What I read in November...

1. Girl Meets God: On the Path to a Spiritual Life by Lauren F. Winner ****
2. Crossed by Ally Condie ***
3. Heaven is For Real by Todd Burpo*
4. The Litigators by John Grisham ***
5. What I Know Now: Letters to My Younger Self by Ellyn Spragins***
6. The Red Tent by Anita Diamant*****
7. Mitten Strings for God: Reflections for Mothers in a Hurry by Katrina Kenison*****
8. Escape by Carolyn Jessop****
9. Perfection: A Memoir of Betrayal and Renewal by Julie Metz*
10. Believe It, Be It: How Being the Biggest Loser Won Me Back my Life***

I'm pretty satisfied with 10 books this month. I'm still hoping to break over 100 before the end of the year but we'll see how it goes. Advent is a pretty busy time in my business :~)

Total books read in 2011: 92

P.S. the * mean how many stars I rated the book. You'll notice a couple of one stars. That's always a bummer when a book just isn't good.

One-on-one...

Today I had some precious one-on-one time with both my kids. Eli took a very long nap this afternoon so it was just me and Emerson for several hours. She chatted, helped me wrap some presents, found every snowman in our Christmas box, and then asked me to take their pictures.

She held them up and said, "cheese" then politely said, "thank you mama"

And another set of snowmen. (At some point she decided she no longer wanted to wear her pants this afternoon). 

Then tonight I put both kids to bed at their regular time. Emerson fell asleep instantly, Eli however because of his nap did not. After he was in their for about an hour it became apparent that he wasn't yet tired and I didn't want him to wake his sister. So I had him come out and sit with me.

Of my two kids Emerson is louder, more vocal, more demanding, and requires way more attention. So I especially cherish my time with Eli. Tonight sitting on my lap in his quiet soft spoken voice he asked me about Charlie, Hannah, and Grammy. (Charlie and Hannah are cousins). He then said "home?" 

He doesn't often initiate conversations he mostly just parrots everything we say, so I adored that he was  communicating with me. 

Then he went and got these small santa and snowman figures that light up and plug into my computer. As they changed from color to color, we practiced saying each of them. 

Of course then his daddy came home and Eli pretty much went crazy with excitement.

I hope that I have more opportunities each day to spend time with my kids one-on-one. I love having time with each of them, they're so different and I love the opportunity to cherish and honor the things that make each of them, so beautifully and uniquely them. 

We briefly lost Eli tonight & other musings...

~Turns out he fell asleep randomly on our living room floor about 20 minutes before his bedtime. We quickly changed his diaper and put him into his pajamas so we could put him in bed.

While we were doing this Emerson was watching with some interest and finally she shouted, "Wake-up!"

Haha crazy girl she never likes to let her brother sleep. I then decided she and I should go clean the play room as a distraction. Luckily, she thinks picking up the play room is great fun.

~We also put up a couple of our nativity sets today. I was explaining each piece to Eli and Emerson, reminding them to just look with their eyes. Emerson was so cute.

She stood on a chair and just stared at the pieces. She was especially transfixed by the animals. Each time I came to check on her she was giving the camel a kiss. She also decided that baby Jesus is actually her baby cousin Charlie who just visited for thanksgiving.

Then when Marcus came home from work she took his hand and said, "come here" and she showed him each of the nativities set up.

~I'm excited for our Christmas tree. I told them that very soon we were going to put a tree up in our house. I always forget that two year olds don't grasp the concept of soon, in a minute, tomorrow etc. Eli grabbed his shoes and headed for the door. He was showing me that there were plenty of trees to pick from right outside the window.

~Christmas is truly magical through the eyes of a child, and I can't wait for all of the festivities and traditions we do as a family. We saw Santa (From a distance) at the mall on friday and while they have no desire to get close to him they now recognize his picture and know that he says, "ho, ho, ho"

I'm hoping I can convince them that a quick picture with Santa won't be so bad.

~ I read two books today. I love when my kids play well enough that I can read. I also really love that after Marcus came home and I was sitting on the couch with my blanket, space heater, and a book reading. Emerson grabbed her own blanket and book and we read together. I so hope she always loves books and I really hope Eli will grow in his love of books as well (If only I could get Marcus to read more since Eli is his little shadow.

~We had pictures taken for our christmas cards last week. I'll post more of them tomorrow but just want to share one tonight.

I love this picture. It's so authentically them. Running and laughing together.

~ Eli just woke up. I wish he'd sleep through the night. Off I go...

This was a random all over the place post. Goodnight.

Still hosting family...

I hosted my family this year for thanksgiving. 4 of my 5 siblings came and so did my mom and they all stayed at our house.

At one point we had 10 adults and 5 kids two and under in various locations around our home. Every room was occupied and so I haven't had a chance to sit down and write, or upload pictures.

Everything went pretty well. My niece fell on thanksgiving and it required a quick trip to the ER but she's a tough girl and no worse for the wear and thankfully her nose wasn't swollen, but oh my goodness did it swell and bruise instantly. It looked so awful.

I set the table, did a thanksgiving liturgy, even baked a few things (which I never do). Although as I was doing some of the prep on Wednesday night I might have said, "who in the heck thinks this cooking stuff is fun?" Marcus just laughed at me. I really do wish I could enjoy cooking, but I just really really don't.

Overall, we had a very nice thanksgiving. I'll write the real post with pictures once all of family is gone tomorrow.

Now we move onto advent which starts tomorrow I can't wait one of my favorite seasons of the year!

My Children fascinate me...

I adore watching Eli and Emerson play and communicate with each other. For the most part they get along amazingly. Yes, there are moments when they're both arguing over the same toy, or when Eli decides it's funny to take his sister's pig and watch as she tries to get it back.

But overall they are great companions and playmates to one another. As I type I'm watching the two of them right outside the door. They're playing their own version of catch with a tennis ball. Which involves throwing the ball and the other one chasing it, not matter where it lands.

Emerson threw the ball behind her and Eli simply ran the distance to retrieve and then went back to his starting place. While watching they're also very clearly having a conversation. Some of it I can understand, like "catch, bubba, get it, be back, here" others are in a language all of their own, but they seem to understand one another perfectly.

Chatting, playing, laughing.

That's what I'm thankful for today.

And then there are these moments...

Moments of pure joy and laughter.

And for all those many moments in a house with two 2 year olds I am thankful. 

The continued sting of infertility and prematurity...

I know I shouldn't let things bother me, but that knowledge does very little to actually help. Today I went to a baby shower for a women in my congregation who's due in the next few weeks.

It was a very nice shower and overall I had a really good time. There were just a few things that have been weighing on me since them.

1.) There was another two year old girl there. She's exactly 1 month older than Eli and Emerson. However, this girl can talk. In complete full sentences, she can have actual conversations, she can sing entire songs. Her language skills were just insane.

Which of course got me worrying about Eli and Emerson again. I know they're still behind in language. They're making progress, especially Emerson, but for the most part they still very much just parrot whatever we say. So if we ask them a question they just repeat the last word of it. "What color is this" answer: "this". "Do you want to take a bath?" Answer: "Bath"

They do have a few phrases that are independent of parroting, but they can't hold clear conversations, they don't know any songs, they can't "really" answer any questions with clear fully constructed sentences.

I don't know at this point if they're still affected by their prematurity. I was always told the expectation was for them to be caught up by two, but they are so not.

This little girl is also fully potty trained (but I don't really care so much about that).

I think what bothered me more is that once the mom realized that our kids were essentially the exact same age the difference between mine and hers was so clear. Mine were still very much babies compared to this other little girl, the difference was really astounding to me. Plus the mom kept saying "M--- you're just so smart" and then encouraged her to keep showing off all of the songs and things that she could do.

I hate that Eli and Emmy are still behind. I'm thinking of re-calling early intervention and seeing if they'll re-evaluate them. I wasn't satisfied with the last evaluation and would just like them to check in and see where we're at.

2.) Of course when you're at baby showers everybody likes to talk about their own pregnancies and births. Someone asked me how much weight I gained with the twins and I said 32lbs. They were shocked that it seemed like so little and then one women said, "Maybe your not eating enough is what caused them to come early."

As the mom of preemies I already question pretty much every second of my pregnancy wondering if I could have done something different. Having some essentially place blame on my shoulders for their prematurity never feels good.

3.) The fertility of others is still sometimes hard for me to handle. My best friend from high school just delivered her second baby on monday. We went through our first pregnancy together.  Three new babies are expected in my congregation in the next several months (and that's really wonderful and exciting), but sometimes it still stings a little.

The weird part is I do not want another child right now at all. But I think the hard part is not knowing if we'll ever truly be in a position where it's even possible.  The costs of the IF doctor and the necessary procedures to even get pregnant are so expensive, and none of it is covered by insurance.

Plus I absolutely do not want to repeat a multiples pregnancy. My first one did not go well at all and I have so much fear that by body will not handle another one either and I'll have even earlier preemies and more NICU time and all that goes with it.

While the pain of infertility has without a doubt diminished (I don't cry when others give birth any more yay for progress), it's still there. Some twinges of sadness, resentment, disappointment, that for us family building will never be simple or easy.