Unstoppable forces, immovable objects

I woke up this morning with every intention of getting some big ticket items crossed off of my to-do list; namely, undecorating the living room. Unfortunately, I'm finding my task fairly impossible to complete, seeing as I have this little munchkin running around with a mind of her own, full of goals that are in direct opposition to mine.

She has thouroughly enjoyed Christmas and all the trimmings. Each morning she toddles into the living room and asks for the lights to be turned on on the the Christmas tree, then proceeds to point out the star ("dar"), snowmen ("sno-no"), Santas ("ho ho ho"), and every ball, candy cane and other ornament that adorns it. So when she caught me removing these objects from the tree...well, let's just say that didn't go over well with my daughter.

For every ornament I remove from the tree, she puts two back in it. Not on it...IN it. She doesn't understand how to hang them, so she simply takes the ornaments I've removed from the tree and crams them in between the branches for me to search for. We have a number of guitar and M & M shaped covers that snap onto the lights on the tree. Once I had found and removed all of them, she displayed her disdain by shaking the bag I had put them in upside down until she got it open, then proceeded to stuff those back in the tree as well.

After neatly wrapping all our breakable ornaments in tissue paper, I looked for the little cardboard box I was putting them into only to find that Abby had emptied that as well and was filling it with assorted stuffed ducks to prevent me from putting anything else in it.

Oh, and my Rubbermaid box lids have proved their durability this morning, since Abby has decided that rather than use them to close up my Christmas boxes until next year, it is much more fun to run toward a lid that has been left on the floor and dive onto it, resulting in an approximate 1-4 foot slide across our hard wood floors (depending on the velocity of the dive).

It's been slow going this morning...

Savoring the real reason

There was no frantic unwrapping, no fighting over whose turn it was to rip into the next gift, no grumbling about who got (or didn't get) what. Christmas with our 16-month-old was, in a word, peaceful.

Abby exhibited an uncanny ability for staying focused on what could have been a pretty crazy morning. Well-meaning relatives did their best to distract her with brightly colored paper and shiny bows on far too many presents under our tree, but Abby's complete lack of understanding of the commercialization of Christmas won out. Grandparents, aunts and uncles would have been thrilled at the way she seemed surprised by every new toy or book that came out of a box. Completely unaware that there was still more unwrapping to be done, Abby savored every gift, hugged every new doll and stuffed animal as if it was her favorite, and played with every toy as if it was the only one she had (for the few minutes that elapsed before we pushed the next gift on her).

Christmas with the family of fish took 12 hours this year...and I loved every minute. We didn't open our last present until just before Abby went to bed. It was one of the most relaxing Christmases I've ever enjoyed. I'm just hoping as the kids get older that we can help them savor the holiday every year the way Abby did this year. Maybe we can turn the world's idea of Christmas on its head and help our little ones understand that the only reason there are presents is that there's one very special birthday being celebrated and that Christmas really has nothing to do with a fat man coming down from the North Pole and everything to do with a Savior who came down from Heaven.

I know Christmas morning will only get crazier as kids get older, but I have lofty goals for my family that include celebrating the real reason for the season and not getting caught up in the prevailing greed of the holiday. There will still be presents, and there will still be cookies left out for Santa...but there will also be a star at the top of our tree reminding us of that first Christmas morning in Bethlehem. Because without Jesus, there would be no Christmas. I'm determined for my kids to understand that.

Click here for more Christmas pics...

Away in a manger

On the one morning we were actually running ahead of schedule, we were rewarded with a live nativity set up in the church parking lot. While there was some initial hesitation on the part of her dad about letting Abby touch the stinky wet animals (a slight drizzle does make for a smelly manger scene) Abby's excitement and my impulsiveness won out.

Since we've not yet introduced goats or burros into her vocabulary, all the animals present at this particular recreation of Jesus' birth were sheep to Abby. After petting both sheep and greeting them with a resounding "baaaaaa!" she proceeded to wander around to all the other animals and greet them in similar fashion, unfazed by the fact that some of the "sheep" had horns and others looked a lot like donkeys. To her credit, they did all smell the same.

Church should always be this much fun...

Liquid merriment

There are rules regarding the drinking of holiday eggnog, and this year it was time to indoctrinate our daughter. Too many sips too late, we realized that Abby doesn't just like eggnog, she loves it. She was a little disappointed to find that her sippy cup doesn't dispense the stuff.

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Rule 1: No eggnog, eggnog-flavored beverage, or eggnog ice cream shall be consumed before the last bite of Thanksgiving dinner has been eaten.

Rule 2: No eggnog shall be consumed after midnight on December 31.

Rule 3: Eggnog shall not be served without a healthy sprinkling of cinnamon and nutmeg on top.

Rule 4: The aforementioned nutmeg shall originate in the form of an actual nut, and shall be grated fresh directly into the glass using a tiny nutmeg grater.

Rule 5: Eggnog shall be consumed in moderation so as to account for no more than 25% of your overall holiday weight gain.

Rule 6: Eggnog shall be served in a festive glass. When served cold, eggnog should be poured into a wine glass. When served hot, eggnog should be poured into a holiday mug. If neither option is available, wearing reindeer antlers or a Santa hat while you imbibe will suffice.

Waitin' on Caleb: Week 33

It turns out "33 weeks pregnant" and "cocktail party" are not mutually exclusive phrases.

Caleb's weighing in at about 4 pounds this week and should be about 17 inches long. His skeleton is hardening and he's just packing on pounds for the next few weeks in preparation for his debut in January.

I've perfected the art of the pregnancy waddle and am getting increasingly less graceful as the days wear on. My knack for bumping into things with my belly is improving, but Caleb doesn't seem to mind too much. In fact, he seems to be doing quite well throwing parties and punches in my uterus! He continues to be extremely active, and it's fun to watch my belly take on a life of its own once in a while when he decides to start doing calisthenics in there.

The nursery is coming along slowly but surely...it's a lot more challenging to complete these home improvement tasks with a 15-month-old running around! Please pray that our hearts, and Abby's, would be prepared for Caleb's arrival in a few weeks and that God would teach us how to parent this precious son He's giving us!

Double Trouble

Rebecca and I took the Abbys out for lunch and a spin around Lowe's this afternoon. These girls are hilarious together. Not sure what they're going to do come January when their little brothers arrive on the scene...

Holiday math

What do you get when you combine:

• 90 minutes in line
• 12 laps around the mall
• 8 ounces of apple juice
• 4 temper tantrums
• 1 tall latte (for dad)?

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5 minutes on Santa's lap and one half smile...

But hey...at least she looked cute, right?

Pick a winner

Abby's learning to identify parts of her body. So far she's almost 100% accurate when asked to locate her hair, nose, eyes, ears, mouth, belly button, hand, bottom, knee and toes. We practiced at lunch today...

Question:
Where's your nose?

Answer:
Right here, on the end of my finger.

Waitin' on Caleb: Week 32

After a holiday hiatus, I'm back and bigger than ever! Coming in at just over 38 inches around (about a half inch bigger than I was with my first pregnancy at this point) and 22 pounds heavier than I started (just a pound lighter than my total weight gain in round one), I'm thrilled to be at week 32 and counting down the last two months of waiting on Caleb!

First, a huge thanks to everyone who prayed for relief from the sciatic nerve pain I'd been dealing with. Your prayers have been answered! The doctors gave us little hope of relief, but Caleb managed to ignore them and shift out of the position that was causing so much pain. I've been pain-free for over two weeks now, and it's made a world of difference!

The shift in position is a surprising one considering how big our little guy is getting. He probably weighs over three and a half pounds by now and is almost 17 inches long. That's a lot of baby in this little belly! I'm adding about a pound a week to my gross tonnage at this point and about half of that is going to Caleb, meaning he could more than double his weight before his birthday. His little body is complete with toenails and fingernails now, and whatever hair he's going to burst into the world with is probably already in place on his head.

Our most recent doctor's visit confirmed that he's still in his head down position, a good place to be at this point in the pregnancy. His movements tell me that he's laying on his side with his body on the left side of my belly and his tiny butt up under my sternum, which means my right side gets a fairly good daily beating as he continues to use the inside of my uterus as a punching bag.

Our eight-week countdown kick off found Justin hard at work with power tools cutting and hanging chair rail in what will soon be our little boy's nursery. Please pray that we would find time for all the preparations required for a new baby over these brief last two months and that our hearts would be prepared as well to welcome the newest member of the family of fish into our lives!