My parents live on this street and we like to take walks down the road as it runs along the river. Tonight I snapped some pictures of the homes we pass - starting with my favorite:

My parents’ place:

Kit and the older three kids enjoying the river view, and getting a little too close to the edge for my comfort:

We bought the Cocoa Puffs Christopher requested for his birthday this year. While shopping Christopher was presented with a couple of choices of box style. One was advertising extra proofs of purchases for school box top programs. The other was advertising the new flick, Bee Movie from Dreamworks (which we’re not going to see any time soon, by the way, for a variety of reasons).

The Bee Movie box came with a bee-themed spoon. We thought that would pique his interest. No.

Christopher immediately recognized that the box was advertising a movie. He says, “This box wants to get me to buy something. What’s it trying to sell?”

“It’s selling a new movie coming out soon.”

“I’ll take the other one, then,” Christopher announces. “They put it on there because they want me to buy their movie.”

“Well, yes Christopher. But you don’t have to buy their movie.” Heidi says, “And this one comes with a spoon.” It had a bee on it. It looked cute.

“What does the other one come with,” C asks.

“Nothing. You get a spoon and Cocoa Puffs,” Heidi says, “or just the Cocoa Puffs.”

“I’ll take this box.” He’s hugging on to the box without an advert on it. We tell him that we respect his choice. He happily puts his box in the cart and we go on our way.

Thing is, when did we teach this to him? By example, apparently. Heidi and I are fiercely skeptical of advertisements. But wait a second: I recall one time when Critter was simply overwhelmed by the vast array of colorful cereal boxes in the aisle of the store. He kept of flitting from box to box asking if he could have this or that, noting all the nifty surprises in the boxes — that some came with games and others with flashlights, and I told him (once!) that they only stuck those things in the boxes to make you want to buy them. First they use bright colors, then they add something shiny inside, and it makes kids want to buy them. That he didn’t even know what the cereal was, if it was any good or not, and the advertising was working on him. ONCE! He seems to have gotten the message, in any case, because he’s just as skeptical of what he sees on TV and in print as a five-year-old can be.

I’m so proud of our budding, discerning consumer.

P.S.

Speaking of pos-consumerism, have you checked out Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty? This is a corporation using its powers for good not evil here with some powerful messages about the distortions of the beauty industry and their effect on our kids.

True Colors — the first one of this campaign I saw on TV. Couldn’t find it on the Dove site, so here’s Youtube.

Amy — I think I knew her.

Evolution — because what you can’t do with makeup is easily accomplished in Photoshop. Seriously: anyone can look like this. (Um, that’s sarcasm, by the way.)

Daughters — Okay, this one is depressing, but only because it’s true. Youtube.

Onslaught — the latest of the campaign, a stark sampling of the beauty messages we’re assaulted with every single day.

Not to mention the interactive image manipulation quiz.

Go ahead, click around, feel some outrage.

We came back from Kansas with so many pictures it’s unreal (even for Thadens) and a great set of picture frames & mirrors, compliments of the grandparents. I’m just now settling on which photos to put up - here they are.

The vote below really has been fun for us to read, thanks for everyone that posted their website and their “vote” - I knew some of you were reading, but I think in our head we’re still just writing for the kids and our families. I love our blog, I love that we have such a detailed record of Bennett’s NICU time and Emy’s entire pregnancy and first year and so much of the kids’ lives. It’s been a family journal in a way we never envisioned when we started years ago. But honestly we didn’t think that anyone else would be reading along with us still… we thought the readership would lose interest once Bennett got home and the NICU updates ended, since we started this specifically for NICU updates. Of course we thought we were going to stop blogging then and look what happened. It took on a life of its own.

Anyway, thank you for being willing to comment and let us know who you are. We’re happy we can provide some amusement in your day! I’m going to keep bumping the vote up so anyone stopping by can say hi. Of course feel free to comment on any post.

Sometimes I wonder if they practice being this cute, or if it just comes naturally to them?

Singing and Dancing to SuperWhy, the kids’ current favorite show. ~5MB

You can really see what Heidi’s talking about when Bennett starts dancing on his toe. Oh and gratuitous cuteness from Emy at the end. Make sure you stick around for that.

This is what Heidi makes me do when I should be working. : ]

Click on “Read More” there to see the rest of the results.
(more…)

This is sort of a roundup post.

Heidi’s sister had her third baby yesterday. To mark the occasion, we took the kids down to visit their cousins while their mom was recuperating at the hospital (uneventful birth with a midwife at that hospital, by the way — everything turned out just fine). Bonus that grandma was also visiting to help out for the birth.

Christopher and Mo went with Heidi to go an visit, and I’m happy to report that, not only did they get to hold the new baby, they both did so perfectly with support for her little bum and head just like they’ve been taught. I suppose that makes sense, though: They’ve both had plenty of experience with new babies around here, haven’t they? I stayed behind at their home with the babies and had a lovely time of it.

When everybody came back, we loaded up all the cousins (two minivans, natch) and headed out to the Tarrant Co. Duck Pond. Apparently this is THE duck pond. All others must be pale imitations. The kids had fun alternately throwing handfuls of bread and jellybeans at the ducks, and Bennett didn’t climb over the chains into the water once! Heidi was stressing this, as we didn’t pack a change of clothes, but I reminded her that we live in Texas and it’s summer. Strip the boy down and let him run around a diaper, if need be. That’s just fine around here. Between the ducks, minnows, grackles, squirrels, and a dreadnaught of a goose our meager helpings of bread found ample consideration.

Now, I haven’t posted pictures of the event. You would be right to ask why. We didn’t pack a camera. And the one professional photographer was in the hospital, and the other was taking pictures, but I’m not going to be able to get to her camera until Tuesday. I expect they’re cute, but the waiting is making me anxious.

Funny thing, though. While we were at the pond, an independent film crew was shooting a movie. One of the folks on the crew, taking a break, decided Bennett was cute and started snapping his picture. Here’s the weird part: She managed to take a picture of his face. No, really! In most of our pictures of Bennett, he’s running away or in the process of doing so, but apparently she got a few of him facing the camera, though still running, of course. We gave her our email address, and we’ll be seeing those images before too long, we hope.

I’m glad we went. Though it was only a trip to Fort Worth, it was kind of like a mini-vacation road trip for us. Nice way to break up what is normally a hard day of the week for me.

I’m remiss for not mentioning this before now, but the kids’ Nana came through in a big way for Emy’s birthday. Nancy, if you’re reading this, Emy loves her Nanny doll. See?

Thank you very much! I love that you gave it brown eyes. All the kids noticed that thoughtful detail.

And last thing. Heidi made up a batch of her cereal toffee concoction, and spread it out to cool on a sheet of parchment. It didn’t last long, however. She and I managed to eat most of it before bedtime. Much of it was gone before it was even cool. Couldn’t help notice that it looked like something in it’s mostly-gone state, however. Ah yes:

Ireland was delicious.

So I checked out a visitor’s blog yesterday and was really impressed. And I was introduced to a new word, Lactivism. Wikipedia has a good definition if you follow that link.

I understand not all women are able to breastfeed, but Heidi can and does, and I think it’s a beautiful thing. Let me show you.

This is one of the first pictures taken of us as parents. Critter’s latched on.

Here’s the first time she was able to nurse Bennett in the NICU. He was three months old by this time .

Emiline gets latched on at the birth center.

And Mo’s clearly comfortable with her acrobatic nursing.

And finally, here’s Mo (age 2), wanting to be like Mommy.

I love my family.

Oh, and Heidi has my blessing here. She picked out the pictures!

We made it to McKinney with plenty of time this morning. We were the first guests to arrive, in fact, and that was good. It gave Mo some much-needed transition time before the other kids arrived, not that the transition time did all that much good. She still required, if not physical contact from a parent at all times, no less than two feet in proximity to a parent at all times. Once the camera guy showed up, us dads took the kids across to the neighbor’s house.

First off, that was fun — hanging out with another home school dad. Second off, the dad is a creative director for his company, and I could relate to him on that level, too. (Random Kit fact: I was an Art director (or something like it) for a number of enterprises during the dot.com brouhaha.) The nice lady who opened up her yard to us had a daughter hanging out with her. I didn’t think much of it at first: The girl was about Christopher’s age. Then I saw her son who was about 8. Then her teenage daughter came out, and it clicked. Here was another homeschool family, and right across the street from our hosts for the morning. I mentioned to her that this was a nice change for us. Many people have been noting Christopher’s age and remarking how we must be getting ready to send him off to school. It’s about all I can do to not laugh in their faces. They never seem to know exactly how to react when they face the obvious contradiction of me telling them about our homeschooling. Here’s how it breaks down.

Kit’s a nice guy — really down to earth.
He just told me he’s homeschooling.
Christopher is a delightful, well-mannered child and not at all socially awkward.
They have four kids.

And right about then their heads explode, or at least their preconceptions about homeschooling. Awkward stammering with long pauses follow as if we just announced that we’re contagious or something. But we didn’t have to do that here. And more and more our little circle of friends is becoming densely populated by other homeschooling families. It’s a nice change.

So there we were, talking a little shop, when I see what must be the clumsiest hummingbird ever flailing around a tree, or a cicada finding a place to land. I get closer and it turns out to be the latter, and I point it out to the other homeschool dad. This starts to draw a crowd, and the nice lady’s son fetches a bug net and captures the cicada and suggests they feed it to their pet tortoise who lives in the bushes.

“Oh? You have a turtle?” I ask.

“A tortoise,” the youngest daughter politely corrects. Of course. Because this particular reptile is completely land-dwelling, and these homeschool kids know the difference. Before they feed the insect to the turtle tortoise, our hostess gathers the kids around for a brief lecture on turtles and tortoises, lets them hold the critter, has them wash their hands because of the sleight risk of salmonella — the whole spiel. Not only did they get a playdate, but they got a science lesson, too. I love this lifestyle!

Well, not everyone got the science lesson, because the nice lady fetched out a bubble table and a half dozen giant bubble wands. Bennett was merrily playing in the sudsy tub up to his elbows (and all over his shirt, hair, pants…) while Mo was spinning around making bubbles at a dizzying pace.

Let’s see, Christopher was introduced to tetherball, there were slides and swings, and that was just the older kids’ experience. From what Heidi tells me, Emy was a total charmer and will very likely be on TV again for this family’s blanket venture. If we see it, we’ll get it posted for you to coo over.

Incidentally, the camera guy is a homeschooler, too.

On the way home, we crashed Ikea for lunch and to grab a new dish set. We’re letting the kids start using the glassware now, and we anticipate fumbles, so we hit a sale and are now prepared with replacements. For lunch, Heidi and I sat near the kids’ section feeding Emy, and the three older kids all sat at a table, by themselves, ate their lunch, and didn’t dump anything out on the table or floor (not purposefully, anyway — C dumped his soda, but he also cleaned it up). I was so proud of them. We all went out to eat, and the kids were so well behaved, that I’m seriously considering trying such a thing again in the near future.

Heidi made a pie, Bennett dumped out a container of nutmeg… let’s see… what else?

Oh! Emy wanted in the dishwasher and couldn’t get it open so Bennett opened it for her. He also opens the fridge door for her so she can sit in there. They are now partners in crime.

We had another run-in with the fire ants and Bennett. He went to check out the mushrooms growing out of a root next to the house, and that happens to be a fire ant nest, too. He came in crying, plopped himself on Heidi’s lap, and it took us a moment to see what was going on. Once we saw the ants, Heidi realized they were crawling all over her by association, so I got Bennett into the kitchen as fast as I could, and Heidi ran to get the ants off of her pants, but it was already too late. One bit her hip. Two little bites. Bennett got at least 20 across his hands and legs, and they swelled up a bit, but that went away almost immediately. Heidi, on the other hand… Well, here are some pictures for comparison.

Bennett — little bit of mottled color, few spots. This is at least a dozen bites, poor guy.

Heidi — note the size of that one welt and the size of her finger. Two bites!

I gave them both some antihistamine and hydrocortisone cream to help with the reactions. Hoping Bennett won’t itch himself awake tonight, and Heidi has already konked out here at 9 from the drugs. But when she told me that she was really allergic to fire ants, I guess I didn’t fully realize just how bad she meant. I sat in a fire ant mound when I was three, and my reaction, while in the moment was filled with howls of pain, didn’t persist — much like Bennett’s. Heidi expects her swelling to last for at least a week. Small wonder she doesn’t like ants.

Last thing:

This may be the cutest minute of video you will ever see. At least today. Heidi ran for the camera as soon as she noticed Emy was saying, “shoes.” And we have Bennett on tape saying, “mama.” (finally) Then Ben and Emy fight over the little view-screen so they can watch themselves. And finally, Emy starts shooting the camera some seriously dirty looks for no reason whatsoever. Totally cute, and it clocks in at just over one minute. ~2MB.

How’s that? Rambling enough to keep you from missing Heidi too much?

Heidi adds - counted the bites on Bennett’s worse leg this morning. Swelling went down, easier to identify the red spots now. 47 on one leg. Then I quit counting… Also, camera explanation - our video camera has a screen that you can flip out and turn around so the kids can see themselves being taped. It’s to the left of the camera which is why they are knocking each other out of the way getting close - they were fighting to see themselves in the screen.

I have the movie of Emy’s first birthday party uploaded. It was hard to make: I had to distill 15 minutes of adorableness to 6 minutes of crystallized cute in its most pure form — that is, covered in cake.

Emy’s First Birthday and obligatory cake smashing. Big file: ~18MB.

The kids were just getting ready to eat their lunch when Christopher asked, “Dad! Can I have a glass of water?”

“Of course you may, Christopher, but you’ll have to get it yourself. I’m in the middle of doing dishes.”

“Okay, Dad.”

Christopher climbed down from the bench to get himself a glass of water. Moira suddenly wants a glass of water, too. “Daddy? May I have glass of water also?”

“Moira, of course. But you’ll have to get it yourself or ask someone else to help you.

“Cri-er, you get me a glass of water?”

“No, Moira, you’re a big four-year-old. You’ll have to get it yourself.”

I gently nudged Christopher over his refusal. “Christopher, you just missed an excellent opportunity to be kind.”

Mo’s immediate suggestion to Christopher: “Be kind, Cri-er! Be kind!”

After we were all done laughing, Christopher cheerfully accepted the chance to practice kindness.

Mo was working on her homework this morning. She was doing quite well. Though at the end, she went a little freestyle.

She got to practicing her eights. This was too adorable for me to not share. Can’t help myself.

Don’t know when it happened, but Mo’s drawing has suddenly become really detailed and, to me, almost unbearably cute.

Heidi here: I leave for one morning and miss so much cuteness! But I did get to capture some of my own with Emiline. She was modeling with the Secure2Me blankets. They are even more wonderful in real life, unbelievably snuggly and I wish they had huge versions of these blankets for grown ups. Here is Emy snuggling up in the blue bon bon that she was clutching all the way home in the car.

I’ve been playing around with no flash but my children move too fast in every shot -

In a couple weeks we’ll see if Emy made the news, they did video while we were there. Seriously, love these blankets. Would have been handy while we were trying to juggle Bennett’s carseat and oxygen tank and monitors and keep him covered because I was dropping his blanket cover off all the time. I love finding these great baby products but then I think “Dang, why could I not find these three babies ago?? I could have really used it all these years!”

Heidi saw Harry Potter: The Order of the Phoenix last night. Her description of the movie has reinforced my decision to not watch any more of the movies. Not that it was bad, per se, but I like the books better. That’s not the point of this post. Here’s the point:

Heidi left me all four kids at bedtime. Not really a big deal — I’ve handled this before. Certainly there’s some stress involved. I mean, bedtime is rather touchy, filled with rituals and needs, and as far as Emy’s concerned, I’m missing some vital equipment that makes me a poor second to mommy. Not to mention, I was tired. Not just sluggish, dreaming of an early bedtime tired, but fall down and let the kids crawl all over me tired. That’s how bedtime started, in fact.

As soon as Heidi left, I turned out all of the lights and unplugged the TV. This was around 7:30. I took Emy into the boys’ bedroom, placed her gently into the ball pit and laid down on the bed. Within moments, Emy was up on the bed nuzzling my face. I was dozing. Another moment later and Bennett was in the room, playing with the Little People playsets. Then Christopher came in and cuddled under a blanket next to me, with Emy in between. Then Mo. Mo laid across the exact middle of the bed, perpendicular to us, and proceeded to smother herself with a feather decker. Bennett joined us on the bed next, half laying on Mo, half on Critter. I admonished the children that this was quiet time, and if they didn’t lie still, then they would have to leave the room.

When I woke up, Ben was banging on the Little People Fire Station™, Mo and Critter were bouncing on the bed, and Emy was trying to climb up on the bed to get to me. “All right!” I cried. “Mo, get into your bed. Ben lay down. Christopher, you too.” And they did.

I told the kids that I would be trying to get Emy to bed, and that I wouldn’t be able to do our whole big bedtime routines. They fussed a little bit, but I told them I love them and excused myself. Emy’s main concern was that the frozen milk wasn’t thawing fast enough for her, and after a bit of fussing, I was able to get about 6 oz into her with a sippy cup, and I laid her down.

This entire time, I was completely expecting at least one of my older kids to get up and start moping about the living room, distraught for lack of routine, but they didn’t. Emy woke up once when she realized she was alone, and I got her back to bed without too much trouble. I started by trying to give her the rest of her sippy, but she adamantly refused. Not having too much else to try, I just stuck her back in bed, patted her back gently, and she was out within moments. She was up again by the time Heidi came home at 11:30 for her first midnight snack, but stayed in her bedtime groove for the rest of the night. None of the older kids had so much as a peep until they woke me up the next morning at 7.

When I explained what happened to Heidi, I wasn’t sure she was going to believe me. “It’s a miracle!” she laughed. I think I’ll try it again tonight, though I honestly expect that they won’t submit to such treatment when Heidi’s home. Not that she’s a pushover by any stretch, the kids just seem more prone to test their limits when both of us are home, for some reason.

The bittersweet postscript to this bedtime miracle came this morning when Christopher was cuddling with me. I announced that I was surprised and overall happy with the way bedtime went. So much so, that I was going to try it again.

“Why, D-A-D,” Christopher asked.

“Well, when you’re all grown up, you’re going to have to get yourself to sleep. I don’t think you’ll want me there to cuddle you when you’re all moved out of the house and married.”

Christopher’s eyes began welling up, and he dived underneath the sheets.

Oh-oh. “Christopher,” I began, “I love cuddling with you. I just want you to be able to get to sleep by yourself.” He didn’t respond. “Christopher? Will you talk to me?”

“I don’t ever want to move out, Daddy. I always want you to cuddle me.” He was sobbing. Some silly jokes and tickles brought him back, but the thought of losing Daddy cuddle time was too much for him.

I’m torn here. I want to get my evenings back to some degree. Cuddling the boys and falling asleep only to wake up an hour before my own bedtime isn’t working all that well for me. But I don’t want to be found guilty of compelling my sweet boy to grow up too soon. I’ll give him some short cuddles tonight, but we’re reading stories in the living room and see how that goes.