writing this down."  In an effort to follow her advice, and tie a memory to the rather random pictures below, I give you the text of an email Joe wrote to a few friends Easter weekend (April 8) recapping our family adventures from February 25 to the time of his writing said email.  Additional commentary in italics provided by Trisha.

We left Maryland on February 25 in our minivan, loaded to the gills, complete with a fire safe full of birth certificates that we had somehow overlooked when loading the moving truck, and almost left in a closet.  We drove west for two and a half days and arrived in North Dakota on February 27.

-On February 28, Joe had a job interview in Fargo, Trisha had her first visit with the midwife here, and Liyah went to the doctor for pinkeye, and Trisha broke a bracket of her braces eating a chocolate covered peanut.  That night there was a snowstorm.

-We wanted to have the baby on February 29, but she refused to come out, despite miles of walking at the gym and lots of wishful thinking.

-On March 2, Tikvah ("Hope") was born.  From the maternity ward room on the top floor of the hospital, we could see for miles out over the flat city and count 13 separate water towers.

-On March 3, we saw our niece in the hospital because she had an emergency room visit for stitches on her forehead.  We did not see our children in the hospital because Joey had pinkeye and we did not want to expose everyone in the hospital to it.

-Tikvah came home on March 4.

-On March 9, we found lice in Xandra's hair, as her Aunt Beth was preparing to cut it, and spent about 12 hours bathing all the kids (except the baby), combing through their hair while watching episode after episode of Dora, and laundering everything in sight.  Xandra went to bed at midnight, and Trisha had 3 hours of sleep that night.  We did cut about six inches off of Xandra's hair and eight inches off of Trisha's hair to make the lice treatment easier and more effective.

-On March 10, Trisha and Tim went to the laundromat and did 22 loads of laundry.  Total laundry load count from head lice:  40+ loads,  we stopped tallying at load forty.

-On March 13, Theia got sick with a flu-like virus, and Trisha, Mary, and Xandra came down with it over the next few days.  This lasted two or three days for each person, involved high fevers, no appetite, and put them in bed for the duration of the sickness. It started on Monday morning with Theia and Joey lounging on the floor.  We thought it was really cute until we realized it was because she was sick.

-On March 19, Joe started work in Bismarck, about a three-hour drive from his parents' house where Trisha and the kids are staying.  That same day, Trisha saw the doctor for mastitis and Theia saw the doctor for an ear infection.

-Since then,  Joe has been working Monday through Friday in Bismarck, then coming home for the weekend before driving back to Bismarck on Sunday nights. 

-We have also been looking for a house to buy, in market that is best described as absurd.  There are a lot of buyers, and not enough sellers.  In Bismarck, a good house will sell the same day that it lists for sale.  Sometimes, you make an appointment to see a house and it is sold before you get there. Needless to say, prices are rising, too.  Since the writing of the original email, we have found a home.  If all goes according to plan, we'll close on said house on June 29th and resume living in the same city and home as Joe again.

At a later date, like maybe when some of these adventures seem somehow funny (isn't it strange how our brains do that?) and I'm no longer paranoid about seeing head lice in my kids hair or brush, I'll add further reflection.  For now, the simple recording of the events is enough for me.