7 Quick Takes: June 27

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The new normal is slowly emerging.  Of course it is being foiled by the ever-changing sleep patterns of our newborn...and toddler.  Who's children are these who wake up at 6:00am?  There are no early birds in this family.  Someone must have abducted them and replaced them with these terrible early morning-risers.

-2-

The other day a friend asked for tips to keep her three year old from treating the furniture like a jungle gym.  I don't have the best answer for this one, but I do have this little exercise trampoline handed down to me by my parents.  They bought it to answer this very problem when I was a little rapscallion.


Most of the time Peep just jumps to his heart's content, but recently he's decided that maybe it would be really cool to combine the trampoline with the furniture.

Apparently the coolness is further increased by rearranging the furniture and dragging the trampoline as close as possible to Mommy and his nursing brother.
 
So for now I'm settling for him jumping off the furniture onto the trampoline rather than jumping up and down on the furniture.  It's something - right?

-3- 

One of the few glories of my week has been edging the patio and sidewalk.  It's amazing how hard it is for grass to grow on the lawn and how easy it is for it to grow on concrete and brick.

Before

After

 Inches!  Inches of reclaimed patio!

-4- 

Snow boots in summer?  I've heard a lot of kids go through this. 

-5-

Speaking of winter, I felt a little guilty as I logged some Christmas books on Peep's reading list for our library's summer reading challenge.  He found them and we read them. Hopefully librarians don't judge.

-6-

Echoing Amy's post earlier today: "Here I am, former Notre Dame grad, now a completely brain-dead mom...."

After an embarrassingly long time, I've finally cracked open a book that doesn't have a picture on every page.  Fittingly my own summer reading, is Jen's book Something Other Than God.

I've had it in hand for two days, am about halfway through, and hate having to put it down.  Read: This book is AWESOME and without children it would have been finished in one day. 

Amy also reminded me that I actually own A Mother's Rule of Life. I started reading it while expecting Peep, never finished, and until today totally forgot about it.  Oops.  It might behoove me to find it.

-7-

I mentioned the children have been rising early.  They've also been going to bed late.  It's 10:30 and Peep just went to sleep.  Pebble is still up.  Yikes.


Linking to the fabulous Jen Fulwiler!

7 Quick Takes: Selected Thoughts & Finding A New Normal

Over the past several weeks there have been a million thoughts flying around my head, I've wanted to blog about so many of them, but it seemed impossible to find the time or concentration to turn a single one into a coherent post.

My dear husband can only sum up the last several months (and I think he'd be more accurate in saying the last year and a half) as "fighting a war."

We just returned home from our last major planned event - my sister-in-law's graduation. We have "nothing" on the calendar until August.*  

What was "normal" is gone.  Life has changed.  Now we have to find a new normal, and that is no easy task.

So here are 7 very quick takes that have been complied over the last several weeks:

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My lap exists again and I'm happy Peep can sit on it. So is he. I'm also grateful my ankles and feet are not swollen to twice their normal size.

A visit to Holland, MI

-2-

Pebble started smiling at around the time he turned one month.  His full, open-mouthed, beaming face is heart-melting. (Now if only I could get a picture of it...)

-3-

On May 2, I wrote: Parenting two is interesting balancing act.  It is definitely going to take some getting used to.

Riding Lions with Friends

-4-

Recently #4 has grown to: It's not having a baby that's a challenge, it's having a toddler that's the hard part. 

 -5-

It's astounding how different two brothers can be. Seeing Pebble's personality develop is fascinating.  His daddy and I agree that Pebble's temperament seems to be taking after his godfather uncle's.

"Put he in the oval so we can play traaaaiiins!!"

-6-

Peep loves trains, dogs, the zoo, playgrounds, being loud, climbing, bouncing, his aunts and uncles, his grandparents, his brother, and generally being a stinker.  We're not so sure he still loves Mommy and Daddy. 

-7-

If you haven't read my sister's blog you should.

Peep and his Aunt going on a journey

Lastly a question: If I can find the time, should I write Pebble's birth story/saga? Is there any interest in it?


Happy Friday!
Linking to Jen/Kathryn.

*I say "nothing" - but really I mean no "major life events," just heaps upon heaps of the "little" things - the kind that seem so infinitesimal until you're in the middle of them and just want to sleep.