Minnesota is Heaven, But Virginia is Home

Dad has been working on scanning in some of his slides...yesterday he sent me some from 1974. Me and my Papa...this one made me cry Hip and happenin' Jan (loving the sideswept bangs!) Behold the cheeks * What a cute bib--I just noticed that! Butterball * We had supper at a very traditional German restaurant in Partenkirchen on Sunday evening ( Jodi has some pictures of the exterior). The kids did pretty good...we didn't seem to get any GLoDs from the other Germans in our portion of the restaurant and Will slept almost all the way through supper. Just as they were turning the Who Shot John music up and the Germans were switching over from "stern" to "mildly happy", the kids got antsy and Will woke up. As I was putting him back into his stroller, the older German couple at the table next to us started talking to us, in German...we think they were admiring our well-fed baby, because they were making motions at their cheeks. We just said "Ja, ja"...

Lindsey asked how the cloth diapering is going. I am here to tell you that it is going great for a number of reasons: Will is very regular and usually has his poo upon waking up in the morning, thus in his disposable diaper. He also poops only once per day, so I have experienced cleaning a dirty cloth diaper exactly twice on that rare occasion when he gifts us with a second poo. I bought two more Bum Genius 3.0s and have begun using them properly. Before, when I had three diapers, I was putting the microfiber doublers next to Will's skin outside the diaper pocket. This worked pretty well except that the diapers are meant to have the doublers stuffed inside the pocket--it puts the nice, soft wicking layer next to the baby's skin, rather than a wet bunch of microfiber. Like I said, I bought two more, so I have a total of five, which works great. I change him about every 2-1/2 hours or thereabouts. At the end of the day, I take all the liners out of the damp diapers and I th...

Josiah gives it a try...Will is just mesmerized by both of his siblings. It really is hard to find Will's neck! He had his first taste of bananas last night. I think he's not quite ready just yet because more came out than went in...but we'll try a little more tonight and see what happens. He will be four months in just about two weeks, so this is about the time I started solids for Josiah and Annika. I'll be happy to start giving him solids and spending less on formula...he takes a special soy formula that's not cheap, but it was necessary to help with his gas problem. I'm considering getting a Beaba Babycook and making baby food. I know you're all getting concerned because first I started in with the cloth diapers and now I'm talking about making homemade baby food. It doesn't stem from being an "Earth" mama, I'm just cheap about some things...like diapers and food. The two tiny First Stage Gerber foods cost almost a dollar at the co...

Will reminds me so much of his father...all chatty, giggly and happy. UNTIL the camera is pointed at him. And then, he gets serious and asks for his pipe and slippers. Sigh. I swear, 30 seconds earlier he was chattering and squealing! At least there's some super-cuteness and also a little spit bubble blowing in this one. Enjoy!

And my house was messy! Here I was, trying to save my rep as "the lady with the shiniest toaster"... Jen, I hope you'll still be my friend even though Mark has seen my house in a messy state... :) I even woke Will up so we could get a picture. Thought you would get a kick out of seeing the three of us!

Dear Ladies & Gentlemen of the Board: I believe that I deserve the coveted and prestigous Mother of the Year award (though we are in actuality only three weeks into the year), for the following glorious reason: Today while cutting my three-month-old's tiny, paper-thin fingernails, I cut him with the clippers. Not once. Twice. On both thumbs. Note: He's a bleeder. I hereby submit my application for Mother of the Year. Please consider me as I am certain that I'll have many, many more similar fiascoes to add to the list. Respectfully, MamaD4

This last week was a busy one. Monday we had a followup interview at Annika's prospective preschool. The teacher tested her on several different subjects: colors, letters, phonics, shapes and three-letter words. I sat a room away and listened and couldn't help smiling, hearing this conversation: Teacher: OK Annika, now what is this word? Annika: (sounding it out) PIN! If you put a "g" instead of an "n" on the end, it would be PIG! Needless to say, she passed with flying colors except that she didn't happen to know that vowels are called vowels and consonants consonants. Later that day, I got an e-mail from the principal, saying that they would love to have Annika and giving me the tuition rates...which were more than a little different than what was posted on their website. The tuition that was listed on the website was something we were comfortable with...the tuition the principal gave me, not so much. Plus they wanted 170 Euro in "regis...

Good Lord, my almost three-month-old is busting out his first tooth! He hasn't been overly cranky or anything...I just noticed that he's been gnawing on his fingers and fist a lot more than usual and sure enough, when I rubbed his gums, I felt the very tiniest rough corner emerging. Noooooo!! Why oh why do they have to grow up so quickly? I just want him to stay a baby for a few more weeks... The toofie and also (so jinxing it by writing about it): he is sleeping from 7:00-8:00 until 4:00-5:00 a.m. Which is great, but...I sort of miss seeing him in the middle of the night. I know, I know. Why can't Rachel EVER be happy? With two other children clamoring for my attention, middle of the night wake-ups were almost the only time I got all alone in silence with Will. Sigh. I guess this last time is just a little more bittersweet because I know I won't ever go through these stages again, so I'm trying to slow down and enjoy Will to the fullest. He makes it easy be...

How he gets the name Tubby McBubbers...!

A little video of Will, aka Tubby McBubbers, enjoying his new gym. He's getting pretty buff.

Thank you to Uncle Peder and Aunt Sarah for the Christmas package...they are still chasing Hamsuta around...! Those are the best kinds of gifts (the ones that give Mommy just enough time to do things like upload videos, etc.)!

Last night, I was tucked in bed with Annika reading a library book to her, when she decided to start reading. F-U-N, it said in the book. She knows her letter sounds, so she said "FFFFF-UHHHHHH-NNNNN..." "FUN!!" she declared. And thus is a reader born! This morning I got out the three-letter word puzzle and we worked on some other little words, like pig and tub. She's getting the hang of it. It's such a wonder to me to see that flash go off in their minds, connecting the sounds together and out of the jumble of familiar words, to know that they suddenly see a WORD. It amazes me. Anyway. Speaking of readers, I am currently almost 300 pages into the biggest book I have ever read. "House Divided" is, probably obviously, a fictional work about the Civil War. It's over 1,500 pages and I have borrowed it from the library, so I'm going to have to renew it five times! It is very good though, I would recommend it for men and women as it ski...