Merry Christmas Even!

December 24th and Anneliese woke up insisting that it's Christmas Even. No one better correct her, got it?

Church and chasing eye meds and last-minute wrapping and a quick grocery run and stockings stuffed and Nathan singing in choir and playing Santa and Christmas PJs and candlelight worship and so many bells ringing. Just your classic Christmas Eve in these parts.

Merry Christmas Even!

Eyeball Ulcers Strike Again

Y'all remember our eyeball maladies over the last few months, right? In particular, these lovely ulcers back in October?

Yeah, they're back.Pain and throbbing and sensitivity to light and weepy discharge and all. Pretty sad and gross, huh.

Ever want people to look at you and then cringe and take one step back? This is the malady for you!

Christmas 2012: to be enjoyed through my right eye only. Merry merry y'all!

The Library Floor

Every few weeks when we go to the library to get new books, Nathan goes straight for children's nonfiction (guess which prehistoric creatures live there?) makes himself comfortable for a while.

Flopping down on the floor next to his favorite shelf in the library? That, he gets from me.

A Couple of My Favorite Smiles

Another Nathan and I took the kids for a weekday holiday pancake lunch, a Christmas-break tradition we revisited from last year. Nathan is a little stomach-buggy (again! this will never end!) and I was on the mend from a rough mental-health night. So while all was not peaches, there's was this:

Yknow, just a couple of my favorite smiles.

Yay Five

Well Nathan is officially done with his first semester of kindergarten. (Do you say semesters about kindergarten? It sounds so old!) He has been doing splendidly. Really, we are so so pleased. If we ask him his favorite part of the school day, he says "when we do our work." Zomg adorable.

Can I just say for the record that five is my favorite age so far? Nathan is delightful these days. Old enough to be surprisingly self-sufficient, young enough to still feel attached. He is fun and says funny things. He is sweet and (mostly) patient with his sisters. He is high on dinosaurs and legos and coloring and singing and soft shirts and has no shame in a good stuffed animal snuggle. He's completely wonderful.

Whenever things feel rough with Anneliese (or Charlotte, for that matter, although that's rare these days since she is also at a delightful-to-me-anyway age), I remind myself that three was tough with Nathan too (albeit in different ways), and that someday she will be five and it will be better. Five! I get to do five again! Twice!

I love five. I can't quit five.

Look what I built with Daddy! We had directions!
(He loves a toy with directions.)

Anyway when I was at school to help with his class Christmas party, both his teachers pulled me aside to tell me how great he is to have around. Incredibly bright, shockingly good memory, one of the best grasps of numbers and patterns and mathy things that they've seen from a kindergartner (he doesn't get that from me. in case you couldn't guess by the fact that I just said mathy things). I mean, what parent doesn't want to hear that stuff? I loved hearing it.

But you know what I loved hearing even more? That he is kind. And compassionate. Sweet to everyone. And has a good sense of fairness and justice for his classmates. I roll my eyes sometimes at his rule-followingness (he doesn't get that from me either), but if it brings out his willingness to share and take turns and be a good listener, I will stop the eye rolling. I love that his teachers and friends can count on him. It's way better than any academic accolades they could mention. Truly.

My shy socially-slow Nathan is turning into the easygoing kind kid in the class? The one everyone wants to play with? The one who won't name a best friend because "I like all my friends, mommy." I LOVE THAT, Y'ALL. I love it so hard.

And that is why I still want him to stay five forever. (Yes, he is still sticking to his promise.)

Baby's First Cheerios

So after Charlotte got pretty sick last summer and landed herself in the hospital, unable to tolerate much of anything in her tummy, we spent months feeding her milk and only milk (of the boob/formula variety, not from a cow). She was significantly enough underweight that we didn't want to try to force calories in her that she might not be able to keep down.

The result is that she is now a sixteen-month old who eats about like an eleven-month old. Which... fine by us! She is growing great and will catch up eventually. And while we have been slooooowly adding baby food and other solids back into her diet, she is taking to it just great. Exactly like she did the first time. There really isn't even much to tell, actually. (Which is a relief for me because this has felt emotionally complicated from my end. To say the least.) Anyway yay! Food! Easy!

Anyway, we never quite made it to finger foods before we went back to an all-milk diet, so the last few weeks of cereal and fruit and bread have been Charlotte's first experience with it.

your daily Charlotte

I don't know, I'm not sure if she likes it or not...

Dove

Nathan was the dove in his school nativity this year. Well, one of two doves. He sang a little duet as a verse in The Friendly Beasts.

I, said the dove from rafters high,
I cooed him to sleep that he should not cry.
I cooed him to sleep, my mate and I.
I, said the dove from rafters high.

I'm not sure who chose him to sing a duet (he's not much with the confidence in front of a crowd, or with the pitch-matching either), but he did great. Remembered all his words, and sang loud and clear.

And the nativity story has never been more sweetly told than with the help of a five-year-old dove wearing glasses.

(Yes, I cried. Obviously.)

And in case it couldn't get any cuter, he colored this picture of a dove (we now live in a world where coloring books are printed at home according to by-request googling):

He had to add the headband on himself. I mean a dove can't be without his headband. Duh mommy.

Almost Almost-Walking

Y'all aren't sick of hearing about Charlotte this week yet are you? Good. Because I seriously can't quit her these days. Speaking of things that are delightful.

So. About a month ago, she started doing this:

It is cute and sweet and got us all excited that her first steps were imminent. Ummmm...... yeah, no. She's still doing exactly this.

(But now with a cuteness bonus, sometimes it's Nathan holding one hand and Anneliese holding the other, although I swear the three of them are conspiring against my ability to capture it on camera.)

We think those first steps are close, though. Last week she started doing that thing where she lets go of furniture and stands unassisted, until she notices she's standing unassisted and promptly flops to the ground. You know. Like you do.

She's old enough now that I am entering that stage (again! for the third time! I roll my eyes at myself!) starting to get second-guessy about her skillz and feel jealous when other kids seem so much farther ahead of her. I know, I know, I should be better than to let myself get hung up on these things. Yet, I do sometimes. I'm happy for our friends and relatives and their normal-milestone-age children, while at the same time sometimes needing to awkwardly look away from the running and toddling and chattering that makes their kids seem so much older than little Charlotte. (Not that I'm not happy to cling to her babyhood. She's my last one! I cling! I am clinging so hard!)

(And for those of you saying "it all evens out eventually!" you should know that Nathan's peers are now riding big-kid bikes and if you think he even can -- or wants to -- push the pedals at all on a tricycle or training wheeled bike just HA HA NO. Not that I care. Ahem. My only point is that he is wonderful at many many things and it doesn't all "even out," nor does it necessarily have to, but let's not make ourselves say it does, that's all.)

ANYWAY.

The point of all this is to say look at sweet Charlotte up there, almost walking. Well, almost almost-walking. If she takes her first steps before the new year, when she'll be a week shy of seventeen months, she'll be the earliest walker of our crew. (And if she doesn't, then it means Nathan was our earliest to hit that milestone. Which haaaaaa the 2008 version of me would not even be able to wrap my brain around.)

So the moral of the story is: she will walk when she walks. And she will look adorable in the meantime, trying.

Everybody's Favorite Scarf

Look who else wants a piece of mommy's favorite scarf.

(We could have a contest about who wears it best, Charlotte, or Nathan, or me. But let's not. I don't think I would win.)

Santa Terror, Yet Santa Letter

Happy St Nicks's Day! {Late. As usual.}

So, Santa. Another year, another terrified Nathan meltdown. No one is surprised by this anymore, right? (I kind of was, actually. Am I dumb?)

We took the kids to a birthday party for some church friends last weekend -- siblings who share a birthday, but two years apart. Except it was also a Christmas party. With Santa making a guest appearance. (Confused yet? Me too. But it was sweet and the kids had fun, so hey whatever works.)

Well, I should say, some kids had fun. Most kids had fun. Most of my kids had fun.

Anneliese colored pictures and wore reindeer antlers and an elf hat, and was worried but eventually brave enough to talk to Santa (no specific requests, whatever he wants to bring her #adorable).

And Charlotte crawled all over the place and squealed happily and only fussed once, when we put her in Santa's lap. We rescued her immediately after this photo op:

But oh Nathan. The coloring, he loved. The cookies, he loved. He even wore some felt antlers! But the Santa misery continues.

He spent the second half of the party in tears, waffling between so badly wanting to be brave enough to talk to him and get a candy cane or stuffed toy, but unable to stop the tears streaming down his face to make it happen. Even while standing in line. (It sounds sad now, but I will be honest and admit that in the moment it was mostly frustrating.)

I don't know if he's just unusually fearful or if getting burgled the fall when he was three permanently confused him about strangers in his house at a crucial age. Whatever the reasons, he remains terrified. Like, maybe more scared of Santa than anything else I can think of (off the top of my head anyway).

At the very end of the party, he did accept a candy cane (passed through another person) and mumbled bye and thank you to Santa, but seemed distressed the rest of the night.

Until the next day when he wrote the most perfect Santa letter (his first!) the world has ever seen, and no I am not just saying that because I am his mother IT IS THAT GOOD. I will keep it forever and ever amen.

(In case you can't read kindergartner: Dear Santa How many minutes to the North Pole? Will you please bring me a soft t-rex and a Henry he is a train does he know the Polar Express Merry Christmas Love Nathan ... "and then I drew a church and a reindeer and elves and wrote Christmas again.")

Thus proving again that he loves the idea of Santa and we shouldn't push a real Santa. Yep, that's still where we are.

Oh and a bonus picture of Anneliese, the toothy elf:

Now excuse me while I go melt into a lovedrunk mommy Christmas puddle.

Awkward Sibling Pic, v7.0

Guess who loves bathtime, and guess who doesn't love sharing bathtime with their splashy baby sister.

I can honestly say I am sad I ordered Christmas cards before I found this picture.

Recovery Mode Miscellany

It's December! Miscellaneous updates, as we've been recovering from Sicksgiving:

1.) We bought plane tickets to go to St Croix for my brother Brad's wedding! And now it seems really real for real and there are important things that have to happen before then, like getting Charlotte a passport, renewing Mark's and Nathan's, and oh yeah that whole pesky task of finding the rsvp card and mailing it back since someone has been a bit naggy about it. Naggy I say! He is a nag! (Hugs and kisses, Brad.)

2.) I took Nathan shopping. Well, mall-wandering. I needed him to point to some things he liked, and I needed to reward him for something awesome he did that day, don't ask me what. So we went to the Lego store. (And we even bought a few things for -- wait for it -- another craft!) (Who am I?)

What, you have a cuter starbucks-drinking mall buddy to Christmas shop with? Didn't think so.

3.) Okay so I have this annual dilemma about advent calendars. I hate to be that annoying semantics person (just kidding, I love it, you know I do) but December does not mean Advent! And a "season of waiting" is not the same thing as a "countdown to Christmas" and dang it all, I am persnickity about this! The cardboard calendars with crappy chocolate inside are cute, and I loved them as kids, and we have one now too, but believe you me, I am a little cringey about it.

That being said, I don't hate Advent calendars, I really want one actually, a legitimate Advent one. In my mind it will be pretty and made of cloth, with pockets, hanging on a rod or something, like the one my host family had when I lived with them in Germany. And it won't correspond with the days of December (again! not the same thing!) but with the ACTUAL WEEKS OF ADVENT, by weekly theme (hope/peace/joy/love/Christ), and somehow flexible enough to work with however the dates fall in any given year? Am I asking too much? Who would like to design such a calendar for our Advent needs?

Someone on Etsy would do it, but in December I'm overwhelmed with other shopping and I say "next year" but then June comes and I don't think about it, sooooo, yeah. We continue to punch crappy chocolate out of cardboard windows covering a plastic tray. And I roll my eyes but at least it (helps) keep the "how many days til Christmas" questions at bay. Kind of. A little.

Okay. Calendar rant, over.

4.) In preparation for black Friday, these two got up early and combed through ads, because yes I raised them right.

5.) Nathan is learning to talk on the phone. We figured he's five and it's something he should know how to do. No two smartphones are alike, and we see no real need to teach him to use a landline, so for now we are working with him on unlocking my phone, scrolling to a screen of favorite contacts, and touching whoever he wants to call (my "favorites" are now all people he could call in an emergency). And no, he is not one of those five year olds who already knows how to work a smartphone for his own app and gaming purposes because JUST NO. (I am territorial.)

Oh and Charlotte learned to talk on the phone too.

She's a great conversationalist, if you like hearing hi! over and over again. (I do.)

So About This Owl

Okay, the long-promised details of this whole owl costume, alternately titled: How I Became a Crafty Mom and Didn't Even Hate It.

So.

I thought I had hand-me-down (freebie) costumes for all three kids lined up this year, but at the last minute, both the ones I was hoping I could use for Nathan and Anneliese ended up being too big and didn't pan out.

Since we had a Harry Potter robe in the dress up bin (and a Gryffindor scarf a friend made me a few years back), I thought it would be super cute if they went as Harry and his owl, Hedwig. So I did some googling and saw lots of moms who had made owl costumes, and because I am blindly and wildly overconfident, I thought hey I could do that! (Mark and Another Nathan wore bemused smiles and raised their eyebrows.)

So I drove my ass to the craft store (I KNOW!!!) and bought supplies -- felt and feathers and fabric glue and a plastic eye mask with elastic. Then I got all crafy up in here.

Step 1 - I printed a petal template from the interwebz and traced it onto the felt and then cut out like a zillion of them. Well, like a hundred. Or two. Until I had enough to cover a pillowcase, like this:

I might or might not have sent a lot of texts during this process. Look at me cutting out felt petals! Still cutting out felt petals! Wait do these look like scales or like feathers? What should my ratio of white petals to brown petals be? Yep still cutting! (Crafty mommies are fascinating texters, it turns out.)

Anyway.

Step 2 - I cut a neck hole and arm holes in said pillowcase, then turned it inside out to pin in the seams so it'd be slim enough for Anneliese to wear like a shirt dress. (Good thing pinterest exists or I'd never know there was a whole movement of mommies out there who can't stop making sh!t from pillowcases. I see you, pillowcase mommies!)

Step 3 - And then, with a bit of "help" from my owl-to-be, I glued that felt to that pillowcase. Like a boss.

First fitting!

(I ended up cutting open the pillowcase seam at the top of one of the shoulders -- I wanted it to fit more snugly around the neck, but still needed a way to make it easier for her to get in and out. We just safety pinned it once she was in, but if I did it again I would get some velcro or snaps.)

Step 4 - To make the mask, I did a google image search for an owl mask template, found one with a shape I liked, enlarged it on our printer/copier, then traced it onto card stock. And by "card stock" (which y'all know I do not just keep on hand) I mean the inside of a cereal box, because hellz yes I am crafty hear me roar.

Step 5 - I cut some felt and paper, markered/crayoned a bit, and layered them in concentric circles until it looked like this:

I didn't worry about cutting eye holes, because I knew Anneliese wouldn't want it on her eyes, and masks weren't allowed at her preschool costume parade anyway. (No eyes, not a mask. Technically this is an owl headpiece, obviously.) Anyway, then I stuck it to the craft store mask. With scotch tape. STAY CLASSY, CRAFTY ERIN.

I won't lie, I was pretty freaking proud of that mask. I texted a picture of it to Mark and he asked why it didn't have a beak, and good news y'all, we're still not divorced.

Anneliese, however, loved it, and with some feathers (also from the craft store, omg how many times can I mentioned I went to a CRAFT STORE in one post?) in her pigtails, the outfit was complete.

(Hey Mark, notice she didn't even ask why there were no wings. Nobody else better ask that either.)

And that's the story of how I glued some felt to a pillowcase and became this year's breakout crafty mom superstar.

(This is the post that was the most helpful in my costume planning, if anyone wants to try to make something like this.)

Baby in a Shoe Mirror

In case y'all are curious what the best part of the shoe store is...

... Charlotte has discovered it.

A Pink Donut with Sprinkles

Anneliese has become accustomed to the occasional donut after the gym.

Your daily Anneliese

I totally get it.

Sicksgiving 2012

Instead of writing lovely and funny and thankful posts over the last week like everyone else on the internet, here's how I spent my week:

Saturday afternoon before Thanksgiving, Mark and Nathan (in our bed, as terrible timing would have it) suddenly got hit with some bug (which was apparently going around) (which I didn't know about). Charlotte also saw it as a great time to yarf in her crib.

I spent a long night camped on the living room floor with Nathan surrounded by towels on the couch, going back and forth between scrambling to get him to the bathroom in time, and checking on Mark where I had sent his sickness over to the guest house.

Sunday afternoon, right when we were feeling like the worst had passed (haaaaaaaaaaaa no), Nathan got sick again (in his bed, this time). And then that night, Anneliese started throwing up too (you guessed it, in her bed). So I got to spend another night camped out in the living room, but this time with a child who had no hope of making it to the bathroom on time.

Mommyhood means catching vom in your bare hands. And not even being that grossed out.

Mommyhood also means watching Tangled on endless loop. That part I didn't mind as much.

Yes, Charlotte is literally asleep on her feet.

Monday my children flung themselves on various pieces of furniture around the house and stared at the walls all day. 

That night, when Mark was working, and I was so exhausted and frustrated and cranky I could barely think, sweet Another Nathan came and made dinner (a germ-exposure decision that would later bite him in the ass) and I finally got to rest and let myself be the one taken care of. I felt relaxed and loved.

Then on Tuesday it got me. Because of course it did. (Turns out it's not possible to avoid a bug your whole family has had, just through the force of sheer will.)

Wednesday morning the colds that Mark and Charlotte had been fighting for a week turned into fevers and coughing and aches. Charlotte couldn't sleep and Mark could barely talk. 

We officially cancelled Thanksgiving.

On Thursday I pieced together a makeshift holiday meal (with two less-than-professional helpers). 

The grownups tasted it.  The kids mostly didn't. 

Black Friday, I escaped our hothouse of vom and had a fun shopping day while sicky Mark managed a sicky baby and two increasingly-sick-of-each-other siblings. 

Saturday was tree day, so we smiled at the shining sun, went to the farmer's market, and loaded our tree on the top of the minivan full of our three kids. (Because that's who we are now. WEIRD.) 

We decorated it. We put the batteries back in Jingle and read together. Mark hung lights on the roof and wreaths in the window and never even cursed me under his breath. We picked out wrapping paper and put garland on the mantel (Nathan: that garlic is so pretty!) (and we will never call it garland again). We felt content and thankful that we were finally getting better.

And then Sunday Mark and Anneliese turned up with bloodshot weepy gunky eyes, because apparently Sicksgiving 2012 will NEVER FREAKING END.

Y'all. I can't even.

Charlotte, Pushing

Look who is pushing a toy stroller around the house!


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

If she can make this happen by the end of the year, she'd be our earliest walker yet. Go Charlotte go!!

Picture Face, Revisited

Recently Anneliese has started doing THIS when we take pictures of her:

Why? I... have no idea. Is she trying to improve her picture face and be funny like mommy? Maybe. Or are we making this face at her when we take the picture? (Hmmm that seems likely, actually.)

Either way, it makes me laugh.

State Fair Wins and Fails (Butter Elvis Not Included)

So, we went to the state fair... about a month ago. (I am so on top of all things bloggity.) With three kiddies, the fair is a bit different than when it was just Mark and me.  This year we didn't get on any adult rides. We didn't see any fancy crafts. We went in broad daylight when the crowds were thin enough to push strollers (strollers! plural! like two strollers!) through. We did not shoot targets to win turkeys. We didn't go into even one exhibit building.

What we did do was ride kiddie rides and eat fried junk food. Yay North Carolina?

WIN - The big kids are old enough to go on rides themselves. And Anneliese's bravery makes Nathan a little less chicken. Sibling support at its best.

FAIL - Charlotte miiiiiight have gotten a bit sunburned on her still-kinda-bald hatless head.

WIN - Daniel Tiger at the pbs kids tent. (Don't ask me why Daniel is the only one looking at the camera.)

FAIL - This was about two seconds before the rooster crowed in Charlotte's face and she completely lost her sh!t. I don't know what her favorite animal will end up being, but I think we can safely say not rooster.

WIN - A friend who helps you manages your strollers and corresponding small people who ride in them. If you don't have this friend, I am sad for you.

FAIL - This stroller might be a bit small for our tall girl.

WIN - Fried everything, and dipped cheesecake on a stick.

FAIL - It's not the state fair until someone chickens out of going down the giant slide. This year? Nathan.

WIN - Both kids eat hot dogs now. I see a light at the end of the picky eating tunnel!

FAIL - Hey Anneliese y u no looky at the camera?

WIN - Being out past naptime is easier if the baby naps anyway. Yay flexible baby! (Actually, yay anything that wears kids out!)

FAIL - no sculptures made of butter.

Another Nathan was properly horrified. You see, he comes from Iowa and in case you didn't know, Iowa has the best state fair of all the state fairs (in related news, Another Nathan has more state pride than most people we know). And at the Iowa state fair, they have a butter cow. It's famous! It's important!

He legitimately couldn't believe we didn't have any butter sculptures at the fair. He kept asking Mark "what, no things made of butter? none? you mean, no butter elvis? no butter Last Supper?" with a straight face.

Actually I just decided North Carolina's lack of a butter Last Supper might be a WIN.

Apparently They Went to the Park

One of my favorite things continues to be finding pictures Mark took on his phone or our camera of stuff I didn't even know happened.

Wait, favorite? Okay, favorite. Let's say favorite.

(Yes, I know this is basically proof of terrible communication. But we're going with yay! fun! surprising! instead. Just go with it.)

Anneliese pushed Charlotte in a swing! Adorable!

Anneliese climbed a jungle gym by herself! Adorable!

Anneliese road a boat a Pullen Park! Adorable!

Anneliese road a giraffe on the carousel at Pullen Park! Adora... wait. Daddy is spending money on rides and treats that Mommy always says no to. Hmmm.

Okay Daddy, let's smile to ourselves about being spoiled a little bit today. Oh and ride the train. Mommy doesn't need to know.

Adorable.

Chocolate Chip Salted Caramel Exactness

I have just eaten (for breakfast, if you must know) the last of the best batch of cookies I have ever made in my life.

But. They kinda were not my own doing.

Okay here's the thing about Another Nathan. He, much like my dear husband and sweet oldest child, is what you'd call a Rule Follower. I am... not what you'd call that. So while I'm a decent cook, my Rule Following shortcomings make me not a great baker. You have to measure to bake well, and I'm notsomuch one with the measuring. I'm a firm believer in eyeballing it.

Well it turns out Another Nathan is a firm believer in doing the recipe exactly as instructed. (Shocking, for a Rule Follower.) But true story: if you do that, you get freaking delicious cookie bars.

They were perfect. The perfect combination of sweet and salty, the perfect combination of crisped up tops and gooey insides, the perfect blend of dough and chips. I cannot say enough good things about these cookies.

Left to my own devices, I would have just thrown in two two eggs, not separating out one of the whites. I would have tossed the unwrapped caramels straight onto the dough in the baking dish, definitely not melted them down first with cream. I would have used whatever salt I had on hand, not the fancy fleur de sel Another Nathan had in his cabinet. I would have just pinched the tiny amounts of those random ingredients I'm not sure do anything anyway -- baking soda and powder and the like. I definitely wouldn't have packed the brown sugar into the measuring cup (!!) -- yes I was wide-eyed. Who actually does that?!

But in his kitchen, I (grudgingly) played by his rules. And let the record show, those cookie bars were awesome. 

(Let the record also show: dude loves him some Cheerios. Even hoards them a little. Yeah I said it.)

Recipe: Chocolate chip salted caramel cookie bars. Go make some yourself and you'll see their perfection.  Follow the directions exactly though, or I will sic our Rule Follower best friend on you.