Have the pregnancy hormones arrived?

Now, if you are reading this, and thought I was already acting hormonally---shush!

Yesterday I felt unreasonably sad at several points during the day.  In the afternoon he was going to buy a new pair of shoes, and I didn't want him to leave me.  So he waited until the big kids got home from school.  I still didn't want him to leave, but I did survive the 30 minutes he was away.

Today I checked Entertainment Weekly dot com, and noticed that there was a link to the newly released trailer for Les Miserables.  Like an idiot I clicked.

So then I sobbed uncontrollably for 10 minutes.  I have to be honest--I've never seen Les Miz without crying, and I've seen it performed many times.  But usually I wait til the end.  Today the sacrifices the mother in this trailer make, just undid me.

Fortunately, this guy came and hugged and kissed me a lot.  So that was all right.

When are we going to go to the Saturday Market?

We finally made it, nearly two months after it opened.  We usually go every week, or nearly that, so the absence was really affecting us.  Poor Lillian seemed to just know we were missing it, without actually knowing in a calendar sense.  So, off my crutches by 3 days, I took a cane, the three oldest children, and my mother (an essential part of the team) to the market.

Roland, Lillian, and Molly were all allowed to buy one plant.  Lillian instantly picked some sunflower seedlings, Molly chose an amaranth plant (non-food, which they usually are not allowed to choose), and Roland wanted a plant that wouldn't die at the end of Summer, so he chose a basil that I told him we could winter inside.  He also chose a large tomatillo plant because I am indulgent about the plant habit.

Molly with the amaranth

Roland had earned some money that morning by helping me take cans in ( I love our new centralized can drop off system-such an improvement over the grocery store!), and he ended up spending it all on a succulent (hens and chicks) at one of his favorite stands.  He wanted to keep it on his window sill which I temporarily authorized.  (we'll have to see if it can be protected from the little ones.)  He cracks me up that he'd rather have a plant than a toy.

What else did we buy? a new stand is selling artisan bread dough, I'm excited to bake up mine, the world's best toffee--we're addicted, a new stand is selling salsa and hummus, and they were nearly out of everything, and by the time we finished, they had run out of everything, (then we forgot to pick it up after we paid--we were tired), a half flat of strawberries, just for eating (that is fun), some banana and zucchini bread...maybe some other stuff.

I so appreciate my mom who helps us so much, and helps us do unnecessary things like marketing--she is so generous with her time and love.

Is there a show after dinner?

With Jack there is.  His favorite post meal--dinner table entertainment is the eyebrow game.  It is played by raising your eyebrows at the audience, and then cracking up when they also raise their brows.  Then the audience laughs, and it can go on for several minutes.   Since he pounds his dinner down, it keeps us at the table with him a little longer.  Unfortunately, when you are laughing, it's hard to eat much more yourself!

We love you Jack!

So what's with the mustaches?

 So my little sister is pregnant.  After 9 years of having children, it's exciting to have someone on my side of the family join me in this endeavor.  (Even more excitingly, we are having our boys within 2 weeks of each other.)  She came to visit from VA for a few days last month, and though my foot was broken, my mom and I threw her a shower and made her a quilt in her favored nursery colors.

I have to say, I love our local quilt store, Greenbaum's Quilted Forest, they spent so much time with me and my mom, bringing me gray and yellow fabrics to approve, as we tried to find 6 of each that we liked.  I decided to make a rail fence, since I didn't have tons of time, and I knew I wanted to spend most of my time hand quilting the thing.  Except for one glitch (Ashley and Matt changed the name choice between when she'd announced the name, and the shower.  I had quilted a monogram into the center block.  I just left the last intital, and unpicked the rest.  But after thinking about it for half a day, I fixed it), I made, quilted, and bound it so speedily.  It is truly amazing how much handwork you can get done when you are wounded and useless.  I wish I had some better pictures of it.  Ashley, when your little guy comes, will you take some better pictures, with the baby, so I can put them up?

 I took a bunch of poor, blurry photographs with my daughter's camera (mine needs to be reunited with it's charger)  The party really did turn out pretty cute.  I made some bunting out of mustache fabric we found at the quilt store, and some appliqued onesises.  It was the second mustache shower I'd helped with this spring.  My friend Neysa had the brainstorm for the first, and we reused a few things from that shower.  It was definitely a generationaly themed shower.  At the first shower, everyone took the theme in stride, at the second, where the average attendee was older, people kept saying 'so what's with the mustaches?'  We didn't have a great answer for them.

I wanted to take more pictures of Ashley with the attendees, who were so sweet and generous with her, but everyone left in a huge clump.  Also, taking pictures from a recliner--exclusively, is not a super great way to memorialize anything, but--we tried!

Want a little more parade coverage?

The kids performing at Keizer Fest last Sunday.
The video from the parade--can't see Roland, but Molly is the little thing on the float!
http://www.keizertv.com/iris-festival-parade-2012/
Check out Minutes 64 to 65!

Everyone has been so kind to me and the children.  It's been a family friendly environment, and the way the rehearsals are going, I think it's going to be pretty great too!

Did you get some sun this weekend?

The kids were in the Iris Festival parade this weekend.  Roland and Molly are in this production of Theater Outreach's Sleeping Beauty.  The director decided we should do the parade, and awesome people built this cool float, and we were in the parade.  I even wore a Theater Outreach shirt, and minded the fliers the cast members were giving out.  Travelling via parade is fun.  Everyone seems so glad to see you.--I did make the classic mistake of sunscreening my kids, and neglecting my own face, which was a little pink as a result.

Here's Roland being guarded by some castle guards--often quite necessary.

The float, which was the best there, won this award.

Molly peeks down from the tower.

This flag had been attached to the top of a tower (see first picture)  Before the parade, it got sheared off by a power line as we were trying to make it from the staging area to the parade route.  Not our last power line casualty.  I ended up holding that flag while riding the float.

Molly and Roland passed out fliers advertising the play (Opening June 22) to the many parade watchers.

The cast carried this banner proclaiming the float's superiority.
After we got the end of the parade route, the director, who drove, told us all to hop on, and sent the children into the tower, and we got a ride through the neighborhood to our origin location.

Suddenly we were going much faster, whipping the bottoms of trees, a power line knocked off the roof of the center tower, and we were laughing like crazy, especially when a clearly stoned guy in a house hailed us...we imagined how high he must thought he was, to see a travelling castle.

Then a middle school-er in the tower got hit in the eye by a power line.  Fortunately she was fine except for a small bruise.  Roland and Molly reminisced about it incessantly afterward--clearly the highlight of the day!

--Photos Credit: Ed Stiner

How did your Orthopedist visit go?

 So it turns out, you probably won't heal from your Jones fracture without surgery--but if you are expecting a baby, feel free to hope that you might, because no one will help you in your current predicament.

If you don't heal, you may just do another six weeks of no activity.   It didn't help before, but maybe it will make some kind of difference this time, anything is possible.

If you are concerned about the effect on your body and family of what is sure to be another 12 weeks of no activity, followed by the delivery of a newborn, rest in the knowledge that you really deserved the fate.  Nothing like doing charity work for Shriner's hospital to be asking for karma to zap you.

And if your youngest child now prefers not only his father, but both Grandmothers to you...because you are useless and boring...at least he's your fourth!

Sorry for the bitterness of the post.  All is well with my children, pregnancy, and life in general...I just feel like a fool for believing that I could get better, and like a chump for letting such a small bone derail everything.