I remember hearing a joke once about a husband that came home from work to find his house in a disaster.  There were snow skis on the roof, the family dog was outside chasing the cat and the furniture sat on the front lawn.  When he ran inside to see what had happened it was even worse.  The kids were running wild and the house was turned completely upside down.  Thinking that something was horribly wrong with his wife, he scrambled to find her.  After searching the entire house, he desperately looked in the last place he could think. There she was, sitting in their bed with a big bowl of ice cream.  Panic stricken he bellowed out, "Are you OK?!  What is GOING ON?!"  His wife calmly looked at her husband with a spoon in her hand and replied, "You know how you always ask me what it is that I could possibly 'do' all day long?...Well...today I didn't do it." 
  I'm lucky to have a husband that doesn't go crazy when he comes home to a house that is wild.  Between the kids, the dishes, laundry, toys, pancake syrup and Lord knows what else, it's hard to tell what he's going to find.  It feels like sometimes we're just hanging on in survival mode.  I can only hope that one day our house will be spotless, the dishes done and laundry put away.  Until that day we'll keep having fun and getting by.  We might even have a couple bowls of ice cream while we're at it. 

After our daughter schwacked her hair off right before Christmas, one of my favorite friends found an adorable hair styling set for her to play with.  It was such a great idea to get her to fix her hair without cutting it again.  It turns out that she can't get enough of it.  She wants to style her hair, my hair, the cat's "hair."  Yesterday I heard her lure her latest client/victim into her salon.  Our four year old son was helpless to her charm.  He sat patiently as she danced around him primping away.  It's something to see how he interacts with his two big brothers in one way, then with her in another.  When he's playing with our older boys he usually ends up being more of a moving target than anything.  He has quickly learned that the faster he runs, the more likely he can avoid whatever his brothers have coming to him.  With his little sister though he's a protector.  He helps her and takes care of her.  Sure they fight and argue about almost anything, but when it comes down to it, he's there for her.  It's these moments I'll always remember.  I hope they will continue to grow a bond between them that will last forever...one haircut at a time.

Here we go.  Sweat pants, t-shirt, running shoes, pony tail.  I stare at the ominous treadmill and we have a stand off.  It's 8:00 am.  The two older boys are in school and the two younger kids are strategically placed in front of their favorite morning show downstairs.  It's time.  I get on the conveyer belt and push the start button.  30 seconds pass with a pretty good warm up.  One minute...I get ready to turn the speed up from a fast walk to a slow jog.  One minute, thirty seconds..."MOMMY!  Can we have a DRIIIINK?!"  I hit the Stop button, go down the stairs, get two cups of milk, then back up the stairs aaaaaand press the Start button.  Two minutes, three, four, to a little faster jog..."MOMMY!  Lauren spilled her DRIIINK!"  Stop button...Down the stairs, clean, clean, clean, up the stairs....Start button.  Five minutes and a slow run to keep the heart rate up from the built-in stair master I just finished.  Six minutes, seven..."MOOOOOMMY!!!  Can we have some eggs?"  Stop, down, eggs, up, Start.  Eight minutes and I can hardly breathe.  I'm sweating and my hair smells like eggs.  Nine minutes, running fast, ten, eleven..."MOMMY!  The tv show is OOOOVER!"  Stop, down, tv off, up, collapse and done.  THIS is why I'm not a runner.

So here's what happened.  The kids were playing with their toys yesterday and I heard two of the boys begin to fight.  They were arguing over who had what car first and who's turn it was now.  The name calling began to fly..."That one's MINE you Jerk!"  "No it isn't you Baby Pants!"...and my personal favorite..."YES it IS you Underwear Head!"  I knew I should be grateful that the words weren't worse.  My husband used to be a fighter pilot.  He flew the F-15 E Strike Eagle and had an unclassified training video that I watched once.  I say once because I was so shocked at how different he was in the jet.  He somehow managed to put words and phrases together that I have never heard used in the same context by any human being...ever.  I hadn't heard him talk like that before.  I had to understand that when he was "fighting" he became a different person...necessarily so in his field.  I tried to remind myself of this when our own boys were fighting yesterday.  On a much lighter level, they might say or do things that wouldn't normally occur when not in the heat of battle.  Our job is to teach them how to work things out together.  I know that one day they will have more pressing matters in life and things will undoubtedly become more complicated than playing with cars.  When that happens, I hope they will always have each other to count on, Underwear Heads or not.

Last night we were at my Mom and Dad's.  Before we left, we decided to give the kids a bath and snuggle them in their PJ's before taking our car ride home.  When it was time to go, we loaded the kids in the car and within ten minutes of our trip, three of the four kids were out like a light.  We continued to drive through the back country roads under the night sky.  One little voice was heard singing songs and talking to the moon. Our little girl was wide awake and began to ask questions about the stars, the trees, anything to avoid shutting her eyes.  She did pretend to close them once only to act like her brothers.  She had a big smile and quietly whispered, "Wook Mommy!  I'm Sweeping too!"
  I'll never forget the day she was born.  My Mother-in-law said to us that it would be perfect because, "Between my husband and myself, God gave us each two hands.  Now we could hold the four of them together...one in each hand."  That sounded great in theory, but God forgot to tell us how to get them all to fall asleep at the same time.  We used to swear that the kids had designed a system where they would high-five each other throughout all hours of the night taking turns waking us up...sort of like a tag team.  We wondered if they secretly plotted elaborate schedules and charts for each night of the week.  Our oldest son would take the 1:00 am shift on down the line.
  By the time we made it home last night, our little girl had actually fallen asleep.  We quietly took them out of the car and put each of them in their beds.  There were no "high-fives" last night, no tag teams.  All four little ones stayed sound asleep throughout the night. When that happens, it's like a miracle.  It never fails though, just when we get a taste of a night or two of solid sleep, I hear that sweet little voice call from down the hall saying, "Mommy, I can't sweep!" and then I wait quietly to listen for the sound of a high-five and a giggle.

 

Two of the most wonderful words any parent can hear from a child who's potty training are "I'm Done!"  That feeling of success, that pride and accomplishment.  There's something about going potty like a big kid, that makes one swell with pride.  They say potty training is different with boys than with girls.  Our little girl is almost there as a new three year old.  Some people scoff at this saying that she should have been trained months ago.  We, on the other hand, are giddy.  Our three boys were pretty close to looking at getting their drivers' licenses before they were out of pull-ups.  Before we had kids I was always against bribing with food or treats.  I was a firm believer that children needed routine and consistency.  Then we HAD kids.  When our first son came around, it got to the point where we all but offered him a pony just to get him to use the bathroom.  Our second son was even harder.  The only way he would go "potty" was if he stripped down to nothing at all.  We figured, "Whatever works."  That's fine until you get a call on the first day of preschool because your child is walking around the classroom buck naked saying, "I'm DONE!"
  When our little girl is finally potty trained I don't even know what we'll do.  It will be so strange to get in the car for the first time in years without a diaper bag.  No messy wipes, no sudden fragrant smells wafting through the car.  I think I might sit for a minute just to take it all in.  Then I'll look at my husband with a big smile on my face and say, "We're Done!"

What do you get when you put a group of four-year old sluggers on a field for t-ball practice?  The world's biggest sandbox.  Baseball season is in full swing and the boys can hardly see straight.  You can imagine our surprise then when our youngest son became more interested making "roads" in the dirt than playing ball.  Oh the practice started off well enough.  We actually sat in the bleachers and giggled at how both our son's helmet and bat were bigger than he was.  The first time he hit the ball off the T, he raised his bat like a sword and took off flying around the bases like he was charging a dragon.  He didn't want to let go of his bat, but didn't know what else to do with it.  We even started to wonder if he would run right into the fence as he rounded third base.  He couldn't see a thing from under his helmet. 
  Needless to say, he made it to home plate safely, sword in hand.  With the attention span of a group of four-year old kids though, it only took about half an hour or so for them to start playing in the dirt.  It gave us a whole new appreciation for any coach that is willing to take on such cute little kids who have no clue of what to do, at least in baseball that is.  I think they have dragon slaying and moat building pretty much covered.  

Last night as we sat around the dinner table one of our beautifully mannered boys "passed gas."  As the kitchen turned into snorts of laughter our three year old little girl proudly announced that her brother's "booty burped."  Again, being the proud mother of these wonderfully behaved children - I wasn't exactly sure what she said.  "His what?" I asked.  She laughed again and said, "Mommy!  His Booty Burped!"  How do they come up with these things?  I understand that a lot of their expressions may come from tv or who knows where, but I don't know that "booty burps" have even been in the English language until last night.
  One thing we have learned quickly with young children is that you have to discover a whole new way to speak.  Take for instance our four year old.  He would ask for the "witch" during meals for weeks and get so frustrated when absolutely no one knew what he meant.  Finally one night during dinner he was eating a salad and sighed saying, "I love witch dressing so much."
  Our second son would do the same types of things.  Anytime we got in the car he would ask if we could try a new "haircut."  We could literally leave the barber shop and get in the car, only to hear Ethan say, "Can we try a new haircut?"  My husband and I would go bonkers.  Sure enough, we were traveling to my Mom and Dad's house and happened to take a different way.  Ethan got so excited and shouted from the back, "I love it when we take a new haircut Dad!  Will we get there sooner now?"  You have got to be kidding.
  So, from "Booty burps" to "Witch Dressing" and haircuts, we'll continue to learn this new language.  It's hard to imagine what they'll come up with next but I guess that's half the fur.  

Our two older boys used to snore.  I don't mean cute "little kid snore," I mean when we would check on them at night it sounded like a truck stop - kind of snore.  A couple of years ago at their dentist appointment it was discovered that they both had huge tonsils.  We were referred to a specialist and it was confirmed that in fact, they had monster tonsils that needed to come out.  Now - I'm a big fan of keeping all of your body parts so I was a little more than apprehensive about this.  We were told that they would sleep better not only now, but as adults - while possibly preventing them from dealing with sleep apnea or other problems.  The surgery was set, both boys had their tonsils taken out on the same day, then came home to recover side by side, bowls of ice cream in hand.  The craziest part about it was when we checked on them at night, you could hear a pin drop.  We had to put our noses up to theirs to make sure they were still breathing.  Total silence.  It's been that way every night for the past couple of years until we heard the "bear cave" return.  I shot my husband a "That's impossible" look as we searched for the source.  It wasn't coming from our oldest son, or our second but sure enough - our third.  Right there as loud as a buzz saw was our sweet little boy, snoring like a sailor.  I guess we'll have to see what the dentist says at his next check-up and hope for the best.  For now, it looks like we have a third little snoring bear in our house.  We can't help but wonder if our baby girl will turn out to be a "Goldilocks" or bear number four.

Everyday it's the same thing.  My husband and I crawl out of bed asking ourselves why we stayed up so late the night before.  We swear that tonight we'll get to bed earlier.  We wake our two older boys up and immediately begin the routine of "shushing" them to keep them quiet so they won't wake their younger brother and sister up.  Inevitably, our three year old and four year old hear the morning commotion downstairs and make their way to the kitchen, rubbing their eyes.  Today began no differently.  We hustled about, getting breakfast and packing school lunches.  Out of nowhere, my husband broke our morning routine to call us all outside.  Right there, big as life was the most perfect rainbow I had ever seen.  It went from end to end and filled the whole sky.  In my entire life I have only seen a full rainbow one other time.  We stood in awe.  Who would have thought that right outside our door was such an amazing thing and we all would have hurried by without even noticing.  It taught me a good lesson on this first day of Spring.  Pay attention to what God puts right in front of you.  It's so easy to lose sight of the important things.
  Yes, on this fine Spring day I had a good reminder to slow down and pay attention.  It's always good to take time to enjoy the good stuff.