Finn Turns One

Despite my incredulity, it has happened. Finn has turned one year old. No year of my life has passed faster, but the calendar doesn't lie.

We celebrated with a short trip to Glenwood Springs, and stayed at the hot springs lodge. There we met Dave's brother Chris, his wife Susie, and their baby Liam (two months younger—and twenty pounds heavier—than Finn). We spent as much time at the pool as very young children will allow, which is not to say that they didn't enjoy it. As soon as Asher discovered jumping off the sides of the pool, he never wanted to leave. A king carried on his litter was never more pleased than Finn lounging in his little inflatable. He would gaze around imperiously at everyone, or daydream contentedly. At one point he dozed off. The other pool-goers were quite taken with him. I enjoyed the hot water under the breezy 50-degree day, and suspended my germophobia. (Having kids taught me how to do that.) How do three-dozen people sit in a 104-degree bathtub, un-chlorinated, and not get sick? I do not know, nor do I think the inquiry bears much investigation.

The evening of Finn's birthday we went to a restaurant called "The River." As soon as they ushered us to our table I knew it was way too fancy for three kids under four years old. White tablecloths, real flowers on the table, quiet even on a holiday...I was surprised they even had high chairs. I asked if they had any plastic plates so that Finn had something non-breakable to eat off of. Of course they didn't. I felt like we brought a brass band to a library, which is to say nothing of the puffs that covered the floor and the chocolate cake stains that Finn left all over the white tablecloth. I can only hope that the exasperation that the waitstaff and other customers felt was tempered when we sang "Happy Birthday."

We came home the next day, but not after visiting the pool again. Dave and Chris left that morning to go hiking for shed antlers, so it was just Susie and I and the kids. We switched off childcare and showering, which resulted in some pretty hilarious looks from strangers when I was holding one baby, towing another in the floatie, and trying to appease a screaming three-year-old.

Once home we threw together a birthday party for Finn. Susie was a tremendous help, but we did not have nearly enough prep time to fulfill my grand decorating visions (never do). 

Asher sneaking a cupcake before the party. Three-year-olds are hilariously transparent.

My cake that I had dreamed of decorating for months was almost bad enough for cakewrecks.com because of an errant bit of something that smeared the frosting as I spun the cake. Oh well. The upside is that I can try the cake again next year, as Finn's birthday will always be on St. Patrick's Day and I will probably stick with that theme until he develops other interests. This was a Graham cracker cake with chocolate buttercream frosting, and it tasted fabulous. The company was wonderful, though if people keep having kids we are going to have to buy a bigger house to entertain everyone. There were 21 people in our modest home. We can no longer fit everyone in the kitchen to sing "happy birthday."

Finn was overwhelmed by the fanfare, hence the deer-in-the-headlights expression of the following picture. 

He nearly had to be anchored down to "help" open his pot o' gold (presents). Once he got the idea he was moderately amused.

Sneaking in for one pic with the birthday boy. As mom, I'm usually the invisible orchestrator.

I am still trying to convince Asher that it was not his birthday, nor will it be anytime soon. Asher ate more cake than anyone, and has since commandeered all of Finn's presents. Finn has not minded, or even noticed. The upshot is that any toy that Asher loves becomes 100 times cooler in Finn's eyes, so his birthday presents are now very cool.

Be careful what you pray for

If it is said, "Be careful what you wish for," then it follows that we should be doubly careful what we pray for. Dave left for a four-day stint in Vernal, Utah, on Wednesday morning. By that night I was ready for him to come home. Finn woke up from his nap uncharacteristically out-of-sorts, and I hadn't properly exercised the border collie out of Asher, so he was rambunctious and antagonizing. Finn basically wanted to be held all evening, and Asher basically wanted to spend the evening in time out. Here I am, trying to get a workout in with Finn climbing on me during a wall sit.

If I had known the true extent of Finn's discontent I would have been more sympathetic. Dave FaceTimed us that night. He had to put off his call at first because Asher was in time out, and the call pretty much consisted of Finn mauling me and Asher jumping off of furniture and throwing things. It was a very, very rough evening.

When I finally got the boys in bed, I made a batch of cookies and shamelessly tucked in. I sent a text to my dear friend Miranda, whose children are close to the ages of mine and whose husband is out of town most weeks for work. Here was her response:

"Some days suck, and some days suck so much worse. I am beginning to understand what the grace of God is. It is strength beyond my own, and blessings above my worthiness. I hang upon Him every day, and even when I forget to pray or read my scriptures or even say kind things, He is there...Being a temporary single parent was definitely not on our five-year plan, but it doesn't come without blessings of its own."

Feeling more than a little chagrined about my own coping strategy, I looked up at the scripture I had written on our chalkboard this week:

I was determined to do better. To rely on Heavenly Father more in the moment-to-moment stresses of mothering. I said a prayer, thanking Him for the marvelous friends that I have, who make me better and provide truly admirable examples of how to be a great mom. Friends who point out where I need to improve, just by the way they conduct themselves. I asked God to help me be more patient, to be a better mom, and to give me strength. To help me rely on Him.

As I said, be careful what you pray for. That night, as I crawled into bed at far too late an hour, Finn woke up. I'd gone in and nursed him back to sleep once already, and I reasoned that he was fine. It was a long, fussy bout of crying that never escalated. He eventually fell back asleep, and it wasn't until I went in to wake him the next morning that I pieced together the distress of the evening before. The crying in the night.

His head was caked in dried barf. His mattress was strewn with half-digested strawberries and other things I didn't guess at. I felt terrible.

Thank goodness he is forgiving.

So began a long day of barfing and clinginess. Twice I nursed him, only to have him immediately spew it all back out. The TV took over parenting Asher for the day while I tried to keep Finn happy and hydrated. I wrestled with the guilt that all parents of multiple children have at times. And prayed that Finn would recover and the rest of us would be well.

Friday was a heaven-sent reprieve. Finn was better, and so we went to the park for a play date with Asher's friends, soaking in the 70-degrees of sunshine. 

It was the sort of almost-spring day that makes you never want to come in, for fear that winter will come howling back and drop a foot of snow. I even took down my Christmas lights (finally!), while the boys coordinated in concurrently taking very long naps.

It was a truly marvelous day, complete with dinner provided by Pizza Hut (my weakness when gluten-free Dave is not around)...until Asher erupted all over the middle of the kitchen floor. And again, from the bathtub. And again, and again, and again. He found the process so disturbing that he resolved that he simply would.not.barf. I kept my eyes glued on him to see when he was about to vomit, and then tried in vain to shove a bowl under him or whisk him off to the toilet. This set him in a panic, where he would leverage all the strength of his little body into pushing me and my receptacle away, whilst convulsing against the demon within him. Up it would come, and he would gulp it back down. Eventually some measure of it would escape, and he would find relief for a few moments.

Somehow in the midst of this I tucked Finn into bed, grateful that at least they had not been sick at the same time. Asher was in bed soon after, but with little hope of him sleeping. I set up camp for a long night. Every 15 or 20 minutes, I would rush into his room at the sound of a cough, and we would repeat the ritual. I rubbed his back, stroked his hair, and begged him to just let it happen. Stubborn boy that he is, he fought a good barf for hours and thus never got the relief that it brings. Each time I tucked him back in, his exhausted eyes would droop and he would mutter faintly, "Goodnight! See you next later," hand fluttering above his blanket.

At 12:45 he finally had a solid upchuck, and so I changed his sheets and we both slept for a couple hours. And then a couple more hours. At 5:30 Finn finally woke up to nurse, and as soon as I opened his bedroom door, I could smell that something was very wrong. He had thrown up all over his sheets again. I changed him, hopeful that I could still nurse him back to sleep. Even before I finished, he threw it all back up. Into the tub we both went, and I sent an urgent text to Dave, pleading for him to come home. He had extended his work trip for a day to go hiking in a remote area near Vernal, which was fine by me the previous day when both kids were healthy. Even one sick kid I could handle. But two was a nightmare.

Dave, however, had turned off his phone to conserve the battery. By the time he saw my message and was ready to go, it was 11:00. And he was a seven-hour drive away. I would have to make it alone, one more day. I prepped the living room for a barf-fest, and prayed that I wouldn't get sick too. Or that I could hold off until Dave was home. That's when the realization hit me. I had prayed that I would rely more on Heavenly Father to help me as a mother. And He had given me a trial that demanded I rely on Him, and him alone. To this point I had handled the whole situation bravely, with humor even. I felt that I was being helped. And I laughed at the immediacy, and the manner in which He had answered that prayer.

I covered the floor in towels and a tarp. I have never done so much laundry in my life!

Asher continued to fight the losing battle, until even I felt sick just watching him. And hearing him. I have never been one to get sick vicariously, but even the most iron-stomached among us would feel queazy at hearing someone repeatedly swallow his own vomit. As the day wore on, my stomach felt more and more unsettled. Was it merely a visceral reaction to Asher? Anxiety about caring for two barfing beings on my own? Or the much-dreaded alternative?

By early afternoon I was sure. My stomach churned and emitted pangs of foreshadowing torment. I too was possessed by the demon. It swirled around my innards until I released it from one end or the other, always a violent process. It is an alarming dilemma, deciding which end needs the toilet more urgently. My words to Asher mocked me, "You can't stop it from happening. You just have to let it out." As much as I could, I laid on the couch, inane cartoons cycling endlessly. At one point I spewed into the barf bowl on the couch while Finn tugged at my leg and Asher shrieked at me to change his show. As much as possible, I avoided moving. Asher dozed on the couch, and I managed to nurse Finn to sleep at nap time without throwing up on him. I tried to keep drinking because Finn wouldn't take anything besides breast milk.

Eventually, Dave did come home. Asher was watching who knows what, and I was huddled next to my barf bowl on the bedroom floor. "What do you need me to do?"

"Just take care of the kids."

And so I slept. Drifting off to the sounds of two boys happy to play with their dad, feeling the surge of energy that comes when one is on the mend. I woke feeling that the tide had turned, put Finn to bed. And we all slept.

Today I woke feeling confident that we would all finally be well. Until I retrieved Asher from his bedroom, and found that he had thrown up again. Stripped the bed. (Have I ever done so much laundry in a 24-hour period?) Repeated the process of trying to keep something in him.  Watched him immediately barf up the most benign things. Fretted over his shriveled lips and ghostly complexion. Resigned myself to a new way of life.

After three days, Finn finally found his appetite. Eventually Asher came around too (7-Up does the trick, I tell you). It was a day of bumming around the house, trying to retrieve some modicum of order, pushing the fluids, lots and lots of laundry. Guts rumbling sourly, but not violently. I think tomorrow will put us back on our feet. But poor Dave. The destroying angel makes another pass.

Them Boys

Asher is doing fabulously in primary. As the youngest child in his class by four months, and the youngest boy by nine months, I was very concerned about his maturity. I fretted that he would cry to go back to nursery, that his spirit would be crushed by being made to sit and be quiet in the more structured confines of primary. I worried needlessly.

Today the primary president approached me in the parking lot. "I just wanted to tell you that Asher is doing great! The bishop came in to primary today, and Asher immediately yelled, 'We're in primary!'" 

Further emphasizing his enthusiasm, Asher peered up at her with his clear blue eyes and declared charmingly, "Give me a hug!" He proceeded to give her a hug, and once she bent over, "Give me a kiss!" And so she did. And then he told her good-bye about 20 times. 

Whenever I pick Asher up after class, he yells, "Momma!", runs, flings his arms around me, shares whatever treasure he's been given, and immediately tells me how much fun he had with all of his "friends." It's seriously like something out of a movie. On the drive home I told him how pleased I was to hear that he's so well-behaved, and he just looked out the window with a half-concealed grin.

I'll never get past those eyes of his, heaven help me.

Asher is genuinely just a sweet, indomitably happy kid. I used to think I was a very patient person, but he has since proved me otherwise. Regardless, it's nearly impossible to rain on his parade. Sometimes I think he's a steep learning curve for a first child, but I also appreciate his hardy feelings that so effortlessly withstand my frequent frustration with him. I don't know if I deserve it, but this week he has told me, "You important," "You face wook cute. You hair wook cute," (it didn't)  and "You great!" He lavishes his "Thank yous," and "Good jobs!" I have been congratulated on successfully backing out of the driveway through a snow drift, and been compelled to give him two high fives for a superior diaper change. Today he picked a random person at church and repeatedly told him, "Good job! Gimme five!" I only witnessed it as we were leaving, but the man informed me that Asher had done it several times throughout the meetings.

One of my favorite Asher stories ever took place a few weeks ago when our little family attended a 60th birthday party for Dave's coworker, Mike. We were at Mike's house, and though Asher wasn't familiar with anyone there, he immediately made himself at home. At one point, Asher was playing with a helium balloon, which got away from him. Asher asked Mike to get the balloon for him, and then gestured that he should bend over. As a token of his gratitude, Asher gave Mike a big kiss on the forehead!

These are the things I must remember, when Asher is being the very essence of a three-year-old. This week he had a grand mal meltdown over his inability to whistle. He laid on the floor, straining, apparently unable to stand(?), making a moaning noise and half-pursing his lips. He would occasionally wail, "Need to help my mouf!" As if I could arrange his mouth properly and he would immediately sound like a meadowlark. The whole thing climaxed with him screaming and throwing his sandwich on the floor, which got him sent to his room.

Lately, he has been fighting naps and I'm afraid he might be phasing them out entirely. (Sob.) I still really need him to take them, and he is atrocious in the evenings without them. I can leave him in his room for a couple hours in the afternoons sometimes, but instead of sleeping he will strip his bed to the mattress, climb on his dresser, unscrew the lightbulb in his lamp and bang it against the wall, unplug the camera monitor...you name it. I adore that child so much it hurts sometimes, but we need our daily break from each other.

Finn is remarkably sweet and easy. His smile makes me feel as gooey as a Cadbury egg inside. Was Asher so easy at this age, and Finn is merely a breeze by comparison to Asher's three-year-old self? I can't say for sure. [Hence we blog for future reference.] All I can say is that Finn is a dream. He is always sweet, nearly always happy, and never throws tantrums. Unlike Asher, he eats practically anything. Asher loves his brother but has the usual dose of stinkery-ness that prompts him to see just how much Finn will put up with before he squawks. It's usually more than I am willing to put up with. Finn rolls with the punches very well. He can be found grinning, tongue protruding over his one tooth, from the bottom of a pile of couch cushions. He utters only the briefest exclamation of indignation when Asher places a similar pile of cushions as a roadblock to him.

Finn is not in any great hurry to walk, but he is progressing. I would pit him against any baby in an all-fours race though. Sometimes, if he sees something truly irresistible, he tucks his chin and hauls diaper at maximum capacity. I really need to get video of it before he's done crawling. Mostly he follows the rest of us around like an adoring puppy, tongue constantly hanging out (trying to sort out that one tooth?), until we stop and he can climb a leg. It's impossible not to scoop him up and award him a halo of kisses.

If I wore lipstick every day, his whole head would be pink.

Finn is more like me in temperament. He is undoubtedly far more sensitive than his brother, both physically and emotionally. He cries when he gets hurt (normal I know, but Asher hardly did at this age), and is very attuned to facial expressions and tone of voice. I have to be far more careful in how I talk to him. Even when I am not angry, an exclamation of surprise or apprehension can make him fall to pieces. I am starting to really understand how parents have to use different tactics to raise different kids.

His speech is coming along very well. It's so foreign to me that he should be starting to talk, or that it should not be so difficult to get him to repeat me! He first said "Mama!" at seven months, and clearly in reference to me. Since he has said, "Da-da!", "Hi!" (to a man at the Republican caucus on Tuesday), and today he said, "Bye-bye." He waves, points, and plays peek-a-boo. He will sign "milk" sometimes, and is picking up "more." I suppose this is all typical behavior for an almost one-year-old, but I am in awe.

Most of all, I am in denial that he will turn one next week. I'm honestly kind of sad about it. That first year with Asher seemed to go a lot slower. With Asher I've been happy every birthday, looking forward to the new horizons that each year holds. It's different with Finn. I still feel like he should be my little newborn that only wants to cuddle and nurse. I suppose this is very typical for younger children, but it makes me a little scared for the future. I want more kids, but is each one going to grow up faster than the last? What happens when my very last baby turns one? I am going to be a wreck. Please stop me before I have ten kids.

A Week in the Life: Poop, Cake, and Striptease

Monday: There are no weekends for moms, but there ARE mondays. Monday, when I crack down on my messy house, and Dave usually doesn't get home from the gym after work until nearly seven o'clock. We try to squeeze in a brief family home evening before the kids go to bed, which happens somewhere in that Goldilocks zone between Dad Needs to Make an Appearance and Mom's Last Nerve. I fully support Dave working out, but I was a little relieved to see the following text message:

"Maybe I'll just work out at home tonight. Miss my family."

Sitting around the backyard campfire, we eked out that brief window of the day which is always my favorite. Everyone is home. Exhausted in our various ways—Asher: Excessively rambunctious, in equal parts provoking his dad to play and staving off fatigue; Finn: Occasionally fussy, but always goodnatured; Me: Trying to tune out the circus in an attempt to finally engage another adult in conversation; David: Quietly trying to appease both boys while following my pent-up flow of soliloquy. We sat around the fire, passing our bundled babe back and forth and intermittently warning Asher about the consequences of throwing this or that on the fire. Eventually Asher's composure dissolved and we called it a night. Not bad for a monday.


Tuesday: I sneaked off for lunch with a friend after a rather sorry attempt at working out together. (Small children + aforementioned appetite for conversation = sad workout.) Finn fell asleep in the car and Asher watched a show on the electronic babysitter. For once I got to eat my food at the same time as everyone else, and it was still warm. (It was Cafe Rio anyway, which I would pretty much eat out of the gutter.) It's the little things.

That night while I was eating dinner, I looked under the table and saw this:

Asher says: "Firetruck gassing up!" (That is laptop charger.)

I was impressed. Dave was disappointed that Asher has decided on electric.

Wednesday: I was brave/stupid enough to take both kids to the pool on my own, as part of the church playgroup I attend. The swimming is the easy part. The rec center has a shallow, warm kiddie pool with slides and playground equipment that is well-matched to Asher's skill level, so I mostly just have to worry about Finn. The post-swim routine is the doozy. I refuse to put my finger-sucking, crawling baby on the floor of a public locker room. So just imagine trying to undress, wash, dry, and re-dress three people, all one-handed. One of those people acts like a blender with no lid, the other is as slick as a bar of soap when wet and naked, and the third requires a bra. (Go ahead and try to clasp a bra one-handed behind your back.)

The swimming part went better than expected. A fellow mom allowed me to borrow her baby lounger flotation device, and from the faraway look on Finn's face, he was apparently taken back to his days in the womb #blissedout. All was going well until 20 minutes after we got there, when the lifeguard announced that there was poop in the gutter, and the pool had to be evacuated for an hour. In the hubbub that ensued (during which Asher dashed off and jumped back into the poop pool) I lost track of the other moms (I later learned they retreated to the hot tubs). Because Asher isn't big enough to navigate the lazy river or lap pool we opted to leave. 

We spent more time in the locker room than we had in the pool. Finn did not appreciate the shower, nor did he enjoy the acrobatics of a mom trying to get him dressed and dry while herself being wet and cold and unable to set him down. Asher vacillated between unlocking the door to our family locker room and playing with the grate over the shower drain. When at last we left, I felt no cleaner than I did the moment I dived back into the poopy pool to retrieve my errant Asher.

Thursday:  I took the boys on a walk to the library. I made Asher own up to what he did to this library book:

I am still finding confetti-sized pieces of this book.

For some reason, I still got him more books. Can you blame me for being swindled by this face?

This book was a major score. He loves the TV show.

That night I went to the last session of my cake-decorating class. Initially I was a little hesitant about the class. It was a friend's idea, and I'm not planning on pursuing cake-decorating. I realize now that I haven't really got out and done something just for me since Finn was born, and at the onset I was hesitant to take the time for something I'm not "serious" about. But, it was SO worth it! Here are some of the things I made:

Valentine's Day cupcakes

My first time torting a cake. This five-layered baby is covered in chocolate buttercream and filled with raspberry jam.

It must be noted that this gaudy cake was a gag. Our friends came to town after my final class, when I was learning to make buttercream roses. He had just had a birthday, and he has three daughters (#4 is on the way). Being a manly man like my husband, we have fun teasing him about the girly-ness that surrounds him. This cake paid homage to that theme.

I stayed up until til 3 or 4 am finishing my masterpieces after class more than once, but had a ton of fun. I've concluded that I need to make doing things that I enjoy a greater priority, as it makes me a much happier mom and better wife. Watching TV while folding laundry doesn't really count, even if it's all I have time for most days.

Friday: I spent way too long reading up on various makes and models of carseats for the boys. Dave is convinced that I have bought Asher the most cumbersome model out there. I am convinced that carseats for three-year-olds are generally a pain in the tuchus. I think of all the gizmos that are standard issue baby gear now, that my parents surely didn't have, and wonder what they'll come up with by the time my grandkids are born. I think carseats have the most room for improvement. Someday I'll tell my children about hauling Asher's 25-lb steel frame behemoth of a carseat through airport security as we island-hopped Hawaii, and they will be dumbfounded.

That night Dave's brother Chris came to stay, along with his wife Susie and their son Liam (two months younger than Finn.) Good news: Finn is gaining on Liam, who dwarfed him at their last meeting. Girls stomped the boys at Sequence. Bad news: Finn was scared of Liam. Donald Trump is probably going to get the Republican nomination (not pertinent to Friday, but a major topic of conversation that night. I detest him.)

Saturday: The menfolk took off for a day in the mountains while Susie and I hung with the kids. I took Asher to Lowe's, where we (I) built him a little monster truck toy. In addition to the free toy, it's important that the kids get a certificate "of merit" for "building" it.

They put the wrong name for "Builder."

It's basically impossible for all of us to leave the house when you have three kids off-setting their naps, but I watched the sprouts while Susie caught a temple session. Let's just say...Liam likes his mom. And Finn is pretty good doing his own thing, until someone else is laying claim to his mom. These were the happier moments:

Sunday/Today: Sacrament meeting was amazing! Okay, I still can't even remember the talks, but we were on time and the kids were happy throughout. Asher wanted to "cuddle" with me the whole time, and Finn mostly spent his time repeatedly dropping a toy over the pew for the gentleman behind me to retrieve. Dave pretty much got off scotch free. No fair.

After church, Asher took off his shirt and spun it around in the air before tossing it aside. Chippendales couldn't have done it better. I don't know where he gets these things. He refused to take his nap despite several attempts (from me, not him). Dave finally went in to retrieve him, at which point he was found standing on his dresser, light bulb unscrewed from his lamp, banging the thing against his wall.

Finn has exactly one tooth, which makes him look like the world's most charming hill billy. He is getting more and more mobile. He may be a shrimp compared to his cousin, but he's a rocket when it comes to crawling! He pulls himself up easily and walks along things.

"Look ma, one hand!"

And here is a random picture of him that I'm going to shoehorn in here because it's adorable and doesn't fit anywhere in this post. Have a great week!

Peanut butter and kiwi: works as both a facial scrub and hair mask!

Start Where You Are

Once, when I was having a conversation with my sister about catching up on my (previous) blog and filling in the gaps of all that had happened, she advised me to just "Start where you are."

I feel like I've missed so much. I have only a handful of posts since Asher was born, which was now more than three years ago. All of them were written even before I got pregnant with Finn. So, setting aside the desire to document the last three years, which will inevitably bog me down and result in me not writing at all, here I am. Now.

I've been wracking my brains for inspiration on what to write about for days, and come up with nada. Frankly, I'm in a bit of a funk. Feeling very February-ish around here. It's a mercy that February is so short (thank you, King Numa). So, where I am now is grumpy and very ADHD. But I'm "dressing out" anyway, even if my panties are in a twist.

I'm feeling pulled in roughly 413 directions. I know what is most important: my family, my home, my spiritual development. But sometimes, sometimes...the Priscilla in me rears up and I want to do EVERYTHING. In most ways I strive to be like my mom and consider her an exemplar, but in this way I sometimes wish I was less like her. She had the energy of three people, which somehow allowed her to raise seven children, work part-time (typically at night), and have several very time-consuming hobbies. 

I want to be a fantastic writer. My fantasy career is to be a novelist, and I have an idea for a book (series?) that I've kicked around for years and never taken a run at. I want to paint. Art was my primary passion growing up, and frankly it's what I'm best at. I want to be a fabulous baker and decorate everything like a masterpiece. I'm nearing the end of a month-long cake-decorating class and not to brag, but I'm pretty good at it. The Great British Baking Show has ruined me for haphazard baking, people. I want to take up violin lessons again. I took them for a couple of years as a kid, and have promised myself that after I accomplished this or that, I would take them up again. Hasn't happened. I want to finally figure out how to use my camera, but every time I have a go at it I just end up frustrated with all the settings that I don't understand and my kids who won't sit still. I want to plant a beautiful and bountiful garden come spring, but I actually have no idea what I'm doing, and I have to kill my neighbors' new dogs if I want to be able to enjoy my backyard this summer. (Let's get real though: It's February and I still have Christmas lights on my house). I want my home to be impeccably decorated, clean, and organized, but it's been six months since I painted my living room and I still haven't hung up new family photos. (I want to put up recent pics of my boys, but I don't know how to use my camera.) I want to learn to cook fabulous Thai food like the lady in the little cart downtown that my husband frequents, but so far everything I make comes out bland or tasting only of soy sauce. My New Year's resolution was to manage my time better, and more specifically to be punctual, but all that's really happened is that I'm more angry with myself (and my kids) every time I'm late. I want to finish the book I started reading for the January book club that I didn't go to, as well as the other three on my docket, but lately I can't even finish the books I start. I want to exercise and really, REALLY get in good shape before I hit 30, but that requires that I manage my time better. It would be nice to get everything real high and tight, but see, I can't even write a blog post that's high and tight. 

Those are just my personal goals. I haven't even mentioned the things I want as a mother. Asher, my sweet little border collie, needs a LOT of attention and physical exertion to keep him happy and keep his hyperactivity in check. His speech, for which he received therapy for over a year, is now within normal range, but perhaps still on the delayed end of the spectrum. I've looked into doing a bit of homeschool with him, but—you guessed it—haven't actually started on it. He is hopelessly picky, so much so that he actually threw up several times the other night because he hated my chicken dinner. (I've got a book that will supposedly fix him, if I can ever get around to starting it.) Finn is growing okay now, I think. He had a three-month period where he basically did not grow, and though he's picked up the pace again, the worry still nags at me. He's nearing toddler-hood, that blissful period where he gets into EVERYthing and does not understand "no." Not looking forward to that. They offset their naps now, which basically makes it impossible to leave the house from noon until six o'clock.

I realize almost all of this pressure is self-imposed. I get that I do it to myself. I'm starting to realize that being an adult is very much about picking the few things that are important and chipping away at them, and letting go of the rest. Being okay with "good enough" is a sign of maturity. So is realizing that there are seasons of life, and the things that frustrate me will change.

I live an incredibly privileged life. I know that, and I am genuinely happy. I have beautiful, fun children that I generally consider a blessing beyond what I deserve. My husband is loyal and hard-working and complements my weaknesses nearly perfectly. He's done with grad school, and so now he even does dishes and laundry sometimes. We have a comfortable home in a safe place. I have better friends than I've ever had in my whole life. We are healthy. We don't have to worry about money. I have the gospel, which gives me the perspective to know that most of these things I worry about are merely distractions from what is most important.

What's most important is God and family. But, I know that I must do some things for my own happiness. I just feel so incredibly ADHD lately that I've become abysmal at follow-through. And I have a very hard time being okay with putting something out there that falls far short of what I know I'm capable of. The fact that I'm going to hit "Publish" on this loose and saggy blog post is "exposure therapy" to exorcise that demon. Promise me, dear readership of eight, that you won't let me quit my blog? And I will promise you something. I will be more chipper. I am not typically melancholy. It's just where I am right now.

Ten years

My mom died 10 years ago today. She's been gone now for more than a third of my life. My whole adult life, really. Sometimes a trigger will bring her rushing back, but mostly she feels very, very far away. Everything about her—from the way she cleared her throat to the roughness of her garden-callused hands—I try to hold close, but she is slowly slipping further from me. She sinks beneath the currents of all that has happened since, until all I can see is the form of her, and then nothing but my own reflection staring back at me. The memories have been dredged up so many times, my mind distorting them a little more each time. Who knows what was real, and what is my faulty re-imagining?

I don't have a place for her in my life. Last I knew her, I was a kid sleeping on the bottom bunk with a freshly-minted driver's license. Six months after she was gone, so was I. In college, with new friends and new dreams, reinventing myself. Ten months later, I was married. Ten years after her exit, everything has changed. I live in a different state, have two kids, I've completed college, am married to a man she never met...I don't think I can overstate how isolated the memories of her feel to me now. Did you know that butterflies can remember what they learned as caterpillars? It seems incredible, but so can I. I wonder if they believe it really happened, or if it just feels like a dream.

This is different for my six older siblings, who all lived on their own before my mother died. She met their spouses; some had children before she died. They had adult conversations with her, they asked her things an adult would ask and got to know her as a contemporary rather than just as a child. So much of what I know about her as a person—not as my mother, but as a complex individual with dreams and flaws and fears—comes from interviewing my siblings about her. I never had those conversations.

They can sit with her in memory and feel at home in ways I cannot, because she walked further with them.

Really, this is why my memories of her are fading. Memories only stay with us if we revisit them. What then, could summon her? Nothing to do with my children, my husband, my current residence or interests recalls a context in which I can place her. How can I even postulate what she would say or think of my rambunctious three-year-old, when we left off at conversations about high school boys and homework assignments? 

There are stages of grief beyond The Big Five, stages of nostalgia and nuance. At this point I don't cry about her passing; I don't blame or get angry or feel depressed. But it does still hurt, and what hurts is the forgetting. It's the fact that I'm slowly losing her more and more, that I didn't just lose her once. All that I had of her ten years ago this night was memories, and I have fewer of them now than I did then.

All that's left of any of us, after we die, are memories. We all know that, but most do a poor job of preserving them. We rely on those we love to remember us, and they try their best. Someday, my children and grandchildren will live in a different place and do different things with different people than they did when I left them. At that point I hope to have made a record of myself, of the little things and the big things. I don't expect to be pithy or clever very often. No one beyond my family and a few friends will care what I put here. My life is not very exciting. But what would I give to know how my mother felt on days like I had today, wrangling two little boys through sacrament meeting and desperately trying to get them to go.to.sleep. Perhaps no one else in the world would care, but such a record would be precious to me.

I revisit all of this now, as the two ends of this solemn realization rush at me from both sides. Ever since I had a child, my life has been on fast forward. I realize what older folks always say is true: It all goes by so fast. Anyone who literally watches an infant grow from day to day gains a profound understanding of that fact. And looming over this journey I have taken in to the foreign land of parenthood are so many, many questions I have for my own mother. Questions that I hope to answer for my own children, someday.