Happy 9th Birthday, Anneliese!

Anneliese is 9 today! (Today meaning, just after midnight, when all the sporadic birthday blogs get published, because if it's a good enough time to have a baby, it's a good enough time to post about it.)

All day I've been asking her, "you know what I was doing nine years ago RIGHT NOW?" and then telling her parts of her birth and labor story and she rolls her eyes (because tween) but then she side-eyes a grin with that dimple and I know she loves it.

I told her I wasn't going to let her go to bed earlier because once she was asleep, she'd be all done being 8, and I wasn't ready to authorize a new age yet. She's all, "mom! you do this every year!" Well... YEP I sure do, can't stop won't stop, get on board baby girl.

So! Birthday week! We are just in the aftermath of our second hurricane in a month (both minor for our purposes, still both frustrating) and we haven't had power and I couldn't bake a cake (I bought one for the first time, someone tell me it's fiiiiiine) or make a birthday video until the wee hours (we have power back, yay!) AND I just got back from a fall break trip with Nathan, so it's been an odd week of nerves and scattered attention and all of a sudden WHOA IT IS HER BIRTHDAY.

She's 9! Look at this sweet big girl.

Anneliese at 9 (almost) (as I'm writing this) is a kind, poised, quirky fun kid. She's ever more introverted, but still chatty with us at home. She's social and has lots of friends and giggles, but doesn't seem to be the leader in any group situation. (Except! We hear she is a leader in the classroom, which is fun to picture.) She has a steady approach to life, in many ways some version of an ideal self I think many adults would want to be (myself included): observing and measuring before acting, not reckless but glad to try new things, confident in saying what she wants or needs yet rarely pushy about it, and (usually) maintaining her composure even when she's confused or stressed.

UNLESS YOU RUSH HER DO NOT RUSH HER SHE CANNOT BE RUSHED. She will cry and break down and say she can't move fast or think clearly when someone is rushing her and stressing her and MOM YOU ARE STRESSING ME OUT (yes, it has begun) (she takes seriously 45 mins to shower and put clothes on every day, and I have no idea what she is doing up there -- staring at the wall? daydreaming of underwear? trying to "match" outfits? -- but I can't look too closely at it, I just have to trust that she'll be dressed and ready and she almost always is; we both do better when I don't micromanage her time but SERIOUSLY WHAT IS SHE DOING (I digress).

She loves to lollygag with her head in the clouds, she's very much a daydreamer, and also a big-picture dreamer, and I think it keeps her content and chill with most of what swirls around her, because she so easily can put her brain somewhere else. I sort of love that about her, because for all the ways she is similar to me emotionally, this corner of her brain is nothing like me, and it's interesting and fun to learn it about her.

She loves her violin and craves our attention and notice when she practices and masters a new song or skill. She likes books and audiobooks and has started leaning into some history and nonfiction which is fun. She is very pro-female and girl-leadership and scowls at people who underestimate girls. (YES YES YES.)

She decided this year she'd like to save some turtles, so we now get straw-shamed when we use a disposable straw around her in a restaurant, except when it's convenient for her, of course, and then it's fine. So... basically she's saving turtles at the speed of a turtle, which is better than not saving them at all right?

Despite being a whole head taller than average for her age, she's still plugging away at gymnastics, and getting better, and having fun! She also loves kicking the soccer ball around outside (this might or might not have more to do with attention and quality time with Nathan than any particular love of soccer) and she's still a strong quick little swimmer. She got a new bike for Christmas (after finally learning to ride last fall) and she's pretty good at that now too!

She's more and more independent, walking to and from the bus stop with Charlotte on her own each day, getting around Montreat on foot on her own this summer, and because she's eager for more independence, she's super reliable and helpful and trustworthy, which is... excellent, and a relief. (And a prayer it sticks, please.)

She loves milk and spaghetti and cabbage risotto and pineapples and sloppy joes and easy mac with sour cream mixed in (I don't even know). She dislikes fizzy drinks and all potatoes except the skinniest of fries, or chips. She would never choose ice cream over another dessert, and she'd never choose chocolate over vanilla, though she'll eat both of those things and rave about them when they're the only options. She adores babies, especially her youngest cousins. She loves dancing to music on YouTube and Amazon. She asked to re-paint her room this summer and after a zillion samples we found an aqua we both agreed on, so... yay for feeling invested in her sense of space? (And by yay I mean WHOA I'm exhausted.) She loves playing dolls with Charlotte and sports with Nathan and board games with Mark. She would communicate in nothing but emojis if we'd let her. She loves unicorns and rainbows and sparkles and slime, and her minecraft worlds are created thusly.

I've said it many times, and I think it even more often: it's bananas cool that we get to be her parents, to love her, to raise her, to see who she's becoming. All of us who get to know and love her are truly better for it, I really believe that.

Video of the past year:


(If you can't see the video embedded above, click here to watch it on YouTube.)

Past years of memories:
8th year
7th year
6th year
5th year
4th year
3rd year
2nd year
1st year

Happy birthday, baby Beanie. We love you forever and ever.

Happy 7th Birthday, Charlotte!

Charlotte Booler is 7 today! Happy birthday, baby girl!

She doesn't know it yet, but when we wake up in the morning, we are taking her to the American Girl Store (we drove to Charlotte, which is the closest storefront to us, to spend the night with my mom and put us closer) and letting her finally FINALLY get an American Girl doll, which she has been coveting for literal years. After wandering the Chicago store last summer, she knows exactly which one she wants, and we have two aunts meeting us there for a tea party/ lunch in the doll cafe (I DO NOT EVEN KNOW WHO I AM ANYMORE), and I am actually legit excited to finally give her this thing she has wanted for so long. (There has been a "responsibility" requirement for such an expensive doll in our family, which she has... um... taken a few extra years to show she can handle.)

Anyway. Doll me strength. Happy doll lunch birthday to this child who has big-girl interests and somehow isn't in a bumbo seat drooling on herself anymore. I know, it's weird how that happened.

Seven!

Charlotte at 7 is a gappy-toothed bubbly chatty funny delight. She has no shortage of personality, and though she still hasn't really ever met a stranger, she's become sliiiiightly more guarded with who gets to see her truly silly side. She loves dancing in her room, lip syncing with a hairbrush, and filming herself talking to the camera about all manner of nothing (as if she's a youtuber, which she longs to be, which I will not allow, despite the hours of footage added up on all our devices showing her life dream about this).

She's a night owl and an early riser, both. She's a lefty who loves drawing and writing her name on everything. She loves puzzles and math. Her favorite mammal is a sheep but her favorite SEA-mammal is a narwhal, and her favorite overall animal is a penguin. (She really likes animals.)

She took a sign language elective at school last year, and now loves signing. She's on a quest to learn more, and notices sign language now everrrrywhere, tons of places I had never noticed myself. She says when she grows up, she wants to be a person who signs sermons in church (or an artist. one of those).

She loves Beanie Boos, and will recite a list of the ones she owns, in order of acquisition, to anyone who will listen. (I don't recommend listening to this, unless you have, like, very specific insomnia needs.)

She reports that the best new places she went this year were a Disney Cruise, and (finally!) Montreat. Of all our kids, she's the one who most craves a new adventure, which is really fun for me, since it feels like a little bit of me, connecting to her in that way.

She didn't do dance this year, because she was a bit overwhelmed at starting a full-day school schedule, and it was all just... too much. (To this I say: YEP I GET IT ME TOO.) She does miss having an activity though, so she will start gymnastics with Anneliese this fall. She also loves running (and is fast!) and finally this winter learned to swim. It's amazing how fast and strong her swimming is now, just a few months later. (However, she doesn't want to be called "quite the little fish" but "quite the little narwhal." Please to make a note.)

She and Anneliese have become thick as thieves this year, which is really fun to see. (Well, really fun insofar as the bickering doesn't exhaust me, because they are very much thieves of the bickering ilk.) When Nathan is home, she sort of has to vy for Anneliese's attention and affection, but most often she can fit right into the group dynamic, and the girls find lots of moments for sister time with dolls and dancing and whatever camping show they're into watching together these days.

Sometimes parenting Charlotte feels like a whole new beast to Mark and me. She's somehow cut from a very different cloth than the other two (I know, I know, all children are different), and it once in a while renders us feeling like hopeless newbies at this whole thing, even though we're over a decade in and she's our third kid. Those days and weeks and spells are... hard. She has her own mind, and knowing what the expectations are, and what the right thing to do is, isn't *always* enough to convince her to do it. But MOST of the time, she is wonderful and quirky and funny and sweet, always the first one who wants to snuggle or have special time one on one with us, often the first who wants to help in the kitchen, the least complainy about chores and cleaning, and these days the best eater in the house (whoa). She is becoming more confident in her needs and her gifts, and it's super cool to see her becoming the person she will be.

For now, we'll settle into watching her be seven. We'll spend the day doll shopping and eating chocolate cheesecake (her request). We'll delight in this little Booler, and be so joyful that we get to know her and love her. It seems only a moment ago, the idea of a third baby was so hypothetical, just a lark of a hope, and now she's here and human and funny and HER. She made and makes our family complete, and we love her like the sun.

Happy birthday, dear Charlotte. We love you so much, forever and ever, baby Booler.

Memories from Charlotte's 7th year:



(If you can't see the embedded video, click here to watch on YouTube.)

And from years past:

Sixth year
Fifth year
Fourth year
Third year
Second year
First year

Happy 11th Birthday, Nathan!

Welp, Nathan is eleven!

The tiny baby who came home to two mostly-clueless parents and two pups who thought they were human, the baby who inspired the move of Erin's Official Internet Sharings from, like, long emails and LiveJournals and MySpace to HERE IN YE LITTLE CORNER OF THE WEBZ which has already somehow aged itself out of usefulness in keeping up with the times but I can't quite quit it anyway -- yeah, THAT little newborn baby is now eleven.

Eleven!

Happy birthday, baby Nathan!

He started middle school this week (magnet school with a modified schedule starts early and ends early each year). He's still doing orchestra, and loving science and design things, is doing a geometric construction class (?) (something about math and buildings) and also digital literacy (because 2018) and Chinese and all sorts of big-kid things.

He has reached the age of into-every-sport, thinks he is destined to be a great football star (he has never played football, never, not once, but he will be trying it this fall) (the flag variety, I'm not nuts y'all, PLEZ), is actually a really fast swimmer, likes running, and wears out athletic shoes faster than he outgrows them (he's still the smallest kid in his grade) (best of luck with those football dreams, buddy). He has fallen hard for the Croatian national soccer team, the Twins (?) and the Vikings (???) - but is most enthused about Clemson football, because, yknow, Dad time.

He tells jokes that actually (sometimes) have a real punchlines that are (somewhat) funny. He is too old for Daniel Tiger but not too old for Cars and Toy Story. He isn't yet too cool for snuggling. THANK THE LORD AMIRITE?! He loves his little sisters and his little cousins and is compliant and responsible and polite, and only shows signs of teen 'tude when he's overstimulated or beyond his introvert limits (but is better than many adults at recognizing that and escaping for a bit to recharge).

He is bossy but we have no idea where he gets that. *shrug*  *cringe*

His YouTube history is still full of dinosaur documentaries and info about maritime history, now with a smattering of Two Cellos, The Piano Guys, Imagine Dragons, Minecraft how-tos, sportsball highlights, kid chef/cooking shows, drawing tutorials, and Try Not to Laugh videos. (Spoiler alert: he usually laughs. Often at o' dark thirty in the morning when I am trying to sleep late.) (Someone wake me when my mom of the year trophy arrives.)

We got him a cell phone earlier this summer, for the advent of middle school (he'll eventually be taking a city bus home, and I need to text him and also track his every location and move like any millenial parent, duh) and as we were setting up our family cell phone rules, and talking about not disparaging other people or excluding them or saying unkind or untrue things about them, etc - he said "so basically, be a a Hufflepuff?" YES, BUDDY. YES. BE A HUFFLEPUFF.

And he is. Through and through. He seeks to include, he clamors for what's fair (to the point where his exacting nature is sometimes exhausting for me), he is empathetic and kind and funny, and just a truly wonderful little human.

I felt a LOT of feelings this past Sunday, his due date, the night before he started middle school. I cried all my tears and missed his infant self and I think I have that out of my system for the moment, because right now all I can think about is how great he is, how glad I am I know him, and how amazed and grateful I am that we get to be his parents.

Happy birthday, dear Nathan. We love you so much. xoxo


(Click here to watch the embedded video above on YouTube.)


Memory lane:

Nathan's 10th year
9th year
8th year
7th year
6th year
5th year
4th year
3rd year
2nd year
1st year (omg   *sob emoji*)

Anneliese at Almost 8

We have reached the point in this funny moment in time known as "blogging" where instead of everyday tidbits and daily-slog-minutiae delight nuggets, I find myself only vignetting my babies into words a thin slice at a time. And that's harder than you'd think, or maybe exactly as hard as you'd think, because capturing any human into a slice of a moment in time is... well, hard.

And here we are, with tiny "new baby" turned big girl big sister "middlest baby" Anneliese as an almost-eight-year-old. When I try to wrap my brain around where we were eight years ago this week -- newly a stay-at-home-parent, very pregnant, worried about H1N1, curious about folks getting smartphones, wondering how to picture our only child as a big brother, ending what we then naively adorably thought was the hardest decade in America we had seen in ages haaaaaaomg -- it's almost hard to remember that. It seems like another life. It was another life.

And then there was Anneliese. And now, well, look at her go.

Last winter, she finally lost that janky tooth that busted up her face when she was two. It's weird how it feels like both Anneliese and I spent five years cussing that tooth and missing her baby smile (me), and hating the jank (her), and then when it finally came out, I was, like, profoundly sad. When you have legit feelings about teeth as the end of an era, that's when you know your mom math is some weird sh!t, yo. (Anneliese was uncomplicatedly thrilled to toss it to the tooth fairy and move on with her life, for the record. Gave none craps about the memory and trauma and face change. KIDS AMIRITE.)

Anneliese at almost eight is a bookworm, devouring chapter books and audiobooks faster than we can put them in her hands or ears, and always on the hunt for a new free little library. She has taken in some of my own children's favorites this year (Harry Potter, the Little House series, the Narnia books, Roald Dahl, Beverly Cleary) which has been super fun (for me). One of her current favorite things is for us to go on a walk together and listen to our audiobooks and hold hands. She won't outgrow this too soon, right? Right?? RIGHT?! (Someone tell me she won't. Lie to me if you must.)

She has also decided sometime in the last year that music is maybe her Thing. She started on violin in orchestra last winter, and also auditioned for a spot in a community choir in a neighboring suburb, and adores singing with them. She is the youngest one, and thinks that singing with big kids all the way up through high school is the best. She spends a fair amount of time upstairs in the closest between her room and Charlotte's, sounding out tunes on the keyboard and trying to match it to her violin, which is super sweet, and also whoa dang loud, and also no you may not start piano yet, my dear, you are already super booked up. (But yes, our band nerd hearts are proud.)

She loves babies and taking care of her baby cousins, and is convinced (and will tell anyone who will listen) that she possesses a talent called "baby magic" that means she can always soothe them, and, well, I mean, let's just say I will be a very sweet mom when her own kid has colic, because that's definitely happening, right? That's how the universe works, last time I checked.

Anneliese and Charlotte have been playing together better this year than ever before in their lives. The closet between their rooms is currently set up like a nursery for all their babies (and I do mean all! their! babies! SO MANY BABIES OMG) and it reminds me so much of Ashley and me at that age that it just squeezes my heart and is exactly what I was hoping their sisterhood would be like.

She and Nathan are still fast friends too, and they all three still pile into her room every Friday night for a sleepover. I'm so scared those days are numbered but I will cling to it and let them do it as many more weeks/months/years of their childhoods as they want.

Anneliese become a bit more shy and a bit more poised this year. She is polite and mostly quiet in a group, yet also social and fun with lots of friends and party invites and stories from school. When she's chatty, she's nonstop - but she's decidedly less chatty than Other People who live in this house.

She switched this fall from dance to gymnastics and that seems to be going well, although it's a new rhythm for our family not to have any tiny dancers at the moment. She also likes crafts and sewing, and (like her mommy!) loves notebooks and pens and is always trying a new pretty ("pretty") lettering.

She loves sunshine and hates cold weather. She considers herself an indoor cat, except for trampolining and her newly-learned skill of bike riding. She adores sleep. First one down every night, and the last one up every morning. And she would nap any day we'd let her.

She is obsessed with spaghetti, especially her daddy's. She loves coconut and almonds and somehow loves popping candy but not carbonated beverages, because, well, people are complicated I guess.

And yes, a streak of rainbow still follows her everywhere she goes.

We love you, baby Beanie. Happy almost 8!

Charlotte at Almost 6

As I am writing this, it's August 1, and we are in transit on the way home from our road trip. We are in... (I just legit had to look at my maps app to see)... Washington Court House, Ohio, which is a thriving (no) metropolis (no) in the middle of a cornfield (yes). It's beautiful here and the hotel is so new it smells like construction (in a good way) and there is an indoor pool, where the kids are swimming. Because they've been cooped up in the car all day and I have no idea what time it is because I can't remember what time zone we are in, and all semblance of a schedule has flown straight out the window and not only do I not care, I sort of love it.

So.

Six years ago today was Charlotte's due date, but I harbored no illusions that I would be having a baby. I had a massage scheduled, and I hadn't even brought the other kids to their please-watch-my-babies-because-I'm-having-a-baby grandparent coverage. But it's still a date that stands out to me. I can only be who I am, yknow?

Charlotte has been less delightful at age five than the other two were, but she was also less horrifying at three, so maybe this is just how the world balances. She is feisty and spirited and defiant and playful and exuberant in ways that are new to our family (her Bumgarner is showing, I think), until I get her around a group of other kids her age and she seems the most calm and even-keeled child in the crowd. PERSPECTIVE, is what I'm saying.

So basically she IS a delight, and it's a whole different brand of delight than we have parented before, and she is the bright spot in our brightest days.

Charlotte at almost six is impossibly sunny (except when she's impossibly cloudy), is constantly in motion, has an imagination on fire, and isn't short on ideas or opinions (we don't know where she gets that).

She is likely our only extrovert child, yet she's also the best one at playing by herself for hours (literally) on end, talking out loud to herself and her multitude of toys and toy figurines and calico critters and toysies and paw patrol pups. She chatters constantly, either at whoever is in the room, or at herself when she's alone.

She did a half-day kindergarten this year, and she has done fine, but school isn't so much her jam that we are ready to scoot her on to first grade next year. So when she starts public school in a few weeks, it'll be in a full-day K class, which was a surprisingly uncomplicated decision for us. It feels right and we are super excited to see what she will do next year. (She is super excited to finally ride the bus with her siblings.) She is really respectful and compliant in class, and we get so many compliments from her teachers and her friends' parents about what a dream she is to have around, which is is always so nice to hear.

At home, she is less inclined to the rules and more inclined to sneak some privacy for breaking them - a few months ago she stole Anneliese's (righty!) scissors (Charlotte's had already been taken away because of a whole separate scissor incident) and cut her hair. Right in the front on her forehead. While standing on a stool. She GOT A STOOL and she STOLE SCISSORS which she KNEW she was NOT ALLOWED TO HAVE and she CUT HER HAIR. With her NON-DOMINANT HAND. And that's basically how Charlotte feels about rules she doesn't like. (She also can't walk by a mirror without admiring herself and preening, so the natural consequences of that one were punishment enough.)

She has big dreams for when she grows up, either to be a preacher or to be the president, although recently she's been saying the presidency sounds sort of hard and she doesn't feel like going to college so maybe she will choose a job that doesn't require a college degree, like cleaning houses. Which apparently she thinks she likes. And also is good at. (If you saw her room, you would understand my wide eyes at this.)

She loves running and the trampoline and she's an excellent artist (really! I'm not just saying that because I'm her mom!) and a beautiful singer. She is learning to spell and type and add and subtract. She is great on her scooter but still working on bikes and swimming. She's an adorable dancer and loves doing tumbling and somersaults with Anneliese.
She loves the beach and the pool and candy and pizza and corn on the cob and playgrounds and youtube (she also loves taking the ipod upstairs and recording her own youtube-style videos, mostly outlining the mess in her room and all the rules she is breaking by making a video when she's supposed to be cleaning or whatever).

She has a withering glare that DOES NOT PLAY, and no one in our family can beat her at the straight-faced game. Which is a game the kids play. For fun, I guess. I don't know. (It's less fun for me when she perfects said glare when I would like her to just! smile! and take! a! nice! picture! but I know those photos will make me laugh one day so I try to roll with it but LAWD child, that face.)

She still answers to the name Booler (at home, more often than Charlotte) and she loves to tell us she's the pinky finger of our family but she is NOT a baby anymore. Basically she is a hilarious, warm, loving, playful creature and she brings so much happiness to our home. Our family is complete because she is with us, and we love her so much. Happy almost six, little Booler.

Nathan at Almost 10

Well I never thought I would see the day, but this year -- ten years in -- is the year I finally had to ask myself a few times, trying to remember which was Nathan's due date. (The 22nd. It was the 22nd!)

It's also the year everything went completely bananas and I stopped even pretending to blog, but I have to leave this space here anyway, my own little corner of the internet, because I need a home for memories and milestones and that kind of thing, even if the day-to-day captures have moved to other online homes.

As this is posting, our family is floating northward on America's highways, en route to Wisconsin Dells, because a day of giant waterparks is what Nathan requested for his 10th birthday, and we do love a reason for a road trip. (And a waterpark.) (And a celebration.) It's funny how tween and preteen birthday requests have moved away from toys and Thomas and Friend Cars, and are now all about devices and bikes and projects and trips. COME BACK TO ME, FRIEND CARS. (Cars 3 is out this summer and I won't lie, I'm dying to see it just so I can cry some nostalgia tears remembering the baby and toddler years.)

So yeah, Nathan is about to turn ten. We've known him for a decade. We've been parents for a decade. I am so freaking full of Feelings my head has been spinning for weeks.

Nathan has had a really good year -- dare I say it was even better than when he was five? (#fiveforever!) He is kind and responsible and funny, and while he remains a true introvert, he is ever more out of his shell. He likes public speaking, and he is proud anytime he can be in a leader role.

He is doing pretty well in school, working hard enough to make decent grades, but not so hard he sacrifices precious Pokemon chatter time. He loves science and math, and loves reading history and biography books. It's taken me years to convince him that novels (or any fiction) are also a delight, but finally FINALLY he is very super crazy into Harry Potter, is partway through the 7th book, and talks about almost nothing else these days. In classic Nathan fashion, he spends hours in internet rabbit holes about fan theories and movie castings and behind the scenes info, and lost in Pottermore fandom, and he thinks it's very important that I tell you here that he's a proud Hufflepuff who thinks fairness, justice, loyalty, and inclusion are the most important things (this is actually delightfully accurate about him).

These days he says he'd like to be an architect when he grows up; he spends lots of his time building and designing all manner of things with his legos and sketching and any boxes or tubes or bottles or other crap he pulls from the recycling bin. (He might or might not have a tiny hoarding problem in his room.)

He also loves watching Master Chef, Jr, and has been harboring some serious cooking desires recently. He wants to try new foods and learn to make them, and we don't even know what happened to our little baby who only ever wanted to eat bagels, and now requests lunch dates so he can have some grilled salmon which we never really fix at home. He delights me in surprising quirky ways, and I love seeing him become more and more himself.

He has become surprisingly (to us! we didn't see it coming!) athletic in the last year, thriving at soccer, making a good effort at basketball, and swimming and running faster than many kids his age, despite his small size (he's still the tiniest kid in his grade). He had two bad scooter spills this year resulting in a few (minor) fractures and injuries in his wrist, elbow, knee and hip -- and spent most of his spring in a leg cast, wrist brace and sling. He was discouraged at the time, but has recovered with no problems and is back to normal now.

He's still playing his cello, and has buckled down and really worked hard at this year; we are officially impressed by what he can do. And! He can now match a pitch, singing! We also never thought we'd see that day. :) He loves choir at church, partly because he's suddenly a great singing leader, and partly because as one of the older kids, he has lots of chances for speaking parts and reading at the front of the church, which he loves.

He and Anneliese are still chummy with each other above all others, but are learning to branch out and be social with their own peer groups and also with Charlotte. They've had a few moments of pain together this year that were hard to watch, but also good to see them grow and learn.

Nathan is still the tiny adult in our family, classic oldest child: doing a funny dance between needing to be a baby with snuggles and back scratching and coddling -- and acting as grown up as possible, bossing his sisters and generally trying to manage everyone and everything around him (I seriously have NO IDEA WHERE HE GETS THIS *ahem*). He's helpful, sometimes to a fault, but we love about him that  he always takes initiative and looks to see what others might need or want. His toddlerhood excellence at empathy is manifesting in new and caring ways, and we are so proud.

Happy almost-ten to our wonderful, serious, funny, loving, bright baby boy. Watching you grow for a decade has been the greatest joy of our lives.

Anneliese at Almost Seven

Okay so there are golden birthdays, but is there such a thing as a golden due date? If so, this is Anneliese's. It's October 7th again, and she's almost 7!

Anneliese these days is made up of big feelings, rainbows, chapter books, dolls and doll dress-ups, spaghetti, coconut, craft projects, an odd blend of sassy and compliant responsibility, a head of loose teeth (though not enough missing for her taste), running, swimming, dancing, Olympics, creativity, bright smarts, and one of the funniest kindest hearts I've ever known. She's into girl strength and also silly girlishness. She's a beautiful singer. She loves school and sleeping late. She does cartwheels the way some people talk with their hands. She's the object of affection and attention from both her siblings. She is our middlest, and she is beloved.

I can't believe it was seven years ago she was inside me and we only knew her as Beanie, the awaited baby daughter I was so excited to finally have.

Once in a while, something your heart has huge hopes for, turns out to be exactly as good as you'd hoped. For me, being Anneliese's mom is one of those things.

I love you, little Beanie. Happy due date.

Charlotte At Almost Five

Charlotte is almost five! Happy due date, five years ago today! Age five! Five forever! I love five! I am about to have another five-year-old (yay)! ... My last five-year-old (sob).

But really. Look at this beautiful young lady. She hardly seems like a baby anymore.

(Hahahahahaaaaaa yeah right *wipes tear* no no, she's obviously still The Baby. Of course.)

Charlotte seems to have already entered into Age Five Delightfulness. She is old enough to be independent and have preferences and chase after what she wants and likes. But she's still young enough to have none ounces of too cool, and lots of innocent curiosity still in her.

Plus, she still says some words wrong. Syrup like cereal: syriup. The bonus room is the bennis room. Eating two pieces of toast is toast-es.When she wants you to leave something where it is (a song on the radio, the PJ's she wants to wear all day, etc) she says stay it on. And actually, stay makes more sense than leave, so I get it.

She is chatty and full of stories, half the time made up and half the time completely earnest retellings of mundane events ("and then he poured the cereal but mixed it with the other cereal can you even believe that???" *cue wild hand motions*) and unlike the other two, who we naively maybe once thought were talkative, Charlotte kind of never. stops. talking.

She has two made-up friends, Apple and Sushi (I don't even know) and when no one else will play with her, she plays with them. I have never seen a child outside of a novel so committed to her imaginary friends. Or so chatty with them. She and Apple and Sushi have an army of small toys like her Daniel Tiger "toysies" figurines, and Calico Critters, and a few Paw Patrol pups, and she creates whole worlds and houses and neighborhoods for them, and will do this for hours.

Also, she has several small purses and bags and even a portable Calico house, but her preferred transportation method for her most precious toys is a pizza breadstick box. She takes it all over the house and even on playdates. (Again, I don't even know.)

She dances and skips around the house, because why walk?

She floats around the pool in her puddle jumper, because why learn to swim? (Sigh.)

She follows Nathan and Anneliese and still can't quiiiite keep up, and "hey guys wait for me!" is still a very big part of her life.

She and Anneliese play together ever better, they are both very into dolls and babies and it has been a bonding thing for them this year. It has taken years for them to seem as close to the same age as they are (less than two years! only one school year apart! it has always seemed a much bigger chasm) but I think we are finally getting there.

She still sucks her thumb (no, I do not care anymore), and she calls it her "strong thumb" because it helps her feel better. I will never argue with that. Girl's got an overbite like whoa, braces are coming, there's no more preventing it, so thumb away, little one.

I feel like Charlotte eats almost nothing, and she is somewhat wee, but she's growing, so... meh? She does like french fries and gummy snacks. And gogurt and pizza. And sandwiches but only if they're cut in certain shapes (because obviously puzzles are delicious but dinosaurs are not). She also apparently loves the arsenal of snacks she keeps sneaking into her room and then doing a terrible job of hiding the evidence from. *mad face*

She sort of fails in her own Sneaky Wheelhouse though, replying when I call upstairs to her with things like, "I don't have my scissors, you don't need to come up here!"

Um.

She loves coloring, and is still really good at fine motor type things for her age. "Can you please print me something" has basically been her motto this year, there aren't enough coloring pages in the world to sate this child.

She loves winter, the only one in our house who grins in the outdoor chill, and bundles into her coat and hat with glee. (The rest of us glare at her properly, I promise.)

She loves being read to, but has shown very little interest in trying to read on her own yet.

She thinks she is good at numbers, and shushes everyone at least once a day to tell us "plus one plus one is two" and wait for people to lavish praise on her for such genius. (The amount of eye rolling from Nathan cannot be overstated.)

She likes to pray, and is the one who leads us in prayer 99% of evenings before dinner. She has a whole medley of blessings she likes to say.

She is off to kindergarten in a month. WHAT.

She is wheezy and sunshiney and makes the best mad faces of anyone I know. She has no modesty. She cries having her hair brushed. She cheats at games and tries to charm her way out of it. She is strong and delicate at the same time. She has gobs of friends and would play with them all every day if she could. She loves people, and new people, and she's never met a stranger. She's a good listener, always ready for a story or a joke. When she's happy to see you, she quite literally jumps up and down in excitement, and it's the best feeling in the world.

She made and makes our family complete.

Happy almost five, Charlotte Booler. You won't stay five forever, but we're sure going to enjoy it while it's here, you delightful little human, you.

Nathan at Almost Nine

Nine years ago today, I woke up eager to read the new last final Harry Potter book, and eager to meet my unborn baby, but hopefully not at the same time. (Was secretly worried my  labor would interrupt my Series Ending Feelings before I could finish.) (It didn't.) (Was also not-so-secretly worried that I wouldn't even know I was in labor, doing that awkward 40-weeks mental dance of "pee or broken water?" because the end of pregnancy is so glamorous.)

I can't believe that was nine years ago.

It no longer feels like yesterday, exactly, but it also feels like... well, not like nine years. And if this is what nine years feels like, then I can't believe I only have nine left. He's halfway out of the house! Which is not a ridiculous mental milestone at all so bite your tongue.

Today* he's a full-on big kid, doing big kid things, like reading Harry Potter himself. (Yes! Novels! He reads them now!) (Sometimes!) (He still would choose a biography or fact book nineteen times out of twenty.)

*Well, today today he is not doing any big kid thing or reading any books, because he's battling down a barf bug as I type this. Having a big kid means that when they're sick, you sit ten feet away at the computer and listen to them dry heave while you write a blog post about them. It's both easier and harder than having a sick baby.

(Oh who am I kidding. It's totally easier.)

He's a good sick kid though. He's rull pukey in general when he's sick, so he's kind of a champ at it by now. If one of the kids has to be barfy, I'm glad it's him. Which is a weird thing to say about him at this milestone juncture, but it's organic to our day, so, there you go.

Besides A+ barfing, which I feel like I should stop talking about now, Nathan is doing really well these days. I was told that eight would be as good as five, and I think maybe it has been. Eight is much less moody than seven, and much more helpful, and much more worldly.

He needs me less than ever, but when he does need me, he needs me bigger. If that makes sense. When we do encounter rough patches, it's not about whining or potty training or grabbing anymore, it's about honesty and sneakiness and work ethic and bullies and the balance between fitting in and being doggedly confident in who you are. Raising tiny humans is no joke, and we are constantly flying by the seat of our pants, especially with Nathan, because the oldest kid is always throwing stuff at you you didn't even know you didn't know, didn't think of to think about. Parenting: not for the faint of heart.

He is still doing great in school, although he's right in that space where from a teacher's perspective he is fiiiiiiine and doing his work well enough, and not causing trouble, that he flies under the radar a bit when he's not doing his best, because it's still good enough. So we have had a lot of conversations about not half-assing his schoolwork, and not rushing to be done, and not practicing only the parts he already knows just because they're more fun to play, etc etc etc. How do you teach an eight-year-old the intrinsic value of hard work, especially in a reward-saturated world? That's not rhetorical, I'm really asking. TELL ME IF YOU KNOW PLEASE FOR REAL.

He has a handful of good kids at school that he buddies around with, and a handful that make me purse my lips, which I assume is about normal and will always be the case. He goes to a super diverse school, so he has friends from all continents and many religions, and is becoming a person who knows how and what to ask people about their heritage, his cultural curiosity unstifled by the fear of being offensive, because he is in relationship with all kinds of kids. I've admired him several times when, for instance, he sees the Asian man playing as a guest violinist from church, and he is happy and friendly to walk up to him and ask him about his instrument, or if his family is from Korea or another place in Asia - and what unfolds is a perfectly natural conversation that isn't about race but also doesn't shy away from it. He takes in stride that some of his Muslim friends pray several times a day during school, or that his Sikh Indian friend wears a turban. He just... casually knows a lot about a variety of things, as we all do about our friends, I suppose, but it's so cool that he lives it and is growing a kind and nuanced language for something we, as a culture, struggle to do, or at least to do well. The kids are all right, as they say. (They give me hope.)

 His favorite school work is science, for sure -- he is curious about the world and nature and animals and astronomy and matter, and loves being able to build some tool or model that will help him test an idea. He also does math extremely well; I kind of can't believe how quickly his little brain can grasp a new concept and be able to apply it. He still likes to read a lot, but mostly for fun; it's not something he seems to want to push himself on. He likes writing stories but prefers... reports. "This is an informational text about x," he tells us on the reg. (It's usually a historical ship, or an animal; yesterday, it was a commodities report about how some virus is affecting coffee beans and the world might be running out of coffee; this is information he thought I would like to know.)

He loves legos, if anything, even more than he has in the past. He is less and less married to the idea of keeping his creations together as they look on the box, and increasingly into making his own designs, or replicating designs he sees in the real world. His need to build things extends beyond legos and now includes a variety of trash, which he raids from the recycling bin, and I am constantly having to gently* urge him to remove the coke can boxes and coffee cans and Gatorade bottles from his room, where they are inevitably taped to each other and to rocks and strings and folded paper, because that's a dinosaur habitat/ ship yard/ new solar system/ airport/ lemur rescue center DUH MOM CAN'T YOU SEE I NEED THAT. (*What, I try.)

Nathan is so independent and helpful at home; he's definitely the chore workhorse of the three kids, and helps his sisters and both Mark and me, so much. He fixes his own breakfast and packs his own lunch (and often helps the girls with both those things) and fancies himself a budding master chef, so he loves to help with dinner too.

He loves his cello and his choir at church, and he loves running. The big kids do a track club every Friday morning before school, and he often gets a couple of miles in, which impresses me. He's also become quite a fast swimmer this summer, which blows my mind a little. Two years ago he couldn't swim at all, and now he's one of the fastest in the pack at his swim meets. He just looks like a swimmer in the water; it's the most athletic thing we have ever seen him do, and it's fun to see him grow in confidence with it.

He's still one of the smallest in his grade, less skin and bones now that he is getting stronger, but still just... short. We've been saying for over a year now that he's due a growth spurt at any moment, but it keeps not coming. So.... yeah? Any day now? I guess? Or maybe never.

He loves minecraft. He films himself talking to the camera for his "youtube channel, please subscribe!" (which is locked to everyone but him, but he can dream of his internet superstardom if he wants). He sends lovely heart-feelings texts and emails. He has a teenager voice he uses to talk on the phone. Has spent the year obsessed with Pokemon, so the current GO trend is blowing his mind and providing some good Daddy-kid bonding time to be out exploring. He plays fine alone but still clings to attention from Anneliese, which often wanes these days, because of Charlotte's equal demand and more interesting (to her) playtime ideas. He is bossy and firm and kind and generous. He remains sensitive, and is easily hurt and offended. He saves his silly side for people he really trusts. He is ever more self-assured, and no longer scared of real conversation with new people, even adults. He is polite and witty and full of fun! facts! and loves studying the giant world atlas that hangs over his bed.

He is a wonderful person, and now I need to go wipe his face with a washcloth and scratch his sicky back and offer him some ice chips. (He's patient zero. Pray for us.)

We love you, sweet Nathan. Happy due date, you excellent human, you.

Anneliese, Almost Six

Last week in Anneliese's kindergarten class, she was the "owl of the week" (because just being student of the week is so last millenium?) and she got to ("got to") make a collage and bring a stuffed toy home and write in a journal about it, and also answer a questionnaire about herself.

One of the prompts was to name a dream she has for herself one day. Her answer? "See a rainbow." When I pointed out that she has indeed seen a rainbow before already, she said "Yes! And it was a dream come true!"

So, that's basically all you need to know about Anneliese and her delightful little heart these days.

But here is some more anyway:

She is reading, more and more. She is writing, more and more. Suddenly the world seems hers for the taking. (Hashtag: literacy, amiright?) She sings and dances and makes funny facial expressions and talks with her hands.

She plays with her American Girl doll and her baby doll and chats about Shopkins and Pokemon. She can build lego sets now, with only a little help from big brother. She can fix her own food and find her own tv show and she has her own email address, which she uses to send very important emails covering important topics such as I LOVE YOU and also I LOVE PARSNIPS and also HI BYE LOVE ANNELIESE, but with far fewer correctly spelled words than that there.

She remains obsessed with rainbows. And wearing as many colors as possible. In another of her school projects, she did a collage (why so many collages, teachers of America? whyyyy) or list type thing of her favorites -- naming her favorite color as a rainbow and her favorite animal as a unicorn.

She will not fit into someone else's fill in the blank, NO SHE WILL NOT. (In the most delightful way possible.)

And she is trying very hard to seem grown up, and to grow up, and to be taken seriously, while also clinging tight to a few vestiges of babyhood: her thumb, and Hattie, and dress-ups.

Anneliese seems to approach the world with the assumption that the world is out to delight her. And, therefore, it usually does. I think this is a good way to live. I think I would like to be more like her when I grow up.

I can't believe six years ago tonight she was still inside me, and now here she is, a bright-eyed funny smiling little kindergarten human, making the world better because she is in it. She is everything.

Happy due date, Beanie. We love you always.

Charlotte Booler, Almost Four

Charlotte, despite being born only a few weeks ago and clearly still being a baby, is about to turn four next weekend. Four years ago today I was sitting around very pregnant thinking "any minute now" -- haaaaaa no I wasn't, I knew she would be late, we hadn't even gotten the kids handed off to grandparents by her due date. Anyway. Four years later and this post is going up as we are somewhere on the road between North Carolina and the great midwest (funny, exactly like this day last year), on a long family road trip. One of the games (conversations, really) that Charlotte loves best these days in the car is having us "guess" all the facts about Boolers. What they like to eat and wear and do. She delights in this game. So, let's learn all about what a Booler does.

A Booler loves to giggle and shriek.
A Booler loves her brother and sister.
Boolers always use the potty.
Boolers are delicate flowers who are somewhat accident-prone.
(Boolers bruise easily.)
A Booler loves to dance, always, but especially with no clothes on.
A Booler loves to do dress-ups.
Boolers can buckle their own seat belts!
(But not unbuckle them.)
A Booler cannot walk past a mirror without admiring herself.
Boolers love pigtails, but also bows, but these days mostly pigtails.
A Booler does not like to wear her shoes on the correct feet, ever.
Boolers fall asleep in car seats, almost immediately.
A Booler's favorite foods are yogurt and french fries.
Boolers are social and love other people and might be budding extroverts.
A Booler loves to go to bed with her good-night song.
A Booler's biggest fear is being left behind: "don't leave meeeee!"
Boolers have imaginary friends, sometimes named Apple.
Boolers talk with their hands, emphatically.
A Booler loves to suck her thumb and snuggle Sheepie.
A Booler loves Daniel Tiger and toysies and her trolley hoodie.
Boolers have hair the color of the beach.
But Boolers do not have any curls.
Boolers can swim by themselves but only with a floatie.
Boolers are good at puzzles.
Boolers are good at scooters.
Boolers are really good at coloring.
A Booler promises her family she will always be a Booler.
A Booler makes her family complete.
A Booler is delightful.

Happy due date, Charlotte Booler. You are an amazing little girl.

Nathan at Almost 8

Happy July 22nd! It's Nathan's due date! Again! (No, I have not let go of due dates yet. Hush.)

I am full of feelings today, like every year, remembering eight years ago in the final days of being pregnant, before I was officially a mom. This year for the first time, it feels far away, a long time ago, a previous lifetime. Even just last year I would have said it felt like just yesterday, and now in some ways it does, but mostly it feels now like... a memory.

Pregnancy and babies seem far from my life now, suddenly. It's good and bad. Post for another day. Anyway! *brisk clap*

Sweet Nathan will be eight years old this weekend, y'all. EIGHT.

At almost eight he is still into ships, and dinosaurs, and reading anything non-fiction unless I pull teeth to talk him into a novel. Actually, speaking of teeth, he still hasn't lost any since waaaay last May, over a year ago, and one the Christmas before that. I suspect this time next year he will have a mouth full of holes, or maybe even a mouth full of grownup teeth, so this might be the last of his birthday pictures where he looks like a... little kid. *sob*

He is indeed still little; he actually hasn't gotten any taller since last year, and only one pound heavier, which hopefully doesn't mean anything other than 1- he has Mark's tiny tween genes for being the class shrimp, and 2- he is due for a growth spurt any moment now. He is strong though, and can run fast for a long time, and swim for hours, so his skinny little ribs must have some muscle around them.

He is still a tiny pedant, holding people to their time estimates down to the minute, and correcting anything he perceives as a mistake (I sent him a weather channel video of the biggest ship in the world, and was informed that the biggest ship in the world is actually in a different class and company, and *sigh*) (we are working on politeness). We have no idea where he got that know-it-all gene I MEAN REALLY NO IDEA.

He takes himself and others very seriously, but he also has a playful side when he wants to be silly (and then suddenly acts much younger than his age). He is starting to ask to be into The Things of Older Kids - movies he hears about from friends, and video games, and such. We had one painfully awkward but necessary conversation about birds and bees and the ways life is made, after he learned some wrong things on the playground. (Already!) (I KNOW.) (Recording here for posterity's sake: his notion of all of this came thirdhand via friends about Jack and Rose in the engine room on the Titanic YES REALLY.)

Some days it feels like we are on the brink of a new world, one I am in no rush to get to, yet one I know we can't and shouldn't keep him from.

He is a hard worker and gladly does chores and homework and helps his sisters. He remains one of the most generally compliant kids I have ever known. He loves one on one attention and outings, and is crabby when he feels unseen, and would get lost in internet videos about minecraft, and ship histories, and drawing classes, for hours if we'd let him.

He the moodiest person in our house and also probably the kindest. He is cautious and needs to observe things before he tries them, but once he tries something he keeps pushing until he can do it well; he is driven. He tells funny jokes and horrible ones, is ever better at the cello and ever more tone deaf when he sings, and he writes beautifully.

He is a tiny hoarder of all things sentimental: scraps of paper and drawings and postcards and things other people would consider trash are worth keeping, for him. They get pinned to his bulletin board or stuck in boxes and notebooks, or folded and taped and made into new creations, meshed together with legos and stuffed animals for some world he has dreamed up and decided to build. He is an introvert in the truest sense of the definition: only talks about things important to him, not good at surface level conversation, wants and needs lots of time alone to play and re-charge, and will play happily in his room for long windows of time before emerging to show us what he's been building or working on.

He is a night owl like me, and to wind down in the evenings we usually lie in my bed to read by ourselves together. He is also somehow an early riser, motivated more by the promise of having the house to himself, quiet for breakfast and his favorite youtube channels, than by extra sleep. (He is nothing like me in that way.)

He likes yogurt and candy and hot chocolate and coffee and cheese and crackers and oatmeal and mashed potatoes with gravy. He loves snuggling. He adores his sisters. He texts people the most precious and lovely parts of his heart, things he could or would never say out loud.

He is a wonderful little human, and it's an honor to be his mom, the one who made me a mom, almost eight years ago. Amazing.

Anneliese at Almost Five

It's October 7th again, and I don't need any stinking timehop notifications to remind me it's Anneliese's due date. Baby Beanie! Who was due on this day, five years ago. FIVE.

I can't believe she's almost five.

I know from experience that five is an awesome age, and while the passing of time is always a little sad, and I will miss her babyhood, mostly I am excited to see what five brings for her. She has grown up so much in the last year. She's gone from a kid just pulling out of toddlerhood, into a... little lady. It is so cool to see. She's a bright spot in any day - happy, joyful, friendly. Delightful, basically.

Amongst our three, she seems like an extrovert, but out in the wild compared to the general population, decidedly less so. She's not shy, but she's not the most outgoing in a crowd either. She's friendly and chatty and easy to talk to.

She loves to swing, and play dress-up, and have books read to her, and dance. She hates being cold. She loves bright colors, as many as possible at the same time. She's never seen a rainbow anything that didn't thrill her.

She attaches to people and craves their love and wants to be with them. She and Nathan remain almost inseparable when they're home, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. There was a hurtful exchange of words last week that shook them both up (me too!) but even that, they've come right back from. I can't believe that five years ago right now, Nathan didn't even know her yet. His life, like all of ours, is so much better because she is in it.

I think, actually, that Nathan and Charlotte and Ali might each name Anneliese as their favorite -- she's a real middle child in that way. She adores them all and is happy to be the in-demand playmate, bouncing between trains and princesses and snuggles and dinosaurs and coloring.

When she does want to be alone (unusual, but it happens) she wants to sit on the deck and look at the sky and the pool. Or swing as high as she can, while singing a song at the top of her lungs. Or lie on our shoulders and close her eyes and suck her thumb. Or paint a picture in neon colors, covering the whole page til there's not any white.

She remains ever loyal to Hattie, who is more flat and less green every year, yet as loved as ever. I made Anneliese a friendship bracelet in June and she requested a matching one for Hattie, and now they both have rainbow bracelets they wear all the time. Yes, still. My four-year-old has been wearing one single bracelet for almost five months. And hasn't lost it. Which, considering the rate she loses everything else under the sun (on my gravestone: ANNELIESE WHERE ARE YOUR SHOES), is pretty unbelievable.

She is incredibly helpful at home (especially with Ali, much more than she ever was with Charlotte... maybe just an age thing?) - fetching things and soothing tears and zipping jackets and putting socks on toddlers. She loves helping. Her teachers at preschool tell me she's the same way there.

You'd think this would mean she's great at cleaning up, but no. NO. NOPE. She leaves a trail of mess behind her wherever she goes, somehow shedding stickers and glitter and feathers and toys that she must pull out of thin air, just to drop on the ground. Some days she literally leaves rainbows in her wake.

She'd rather roll around in a mess giggling than clean up, when it comes time. Well, until the giggles turn to sobs. Cleaning up usually ends in sobs. The effort she will put into not cleaning up seems so much harder than just... cleaning up. I don't get it.

Like every other almost-five-year-old in America, she loves Frozen. She also likes to watch Daniel Tiger and My Little Pony, and she loves the Olivia books. She likes nature magazines and she pores over the American Girl Doll catalog any time it comes in the mail (how can this be starting already?? curses, CURSES to whoever got us on that list).

Her love affair with cottage cheese seems to be over, which makes me sad, even though it's gross and I can't fault her for finally realizing that. But it was her first favorite food! These days she loves hot dogs and bananas and yogurt and mac and cheese, and -- her very favorite food in the world -- Daddy's spaghetti.

She sometimes says really profound things without knowing it: I was sad when that didn't happen, but it's okay because it felt good to hope for it.

Whoa.

She feels her feelings, big, all of them. Sometimes that means she hurts, and it's hard to watch, but mostly I'm really glad she's like that. I'm wired the same way. I get it. It's a curse but mostly a blessing.

She asks every Friday to have a sleepover with Nathan, and we always say yes. She asks every night to be tucked in one extra time. She asks every night for us to leave the hall light on til we go to bed. She tells us every night, still, for years now -- love you night night, like it's all one phrase, like a good-night is always connected to love you. We all say it that way now. She's a good influence on us.

Happy due date, Anneliese. You delight us every day with your kindness and your sweet heart and the joyful way you love people. You are a ray of sunshine to those of us who get to be around you. It's tempting to believe I love you so much that I couldn't possibly love you more, but I know I will again tomorrow. You keep chasing those rainbows, little lady.

Charlotte at Almost Three

As this post goes up, I am somewhere in the great American midwest, en route to Minnesota, no idea exactly where yet, but on August 1st {Note 8/5: Lies. I didn't have pics so it didn't publish til I got home. Whatever.} it will be weird because 1- AUGUST (where did July go?) and 2- Charlotte's due date! And this is the second year I am far from her on her due date which is also weird, not because a due date needs family togetherness, but just because (as we have well established) I remain connected to due dates. Now and forevermore amen. You should all make peace with this fact. I have.

Anyway, let's talk about Charlotte. She's delightful.

Here are my favorite things, right now, here in this season of two but not yet three (I am bracing myself for three, because frankly it suuuuucked the first two times but this time I vow to not take it personally if it goes south again), my favorite things in this sweet and funny and curious year:

Booler - She is the only one of our kids with a nickname we actually use every day, and it is nothing we could have planned as a nickname, just a nonsense word Nathan used to use about everyone, that somehow only stuck to Charlotte. It doesn't mean anything, but it somehow seems very her. I guess that's the nature of a nickname?

Who wikes a moo? Charlotte's favorite game is maybe the one where all the kids sit around asking each other who likes and doesn't like random things, and then raising their hands accordingly. (It is a riveting game.) We get asked about different kinds of dinosaurs and people we know and songs and colors and Charlotte inevitably joins in with a singsongy voice saying who wiiiiikes... a moo? and a few weeks ago when she told us I don't wike a moo, I wike a wadybug, it made us sad. I guess she knows a moo is a cow now. (Another favorite is who wiiiiikes... a hockahonut? = chocolate donut. SO GREAT.)

I come too! Charlotte's motto in life. Never quite keeping up, always worried she will be left behind, never wanting to be left out. I struggle with this, actually, because Nathan and Anneliese are so close and there doesn't seem room yet for Charlotte in it. I totally thought that by now the girls would be closer -- they are closer in age, and with Nathan in school every day (and all day) they have more time together, and they're both girls. Am I assuming some kind of sister closeness, based on my own childhood experience, that doesn't always happen? I keep waiting for the shift from feeling like big kids + a baby, to Nathan + the girls, but it hasn't happened yet. Maybe it won't. And that would be okay I guess. But in the meantime it is adorable and also sometimes makes me ache to see how much Charlotte loves to come along, not just with Anneliese and Nathan, but anytime anyone goes anywhere. She's our baby who is determined to keep up.

Silly goose - Dang, two is such a good age for delighting in all things silly, isn't it? Charlotte loves to giggle at nonsense things, and is just learning to call other people out on not making sense. If I forget my keys or miss a PJ button or something, she loves to call me silly goose and it is just so old fashioned and funny and, well, delightful. Mommy you a silly goose!

Singing and dancing - Between her beloved Daniel Tiger (she knows the words to every episode's jingle) and her and Anneliese's collective fascination with Frozen, Charlotte sings constantly. She sings to her animals and in the car and in bed, and dances too. (She has always been kind of dancey so it is fun she gets to start in a dance class this fall. She is very very excited.) My favorite is when she sings the Daniel good-night song to her toys, in her sweet little gentle voice, and oh it just makes me melt.

Lefty - Our baby is for sure a lefty. She is very consistent. (For a while we thought Anneliese might be, but she goes back and forth between hands now, although almost always writes backwards when she uses her right hand, so who knows, maybe she is too -- but Charlotte is for sure.) I am already stumbling into little things that are harder for lefties, or they have to learn differently -- scissors and the way certain toys spin or open or whatever. Things I have never had to notice before, except growing up with  my lefty sister. Anyway it's a cute sweet thing about her.

She does look a lot older to me than a year ago, her face showing a year of life with her frankenbooler scar and her missing bottom tooth. She has a lot more hair too, but I can't bring myself to do her first haircut yet. It will happen maybe before school starts. Three is a good age, right? (I am totally doing that thing where I baby the last baby into not growing up too fast, and no I'm not sorry.)

So, my last baby is about to be three. We are on the cusp of a new era of child-rearing. WEIRD. We are almost done with diapers and I assume naps will go next. We are already done with strollers and high chairs and cribs. And suddenly we have a family full of kids. I both hate it and love it. Hi there, am a walking cliche.

Happy almost three, little baby Booler. You are our sunshine and you are just the best.

Due Date Update - Nathan at Almost Seven

Yes, yes, you read that blog title correctly. It has been seven years, and I still remember/love/hate/notice due dates as much as I did when my babies were still quietly kicking away inside me. And it remains a good time for updates, so here's what's up with Nathan these days:

He is very bright. His love and obsession surrounding dinosaurs has branched out to other kinds of science and animal kingdom factoids, with a special fondness for whales and other animals that are as old as his favorite dinos. (We are very very into sperm whales in particular, these days. Did you know that sperm whales live in every ocean of the world? Did you know that they are the most fascinating kind of whale? Because they have about ten fascinating things about them and other whales have only about four or five.) (That is basically a direct quote.)

He is also newly re-interested in the friend cars, especially the second movie, which is totally not as good but does have cars from around the world and he likes to ask questions about different countries and their flags and languages and such. I remember sometime when I was a kid, going through a phase where I wanted to look up flags of the world in the encyclopedia (adorable right? you know that flag page was the best! it was!) and it seems so unreal to me that my own tiny baby is old enough to show his own interest in that kind of thing. It seems like such... big kid territory. I don't know.

Relatedly, he has learned that he can type almost anything into the YouTube search box and watch a video on it. Which could be dangerous for some kids but little adorkable Nathan is just high on documentaries about dinosaurs and whales and how trains are made, and African animals, and really boring (he denies it, but it is true) people who collect and show Disney and Pixar toys, which basically numbs my brain but he would watch forever if we'd let him. These are also the kinds of things he wants to read about. I have to really talk him into reading stories. He would much rather read fun! fact! type things, which... I mean, okay? Not what I would read (Ramona! Buddy! Get on board! That is good stuff!) but he is his own little creature and I like that he likes what he likes, yknow?

He is still a little on the small side, just below average on the growth charts for his age, but tiny next to his peers, considering he is one of the youngest for his year, and there are many (many) kids who red-shirted kindergarten and are more than a year older than he is. All of which is fine, he doesn't seem to mind, and Mark was always the tiny one in his class growing up, so they can bond over it. And maybe next year his feet will actually touch the floor when he plays his cello! One can hope!

He still loves playing with legos and trains and he loves doing choir and orchestra, and he is a braver and braver swimmer. He is a fast runner and loves to be outside. He seems to be somewhat outgrowing his need to "look cute" (or his definition of that has changed) and most of the time he wanders around in gym shorts and no shirt and no shoes. We keep it rull classy around here.

He remains a pretty sensitive kid, easily offended and hurt (and then crabby about it), but also quick with a kind word or note for people he loves. He is so. much. moodier. than he was a year ago, and I hear that seven will bring even more 'tude, so I am trying to brace myself, and also feel ready to just roll with it. He loves his sisters fiercely, and stays very glued to Anneliese's hip. They have sleepovers in each other's rooms every Friday night (I guess Charlotte will join them when she is potty trained?) and although there are times it pains me to see Charlotte struggle to keep up with them and be included (which is a post for another day, maybe), I would never ever begrudge those two their closeness and attachment to each other. I think Anneliese has maybe been the most important person in Nathan's life since the day she came home from the hospital, and still is.  I could do with less bickering most days, but he is just such a good big brother that is hard for me to remember a day when his life didn't include that role. Weird.

As I am writing this, he is reading over my shoulder and wants me to also say that his YouTube videos are definitely not boring.

So there's that.

Happy due date, sweet Nathan! Almost seven!

A is for Almost Four

This little girl who four years ago right now was still comfortably hanging out inside me, mocking any pretense of a due date, is now suddenly not a baby, and not a toddler, but a kid. See?

Well, I shouldn't say suddenly. Anneliese has seemed... old (?) for some time now. Articulate, outgoing, tall enough to tower over the other kids in her class. I have been asked more often in the last few months if she and Nathan are twins than any other time so far in their lives. (Still hard for me to remember she is actually closer to Charlotte's age than Nathan's. Weird.)

Anyway, she is growing up. And instead of feeling all sappy and sad about the passage of time, I am sitting here feeling soaring happy thoughts about her. The exhausting horrible season of defiance and toddler frustration is really and truly over. She still has naughty maddening days, because hello, she's three, and they are just days. And in the middle of that she is downright delightful.

She loves dress-up and dancing and she sings pretty much constantly. To the radio, in church, when someone else is singing, when she knows the words and when she doesn't. The girl knows how to make a joyful noise.

She is bright and speaks well, but hasn't quite shaken the toddler habit of not getting words quiiiite right: Firefighters are fighter-fighters. Backpacks are still pack-packs. Our current season is falling.

She has been looking forward to her birthday for months. Mostly since Nathan's and Charlotte's at the end of the summer, but also kind of since her last birthday. She really loves birthdays. Like really really loves them. More than anyone I have ever known except her Aunt Ashley. She told me last week in the grocery store, in her most serious voice, I am just so excited for my birthday I can't even believe it. And then proceeded to sing her way through the rest of our errands, I love birthdays, I love birthdays, in some made-up tune because that's just... what she does. Sometimes I forget to appreciate how adorable she is because I am so used to it.

Also, clearly, she remains the best shopping buddy I have ever given birth to.

She isn't doing much (any) reading or writing yet, but she is starting to recognize letters. With every A she encounters, she proudly proclaims A is for me! Yes, they are. Every single A for you, baby girl.

So, yeah. She is pretty great these days. Still sometimes a pain in the butt, but a pain made of glitter rainbows, so we will take it.

And while I don't feel terribly sad about the passing of time as she hits another year older, I am, predictably, full of sweet and sappy thoughts about her birth and newborn days. A daughter! I had wanted a daughter so badly! And then I had one, I had her! My daughter! And four years later she is this awesome funny silly bright little person, and she is our person, our Beanie, our Anneliese, and good grief do we love her.

Charlotte at Almost Two

Y'all. Can we talk about Charlotte for a second? I want to. I need to.

I won't have pictures to add to this or be able to post it til I get home, but tomorrow is her due date, Charlotte day, August 1st, bo time! as we were ready to call it back in 2011. Now I am sitting on a quiet porch at Montreat, watching a waterfall (well, a dam), glad for a free afternoon of sabbath rest from an insanely busy week, really glad to be here -- full of heart feelings and the holy spirit and a peaceful view to boot...

...but I miss my sweet Charlotte like there is a hole in my chest.

I miss both girls, of course, and Marky, and Bowden, but today the thought of Charlotte's toothy grin and a mouth-open slobber kiss just makes me ache.

So I am going to blather on about her for a hot minute, yes I am.

In the past year Charlotte has gone from our sweet slow tiny delicate flower to a running jumping dancing grinning laughing silly little girl. She is still sweet. She is still tiny. She is still kind of a delicate flower. But thriving in her delicacy.

She is still timid around strangers, but no longer panicky. She greets people with a wave and kiss blowing and a grin. Full of teeth. That girl has a grin for days. FOR DAYS. She will copy anything Nathan and Anneliese do, and eats up their praise. She is picky about what she wears and her biggest tantrums so far involve us putting something on her that she doesn't approve of. (Her approval is exactly as predictable as you would think it is. She's almost two. That's to say, not predictable.)

She isn't a big eater but she loves yogurt and bananas and nutri-grain bars, unless she doesn't. (Again, almost two.) She sleeps every night with a menagerie of toys and animals and books, but is most loyal to Sheep and Sunny Puppy. She loves blocks and buildings and will habitually stack up any group of toys she encounters. She calls her siblings Lee-Lee and Nay-Nay and I hope she never outgrows it. They are her very favorite people.

She is quirky: Scampering to the window to wave at the car of someone who is physically standing right by her. Running a crazy run that involves one (just one) of her arms swinging by her side. Sporting the most incredible bed head where her wispy hair sticks out in front of her face like a visor, because apparently she sleeps on her face. (?) Oh and she's still wearing that winter hat in any and all weather.

She is obsessed with shoes. Never in the history of children or shoes has any child ever asked for shoes to be taken on or off more times in one day, every day, than Charlotte. Ever. If they're off, she wants them on. If they're on, she wants them off. And if she's satisfied with their current status, she's still talking about them. Syoo? Syoo? I hear it my dreams.

She calls milk how. Yeah I don't even know.

She still insists her name is Night-Night.

And in three short (long) days she will be hugging me and saying Mommy and my arms will be full of her wispy hair and sweet smell.

Happy almost two, little Booler.