Day 27 :: Pumpkins in my Dream Home

My dream home is the home where we are all happy and no one is fighting.

So, I'm officially giving the token "mom" answer when you ask her what she wants for Christmas: "I just want everyone to be happy". 

Yessir, I completely understand that answer now. Just give me a home where everyone is happy. That's all I want. 

(but go ahead and throw in an awesome neighborhood such as ours, with the best neighbors ever if you must)

Evan told me exactly how he wanted his jack-o-lantern designed. The eyes, the sharp teeth, the mean eyebrows.

I love this tradition. 

Whoever invented it...it is the best. I don't even care how messy and arduous it is. 

If I had to choose between carving pumpkins and decorating a Christmas tree, I would totally pick this. 

This year "Alvin and the Chipmunks Meet the Wolfman" was on in the back ground. 

Hermione!

Every year Jim works and works on Avery's pumpkin, the whole time saying how he keeps messing up and this one isn't going to look good, and every year he produces these show stoppers. 

I am so excited for this year's costumes. You'll just have to wait and see.

my dream home 5 years ago.

Day 26 :: A Picture of Something that Makes Me Sad (Nostalgic)

"Sad" isn't the right word. Let's change it to "Nostalgic".

Looking at pictures of me with my newborn babies makes me feel so many things.

This was hours after Avery was born. I had no idea what I was doing. 

That first baby...learning how to do it all. I can see so much that I don't know yet. 

Like, I tried to keep a blanket on her to keep her warm...now I know to put them in zip up pajamas. Duh.

And those socks on her hands? Why did I do that?

I look at me in this picture and I feel heavy for all that I am about to learn. 

I guess I do kind of feel sad. Sad that I won't get to experience all these special baby things anymore. 

Like, meeting them for the first time. Seeing them face to face after nine months of poking and prodding through the belly. Remember that first time seeing your baby? It is surreal.

I have a love/hate with all the down time that comes with new babies. Just me and them and four walls. No school, no schedule. In hind sight, it is such a simple time; a different kind of busy. Not easier, but definitely more simple.

Remember all the Nick Jr shows we used to watch? Sometimes when those cartoons come on, I secretly love to watch them. They were such a big part of our life and they make me feel squishy inside.

No more c-section surgeries. All that blue sterile material. 

This is meeting Andrew for the first time. 

The difference with baby Andrew is we have so many pictures of him. Like, 40 times more pictures than my other babies thanks to the invention of the iphone.

Adding another baby to a family is exciting.

Look how confused Evan is.

With Andrew, I savored every minute knowing he might be my last baby. 

But savoring didn't make the time slow down. 

I will miss that special time in the hospital when it's just me and my baby in a bubble. 

I love those hospital days.

And then bringing home a new baby...everyone has to adjust to the new normal. 

Yep I have a heavy feeling of nostalgia right now.

five years ago

Day 25 :: A Picture of Something That Makes Me Happy

A few things about this picture make me happy:

pumpkin patches,

Christopher and his long braid,

but most of all Evan with his friends.

A little back story here...

the past few years Evan has gone to preschool because of developmental delays - speech, fine motor, and social/emotional delays.

At the end of last school year, we came to the conclusion that he is just "immature" for his age. He would cry a lot and yell at his friends when things didn't go his way. 

When summer started, I planned on having a "play date" at least once a week so we could work on the social skills. Little did I know that this summer Evan would be socializing ALL day, EVERY day out there in the neighborhood, riding bikes, building forts, running through the forest with the neighbor kids.

When we first moved here, he still yelled and cried often. The other kids were confused and put off by this at first. They didn't like playing with him. It was frustrating for everyone, but we just kept talking to him about appropriate behavior, and he kept playing out there ALL day EVERY day.

Slowly he learned how to express himself when he got frustrated. The kids he was playing with are mostly older and mature for their age. They are such great models of appropriate behavior. 

I don't even know when it happened because the change was so gradual, but the immaturity gap closed and soon he was no longer the "crying kid" out in the neighborhood. 

When school started, I was worried about him. Of course all parents want their kids to have friends and not be "the weird kid", but Evan has an IEP for social/emotional delays, so it was more than the usual concerns. I wondered how he'd do in a class full of kids and only one teacher.

Cut to Thursday, when I went with him on the pumpkin patch field trip. As we were walking around, so many kids yelled out to Evan in excitement "Hi Evan!", and a few ran over to him wanting to be in his group, and one boy ran up and hugged him. A few of them weren't even from his class,

 and I asked, "how do you know him?"

"from recess."

He is such a friendly and happy and excited boy who loves being at school and loves his friends. 

The times I have been in his classroom this year, I have observed how completely non-delayed he is. In fact I would say he is well above the maturity level of a lot of the other kindergartners. 

We can't even believe we were worried about him. 

And it makes me so so happy. 

This Christopher is our neighbor and I was so happy when they got put in the same class. I just want to give him a hug, he's so adorable, but that would offend his personal space, I'm sure. 

That kid behind the pig is such a crack up. He is an only child and he has lots of allergies to food and fur and such, so he was so finicky about the whole thing: the corn maze was "a bad idea", he complained about the raised print on his sock hurting his foot (he's practically the princess and the pea), and he mostly just stayed beside the adults all day.

 

five years ago

Day 24 :: A Good Book I've Read

I'm kind of avoiding this topic because I have a confession: I haven't read in so long. I have only read three, THREE! books this year. And none of them were that good.

We were going to book club My Side of the Mountain this summer, but we never got around to it. Here is my Goodreads review on that book: Boring. Too unrealistic for me to enjoy. The things this little boy accomplished would be a big deal for a grown man. No little boy could live alone for a year. Where is his mother?

I also read The Long Walk: The True Story of a Trek to Freedom. Here is my review on that one: I enjoyed how this survival story shifted from man v man to man v nature. 
I loved how all the people the men met along the way followed strict rules of hospitality. It is refreshing to see how kind people can be to each other compared to how cruelly the men were treated in the work camps.
I do question some of the missing details. Like, how could their shoes possibly last the whole year? And it seems like they went unrealistically too often without water.
But I liked it. I read it on the flights to and from Houston.

And the last book I read this year was And the Mountains Echoed. I really loved the beginning of this book. I loved the characters. But by the end, I felt like it was repetitive and it had dropped the characters I was so invested in. It just wasn't a very satisfying ending for me. 

I love his writing though, and I love his characters, although there is always so much sadness and tragedy involved. I have to put on my thick skin when I read his books.

If I had to pick my favorite read in the last five years, it would be The Secret Race. (read Oct 2012) this book is crazy. i read it in about 24 hours and couldn't put it down. from the beginning it just takes you on a truth train ride. there isn't a lot of meandering around - it's just beginning to end THE story of what really happens in bike racing. (of course i always assume there is embellishing and exaggerating in memoirs.) 

interesting how, really, you have no choice but to dope if you expect your body to endure something like the tour de france. even more so, it's the accepted culture of the sport.
anyway, i am a bit of a blow hard here because it's not like i am a huge cycling fan - more like a casual observer - but it's amazing what goes on in the world of cycling. i always knew it wasn't a clean sport, but this has made me leery of the purity in all sports. just one more thing in pop culture for me to furrow my truth brow at.

And two honorable mentions: 

Peace Like a River (read Oct 2012) this might even be a five star book because the writing is so unbelievably wonderful. it's poetic without being pretentious or cumbersome. 

One random part that stands out to me is the description of a man coming out of the post office and it's windy and cold. It's just a beautiful random part.
there are tons of great allusions to literature, the bible, and history. i love swede's sundown poem.
i love the characters. you're not sure who's "good" and who's "bad" (well, yeah, there is a definite bad guy at the end), but by that i mean they are all flawed.
the main characters and the minor ones as well are so familiar.
it's a bit mysterious and miraculous, yet down to earth, even though the words and phrases are elevated and even complex.
i really loved it. i might even give it five stars if i can't stop thinking about the writing.

Pope Joan (read April 2012) the way humans upgrade and evolve is fascinating to me.

for example: babies. at one point in their life, they can't even feed themselves. eventually that same being will have the ability to drive heavy machinery. you know what i mean? the learning and development is exponential.
similarly, the evolution of civil rights, medicine, logic, technology - all of that - is mind boggling. like how women in the 9th century were viewed as worthless and almost evil. "the size of a woman's uterus is inversely related to the size of their brain." wow.
i just can't believe that the society in the 21st century is the same human race as the society in the 9th century.
other thoughts: i find it interesting that many of the religious men chose to ignore the fact that Jesus appeared first to a woman - before, even, his disciples. surely that has a lot of meaning and symbolism. it does to me, anyway.
this book gave me a lot to think about. it made me want to learn more about the dark ages. what a strange, frustrating time in history.

book reviews from five years ago

Stoney Ridge Farm

Well. Guess what. 

This is the last year Stoney Ridge Farm will do this whole pumpkin patch fest. Can you believe it? 

We went on a Saturday that wasn't rainy, and the place was packed - lines for everything. 

It really sucked the magic out of it. 

Everyone came out of the woodwork to partake in the last chance Stoney Ridge, 

so we didn't even get cider donuts, buy pumpkins, or sit by the fire. 

It really bummed me out because this is one of my favorite places to visit.

They're so tall!

True to tradition, one or two kids hated standing next to this thing. 

haha. complete torture.

As predicted last year, Andrew was old enough to beg to go on the train this year. He cried and cried when his turn was over. 

The line to pay for the pumpkins was out of control, so we just went to the market on the way home and bought some there.

One or both of the boys were whining/crying the whole time, so right around the time I declared: "done!",

we walked over to these cows and camel, and had the best time of the whole day. 

It's because there weren't very many people over here. 

And we fed the camel an apple out of our hands. 

And the cows' moos cracked the kids up for some reason. 

 

So long, Stoney Ridge.

Day 23 :: Something I Could Never Get Sick Of

My knee-jerk answer to this question would be "getting into bed", 

but sooner or later I do get sick of laying in bed.

Believe it or not.

So my answer is:

The Changing Seasons

Which is kind of a trick answer because basically I'm saying I could never get sick of change. 

This is us all four seasons of 2015:

:: WINTER ::

(they seem so little!)

:: SPRING ::

 

:: SUMMER ::

:: AUTUMN ::

I love how every season has a flavor and a feel.

I love that right about the time things are starting to feel stagnant we move into a new season and things are new and exciting and fresh again. 

5 years ago