Me: Did you pour the juice on the floor?
Jonas: NO.
Me: You didn't make the puddle over there?
Jonas: No.
Me: Did you dump the juice out of your sippy cup onto the floor over there?
Jonas: No.
Me: Are you lying to me?
Jonas: Yes.
Me: Well, go clean up the juice!

6:00pm- Mother puts meatloaf in the oven and peels potatoes, sits down to the computer to feed Infant and surf blogs.

6:50 pm- Child complains that his tummy hurts. Mother looks for owies and finds nothing. Figures it couldn’t have gotten hurt too badly as there are no marks.

6:56pm- Child complains again. Really bright mother realizes that pain must be coming from the inside. Mother has brief, horrific fantasy about appendix rupturing, snaps back into reality, tells child to go sit down and watch his movie, maybe he’ll feel better. Child stays by Mother’s side.

7:00pm- Child cries out, then vomits spectacularly onto dining room floor. Mother cleans up Child, gets Child a drink, cleans up floor, washes her hands, wonders if people with rupturing appendixes vomit.

7:08pm-Mother opens oven to find that she forgot to take the Saran wrap off of the dish prior to inserting into 325 degree oven. Thankfully Saran wrap shrinks to the sides. Mother speculates that meatloaf is probably still good.

7:09pm- Child vomits drink onto kitchen floor. Mother cleans up Child, gets Child a drink, cleans up floor, washes her hands, prays that Infant doesn’t get sick.

7:21pm- Mother piles several clean blankets onto couch where child wants to sit. She has concocted a plan where she only has to move one or two blankets if Child vomits on couch, and there will still be more blankies underneath.

7:30pm- Mother realizes that she is burning dinner, starts to remove dinner from oven when Child starts to gag. Mother flips the oven off and runs to the living room with a plastic bucket. Child successfully pukes into the bucket. Yea, Mother, yea Child. Mother gets Child a drink and washes hands.

7:45pm- Mother eats dinner, Child is not interested, for obvious reasons.

8:00pm- Child asks to watch “Pider.” Mother puts the Spiderman cartoons on. Mother goes up to Child’s bedroom to put clean sheets on the bed, and piles six more blankets on top of that, hoping to employ same strategy as couch strategy.

8:45pm- Mother puts child to bed, reads stories, says prayers, encourages Child to throw up in the bucket, please.

8:51pm- Child vomits on bed. Mother removes top two blankies and replaces the pillow. Is silently pleased that her plan worked, as Child is comfortable in bed within a minute.

8:54pm- Mother starts a load of laundry and washes hands. Prays that Infant does not catch this, gets Child a drink.

9:00pm- House is a disaster. Kitchen is gross. Mother is tired and doesn’t care. Mother leaves note for Father to please deal with mess if he happens to come home on break. Mother does manage to put away leftover meatloaf.

9:30pm- Mother goes to bed with Infant. Infant immediately asks to be fed. Mother lays awake praying that the rest of the Family, especially Infant, won’t catch this. Mother pleads with God to please, please, please make the breastmilk work. Infant is finished eating. Mother tries to sleep.

10:00pm- Mother is still awake, contemplating how a baby could possibly get antibodies from breastmilk for an illness that her mother hadn’t had yet. Mother prays that she gets sick first for the sake of keeping Infant healthy.

10:10pm- Mother realizes that she could just be carrier of the virus and build immunities that way. Mother edits prayer to, “please keep Infant healthy and only let me get sick if You really have to, otherwise just make me a carrier so Infant doesn’t get sick.”

10:15pm- Mother realizes she must be insane to be praying to get sick. Mercifully falls asleep.

2:43am- Child is standing by Mother’s bed moaning. Mother sits up and child vomits all over Mother’s legs and the floor. Mother tries not to be grossed out. Mother gets Child a drink, cleans up floor with a dirty t-shirt, washes her hands, prays that Infant doesn’t get sick.

2:54am- Mother is reading bedtime stories to child, again. Child asks for another drink. Mother finds note from Father downstairs stating that he didn’t get any breaks last night. Child is asleep before Mother gets back upstairs with drink.

2:55am- Mother goes back to sleep.

3:10am- Infant wakes up hungry. Mother feeds the her.

6:08am- Infant wakes up hungry again. Mother feeds her, and remembers that her allergy clinic appointment is at 9:00 am. Mother goes back to sleep.

6:46am- Child is crying by Mother’s bed again. Mother leaps out of bed and leads Child to the toilet. “Remember when I was pregnant with Maggie and I puked in the toilet all of the time?” Child retches in response. “This is the best place to puke, that’s it, get it all out, get all the yuck out, you can do it, keep going. . .” Mother feels a bit funny giving a motivational speech for vomiting. Oh well. Mother washes her hands.

7:00am- Mother has Child parked in front of the TV with his blankets and the bucket and switched the laundry. Mother goes back upstairs and feeds Infant.

7:30am- Mother realizes there is no possible way she can get herself out the door for her appointment without Father’s assistance. Mother wakes sleep deprived Father. Father answers the call to duty.

7:45am-Father takes over. Child vomits more. Father cleans up, gets Child a drink, and Mother hopes he washed his hands.

8:30am- Mother leaves with Infant to go to her appointment and pick up more Pedialyte and children’s Tylenol. Child is upset because he can’t go with. Mother promises a treat from the store.

8:31am-12:10pm- Father runs the show. Child vomits at least twice more, then sleeps for a few hours. Father cleans the house. Father rocks.

12:15pm- Mother and Infant arrive home. Mother gives Child new Spiderman action figure and Incredibles book. Child is so elated he vomits. Mother boils Infant's pacifiers.

1:00pm- Child has sudden burst of energy, runs around with Spiderman toy.

1:45pm- Child looks ok. Mother sits down to the computer. Mother thinks she should have bought Spiderman toy yesterday.

2:00pm- Child asks for food. Mother gives him saltine crackers.

2:15pm- Child vomits up food.

3:00pm- Child still sick. Mother must get off computer and attend to her mothering duties. Please pray that Infant doesn’t get sick.

Just some shots from around my patio. . .I love spring!



Top: Whirligig, geranium, icelandic poppy
Bottom: columbine, grapefruit blossom (not jasmine!)

I found a really great new take on Kool-Aid. It is invisible! I don't feed Jonas a lot of sugary drinks to begin with, but we had a barbeque on Saturday, so I picked some up for all of the kids. It is great, it got sloshed all over and one kid sat in a puddle of it and no stains. The only problem is that we are trying to get Jonas to drink the rest of it and he is throwing a huge fit because he thinks we are trying to poison him with plain old water. Clearly, I can't win.

The Magster is officially rolling over. She has tummy to back mastered. In fact, I can't even get her onto her tummy any more. The minute she figured out how to flip I could see her thinking, "That's enough of that lame-o tummy time! I hate that! Just try and put me on my tummy now, Mommy! Ha!" She is halfway flipped over before I even take my hands off her. Truly gifted, this one is.

I had a fabulous breakfast today! I toasted whole wheat bread, buttered it, then sliced fresh strawberries onto the toast. It was wonderful! I think that will become the breakfast of the summer. Balanced and yummy.

I sat in the garden today and rearanged a bunch of pots so the jasmine plant could have more sun. Chris fell in love with a jasmine bush/tree thing a few weeks ago and brought it home. At the time the plant had no identification tag and no instructions. I did several Google searches for stuff like "smelly white waxy flowers" and "flowering tree/vine/shrub thingies" before I made an educated guess toward jasmine. A few days after we got it I went to Bath and Body Works and on a whim looked at the label on the jasime body wash. There was a picture of my plant! I'm such a detective. The plant is pretty peaky looking; it has yellowing leaves and just looks a bit sad. Chris was hoping I could revive it. I love him for thinking I could. What part of "raised on the North Dakota tundra with no tropical plants" thing did he miss? I can fix easy plants. I tend to plant stuff that pretty much grows itself. Even with those strikes against me the jasmine does have some fresh growth and many, many heavenly smelling blooms. I must be doing something right.

Chris just got switched to working the swing shift. While I don't really like him gone in the evenings, it will be nice to have him around for the better part of the day. He has a lot of training that will be taking up his time for now. He did get pulled off of the twelve hour shifts, so yippee for that. That was much more short lived than expected and I am grateful.

Jonas wanted to go for a drive today so I took him out to the car and let him pretend to drive while I cleaned it out. It needed it. There were five sippy cups stuffed under seats and toys and random french fries from our trip to the Botanical Gardens when Jonas punctuated throwing a fit by throwing his fries. What a mess! We are slobs.

After church today I came home and read some of the transcripts of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints General Conference talks from last weekend. There were some really wonderful talks given. I didn't catch much last weekend when I was listening because my children were a bit noisy (ok, rioting madly for the cause of the moment is a more honest description). I am glad the talks are transcribed so I can go back and read them during naptimes. They are very uplifting and offer so much good counsel. I really enjoyed this one, in particular. Conference talks always encourage me to do a little better, stand a little taller. There are always a few that seem to jump out at me as answers and guidance to the stresses and trials in my life. Most of the time the counsel given is something I have already heard, but I am in a postition where it makes sense anew. I need the repetition.

So, that it today in a nutshell. What did you do?

We really did love the botanical gardens in San Francisco. They had different sections devoted to different parts of the world. My favorite part was definately South Africa (Cape Province to be exact). You guys have some awesome plants!


This one was stunning, in particular, but this next one, well, if I could have hidden it in my camera bag, I would have. This is the coolest succulent I have ever seen. It it like a Hen and Chicks, but it grows on these wild stems that send the tops careening in all directions and it is about four times bigger than me!.

Scott, Janine, if you have a spare one of these around, send it my way! Someday I will have one of these in my garden! (Probably when I have an actual yard and not just 10,000 pots).

The weather was incredible, especially for San Francisco, which enjoys being all foggy and cool. Maggie was content (that's her specialty), Jonas was wild and crazy and had a wonderful time running down the paths and smelling the flowers. It was the nicest day we have spent as a family in a long, long time.

Here are some more pictures as PROOF that we went somewhere and did something as a family.

Jonas enjoying the foilage

Maggie enjoying all the nature

Me and the Wild Man

Another really spiffy plant.

The handsome husband and darling babe.

and another one of the cutest baby in the world. I just want to eat her little toes and chubby cheeks!

You know what I like about being a grown up? I know there are lots of negative things, like taxes and having to pay for your own stuff, and getting fat and old, but guess what?

You can grab the entire container of ice cream and spoon, dive in, and nobody is going to tell you NO because YOU are the adult. And you can eat it until you are sick if you so choose! Isn't that awesome!

C'mon, I gotta get my kicks somehow :-)

Breastfeeding has many benefits. Babies are supposed to receive the mother’s antibodies and maintain better health. The rest of the family will get sick and the infant will stay healthy- all due to the miracle of breastfeeding. Everyone told me that if I breastfed I would not only lose the baby weight faster, but I would be so fortunate as to not menstruate the entire time I was exclusively breastfeeding. Pretty good perks, eh?

Well, I am here today to tell you that it is either a hoax or I have defective hormones. Maggie has gotten every bug the family has thrown at her. None of them have totally wiped her out, but she has been boogery just like the rest of us. I am perpetually picking little crusties off of her teeny little nose. She has been congested for over a month. It doesn’t seem to bother her too much, thankfully. She does, however, snort when she cries. This is quite amusing, although not very girly. It is getting her extra attention. We were out shopping yesterday when she started to fuss.

The whole store heard, “Waaaaaaaah! SNORT! SNORT! Waaaaaaaaaah! Snort!”
One mother finally asked incredulously, “Was that her?”
“Um, yeah, she’s a little stuffy.”
“Do you breastfeed?”
“ARGH!”

So, clearly, not helping me out there. Let’s discuss the weight issue. Now, everyone said that I’d get skinny faster if I breastfed. The truth is exactly opposite. I am incapable of losing weight when I breastfeed. It refuses to budge, and for good reason. Once I realized I wasn’t returning to my svelt self I did a little research. Apparently, really healthy women will retain five to ten pounds to help them better feed their infants. It protects the mother from illness and depletion. So, apparently, I am oh so healthy. Darn! My mother had to stop breastfeeding because she couldn’t keep any weight on. Why couldn’t I have been like that? To heck with healthy, I want my size six back thanks!

And now for the final blow. Yesterday, as I was rushing to get out the door I realized I had a very full bladder, I ran to the bathroom, dropped my pants, saw red, and actually jumped from the shock. That’s right, Maggie is only three months and unwelcome Aunt Flo is back in full force. I ask you, is there no justice? I suppose I should be grateful, Jonas was only two months when I got it back. But still, do you know what this means? This means that my body is capable of getting pregnant again. It is ready and rarin’ to go. Oh. No. Hell no. I love babies, but I abhor being pregnant. The fact that my body is now ovulating and is capable of getting pregnant is not a good thing. I really don’t want to get pregnant again. Birth control is not good enough to prevent this. Abstinence is the only answer that gives me any comfort. . .now I just have to convince my husband.

Ok, so why is this woman still breastfeeding, you ask? Clearly, the most exciting perks have been denied her.

I do it because I love breastfeeding. I love the snuggling, I love the attachment Maggie and I have. I love the convenience. Blessings of health, birth control, and skinniness denied, I still love breastfeeding.