Dead birthday

We lost Ethan yesterday. Or rather, yesterday we discovered that he had passed, no telling when. Poor Ethan. He died a lonely, mostly unnoticed hamster death. In case you were keeping track, that's three hamsters that have perished under our watch. And so, we buried the little man after many tears and some post-mortem caresses (eeeew).

I think this particular death caused so much more grief for the girls because it was so much more mysterious than the others. Little John fell to his death and got trapped, probably dehydrated as he lay tangled in the curtains behind the toy bin. Mason went squish. But Ethan? A bowl full of food, a bottle full of water, a clean little cage and a coconut house to call his own. The girls were baffled.

With a couple of rodent deaths under my belt, I took a new, different approach yesterday. I comforted them. I told them it was ok to feel sad. I said no when Bela asked if we could drive straight away to the pet store and get more pets. In fact, I made almost no mention of replacement critters.

Mae broke down: Now we hardly have ANY pets. All we have are crickets, two cats, a hundred fish, and two guinea pigs.

This did not convince me.

Instead, we talked about feeling sad. We hugged. They buried him. And then we did what everyone should do in their deepest times of sorrow: we baked a cake. A lemon pound cake with drizzly lemon sugar glaze.

I let Bela take charge of the cake while Mae made the soup for dinner. Bela creamed butter and cream cheese while Mae chopped carrots. Bela cracked eggs while Mae stirred in parsley. And all of a sudden, Mae declared: Hey! I haven't even thought about Ethan for awhile. My mind is on something else! I don't feel sad! Bela chimed in: My mind is not even on anything at all!

We sat down to a dinner of Hearty Pea Soup, bread, cheese, salad. We cleared the table, turned the lights down low, and then proceeded to do the creepiest thing I've done in a long time. We celebrated what Bela called "dead birthday."  (I suggested dead day, or deathday). We lit candles on our cake and our voices joined in the strangest rendition of "Happy Birthday" I ever care to sing again.

And the girls were smiling.

This Moment

My Friday post. A moment from our week I'd like to share and remember. Have a great weekend.

What we're reading

I love reading to the girls. Even when I pretend I don't. Even when minutes before I was yelling at them to clear their dinner plates, to brush their teeth, to stop fighting.

We embarked on the journey through chapter books about two years ago when I pulled out an old copy of Little House in the Big Woods. Bela loved it. Mae would come and go during the sessions and catch bits and pieces of the story of Ma, Pa, Mary and Laura, but her two-year-old attention span didn't really allow her to enter the obsession the way Bela did.

Laura and Mary: Halloween 2009

By the time we were On the Banks of Plum Creek, Mae was all in. As it turned out, that particular installment of the series was our "peak", and the girls' fondness for the story slowly declined as the heroines aged. I mean, what little girl wants to hear about the trials and tribulations of a young woman, wife, mother? Eeeew. The story might as well have been about a little boy.

So it took us awhile to finish up with The First Four Years. We needed to shake up the bedtime reading routine a bit, for sure, so I pulled out The Secret Garden. We consumed its pages in about 1 week, and we haven't looked back since.

Chris's mom caught wind of our reading frenzy and sent us a box full of favorites: Where the Red Fern Grows, Because of Winn Dixie, Old Yeller, The Wizard of Oz,  A Wrinkle in Time, The Indian in the Cupboard. This last one we started several weeks ago and made it half-way through when I decided suddenly that we needed an extra dose of magic around here.

Enter Narnia.

Each night the girls ask for "just one more page, please!", even though Mae complains of nightmares about the White Witch. Even though Bela almost cried when Mr. Tumnus was turned to stone.

We began Prince Caspian a few nights ago, and the sibling foursome just realized that the ancient abandoned castle they stumbled upon was, in fact, the remnants of their beloved Cair Paravel.

I hope these girls of mine let me read to them until they are grown.

What do you read to your kids? What can we add to our list?

Signage

With budding literacy comes a new era of signage around these parts.  I mean, why talk when you can actually spell it out?

A few samples of my 13 7-year-old's verbiage of late:

1) After a recent talk about the importance of privacy and alone time - difficult to come by but nonetheless important when you live in a two bedroom apartment with three children.

2) When asked why on Earth she couldn't just brush her teeth in the bathroom like everyone else:

This Moment

My Friday post. A moment from our week I'd like to share and remember. Have a nice weekend.

Advice

Gillian Fern: 4 months old

Gil went in for her 4 month check up two weeks ago. She's in the 50th percentile for her height. No big surprises there, as the poor child's mother doesn't even make it to 5' 3". And she is in the 90th percentile for her weight. Again. No surprise.

Me. 4 Months. Gilli looks downright teeny in comparison.

What was surprising was the talk I got from the doctor after Gil was weighed. You know which one I mean, right? The healthy-habits-healthy-food-childhood-obesity-at-the-top-of-the-weight-curve-maybe-you're-feeding-her-too-much talk.  I got the same talk from her when Mae was at the 90th percentile at 4 months, and when Bela was a bit too chubby for her taste at 2 years.

As parents we are often the target of unsolicited advice when it comes to our kids. It comes from all corners: family, friends, strangers on the street  (like the lady who stopped Chris to tell him he was poisoning baby Bela by letting her drool on our key chain.) All well meaning, for sure. As a new parent it can feel overwhelming, and has the tendency to shake up your burgeoning self-confidence in your new role as mommy or daddy to a little one. But even a veteran parent can fall victim to opinion and advice, especially when it comes from the child's own pediatrician.

I usually descend upon our pediatrician's office with the understanding that I am not going to agree with 85% of what she is going to say to me. I put in my two minutes of active presence with her by answering the common milestone questions (Does she roll over one way? Can she hold her head up by herself? Does she respond to your voice?) and then my eyes begin to glaze over as she drones on about vitamins, medicine, or transitioning a then 4 week old Gillian out of our room (apparently it is not advisable to sleep with your children near you) to her own room--as if that room even existed in our current apartment.

But when my pediatrician gives me a hard time about my kids' weight it really shakes me up. Maybe it's because my own self-image suffered so terribly through my teen years and into my twenties. Ok. And maybe into my thirties. Maybe it's because I'm afraid of watching that same thing (read, making that) happen to my own girls.

Or MAYBE it's because I am the mother of two older girls who are at perfect, healthy weights; who gladly sit down to a meal of lentils and spinach over toast; who eat more vegetables than most of my friends; and who spend a lot of healthy time outside.

I didn't let my eyes glaze over this time. I spoke up.

Me: "So, what you're saying is that I'm feeding her too much? Too much breast milk?
Her: It's possible. She may just be thirsty, but not hungry. I'd advise you to start giving her water before each feeding.
Me: So, what you're saying is that my four month old baby, who is breastfed by me every few hours when she seems hungry...what you're saying is that I should give her water instead? Instead of breast milk?
Her: Not instead. Just before. It might cut down on how much milk she is taking in. And I'd like you to start her on solids.
Me: (getting really annoyed and annoying) So, you'd like me to give my overweight breast fed baby more food? Solids? Now? At four months? Not 6 months? Not when she seems ready? You don't think that this is just who she is? Like her sisters? Look at them now - no problems.

Then she gave me the special smile I'm almost certain she reserves for me and mothers like me.

Her: Yes. (In a slow, I'm exasperated but incredibly patient way).
Me: Should I be worried about my heavy baby?
Her: Not worried. Just on alert.

And that was all the fight I had in me. And while I allowed my pediatrician, who has no children of her own,  to continue on with a detailed plan of how I should begin to introduce solids to my not yet ready 4 month old baby who probably shouldn't be sleeping in my room let alone sleeping in my bed, my eyes glazed over.

This Moment

A moment from our week to share. Have a great weekend, all!

Gil at 4 months

I have two journals at home filled with details that cover the early years of Bela and Mae. What they ate, when and how they learned to roll over, stand, walk, talk. Pages and pages to give to the girls when they're older, to prove to them that I actually loved them :)

But Gil? Well, she's suffering from third baby syndrome. She gets twice as much love (because she has twice as many siblings as the other two did) but a whole lot less documentation. So here is a post dedicated to my sweet, sweet baby girl 3.

Gillian Fern - 4 months, Urbana

What can I say about my beautiful babe? She's a quiet but happy girl. If she's awake she's smiling. She will only gift you with her out-loud giggle if you are patient and ever so funny.

She sleeps like a charm, most days. We lay her down before dinner, around 6:00, and aside from 2-3 wakings to nurse, she sleeps until 7:00 the next morning. She's happy to be toted about in a carrier, she's working hard at rolling from her tummy to her back, she spends a lot of time staring at her hands. She's really started reaching for toys and handling them gently. She makes soft little gurgling sounds and the occasional loud happy squeal.

What did we do to deserve such an easy breezy baby? I was sure she'd make me work hard for my motherhood badge. We are definitely a lucky bunch. But what baby wouldn't be happy with two adoring older sisters to fill her time with?

Sister Bela, Cousin Ruby, Sister Mae

Easter

What kind of traditions do you observe for Easter? Church service? Baked ham and deviled eggs? Family? Friends? Drainage ditch? What?

I've written a lot about family traditions on this blog - my never ending quest to craft them, maintain them, force them down my family's collective throat. And sometimes, just sometimes, let them go.

Easter is a great example. Over the years we've done some pretty cool Easter projects. My favorite was the year we (I) made our own baskets and dyed our (my) eggs in pots of vinegar and boiling cabbage, onions, turmeric and beets.

Bela, 2009

There was real grass in those baskets, and daffodils. A Toy Garden  even used one of the images we took as their product photo on their website a few years back.

But this year I left the baskets at home when we traveled to Urbana. I tried (and failed) to do a batch of eggs in natural dye. Oh, Paula, if you're reading this, please toss out the contents of the four mason jars in your fridge. Those are my eggs, soaking still in cabbage juice, instant coffee, and dill and kale. Eeek.

One tradition that has lasted over the years and was started by Chris is adventuring in what Mae likes to call the "calm creek", which, though admittedly calm, is neither a creek nor a stream but a rural drainage ditch. They like to lure crawdads with bacon and catch teeny tiny little drainage ditch fishes with three eyes and a sprouting pair of arms.

So while each year I dream big, sometimes you have to let go of the hand-woven baskets, the beautiful natural dyes, the embroidered balloon eggs, the decadent chocolate cake. Sometimes you have to throw a bunch of Paas dyes at the kids and let them walk around in the muck under a bridge.

Hope you all had a happy Easter!

This Moment, and an explanation

I know this is supposed to be a wordless post, but I felt that I needed to toss out a little explanation about my absence around here lately.

One of these days, I'll own a laptop that was made after 2006, and it will work beautifully. And it will be able to handle the photos I take and try to download and organize. And the letter N won't stick. Nor the letter W. It will charge even when it's not at a 45 degree angle propped on a book. And I will be able to blog on it without a care. Without a problem.

Until then, I'll keep clunking away at it and slowly putting up those posts. But it's hard to be inspired to share a story when I don't have a photo to go with it.

In the meantime, enjoy this photo of my big baby girl. Well, er, my two baby girls, if you will.

We are in Urbana for some egg coloring Easter crafting extravaganza. Enjoy your holiday!