Totally Worth It

Long nights are totally worth it to see smiles like this.

Kade, 11 weeks

Kade, 11 weeks

Colt, 11 weeks

Colt, 11 weeks

A Day with Me

     It’s 3 am.  Kade wakes up and wants to eat.  By the time he is finished eating, had a bottle supplement and burped it is almost 4 o’clock.  He’s bright eyed, so I put him in the bouncy chair and get Colt.  I nurse, supplement with a bottle and get Colt back to sleep while watching Kade kick and smile.  Kade is still wide awake.  It’s 4:35 and I figure I might as well nurse him again.  At 5:15 he’s back asleep and I decide to go back to bed.  It’d be nice to sleep until 7, I think.  At some point my husband wakes me up.  He wants me to move over; the next thing I know Colt is fussing and wants to eat.  It’s 6:15.  I guess I should have just stayed up.  Jeff gives him to me and I nurse him in bed while dozing.  Jeff goes for a run.  It is so hard to wake up.  Jeff’s getting ready for work and encouraging the kids at their chores.  He changed Quinn’s diaper and got him dressed for the day.  Jeff heads out and I finally make it out of bed.  I don’t look at the clock, but guess it’s close to 8:00.  I enter into the usual chaos in the rest of the house.  I fix breakfast for Clark and Lissie.  I’m still not really awake, so I sit down to try and finish waking up and check my e-mail.  Both babies are still sleeping, so I take advantage of that to fry an egg and eat breakfast, while fielding school related questions.  Kent (11) starts “freaking” out about a plastic spider ring.  This type of behavior is on the normal side for him, so I ignore it and continue eating.
      It’s almost 9:00.  The older kids have science class today.  I need to hurry.  I get Kade up.  He has lots of cute smiles for me, but he’s drenched.  I change his diaper and clothes and get out a clean rag and Felicity got me a clean blanket.  I sit down to nurse him.  At some point Kent asks for help.  I guess he put the spider ring on his finger and can’t get it off.  It doesn’t look like its cutting the circulation off and I have no free hands to help.  He’ll have to wait.  I finish feeding Kade and it is time to leave, but before we can leave I need to change Quinn’s diaper and Colt’s diaper and clothes.  As I buckle Colt into his seat he looks at me with a puzzled expression, he thought he was going to be fed.  I send everyone to get in the van and Kent isn’t ready to go, even though I had said to be ready to go twenty minutes ago.  On the way I remember the spider ring and told him he’d have to wear it until he got home and I would help get it off then, but he had already removed it.  We pulled into the parking lot where the science co-op meets two minutes before class time.  Kent, Katy, and Kaomi hurry to their class and I drive back home. 
     I help unbuckle Clark and Quinn at home and we unload from the van.  By 10:35 Colt is finally getting to eat.  Clark and Quinn play with little legos while I am feeding Colt and Felicity wants to know what the activities are for the day.  She has to wait since I haven’t pulled today’s activities out yet.  She plays and talks to Kade while waiting.  Colt fell asleep so I put him in his rocker and grab the daily activities, before I feed Kade.  Today’s activities are the cooking set, markers, Doodle Dice, books about boys or girls, and floor puzzles, which I didn’t get out.  I’m disappointed because I don’t think we’ll enjoy preschool today.  On Thursday’s I need to be up no later than 7 in the morning for me to be able to help the morning run smoothly.  I’m hoping for a late morning cup of coffee when Kade finishes nursing.
     Yeah!  There was enough coffee leftover in the pot for a cup.  I drank it while putting sweet potatoes in the oven to bake and making lunch for Felicity, Clark, and Quinn.  Today they had peanut butter sandwiches, peach yogurt and a cookie.  I found some leftover tamales in the freezer and warmed them up for my lunch.  While they were warming I handed out reward stickers to the preschoolers for the activities they did this morning.  After I ate my tamales I sharpened colored pencils while chatting with my children.  Jeff dropped Kent, Katy, and Kaomi home from science and they started making their own lunches and I handed out their reward stickers.  Then I had twenty minutes of free time in which I printed a coloring sheet for school, held a sleeping baby and changed a diaper.
     At 1:05 pm we started school with story time and I fed Colt.  I read for about 45 minutes.  The books we are currently reading are Mystery of the Silver Coins and The Illustrated Book of Knights.  Then Kent, Katy, and Kaomi worked on their school and met with me as needed for instruction while I fed Kade.  Quinn went to his bed for nap time and Lissie and Clark sat on opposite ends of the couch with books and their blankets for quiet time.  By 3:00 I was completing most of the instruction that I needed to give.  I have had a little time to get on my computer this afternoon when it wasn’t being used for math class.  The older children continued working on their work to wrap up everything possible by 4:00.  I didn’t give instructions to everyone about their reading project, so we will add that to their list of assignments for tomorrow.  Anything else that hasn’t been finished by 4 o’clock will also be added to tomorrow’s assignments.  The goal is to have everything completed by this afternoon or no later than noon on Friday, so we can watch our Friday movie.
     From 3:00 to 4:00 I attend to some of my children’s needs and help Katy with a few ideas on how to make her writing assignment better.   I made sure everyone had a snack of unhealthy candy.  I didn’t have the energy to find something else and what was on my snack menu I didn’t have in my pantry.  I’m also feeling the end of the afternoon drain.  I’m so sleepy, but naps aren’t an activity I get to participate in, because even if I were to fall asleep someone will come and wake me up with a question or argument.  Feeding babies, again, fits into the late afternoon.  Most of the kids are making sure their chores for the day are completed and having free time.  I’m thankful it’s cereal night.  I don’t have to prepare anything for the kids dinner.  I’m not sure what Jeff and I are going to have, so I sent him a text to see if he wanted to bring something home for our dinner.  Auto correct kicked in on a text and it said something about him bringing “snot” home for dinner.  I was trying to control my laughter and not draw the attention of all my kids.  I snuggle with Kade for several minutes and help Kent check on his fantasy football team.
     Quinn asks me to change his diaper.  Then, I head into the kitchen to fix Kade a bottle.  He keeps fussing, so maybe he needs a little extra.  He eats and continues to fuss, so I put him in another room.  While in there I take care of the sweet potatoes and get out the cereal for tonight and pour portions out for everyone to eat when the children are ready.  They heard breakfast was ready and all ate promptly tonight.  I clean up a few things in the kitchen and it is time for Colt to eat again.  Around 6:00 Katy wants to hold Kade and see if she can help him stop fussing.  Colt is ready for a bottle, too.
     Jeff arrives home with Schlotzky’s for us while Colt is finishing his bottle.  Kade is still fussing and it’s almost time for him to eat.  I feed him with hopes that he will be happy and we can eat without babies needing me.  We ate, Kent went running, and the other siblings provided distractions for the twins.  Then I washed baby bottles, mixed formula and worked on something for school.  Jeff took five of the kids for a walk and Kent was given permission to turn on the Thursday night football game.  The Denver Broncos are playing.  I asked Kent to help fold laundry while he watched the game, since the pile to be folded has exceeded the number of pieces that usually get folded in a day.  I joined Kent in folding the laundry to see how much we could get squared away in a short time before the twins would need to eat.  Jeff and the kids got back from their walk and they made a crowd in the living room to watch the game.  We sent them off to bed at half-time and then Jeff and I had a snack and watched a tv show and picked up most of the last quarter of the Broncos game to see the defense pull off a win.  Now its to bed.  Hopefully the twins will sleep a little later than 3 am tomorrow.
    
    

8 Weeks - Colt and Kade

Here are their 8 week old pictures.

Colt - 8 weeks

Kade - 8 weeks