Most! Disjointed! Post! Ever!

Okay sidenote. Did anyone ever watch that badly dubbed Most! Extreme! Elimination! Challenge! that was on around 2003 or so? That’s totally the voice running in my head when I typed the title. (Why yes, I am hearing voices now. Sleep deprivation. Gotta love it.)

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This is a note I just sent to my beloved at work:

You know how Talia likes to give kisses now?And she’s decide it’s funny to give stuffed toys (or her blanket kisses too). Big smiles; she knows what she is doing.

Today she thought it was super funny to put things up to my mouth for ME to kiss. Which is super cool from a developmental perspective but also? the thing she wanted me to kiss? A balled up pair of your socks. Awesome.

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Yes. So. We are good here. I wish this post was that giant catch up post that would fill you in on all the comings and goings and ups and downs and craziness of life with four kids but the fact of the matter is that every time I think about trying to update this thing properly it makes me want to curl up into a little ball and cry because it’s HARD. It’s hard to keep up with everything and truthfully most days I’m *really* just treading water and I’m barely doing that very well. So instead I’m going to not beat myself up about it and just post some STUFF. Maybe it will be easier to just go from there?

Babies are good; really good. Lucy…man she’s funny.

She is FINALLY starting to catch up in amazing ways. We have her reflux basically eliminated (turns out the biggest problem for her was fortifying her formula. She just couldn’t handle the calorie density. Put her on a normal 20cal/ounce amount? She’s eating like a horse. Who knew??).

And girlfriend LOVES food. Loves being in her highchair; loves spoons; love love love. Super proud and loves it. Worked out how to pick up little puff things and eat them (lack of teeth notwithstanding). She really is doing amazingly well with all of it. And I *think* she’s catching Talia (though I haven’t had her weighed in awhile).

(This amuses me to no end – occasionally she forgets that her soother is in her mouth, so when you give her a cracker – FAVOURITE EVER – she sits there and cries because she can’t work out how to get it IN to her mouth. Clearly gifted. Oy.)

She actually cracked her first tooth just yesterday – GO LUCY!

She can sit now, though she is more prone to tipping – for a long time her hips were so narrow compared to her head that staying upright was not really an option.

(I swear, I let my mom and sister watch the girls via facetime for TWO SECONDS….and Lucy tipped. And what do they do?? Take a picture of it. Amazing. Note Shannon laughing in the camera in camera view.)

But she’s a lot more balanced and strong now. She seems to love playing with cars and trucks – I can’t decide if this is directly related to her mad crazy love of her brother (seriously, he just has to walk in the room and she laughs) or if it’s just a Lucy thing but she does.

Talia is great too – super strong; desperate to crawl although THANK GOODNESS she hasn’t figured that out yet. (Look, I know ok? Growing developing babies good! But I LOVE the phase where you can park them on a blanket with a bunch of toys and a cracker and they STAY THERE. I do not need mobility too quickly. I’m okay with that.)

Talia is the proud owner of three teeth – two she’s had for awhile and one she just managed to get through there. You can imagine how much joy this brings me, since she’s the baby who still nurses. GAH. Also, OW.

Talia kind of likes food but she’s really ambivalent about the spoon. She just doesn’t like it and doesn’t especially want it in her mouth THANKS ANYWAY MOM. So she doesn’t eat as much and she doesn’t always nurse as much so – shocker – she’s been slipping down the charts a bit growth-wise. We have a weight check next week and she seems to be doing a bit better so hopefully she’s on track. She seems fine to me – I can’t quite bring myself to get worked up about it.

The bigs are good too – Anika is working like mad to get ready for her recital in another two weeks, so that’s awesome. She’s worked really hard this year and I’m so proud of her. Can’t wait to see her do her thing! She also got 100% on a french test the other day and that was an amazing confidence booster. I’ve talked before about Anika & academics/confidence and this was just an awesome jump for her. Super proud.

Sam is crazy and silly and all of the wonderful things that are Sam. He’s also stubborn and frustrating but that comes with the territory I guess. He’s almost four and has Big Plans for an “In Summer” birthday party (from the movie Frozen – he wants it to feature Olaf and Sven heavily). I figure we’ll rent a snow cone machine and get some water balloons for a “snowball fight” and call it good. He made a list of people to invite that basically consists of 32 people and one dog. Alrighty then!

I’ve been trying to use Tuesdays (when I have Lisa here with the babies) to do things with Sam and spend time with him. We’ve actually had some good fun. Most recently we went to the BMX park and oh my goodness he had a blast with that. LOVED it. Definitely going to need to go back there soon. Really really fun.

I am a TOTAL convert to these strider bikes now. I was seriously wondering after last year (recall this post). But it clicked for him this year and now I literally cannot keep up with the kid. I would have to strap on the sneakers and jog with him in order to even sort of keep pace. It is AMAZING. He would probably be riding a trike if not for this, and he’d be going like two sidewalk squares per hour and driving the rest of us nuts trying to go for a walk, and now he can almost match Anika on her bike. It’s really amazing.

(I know a lot of these pictures are pretty dull if you already follow me on Instagram or Facebook so I apologize – I’ll try to get more creative soon!)

Mr. B and I are okay too. Lots of ups and downs – him with work and me with just finding some sort of balance (hah). We are trying to figure out which things need to change and which don’t. There’s a lot that’s really good about where we’re at; it’s just that there’s lots that’s challenging still too. For me it’s about carving out any space for myself – most mom-types know that whatever *we* want to do generally comes last, after everyone elses’ needs and desires are met. The problem is that things are so busy right now that the time for me never seems to come. I’ve been working on a washi dress for what seems like months – and a year ago this would have taken me maybe two days to do. So that’s really frustrating; it’s pretty hard to feel good about what I’m making when the progress is so wretchedly slow. I get so inspired and excited when I come up with new projects I want to do….the trouble is just that it takes me so long to finish anything I kind of just give up. There hasn’t been any time to even get a haircut since last August. (How alarming is that?! AM PRETTY).

Oh well. I keep trying to remember it’s just a season; it’s going to get easier. The things I love that I am passionate about will eventually have some time and space again….and I just need to keep plugging to get there.

And it’s not that I’m wishing away the girls’ babyhood – I’m really not. They are wonderful and silly and fun and make us all really happy….and the four of them together just floor me. So fun. (Also: THERE ARE FOUR OF THEM. WHO LET THAT HAPPEN?!)