The Things They Say, part III

After kissing Thora, Katie exclaimed, "Haha! I kissed a woman!"

Teaching the kids the definition of the words "male" and "female," I told them that a female is a girl or a woman. Dancy added, "And Black Widow."

While playing, Tommy told me he was going to kill me. Then he said, "Just kidding. I'm not going to kill you. I usually don't want to kill my mother. I usually want to keep you."

In January, Thora had a conversation with her friend Elisha, who is 3 months younger than her. Neither had a very large vocabulary at the time, but they both knew "uh-oh" and "bye-bye," so that's how they talked to each other for several minutes.

Thora's favorite book is A, You're Adorable, so when she reads books to herself, she says, "A! A! A!"

Sometimes kids find better ways of saying things. I call these words "ki'tractions." For years, we've called Honey Bunches of Oats "Honey Boats." That's the way two-year-old Tommy said it, and it made too much sense to me to correct it. Dancy has done the same thing with hand sanitizer.  She calls it "Hanitizer."

I asked Dancy one day if I could change her diaper. "Oh, dat's so nice! But no. It's fine." "Okay, well come here anyway." "Nevah!"

Shad greeted Dancy one day with, "Hey, Cheeks!" She didn't miss a second before responding, "Hey, Bum Bum!"

Shad had Tommy in a tackle hold, and Katie demanded, "Set him free!" Shad said no, so Kate countered with, "Then kill him! Kill him!"

Dancy has a new word she loves to say: "disgusting. " However, she mixes up the sounds and pronounces it "gus-dusting!"

Pris (Nana) washed sheets and asked Tommy if he'd like her to put the dinosaur sheets on his bed. He couldn't contain his excitement and exclaimed, "Damn yes!" She and Shad asked Tommy why he said that. He replied, "Because it's damn awesome!" After choking back their laughter, Shad told Tommy not to say that.

You know that baby reflex when their cheek gets stroked they turn and start sucking to eat? Tommy kissed Samson's cheek, and Samson turned to suck on Tommy's cheek. When Tommy realized Samson wasn't  trying to kiss him back, he laughed and said, "Mom, he thinks I'm your breast!" What I find most funny about this is that we don't say 'breast' in our house, we say ,"boob."

Samson Wiggin Kendell

Not having time to write this post has been driving me nuts for nearly a week. My baby deserves his literary debut! But with my physical healing time, cuddling a new baby time, mothering 4 other children time, and homework time, there hasn't been writing time. And there still isn't. But I'm taking it anyway.

FIRST OF ALL, let me clarify that Samson did NOT come early--I lied about my due date. Don't take it personally, but that last month of pregnancy is eternally long and uncomfortable and emotionally tumultuous without having people asking you daily, "Where's that baby?!" "Why hasn't he come yet?" "How much longer?"

Thank you, Mr. Wonka and the creator of this meme. You speak the thoughts of pregnant women everywhere.

So then, the real due date was February 20, not March 17 (St. Patrick's Day). Samson was born an agonizing four days late on February 24, at 10:43 pm. He weighed 6 lbs 11 oz, and was 20.75 inches long. Standard Kendell body type--long and skinny.

And if Thora's birth was my easiest one, Samson's was by far the most difficult. I was already so physically exhausted, I just didn't have the strength or willpower. Shad also pointed out that in all my other pregnancies I was able to be physically active, which definitely plays a part in the ease of delivery. However, this pregnancy I was barely able to move.

Recovery has been pretty smooth and easy. Lavender oil, again, deserves a lot of credit. Rubbing that on my belly and back for 2 days was enough to take away the after-birth cramps and pains, and soothe my back muscles from the intense back labor I get. Samson is doing well. He's a good sleeper, as long as he's not bothered by mass amounts of poop. We had one night where I had to stay up with him for 2 hours because he just kept pooping! But he sleeps well at night otherwise. He does have a lip-tie, so Shad and I will hopefully be cutting that today so that we can be successful with breastfeeding.

Words can never express the joy and love a mother has with her new baby; but this time for me, that statement is just as truly applied to how I feel about not being pregnant anymore. Shad has commented to me several times that I look happier than he's seen me be in 8 months. I am so unbelievably happy and grateful to be done with that torture session I had to endure. And I love this baby and his adorable, cuddly face. 

Moms Make the Best Photographers

This isn't bragging about my photography skills, but rather in how I feel about the pictures I take of my kids versus professional photos. We took family pictures back in September and I requested specifically to get vertical portrait pictures of my kids. I have a photo wall of 8x10 frames for my kids, and it hasn't been updated in well over a year. But guess what? Aside from the cost to print the pictures taken by said photographer (it would've been $100 for the 4 8x10s I wanted), I just didn't like any of them. They weren't my kids. They were staged, unnaturally posed, and fake smiles--probably because Katie was uncomfortable with her arm twisted in that position. This photographer also failed to capture any of Thora's smiles because she (the photographer) was looking at the images any time Thora finally did break a smile for us. Long story short, I didn't print any pictures whatsoever, and lament the $75 I wasted on the session.

SO THEN--to still get my photo wall updated, I did my own mini session last month. I got the kids dressed in clothes that look nice (except Thora who is irresistibly cute and cuddly in her pajamas), cleaned their faces, combed and fixed their hair. And then gave them each props that they love, provoking genuine smiles. Here are the winners that will be printed for the wall:

Tommy, with his lightsaber, doing his random karate/kung fu moves.

Katie, and her art desk. I asked her to draw me a unicorn fart.

Sundance, with her pink church bag and her Coconut Blankie.

Thora with her books, namely, A, You're Adorable, while I sang the song to her.

Here are runner-ups, which will make their way into photo albums.

Big smiles for her favorite book.

Tea party!

Big cheese.

Lego creations.

Hahahaha! This girl just climbed herself up there and helped herself.

This is when she told me she's not going to show me the progress of her drawing again. I have to wait until it's finished.

Showing Dad her unicorn fart picture. If you look closely at it, you'll see that the unicorn has a yellow leg at the back of his body. "He" is the correct pronoun because she explained to me that the blue appendage near the middle of the body is the unicorn's penis. She thought it was so funny to draw that!

New Year, New Resolutions

Today is Chinese New Year, and begins the Year of the Monkey. But I'm in a crunch to get as much editing work done for my last class as I possibly can before I'm interrupted by giving birth, which believe me, can't come soon enough. Today has been a hellacious maelstrom of emotions. I feel broken, defeated and just plain done. Anyway, quick review, then on to 23 pages of heavy editing and rewriting someone's non-native English.

2015 Resolutions

One: Complete online classes to earn a copy editing certificate. Due to having trouble enrolling in a class, that might not get complete until next March. But my grammar lab class starts on Monday! 

Two: finish typing Shad's journals. That's actually a hefty one. I started typing Shad's illegible journals when we got engaged nearly 6 years ago. He writes almost a book a year. So far I've got 170 pages typed in Word. I used to do it maybe once a month, but now I'm typing one month a day, which averages an hour of typing. I'm hoping to complete one journal a month, except for April and July when we'll be travelling, and finish the project by November for a birthday present to him.

Report: My last class (currently ongoing) ends in March. Then I'll have my certificate and be done! The journals...yeah. I still have 3 or 4 to type, but I did finish 3.5 of them, which is still a huge accomplishment.

2016 Resolutions

One: Type 2 of Shad's journals. Overachieving and doing more is welcome.

Two: Reestablish daily journal writing for myself. I quit writing in my journal last year because this pregnancy has turned me into a miserable, cranky complainer, and I didn't want that in my journal. So not only daily journaling, but also writing of gratitude and happy thoughts. That's not to say I'll censor my real feelings, but that I'll make sure it's paired with positivity.

Fun Days

Sometimes we just need a day of fun. Fun, fun, and only fun. It's so hard to make that happen when I feel the way I feel all the time. But last month, it worked. I only asked the kids to unload the dishwasher in the morning. No other chores or helping me with housework. It had snowed overnight, but I didn't notice until 11 when I was reloading the dishwasher. Katie told me that she had already seen the snow, and declared that she was going to go play in it. So I spent half an hour rounding up all the right size snow pants, boots, hats and mittens, regulating kids going to the bathroom, and stuffing each child into their gear.

Worth it.

And they even stayed outside for more than 5 minutes! Thora was so jealous when she got left behind inside that I even got dressed and bundled us up to sit on the porch swing. Let it be known that my body is so physically uncomfortable that I don't get dressed anymore unless I have to. Yep, now you know. I can barely handle being in a robe with underwear on. Anything more than that is just awful and becomes unbearable after an hour. Sometimes 10 minutes.

Later that evening, Shad was busy elsewhere with something, so the kids and I had a tea party. Dancy and Thora have tea parties almost daily, but this time I joined and let us have Chex Mix and water.

Tom is getting to be a pretty good photographer.

"Now make crazy faces!"

The Things They Say, part II

The dry erase board is filled up again, so here's the post.

Dancy's use of the word 'ever' always leaves a smile on my face.
Playing hide-and-seek: "Don't EVER find me!"
Talking about Levi: "I love my Levi! He's da best Levi EVER!"
After falling down: "I hurt my butt. But it's better. Mom, don't ever kiss my butt." For the record, I wasn't going to!

After getting washed up after a meal, Katie wanted to make sure she'd done a good enough job.
Katie: "Does my face look clean? There's just a little bit of red because there's tiny invisible owwies."
Dancy: "Oh, cwap! Dat cannot be good."

Katie, trying to use the correct verb and verb tense: "I reached...I wretched...no, reached an apple."

First thing coming down the stairs one morning--
Dancy: "We can sit down and read a book!"
Shad: "But what about breakfast?"
Dancy: "But what about books?"

Dancy has a pink blankie with white polka dots. It is her "coconut blankie."

If you ever get a text from my kids, here's how to tell who sent it:
Tom and Katie write real messages and sign off with their names.
Dancy sends specific letters of the alphabet that she loves. Her texts look like "Lllloooobbbbddddzzzz." That's L for Levi, O just because, B for blankie, D for Dancy, and Z for zebra.
And Thora's messages are just finger smashes: asfjl;kdpowuiqaetnwtr02

Every time I put Dancy down for a nap or for bed:
"Hey guess what? After I wake up, after you wake up, after Thora wakes up, after Katie wakes up, after Tommy wakes up, after Dadda wakes up, we could have a TEA PARTY!" Verbatim. Every time.

And what finished off the dry erase board space was when I had to play stenographer for tonight's dinner conversation. We just got a beta fish from friends who are moving, and the beta was previously named Rainbow Dash.
Me: "What should we name our fish?"
Tommy: "Rainbow Beauty. Rainbow Stripe. Rainbow Fish."
Katie: "Butt. Butt water!"
Dancy: "Fart water!"
Katie: "Toilet water!"
Tommy: "Mom, are you writing this down?"
Shad: "You can't help if you're going to only say silly things."
Dancy: "And pooping and farting and peeing."
Me: "Yeah, that too. So let's think of human names."
Tom: "Tommy!"
Me: "We already have one Tommy in this house. We can't have two."
Shad: "It could be a planet name. Jupiter...Saturn...Mars..."
Katie: "Pluto!"
Shad: "But not Uranus."
Me: "No, because that falls into the previous train of thought."
Shad: "Jupiter? Everyone okay with Jupiter?"
Everyone agreed.
Katie: "And Pluto can be his Kendell name!" (that means last name)
Shad: "Megan, is that okay?"
Me: "Yeah, I'm fine with Jupiter. Just no Rainbow S-H-I-T."
Shad: "No, because we wouldn't want to name it that. That's ice cream, right?"
And thus we settled on Jupiter Pluto.

And if you don't know the ice cream reference, here's a happy video to watch:

Kid Pictures

Tom and Katie skipped naps one day and did fine until they sat down on the couch around 5 pm. Knocked. Out.

Here's a little glimpse of what it's like trying to take pictures with/of kids:

Dance and Katie decorating the tree. Yes, Dancy is only wearing a shirt. We do "free range" potty training.

This girl and pictures sometimes...

Cheering Thora up after a bath.

If she ever needs distracted from something, whip out a camera.

Bed time one night and Katie says, "Let's take pictures of the kids with Dad!"

And then they piled on me.

Sometimes they just don't know where to look.

She's smiling this time...

And now it's blurry because she didn't hold still.

(By the way, Katie is showing what she built at Lego Club at the library)

Tom by his Lego creation.