Sneaking Quietly as a Mouse

When I had my first baby, either he was a bit slow about purposeful sneaking behavior (and I say that with all love) or I was a bit naive, thinking babies didn't show that kind of purpose till, what? two years old?

Then with Mary, I could tell that by something like 12 months old (my memory fails me in exactness), she had great receptive language skills and knew quite more what she was doing than I'd ever thought about John. I remember I'd tell baby Mary not to go into the bathroom and she'd stand at the threshold and put one toe over the line into the bathroom while staring at me and smiling--at newly turned one year old!

Miss Margaret is nine months old and I'm already noticing the same in her. I haven't put up baby gates and am not sure if I will, as I weigh the inconvenience of having to grab up the baby often against that of the rest of us climbing over gates. The baby has already figured out that I don't want her climbing up the stairs by herself, as I whisk her down from the stairs over and over again while I'm working in the kitchen.

Now it is common that she'll be crawling around happily chattering and then I'll notice That Quiet that all mothers recognize. I'll glance up and Margaret will be about two steps up the stairs, peering at me through the balusters, smiling and being as quiet as a mouse. As soon as I've spotted her, she starts high tailing it up the stairs as fast as she can scurry before I come whisk her down again.

She laughs and laughs until I catch her up and set her back down in the kitchen, where she then howls at me in protest (no tears). But I know she's angry and not sad because if I give her what she wants in those instances, she stops howling instantly.

I find babies' bright brains humorous and amazing all at once.

Christmas in Stone Mountain

We visited Chris' parents in Stone Mountain, Georgia, to celebrate Christmas. I realized upon coming home that I took virtually no photographs over the several days. That doesn't mean there were virtually no photographs on my cell phone camera: John managed to take about 100, but I don't think you're interested in every version of blurry and subject matter like his toes, the carpet, or pieces of furniture.

We enjoyed a feast cooked by my mother-in-law, exchange of gifts, more camping in the trailer in the back yard, ascending Stone Mountain by gondola (where it was bitterly cold!), dinner at an authentic German restaurant, and the various cousins playing together. Sweet times were had by all.

Christmas 2011

Merry Christmas!

I was confused this morning when Mary came downstairs, plunked into a chair, and didn't want to go wake Daddy and John to open stockings. After I questioned her a bit, I asked her if she wanted to go back to sleep: she said 'yes,' so I put a blanket over her and she slept another half hour.

Then she woke and asked for oatmeal, still not wanting to open her stocking. So she sat and ate while the rest of us opened our stockings.

When she slept through Mass (and the brass band!)--which she doesn't ever do, and this was a later Mass than we normally attend--I was really quite worried that she was fast becoming ill. Relief swept over me when Chris was carrying a groggy Mary out after Mass and the girl began shrieking with joy at seeing doughnuts. She was perfectly well.

I include this photo taken after Mass to show the scale of our new saints statues.

Speaking of saints, I was tickled with our priest's homily today. He began by talking about the new statues, which most of us were seeing for the first time that day. I thought to myself, "There is no way that Fr. R--- is going to miss an opportunity of talking to C&E Catholics without presenting the Gospel. How is he going to move from statues to the plan of salvation?"

For those who enjoy the art of a well-written homily, my summary of his 20-minute delivery was that the statues represent the invisible (cloud of witnesses around us always) made visible (in the form of statues to remind us of these edifying Christians gone before us). And today we celebrate the invisible God (the Father) made visible in the birth of Jesus Christ: God incarnate (in-fleshed). And why did God incarnate himself as a baby? Because of our Original Sin (which Father weaved in beautifully), which is why we require a Savior, and (drum roll, please) therefore it is important to come back into the Church, go to sacramental Confession, in order to join the saints one day in Heaven--bringing us full circle back to those statues. It was masterfully done. And not to rely only his exceptional homily, Father R--- handed out gifts of CDs wrapped in jaunty bows, so that each person attending Christmas Mass took home a talk on the meaning of the Mass and on Confession. Well done, Father!

I am blessed beyond measure! My cup runneth over. 

I was actually rather tearful during Mass because I kept thinking about our human mortality: that we need to embrace these special days, and also the mundane days, because we never know when this will be our last or the last one with someone we love.

After Mass, we came home and enjoyed a special breakfast: cinnamon rolls, toast, fried eggs, bacon, strawberries, and clementine oranges.

We didn't begin opening presents until around 11:30 and we were so pleased to see that the children know no different. They don't know that "Christmas lists" exist and they don't know that kids tell their parents gifts that they want. They do know that we are celebrating Jesus' birthday, so we go to Mass first--like going to the person's birthday party--open gifts in His honor second. They were quite docile about waiting to open gifts and I was so pleased, knowing it will probably be a lesson taught many times, in many ways, to many different ages of our kids, and might not always go as easily as it did this year.

It was an athletic event to keep Margaret from eating all the gifts. She can crawl fast like lightening now!

Stopping amidst the chaos to read a book quietly

You know you're a Catholic when . . . your Catholic friend decorates your gift with a sticker of a saint being brutally martyred by arrows and you receive it and think that is a perfectly normal decoration.

Some people know me very well!

Our main gift to the children (and some relatives went in on the gift with us) were these maple wood blocks. We were so pleased to see how the children instantly gravitated to these simple, timeless toys. They spent the rest of the afternoon building castles and battle machinery with this wood.

I took this picture as I was putting away the gifts because it struck me as so humorous: You know you're a family of bookworms when you receive this many books at Christmas in contrast to one toy, I think, that uses any electricity at all.

The dinner menu was: pork chops with cinnamon apples and sauerkraut (chickpea patty for me, good ol' mac & cheese for John), puree of potato and leek soup, and roasted winter vegetables, with gingerbread cookies for dessert.

We had a beautiful and truly merry day. As we tucked in the getting-wild and exhausted children at a very early bedtime, Mary asked me, "Can we have another Merry Christmas tomorrow?"

The Vigil of the Nativity of Our Lord

Brother and Sister at Piano

John following along a free piano lesson on YouTube--he can now tell me what a scale is, which keys are which notes, and proper and improper hand position

Margaret always rushes over to "dance" 

She likes to play a little tune herself too

Baking Cookies for Christmas

Two days before Christmas, we baked cookies that will be our dessert on Christmas day. I had wanted to try an interesting iced pumpkin cookie recipe, but apparently the children remembered making gingerbread men last year when I had forgotten and those are what Christmas cookies are.

So, to satisfy my plan to make something with pumpkin, I tried a double batch of Pumpkin Spice Bread. I made it more healthy by reducing sugar by one-third, replacing the oil with homemade apple sauce from last fall's apple-picking, and replacing the white flour with white wheat flour. Indeed, instead of tasting like gooey, sweet breakfast bread (read: like cake), it tastes, as I like to say, "like health." But my kids loved it, surprisingly, so all is well in the world. I froze three loaves.

At one point, Mary was dangerous with the hot stove, so she lost her "hot stove privileges" for a minute, which just means she had to step away from the stove. But she disappeared into the den and wept quietly in the corner, where I discovered her, and realized just how hurt she was by being excluded oh-so-momentarily from the Christmas baking. Broke this mama's heart! Doesn't mean I'd change my teaching moment, but it sure was sad--and she did nothing dangerous around the heat after that!

An unstaged photo of Mary sulking and boycotting the licking of one of the beaters covered in frosting for some capricious reason I forget. She stuck to her guns and never did eat the frosting.

I was trying to frost the cookies on one side of the counter while the children decorated on the other side of the counter until John dumped out most of a jar of green sprinkles and then Mary dumped out most of a jar of pink sprinkles. Then I called a moratorium on decorating until I was done frosting and could join them on their side of the counter to assist.

Margaret is teething and has not been willingly set down much in the last week. Tears and drool abound around here.

They're not sophisticated, but they have a childish charm and sure do taste good!

All these pictures remind me of a discussion point I helped lead at our La Leche League meeting just two days ago, which I will share for any blog readers who might benefit from the encouragement. We were brainstorming about stress around Christmas for mamas and what we can do to reduce it. There are times when mommies have to cut back, even radically. If that means not getting a tree this year, then don't get a tree: it's just a German tradition anyway. Maybe buy fewer gifts and send electronic cards instead of paper ones. Shop online and don't set foot in a store. Buy cookies instead of baking, or bake fewer, or bake none! I've had two holiday babies and I've now had plenty of Thanksgiving and Christmas meals (more than those two years) for which Chris bought all our food at the deli instead of my cooking it. It just so happens that this year, my kids are old enough, my baby is just barely old enough and manageable, that I can do a lot this Christmas season. But every holiday needs to be revisited and basic family needs (including mama's sanity) come first before trying to look like a Norman Rockwell painting.

Update: A sprained neck isn't nothing, although I'm glad I can rest easy knowing because of the x ray that John did not break or fracture anything. He is walking around with a stiff neck, turning his whole body to look at things. He's in pain and actively asking for his ibuprofen (when normally he does everything he can to avoid taking medicine). He asked to play outside and I said 'yes,' but then thought to add, "But you can't climb trees because of your neck. And you can't go on the swings . . . or climb the jungle gym. Ummmm . . . I guess you can walk around and look at things." But, really, he doesn't even need the warnings because he's in enough pain that he's self-regulating his behavior, even letting Daddy know if he's tickling John too hard and it hurts his neck. It's really sad and pathetic. So, this mama isn't done worrying yet.

Bonus Moment: I was reading a story book to Mary, a book about a cat, a story that had nothing to do with climbing anything. As she looked at one picture of the cat riding inside of a large four-wheel drive vehicle, Mary said thoughtfully, "I think I could climb on top of that car." Yes, dear, I think you could climb just about anything you set your mind to.

Saints Join Us for Christmas

Our little parish (on average 900 people attending each Sunday) has undergone so much transformation in the last two years! (See video here--it's like the metamorphosis of a butterfly and it still makes me cry with joy to watch every time because I can remember when we were new to this city and trying out parishes, we walked into this one held for 50 years in a dank, dark basement and we knew it was for us based on the orthodoxy of its teaching and faithfulness to our Mother Church. See pictures here. Read a theological tour of our church architecture here.)

And now, we have statues! Just in time for celebrating the birth of Our Lord, these statues from Italy come to give us daily visual reminders of edifying Christians who went before us and whom we should emulate.

St. Thomas More, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. John Vianney 

St. Benedict, St. Augustine, St. Lawrence

St. Lucy, St. Maria Goretti, St. Rose of Lima

St. Clare, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Rita

Mama Home Alone No Longer

My babies are home safe! They were greeted with many hugs and kisses and a big dinner waiting for them. And I feel so refreshed!

We've discovered over the last year that Mary now gets carsick! It's no fun at all. Above is the latest contraption Daddy invented to try to contain the mess (but on the drive home she actually stayed well for once, so we didn't get to try it).

Mama Home Alone: Day 2

Waking up home alone-with-the-baby on Day 2 started out luxuriously, with my not rising from my slug-a-bug bed till seven o'clock, but before I had breakfast cooked my Nervous Nellie worries came true when Chris called me to report that he needed to take John to some kind of urgent care.

John had rolled out of the top bunk in the night and in the morning his neck was hurting so much, he wouldn't move it and was still crying.

So, Mama spent the next three hours crying herself as she worried about her firstborn and wished she were with him. For a while, I tried to distract myself by finishing writing our Christmas cards, but I'd write down the wrong names, wrong words, and have to scratch out a lot, so I gave up. (Therefore, if you receive a card in the mail with scratched-out words, you'll know when I was writing it!)

Checking vitals at Children's Hospital of Atlanta

Prepping for x ray 

Mary sees no reason to stop climbing anything that can be climbed

My little, vulnerable boy being wheeled down the hall for an x ray

The diagnosis was simply a sprained neck, so the doctor's prescription was children's ibuprofen and taking it easy. Daddy's additional prescription was an ice cream shake!

Praise God! Thank you to the Blessed Virgin Mother to whose maternal care I commended John when I couldn't be there; to St. John the Baptist who, as our priest said to me, knows about head injuries; and to Our Lord for not allowing John's injury to be worse.

The rest of my day at home was a bit emotionally subdued because of all that "excitement," but I did finish writing Christmas cards, sewing Christmas gifts, planning the Christmas meals and placing the online grocery order, and wrapping the Christmas gifts.