Eleanor, almost six months

So Eleanor is almost six months old.  If she was my first child I would be counting in weeks, days, hours, and minutes, but since she's my fifth, we'll just call her six months old.  

I remember thinking that Kathleen was an enormous giant that was about ready to head off to college when she was six months old.  She was hardly even a baby anymore!  I blinked in May and now I have a six month old baby.  It's pretty shocking.

After acting the punk for her first two months she's really settled down to a happy, smiling baby who is completely relaxed about pretty much anything.  I was resigned to giving up our adventure Saturdays until next year, having to work around baby naps, but Eleanor just rolls with whatever we're up to - camping, hiking, or just going to the playground with friends.  I carry her around in my carrier (thank you, Laura, for that recommendation so many years ago) and she falls asleep when she gets tired and the adventure continues.  When we're home she is kind enough to sleep through most (and sometimes all) of school and go to bed before I get dinner started.  I don't think that I could ask for a better baby.  

Every evening when it's my bedtime I feed Eleanor one last time.  Then Brandon and I sit around and admire just how darn cute she is.  I think that I could sit and watch her all day.  I'm probably biased but I think that she might just be the cutest baby ever.

I'm not looking forward to spending four days traveling halfway across the world with a six month-old baby, especially one that has just discovered that the best cure for boredom is to make continual high-pitched baby squeals interspersed with coughing, but I'm pretty sure that we'll all make it there intact.  Because, after all, nobody can stay irritated very long with a baby that is just so cute.

Welcome to Crazy Town

We have just a tad over three weeks left before we hop on a long sequence of airplanes that will eventually deliver us to Dushanbe.  So far I've managed to keep a lid on the Crazy, (mostly) keeping to our normal schedule and fitting in all of the necessary pre-departure administrative items around regular life.  Brandon and I started a checklist and have been steadily marking tasks off to make room for new items.  I checked the initial date on our list a few days ago and realized that we've been working on leaving since the first week of August.

So far we've gotten new passports for everyone (that was a fun dog-and-pony show to take down to Main State), gotten our Tajiki visas, renewed our medical clearances, gotten Eleanor medically cleared, added Eleanor to Brandon's orders, booked plane tickets, booked two hotel rooms in Frankfurt, had two of our three shot appointments, bought consumables, shipped consumables, scheduled our packout, hired a financial planner (to manage the loads of cash we make in our high-class lifestyle), taken everyone but Eleanor to the dentist and half of us to the optometrist, repaired our camera and shoes, and hung out with a variety of friends and family.  It's been busy.

But now life's about to get serious.  I feel that I've actually done a pretty good job of managing the multitude of tiny details; my native tendency is to seriously underestimate the amount of time it takes to get everything done (really, how hard is it to book a few tickets, right?) and then forget about the twenty pre-steps that pop up when you're trying to get one thing done.  Which inevitably leads to complete disaster and all semblance of normal life ceasing for much longer than is healthy for the children and their long-term education.

Life I said, however, this time I listened to my husband's advice (yes, we all get smarter over time) and I really feel like I've got the meta-situation under control.

But it doesn't matter how well you've prepared, eventually three weeks is three weeks is three weeks and life just gets crazy because you can't fit in all of the things that have to be done in around the edges of your normal life.  So next week is our last week of normal life - we'll have school, visit the library, go to the park, spend some time with friends, and enjoy the last week of consistently cooked dinner.  Then, normal life gets packed away for at least four weeks (yes, all of you who know better, I'm being optimistic) while Crazy Town is in session.

Although Crazy Town is, by its very name and nature, crazy and therefore kind of exhausting and pretty unsettling, it has its own appeal.  While we're living in CT, long lasting issues (how are those piles of cash doing?  What about the long-term emotional health of current problem child?  And Ebola?) don't have to be dealt with because we're so busy sorting through piles of crap stuff that has found our apartment and hidden in drawers and closets so it can jump out and scare us two days before the movers show up.  In Crazy Town, nutrition no longer exists (pancakes! again!!), along with healthy sleep needs.  And all of those AAP guidelines about screen time?  They don't apply at all.  The more screen time, the more suitcases I can pack in peace.

By the time we get to Dushanbe, detox from jet-lag, unpack suitcases, figure out how to cook without having to resort to our welcome kit knives, and get some more sleep I'll be ready to leave Crazy Town behind and get back to a life where I have to cook dinner every night, teach school every day, and get up at five every morning.  So it works out pretty well.

But that time is more than a month, several continents, and over seven thousand miles away.  So for now, welcome to Crazy Town!

Camping and Camping

Did I tell you that we went camping again?  No?  Well, we did.  And then we did it again.  But now we're done for the year (only four weekends left) and our stuff is rolled up and waiting to be shipped halfway across the world.

A few weekends ago we went to a state park on the Shenandoah river.  While not as beautiful in a mountain sense (I think that really the only place to camp is the mountains) as the National Forest a few miles away, it did have a lot more stinkbugs to crawl into our tent and scare Kathleen into a whimpering mess.

The trip was a reasonable success (nobody got hurt, it didn't rain), but we realized that camping is a lot more fun when you bring other adults that don't have children.  Then you are somewhat distracted from having to take care of five children outside in a public place.  And then the children can get distracted by the other adults and not swarm you while you're trying to roll up six different sleeping bags.  

We also sorely missed the songstress/game leader/cheerful presence of my cousin's wife, especially when we were about a quarter mile into our four-mile hike and the only response I could think of when the inevitable whining started was 'quit whining because you're driving me crazy!'  Also, when there are witnesses around, you're less likely to commit physical violence upon your whining/fighting/arguing/yelling/crying children.  Just sayin'.

Last weekend we went camping again with my Aunt and Uncle.  The plan was to try our luck on a first come, first serve camping spot in Shenandoah National Forest, which was evidently the plan of everyone else on the east coast because every single campground in the entire park was full by the time we got to them.  So instead we drove the entire 105 miles of Skyline Drive before exiting the park and finding a commercial campground to sleep for the night.  Not quite as atmospheric, but there was a playground.  

We had a beautiful hike the next day, which was made even better by having two adults to take turns carrying Joseph when he decided (about twenty feet in) that hiking really wasn't his thing but being carried certainly is.  I've realized that it's generally not the baby that causes problems on these outings, it's the two year-old.  

The next time we go camping, it will be on another continent in a country where there is no such thing as a campground.  While I'll certainly miss having running water and especially toilets, I do look forward to not having to camp next to anyone but the sheep.  There's something to be said for being away from the rest of humanity when you have five children who occasionally fight and might sometimes have to be loudly reprimanded for it.  Just sayin'.  

Mt. Vernon, With Friends

I am a very bad tourist.  Since we've gotten to DC in late February, Brandon and I have taken the children to see one (1) point of historical or touristical notice - the Museum of Natural History.  This is the exact same museum we took them to last time we saw something of note in the area - which was three years ago, during the Arab Spring evacuation.

We have, however, seen a lot of parks and gone camping three times.  So that's something.

Recently I reconnected with a good friend from high school who is now living in Richmond.  It turns out that she also has five children, all about the same ages as mine.  We almost got the same gender mix, only getting out of sync on the last children, who were born within two weeks of each other.  And since she homeschools her children (with the same curriculum we use) we decided that a reunion/field trip would be in order as soon as we recovered from the babies.

So a few weeks ago I got to play tourist and meet up with her and her own five children at Mt. Vernon.  I think that perhaps I could hear George Washington rolling over in his grave when we all showed up.

Thankfully, my friend's mom was in town so we had three adults versus ten children eight and under, which was a slightly better ratio.  I was very grateful that most of the day was outside and the weather was cloudy so that there were much fewer people to give our rowdy children the stink-eye as they tore around the estate.

We didn't help much because we were too busy catching up and comparing notes.  It's funny how you can not see some friends in over a decade and pretty much catch up right where you left off.  We were of similar mindsets and temperaments in high school and it was pretty obvious that things hadn't changed very much.  

I don't remember that much about the actual historical side, but I do remember having a great time and being surrounded by a continual swirl of motion and chaos that drifted around us as we strolled through the grounds.  Like I said, it was a good thing we came on a cloudy October weekday.

By the end of seven or eight hours together (we only left because it was closing), we decided that we had to do it again before I took off to the other side of the world.  Hooray for friends and hooray for history!

...And Kathleen is Never Getting a Smart Phone

Girlfriend is already too fond of selfies as it is.  I shudder to think what would happen if she got her hands on an internet connection and Instagram account.

The Last Six Weeks, or "Oh shoot! I forgot to do that and that and that and that..."

As of Monday, we officially have six weeks less in America.  Yesterday while shopping at Costco (where I got to make two trips with a lunch break in between) I realized that I was probably buying my last quart of Land O' Lakes cream for the next several years.  It's always sad when you start reaching the 'last of' stage before moving.  I'm really going to miss bulk amounts of... everything.

We've known about our impending departure for quite some time now, but somehow nine months feels like an eternity and six months is quite a lot time and four months is probably too early to start things but two months - wait!  That's only eight weeks!  And suddenly travel orders need to be changed and shots scheduled and pack-outs (yes, that's with an 's') arranged and consumables purchased and medical clearances updated and plane tickets scheduled and passports renewed and visas obtained and hotel rooms reserved and shuttles booked and luggage purchased and shoes repaired and doctor's appointments scheduled and cameras fixed and laptops obtained and eventually, finally, at long last, at the very end, all fourteen suitcases packed.

It's a lot to do.

And then, of course, just like that cream will no longer be available in a month and a half, neither will we.  And the cousins and aunts and uncles and former co-workers and friends and former roommates and future co-workers random people that you've been meaning to see over the last several months need to all be fit into the next six weeks.

So if you're dying to see me?  Let me know.  The weekends are almost gone, but we still have a few weeknights available.  I've never felt so popular.

But right now I'm in a good spot, emotionally.  We're leaving far enough away that it still seems possible to get everything done in an orderly fashion and I can still enjoy my cream a little while longer (note to self: eat more ice cream).  But it's still soon enough that I can start to really anticipate finally getting on that plane (or rather, finally getting off that plane).  I'm busy enough that I'm not bored, but not too busy that I'm feeding everyone cold cereal for dinner every night.

Of course in about four weeks, I'll be a crazy lady, trying to get everything done and cram one last visit and date and movie and park and library in before it's too late.

Until then, however, you can find me in the ice cream aisle at the local Safeway.  Mmmmm, mint chocolate chip....

Just call her four-eyes

Brandon and I both have glasses.  I got my first pair in fourth grade and Brandon got his in high school.  I remember having to strain more and more each week to read my teacher's handwriting up on that fuzzy trapezoid of light cast by the overhead projector in the stuffy darkness of twenty-five bored children learning about the nine planets (back when there were nine) of the solar system.  It was months before I finally confessed to my mother that I might need glasses, shamed with my inability to see.

So when Kathleen asked what hymns we were singing in church and I directed her to the handy large numbers on the wall that told her and she admitted to not being able to read them, I wasn't surprised.  She's been reading in the semi-dark for years now (crazy to think that it's been over four years now) and it was just a matter of time before she needed glasses.

Being lazy, I just waited until her eight year-old check up.  Pediatric care has gotten fancy since I was a child and instead of the chart on the wall, the nurse now takes a magic picture of the child's eyes which magically tells me that - guess what - your child needs to go see a professional and your life just got a little more expensive.

The problem with children is that when they come out they're not too expensive to keep - a few diapers, some onesies, maybe a toy or too - and so you have another one and maybe another one too as long as you're having them.  And then by the time they start needing things like glasses and braces it's too late and you have five children and they rest are likely to be just as, if not more, expensive as the first.  And I'm not going to even think about thinking about college.  Hopefully they'll be too dumb to go to college.

So last week Kathleen and I trotted down to Target and visited with the eye doctor that confirmed that yes, Kathleen was definitely in need of glasses.  Kathleen was ecstatic.  We had a fun time trying all the pairs of children's glasses sitting on the cool white pedestals, just begging to add some hipster to your child's life.

After a few days, Kathleen's glasses were ready.

I don't even want to think about braces.

An Act of Joseph

Joseph is probably the cutest two year-old I've ever had (although I can't really say that definitively, as I can only vaguely remember Kathleen, Sophia, and Edwin at two years).  He talks in a high, squeaky little voice, parroting everything anyone says to him.  "Joseph," I say to him about three times a day, "are you a monkey?"

"Yes, Mommy!" he invariably replies with his cheeky smile full of teeth made crooked with constant thumb-sucking, "I monkey!!!"  The other day, he announced that he wasn't Batman, he was a Cute Boy.

 

Every time we are riding the elevator and someone joins us he'll greet them with a cheerful hello and make sure they know that he's doing well and we're riding the elevator, followed by details of where we're going - to the store or the pool or the park or the car.  With his white-blonde hair and cheerful grin, nobody can resist him.  I can hardly resist him myself.

 Which is probably a good thing because not only is he the cutest two year-old I've had, he is also by far the most destructive.  I should have been wary when the ripped up board books started littering the floor around his crib when he was about eighteen months old.  Occasionally I would throw one into his bed at nap time, hoping that it would buy me a half hour more of silence.  And it did - but at the cost of a board book each time.  These board books had made it through Joseph's three older siblings with the usual damage - corners chewed on, covers scratched - but they didn't survive Joseph.

I remember my mother-in-law recounting the two year-old days of her own troublemaker.  "It was a constant stream of messes," she remembered, shaking her head in twenty-five years of disbelief, "as soon as I would clean up one mess, I'd find the next one.  I just followed him around the house cleaning up messes all day long."  When I first heard this story, pre-children and pre-Joseph, I couldn't believe that any one child could be that bad.  And then I had Joseph.

On any given day he will find any useful vessel, fill it full of water, and then dump all of the sidewalk chalk he can find in it.  He calls this 'making lemonade.'  I have a jar of 'lemonade' on my counter right now.  This morning he decided that the cheese grater and my mixer beaters would make a perfect accompaniment to my breakfast preparations.

One morning he was out on our balcony when he started wailing.  Evidently he had decided that a pvc pipe, rope and plastic fish (from Eleanor's play gym) would make the perfect fishing kit to dangle over the edge of the seventh floor railing.  Thankfully grass grows at the bottom of that particular drop and the fish was apparently unharmed.  

One day I couldn't find my glasses and set everyone looking for them with no results.  A few days later, Sophia found them stuffed into the hole in our computer speakers.  And after shaking the speakers, we also found the golf ball Joseph had picked up in our parking lot.  It's still there.

Not only is Joseph destructive, he is acquisitive and in love with all things electronic.  My cameras have permanent two year-old fingerprint smudges on the lenses and a lot of Joseph self portraits on the memory card.  After defending my keys from him for years, I finally gave up and bought his own set of keys for him, which he keeps next to his pillow at night.  Same for the old cell phone he acquired, which thankfully can't call 911 (which he did with my phone while we were at the park last week).

He also managed to acquire an old baby monitor and likes to turn it to static as loudly as possible and pretend that he's unlocking our car.  An old USB drive from college is the 'movie maker.'  One day I found the door to my room open, Eleanor awake, and cord to the baby monitor gone.  Joseph had happily hooked it up to a duplo contraption he had made and was 'vacuuming the floor, Mommy,' quite contentedly.

Living up to his monkey name, he will climb any shelf to get to food that he wants.  One day he discovered that Brandon and I keep our secret chocolate stash in our closet, right below a stack of bins holding Eleanor's clothes.  A few days later he nonchalantly walked into my room, stole a glance at me and shut himself up in the closet.  I opened the door a minute later just in time to save most of my Lindt caramel truffles from a heathen palate.  His sisters have learned the hard way to keep their candy out of sight of their little brother who considers something open to pillaging unless expressly forbidden.

Lately Brandon and I have taken to calling unexplained, bizarre messes 'Acts of Joseph.'  "What happened here!?" Brandon will ask as he surveys a bathroom sink filled with water, a marker, washcloth, truck, toothpaste, and about thirty q-tips.  Act of Joseph.  When I find butter smeared over the side of the refrigerator with bits of paper stuck in it and a smashed M&M for color, I know that my kitchen was just visited by an Act of Joseph.  If the girls come running to me, enraged because their favorite cardboard doll house has just been ripped apart, the furniture in pieces, wall paper gone, and dolls stripped naked I have to tell them that it was an Act of Joseph and the insurance couldn't cover it.

I know that one day Joseph will grow out of his Acts and so I don't worry too much.  They're even kind of funny.  But it's a good thing he's so cute.

Friday Night Hijinks, part II

Last Friday night was, as usual, date night.  Brandon and I haven't had a pizza and movie stay-at-home date night since July.  We've been unusually social recently and been traveling a lot lately and so I was happy to stay home with some homemade pizza and ice-cold root beer.

Stay at home dates are sometimes successful, sometimes not so successful.  It's really pretty hard to have an undisturbed movie when there are five children in the house, four of whom sleep in the same room.  Someone is always getting out of bed and using the toilet, smacking their sibling, wanting a drink of water, beating on their sibling, flipping the lights on and off, hitting their sibling, playing with toys, punching their sibling, or wetting their bed.  The hijinks started when Kathleen was moved out of her crib over six years ago and they haven't quit yet.

There will be lulls when the youngest sibling, after having been moved up to the party room, has gotten over the elation of having other people to bother and has had enough beatings that they will stay in bed.  But that's usually right before the next one joins the party.  I'm never quite sure whether my least favorite part of the night is bedtime or dinner time.  Maybe lunch?  We're planning on splitting up the boys and girls (bedrooms willing) when we get to Dushanbe and I am foolishly hoping that this will cut down on the hijinks, but really it will probably make them worse, since there are no girls to intervene when Edwin and Joseph are really going at it.  Joseph really needs to bulk up so I can finally just let them fight it out.

Recently, when I've put the children to bed, I've started giving them a lecture about date night.  'Friday night is date night,' I patiently explain (over and over and over), 'which means that Daddy and I are having a date.  And when you interrupt us with fighting (with a hard look at Edwin) or getting out of bed (Joseph) or needing a thirtieth kiss (Sophia) you are stealing our date night.  Now Saturday night is family night.  That's when we spend time together as a family.  But not tonight.  Tonight is for Daddy and me to spend time together.  So if you steal our date night, you will not be able to participate in family night.  Got it?'  I'm never quite sure whether to end with a hard stare or a pleading look.  It's a hard audience to play.

Last Friday night was going well - leftover borsch for the children's dinner, all of the necessary pizza ingredients present, movie in hand - so I got the children in bed by seven.  Kathleen has a watch, so I instructed her to shut of the lights at eight.  And then I shut the door and walked away.

I might have giggled as I bolted for my room, shutting the door and sealing Brandon and I off in our own little studio apartment, complete with pizza in the oven and root beer in the refrigerator.  I figured that as long as I didn't hear any noise coming from the children's room, it wouldn't be happening, right?

A few hours later, full of pizza and a few IQ points less from having watched Divergent (since the book wasn't that great I knew not to expect much from the movie.  Brandon viewed it as a good opportunity for mockery, exclaiming "Mr. Pamuk!" in a high-pitched Edwardian accent every few minutes) I opened the bedroom door.  No noise.

I crept into the living room.  No lights.  I cracked open the door and listened again.  No noise.  Finally, I stuck my head, silent and invisible, into the bedroom.  Four little bodies, all sleeping.  Three tucked in neatly, Joseph sprawled over his bed in typical fashion.  I felt like a magic fairy.  I put the children their room at seven, told them to go to bed at eight, and they did it.  Amazing.  I couldn't help doing a happy dance right in the middle of all of those sleeping bodies.  The children did what I asked!  I got a whole pizza and movie with no interruptions!  It was magic.

So I went to bed.  Back in my single days I wouldn't go to bed on a Friday night before two in the morning out of principle.  These days I love going to bed early on a Friday night, seizing the opportunity to get eight or even nine hours of sleep.  Be still my beating heart.  I've grown old and boring and I tell you it's fantastic.



The next thing I knew, someone was crying outside our door.  Brandon, with the lightning-quick reflexes of a sleeping parent, vaulted out of bed to see who had been decapitated in their sleep, or fallen out the window, or been burned to death on the toilet.  He found Sophia weeping outside the door (it's always Sophia, no matter who has had the problem.  The other day Joseph had woken up at one in the morning with poop crusted to his rear and Sophia couldn't figure out how to help him out.  She asked Kathleen for help and Kathleen's response was 'leave me alone or I'll bite you.')

Kathleen had thrown up earlier and now Joseph had thrown up to and she was so so so sorry to wake us up but really she needed some help cleaning up the vomit since Joseph didn't get it all in the toilet.

We blearily stumbled into the room to see how bad the damage was.  Since the linens had just been changed that day, Joseph had managed to get borscht on all of the sheets, the blankets, both of his blankies, and for good measure, on the floor.  Kathleen, thankfully, had the presence of mind to make it to the toilet.  "It was a good thing, Mom, 'cause it was a lot of vomit."

I stumbled back into the kitchen and got drinks of water and Brandon wearily filled a bowl with hot water to start the scrubbing.  He stripped the sheets and dumped them outside the laundry closet/Eleanor's bedroom.  I started on the floor, and we thanked our lucky stars most of it was bundled up in Joseph's linen.  Brandon borrowed Eleanor's blanket for Joseph, we handed out bowls, and called it a night.

Next time, we're staying in a hotel.

Five children, and how I make it work

Sunday I was talking with another mother in the nursing lounge at church.  It's where all the cool kids hang out during church and I confess to having spent more time in there than strictly necessary when I've been having a fun time chatting.  We mothers have to get our socializing in wherever we can.

This mother and I had never met before (it was Stake Conference) so we swapped info: what ward are you from?  How many children do you have?  What ages are they?

She listed off her children's ages - three, two and a half, and the three-month old baby she was nursing.  Then I gave her the run down of my own - eight, six, four, two, and the baby (for a brief three-month period they're perfectly spaced two years apart and then it's back to eyebrow-raising territory).  "Five children!" she gasped, "How do you handle that?  I'm barely able to handle my three!!"

I always chuckle when I get that response from mothers of little children and then assure them that I would much, much rather have five children at the ages my children are than ever go back to three that are three and under.  And then they scratch their head, trying to figure out how adding two more children is supposed to make your life easier.

But the truth is that having five children has its benefits.  Some of these benefits come with any number of children - they're just a result of children getting older - but some of them really do come from having a lot of children.

When I had three little ones, I was everything to them.  Just about the only thing any of them could do alone was use the toilet - and that was just Kathleen.  I dressed everyone, put everyone's shoes one, fed everyone, cleaned up everyone's messes, changed two sets of diapers, played with everyone, sorted out all of the fights, cut everyone's fingernails and toenails (yes, that's eighty in a day when I did my own too), brushed everyone's hair, and was the center of everyone's universe (including my own).  Everything I did, I did with three adoring fans in tow.

Now not only have I trained up the majority to be mostly self-sufficient, I have actually trained some to be helpful.  It's amazing.  Every morning after breakfast, Kathleen and Sophia have the same discussion.  "No it's my turn today! You did it yesterday!!"  When they've sorted out whose turn it is, they both dash for the laundry closet Eleanor's room and try to squeeze through the doorway at the same time.  The lucky winner for the day picks up Eleanor and starts cooing, "Aren't you a beautiful baby?  Oh Eleanor!  Good morning!  Are you ready for your bottle?"

After the bottle, the loser looks on forlornly while the winner picks out Eleanor's outfit for the day before giving the baby her morning bath.  They both get to dress her while brainstorming what exciting thing they could build for Baby Eleanor Playtime that morning.  Eventually I pry her out of their clutches so that Eleanor can get some sleep and time away from her adoring fans.  If I wasn't nursing her I don't think I'd have to do a thing if I didn't want to (which of course I do, because who can resist such a cute baby?).

When we were in Baku and I was busy with a project, the girls would take the boys outside for walks and playground time.  I remember cooking dinner one day and realizing that I hadn't seen the children for at least an hour.  Joseph was keeping me company, but nobody else was crowding around to surround me in a forest of chairs as I stirred the soup.  Another center of gravity had been formed in the family and it wasn't me.

This summer we've traveled quite a bit, and the last three times we headed out of town, I printed off packing lists and handed them to the girls.  Kathleen was in charge of packing her and Joseph's clothes and Sophia helped Edwin.  At the end of an hour or two, I had a duffel full with everything the children needed.  And then they unpacked it when we got home!

It's been years since I hovered around my children at the park, keeping up the continual patter that includes frequent repetitions of 'watch out!' in all of its forms.  As soon as Joseph learned to walk he was off with his siblings, doing whatever he could to keep up with him.  Not once did he turn around and ask him to come play.  I often take my Kindle to the playground because there's nothing else for me to do.

But most of all, aside from the practicalities of having five children, they've taught me how to love.  As I've had each child my capacity to love had increased.  When Kathleen was born, I looked her and saw a gaping hole of Need.  I didn't see chubby baby cheeks and tiny little fingers and a perfect rosebud mouth, I saw someone who was going to interrupt my regularly scheduled life with constant needs that only I could fill.  I was worried about getting her to sleep, I was stressed about feeding her, and I was terrified about forming bad habits.

When I look at Eleanor, I see her irresistible baby cheeks and overflow with delight when she squirms, wriggling with happiness every time she catches my eye.  When Joseph has made yet another dripping mess, I can't help but laugh at his devilish cleverness even as I'm paying for it.  I relish the time spent cuddling Edwin when he has been hurt and runs to me for comfort, fitting his soft body into the folds of mine as I rock the pain away, running my fingers through his soft blonde hair.  When Sophia steals a look at me in church, I can't frown at her inattention, I can only smile back at her, co-conspirators in crime.  And I am amazed to find, despite the sarcasm and jokes, underneath it all, I love being a mother.

I never ever thought that I would ever love it, especially with young children.  I knew it would be work and I was prepared for the work.  I knew that it would pay off in time when I was old and someone would be there to care it was my birthday.  I felt it was my duty, religiously, to have as many children as I could take care of.  But I never could never even begin to conceive of the joy that my five children bring to me every single day.  It fills my entire existence and literally changes my life every single day.  Not only do I love my children, but because of the love that has grown from them I love my friends more.  I love my family more.  I love strangers more.  I view the whole world differently because I am a mother.  I am transformed.

So when you see a mother trailing multiple children behind her, don't feel sorry for her, for the time she spends wiping noses and cleaning up messes.  Don't wonder why anyone would willingly give up their life to bring mouth after mouth after mouth into the world.  Don't think of all of the things she gives up.  Think instead of everything she has gained - many to love, many to love her back, and her whole world transformed.  I think it's a pretty good exchange.