Record of Operations

Oh, the first few weeks of a new kid in the house.  Some people are trapped at home overwhelmed by the sleep/feed/change cycle for all five kids.  Not me. This is my jam.  Having a new baby and a toddler on top of a kindergartener, first and third graders is becoming my homeostasis. It takes two babies for me to feel like I am sufficiently innundated and unable to accomplish anything but babies.  With one baby you still think you can go places and do things. With two you're like, "Nope. I just keep people alive and that is enough."

But aside from the babies I still have to keep the lives of the other children functioning.  Jude and Si have breakdancing class.  Mimi had a birthday.  There were Valentine's to assemble.  We needed a table.  Life had to continue so we had to hit the ground running.

And this is the rundown of our happily functioning life:

When kids are home from school they help hold Philo so I can get some things done around the house and make dinner.

We went light for Mimi's birthday this year by just having a late-over in jammies and she was just as pleased.  She had a bunch of girlfriends over to eat cake, dance to Katy Perry in the kitchen and sing karaoke.  Then they all went downstairs and watched a movie.

Mimi is so blessed to have so many girl friends and I am so blessed to love all their mothers. This is one of my favorite parts about Utah: all the people doing the same thing in the same phase of life.

Hush does a LOT of baby duty.  He maintains the babies while I get the big kids in their beds at night. I have never felt more like a team with my coparent than I do these weeks. I strongly believe that the dad becomes a full time parent when the second baby comes.

Mercifully, LouLou is a great and flexible sleeper. Although she is a light sleeper, I can get her to nap when it's convenient for me and Philo.  She's on one or two naps a day at 17 months.

Occasionally the sink is sufficiently clear of dishes so I can bathe Phi in it.

Lou is feeling the shift of her throne.  She wants to be carried as much as possible. Never has she been more satisfied than when I put the giantess in the baby bjorn. But it totally hurt my back so forget it, kid.  In the afternoons we often have help from a mother's helper, Mikayla, whose main job is to hold and chase LouLou. I use that time to nurse without getting jumped on and to clean up the tornado she's caused around the house. Toddlers are so messy!

Snuggly babies in footie jammies. They're 16 months apart.

MJS built a Rubes Goldberg machine this week and Hush and I about died of pride.  They hadn't even been introduced to them yet but they figured out how to make a chain reaction.  Very proud.

Bath gazing.  Only one person pooped in the bath this week. Not bad.

Last Saturday the kids were playing happily with some friends downstairs so I took the opportunity to run an errand.  When I came back there were a total of 9 children in the house.

I don't take enough pictures of my cutest human.  Lou is a charming little monster.

Jude and his buddy Jack decided that they're twins because they both have two front teeth missing and similar haircuts. 

Most of my photos on my phone look like this. I think I've taken a picture of Philo every day of his life.

Philo is an okay sleeper. It takes him a while to get into a deep sleep but when he does he's out for hours. He's super gassy though, so that's been a challenge.  At five weeks he is waking up only once a night to nurse, and that feeding is happening around six am. So I guess technically he slept through the night last night for the first time.  Best newborn yet!

Little Brother's Little Brother

As second boy and the youngest of the triumvirate I worry that Silas (6) gets lumped in with the other kids and that I don't help him develop his own interests and talents.  He's so easy going as far as activities: whatever Mimi and Jude feel like doing he likes it too.  He's a lot like Mimi in that he is happiest when he's playing with other kids, so he doesn't have a lot of solo activities nor hobbies yet.  In the last few months, however, we've tapped into Silas' true nature.  He's a lover.

Silas is in love with baby Philo.  He is perfectly content to snuggle Phi all day.  

I often catch Silas laying all his love on the babe wherever he happens to be.  No accidents have happened yet because Si is very conscious of how fragile 5 week Philo is.

Amusingly, Silas sees LouLou as competition and a bit of a rival because she's so bossy.  The other kids give BL a wide berth but Silas meets her head on to establish dominance.  But Philo is an object to be lavished with adoration.

My favorite thing about Silas is that he is in complete bliss when he's asked to be lazy and just sit and hold.  The other day we were shopping for tables at crate and barrel (they had nothing we wanted) and I set him down on Philo duty.  Silas smiled a beatific smile at all passersby. 

It's good for the little brother to have a little brother.  I love Silas for his nurturing personality.

Punxsutawney Phi

My sister Celia used to have a blog: Groundhog Day with Celia Fae.  Like the Bill Murray movie, parenting can get redundant.  The premise of her blog at genesis was that she felt like as a parent and stay at home mother she lived the same day again and again.  The blog was an effort to find the extraordinary or remarkable in the repetitive and she was undeniably successful, she's a far better writer than I.  But, like many blogs started in the blog heyday, she tapered off and then ended more officially when her husband became the ecclesiastical leader of her congregation.

But this idea of parenting Groundhog Day has lingered for me.

Groundhog Day this year has struck a rather different chord with me because as Punxsutawney Phil was making his prognostication I noticed that my tiny baby newborn, now three and a half weeks, is making the switch from newborn to nearly one month old baby. He's still very tiny of course but there is a big difference between a newborn and a baby/infant. Usually the transition passes unnoticed but it seemed to have happened overnight with Philo and I'm experienced enough to objectively observe it rather than being caught unaware after it's happened.

And it just kills me.

Already I miss the newborn from a week ago. He's still in newborn diapers and tiny clothes but he's grown out of one outfit already and I miss him in it!

This is a microcosm of my very least favorite part of parenting: the growing up part.

And so I wish for Groundhog Day: the same day over and over again.  I want time to stop and my babies to stay little.

I think it's a rather cruel trick of God to give us these precious newborns and then take them away forever.  And I feel that way about every age of my children.  I miss toddler Silas.  I miss four year old Mimi and four month old Mimi.  I can't even remember newborn Jude (other than his unwanted haircut) but I want him and I want three year old Jude.  I want them back. I want to have all of them at all of their ages.

I do my best to savor every age: it goes so fast, it goes too fast.  Sleep deprivation makes me forget huge chunks and sometimes I find myself nearly weeping that my kids have gotten so big.  I know it means that I'm doing my job correctly keeping them alive and learning, but I just want all of my babies back.

The coffers have been replenished a number of times and I do get to relive their stages, but it's not the same.  Lou the tyrant is very similar to Mimi the toddler tyrant but I can't touch Mimi's perfect curls.  I have only pictures and memories, and my sleep deprived memory is so fuzzy.

I have my blog and our history but I don't have their little smells and their little hands.

The big kids are still a little unit but they don't need me as much any more. I've asked each of the children to stop growing. I push on their heads to keep them short. Nothing works.

I can appreciate this stage, of course.  They're so helpful now and I love showing them what it was like when they were babies: all hands on deck, constant needs to be met, no sleep til Brooklyn.

I appreciate that they get to see full arms and that they can now help.  They get to raise babies with me, the same way they were raised and teaching them the same lesson of selflessness that having babies requires.

Thankfully, this baby is easy. He's my easiest baby by a long shot, mostly because I finally got nursing down. It took me five kids to figure out how to get my body to cooperate but Philo has helped me master breastfeeding.

I appreciate the children's current phases: Mimi the tempestuous little mama, Jude the innocent bully big brother, Silas the emotional space cadet, Lou the sweet toddling destroyer who is learning to make us laugh intentionally.

(PS, I made this chandelier. Unrelated to this post I just needed to brag).

To combat the days that march steadily onward deeper into their childhoods I document with pictures and videos.  The pictures go here, the 10 second videos I take with my iPhone I've been posting to a private YouTube channel for the past few years so I have them all in one place and watchable at any time.

As the old saying goes, "The days are long but the years are short."  The children's stages are fleeting. But I still have some hope.

In my version of Heaven I get my babies back in all of their stages AND I get to keep having them indefinitely. I can't think of anything more heavenly. My babies for infinity.

Stay little, stay little, stay little.

Pheast Your Eyes on Philo's Newborn Pics

Mimi 8, Jude 7, Silas 6, Lou 16 months, Phi 10 days, me not quite advanced maternal age.  Hush at work so not pictured.

Glorious photos taken by the inimitable Jessica Peterson.  Thank you Jess!!