A busy, non-busy weekend.

This was one of those rare weekends for us where there was nothing major in the calendar and we had no good excuse to be anywhere but home.  And we all needed it.  Mostly I needed it in order to get a handle on the house--- I have been feeling overwhelmed lately by projects that needed to be done that I just never seem to get to.  So we made it a priority this weekend to get some things crossed off the ever growing list.

The first order of business on Saturday morning was to occupy the kids so that I could embark on Operation Reorganize the Pantry.  It's a small space in the house (much smaller than I would prefer)...but goodness gracious does it ever take on a life of its own if not controlled.  So, Mara worked on a pancake and some bananas in her high chair while Josh and Lauren....well, take a look for yourselves to see what they got into...

The big kids played for quite some time in the costume box, making all sorts of interesting combinations.  I forget what they were being when I took this picture, but Lauren said that was the face she had to make.  It was part of the costume.  And who was I to argue.

And after two hours in our itty bitty pantry, here is what I can offer as my biggest accomplishment of the weekend.

 This makes for riveting blog reading, doesn't it?

We spent the rest of Saturday working on my list, putting away, cleaning up, folding and reorganizing all sorts of things, closets and drawers around the house.  We packed our shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child for Sunday morning and had a nice talk about why we do that each year.  Joshua was full of questions about it, and even wrote a very sweet poem to go into his box.  We did one for a boy Joshua's age, and one for a girl Lauren's age.  I thought it was important for them to think about the fact that a little boy or girl just like them might only get this one present for Christmas, and they both had a lot of questions to ask about it.  After all of that, we had a nice dinner, and it was good to spend some time together before Daddy had to get ready to go on his business trip.  He'll be gone almost all of this week, and I can tell you, we are all already missing him.  We're managing and the kids have been really good, but things surely do work smoother around our house when we're all together.  So we're counting down the days until Thursday.

Sunday morning we got up and went to church.  Joshua and Lauren were so excited to get their shoeboxes onto the pile with the others that had been filled.  They loved being a part of the dedication ceremony for them.  I'm not entirely sure if they "get it" completely, but I am noticing a little more connection with the process each year that we participate.  Mara's part of the whole process was to squirm and scrooch as much as she possibly could.  I ended up putting her in the nursery for the few minutes I needed to be with the big kids.  For as unhappy as she was sitting in my lap in the sanctuary, you'd have thought she would have been thrilled with the opportunity to get down and play in the nursery.  But upon my exit, the wailing began, only to be stopped by my reappearance 15 minutes later.  And that pretty much sums up Mara lately.  Sweet as can be while in my arms.  A screaming banshee otherwise.  It's beyond frustrating.  But look at this face....

I find it hard to be mad for long.

In other Mara news, we had a few interesting developments this weekend.

A.  She got her first, adorable little tooth.

B.  She learned to climb up the stairs.

C.  She is starting to stand independently for a few seconds.  And yesterday, I watched her attempt to take one tiny baby step on her own.  She immediately fell to the ground, but I saw it.  It won't be long now until we are officially off to the races.

I sent the first two news items to Libby via text on Saturday when they happened.  And her response cracked me up.  It was:

"A.  Yay!  A tooth!  Finally!! and B. Lord, have mercy!"

My sentinments exactly.

We are on serious countdown to Baby Hayden this week, with great anticipation.  I hope this little girl knows how much she is loved.  I cannot wait to be an Aunt again, and to watch Brooke become the fantastic big sister I know she will be.  Our family has so much to be grateful for this year.  For now, we are praying for a safe and uneventful delivery for Libby and a sweet, healthy baby girl to get to love on Wednesday.

Reset

This morning didn't start out so well. 

And by that I mean, when my alarm went off at 5:15, I couldn't get Mara to lay down and go back to sleep.  All manner of bouncing, singing, shushing, pacifier offering, nursing, etc. made no difference.  She was fast asleep in my arms, but the slightest movement of any of myself caused her to wake up.  I pushed it as long as I could, hopeful that she could get a little more rest, but had to get moving at the last possible minute in order to keep the ship running on time this morning. 

Before I was able to get into the shower (Mara with me in the bathroom, of course), this one was also awake.  It was his day off of school for teacher conferences, and somehow it never fails that on the days we do not have to be up and out on a schedule, the kids are awake and raring to go.  When we need to be somewhere at a certain time, I need a bulldozer to get them out of bed.  I managed to get my shower and get dressed quickly through Mara's protesting and Joshua's 17 requests to go downstairs to get his breakfast.

Before long, this one appeared...whimpering and whining like she does when she obviously hasn't slept long enough.  She wouldn't hear of going back to bed, so I braced myself for the next 25 minutes that it usually takes for her to wake up the whole way and get her attitude adjusted, during which she grumps around, barks at her brother and breaks every rule that she knows darned well to be enforceable in our house.  While I was in the middle of doing my makeup (and please note that I was holding Mara.....yep, it was as difficult as you're imagining), Lauren declared that she had peed on the bathroom floor.  This child hasn't had a potty accident in close to a year...honestly.  What in the world was going on here other than the universe just lining up to give me a good swift kick in the rear this morning?  I put Mara down, grabbed the Clorox and a roll of paper towels and got to work cleaning up.  I may or may not have been grumbling under my breath about how I DID NOT have time for this this morning.  Mara was down at this point and managed to find the one spot that I missed cleaning.  Her pajamas were now soaked and needed immediate changing.

I was running dangerously out of time.  And I was definitely out of patience.

I changed Mara and finished up the bathroom floor.  While I was doing that, this is what Mara did to the kitchen.  The girl loves placemats.  And really anything that she can get into at this point.

By the grace of God, I managed to get Mara fed so that Jason and I could get out the door, only a few minutes late.

On the way to the school, I was feeling horribly guilty for my short fuse this morning.  There are just some days that I wake up with less patience than others, and apparently this wasn't my star Mama performance.  If the truth be told, I just wanted to be left alone for one minute-- to get done what I needed to get done and get moving with the day.  But there were three little ones who really weren't doing anything wrong, but were making me absolutely on the edge.  I wasn't proud of myself, and I was praying for a turn around to the day.  I certainly didn't want to feel this way all day long.

And then...it was like the reset button had been pressed.

Mrs. Case shared with us how much she adores Joshua.  She said that he is bright and creative, and that she loves his sense of humor.  We were relieved to find out that he is using his sense of humor in appropriate ways and she said he has no problems transitioning from activities that are fun (like playtime or more physically active tasks) to sitting quietly and following directions.  She is impressed with his reading skills and shared his school work...the lowest grade I saw was a 95.  She showed us his journal writing and some of his kid writing, as well as gave us some ideas on how to keep working with him at home on the special sounds in words that are a little harder to grasp than the hard sounds that letters make.  But she said he is doing wonderfully and she had no areas of concern for him at all.  We were beaming when we left there, beyond proud of him for the way he is behaving and learning in school.

Just what I had ordered, Lord.....a reset button for my patience, and a reminder that...despite the fact that the kids work together to push me right over the edge of the cliff some days, we have been blessed with some terrific kids.  Tomorrow will be a better day...it always is.

A top 10 in honor of Mara.

Is it me, or is the 5th of each month coming around faster and faster as each month passes?  I find myself with only two stickers in Mara's package of month stickers that Emily brought for her when we were still in the hospital.  I remember looking at the thick stack of stickers thinking that so much time would elapse between holding this sweet (very tiny) baby in my arms, and starting to look at her as a toddler.  Knowing that she is the last Dugan makes all of these monthly milestones even sweeter for me, and I am so thankful for the perspective that I have gained with Joshua and Lauren not to wish these sleepless nights, tired arms, and waning patience away.  Time is already going by so fast, and I know that wishing the tough stuff away also wishes the amazing, precious, priceless memories away with it.  That's not to say that I'm not exhausted, because I surely am.  But I try to keep it all in perspective, and find the good in the extra snuggle time I'm getting with Mara each night between the hours of.......oh......midnight and 5 am......those seem to be her difficult hours.  Every.  Single.  Night.  Perspective, though.  Lord, keep giving me perspective.  With a side of caffeine.

Our sweet girl turned 10 months old yesterday.  So I thought in honor of her big milestone, I would offer 10 little known facts about Mara that I will one day look back on and cherish the reminder.

10.  She adores (ADORES) her big brother and sister.  And I believe the feeling is mutual.  Joshua loves that she lights up when he enters the room.  And Lauren tells me at least twice a day that she loves our baby "so much" and thinks she is the cutest baby ever.  I just adore watching Mara's face as she is watching Joshua and Lauren playing together.  Often she breaks out into full belly giggles that are too precious to even explain.

9.  She is currently weighing somewhere in the neighborhood of 17 lb.  The way she's eating lately, I wouldn't expect that weight gain will be an issue for her from this point forward.  I'm so happy to see her healthy and thriving after worrying about her growth in the beginning.

8.  Speaking of eating, Mara is really enjoying the exploration of table food.  You should have seen her face light up when I gave her a lick of the icing I was eating in my mom's whoopie pies over the weekend.  If she could have formed the words, I believe she would have been saying, "Now hold on just one second.  You mean to tell me I have been eating baby oatmeal and pureed vegetables while you guys have been eating THIS?"  She has recently enjoyed things like pizza crust, my mom's pot pie (yum!), macaroni and cheese, pancakes (her recent favorite) and pieces of cut up vegetables that we are eating.  I am hoping that my days of purchasing Gerber purees are quickly coming to a close.

7.  Call me a rebel, but I have broken a serious parenting rule with Mara in her crib.  Laying her down flat on her back has been an issue for her for some reason.  She hates it, and immediately wakes up when her head hits the crib.  So one night, I transferred her from my arms to the crib while still in the Boppy pillow I had used to nurse her.  And voila, she didn't awaken.  She now sleeps on that pillow nightly for the one two hour stretch of sleep that she gets in her crib (if I'm lucky).

6.  She loves the theme song from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, as well as Hot Dog....just like her brother did.  I cannot count how many times we used to watch the video of those songs on our computer when Joshua was little.  Mara seems a bit obsessed as well.  She loves to "dance" along, and when she's sitting on the floor and hears it come on, she bounces up and down on her bottom the whole time the song plays.  It is precious.

5.  She has tons and tons of baby toys and plays with literally none of them.  Her toys of choice are anything that belongs to Josh and Lauren or anything that belongs in one of my cupboards or drawers that cannot be configured with a baby lock.  It's great fun.  I'm thinking that if we bought her a new set of pots and pans for Christmas she would be thrilled.

4.  Mara loves to hear me sing.  Her most favorite song right now is "Way Up High in the Cherry Tree".  I can usually calm her down when she is feeling scroochy after her tub by singing this song.  She smiles really big and starts to wave her arms as soon as I start singing it, and usually is perfectly calm and starting into my eyes by the time I finish it.

3.  On the topic of music, Mara can be instantly calmed by the Selah CD's that are in my car.  She particularly likes Volume I of their Greatest Hits CD.  By the time the piano accompaniment comes in on Be Still My Soul, she is normally perfectly calm and starting to drift off to sleep.  Travel with her has gotten increasingly easier as she has gotten older, but figuring out that Selah is what she likes to listen to has made it even better.  And trust me, I don't mind singing along to Selah anytime.

2.  Unlike her brother and sister, Mara has not determined a strong affection for a lovey like Josh and Lauren did very early on.  It's possible it still might develop (and I honestly hope that it does).  Right now, I believe I am Mara's security object, which explains our middle of the night rendezvous lately.  I swore after my experience of Lauren being so overly attached to me between 1 year and 18 months old that I would never let that happen again.  So I have either royally screwed something up, or this is just the natural order of things.  I am honestly not fighting it as much this time, just figuring that "it is what it is" and trying to enjoy it.  I keep figuring that when she's about 14 and can't stand the sight of me, I will have these months to recall in my memory.

1.  I am completely, totally, 100% in love with this little girl.  Her personality is developing into a great mixture of Joshua and Lauren--- some persistence like Joshua, with some spunk like Lauren.  A whole lot of sweetness with a little bit of self-assuredness to balance it out.  I consider it an absolute blessing to get a front row seat in watching her grow.  What a gift she is.

Happy 10 months, Mara!

 Sacked out at Nana and Pap's this weekend.  I couldn't stop staring at her.

And, enjoying a piece of pizza crust.  She worked at that thing for the better part of 20 minutes.  Poor girl needs some teeth!

Trick or Treat

We were so grateful that Hurricane Sandy moved on to allow the kids some Trick or Treat fun on Halloween.  Joshua declares that Halloween is his favorite holiday....until he remembers about Christmas....but really, he does enjoy the spooky stuff.  His bedroom has even been decorated as a haunted house since about mid-September- complete with spiders, gooey eyeballs and (Lord help me) a rat.  The only good news is that I have encouraged Joshua to learn how to put away his own laundry because I try to limit my time alone in his room with that stupid rat.

Lauren loves Halloween too...mostly becuase of the candy.  She has been telling me that she wanted to dress up like a beautiful butterfly for months.

And Mara has no idea what Halloween is, but I believe in my heart of hearts that she knew she was adorable in her elephant costume.

We bundled up in many many layers on Wednesday night and headed out around the neighborhood for some treats.  I was disappointed in our neighborhood's showing--- there weren't many lights on at all.  In years past we have gone to the church's Trunk or Treat event, but this year they didn't have it.  I was perfectly content to be back inside within an hour of setting out on our adventure, and honestly the kids didn't seem to mind that it was a pretty low key evening.  After we returned, I swapped just about everything out of their buckets for peanut safe candy choices, while they were outside handing out candy to the kids who came by our house.  The only down side is that not only do we have two trick or treat pails full of candy, but I also have the remnants of the big bags I had to buy to get a good assortment for the kids.  So if you know anyone who needs some candy, kindly let me know.  I have enough sugar at our house to put us into a serious carbohydrate coma.

Here are some pictures!

6...

So, we have made a new rule in our house.  I told Joshua on the night before his birthday that I didn't think I was going to let him get any older than 6.  From now on, he'll go backwards again.  A long conversation ensued about why I didn't want him to grow up.  And during that conversation with an ever-so-wise just about 6 year old, I realized that being the Mom of a big boy has its advantages.

A lot of things have changed in the past six years since Joshua and I first met.  He made me a Mommy, and I can honestly say that there has never been a "promotion" in my life that has meant more to me than that one.  I think about how different things were BC (before children) and I almost have to laugh at how much I had no clue about before October 25, 2006.  I thought I was so prepared...had read all the books, thought I knew just how this was all going to go, figured I would tackle motherhood as I do other challenges in my life.  And then somehow, as soon as he was in my arms...this precious pile of blue blankets that I had dreamed about...I realized how incredibly unprepared I really was for taking responsibility of this miracle.  I knew all I needed to know from a strict informational standpoint, but it's the heart stuff that knocked me totally off my feet.  Like how I ached physically when he was unhappy, how I would defy all logic and throw myself into the middle of a busy highway to save him an ounce of pain, how nothing else would matter in my life besides our family and our solidarity as a unit.  And those changes all started with Joshua.  I find it amazing, also, how much evolution has taken place with the births of Lauren and Mara, but it all started with my sweet boy.

We thought it only fitting to celebrate our big six year old with a party for him.  He chose Scooby Doo as his theme, which was a whole lot less scary for me as the party planner than some of his other choices.  He was thrilled to come home from school to find his cake just about ready.  Our peanut friendly baker, Nicole Swanger from Lewistown, had helped once again with a fondant Scooby that was safe to touch the cake that I baked and iced for Joshua.  Something tells me she might not take my calls from now on after constructing the Doc McStuffins figures and now Scooby.  But she does amazing work.  The rest of the house was decked with Scooby balloons, Scooby snacks and masks for the kids that looked like Scooby heads.  We had hot dogs (get it....hot DOGS) at Joshua's request and other snacks he helped to pick.  The best part was that he had his friends with him, and we had so many people there that mean the world to us to help us celebrate our sixth anniversary of becoming a family.  The kids had a ball, as usual, as there was much running and giggling and sugar consumed. 

 Earl's "cha-cha-cha's" always crack everyone up.  Joshua had so hoped he would sing them for him at his party.

Present time is always a highlight.  Lauren was a little concerned about not getting to open any presents until we gently reminded her of her Doc party just a few weeks ago where she was the only one getting any gifts.  I still don't think she was happy about it, but she was a pretty good sport.  They didn't start fighting over Joshua's new things until Saturday morning.

And this little troublemaker was content mostly to get into everything she wasn't supposed to--- like paper, things on the floor, Kinley's sippy cup and anything else that wasn't meant for her.  Story of our lives these days I guess.  I truly enjoyed seeing her and Kinley together.  There is something so special about those two girls--- I just hope they'll always enjoy each other the way Emily and I enjoy seeing them together.  I always wonder if our Moms felt that way about us when we were little.

I'll end with a few of my favorite things about Joshua...

• I love his creativity.  This child can turn a piece of paper and a pencil into a hundred different things.  He can also take a box of costume pieces and turn them into costuming for any character you can think of.  It's almost amazing to watch.
• I love his artistic abilities.  Some of his drawings are really good- and appear to be the work of someone much older than he is.
• I love his sweet heart.  Although Joshua is a strong willed child for sure, he also has a very soft heart for others.  He gets concerned about them and doesn't want anyone to feel left out or sad, and will do whatever he can do to help.  He'll often tell me about he plays with people at school, and he will do something that isn't his first choice just so the others can do what they want to do.
• I love how protective he is of his sisters.  He loves playing with Lauren, mostly when he can boss her around, but she plays willingly most of the time.  I love the tenderness I see in him when he is with Mara--- this sweet smile and the giggle when he sees her smile back at him.
• I love to see his mind at work.  I still stand by my prediction that he will be an engineer or something that requires him to really use his brain to organize things.  He is always thinking in terms of charts and rules and ways to keep things orderly.  He maintains that his goal is to one day be the President of the United States.  And there is no doubt he could be if he keeps his focus the way it is now.  I just cannot wait to see what God has in store for his life.

We love you more every single day, Josh!  Happy Birthday, buddy!