Instant Best Friends

On Sunday after church we had a lovely visit from my friend Liz and her two daughters. Liz was part of the epic MBASA book club that I was in while Bryan was in grad school. She was a good friend and we've kept in touch. I was delighted to get a message from her last week saying that she was visiting family near enough to come see us and asking if we were available. Of course I said yes!

Her younger daughter Adelaide and Sophie were born the same year. Sophie loved that she had someone just her size to play with. In fact, Sophie shared our riding horse on wheels with Adelaide, but was quite upset when her older sister Zara rode it. I asked Sophie what was going on and she said, "She can't ride it. It's only for little blonde girls." So I guess Adelaide's blondness earned her points as well.

Zara and Phoebe are only a week apart in age and they used to play together during those MBASA years. Neither girl remembered the other, but by the end of the reunion they had each pledged to be BFFs, were planning future visits, and were terribly heartbroken to be parted.

Phoebe was so sad in fact, at Zara's departure she dressed herself in black and announced she was mourning.

Seriously.

Thanks for visiting Liz! We loved it and looked forward to seeing you all again.

My Birthday Activities

I had a great birthday yesterday. Bryan made us a delicious french toast breakfast, I helped a friend move, I spent time with the kids, I got some birthday calls and messages from family and friends, and I opened presents. I'm really excited about this particular gift. I've been pricing ukuleles for a little while and I'd mentioned it to Bryan in passing. I'm impressed he remembered!

Bryan also made a scrumptious beef stroganoff dinner, an extra sweet gesture since he doesn't like stroganoff. Apparently Phoebe and Sophie don't love it either, but Peter ate an entire plateful. Cooper doesn't really eat anything other than fruit and Mexican food, unless we apply great amounts of prodding and encouragement, but I think he liked the little he consumed.

And we closed the night with some sugar-free chocolate cake!

It was a rainy, dreary day outside, so we postponed any adventures for another day. That's fine with me since it means the birthday celebration gets stretched out a little longer.

I Am Sixteen Going on Thirty-Eight

Topher and I ran a quick errand last Friday afternoon. When we returned home I pulled his car seat out of the back of Bryan's car and started to carry him inside. A neighbor that I've seen and waved at but never spoken to called out from across the street, "Congratulations!" I realized she was talking about Topher and I smiled and said thank you.

An older fellow was standing with her and her young daughter. He spoke up, "I don't live here, I'm her dad," and he pointed to the neighbor. Then he went on. "When I saw you get out of your car I thought you were sixteen! I didn't think you were old enough to have a baby!"

To that I laughed, smiled again and said, "I am definitely not sixteen, but thank you. And this is my fifth baby."

He responded with a shocked expression as his daughter said, "Oh that's right, you have lots of kids."

Today is my thirty-eighth birthday, but it's nice to know that if I wear my Gryffindor t-shirt and cuffed jeans and a messy bun, and if the person seeing me is across the street with possibly failing vision, I look like a teenager. Sounds like a birthday gift to me!

Mr. Giggles

Following Bryan's playful example, Peter initiated a game of patty-cake with Topher on Sunday evening. That's the magical activity that led to Topher's first real giggles. Of course our phones wouldn't record the wondrous sound, but I sure took a lot of pictures.

Topher is a lucky boy to have siblings that love him so much.

The Race

Bryan has one more week of paternity leave. It's been amazing having him home to help for so long, especially since the big kids are on summer break. I've been able to focus on feeding Topher and recovering and sleeping when possible. But Bryan's return to work has been looming over me and I feel the need to shift my focus and get used to taking care of everyone while he's still here as a back-up.

That means that I've been working to teach Topher the difference between night and day and working to return to normal hours myself. The good news is that he's improving with night sleep. He usually sleeps for a four-hour block, and, if I'm lucky, a few more three-hour blocks after that.

Unfortunately, he's kind of forgotten how to sleep for longer than forty minutes at a time during the day. And if he's not sleeping or eating or playing with Bryan (Topher's three favorite activities, in no particular order), then he's probably fussing. This means I spend most of my time feeding him or encouraging him to sleep.

Because I know his sleep will most likely be short, as soon as I put him down, I feel like I'm in a race. I have a limited amount of time to accomplish the few things I'm still trying to get done. My biggest focus during the day has been to either spend time with the other kids or prepare food. Bryan and Peter helped a friend move last week so I had a trial run of being on my own with the other four. I was pretty tired when Bryan got home, but everyone was still alive and had been fed, so a success overall.

At night, my thoughts go something like this, "Okay, I really need to sleep, but I'm so hungry. I'll eat really fast, then sleep. And I'll read that library book while I eat since it's due soon. Or maybe I'll knock out a few blog posts while I eat. Shoot, when was the last time I showered? Maybe I should do that after I eat. Or before? Five minutes have already gone by! Whatever, I'll just eat and go to sleep."

Am I the only one with such a detailed inner monologue?

Sometimes I win the race. I got a whopping four hours of uninterrupted sleep one night last week. It was glorious! And other nights I lose the race, like the night I didn't sleep longer than an hour and forty-five minutes in a row. That was rough.

It's nice to know that win or lose, I get the prize of snuggling a sweet baby for several hours during the night and day. And really, that's always a win.

Oh What Do You Do In The Summertime?

And the fall and the winter and the spring...

The Explorer

Important Introductions

Bryan's sister Melinda and her family came to visit this weekend. We loved playing with cousins at home and the park and had a fun picnic. In fact, we had so much fun, that I only pulled my camera out once.

My favorite part of the visit was when two-year-old Emma met Topher for the first time. As soon as she saw him, in her sweet, tiny, excited voice she cried out, "Baby! Baby!" It was adorable. Sam and Nathan also thought Topher was cute, but they weren't taken with him the way Emma was.

Sophie was eager to instruct her cousins on proper baby etiquette. She told them to be gentle and to avoid his soft spot and to give him kisses. They followed her directions well.

Thanks for making the trip guys! We loved seeing you!

A Day of Giving

Our Father's Day celebration looked like this:

• Bryan getting all the kids ready for church while I fed Topher and then got myself ready
• Bryan taking care of the kids after church and insisting that I go take a nap when he saw how tired I was
• Bryan suggesting we eat leftovers and cereal instead of the fancy Father's Day meal I had planned so I could focus on resting
• Bryan choosing a family activity that he wasn't particularly interested in, but he knew the kids would love

I don't think the kids realized that Bryan sacrificed most of his special day for us, but I noticed, and I am thankful.

Thriving

I took this picture after church yesterday. Compare it to the one below of Topher coming home from the hospital. He weighed in last Wednesday at 10lbs 12oz. When he came home from the hospital he weighed 8 lbs 3 oz. This, my friends, is the result of eating nearly every two hours for approximately five weeks.

The Dad

Tonight I was looking though some unpublished posts when I found this picture. We were battling some bug that week and Bryan had stayed home sick one day. When Phoebe got off the bus that afternoon it was clear she felt lousy too. She laid down on the couch, drained of energy and uninterested in anything other than sleep.

When Bryan discovered how she felt he picked her up and carried her to her room so she could nap. I snapped this blurry picture as a reminder that even though he was home sick and felt awful, he put his weariness aside to care for Phoebe. I love these tender dad moments. And I've noticed that when the kids are sick, they often want Bryan to comfort them, which speaks to how he fulfills his role as their dad.

Happy Father's Day!

Real World Magic

A friend offered us this swing and I waffled about whether or not to accept it. We've never had a swing before, in part because we've never had space for one. I finally figured a place where it could live and said yes to her offer.

Topher fell asleep within minutes of trying it out for the first time.

I'm pretty sure it's magic.

Catch!

We celebrated the first day of summer break by going to the park for the first time as a family of seven. Bryan spent time showing the kids how to throw a ball, calling races on the monkey bars, and creating and facilitating a clever team version of fetch. I held onto Topher and stayed clear of flying spheres. There was plenty of laughter and running, a perfect park combination.

Onward and Upward

Last week we supported Peter by attending his sixth grade moving up ceremony. That's right, they didn't call it a graduation, maybe because they didn't use caps and gowns? Regardless of the reasons behind the name, Bryan, Sophie, Topher, and I spent two hours sitting on bleachers designed for elementary school aged bodies while nearly four-hundred kids heard their names called as they walked across the gym to receive their certificates.

If that's not love, I don't know what is.

Sophie and Topher were so well behaved, even at the end when they were tired (notice the yawn) of being there.

Now on to the adventure of middle school!

The Last Day of School, Finally

For comparison, here's the picture I took on the first day of school. It's good to see how they've all grown.

Staring Contest

Put a Bird On It

We're nearly at the end of the school year, which means the kids backpacks are ready to be cleaned out. We took a pass at Cooper's this week and I discovered this picture. One day (no idea when, it had been some time since his bag was emptied) during their library period, Cooper's class had a tutorial on drawing a bird. Apparently he was awarded first place. When I asked him about it he seemed a little embarrassed since he'd followed instructions to create the bird rather than come up with an original design. I say well done regardless.

Bow Ties Are Cool

This handsome boy went to church for the first time on Sunday. We have a small congregation and only a few babies. That means that Topher was incredibly popular. As soon as Sacrament Meeting ended people started coming over to see him. Peter brought the entire Deacons Quorum to meet Topher. As they oood and ahhhed over him, the woman sitting in front of us commented that she had seen little girls flock to see a new baby, but she'd never seen a bunch of twelve and thirteen year old boys do it. That's the power of a very proud oldest brother.

Monikers

I realized last week that Sophie doesn't call Topher by his name, she always refers to him as Baby Brother. During our lunch on Friday, I asked her about this.

Me: Sophie, why don't you ever call him by his name?

Sophie: (in a tone of admitting something) I don't remember his name.

Me: It's Christopher, or Topher.

Sophie: (pausing to consider, then in a husky whisper) Hi Bob Anderson.

Party of Five

Big and Little

As I dressed Topher in a particular pair of yellow pajamas, I was reminded of this ten-year-old picture of Cooper and Peter. This is one of my favorite pictures of my two big boys.

I showed the picture to Cooper and he wanted to take an updated version.