I have so many little matters to tell you of, that I cannot wait any longer before I begin to put them down.
Jul 22nd, 2015 by ECM
Thank goodness for librovox. Stuck mostly at home, the kids have been listening to a lot of audiobooks since my foot broke. The girls’ current favorite author is Louisa May Alcott. This morning, I emerged from my bedroom to find that Elizabeth had tried to search for jakadajillodobk (that’s Jack and Jill Audiobook, for those of you who don’t read Kindergartner).
Jul 19th, 2015 by ECM
This is our house.
Our first summer rain.
Jul 14th, 2015 by ECM
There are two Chick-fil-a options within 10 minutes. Since loading the kids into the car and hobbling into a restaurant isn’t that much harder than making a meal, we went to one for lunch and one for dinner. No creative costumes this year, just their standard print-out to get our free meals. And Tommy has graduated to adult meals!
Amazingly, Janie ate even more at dinner than she did at lunch, then polished off an ice cream cup. Basically, the only meat she’s eaten in the past month was a slider at Hunter House and chicken nuggets at Chick-fil-a. Funny girl!
Jul 13th, 2015 by ECM
One of the most fun things to do last week was dropping Tommy off and picking him up at baseball camp down at CLU. He had a great time, got really dirty, and acquired his first peeling sunburn. Oops!
He also inspired his little sisters to practice in the backyard! Pictures courtesy of Elizabeth.
Jul 12th, 2015 by ECM
The Tuesday before last, I was standing on the side of the girls’ bunkbed, having a heart-to-heart with a sullen child, when I stepped off onto a toy (which I had told the kids three times to pick up that morning), fell into Janie’s dresser, and collapsed on the floor in agony, my left foot throbbing. I crawled around in pain until the afternoon, when I crawled out to the front yard to supervise them riding bikes and was discovered by Steve and Marloy, who had knee surgery last year and had saved her crutches. Steve brought them over and adjusted them to my height, and I hopped around on them for another day. By Thursday, I realized this wasn’t a sprain, so I went to urgent care and got an x-ray which revealed I’d snapped the tip of my fifth metatarsal. Janelle had come over to watch my kids and brought over her left foot boot from when she injured herself, just in case I needed it. The urgent care doc told me to keep my foot in the boot for 4-6 weeks and keep weight off my foot until it no longer hurt to bear down. I’ve mostly only had the boot off to ice my foot, shower, and sleep, but somehow in the past week, I’ve managed to fall on it while hopping ice back into the freezer AND wake up in the middle of the night, hearing crying, and step out of bed only to have the pain remind me that the cries were from the Haney’s baby, not mine.
Yesterday, though, I slipped getting out of the shower and fell onto it again, wrenching my back and stunning me with the pain. After I scraped myself off the floor and into some clothes, Naomi took me back over to urgent care, where another x-ray revealed I had re-broken the foot and undid any healing that these past two weeks might have accomplished. The doc told me if I can’t totally keep my weight off it, I need to get a cast. He referred me to an orthopedic practice and told me to take it easier. Because that’s so easy with four small children… It’s really a bummer.
A blessing in all this is that Naomi and Jonathan have been visiting us, and they’re very up on keeping off feet, since Jonathan tore his achilles this winter. Naomi has been such a trooper about helping me with household tasks and reminding me to ice and take my ibuprofin around the clock. I, of course, feel like the worst hostess ever, and told her she needs to go home and take a vacation from her vacation with us! I’ve already had cleaning ladies in once, and I’ve hired babysitters to take my kids to swimming lessons all week. Sarah and Naomi have been doing my grocery shopping for me, I ordered a bunch of stuff from amazon pantry so I don’t have to brave Target on crutches, and I’m trying to teach the kids how to do more around the house while I sit and elevate my foot for the next 4-6 weeks. Unsurprisingly, I do not easily sit still all day, every day. Since Janie pulled apart my nook, Sarah lent me her kindle, and I’ve been trying to read PG Wodehouse and let the house fall in shambles around me. I even broke down last night and asked our community group to bring us meals for a couple weeks. Asking for help is so hard!
So if you don’t see as many exciting action shots of the kids for the rest of the summer, that is why. We’ll be featuring a lot of amateur work from the kids for the next few weeks…
Jul 10th, 2015 by ECM
The Haneys are in town, and the kids have loved getting to play together for the first time in two years!
Last weekend, they went along with Derek and the kids to the Reagan Library Independence Day celebrations.
And after visiting some family down in LA, they’re back to play some more!
Jul 6th, 2015 by ECM
Last week, we started three back-to-back sessions of swimming lessons at CLU. Yep, we’re going to be pool rats this summer. We’ve loved the Parks and Rec instructors, and I’m hoping that swimming five days a week for six weeks will help the kids get really comfortable in the water. We’re invited to so many pool parties and beach days now that they’re older that I want them confident and safe! And Sarah and I coordinated again this summer so that James is in the pool at the same time as my kids, and Janie and Ellis can play together!
I realized that a big reason the girls disliked goggles was the elastic twisting and pulling their hair. I found super cheap lycra caps on amazon, and now their hair is safe from tangles!
Ellis is definitely Janie’s best friend. Even on the days she sees him twice in a day, she always gushes, “ELLIS! Play Ellis!” Sarah and I also think she loves that he’s still a little smaller than her, so she can push him around when he has a toy she wants.
Jul 4th, 2015 by ECM
Sunday morning photo shoot…
Tea party with Grandma…
Shakespeares! (South side) We found out that Mondays were kids eat free days, so each of the kids got their own pizza as well as dough to play with while we waited.
And family devotions with Grandpa.
Jul 3rd, 2015 by ECM
On our first time through MO, Grandma mentioned there was a race in Fulton the weekend we came back. So Tommy went running with us several times in Detroit, and he completed his first one-mile race in under ten minutes! He ran the whole thing without stopping! Then we cheered on Grandma in the 5K. The girls were great cheerleaders, and we’re already talking about what race we’ll sign up for next!
Afterward, we checked out the Touch a Truck lot. They got to climb in ambulances, a tow truck, a rescue helicopter, and a fire engine.
Jul 2nd, 2015 by ECM
Since Derek was gone for Father’s Day, we had a little photo shoot mid-way through Tommy’s buzz cut to fool Daddy into thinking his son had a mohawk!
And then we had to take a group photo.
The mohawk put everyone in a silly mood!
