Shredded

Since I haven't exercised in approximately 5 years (other than walking, which I have done less and less with each kid), and since I realized that I get winded doing things like walking from the washing machine to the bedroom (and sadly, no, there are no stairs), I decided to do something about it. I don't really like going to the gym. I am utterly unwilling to get up early enough to go walk or jog in the neighborhood before the kids wake up, as well as utterly unwilling to buy a stroller big enough to contain all of them. So, I decided to buy a DVD that I can do during naps or after everyone is in bed. I got one called "Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred". I've never really watched that show "The Biggest Loser," but Jillian Michaels is one of the trainers who helps people become Big Losers. And on the cover of the DVD she looks like she could walk from my washing machine to my bedroom approximately 8.4 million times, while carrying my washing machine AND every member of my family on her back, without getting winded. Since yesterday was February 1, which is practically the same as January 1, I resolved to begin. Each workout is only 20 minutes and I started with the easiest one. Harper joined in for most of it, slightly perturbed that I didn't have any hand weights she could use. It's a pretty basic workout and I felt pretty good when I was doing it. Though Hudson woke up from his nap when I still had 5 minutes to go, and he found my performance during the last round of abdominal exercises disturbing enough that he came over, furrowed his brow, and gently laid his head on my stomach, in need of some reassurance that I wasn't in the death throes.

Another thing I felt tremendous about yesterday is that we stayed home all day AND it was raining so we were stuck inside BUT I still got all of the sheets washed PLUS two other loads of laundry AND, aside from approximately 35 minutes of a Blue's Clues DVD (while I took a shower) the kids didn't watch any other television THE ENTIRE DAY. This is huge for me because I have gotten really bad about giving in to 30 minutes here and there all day long, with the excuse that I need some quiet or I need to get something done. After a fair amount of whining and complaining (including Harper saying to me, "When I am a mommy, I am going to let my children watch "WALL-E" every day if they want to") they actually played really well. Loudly, but well. So it was a good way to start off the week.

Then I woke up this morning and my muscles, well, they do feel shredded. Like at the mitochondrial level. So maybe the 30 Day Shred is going to be more of a 60 Day Shred so I can have a day of rest between beatings.

Job. Less.

A few Sunday musings:

1. Around six months ago, Harper started going to Sunday school for the first time. She learned about Job and was deeply troubled. She had not mentioned it again until today, when she made up this little story, which I transcribed:

Once upon a time there were three little ants. And one morning their house was gone. And then one morning their things were gone. And then they saw the biggest workman shoveling up all the dirt. And the workmen said, “Hm, are those fire ants?” And then the ants ran away and found a new home. The End.

2. She also, after enjoying and singing along with our new cd (thanks Swanks!) based on The Catechism for Young People, asked me if she is going to die someday. She specifically wondered if her bones would die, or if they would be alive like the dinosaur bones in the museum. Remember that post when I wrote about how much I like babies? One of the main reasons, I'm realizing, is that babies will not ask you to explain Job. Or dying. Or why lions eat zebras, which she noticed for the first time in a very food chain-y part of the African display at the museum this week.

3. This morning at church the pastor and his wife did the Scripture reading together and his wife stumbled over several words, which I thought was appropriate. There is not much in Ephesians 5 that is easy, especially not the part about marriage. Speaking of hard texts dealing with marriage, I speak from personal experience when I admonish you to never, never, ever offer to read any part of Romans 7 aloud in any kind of group setting. Even the most somber among us will inevitably get an irrepressible case of the giggles trying to read all of those "do-do's" in verses 14-20.

4. Helena Jane finally has a tooth! It is on the upper left and it is cute and tiny.

5. Actual conversation I had with Harper, thus proving that living in close proximity with a lawyer is, indeed, infectious:

me: Harper, do your pants go on the riding room floor? (the kids call it "the riding room"
because it's where they ride their bikes)

Harper: They are actually leggings.

me: Hm. Well, then do your leggings go on the riding room floor?

Harper: It's actually the table room.

She would rather get into some sort of a debate about the ambiguity of my terminology than just pick up her clothes. Exhausting.

6. I am off to watch the second part of a new version of "Emma" on Masterpiece Theatre. Jane Austen meant for her to be her most unlikable heroine. She is my favorite.

The boy is three today

OH, sweet Hudson. You are a delight. You have changed so much this year. You became a big brother. You are so sweet to "Huh-yay-nuh". You became a real playmate for Harper, whom you still call "Hoppy" and sometimes, "Hopper". The two of you especially love having sleepovers (which entails piling all of your collective bedding on the floor of your room and giggling with the lights off) and "slippy parties" (which entails putting on your Elmo slippers and dancing and sliding all over the front room). You love to swing on the swingset, and you can pump yourself so high on the glider that it makes me panic a little. You are an accomplished cyclist--your tricycle was pretty much abandoned months ago when Daddy got you a small bike with training wheels on which you can go so fast that it makes me panic a little. You have lately been doing lots of jumping off of things that are rather too high for jumping off of. You've been pretty cautious up until now, and, thankfully, you seem to have a pretty good read on your abilities. You like to run Very Fast. You are a keen dancer, and take it very seriously. You furrow your brow and do lots of stomps and lunges, with some karate chops and kicks thrown in for variety. You (like your father) enjoy practicing your beat-boxing, which is extremely cute unless your mouth happens to be filled with black beans, for example.

You have grown physically so much this year too. I'm not sure how much you weigh (around 28 pounds, I'd guess) and while you still have delightfully plump cheeks and hands and feet, the rest of you is starting to lose the baby softness and take on the look of Boy. You love to hug and snuggle, and when you get sleepy, you still like having your blanket and thumb at the ready. I love to watch you gently swish your blanket (which you call your "night-night") under your nose to soothe yourself when things are a little overwhelming. You enjoy eating. A day of your favorite foods would include a waffle and yogurt for breakfast, an almond butter sandwich and a banana for lunch, and an Amy's vegetable pocket with some orange bell pepper slices for dinner. Veggie Pirate Booty is probably your favorite snack, but you also love cashews and pistachios (which you pronounce "snah-shios"). I love to listen to you talk. You insist on using 't' for 'c' and 'k', so that cars are 'tars' and cups are 'tups'. The letter 'L' is hard too--we enjoyed seeing the "yeh-yo yie-yuns" at the zoo today.

You are potty trained and the process was fairly easy. You like wearing big boy underpants. You do not like to be told to go to the bathroom when you don't think you need to. You are just starting to get a little petulant when your will does not coincide with mine or Daddy's (or, most dramatically, Harper's) and you've spent a fair amount of time in your room over the last few months remembering how to obey. You are still taking a great afternoon nap (2-3 hours) and you sleep from 7:30pm-7 am each night.

Your favorite toys are probably your cars and trucks, but you also love balls and playing your drum (loudly, so loudly). You got this "football costume" from the Grandparents Pate yesterday, and you were quite pleased with yourself.You like to paint and practice your letters ('G' and 'H' especially). Some favorite books are Richard Scarry's Cars and Trucks and Things That Go, Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton, and Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey. Your favorite place to go is probably the Museum of Natural Science (which you call the Dinosaur "zoo-min"), but you also love the Children's Museum, the zoo, and trips to the park.

Your favorite color is red.

You are a daddy's boy. Though I will do in a pinch.

You have a whole gaggle of friends you really enjoy. Here is your friend Izzy, who has aspirations of someday being Much More. An idea which you don't seem to mind at all.

You do not enjoy having your hair washed. You like to wear shorts, even when it is cold outside. You get incredibly emotional when you get something in your shoe, which makes wearing your Crocs a bit of a trial. I think it is incredibly cute to watch you pull that plump, white little foot out of your shoe, painstakingly remove the offending object, then say, in a happy little voice, "Get back in there, you little piggies!" as you put it back on. You are, for the most part, an easy-going fellow. We like you. We love you. We are thrilled to spend another year with you.

The accidental oaks

We've been homebound for three days now waiting for a cough and fever to run its course. Harper is the only one afflicted thus far and seems to be on the mend. She's felt well enough to play in the backyard, and the weather, after the freeze over the weekend, is lovely. Most of the morning was spent swinging and gardening, and by "gardening" I mean the kids using Hudson's new tools he got for Christmas to chop leaves off of the wild looking oak saplings that have sprouted all over our jungle-like flower beds, the result of forgotten acorns buried by careless squirrels. Timmy Tiptoes and his pals, no doubt.

While the swinging and gardening ensued, I sat in a chair and read almost half of the new-ish Donald Miller book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. I read Blue Like Jazz a couple of years ago and don't really remember much about it. I don't know exactly how I feel about the memoir/autobiographical musings genre in general. I read a really poor example last month, the title of which I don't even want to mention because I don't want to remotely seem to endorse it. First of all, I think people my age have no real business writing their memoirs. Secondly, the person writing the memoir should have DONE something memorable, like cured cystic fibrosis, for example. Only, and Miller points this out as well, those people are too busy finding cures or climbing mountains or building orphanages to actually sit down and write about it. The thing about Donald Miller is that he acknowledges that he hasn't done much, and this new book is actually a commentary on the fact that when a filmmaker decided to try to make Blue Like Jazz into a script, how hard it was for Donald Miller to make his life into a story worth watching. In this other memoir I read, the author seemed to think that a couple of years writing cards for Hallmark made his life memorable; that his quirks and eccentricities might make people pull for him and find him interesting. I found his recollections boring and, at times, utterly inappropriate and vile. It was like reading someone's unedited journal. I suspect the only reason the book got published is because this guy had decided in his 20's to turn his back on the evangelical Christianity he had embraced up to that point. It's the kind of transformation that most of the people who work in mainstream publishing world can really get behind, in the same way the folks at Thomas Nelson or Word love it when some guy submits a manuscript about his conversion to Christianity from Islam or Buddhism or liberalism or whatever. Anyway, I think this Million Miles book is redeemable because it reminds me that I am responsible for making sure my Story sticks to the rich narrative that is intended.

I read on another blog that Williams-Sonoma had peppermint bark on sale and I ordered two tins. They arrived this evening and I am a happy girl.

What I am is what I am, is that what you are, or what?

Today we were driving behind a Car With Something To Say. I think I've posted about this before, and if I were fancy, I would link to that post. Alas, not fancy. This SUV had 6 bumper stickers in all, but the only 3 I had time to read were:

EPIDEMIOLOGY SAVED MY LIFE ONCE.

I AM A TAX PAYER FOR UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE

and

DON'T WANT TO VACCINATE YOUR CHILD? (and this one had lots of small print under this question that I think was a list of diseases--I thought I glanced 'pertussis'. The lady turned before I could finish.)

I thought it was interesting that the lady driving the Car With a Message was busily applying her make-up while driving, which, and I'm sure you could find an epidemiological study to back you up on this, is probably as dangerous as driving while intoxicated.

The husband is not really a sports guy (he likes to play but rarely to watch) but he mentioned yesterday that we might watch a little of the big football game. I was folding clothes and Harper asked a few questions to decide who she thought should win the game:

Harper: What colors are the teams, Mommy?

me: Well, Texas is orange and Alabama is crimson, which is a shade of red.

Harper: Well, I like pink. What are the animals?

me: Well, let's see. Texas has a longhorn and Alabama, let's see, what is a crimson tide exactly? I believe there's an elephant involved somehow.

Harper: Well, I like elephants. But do we KNOW anyone in Alabama?

me: Well, there's Susannah, in the song--or wait, maybe the guy singing the song came from Alabama. Yes. We should probably want Texas to win because we live in Texas.

Harper: What are the names of all of the football players?

me: Well...um, there's one named Colt McCoy. Colt, like a baby horse.

Harper: Is he on the orange team?

me: Yes, he is the quarterback.

Harper: (politely changing the subject, as this one has grown tiresome) I'm going to play with Play-doh now.

The husband fell asleep about 20 minutes in and I stayed up and watched the whole thing. I ended up pulling for Texas because I just felt bad for them, even though I discovered that the Alabama quarterback went to the high school where I taught for two years right after I finished college.

Ten for Tuesday

1. I realized today that I do not like 3/4 length sleeves. They are too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter. I actually put on a new t-shirt today that I thought was long sleeved, only to realize that the lower quarter of my forearms were going to spend the day cold. And, even under a sweater, they did.

2. In the past week, approximately 5 different people have made comments about my 3 daughters. Maybe the Hudson boy needs another haircut?

3. Of all the toys the kids acquired for Christmas, these Valtech magnetic building tiles are probably my favorite. They are expensive, but I can actually see them playing with them until they are teenagers. And they'll be good for teaching geometry.
4. Harper has decided the words 'bathing suit' are the two most hilarious words ever spoken and she repeats them in a silly voice approximately 537 times per hour.

5. She has a new ballerina bathing suit that has a tutu attached and she wears it all day long with a pair of flannel pj pants for warmth and some plastic princess shoes for added pizzazz.

6. While Hudson clomps around in his new fireman rain boots and Mater underpants.

7. We paid $8 (even with a membership, sigh) to go into the butterfly atrium at the museum yesterday, and Harper and Hudson spent 90% of their time splashing in these two small puddles on the walkway and ignoring the butterflies.

8. Hudson's favorite book this week is The Berenstain Bears and the Spooky Old Tree. Harper's been enjoying Ladybug Girl and Bumblebee Boy by David Soman and Jacky Davis, and I Dreamed I Was a Ballerina by Anna Pavlova with Degas illustrations.

9. I read an Annie Proulx short story before bed last night and didn't understand the ending at all. That's frustrating to me. I don't usually like short stories but I try to keep some handy for bedtime.

10. Harper fell and bumped her head pretty hard on the bookshelf day before yesterday and this is how the husband tended to her:Because nothing says first aid for a moderate head wound like a bag of frozen organic corn and a pink blanket turban.

Eleven months

The sweet baby girl got her own swing on the swingset as a Christmas present. My theory is that she'd probably sway in there for 4-5 hours as long as the other two were swirling around her doing big kid stuff and keeping her generally entertained. She slept almost 14 hours last night, THEN took a FOUR hour nap today. Have I mentioned how thankful I am that once my kids get the sleeping thing down, they are really, really good at it? SOO thankful. She is still a tiny little wisp of a girl, but I got on the scale with her yesterday and she's up to around 16 pounds. She's wearing 6-12 month clothes and size 3 diapers. She likes to eat sweet potatoes and peas and oatmeal. Still toothless. She's been doing lots of this:
The fact that she is wearing clothes in any of these pictures is astonishing because getting clothes on her is still near impossible. I have to put her in this modified wrestling hold just to get her dressed. This is displeasing to her. Footy pajamas with lots of snaps are especially vexing.

Her hair is starting to look a little wavy in the back, which I predict means she's going to join the brother and sister in curliness.

That's enough for now. I got to go to a movie with my friend Wendy tonight. Delightful company, thought-provoking film. Now I am sleepy.