Things have been really busy lately and I realize that I haven’t really sat down to write any sort of blog entry of substance for quite some time. Things have been pretty chaotic and any free time I have lately has been spent either napping or working like an elf on Christmas gifts. Here’s a bit more detail into what we’ve been up to lately.
Me: I have closed down customs on my business until the New Year and have been working quite hard on getting things done for Christmas and Rachel’s wedding. With some help from my mom, Joan Feriante from church and Diane, I managed to get 160 invitations sent out for Rachel’s wedding. I sent the rest (all forty) for Rachel to do herself. Besides that, I made Rachel a wedding website. Other wedding tasks that still need to be performed include making a flower girl dress and table cloths/runners for the reception, and helping Diane make a slide show and write a speech for the reception. I have to admit that I’ve been having a ton of nightmares about this wedding- they all revolve around chaos and not having everything done in time. You can probably see what I’m worried about… Besides wedding, I have been busy embroidering everything under the sun for Christmas presents. Let’s just say I’ve been busy… Thankfully, with Diane here, I’ve been able to get a lot more done lately. It really helps to have an extra set of hands. Another fun craft project that I was able to do was knit a pair of Christmas longies for Liam- which probably sounds sort of ordinary at first, except I finally learned how to knit with “magic loop”, allowing me to knit both legs up at the same time. I’m not sure if it saved a lot of time because it took a while to get the hang of doing it, but I’m hoping that things will go even faster when I make Ethan’s pair of matching Christmas longies next 🙂
Andrew: Andrew has been busy with work and helping around the house. He is almost done with our new add on play room for the boys. It’s been going slowly mainly because he only works on it as he has time. He has also been busy wiring our bedroom for sound and putting a tv on our wall now that he has come up with a new setup for our downstairs. He’s always busy with some sort of computer/techno geeky project around the house!
Patrick: Patrick is growing like a weed. He’s always talking, asking questions, and learning new things. He’s been doing really well at preschool. We’ve begun to look into various options for kindergarten right now. One of the things we’re currently looking into is one of the private Christian schools in Tacoma. I know we have some time until September rolls around, but I would like to try to come up with a plan soon!!! Patrick has been doing very well at preschool and I am often told that he helps other kids learn how to do things like write their letters. Patrick loves to draw and he’s always creating new pictures and taping them to our walls. Sometimes he also writes on the walls, and we have found more than one “NO” written throughout the house. While he has been able to spell and write his name for quite some time, he has also begun writing small words like “dog”, “log”, “Mom” and “Dad”. He is always creating new words on the fridge with his letter magnets and then asking me to tell him what they say. Let’s just say that is no easy task, esp. when the word is full of only vowels or consonants!
Samuel: Sammy has really started talking in the past 6 months and he’s always saying the funniest things. If you come to our house on a typical day, Sammy will always be walking around in underwear or a pull-up- he HATES clothes. He takes them off whenever possible. Part of the reason, I suspect, is that he’s still not solid on the potty training yet and he has a lot more accidents when he is clothed and he realizes that. So, Sammy is always half naked and he loves it 🙂 Sammy is the clown around the house, and he’s also the most social to strangers. He’s just a funny little boy. Lately he’s also been the trouble maker of the group, and he’s always getting into something naughty, with Ethan as a willing and able accomplice.
Ethan: Ethan is a funny boy. He has definitely been our hardest child in so many ways, but he can be such a sweetie…. when he wants to be. He wants so hard to be big like his brothers and he becomes so sad and upset when they get special privileges that he does not get. I try to make him feel special by doing special Mommy/Ethan activities throughout the day. I’m sure it’s hard to be a third born with two older brothers who have a lot of fun activities that you can’t do. One of the recent things was soccer- the two older boys did a 6 week soccer class and Ethan had to watch. It was really hard to make him understand that he was too young to participate, and I cannot wait until he is older and able to do more things with the brothers. Another Ethan update- we just found out recently from a blood test that he has some sort of food allergy, but I haven’t had time to begin an elimination diet to figure out what it is. It’s causing him to have constantly loose stools and, as a result, a very bad perpetual diaper rash despite frequent diaper changes, organic cloth diapers, lots of air time, and prescription diaper rash cream. This is going to be another hard thing for Ethan- it’s going to break my heart to force him on a restricted diet while he watches his older brothers eat whatever they want. I have a couple suspicions- either dairy or eggs- both of which are going to be hard to completely eliminate. I don’t know when to start… esp. with Christmas coming up because I know how hard this is going to be on the poor little guy :(.
Liam: Liam is such a joy to us. He is bubbly, he is sweet, he is always trying to talk, coo, and blow raspberries, he has an infectious laugh, and he’s always smiling. He’s just started grabbing at everything lately, from the nursing necklace around my neck, to the toile pictures on his bassinet, to the twisted i-cord drawstring holding up his wool longies. He is full of delicious fat folds and he’s really become a very rolly polly baby. I wouldn’t mind if he stayed at this stage forever. At four months old, he’s starting to fill out his 3-6 month clothes and I’ve had to put some of them away, but I haven’t had to drag out the 6-9 month box yet. I look forward to making baby food for him in a couple months, but for now I’ve enjoying just nursing him. Even though some days it seems like I’m constantly doing it, it’s nice to have that special bonding time with him amid the chaos of the day.
Jack: Our new goldie has been pretty good for the most part. He is fairly calm for a puppy, but he still is a puppy so we’ve had to deal with the occasional accident (though they are far less than I remember having with any of my dogs growing up!), chewed up toy, jumping up and nipping. We’ve been pretty strict with the puppy though, and I’ve taught the boys how to handle it when the dog tries to be too rough with them. I think things are going pretty well overall.
Well, there is probably more that I could mention, esp. as we head into December, the busiest month in our family… but I better go for now. Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!!!
