My babies are so amazing. They speak to each other through invisible signals and thoughts, and make each other laugh (or cry) without doing anything. The girl baby is incredibly bossy. Her newest thing to do is push her brother towards something and tell him to "go". Little poopsnot! Meanwhile, the boy baby is busy trying to choke to death on anything he can find to put in his mouth. For instance, I just pulled out 1/2 a polly pocket pant, a complete pair being too big, of course.

They are playing together constantly now, although her preference is for anything girl. And his is for anything else. She will say "Mama, mom, mom, mom, mama, mama, mom..." until I stop whatever I am doing and pick her up. It is incredibly difficult to blog...ever.

He is nursing and kicking me in the throat while she is crying at my knee.

Good times. Boring blog.

Thanksgiving

I am thankful for my little sister. I am thankful for the baby she has growing in her womb and that she trusts me enough to ask me to be her midwife. I am thankful for her sense of humor and her wit and her style. I am thankful that we know each other so well now.

I am thankful that pulling out all of the cans from the cupboard keeps the babies occupied. I am thankful that I was the one who got to put them all away even though their dad was standing right there.

I am thankful for my daughter stealing the camera to take 35 pictures that look like this. I will frame them to give to her on wedding day.

I am thankful for my husbands super awesome mustache for movember. It is super awesome! Oh...I guess I already said that.

(http://www.movember.com/)

I am grateful that my neighbor wrote me a note on a brown paper bag and put it in my mailbox calling me lazy because I haven't raked my yard. Croup and scarlet fever don't count when there are leaves on the ground! And neither does the six foot tall privacy fence that makes it so you can't actually see the backyard.

And last but not least, I am grateful for my chickens. That don't lay any eggs.

My mothers bed

I have noticed that my pillows on my bed seem to go missing from time to time. They are there when I make the bed in the morning, and then they are gone when I go to bed at night. This being such a busy household, I haven't had the time or energy to overly question it. It just is what it is.

Last night was so dry in my house, I couldn't breathe through my nose. I ended up with my seven year old in my bed, and of course the two babies and one husband, all which successfully drove me into the arms of another bed. I went to the room with the humidifier in it. And as I crawled into the bottom bunk (the seven year olds) I lay my head down...on all of my pillows. The pale jade silk pillow was there, a recent find from a thrift store. The small pillow and only flowery pillowcase I have was there, laying quietly next to it. My king size feather pillow with its soft sage flannel cover.

I have to wonder. What do they think of their mothers bed?

My mothers bed as a child, was possibly the coolest place in the entire world. It was there that she made her small stamp in a world filled with barbies, and dress up, and bickering, and little girls. It was there that she said...I am a grown up, hear me ROAR!!! And I loved it. I loved the yellow oak headboard with its swirling oak leaf pattern. And the dark bedding that looked like it was out of a catalog. I would crawl into it when I was allowed to, and could play there all day. My mother made her bed everyday, so we were often shooed out. I loved her bed.

So I am left with this thought. What do they think of my bed? Is it a place to hide buried treasure? A boat surrounded by sharks? Can it fly through the clouds and carry us away to a land where no-one grows up?

I hope so.

I change the linens to reflect the season, my one small gift to myself. I look at my daughters sometimes, when they lay on my bed, with the sunlight filtering through the bare branches of fall, and I know that when I walk out of the room, they will turn into fairies and my bed will be their land, and they will go off to far away places. And sometimes, I think, to hold onto a little piece of that...they will steal a pillow for their bed.

Babies

A hurricane...no...a tornado!

I am not kidding when I say I went to bed last night and the house was clean. I remember cleaning it. But somehow this morning I woke up and the house was in ruins. The big girls were at home with strep and scarlet fever and had taken the babies, upon waking, down to play. It took maybe fifteen minutes.

Seriously. I have never seen anything like it. I don't even know how to write about it.

How do you like this apple!!

What would you type so it looks like I'm crying?

Wake up this morning knowing a mom is in labor (or will be soon). That always makes you a little anxious to find childcare. Call a bunch of people but no-one answers. House is a disaster!

Decide to knit.

Upon decision to knit, the middle child decides now is a good time to learn how to knit. Take first sip of now cold coffee, look around and decide the house smells as bad as it looks, and say Sure!, I'll teach you how to knit! An hour later post "Make it stop" as your update on facebook.

Okay, so babies and knitting needles don't go together. Babies and yarn don't go together. Trying to be calm and patient when casting on for the bazillionth time after the boy baby yet again pulls the yarn off the needles...while the five year old acts like the grown up and while you want to stomp your feet and go into a full fledge tantrum. It makes you realize that now isn't the time to teach a child to knit.

I need to clone myself.

And I will leave with these questions in my brain...

Why is my house so dirty when my mom is coming over?
Why isn't anyone answering the phone?
Why do I have so much laundry to do?
Why is that stupid cat peeing on everything and how can I make him go away?