Turn, Turn, Turn

The sun is shining brightly through my windswept curtains. I am sitting at my computer eating a turkey-avocado wrap and drinking an iced coffee, pretending I am in a small Internet cafe downtown. Two of my beautiful children are dreaming nap time dreams.

This morning I got up late because Honey was here. Usually he leaves the house before I wake up in the morning, but today he had an appointment, so stuck around longer and got Brother on the bus before I even made my morning appearance. I staggered out of the bedroom clutching a wee baby and collapsed onto the recliner. My back is sore from nursing laying down through the night. I ask Honey if it is 'cold'. He said Brother wore a sweatshirt to school. I jumped up and threw open the front door. It was colder outside than it was inside, notable in the South. I went straight to the thermostat and turned off the air conditioner, also a notable event.

As I giggled and opened all the windows (We now have 13 in our house to open...), I said, "Let's go to the park!" Honey had to be at his appointment in an hour and a half, but was game. We tugged pants on the little boys and rushed out the door. Honey wore the baby in the Bjorn so I was able to climb on the dew slicked play equipment with Jelly Bean. The wind was blowing and the sun was shining and the day was like the first bite from a ripe pear, juicy and sweet. We came home and I decided it was cool enough to bake. I used up some well-done bananas in banana bread and then made a quiche that we can have for dinner with a Caesar salad.

Things change. Summer fades to fall. Little babies grow into sweet boys. Maternity leave ends. I called the daycare this morning and told them we would be back in two weeks. Because I was going back to work. Things do change and I am different after this maternity leave than I was last time when I held a sorrow so deep and heavy, the weight almost crushed me. I dreamed of staying home with my baby. This time? Well. I have different dreams. I will miss my boys, but Jelly Bean has been ready to go back to school for weeks. He misses his friends and playing all day. I am not nearly as fun as a room full of 4-year-olds. Who knew?

And New Baby? I will miss him terribly and have some adjusting to do. I will work part-time until probably November to help him and myself with the transition. It feels like an ache to know I only have two weeks left. My heart and eyes are full at the thought of this new change. I am looking forward to getting back to my job-home. I love the people there, too and I miss feeling like a vital member of that team. So, I will go back.

This is the time of year where thankfulness hits you. Where you can't believe how incredibly lucky you are to have had such a life so far and still, tomorrow is yet to be determined. Silly as it sounds, I am hearing in my head,

How very special are we
For just a moment to be
Part of Life's eternal rhyme?

I am thankful for a supportive husband and beautiful boys and my time at home. I am thankful to have a job I love and can go back to. I am thankful for cool days and open windows and bittersweet change.

Overboard

Jelly Bean has a birthday coming up very, very soon. Birthdays cause me to lose my mind, just a little.

Ok, maybe a lot.

I started to feel bad because Brother has had a party or extensive outing with multiple friends (Laser Tag and Pizza Party! McDonald's Party! Movies and restaurant and cake and ice cream at the house with friends!) for all of his birthdays. Jelly Bean had a pretty kickass first birthday party..and that was it. Bwomp Bwomp Bwahwahwahwahwah....
And I started feeling guilty because here is this adorable little middle child who 6 short weeks ago was my own sweet baby and not a galumphing Big Kid and I have never given him a birthday party! Shame and utter despair and a week to plan. Oh. My.

So, there will be a SpiderMan spacewalk jumpy thingy. All the neighborhood children will be invited and if parents and relatives show up, there will be about 30+ people at my small, spur of the moment birthday party. There will be a cake with a farm on it. Multiple presents were bought. Books! A beetle poster! And oh, he needs a BALL PIT!

Let's talk about the ball pit. Let's talk about how he is pretty rambunctious and those inflatable things looked too shallow. Let's talk about how Honey decided to build a ball pit out of PVC pipes and plastic garden fencing and used this ball pit calculator to determine how many balls were needed. Let's talk about how it told us 700 balls would make it over a foot deep and how our math skilz are sadly lacking OR the calculator is a P.O.S. And how it didn't work out and now more balls are ordered and the ball pit we built to be cheap is costing us somewhere in the ballpark of $300.00.

I asked Honey. I asked him how did this happen? What were we thinking? It's like we decided to build a ball pit. And we decided we wanted 1.5 feet of balls. Then when the first installment of balls didn't come out as we had envisioned, we just...bought more. And more. And now they are all in the mail and I have a $300 ball pit and a party coming up this weekend to also pay for.

Still, Jelly is loving the ball pit. It will be cool when it is finished. And New Baby will get to play in it someday, too. I don't regret it or getting carried away, per se, I just wished I had opened my eyes a bit.

Still, they are loving it.

Old is New

Some of the best things about having a new baby is remembering all the stuff you loved about having your other babies. I love putting New Baby in Jelly Bean's and Brother's old clothes. And wrapping him snugly in a particular receiving blanket I have had for the other boys. It is like this wonderful mix of new tiny person with a healthy helping of nostalgia thrown in.

Jelly Bean loves being a big brother. He is handling it so well right now. He goes and checks on the baby and looks at me seriously to tell me, "When the baby wakes up, you feed him, ok?" Yessir. Brother is way more nonchalant about the new addition. He might smile at New Baby occasionally and probably has only held him three times, but has said to me, "Gee, I really like New Baby a lot more than I liked Jelly Bean when he was born." The unseating of Prince Brother was not a very enjoyable experience for him.

New Baby is growing really well. In three weeks, he gained 2 lbs 4 oz. Whee! I was so proud of myself. Jelly was so little he lived in the tenth percentile and I was convinced it was all my fault. But this time, New Baby is in the 30th percentile! (I am being slightly sarcastic. I grant it is a silly thing to be proud of because it is not like you control it or anything.) Anyway, he is growing up so fast already and I have my usual "Oh-my-womb-is-vacant-are-you-sure-we-can't-have-any-more-babies?" Honey is pretty firm on the "Hell NO." But I walk through my day snuggling New Baby close and admiring every bit of him, soaking up every molecule of milky smell and yellow poop. Because here, in this one and only lifetime, there will be no more babies I will call my very own. I look at all of our gear. At the teeny outfits that used to belong to the older boys and the worn receiving blanket and I wonder, "What do I do with all this when New Baby no longer needs it?" I want to pack it all away in the attic for grandchildren, but how would my sons' partners look at me if I handed them these ratty old things that are so precious to me? Like I was insane, probably. It's not a form of rejection I really want to experience. Still, what do I do with this stuff?

When I was pregnant, I couldn't relate as well to the posts about folks' hearts breaking because the bassinet was gone. Now I can.