rain rain, don't go away....mommy likes to keep them in

Yeah, it is pouring, chilly dark....which makes it cozy in here. But it would be cozier if mommy would get in the kitchen and start making dinner....soup, I am thinking....and some banana bread. But given me current state of laziness combined with naseua, the kitchen is not where I want to be. So I am doing my favorite thing, blogging while procrastinating. A few of the kids are going to soccer practice tonight (indoor), and Ben is taking them. So their mom really SHOULD start dinner.....

But mommy is tired. See, last night Miss Camille was awful. Really awful, to the tune of getting up 10 times or so. Each time I nursed her and settled her back in, I was optimistic that she would stay asleep this time. So I covered up, relaxed, dozed...and ugh, she was awake again before I knew it. It was rough, but honestly all during it, I was doing alot thinking, and talking to God. Here I am with everything I could possibly need, and much more, and how quickly I get distraught. Yeah, there are ways to get this straightened out, about her sleeping, but that can't happen yet since we are going to a hotel for two nights, and I need to be able to nurse her still if she wakes up when we are there...ha, IF. I am just full of optimism, or I am just plain stupid. I prefer the optimistic......anyway, I survived, barely. I could not get up this morning, as she was finally asleep. So I decided to sleep a bit and take the kids in to school late, the three little girls. Well, fine and dandy, but Evelyn came in and not only woke me up informing me that they missed the bus, but she woke up the dreaded Camille, too. So, my day was started....ready or not.....

Abigail had not left for classes yet and was able to drive them to school, thankfully. So we had a nice quiet relaxing day at home...ha. Jon so nicely gave Camille his plate of potatoes when he was finished, and though she doesn't EAT potatoes, she does play in them. She emptied the towel/washcloth drawer, and threw lots of ponytail holders and barrettes around. Then, when I was sitting at the table, she came in, stood on the bench, put her leg up on the table, and spanked her own leg! Yes, I have had to give her a few little lovepats, complete with my serious face and stern voice. I can't remember my other ones being so busy, but then these things tend to blur....anyway, she is kind of understanding that she just CANNOT get into whatever she wants to. (she discovered that if the dishwasher isn't latched, she can open it, and climb up on the door, instant stool!) Her little pink chair spends alot of time up on the counter.

Well, I need to buy balloons, according to Jonathan. And according to me, I need to make dinner. Tonight, of all nights, I wish there was someone who would cook for me....

easter cookies

Camille likes to feed babydoll her bottle...

Samuel and Joseph helped make the cookies....Joseph liked the dough. Couldn't figure out why I would want to bake it....but when they were done, he forgot about that...

Cookies! Suzanne and I liked how the carrots came out. Carrots? Yes, I bought a carrot cookie cutter....the eggs are actually from a football cutter...I also like the ducks...

I frosted these then let Jon sprinkle. Thankfully, he got tired of it after only ruining I mean making these ones.

Okay, this is probably a form of insanity....but I thought this was cute. Don't worry, we'll eat them tomorrow.

Well, I spent my afternoon making cut out cookies with the kids. We had to clean up very quickly when Camille woke up, she is just too grabby. We still have lots to frost, maybe tomorrow at naptime.

Charlotte Claire is perking up a little bit. She ate some of her dinner like she was starving, then abruptly stopped....she must get full faster since she has not eaten much for a few days now. Like almost nothing, but she has been drinking plenty....

Today some of the kids went out and about with friends. Margaret, Mali, Kathryn, and Evelyn....Ben was at work, Em and Mirielle gone, Charlotte Claire was still in her nap....there were only eight kids at dinner with Paul and I. It seemed so quiet. But since the four little girls were gone, it was nice to focus more on Joe, Aaron, and Sam. We had ham, mashed potatoes, and asparagus. Sonja hates asparagus, so she only had to have one piece, which she rolled into a piece of ham, and gagged it down.

Well, the older kids put in the movie, "Australia", and it is hard to be typing and keep Camille out of things while they are watching .....

spring?

It is cold and windy, rain mixing with snow flurries, high in the thirties today.....a day to hunker down inside, and build a fire. A nice day for a sick girl to get a new dolly. I bought this for her for her birthday, but....I wanted to cheer her up. This doll pees AND poops. Yay. But for now, it is enough that it talks cheerily, and calls out, HI MOMMY!.....Charlotte Claire thinks she is her mommy.....it is a cute doll, and the company did not pay me to say that PottyTraining Baby Alive is sweet. Of course, I got it for half price, which was pricey enough. Who would pay $40 for a doll? The doll smiles, blinks her un-real-y huge eyes, and says sweet things....

Charlotte Claire wasn't the only one enraptured with this new dolly. Camille is in position to steal....

Camille brought this skirt out the other day, and thinks she is so beautiful. She looks like a bear with clothes on, wearing it over her blanket sleeper.

Sonja is on the grumpy side this morning. They stay up tooooo late on Friday nights. When they get home from activity club, they have to show me what they made, and tell me what they did, and it takes a while for them to settle down. Then someone called here at seven this morning, and woke little people up....ugh.

Charlotte Claire is still pretty sick, but she is showing signs of perking up. Now that the excitement of the new dolly has died down, she is cuddling up and resting again. I had to take the batteries out of my camera to charge, and of course the extra set is in someone else's camera (or in one of Jon's trains or something)....and I missed Jon taking his turn with the new doll. He had it wrapped in a blanket, and her was walking around carrying it and talking to it just like it was a real new baby. And, he has a blanket sleeper on. It was too cute. Then Camille finally got her hands on it, she is fascinated......

I feel so much better today because: Camille slept all night last night!!! I thought I was in big trouble when I popped her in bed at eight last night, but she was so fussy, she WANTED to go to bed. I thought she would be up with the birds. Wrong. She slept straight through until nine this morning. How do they tick?

Well, here I sit....there is plenty for me to do.....

charlotte claire is sick...

I was just saying last week that I haven't been to the pediatrician with sick kids in a while. So today when I decided that she was sick enough for a dr. visit, I remembered that..... She has been feverish, and today she was positively couch-bound. So, I got Benjamin to watch Camille (who fell asleep in the highchair while she was eating lunch, and me the bad mommy took the opportunity to run into the bathroom to get ready without any tagalongs....)anyway, Ben watched her and Jon until the older kids got home from school, so I left with just Charlotte Claire. I was holding her on my lap while we waited for the dr., and I asked her if she is my friend, and she said, "No, Carl is my friend."....Carl is Suzanne. Anyway, it took a awhile, but now I am her friend, too.

She has bronchitis, and he put her on Zithromax....which she threw up. Fun. Her fever is still quite high, so we gave her just a little bit more of the antibiotic, and then some Tylenol drops. She is drinking a little bit, mostly Grape Crush, which, is YUM. I do not drink regular soda, my conscience wouldn't allow the calorie glut, but if I ever did, I would drink a GrapeCrush over ice. Yum. I bought it for her, since she needs to be drinking, and cannot drink too much juice.

Since Camille was sleeping in her highchair covered in peanutbutter and jelly when I left today, and when Ben tried to wash her and put her in bed she threw a fit, and he got her back up from her new green bed, she was SO tired this evening. Paul and all the kids went to activity club, leaving me, who is tired too, (Camille was BAD last night, good thing she is so cute), me who had NO nap, with a feverish almost three year old and a tired fussy toddler, I am deserving of this peace and quiet....because: I put Camille in bed at the unheard of hour of EIGHT o'clock. She was so tired she was walking down the hall toward night-night when I mentioned it....and Charlotte Claire is all changed and medicated and sleeping on the floor on a comforter. And here I am.

Tonight I am thankful for:

Frozen chicken strips, frozen fish fillets (the batter-dipped ones, I only love fish when I am pregnant), frozen fries, and a working oven.

I am also thankful for the salad I had with dinner: lettuce, tomato, black olives, and salt. No dressing. It was so fresh and good. I don't like to hide the taste of the veggies with dressings or dip.

I am also thankful that we live in these times, especially because of antibiotics. The dr. said Charlotte Claire hadn't been on the since this time last year.

I am thankful for the internet, so I can keep in touch with my dear sweet oldest daughter, who I miss so much, yet I am enjoying hearing of her escapades across the ocean. She was in Denmark and Amsterdam over the weekend. (she said she really wanted coffee in Amsterdam, saw a sign for a coffee house, climbed the stairs, and did not smell coffee. She did not enter.)

I am also thankful to keep in touch with my other daughter Mirielle, who is in Canada. It is quite miraculous how large the heart can stretch. You might think that with so many kids, I wouldn't possibly miss them so much, or love them so much, but WRONG....

ooh, like summer.....

We spent alot of time outside today. We cleaned and vacuumed the big white van. The school skippers are all tan and sunkissed, they had such a nice day. I think it is important to take a day off from school once in a while to enjoy the weather...see, yesterday was rainy and chilly, and tomorrow will be too. Today was a bonus day. Warm and sunny, 65 degrees. Not a day for children to be sitting inside a school. When the older kids got home, I went with my sister to the grocery store. I told the kids at home they could have a simple dinner tonight of sandwiches. They seemed happy about that, minimal work, minimal cleanup. Camille was glad to see me when I got home from the grocery store tonight. She was gladder to see the donuts I brought for the kids....

She has a chocolate frosted boston cream in one hand, and a pink frosted sprinkled one in the other.

I think she likes the boston cream better!! I'll hopefully write more tomorrow....I need to get to bed....grocery shopping, putting stuff away, and taking care of the little ones tires me out...Paul had to work on the washer, which wasn't spinning out the water for me...but it worked for him. hmm. Anyhoo, I need sleep.

of barfing and such

Little did I know when I blissfully wrote my morning post what a day I would have......Charlotte Claire, who has had a fever, woke up croupy-coughing, covered with- - barf. No nice way to put it. I got her in the tub, cleaned her up nicely, put her in the comfy chair with three towels around her, got her bedding out of her crib...and as I walked by Jon's room, he called casually from his bed, "I know daddy just put clean bedding on my bed last night, but I think I am going to need clean stuff again...." Okay.

Well, she stopped the croupy cough pretty quickly, but she had a low-grade fever and no appetite. She did eat some oatmeal, but mostly just had bottles of juice, water, punch. She wanted to hang out on my lap today, which we did for most of the day, with Camille here on my lap too. I found myself actually counting the minutes 'til naptime. I mean, it is sweet and warm to cuddle with them on a chilly cloudy day, but when I have to go get something to eat (naseaus), they come following me, Charlotte Claire just whiny and fussy......and I had to do that laundry...I somehow managed to do the dishwasher, peel and cube some potatoes and get the dinner soup on to simmer, and sweep the floors. Not too bad, I guess, considering I fed them a few meals, too.

April Fool's day is fun with a four year old. He likes to tell me there is a bug on my head, he thinks it is funny over and over again....but, he did not like it very much when I fooled him. Ben bought another car, just like the smashed one that is still sitting in the driveway. He was trying to charge the battery (yes, on the NEW one) and he had the extension cord plugged into the house. Jonathan asked me why someone would plug a cord into a house AND a car....I looked at him and said, "If they wanted to blow up the house!" He looked so alarmed, and I said APRIL FOOLS......heh, he didn't laugh very quickly. Then he went on to try to figure how far Ben could drive the car with it plugged in....

Well, I need to hustle in and take a little rest before it is time to get up and get dinner served. The second trip kids are home, and I need to talk to them for a minute first.....

Oh, and thank you for the Kreativblog award, Autismomma (I am sorry to say I don't know your first name!)......I am not going to tag anyone, but I will try to comply with the rest,,, later, after my nap.......

one day at a time

Today, I am tired. Camille woke up three times last night to nurse. One of these days I am going to have to let her in on the little secret that she won't be the baby for long. The thing about being tired is this: I cannot wait until naptime. Naptime is a good time to get other things done that are hard to do with little shadows. But when naptime is sleep time, things do slip. But I am tired, and I am a wimp, and when I get a chance to sleep, I will take it.

Whew, 9 kids gone to school. Quietness. The big white van is in town to be fixed. I am stuck here. But that is a good thing. I am glad for today, to have some time to think and set my mind straight before the little ones get up. I will listen to them today, I will read them stories. I will let them help me even if it takes me twice as long to get things done. I will just take Camille into the bathroom with me in the first place, instead of sneaking in when she seems busy with something, and ignoring the pounding on the door when she figures out where I am. Well, maybe not. I will not grumble as I work on the huge pile of dishes in the sink left from last night, when I told the kids so nicely, "I will make you some chocolate chip cookies if you clean up dinner.." Apparently, they forgot a part.

Dinner last night was one of my lazy favorites. Take 4 cans of cream of celery soup, add some water, not quite 4 cans, stir it up, add a 5 lb. bag of individual frozen chicken breasts, simmer for a few hours, stirring occasionally. Before serving, break up the chicken a bit, it will fall apart easily. Serve over mashed potatoes (instant Potato Buds are great when I don't have time to peel (nap took precedance)), with a vegetable on the side. It is so good. And even with all these people here, there is enough left to put on the stove, add some water, some cubed potatoes, and a bag of mixed veges, and call it soup. It is a rare thing for me to get two meals out of one dish.

Chocolate chip cookies. If Mirielle is reading this from Canada: Guess what? B.J.'s had their chocolate chips, Nestle, 72 ounce bags for $7.50. So I bought 3 bags. Like money in the bank, right? I made a double batch last night, and had to keep the boys' hands out of the dough. They cannot understand why I even bake it when it tastes so much better right out of the bowl. I am nice, I always give each of them a few good size tastes.....the boys though, they want to eat it all. Once they found a recipe for choc.chip dough that doesn't call for eggs, specially for eating, they made a batch and ate the whole thing. And if you guessed that I was not home at the time, you are right.....

We have decided to stay for two nights when we go up to Gananoque next week. It just makes more sense. The little girls are so excited. They are making lists. Quarreling and deciding who sleeps where. Talking about what they are going to bring, which is where I step in and remind them we have NO room for toys, stuffed animals....I will let them bring one thing on their lap, but not their whole Barbie collection. or their art kits.

I just realized that since the kids aren't up, I could've snuggled up on the couch and dozed for a while. I'll have to remember that. I know that once I am out of the first trimester, I'll have a little more energy, (only to crash again at the end)....I still can't believe that I am pregnant again. I feel like it is the first one or something, and I want to shout it. But everytime I think of it, I have that under-the-surface worry that something bad will happen. Which I am at war with, that thought. Even if it does, should my happiness be overshadowed by worry? No sir, that is not of God. One day at a time.

God want to give us a good, happy, free life. When I was growing up, I remember thinking that religious people were "Jesus Freaks".....but then I became enthralled with the Gospel. With being set free from sin, from what people think of me, set free from judging others, from worry.....it wasn't that I wanted a "Christian" lifestyle. No, I wanted to be truly cleansed inside from sin. That still is what captures me, day after day. There is a longing in me deep and wide, to follow Jesus on this way of victory and freedom. It has nothing to do with rules and regulations like: hairstyles, skirts, tv, sugar, or whatever other thing groups come up with to keep order or control. No, it is written that we do not battle against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalites...."Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering, bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another, even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. But above all these things, put on love, which is the bond of perfection. And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful. (Collosions 3, 12-15)........

Well, I am encouraged to face the day!