Music Soothes the Savage Beast

From a young(er) age, Kathleen has enjoyed music. When I turn on the stereo, a look of joy comes to her face, and she immediately begins directing the music and exclaiming, unintelligibly, how much she likes a particular piece.

As many children do, Kathleen has acquired various objects from the around the house as hers - an old soda bottle, various measuring cups, my brush when she can get it, and most recently, Brandon's pocket hymn book and children's song book. She enjoys walking around the house with the hymn book in one hand, held out in front of her, and waving the other hand while 'singing.' As she can't talk and can't carry a tune, her singing consists of long tones usually beginning with low-a-low-a-low or wal-a-wal. However, she doesn't seem to know the difference, and it amuses her, so we'll worry about the words later.

In addition to her own singing, Kathleen also enjoys Brandon's and my singing. Often after singing a song of her own, she will force the hymn book into our hands and insist that we trade songs. Being a smart mother, I've begun to employ songs to keep Kathleen content while working on some of my own pursuits that don't involve reading her endless repetitions of Mother Goose.

One morning recently, Kathleen was fussing again, and I wasn't ready to feed her lunch, so I started singing. We began with such classics as "Once There Was a Snowman," "Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree" (at this point wishful thinking), and "I've Been Working on the Railroad." Having exhausted the supply of short songs, I moved on to the longer "The Ants Go Marching" (we made up to fifteen before I couldn't make up any more rhyming words) and "This Old Man" (repeated twice). Following the singing, Kathleen brought me Bill and Pete, which I repeated to her from memory, while she kept turning the pages, looking for where we were in the story.

As it still wasn't time for lunch, and Kathleen started threatening with Mother Goose (of which half of I do have memorized), we started one last song, guaranteed for at least 20 minutes of silence from Kathleen: "99 Bottles of Milk on the Wall." We made it to 45 bottles before lunch.

I'm told that with age comes wisdom. Or at least change. As a teenager, I would unequivocally declare that I didn't believe in exercise. Upon seeing a runner on the street, thoughts of what kind of sick person they were came to my mind. After entering BYU, I amended my policy somewhat, and would work out with my friend Amber twice a week. But it was only weight lifting, and we would go eat lunch at the Cannon center previously.

My sophomore I stepped it up and did kickboxing at my apartment complex, but after attempting running, I gave it up, because I'm not a runner. However, that summer 8 pounds in a month intervened, and running was interspersed with swimming. So, grudgingly, I became a runner. But with conditions:
1. No running when the temperature drops below freezing
2. No running in the rain
3. And absolutely no running in the snow

This past month and a half has been filled with both below-freezing temperatures and snow, and I have not been seen on the streets of Springville. However, recently the snow has finally ceased its falling, and the sidewalks have been somewhat cleared. And even I have been excited to go running. Except for condition number 1. The cold.

To say that it has been cold recently would be an understatement (at least for me). It has been so cold that even Brandon who never complains of the cold has complained of it being chilly. Inside. Our dining table sits in a corner that has a window and is composed of two exterior walls, and one can feel the cold radiating off the walls as one eats. It doesn't make for a very pleasant dinner.

But it doesn't look to be getting any warmer, and I'm certainly not getting any less pregnant, so this morning Kathleen and I took the plunge. I put on two pairs of running tights, two fleece jackets, a neck gaiter, and earband, and gloves. Kathleen had on gloves, a fleece cardigan, her coat, a scarf, and her hat. Once we got outside I wrapped her up in two fleece blankets, and a big quilt for extra measure. At the point, when it started snowing, it wasn't worth undressing and going back inside, so we went running. In 10 degree weather in the snow.



I think that perhaps age only brings insanity.

Why I'd Like to Move to the South

I would like to move to the South (or anywhere else that relies on the solar method of snow removal, or ever better, anywhere that doesn't see snow) so that I wouldn't have to shovel snow when I'm 4 1/2 months pregnant.

The Impeccable Timing of Children

My parents love, as many parents do (I think as their own form of revenge for various humiliations at the hands of their children), telling a story of me as a child. One winter while shopping, they made a stop at the jewelry counter in Bloomingdale's. At the time I was an infant, and my older sister Brynn old enough to speak but not old enough to understand discretion. Due to the leaky nature of cloth diapers, I am alleged to have had... rather unsavory things... running down my legs onto the white marble floors. My sister, eager to point out my act, loudly announced to all within earshot that I had pooped on the floor. My parents, having no other recourse, beat a hasty retreat.

Often there is a debate among parents which accidents are most horrifying and difficult to clean up. Personally, I find vomit most disgusting, but as of a few days ago, had had no first-hand experience with anything beyond heavy spit-up.

New Year's Eve, I have realized, is a holiday for single people and drinkers. Parents, especially those of young children, mostly have no part and are more than happy to go to bed, roll over in the middle of the night, and mumble a Happy New Years, if that much cognizance is present. Having no desire to stay up, but always willing to make a party of things, Brandon and I had a modest party with my cousin Mark and his wife Melodie, who have no children and are always great to invite over. 'Modest' being a deceiving word, and having evidently forgotten the preparations for recent dinner parties and Christmas dinner, Brandon and I spent all day (but only one day this time!) preparing various "small bites."

Dinner was much enjoyed, followed by Boggle and Yahtzee, all to the accompaniment of some nice jazz. Kathleen I am sure dreamed of being in a dicing parlour.

Following fond farewells around 10:30 (we were celebrating the New York New Year), Brandon and I checked on Kathleen, only to discover her face-down in the remains of borsch, having completely soaked all her blankets, her clothes, her sheet, her mattress pad, and her hair, which had by this time dried in spikes.

So indeed we did celebrate New Years in Mountain Standard Time, but I don't think there was much romantic kissing the New Year in, perhaps just a very tired peck.

Having no further symptoms the following day except a reluctance to eat, we scratched our head and did nothing, as Kathleen has shown no inclination to let fall anything from her lips that sounds like English words, and cannot describe any feelings of malaise to us.

Upon waking her from a nap on Wednesday with a loaded, liquid diaper followed five minutes later by evacuation from the other end, we realized that in fact, something was up. A difficulty of having non-communicative children is that, well, they don't communicate very well, including communicating when they don't feel well.

Which returns me to my original subject, that of the timing of children. Not only did Kathleen become sick(er) on Wednesday, but I also had my long-awaited ultrasound. Ultrasounds are supposed to be exciting, the time when you start calling your unborn baby by its name, when you start making plans for games of catch, or polite tea parties. And it was exciting and amazing to see our baby kicking around, moving its little fingers, yawning, and rolling everywhere. Right until Kathleen showed us again what she had eaten for breakfast.

And for anyone who is wondering, we're having another girl, Sophia. Hopefully she'll have better (or worse, depending on how you look at it) timing than her older sister.

I'm Dreaming of a Tropical Christmas

As a child growing up in North Carolina, I loved watching White Christmas with Bing Crosby, where he and some friends head up to Vermont for a wonderful white Christmas filled with snow, skiing, snowmen, and hot chocolate by the fire. My siblings and I would watch the weather report breathlessly around Christmas time, waiting for any small hint of frozen precipitation (even freezing rain counted). I remember one Christmas where a chilled rain almost counted.

After three or four snowstorms since Thanksgiving, I am cured of any desire for snow on, around, or within the three-month vicinity of Christmas, New Years, my birthday, Valentine's Day, or Easter. Perhaps Saint Patrick's day, too. But, as I live in Utah, the most two-week recent forecast includes 7 days of snowflake pictures, and only one day that isn't at least mostly cloudy. And it's been like this for the last two weeks. And the highest temperature on that list is 35 degrees.

If perhaps you are a person of my husband's ilk who spent two winters in frozen Ukraine, and considers the perfect weather to be 33, drizzling, and cloudy, then this Christmas is perfect for you. If, however, you have the soul (if not the appearance) of non-northern European descent, then we can all join together and tell Ol'Blue Eyes (and Irving Berlin, for that matter) to go hang it.

Julia Child, We Salute Thee

For Brandon's birthday this year, he received Mastering the Art of French Cooking, having expressed a desire to learn more about French cooking, and perhaps even eat some French cooking (there don't seem to be many French restaurants around here to try it out). As discussed in an earlier post, the danger of reading a cookbook is the following desire to eat all of the wonderful food described in the glowing prose of Ms. Child. The problem however, is finding or creating an occasion that warrants the 3 days of preparation necessitated by French food. The French never do anything hastily.

Luckily, Brandon's siblings Ashlie and Nick live just up the road in Provo, and both of them had had a birthday in the last year. And what better excuse for a dinner party than a birthday party, too? To make it more of a party, and being meddling older married people, we made them invite dates, so as to further spread the joy of French cooking (and praise for the cooks).

Having already fixated on roast chicken months prior, Brandon and I took faith in the Child, and prepared her suggested side dishes, ratatouille and sauteed potatoes. For a first course we served garlic soup (once again taking a step of faith) with bread, and to finish we had orange Bavarian cream (not French, strictly speaking, but in the book) with hazelnut cookies and hot chocolate.

Writing down such a meal sounds simple; really it should only take a few hours to cook. Roast chicken? Just stick it in the oven. Garlic soup? Boil garlic with a handful of weeds, and add mayonnaise. Bread? It's no-knead, so no problem. Cookies? Anyone can make cookies in 20 minutes. The problem one always runs into when preparing food, however, is not the complexity of individual dishes, but the complexity of everything together. The ratatouille alone took us (there was no way I was going to do this alone) 2 1/2 hours from start to finish.


However, with combination of Brandon's pessimism and my
experience, we accounted for unexpectedly long preparation times and budgeted the prior two days and Sunday morning before church for shopping, chopping, and cooking. And however long it takes to make the food, the food never quite tastes like the culmination of 3 days of preparation, and nobody but the cooks has any idea.

By the time dinner and our guests arrived, Brandon and I were ready to eat anything, after cooking for 2 days. And as is highly unusual with cooking, nothing disastrous happened and the food turned out as hoped for. Everyone seemed, or at least pretended to have a nice time. But we're not doing this again until... Christmas dinner.

I'd like to migrate south

Our heat has now been on for two and a half hours, and it still isn't up to the temperature I like. I just checked the weather, and it's 19 degrees outside, which might explain why the furnace is having difficulty heating our apartment. Yesterday I complained to Brandon that I am done with snow for winter, and he remarked that we have only had two snowstorms so far. Growing up in North Carolina, however, that's one more than is necessary for each winter. And we're not halfway through December yet.

Our first snowstorm was a week and a half ago, on Saturday. Saturday was also the day we planned to go get our Christmas tree. I had planned on taking the camera, taking cute pictures of Kathleen picking out her first Christmas tree (last year she was only a lump in her car seat and didn't count for anything) and making family memories. However, by the time we skidded our way to the lot, sloshed through the mud, and made one circuit of the lot, we bought the first tree we had seen, dumped it into the trunk, and headed home. So much for memories.

After shaking as much snow off in the carport, we set the tree up inside and let it rain for awhile on towels before we ventured putting electric lights in it. Luckily, Kathleen was in bed by this time and so the tree was unmolested until the morning. So far she has left the tree largely alone, but the other day, I did catch her with the bottom of a glass ornament in her mouth. As long as she doesn't bite down, we should be fine.

She Pretends Very Well

But Kathleen isn't fooling anyone.

Dr. Brown, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the ER

Often family pictures can be stressful, and coupled with those flashing lights, it may leave some with headaches. What it left Brandon with was a migraine. Formerly, in another life, before I met Brandon, he suffered from migraines, mostly in high school. However, with my wonderful presence bestowing goodness at every turn, we thought that Brandon was free of them. He was, until a few Fridays ago.

So we prepared to spend the rest of the day sitting out the migraine, and resting from the after-effects. However, when Brandon couldn't remember Kathleen's name, couldn't see out of his right eye, and told me he was having problems "abling," we decided to head to the hospital.

Thankfully the ER was not very busy, and after and hour or so, Brandon was able to get a potent cocktail of drugs that made it difficult to do anything, much less remember anyone's names. Kathleen was very patient, helped by many, many walks around the ER hallways where she smiled and flirted with anyone who would give her a second glance. After three hours and a CT scan, we headed home to put both Brandon and Kathleen to bed. I think he might have gotten ever more sleep than Kathleen, something that has never happened before, and isn't likely to happen again.

How do they get children to smile?

Last Friday, Brandon and I completed another milestone: first family picture. Having had no official photographic record of Kathleen as of yet, and desiring to have one with only three of us (without #4 making its presence know yet visibly), we went to the photographer. We all arose bright and early Friday morning, washed, dressed in our best, combed our hair, and prepared for photographic immortality. I had visions of endless portrait studio ads with sweetly smiling angels, displaying to the world their cheerful temper and cherubic smiles.

Kathleen will never be featured in any of those ads. In fact, I wouldn't even count on her being a model as an adult. Kathleen loves the camera, smiling and cooing whenever we bring it out. One would think that the camera is her next-best friend (after the toilet and perhaps the telephone). Evidently that love doesn't extend to cameras that want to take her picture for hanging on the wall, not just computer screen savers.

After suffering through half an hour of trying to get Kathleen to smile instead of cry inconsolably while sitting on Brandon's and my lap, the photographer then had the Herculean task of stemming the even-louder sobs while again trying to catch a smile that might be hidden behind the runny nose and tears. Brave soul. Eventually cheerios saved as much of the day as possible, and we have hopes for at least one picture that will make it past the digital trash can. If not, there's always digital manipulation, right?

Next time: what happened after the photo session.