Well well well.  It's ten o'clock right now, and MY baby (not Ja's baby... his baby is the one who screams uncontrollably for no apparent reason...) has been asleep in the crib for an hour. 

Yup.

You heard it here first, folks, she's sleeping away AND SHE IS NOT TOUCHING ME!

Well, not too much has been happening in these parts of late.  Just the usual stuff.  Changing diapers, keeping peace, boobing, changing diapers, keeping peace, boobing.  That's pretty much it really.

Knowing that Talya is going to be our last baby has made me really want to cherish every moment.  I don't even mind that she wants me to hold her all the time.  It's sweet the way she nurses and plays with my nursing necklace.  Her coos and giggles are enough to melt any heart.

And the older hooligans.  Oh my goodness do they adore the peanut.  Ephraim will look at her in awe and say, "You're so beautiful, Talya."  Keyzia sings her lullabies so that she can go to sleep.

I was always told by good friends of mine that you just KNOW when you're finished having kids.  You feel full.  The urge to have more, the need to expand is gone.  I have definitely hit that stage. 

Even after having Ephraim, I knew that we would have another baby.  I was wanting to put it off for a good long time, but our family didn't feel complete.

After I had Ephraim, I had some pretty wicked post partum depression.  This time it started before I even had the baby.  Knowing that it would probably just get worse with another one is the key factor in our decision not to have any more.

We have had such amazing support from this crazy group of friends who we can also call brothers and sisters.  The body of Christ has banned together and helped us through this difficult time.  My eyes have been opened, and I have never felt so loved and accepted in all my life.  We have been given so much by so many people that it just makes me want to give and give and give in return.

But that deserves it's own blog post.

Here I am wasting my not being touched time on the computer. 

What am I, a first time mom or something??

No.  Really.  I am about to write an article and post on the WORLD WIDE WEB that contains way too much information.

Dad?  Step away from the computer.  I promise that tomorrow I shall post something happy about... bunnies!  or puppy dogs!  With absolutely no talk whatsoever about my girlie parts or their functionings.

That said...

Here we go.

A few weeks ago I bought something a little nutty.  I had done some research, found a supplier, and purchased the Diva Cup.  ((You'll really really have to click on the link to even get a vague understanding of what this is.))  Think...  a diaphragm, sort of, but for your period! 

Thus follows a review, of sorts, of said Diva Cup and my thoughts to it's uses and whether it was worth the crazy amount of money it cost me.

To sum up, the Diva cup rocks my world and I can't believe I waited so long to get it.

The end.

Hunh?  More details?  Awrighty, here we go.

It's this crazy cup shaped thing that you insert into your, er, girlie bits.  It catches all those monthly nasties, then you empty it out, wash it, and re-insert.  Or put in your cupboard in the handy dandy draw string bag until next month.

A typical period for me lasts about 7 days.  The first two days are usually brutal horrifying nasty things, where if you look at me, I just might rip your face off and have it for dinner.  I will soak through the big tampons in about two hours or so, and be quite heavy even while sleeping.  It does generally taper off a bit by day 3, and then down to almost nothing by day 7.

This time?  I was very uncomfortable, as per usual on day one.  Day two (yesterday) totally fine.  Today?  It's tapering off, and I think that'll probably be it by tonight.

I have yet to fill the cup and I left it in there for 6 hours or more yesterday.  And for a good 8 hours today.  I didn't even need to empty it when I did.

The tricky parts?  Learning how to get it in is tricky.  Especially as a die hard tampon woman.  The lesson I learned is that you do not insert it the way you would a tampon.  It actually sits very low, just inside the vaginal opening.  Surprisingly tho, I cannot feel it when it's in there properly.  I had to go back and read the directions on it to really figure the thing out.

One thing that is weird is peeing with it in.  I have been assured by some cyber buddies that it will not fall out, but it does kind of feel like it.  Maybe it's just my superior vaginal muscles!  After pushing out a ten pound baby!  ha!

I'm convinced that it's the lack of chemicals in these things that's doing my body good.  I also switched to cloth pads for at night, but I haven't even really needed anything on at night, so that part doesn't even matter.

A three day period??  That's unheard of for me!  But, I will take it.  Oh yes, I will take it.

Now I'll probably get pregnant or something.  Figures, eh?

You know, when I'm miserable and crabby, I really don't want to be around cheery people.  I would much rather wallow in my misery.  Content to spread the crab to all who see me and are forced to be in my presence...

I was going to hit the library today.  But then the thought of trying to keep the kids relatively quiet just made me tired.  Then I had to sit down.  All this while the two horribles are giggling and running around like maniacs...

SO, a change of plans.  I kick them outside so that I can sit in the peace and quiet for twenty minutes.  Maybe I'll pick up my bible, look for that renewing sense of peace.  Hope that I'll be granted a fifth wind.

It's the tired that kills me.  That bone numbing tired that just makes you want to sleep for a year or two.  When I'm this tired, the life just seems to be sucked right out of me.  It leaves me barely enough to get by, never mind with enough to pass over to the kidlets.

And yet, I will pull through.  I'll have another cup of tea.  Read some blogs.  Tidy up a little.  Then I'll look at my children tucked snuggly in their beds, and I will know that I would do it all again tomorrow.

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Edited to add:

Had a nap today, and am feeling much much better.  It's amazing what a little bit of sleep will do for you, isn't it???

 

I received an email from my Great Aunt Joyce today demanding that I keep on blogging...  it's funny, actually, I've been kind of planning some articles in my head, and yet it's just so much easier not to write them.  It's easier to just sit around and let the holidays wash over me with all the myriad of feelings that go along with it.

But, Aunt Joyce, you have forced my hand!  Or, at least my fingers!  I could blog about the neat felted bag that I just made, post pictures of the Christmas presents, talk about how we have three get togethers down, and two more to go...

There's something about Christmas that turns me into this raving insane lunatic.  I get super annoyed super easily, nothing ever seems to go "right", and really, the whole meaning of Christmas gets lost in the rushing, and the presents, and the buying, and the travelling, and the trying to make everyone happy.

This year we had Christmas day at our house.  It was great.  Keyzia spent the entire day in her pyjamas, and she was ecstatic.  My parents and my sister Glenna came up and we had turkey, played games, and generally stuffed ourselves silly.  Christmas Eve was a little more hectic.  Lots of yummy food, get together with all the sisters, and presents coming out the wazoo.

Boxing day saw us at the yearly gathering of Wolters' in Brighton.  It was chaos personified.  We did not have a good time at all what with the trying to help in the kitchen and the chasing of the children, and the thirty or fourty relatives who were present...

New Year's day will see us with Ja's immediate family, his brothers, his sister, parents and significant others. 

Some people glory in this hustle and bustle.  They love stressing about what to get for who, don't worry about going into debt to buy things that are going to last such a short time.  These people adore decorating and wrapping and all the jazz that seems to go with the season now.

Me?  Not only did I not want to put up the Christmas tree, but I wanted to take it down Christmas Night.

I love giving gifts to people, but I hate that I'm forced to do it by the consumerist way that Christmas has become.  I hate that people look at me funny in stores when I say Merry Christmas instead of Happy Holidays or Season's Greetings.  I hate that God hasn't been invited to Christmas Celebrations that were conceived to celebrate his birth on earth for a long long time.  ((Don't worry, I totally understand that the odds of Jesus' birthday actually being on December 25th are... well, about 1 in 365, but I see nothing wrong with a day that is to remind us of such a gift...))

What's the solution?  How do we keep Christ in Christmas in our home?  We did put candles in a cake and sing Happy Birthday to Jesus.  We read the story of Christmas as a family on Christmas Eve from the bible.  At every moment we tried to instill in our children that we give gifts to each other to celebrate the greatest gift that was given to us. 

And yet... and yet... something was still lacking.

I think it might be me.  I got some great presents.  I love being with my family...  even though they're all nuts...  Why do I feel like I have to stress out about everyone getting the exact perfect present?  Why do I feel like we need to see everyone, do everything, be everywhere for everyone?  What is it about the way Christmas has become that makes me dread the countdown with every part of my being?

The biggest question is how do we simplify this whole season?  And how do we keep the focus on Christ and off of the consumerism that is forced on us at every turn?

I don't know.  I don't know what the solution is, but I have 360 days to figure it out for next year.

We got a new to us monitor today...  (Thanks Barry!)  and I had no idea what I was missing!  It's quite a bit smaller than the old one, but the colour, people, the colour!  The greens!  The blues!  The contrasting white!  The beauty of it all!

You see, our old monitor wasn't compatible with our computer and hasn't been for years now.  Everything was really dark.  Like, the banner over at Dooce?  Yah, I just thought it was a solid red bar. Thought it was quite unoriginal of her, to be honest...  But then!  The new monitor has shown me the light!

Pictures on people's blogs that I had to squint to figure out what they were are now crystal clear!  The detail!  The colour!  The imagery!  Wow.

Unfortunately, I also noticed how sucky my blog was.  And how the banner did not at all match the colours.  Bah.  Why did no one tell me??  So, I changed the colours.  But the banner needs to change.  But I am tired.  Tired and also?  Crocheting and knitting like a madwoman with only 7 days until Christmas.  It's not looking good, people.  Not looking good at all.

The problem is that I keep adding myself new projects.  These projects that I must not talk about or the potential recipients will know what they are getting.

Ah yes, Christmas.  'Tis the season for lies and deception.

But not this house.

It's funny how we get attached to things.  Things that we can't possibly take with us.  Things that are not eternal.  Things that are just... well... things.  They may be tangible in the moment, but they can be gone in a moment as well.

My Gramma is moving.  We have lived here in Ontario for about 22 years.  That means that for the past 22 years, my Gramma has been at every birthday, every Christmas, every graduation...  every significant and non-significant event for the last 22 years.

This year my Gramma will be in Manitoba for Christmas.  And I am not quite ready to let her, or the house that she's lived in for as long as I can remember go.

I thought it would be easy, sort through the stuff, throw out some stuff, wheedle her out of some stuff...  but, especially this weekend when we were there, I found myself sorting through the memories.

I remember the time my cousin Ben and I traded pj's to try and trick my late sleeping Grampa.  Or the time we used oil paints to...  er...  paint the back porch.

In the basement I could hear my Grampa telling my dad to watch his head, and then promptly whack his own head on the low ceiling.

I remember learning how to sew in that house.  With my Gramma watching over my shoulder while I did straight seams.  I learned pottery, threw some pots, very mishapen pots, on the wheel with Gramma's hands guiding my own.

We're talking about years of Santa Clause parades, years of Thanksgivings, and sleepovers, and just plain old Gramma and Grampa togetherness.

While my Grampa has been gone for a long time now, it seems as if he still lives in that house.  I can see him around every corner, in the nooks, in the household "repairs".  I can hear him say, "'ammer."  I can see him with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth.  I can see him fixing my shoes with army duct tape.  It's almost like we're losing him all over again.

And yet, it's just a house.  A house whose memories now need to be transferred permanently to my mind. 

It's going to be hard not having Gramma close by.  The kids adore their Great Gramma.  It's going to be much more difficult to do Gramma things with her being a nice solid 40 odd hour drive away.  I am really having a much harder time with this than I originally thought I would.

I do, however, feel peace for her for the move.  I think that she will do well in Manitoba, but at the same time, my heart screams, "what about us?  we need you here!"

I've never been close or really gotten to know my dad's parents, and my mom's parents have really fulfilled the grandparent role on both sides. 

And now the new roles begin.  We are going to have to figure out how to be grandchildren while being so far apart.  The kids are going to have to hear stories all the time about their Great Gramma so that she will still be just an hour away in their hearts.  So that when we do meet up, they'll remember her.

My Gramma is a tough old bird.  She is the most amazing woman I know, and I can only hope that when I'm her age, I will be as together as she is.

To say goodbye to the house is going to be very difficult.  But to say goodbye to the woman is going to be even harder.

Our very own Very Mom had a beautiful baby girl a couple of days ago!

Welcome goes to Katherine Sophia, and congrats to mom, dad, and two big brothers!

I’m not feeling sad, really. It’s more like I have these tiny buckets right behind my eyes, and they’re perched on two rickety stools, and there’s an even tinier, grumpy gnome storming around the stools, occasionally kicking them and sloshing some water out through my eyes all over my face.

 

What can I say?  I'm a crier too, and proud of it.

1.  Rainy sundays with the heat turned up and the children napping are just a little bit of what heaven will be like.

2.  I am currently obsessed with the idea of cloth diapers.  (Thanks mostly to Very Mom, and this article.)  We are poor.  We got Ephraim some of these Kushies training pants from Walmart yesterday.  How much do I love them??  You have no idea.  He wore one to bed last night, but it couldn't handle that kind of pressure...  he was a bit damp when he got up.  BUT, during the day?  Fabulous!  He even told us that he had to go pee!  I think that he can feel that he's wet in these, so he knows at the very least that he has gone.  I was also intrigued to find out that you can knit "soakers" or diaper covers.  Great patterns at Little Turtle Knits.  I especially like the ribby rap.  If we are ever nuts enough to have another baby, we will totally go cloth all the way.  I even found a great free pattern to sew your own diapers.  Once the disposables we have are gone, I just might sew up an overnighter for ma boy.  He'll at least be in diapers at night for the next little while. 

3.  Ja has informed me that it is silly to have another baby JUST to use cloth diapers.

4.  I had a very odd dream last night.  One where I met a bunch of people from the blogs I read on an almost daily basis.  Jess was there, and Michele.  Fluid Pudding brought shoes for everyone.  And Amy's baby puked s lot.  Very interesting, to say the least.   It was one of those dreams where you wake up and you think, "wow, that sure was a great time!"

5.  We seriously considered NOT picking the kids up from Sunday school after church today.

6.  Ja and I decided that we are very much looking forward to being raptured, and that we hope it happens before we have to pay back the student loans or before they cut off the cable.

7.  I have a giant loom in my basement.

8.  The floors in here are freezing.  We desperately need some carpet.

9.  I had to discuss the fact that only boys have penises with my son yesterday.  He wanted to "help" me go pee, and told me when I sat down to make sure my penis was pointed down.

10.  Because you just can't stop a list at number 9!

Ask anyone.  I have a very strong belief that Ritalin is over prescribed, that a lot of kids who are diagnosed with ADD or ADHD are just active, and our overworked teachers can't spend the time that they need with those kids.  Don't even get me started on the parents who don't make the effort and ask for the drugs.

This, though, this article is about Ritalin being the last resort and it working.  Kudos to this mom for being such a wonderful advocate for her son.

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Edited to add:

By the way, Tom Cruise is an idiot.  Allyson and I have come to the decision that he just needs to shut up and stop making little of mental disorders.  Maybe some vitamins and exercise will make good ole Tommy less of an idiot.