The Writer

Jack straight up hates writing.

Like writing a journal entry is pure torture.

You know, like burning in acid torture.

His teacher pulled me in for a Conference to talk it over.

In many less words than she used, here's the gist:

"Jack won't complete his writing assignments.  

His handwriting looks like cryptic hieroglyphics.  

And he gives me dirty looks."

Alrighty then.

So I sit the boy down and find out what his deal-io is.

He tells me that he just hates writing.  Period.  He just doesn't see the purpose.

And believe me, when that boy doesn't see the purpose in doing something, 

you better strap your boots on.

So what did I do?

I pretty much brought his world crashing down.

Me:  "You know Jack, any job you decide to get in the future will require writing."

Jack: "What?!  Every one?!"

Me:  "Sorry sweet thang.  EVERY one.  No doubt about it."

There's really no sense in lulling him into a false sense of reality, right?

Unfortunately, that statement didn't exactly seem to light his inner writing fire.

At that moment, 

a little light bulb appeared above my head.

Ding!

I told Jack about a person he knows that has always hated to write.  This person has always agonized over writing assignments and most recently practically perished trying to write a 100 page dissertation.

Who is this person?

None other than my hunk of a man.

(Who just happens to be floating on a giant orange floaty in what appears to be diarrhea water...)

I then proceeded to pull out our copy of Dave's dissertation.

It's a book that sits on the back of a shelf in plastic packaging because the mere sight of it is enough to cause convulsions in this poor man.

Jack however (a true book lover) was suddenly beaming.

He had just learned that his very own father was an author.

(or at least that's how he perceived it)

His stunned little self strutted downstairs to congratulate his Dad for being awesome. 

He carefully looked through all the pages

and then asked if he could take it for Show and Tell.

Uh.  Ok.

I can only imagine how that went down.

Jack proudly standing in front of 30 second graders telling them about the book his father wrote, titled

"The Effect of Microphone Port Occlusion on Hearing Aid Directionality"

The boy hates to write but he should get some points for being able to read that title, right?

He said that his class loved the book.  (right)

Really, I am sure that his teacher just thought that we were absolutely nuts.

Which is mostly likely not true.

Just so we all can recognize that Jack actually has 2 amazing parents and not just one amazing author parent, here is a picture of my famous ear. 

Which just happens to be published in 1 book which exists in 1 library.

Does that make me a famous model?

Um yes. Yes it does.

Baby G

We've had Grant hanging around for 10 whole weeks now.

And I'll tell you one thing;

I think we'll keep him.

I had almost forgotten how fun it is to have a baby in the house.

I pretty much eat his face everyday.

Let's have a quick sum-up of Grant's life thus far.

1.  He's getting plenty to eat.

His pediatrician practically gave him a standing ovation for gaining 2 pounds in his first 3 weeks of life.

10 week weigh-in: 13 pounds

He definitely came with the understanding that he is the 5th child.

This kid can take care of dinner time in 10 minutes or less.

He gets enough to be a little fatty 

and takes some to spare since he tends to spew forth quite often.

2.  He's processing all of that liquid nicely.

No picture for this one, but just know that the "plumbing" is working.

He's nailed me more times than I care to count 

and he may have even decorated the wall at the pediatricians office.

3.  He hardly gets any attention.

I mean, it's like no one likes to look/touch/entertain the poor boy.

Riiight.

Of course,

all that attention can be a bit frightening sometimes.

Just ask the kid.

4.  He smiles and coos.

Which pretty much makes me melt into giant puddle.

For reals.

I practically want to marry him.

Which of course I can't.

Because see that hairy arm?  I'm already married to that guy.

5.  Most importantly, I think his first words will be "Let it go! or Do you want to build a snowman?"

Brooklyn has discovered the 'repeat' button.

Oy.

Biking Bradley

For several months (like 8) we have been trying to get Bradley to ride his bike without training wheels.

Every time we would get it out of the garage he would sit on it for a minute,

take a look around and then quickly get off and go inside.

What's your deal, dude?

If your big ol' pregnant mama is offering to huff down the street 

holding you upright 

the least you can do is try.

After many attempts, I did what any good mother would do.

I gave up.

I let that dirty rotten Spiderman bike sit in the corner of the garage collecting dust.

So of course,

as all rotten children do,

the other day he walked over to that bike,

rolled it out of the garage,

(you know where this is going)

got on and rode away.

Just.like.that.

Say what?!

There was no audience.

No expectations.

No mother in her flip flops running all hunched over to keep him upright.

There was just me,

standing at the top of the driveway doing a victory dance 

and wondering if he was going to bite his tongue off out of sheer concentration.

The longer I watched, the more amazed I was at 

A) how prevelant certain genetic traits can be, 

and B) how his lips were not incredibly chapped. 

I mean seriously,

that tongue was moving back and forth at lightning speed.

I took dozens of quick succession pictures and it appears that your brain and body function better if you've got your tongue hanging out.

Right Dave?  And Dave's Dad?  And my own Mother?  

And who knows how many other countless relatives?

Whatever the case, I was quite proud of my boy.

He does things on his own terms.

But when he decides he is ready - he is very ready.

We love him.

Even if he doesn't believe in wearing shoes.

Or his, um, helmet?!

Big Brother

Bradley is a really good big brother.

Well, let me rephrase that.

Bradley is a really good big brother to Grant.

To Aubrey, I'm afraid he is mostly just a big brother.

He has mastered the delicate balance of both taking good care of her 

and tormenting her.

A balance any good brother will strive for.

To Grant however, (for now) he is as sweet as can be.

He constantly asks if he can hold the baby (who looks HUGE in this picture)

and I often hear him singing his own lullaby.

Which basically consists of repeatedly singing

"Rock a bye baby here on Earth."

As opposed to "Rock a bye baby over on Mars?"

Who knows.

Whatever the case, I find it terribly charming.

He has also been found to share his very favorite book with Grant.

Pete the Cat is not something we take lightly at this house.

That book is coveted by all children under 6 at this house.

Enjoy it Grant, 

because in a few short years these "sweet" big brothers will be sitting on you,

giving you wedgies and making you lick their armpits.

Grant Foster Bowen

Look what I got 3 days after Christmas!

I'm going to share the birth story, but if you're really just here to see pictures of more baby yumminess than one can possibly handle, then I will throw in several pics of my sweet boy.

Let me preface the story with the fact that I (for insurance reasons) decided to deliver in Clovis.

Which is located 1 hour away.

This little fact caused a fair bit of worry 

and at least one hour of reading "what to do if you deliver your baby in the car."

Thankfully, (not to ruin the ending) that information can now safely be stored 

in the "thank goodness I didn't have to use it" section of my brain.

I started having contractions every 15-20 minutes apart about 2 weeks before Grant was actually born.

And for the week before he was born, they would get to 8-10 minutes apart.

Not painful, but very consistent.

In other words, confusing.

I did this with both of my other boys,

but with them, I went in and stayed to have the baby.

This time however,

I drove an hour, was sent to walk the halls, 

was told I was only dialated 2 and then 3 centimeters aaand was sent home.

TWICE.

Hmph.  I was slightly offended that I had hoofed it around the hospital for an hour in my super attractive hospital gown only to be told to get out of town.

That whole hour from the hospital thing was seriously messing with me.

Those nurses were not about to do me any favors either because that hospital was one busy place!

Lots and lots of babies.

Finally, on the morning of the 27th I woke up to some painful contractions.

I told Dave to go to work, but to be ready just in case.

In the meantime, I spent all day contracting every 15 minutes or so.

They kept going and finally around 10 pm 

(why do they always speed up in the pm?)

they were 5-7 minutes apart and I decided that we should take another trip to the hospital.

I felt pretty certain that we would actually get to stay this time.

And if not, I was going to be one grouchy pregnant lady from several hours of painful labor.

Lucky for me, those contractions kept on going 

(causing Dave to drive a bit faster than normal)

and when we got there I was 4.5 cm.

BUT, the crazy nurse didn't have the monitor on correctly so she didn't see any contractions for those first 30 minutes I was laying in that triage room.

She came in, told me I might need to walk the halls

and I gave her a super friendly look and told her she might want to adjust her monitors because these contractions were definitely happening. 

I finally got my "ticket to stay," around midnight

but once again, that place was packed!

So, I got to "hang out" in the triage room for what turned out to be all night.

For the record, those beds are wicked comfortable...

Oh wait, no they aren't.

Not at all.

Truthfully though, I didn't really mind that much.

I was just happy to be staying.

And happy that Dave said I looked cute when I was all flushed in between contractions.

Thanks honey, you really know how to make a girl swoon. :)

The worst part of the whole experience was the really loud and animated hispanic lady that was just one curtain over.  

I thought for sure I was going to have to listen to her deliver a baby right there.

Which I am not going to lie - made me want to head for the hills.

It turns out that she was only dialated 5cm.

But I also know that she swore she wouldn't have anymore kids, she asked for a C-section just to get it over with, she's very skilled at switching between English and Spanish - neither of which made much sense, and she wanted to kill her husband.

I wonder if Dave thought I was cute 

when her yelling and moaning drained the color from my face and made my eyes pop??

At 9am and 8cm I was finally moved to an actual delivery room.

Thankfully my epidural was keeping me pretty comfortable 

because the OB on call was running from one delivery to another 

and I was fairly low on the pecking order.

Finally, at 1:06pm we met our sweet 8lb 3oz baby boy.

I was (am) completely in heaven.

I am a total sucker for the newborn stage.

I am thoroughly enjoying spending many hours a day holding, 

kissing, smelling, feeding and squeezing him.

You just can't beat having a new baby in the home.

My bigger kids seem to think he's ok too.

Sometimes I can't believe that these people are all mine.

They are mostly completely out of control.

Our house is very loud and very busy.

We've got too much laundry and plenty of messes,

but I think I'll keep them anyway.

For the record, it may look like we have already taken Grant to the barber,

but that "combed over" look is all thanks to the giant hurricane going on on the back of his head.

That hair is going to be a whole lot of fun to cut later on.

Would Anyone Else Like to Cut Open Their Face?

Once upon a time there was a family

who couldn't stop injuring themselves.

Week 1, day 1:  

The giant gorilla dogs from next door break through our fence (again)

and nearly devour our own very vicious dog.

I mean can't you just see that "I'm going to eat you" look in her eyes?

Ya, me neither.

But something about her makes those nasty pit bulls next door go wild.

That night was a bit intense as Dave fought off the beasts with a stick 

while trying to rescue chubby little Mona.

Our very own Damsel in Distress.

Week 1: Day 2

Brooklyn is taking a shower.

She gets out of the shower and is being very obedient by quickly drying off and getting dressed.

Oh wait.

No.

That's not how it went.

Brooklyn was in the bathroom practicing some sort of cryptic ballet moves while wrapped in her towel.

Wet floor + cryptic ballet moves + counter edge + Brooklyn's eye = 

4 stitches and a black eye

Not exactly how I had planned to spend my Family Home Evening night,

but what can you do?

Week 2:

On Halloween Night,

our little mouse takes a full blow to the face from a metal Halloween bucket.

"Oh, you're fine little girl - no more crying," I say.

Only to come out of the darkness 

and see a cut that is all matchy-matchy with Brooklyn's.

Whoops.

(I guess that would explain all the tears...)

Thank goodness hers wasn't large enough to need stitches.

Week 3:

Jack - who is always a very calm child, 

one who would certainly never do anything dangerous

decides to do something very boring and ordinary 

like bend over and pick up a book.

Which just happens to be next to a small end table with very sharp edges.

Cue screaming and blood.

Oh no you didn't.

He walked in just as we were about to have dinner.

Dave and I most definitely gave each other "the" look.

The one that says, 

"Whose kids are these?"

Normally I don't get squeamish at all with these types of things (good thing, huh?)

but this one got to me a little bit.

So proceed with caution.

Gross.

That is a pretty wicked awesome line of bloody tears across his cheek.

This one took some "skin un-rolling" (barf) and 5 stitches.

Which brings our 2 week stitch total to 9.

In an effort to preserve our only remaining scar-free kid,

we are implementing a fool-proof safety program.

Original image from http://www.coloribus.com/adsarchive/tv-commercials/suzuki-kizashi-bubble-wrap-suit-kizashi-vs-mercedes-14116955/

That should do the trick!

But I will tell him to use extreme caution while shaving those neck whiskers.

*No animals were seriously harmed in the making of these stories.

Only children.*

Brooklyn Will Make A Really Great Mother

There are a lot of reasons why I think that Brooklyn 

will make a really fantastic mother someday.

She's just naturally wired in a very maternal way.

But today,

she put the cherry on top.

She said something that made me realize 

that she sees the true rewards of being a Mother.

We were delivering some cookies to a friend of ours.

Brooklyn says, "Mom, they only have 3 kids in their family.

Why did you put 7 cookies on the plate?"

I told her that each of the kids would be able to have 1 cookie 

and then maybe the parents can each have an extra one.

She quickly replied,

"Or probably the Mom will eat the extra ones tomorrow

while the Dad is at work."

YES!

Nailed it.

If I haven't taught her anything else,

at least she fully understands the family pecking order 

when it comes to plates of treats.

What else is there?