it’s not about you

We had big plans for this weekend, what with the extra day off and all. Everything started off with a bang on Friday night. I was reading a book to Judah and Joshua and Killian were chasing each other in the back. I heard Killian fall and then heard him scream. He apparently went face first onto the floor and busted his lip pretty bad. I got some ice for him and Joshua held him while I applied ice to his mouth. He didn’t like that at all.

After a few moments, I got a look inside his mouth and noticed that not only was he bleeding from the lip, but that he was bleeding from the gums right where one of his upper teeth was. I also noticed that it looked like the tooth had been pushed back - it wasn’t lined up with the other one - and I wiggled it. It felt loose.

I called the kids’ dentist, who’s a really nice man and as far as I can tell, a good dentist. He told me to take my thumb and push his tooth back into place for a good ten seconds, and that Killian wasn’t going to like it one bit. He said the tooth would either be fine or it could discolor and/or die and then we would have to take steps depending on the severity of the injury. We’re supposed to monitor his tooth over the next month to see it turns a brown or grey color and if it looks like there is any infection in the root. He told us what to look for. So that was that. Killian woke up Saturday morning, looking like he’d had a bout with Rocky around the mouth. Despite pushing on his tooth - and he wasn’t thrilled about that - it remains further back that the other one.

We also decided to switch rooms with the kids since we had the bigger room and they had the smaller one. We never use our room during the day, but I am constantly in the kids’ room all day, as that’s where they spend most of their time playing. Once a few buckets of toys are spilled out, it gets kind of cramped.

We had thought about using the whole three days to slowly transfer everything over, but once we got started, we had everything moved by the time the kids went to bed on Saturday. We’re still tweaking the arrangement of the furniture, but so far, this is going to work out much better.

Having all the major furniture switched on Saturday turned out to be a huge blessing, because Judah woke us up, and by “us” I mean Joshua, at 1:30 Sunday morning with a 102 degree fever and spent the rest of the night and the next day in our bed. She was feeling pretty wimpy. I stayed home from church and took care of her.

Joshua decided to sleep with Killian last night to give Judah and me more room in the bed. I wanted her close by in case she got sicker during the night. I was awakened at 2 a.m. by Joshua calling for help because Killian had thrown up all over himself, Joshua, and the bed. I sat with Killian in the bathroom, stripping him of his puke-covered clothes, while Joshua stripped and changed the bed and got himself new pajamas. No sooner than they got settled back down in bed together, than Killian threw up again, hitting not only the towel Joshua had laid down, but Joshua and the sheets and himself again. So we got up again and stripped everything and changed everything.

Judah decided to take that moment to fully wake up and say she was hungry. She kept puppy-dogging me and I had to keep sending her back to bed. I took her temperature, which was spiking, and gave her a dose of Tylenol. Everyone crawled back into their beds. There’s something about sleeping with a feverish preschooler - she wants to sleep ON TOP OF YOU. Then, when she rolls over, she takes all that great heat with her, so you’re left shivering from the difference. Judah didn’t sleep much after all of that, and about an hour later, woke up from a half-doze and suddenly popped off the bed, announcing, “I’m going to get some breakfast!” she was halfway out the bedroom door before I could get her to crawl back in bed.

Killian came toddling in at five a.m., and crawled in bed with me, laying his head down on my chest. I thought it was sweet, until he started lifting up my shirt, looking for a snack. I refused to nurse him, due to the vomiting, and he screamed bloody murder for a while as Joshua padded in and extracted him, taking him back to their room. Of course, Judah thought this meant she could get up and declared, “I want a hot dog for breakfast!” I made her lie back down.

We managed to keep the kids in their rooms until about 8:15 this morning, when I told Judah she could go play quietly in her room for a little while. Shortly after, Killian came toddling into our room again and I decided to see if he could nurse and keep it down. Joshua headed off to the kitchen to make some breakfast and to START THE COFFEE, and as soon as he turned the corner, I heard him holler.

Apparently, ants had found their way into the kitchen through a crack along the window and a thick black line of ants was snaking its way down the frame, across the backsplash and across the counter, and swarming all over the compost bowl, which we had forgotten to take out the night before.

While Joshua was wiping ants and trying to deal the with compost, I was standing next to him, holding Killian in my arms and watching, when - you guessed it - Killian hurled all over me. So there’s Joshua, his hands thick with ants, trying vainly to contain them as they are quickly spreading across the counter, and me, covered in vomit from shoulders to feet, trying vainly to catch everything with my hands.

After the ants had been vanquished and Killian had been bathed, and I had changed clothes and we both stood there with a cup of coffee in our hands and two full loads of vomit-soaked laundry in the hall, while Joshua made oatmeal, I asked him “Aren’t you glad you have this three day weekend, so you can kick back, take it easy, and just relax a little bit?”

Sometimes you just have to make a choice to laugh.

Simply sit down on the toilet. That’s guaranteed to get them to come running.

And I’m mostly better. And on the bright side, I’ve lost eight pounds. While it’s not my diet of choice, hey. It’s the new year. I’ll take it. I’m now back down to my pre-pregnancy weight. And also on the bright side, after taking off two days of work and quarantining me in the bedroom for four days, and accidentally dropping the entire pot of tortellini into the sink, knocking over the strainer and watching ALL but a few pieces of the tortellini go right down the drain, Joshua will never again come home and wonder what I’ve been doing all day.

“How do you do this?” he asked me. “Every day?”

I just laughed. Maniacally, I laughed. At him, too. I hear the tortellini was good.

And in Death Wish news, while closing the door to the flat this morning on my way to take Judah to preschool, Killian fell down the first set of brick stairs in our stairwell. He walked right off - didn’t even pause. I tried to grab him, but my fingers only grazed his hoodie. The kid totally flipped head over heels. He went down face first, his head hitting about the middle step and his body cartwheeled right over him, landing legs-and-butt-first on the landing, before the rest of him came to a stop. Amazingly enough, I think his momentum kept his head from hitting too hard. And as far as I call tell, his only injuries are three bloodied knuckles.

I’ve checked him over, head to toe, and while he’s clingy and quiet, I think he’s OK. He didn’t get dragged down any of the steps and I don’t see any bumps or bruises. He cried more out of shock and fear than from injury. Of course, Judah completely freaked out and started crying, too. The girl loves her brother.

That must be one of the worst feelings in life: watching your baby take a bad fall and only being able to watch helplessly from the sidelines. Brent, am I a bad parent if I deny him a skateboard??? I mean, he hasn’t even ASKED yet.

Also, today’s is my mom’s birthday. She would have been 57 years old. Happy Birthday, Momma.

Yesterday evening, right before Joshua got home, I had nursed Killian on the couch, and when he was done, he got down and toddled off toward the kids’ room where Judah was playing. I took a moment to drop and close all the mini-blinds in the two front rooms and then followed him back. Guess where he was when I got there?

IN THE TOP BUNK. PLAYING WITH JUDAH.

I totally freaked out. I asked Judah if he got up there by himself and she said no, that she had HELPED him! She knows he’s not allowed to climb the ladder and usually, she lets me know if he’s ever making a break for it. We don’t even allow her to be in the top bunk when he’s around so he won’t want up there as well and be tempted to try. I’m wondering if she went up behind him or pulled him up to the bunk once she was already up (freaky thought for both of them, that way), though I don’t think I can bring myself to ask. I made them both get down and then Judah and I had a talk about how dangerous it is for him to be up there and that if he fell he could get seriously hurt, and that he could even die. To make it worse, the entire floor was strewn with every block they own. That’s not exactly a soft landing pad.

Scary!

We have got to be vigilant with that one, Killian. During the Christmas break, I went to get a haircut and while I was gone, with our entire family at our house, Killian dragged a dining chair over to the Christmas tree, got on it, leaned over to mess with the tree and fell headfirst through the tree to the floor. Once, strapped into his booster seat in the kitchen, while I was cooking dinner, Judah opened the fridge to get something out, and Killian grabbed the handle. When Judah closed the fridge, Killian refused to let go of the handle, and fell over, in his booster in the chair, sideways. Thankfully, his arm that was holding the handle, dragged down the side of the fridge, and in doing so, prevented his head from smacking the floor. We have since put his booster into a sturdier chair.

He’s the climber, and the getting-into-everything boy, the one who sticks his hands in the toilet and tries to breathe his bathwater and climbs on the windows and the bookcase and the dresser and the coffee table and the open dishwasher and stands on the rocking chair and sticks his fingers in the outlets and things in his mouth and boy are we ever in trouble with that one.

Every day that goes by that doesn’t send us to the ER, I’m going to consider a good day.

Yesterday, Judah had a REALLY rough day. I’m not exactly sure what was going on with her, but everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING, was sending her into fits of angry tears.

I picked her up from preschool yesterday, and usually, all the children are sitting on the front steps together singing a song while waiting for all the parents to arrive. When I walked up, I couldn’t see Judah, who is usually right in the middle of everyone with a huge grin on her face.

I heard her call my name but I couldn’t see her and I thought maybe something had happened. Her teachers told me that she refused to put her shoes on and that she was still inside, and that they weren’t making a big deal out of it. Confused, I went upstairs to see what was going on when Judah melted down. Apparently she didn’t want to leave her first day back to preschool. Which doesn’t surprise me, because when I dropped her off that morning, she wouldn’t even give me hugs and kisses good-bye. I think she’s four going on fourteen.

When we got home, all the way through lunch and afterward, it was the same thing. Everything sent her over the edge. I kept sending her to her room and making her sit in my comfy chair until she would calm down, only to have her melt down all over again at the next injustice of the world - Killian wanting to do what HE wanted and not what SHE wanted.

I finally made her go lie down on my bed and gave her an afghan as some covers, which, of course, she immediately threw on the floor to spite me. She screamed at me for about 20 minutes through the door, and when she finally calmed down, I went in to talk to her. I tried to ask her what was going on and why so was crying and so upset. She kept saying she just wanted to play, or just wanted to read that book, or whatever, and I told her I didn’t understand why she was crying about it all.

After a while, I told her I wanted to her lie down on my bed and rest, and maybe take a nap, and that while she did it, I wanted her to talk to Jesus and tell him how she was feeling and ask him to help her have a happy heart.

At that she began to cry again and I asked her what was wrong, and she said she couldn’t talk to Jesus because she couldn’t see the sky. I told her that she could talk to Jesus no matter where she was, and that God was everywhere. She then said that God didn’t live here and so she couldn’t talk to him. I asked her where God lived and she said, whimpering,

“God lives in Texas.”

Classic. Yeah, so I don’t really have a response for that.

So I told her again that I wanted her to talk to God, and she said she didn’t want to. So I said that was fine, and she could lie there and just listen for God to talk to her. At this I left the room and went in the kids’ room to play with Killian. After about 15 or 20 minutes, I heard her calling me. I went in to see what she needed, and she turned to me and said,

“God’s not saying anything to me.”

Judah attends a home-based Spanish immersion preschool two days a week, for those of you that didn’t know. As a result, she has replaced several of her English words with Spanish and now will ONLY use the Spanish version of each word. If I forget and use the English word, I am immediately reprimanded. The list is:

agua
leche
gracias/no, gracias
de nada
por favor
uno
dos
tres
cuatro
cinco
diez
dame besos
dame abrazos

zapatos is a so-so

Her preschool also uses a lot of songs as a teaching and transition method. They have a song they sing when they pick up things to put a space back together, when they transition from indoors to out and vice versa, when they wash their hands, and lot of other songs as well. She is constantly singing in Spanish. Half the time, I have no idea what she is singing - she is learning the way she learned English - by repeating the words she does know, mixed with making up words for the words she can’t remember.

Luckily, I know enough Spanish to be able to converse with her and give her commands and instructions and talk and read to her. And she pretty much knows what I’m saying - lots of pointing and exaggerated displays of motioning helps, too.

Joshua, however… not so much. We’ve purchased Spanish and bilingual books through Scholastic Book Clubs for her and she loves to have us read them to her. It’s always a hoot (yes, i just said “a hoot”) to listen to my husband attempt to read to her in Spanish. He stumbles through each sentence, reading Spanish with a French accent. Which, you know, go figure. I speak what little German I know with a Spanish accent, and I’m sure I’ll do that with my French I’m going to learn, so hey.

Her preschool resumes from Christmas Break, starting tomorrow. That’s the only way I got her to go to bed with no fuss tonight. So if you speak Spanish, and would like to conduct a Spanish-only relationship with her, that’s fine by me. The more reinforcement, the better.

Hasta manana!

link

beautiful.

So much Texas love is being sent my way this month, it’s just.

Well, it’s amazing.

You know me - I don’t often lack for words.

I got to talk to Angela yesterday.

Dawn is here right now, as we speak, about to pass out from sheer exhaustion in the kids’ room. She’ll be here until Saturday morning. She’s in town for a work-related conference.

On Saturday (I think) Brent and Tracy arrive for several days. They’re here to meet Margaux, and boy is Brent going to melt into a little tiny puddle. Perhaps his new hipster frames will soften the cuteness blow.

Karen is officially in California somewhere and I know she’ll be here soon for a week or so, i think. And I CANNOT WAIT to hang out.

And Steven will be here at the end of the month for a pediatrics conference and will be staying with us for a few days.

In all of that, Judah’s preschool is going to Santa Cruz to the Monarch Grove - we get our own little tour - and we’ve got the Rudd’s Fourth Annual Pumpkin Carving Party on the 27th. And you’re invited. So please come.

My sister, her husband, my brother, his wife and my nephew are all coming out for Thanksgiving. Now if only we can convince the others…

We’ve confirmed our Christmas plans as well - skiing in Tahoe with the Rudd side of la familia - Killian’s first snow. *sigh*

I feel loved. By people who are close to me, close to me.

Tired of Being Hassled by your Stupid Parents?

ACT NOW!

Move Out, Get a Job, Pay Your Own Bills While You Still Know Everything!

This was written in pencil in my mother’s handwriting on the back of a floor plan from my high school. You think she was a wee bit frustrated with her brood, perhaps?

In June, my dad gave me a bunch of my old school papers and things and I’m just now getting around to sorting them. I’ve found all my report cards from preschool through fifth grade, most of the rest through high school, and stories written for class (some with my name spelled in different ways - I was trying things out, you know) and filed in a Return of the Jedi folder that was apparently bought at Target, on clearance for 15 cents.

Next I’ll post the commentary from my preschool teacher, Mrs. Curry.

Wow. I haven’t changed much.