Treats

Earlier this week I did something bad. But so good.  But bad.  I went to Cobb's Bread and picked up an over-priced bag of cranberry-organge hot-cross buns.  Our secret Santa had dropped them off as one of our twelve days of Christmas and I have been craving them ever since.  But I never go to Cobb's Bread because I would want to buy everything.  It's kind of an overwhelming store, and I love me some baked goods.  I was good though and only walked away with a half dozen of these babies.  And I enjoyed every single bite.  I let my girls try them and they had NO appreciation!  So, like a good Mom, I ate them all.  I gave Joe one out of the goodness of my heart.


And here's what I am eating right now. This is my new treat now that strawberries are back in season. Yay!  And by "new" treat, I just mean one of the many.  I have a real problem.  But I am going to do as Scarlett O'Hara suggests and think about it tomorrow.  Or in a couple weeks when I can actually start working out.  THAT is when I will think about it.

Quarterly Crisis

Blah.  Blah.  Whine. Whine.  Buckle up.

It seems to happen to me quarterly (more or less) where I remember once upon a time I was a rockstar.  And now?  I am not.  I was browsing through facebook, which is a massive time waster and hate it but I can't help it sometimes, and I noticed that my friend had posted a video of an LDS youth choir singing, "Glorious."  I listened to it and cried because it was beautiful and felt super inspired to write a choral piece myself!  And then I noticed that the person who wrote this piece was none other than Stephanie Mabey!  When I lived in Utah in my YSA years (like almost fifteen years ago), we became good "music-buddy" friends and played a ton of concerts together.  Fifteen years later, she is still writing and being all artistic.  Literally every post on her facebook page (because we are facebook friends) is artistic and all her pictures of herself are all vogue-y and beautiful (she even has purple hair and floral-meets-lace everything), and then there's me, who not only just gave birth to my fifth child, but also had a month-long tumor on my lip called a cold sore.  I am listening to Jane crying upstairs right now which makes me want to twitch because she should be sleeping and I haven't put make up on in days (or left the house in a while because all of my kids are sick) and I'm wearing sweatpants.  I even have barf on my shirt from earlier today that I didn't bother to change because I knew I was just going to get barfed on later.  I smell like barf.  Constantly smelling like barf.  What a MASSIVE difference between where she is after fifteen years and where I am.  So.  I had me a good quarterly cry.  Not because I hate where I am.  I just miss that life.  I miss being on stage.  I miss jamming.  I miss recording in the studio.  I miss people telling me that they were touched by a song I wrote.  I miss that feeling when I am singing a song and sang every note JUST how I wanted to.  I miss feeling beautiful or having a reason to get dressed up at all.  I miss touring and travelling because it made me feel cultured.  I miss photo shoots.  I miss making music videos.  I miss hearing my song come on the radio and getting all excited because that's me.  I feel like I finally know what I'm doing but I'm fifteen years too late.  I have a better sense of who I am and am more confident generally.  I have better style.  I know how to dress and do my make up.  I am all around a better writer.  My voice has matured and is altogether in better shape.  I'm just late to the ball game.  I feel like I write these musicals to fill a void.  I write them because I can never go back to my life when I was twenty, and I HAVE to go forward.  So I HAVE to do something different.  Something that I still love to do, but it has to be different because I am in a different place in my life.  I'm a different person.  I can't tour with five kids.  I wouldn't want to.  And I don't want to hear how grateful I should be because I am a Mom and I have five beautiful children and a loving husband.  I know that.  And I am grateful.  But grateful people can be sad and miss certain parts of their life, right?  I think I am most sad because it feels like it never even happened.  My life back then has vanished.  No one recognizes me or asks for my autograph or asks me anything music-related actually (unless it has to do with church calling stuff).  Where did I go?  Holy smokes.  Major identity crisis right now!  I guess I need to remember that music doesn't define me.  Maybe I am just more well rounded from my years of experience and because I have branched away from music.  I used to play my guitar for hours every day.  I have not touched my guitar in months.  Maybe a couple times a year.  And my callouses are gone.  It HURTS to play my guitar.  What?!

Just let me cry for a few days.  I just had a baby for gosh sake.  Crying is supposed to happen!  And then I will be all inspired and write something amazing and feel great!  Either that, or my kids will finally like a meal I make for dinner and I will get that same amazing feeling of fulfillment.    

Jane is Three Weeks

Looking at these pictures from when Jane is days old to what she looks like today at three weeks, I just can't believe how much she has changed. When she was first born I thought she looked a lot like Zoe. Here face is so tiny and cute!  Here are some more pictures with the kids holding Jane right after she came home from the hospital (Three days old).

Zoe did NOT want to have anything to do with her... for all of five seconds. And now Jane is her favourite little toy.


 Here's a picture of Jane at six days. I think she looks a lot like Noah in this picture.  It's funny what a few extra days does to a baby.  

 I took these of Jane just now (three weeks old) as she was napping because I realized most of the pictures I have of her are on my phone and I wanted some from my good camera.  I caught the end of a smile in the first shot.  She's been smiling a lot these past few days and not just when she toots, but out of recognition.  She's smiling at ME!  My heart melts every time.  My heart also wants time to slow down. Then again, my heart ALSO wants her to be sleeping through the night.  So.  My heart needs to make up its mind.
Looking at these most recent pictures, I'd say she's the girlie version of Jackson and Noah put together.  I still have hope that she will sprout blue eyes since they look kind of Burnham-y here, but when she has her eyes open she looks a lot like Jackson.... and Jackson is my child.  My brown-eyed child.

Let's talk about how these past three weeks have been.  I remember there being about a week or two of really tough nights trying to sleep-train my other babies.  Not THREE!  But maybe my memory is muddy because I was so tired during that time.  THIS girl has been taking her time getting into any kind of routine, but I think we are close.  There's no real predictability yet, but we're getting there.  I can't complain because she has been giving me some really nice long stretches of sleep at night.  Sometimes it is like pulling teeth trying to get her to be awake at certain times during the day so she will have her long stretch at night, but over the past few days she has been my friend and I think we are finally getting somewhere.  All that consistency and frustration is finally paying off.  Yay!  This past week she has been giving me anywhere from 6-9.5 hour long stretches of sleep through the night.  My milk that was coming in didn't like that 9.5 hour stretch, but I'd like to imagine that I would have liked it had I not been literally bursting to nurse her.  Haha!  For any Moms out there wondering how I do it, here is the short version:  I wake her up every three hours during the day to feed her.  Directly after feeding her I keep her awake for about an hour and then let her sleep for the remaining two.  I do this until about 8:30pm where I feed her one last time and put her down for the night so I can have a few hours of the evening to myself.  Sometimes this is bad because I want to stay up late.  I should really be utilizing the time that she is having those long stretches, ...but when you finally have "me" time, and only a few hours of it mind you, you kind of just want it to last.

I am starting to finally feel human again.  Ish.  The thought of leaving the house with five children is still overwhelming to me (unless Joe is with me).  But I went to church yesterday and somehow by some miracle was able to jump right back into my Primary Chorister calling.  On a whopping four hours of sleep.  And then promptly had a nap that afternoon.  I think I am getting used to this broken sleep thing!  I promise I had arranged for a sub, but they couldn't do it last minute so I figured that perhaps it was time to start getting out of the house and back to real life again.  I also made banana bread a couple days ago.  Huge step after all the meals that people have been bringing by.  Time to start making my own I guess.  And Joe and I had our first date sans Jane for the first time this past weekend thanks to a sister named Sarah.  Thankfully she likes babies and since my baby is her niece and she lives twenty minutes away from me, I will likely be asking her a few times until I start feeling comfortable leaving her with a teenager.  Thanks Sarah!  We were only gone three hours, long enough to go out for dinner, but it was enough time to enjoy being out and I even missed her a little bit by the time we got back to pick her up.  Feeling human again also means being a little less unkind to my children.  Sometimes I still burst at the sound of whiney voices and am not the kind of Mom I want to be, but I am getting better at it which is a start.  A very small start.

My favourite "tender" moment thus far was the day Jane came home from the hospital.  Noah was sitting with her on my bed talking to her while stroking her face and said in the sweetest most tender Noah-voice ever,  "Jane, you're going to have a lot of fun in our family.  Okay?"  And I think he's right.

Little Girls. Little Girls.

Zoe and Ellie typically play with each other pretty well during the day, but I often find them like this at bed time ever since I started making them share a room together and put the boys in a separate room.  Ellie felt so ripped off that she didn't get to stay with the boys, but it was time to make the change.  Now it's Ellie's turn to be the older sibling sharing a room with her younger sister.  And she hates it.  Ellie gets so bugged by Zoe at bedtime and claims that she just talks and talks and talks!  Haha!  Isn't that one of the joys of sharing a room with your sister?  Well, apparently, Ellie's not quite there yet and would rather sleep under the bed than share the same bed.  She says, "it's like a bunkbed!"  That's one uncomfortable bunkbed.  I remember the first time I noticed that Ellie was missing from bed, I freaked out.  I didn't know she was under the bed (and she was ALL the way under) and I panicked!  Where could she be!?  Did she sleepwalk into the neighbourhood (yes, those were my first thoughts.  Don't laugh at me).  Joe and I searched the house only to find her fast asleep on the "bottom bunk."  What a weirdo.  I guess she's not afraid of monsters under the bed, so that's a perk.  Unless you consider "Ellie" the monster under the bed.  Hahaha!  Well, these girls had better get used to being friends.  And they better make room for one more in a couple years!  Right now, they are both in love with Jane, which I hope lasts a little while.  She is a new shiny little doll to them and they are wonderful little mothers.  So, here's hoping that will translate into them being great friends one day.  And may they never be on the same period cycle.  Oh.  Or maybe it's better to just get it all done within one week instead of spreading it out.  Okay.  I take it back.  

My Birthday Weekend

This year, we had to book the Glenwood Lodge early because there were going to be too many people away during Spring Break when we usually try to get together, so the next best time seemed to be the last weekend in Feb.  AKA MY BIRTHDAY WEEKEND!  A few weeks ago I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to join all my lady friends because who the heck knew when Jane would come and even if she DID come early (which she did), would I be ready to take my baby out into the world?  I'll be honest, although I was excited that Jane came early, I felt overwhelmed about taking all five kids, one of them being a BRAND NEW baby, to the Lodge.  But perhaps if I only had to take Jane???  Joe and I came to a compromise that wouldn't involve him taking work off where I took the girls and had a "girls weekend away" and Joe had a boys weekend with the boys.  Three sounded a lot more doable than five, so I took it.  And to be honest, these trips are as much about the kids all getting together as they are about the adults.  The days belong to the kids, and the evenings is when we adults can come alive!  With the help of much caffeine and sugar, of course.

Can you believe this is the weather we got in February??  It was between 10-15C the whole weekend.  We really lucked out, so we were able to send the kids outside a lot, which was so nice.  It basically felt like March Break weather!  Here we are on our way to the famous park with "THE" slide.

Yes, I did take Jane down the slide with me. So, if she grows up to be fearless of very long and high slides (like Zoe), then we will all know why!  Seriously, Zoe spent her entire time on this slide.  She loved it and kept going down in different positions.  My fav was when she laid down and then shook her booty from side to side while still laying down.  Haha!


I love this pic of Ellie with Andy's girls (L-R: Eden, Mya, Ellie, Addison).  Like I said, this weekend is just as much about the kids as it is about the Moms, so I was glad I at least brought the girls.  Good thing too because most of the kids were girls!  I think had I brought Jackson and Noah they might have felt a little ripped off!
I had a lot of help this weekend, which is part of the reason why I thought I could pull this off. Everyone pitched in with helping taking care of my girls if I was busy with Jane (which was all the time), or people were more than happy to hold Jane so I could take a break from her, or eat, or take a shower, or deal with other girls that might be crying for their Mama.  It was so nice.  Barb even told me I was not allowed to make a meal.  So I brought paper plates and treats as my lame-o contribution to the weekend.    


Kristi Dupont was awesome and prepared a treasure hunt for the kids. It was pretty intense and amazing and the kids loved it! She separated them into groups and had them put together a puzzle at the end to receive their final treat.  It was awesome.  Zoe loved it, and I loved watching her get along with all the older girls that took her under their wing.  The kids had so many treats between the candy store and things like this treasure hunt.  Oh man!  I got a sick tummy just watching them go to town on all that sugar.  And then I would get a REAL tummy ache later that night from doing the same thing.


Every night before the kids' bedtime we would have circle time, which is basically a giant sing-along.  We would sing name games like "Purple Stew" (Zoe would point to herself each time it came to her name.  Haha!) or rounds like, "Rose, Rose, Rose, Rose" and "One bottle of pop" etc.  Sometimes it went on forever and dug into our late-night Mommy time, but if I'm going to be honest, I loved it.  The kids especially loved singing "Edelwiess."


Every night it was so hard to want to go to bed because I knew the later it got, the more delirious we would get and the more laughs would happen.  But I also knew that I had a baby to feed in the middle of the night and who knew what kind of sleep I was going to get.  It was a gamble every night and every morning I woke up more and more tired.  But all the lack of sleep was so worth it.  This is why I look like a zombie in all of my pictures.  That, and I think I was the only one who opted out of bothering to wear make up that weekend.  My favourite experiences were snuggling into sleeping bags on the trampoline at 2am to watch the stars and sing along to whatever music Cassie had on her phone (My fav being, "The Return to Innocence.").  My other fav was our "pole dancing" night.  If you think this was sexy in the slightest, think again!  It was all laughs.  We laughed.  We cried.  And most importantly, we bonded yet again even deeper into the connection we already have as friends and sisters!  I love these ladies!



Sarah, bless her heart, not only drove the entire time so I wouldn't have to (plus, I think she prefers it), she also made me a Poopsmith Sissie card (which is the group name I have given Sarah, Jenny and I on FB.  Haha!), along with a beautiful Anthropologie mug filled with chocolate that I am too afraid to use because I don't want to break it!  Haha!  She also made me a cake that we never got to dig into at the Lodge because there was too much dang candy, so I decided to freeze it and use it when I don't feel so yucky!  I plan to make SKOR trifle.  Thank you Sarah!


I was so tired by the time we got home on Sunday (my birthday).  It was so nice to come home to clean house and a happy husband.  I kept bugging him all week with a long list of "birthday wishes" that I was kind of joking about, ...but also kind of serious about.  Haha!  I hate the colours in Jane's nursery.  I know it's dumb, but I have to spend so much time in there, and it's really hard to look at lime green and purple, so while I was away Joe painted white over the green part, so now it's only half ugly.  Haha!  I was so happy to come home to that.  He kept LYING about having something else planned and that he couldn't do everything.  Well, he did.  He bought me a Belgain waffle maker which I have had on my wish list for a LONG time (YES!!!) and we had waffles for dinner that night.  He also wrote me the sweetest love letter that made me laugh and cry and had the boys make me cards too.  It was all very sweet and exactly what I wanted for my birthday.  Well done Joe.  I tried to have a nap... but this picture below describes perfectly how that went.  So, I opted for a shower instead and an early bed time.  Haha!  I was very spoiled this year and am so grateful to those who made me feel special on my birthday.  It's going to be a good year.  Gosh.  I'm 35.  When did that happen?