No, I'm not in labour.  And I consoled myself about that fact by telling every nosey rosie who asked "Wow, when are you duuuuuuuue?" that I was due now.  Right now.  As in, right on this lovely plush carpeting in your store and oh, also I'd like to use a changeroom please.

Ridiculous people.  Stop looking at me.

Mostly I cry, and try not to yell at people, but in an effort to be productive I've been checking off The List.

We've got the garden in, have I mentioned that?  I think I have.  Anyway, if I haven't, we have the garden in.  And Samuel has already 'christened' it by falling dramatically on one of the nails and giving himself an impressive cut.  The crying, oh the weeping and wailing that resulted from that cut.  All I did was wash it and put a bit of aloe on it, and you would have though I was amputating.

I spent yesterday dealing with Samuel's bedroom.  I think it just needs to be said that my children need to have nothing at all that is even rather sort of nice.  I wish they could, oh I do.  I picture them with lovely furniture and beautiful books and toys, but the reality is that I found a chicken drumstick on the floor, and dirty clothes at the bottom of the toy box, and, oh, general slovenliness.  And I was terribly upset right up until I discovered the broken dresser drawer and then I was just angry.  Mad.  The drawer, despite both David and I working at it, will not allow itself to be glued back together with wood glue.

So I started throwing things away.  Despite the tears (tears, my children, do not move me) the tiny plastic dinosaurs left, and the army men, and the duplicated trucks and the broken bits of things.  All the very special papers, and the very special wonderful treasures that were SO amazing and necessary that they could not be parted with have been disposed of.  And the pants.  Surely *they* will continue to make pants in the future if I suddenly need more.  And the ripped stuff.  Ugh.  And the colouring books.  Worse invention ever.

Samuel's room now has a bag with some Lego, and a small plastic tub slightly smaller than my dish draining tray in area for wooden trains.  And he has action figures lined on the window sill and a few other reasonable toys that I will debate in the coming week but that is all.  His room is very spartan.

Clara's room is getting it's own sort of overhaul.  A second rod installed in the closet and a lot of clothes purged and packed and what have you.  If only there was a basement.  Or the children could wear one outfit and play with sticks.

And in the meantime I think I have accomplished most of what I've intended to do before the baby arrives. Other things, things that fall into the amorphous category of 'Wouldn't It Be Nice' have mostly been pushed to the side.

The tunnel of Parenting

My friend Kyra mentioned to me that large families start to enter an 'easier period' when the eldest child turns about 10, and that before that you see incremental improvement in life, and also that the period of parenting that I currently am in has a name - The Tunnel of Parenting.

I totally and completely agree.  It is a giant plastic garden hose like opaque tunnel of parenting.  Yes.

On the other hand, I do see flashes of what it WILL be like, one day.  Far from now.  For example, here's one of my first posts from my original blog; and I wrote it when Samuel was about 3 months old.  I'm incredulous when I read it.  Could I seriously not get my act together enough to take one infant outside long enough to buy some groceries?  That same infant can now fetch and carry for me, make his own bed, bathe himself, feed himself, help in the kitchen, play with his sister and put on his own shoes.  There have been changes, in both of us.  He's a helpful and useful member of the family and not a screaming time bomb and I am a calmer mother, one who isn't frightened of the idea of an infant crying periodically.  And when Clara was born, I went through it all again - a toddler and an infant = the worst combination ever made.

Actually, when people talk to me about being nervous to add a third, especially with the fairly short age difference I have already between children (25 months between each child) I don't always understand what they're getting at.  Hard?  Not really in the ways they mean to say.  Samuel is four, he can do so many things alone, and I encourage that independence.  Clara is two, and wants to simply be a shadow - she'll play with Sam as long as he lets her, or follow me around doing 'jobs'.  The baby?  The baby will nurse and sleep and use up diapers, and that's about it.  No, I'm not worried.

But what I am is excited about the future I hear about when my eldest is six and can brush his teeth without needing me to check them after.  I'm excited about when he's eight and is totally able to express himself verbally and doesn't need me to stand in as a constant interpreter.  I'm excited about when the children can sit still.  I'm excited for the day they show up out of their bedrooms wearing clothing that is ACTUALLY seasonally appropriate.  That one might never happen.

Oh, sure, three children will be harder in a lot of ways.  Our car is squeezed as tight as it can go - we're going to need to buy a van very soon.  We don't have a big enough table to fit everyone.  We're into 'people sharing bedrooms' stage and the choices are all awful as to whom has to sleep with whom.  I've run out of space.  And then I've run out of the extra space I found by getting rid of tonnes of stuff.  And now I just pile things.  Our grocery bill is getting ridiculous and it isn't going to look better for a long time.  I'm really tired of wiping bottoms.  I still haven't totally figured out how we're going to leave the house.

Yes, harder, but in the meantime the older ones are growing.  They don't stay babies.  The tunnel of parenting ends.  And at the end is the fantastic world of getting to sit down after lunch and have a cup of tea.

Batman, etc.

It's raining outside, and I'm uncomfortable and depressing to be around, and so I'm mostly spending the day doing things that require a minimum of movement.  I'm going to throw out old magazines, and go through more boxes of little boy clothes and give them away.  David, I think, would like to simply empty the totes of clothes in garbage bags and give them away.  But I am sentimental.  I can't.

Clara, bless her heart, has acquired two incredibly annoying traits in the past few weeks that have rendered me almost entirely unable to speak to her.  The first is to lift her voice at the end of every sentence as though she is living entirely in a huge question.  And the second is to ask, at least a dozen times a day, "what is that thing called?"  Not in itself an awful question, but essentially replacing 'why' in her speech.

"Mama, mama mama?  What is DAT ting called?"
"Cheese."
"Cheeeeeese?"
"Yes, cheese."
"Dat ting called cheese?"
"Yes."
"Mamamamama?  What DAT ting called?"
"It's cheese."
"Dat ting cheese?"

GOOD HEAVENS YES IT'S CHEESE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT'S HOLY.

Bah.  It's a phase, it's a phase.  That particular phrase has never provided me with much comfort but I'll take what I can get.

And it is Tuesday again, so stitching group meets.  And a call has been put out at church to provide a member of the community with food, and so I feel as though I should go buy some, despite the rain, since the stitching group is right next to our grocery store.  Usually, I would tell myself to go to the less expensive store in the city but weariness is winning over logic and I'll spend twice as much here, but gain the satisfaction of actually having purchased food rather than simply telling myself I will for the next week and never remembering.

Speaking of logic or a lack thereof, David and I, despite everything that tells us otherwise, are probably going to spend about $60 on a toy for Samuel.  No, wait, it gets worse.  The toy is an almost two foot tall Batman cave play set thingy.  Lord Jesus, come anytime you like, no really.

It's just that he loves it so, so much.  On this dusty shelf at one of those old family run type department stores that exist practically nowhere.  The kind of place where the same three jars of Ponds cream have sat for a decade.  We go there to let the children ride the arthritic old mechanical pony for a quarter after I buy up all the discounted bananas from the local store.  And we HAD thought that maybe, maybe, the baby could bring gifts with her.  I know.

Ah well, he's only four once.  Would that a two foot tall bat cave could make him happy forever.

Cleaning

Another busy cleaning day.  I rearranged the livingroom furniture and put down the new rug, which has made the room feel much nicer.  I'd like to scrub, but it hurts to do much.  Then some organizing.  And some managing of clothing.  I have a bucket started for thrift store donations and I feel greatly encouraged there.

And I pestered the people who run the local strawberry patch as to when they would open for picking.  Ideally I'd like another large collection of rhubarb to boil down before the strawberries, but I'll happily take what I can get since my rhubarb decided to go to seed.

Oh, this 38 weeks thing is getting to be so much.  I'm sore and tired, and there is so much to do.

Bookshelf

I like to think I'm spending a lot of time in the house decluttering it, but in reality I'm spending a lot of time making mental lists.  Yesterday I sat on the sofa looking angrily at the bookshelf stuffed full.   How had the books gotten in such a mess?  On their sides, on top of each other, all over the place.  Disaster.  I actually got up and went over to straighten it up, and realized that there were waaaay more books than could fit on the shelves and made a revolutionary decision - if it didn't fit, I had to get rid of it.  David got into it as well and together we purged a big pile of books.  David even went into the other room and pulled a few for the pile from another shelf.  Slow and steady decluttering.

I felt so encouraged by the bookshelf that I went and dealt with the crazy hurricane of a front hallway.  Including starting phase 2 of the litter box switch.  I was tired of looking at the cat's litter, so I bought a new box with a lid and a flap door.  Except the cats hated it.  So we're slowly changing it over.  First we just switched to the new tray about a month ago, and now yesterday I put the lid on but not the door - the reaction is a lot better.  In another month I'll try the door.  Then I moved the washer and dryer and collected all of the bits of things from behind them and washed the floor.

It's mid-June, but boy is it cold here.  Because we're on a lake?  I don't remember last summer when we first arrived if it was cold or not.  Fall was here so quickly then and I was preoccupied with unpacking and getting settled in the new parish and then discovering I was pregnant again and pretty much blocking the next few months of awfulness from my mind.  I looked back and wow, I have been expecting since October.  So long.  

I know I'll feel much better when the birth is done and I can move normally again.  Move and breathe.  And reach my feet.  And take a bath.  And, I don't know, go shopping at more than one store before needing a nap.

Homeschooling

Ah, yes.  Homeschooling.

Well, we are homeschooling this September, although that seems to be very surprising to some people.  We've also enrolled Samuel in the local public school kindergarten with the idea of possibly having him attend a few mornings a week just to give him an opportunity to get out of the house, enjoy the company of friends, and let me manage with one less child for a few hours.  We haven't decided whether or not we're going to do it, but we've attended the introduction to kindergarten night and so forth.  I cannot make any decisions beyond that right now.

And I've chosen some 'curriculum'.  It seems strange to consider the books I've chosen as any sort of curriculum, actually.  I mean, Samuel is only four years old.  I thought I'd share them in case anyone was curious.

We're using the BOB Books to teach phonics.  I'm getting the first two sets and if we fly through them I'll pick up a few more, but if we can only make it through those I'm fine.  I'm also using the first level of the Handwriting Without  Tears program - My Letters and Numbers Book.  I debated buying this because I couldn't really see it being useful this early, but I think I'd like to start Samuel off on the right foot with how to hold his pencil and form letters.  We're also using audio books to introduce some classic literature.  I'm getting Beatrix Potter, A.A. Milne, Herriot and possibly the Just so Stories.  Anything more than that I'll borrow from the library.  That pretty much sums up the literature section.

For math I chose Family Math for Young Children which is a book of math related games that I think we'll all enjoy.  I really don't want to jump into math books right away.

I would like to do some poetry and scripture memorization, but instead of buying anything I'll source it elsewhere.  Same with any crafts or anything we do.

Samuel will be taking swimming lessons on Fridays with a homeschool group, and that combined with practicing on his bicycle and nature walks is my plan for gym.

That's the plan!  It's very gentle, but actually still more rigorous than what he would be doing in kindergarten.

Audio Books

Samuel dislikes his afternoon rest time a great deal - undoubtedly thinking it is beneath him as a tall four year old boy - but I need afternoon rest time like I need water, and so he takes it.  And will continue to do so until Jesus returns or I suddenly become a very energetic person, whichever comes first.

To combat this (and the endless reasons-why-I-must-leave-my-room) I'm playing him books on tape.  I don't anticipate that he will fall asleep listening to them, but I don't expect sleep during rest time.  My only requirements are that he stay in his room, with the door closed, and not make huge stomping noises or dump out all of his puzzles or what have you.  Clara, at two, will still sleep, hallelujah.  She sleeps in her bedroom with a gate at the door since she is an escape artist and the thought of her being awake, unattended, and not locked away is a terrifying one.  She, of my two children, would be more likely to eat things from the garbage, or turn on all of the taps and plug the sink, or unlock the front door and wander off.  I don't trust her one little bit.

Anyway, the tapes, yes.  Cds, actually.  He's listening to Anne of Green Gables right now.  I remember audio books as having been very expensive but that was years ago and they're quite reasonable now.  I think Anne cost less than $20 and is unabridged and read like a play.

I'm really hoping that this occupies him well.  Ideally I think I'd love 2 whole hours of napping/quiet play/books on tape but right now we get about an hour.  I'm not worried about the new baby.  New babies tend to just sort of shuffle in wherever they're put.

Tuesday

In the early mornings is when I blog.  Or write at all, really.  This isn't because I'm hugely productive at this time of day or because I especially love dawn.  I do not love dawn.  No, I write in the morning because after a good sleep I am the least stressed and anxious I will be all day and that gives me the opportunity to get at least a few chicken scratches down on metaphorical paper before someone is poking someone else in the eye with a fork or one child starts screaming because the other one got to touch the cat's ear and they didn't.

I'm sitting in bed, at the ridiculously late hour of seven-thirty, hurriedly typing because I can hear my saintly husband not yelling at whomever just clearly broke that glass in the kitchen, and trying not to think of the fact that he is going to be working all day and so am I, but in our separate spheres.  He will go to the deep, quiet church and write, and then he will likely go on many visits to the various people who need to talk to him.  I, on the other hand, will spend my morning trying to make dentist's appointments for people who hate dentists, and do so to the soundtrack of the children (who have recently discovered the cd of Shrek 'music' that one of us purchased back when we clearly the stupidest pre-parents ever and thought it would be so fun for a future child) yelling "NOT MY BUTTONS!"

That sentence might have been a bit hysterical.

Full-term pregnant women should not be allowed to manage household duties alone.  Yesterday I spent a large portion of my afternoon trying to keep the children outside while I called the local wholesale shopping place to figure out why I could not find their price list online.  Eventually my customer helper person (what politically correct term are we using for this job now?)  admitted to me that she was new at her job and transferred me to a manager.  On that topic, why on earth is the phone transfer system set up the way it is?  You explain everything to someone, then they say 'I'm going to transfer you to blahblah', and then you are transferred to someone whom they have clearly not bothered to explain anything to, and you now re-tell your tale, and then THEY SOMETIMES TRANSFER YOU.  It's incredibly disheartening.

I would say that moving closer to family would help, but probably it would not.  Probably not much other than the Holy Spirit working in the hearts of the retail industry and possibly a very large coffee is going to help me today.

Hospital Bag Packing

I’m packing a hospital bag.  Well, to be more specific it turns out I’m packing two hospital bags because something something and it all sounded logical to me at the time and now I’m too lazy to change it.  I’m too lazy to change almost anything these days, honestly.  I sat down to clean the bathroom last night.  And then I sat down again to pack some clothes into storage.  I went outside to watch the children cover themselves in mud, and I sat down.  People are starting to comment on it.

Humour me with a bit of whining.  When I sit, my back hurts.  When I stand, my feet swell.  When I lie down I get heartburn and leg cramps.  So then I stand up, and I have to pee.  So I go to pee and suddenly I’m exhausted from the effort and decide to just change the toilet paper roll and go back to bed, except when I crouch, I get stuck.  Yesterday whilst crocheting I got a cramp in my arm.  In my arm.  Not a ‘oooo, cramp’ but a ‘ AAAHHHHHH HOLY HANNAH MY ARM MY ARRRRRMMMMM’ cramp.

So pretty much I am a delight to live with.  Who knows how the family is managing it all.  David bought me a cake and I sat and ate half of it while watching Gypsy Weddings or whatever that show is where the girls all 

get tans all the time.

You want nice baby news?  Well, she’s head down.  Although that could change.  And all is well with both of us, except that I’m very large.  I think I must be the biggest I’ve ever been.  Ah well, who cares.

Today we take Clara to get her inoculations updated, which should be horrific.  And I’d like to buy more cleaning products because I am hoarding them for some reason.  And then go to the stitching group and leave David to manage everything all by himself.  And come home and eat something premade from the freezer.  Perhaps those little chicken wrapped in bacon things.  I should clean out the fridge except that I really just did, and I’m rebelling against the fact that it appears to need it again.  Why should I have to do these things that God has given me to do?