She's a sensitive girl.

It is well established that my Natalie is a sensitive girl. In addition to all of the other evidence, her mosquito bites blow up into giant welts. Right now she's got one on the inside of her calf that is more than two inches long. It looks better today.

But explain this to me: last night the poor creature was stung by a bee on her toe. Nothing. You'd be hard-pressed to even locate the sting site today. I saw the stinger spot last night, so I know it actually happened. A mosquito welt from days ago is still there, but a bee sting from last night? Nothing.

Meanwhile, Ella has two loose teeth. Finally. Which completely grosses me out. I didn't think it would. But it does. I'm putting Captain America in charge of them because I don't want to be in a 10 mile radius when a root snaps audibly. I feel woozy just imagining it.

I've also been trying to figure out why this baby moves so much more than the other two. It's madness. The rolling, the punching, the kicking. I can already feel elbows and things. It turns out I measure about 5 weeks bigger than she does. {avert your eyes, Jersey and other people who don't want these details: in other words, my uterus has grown at least 5 weeks ahead of schedule, but the baby is right on target. I figure if I continue at this pace, I could end up measuring 50 weeks at some point} Which means, as Captain America put it, she's got an Olympic size pool in there. No wonder she's so squirmy. She's got plenty of room. See what a wonderful mother I am? So accommodating to my child's needs? You're welcome, Baby.

The World Traveler and the Homebody

Last week the girls took off for a week of Camp Grandma. They left on Monday, and we picked them up Friday.

I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but Ella is a social butterfly/world traveler/nomad. She's happy to just keep going. Like the Energizer Bunny. Natalie is a homebody. She's happiest at home sleeping in her own bed and doing her own thing.

On a recent trip to our family hair stylist, I mentioned this and she said, "Yes, Captain America said Ella could be dropped off with the Amish for the summer and be perfectly happy." While I'm sure that's an overstatement (she panics when there's no DVR and live tv can't be paused), she really loves to go and be and do.

True to form, Ella had a fantastic time at Camp Grandma. She would have been happy to stay another week. Or two. Or the summer.

Also true to form, Natalie was beyond ready to go home. How do I know? She gets homesick. Actually sick. When she's done being on the move, she runs an inexplicable fever. It's like her little body starts to shut down. Must. Get. Home. By the time Captain America and I were heading out to a wedding reception, she was up to 101.6. Two days of on and off fever. Not her first time, I must say. On Sunday morning we loaded up to go home. She was fine. Great mood. No fever. Because she was going home.

I'm fascinated to see where New Baby fits into this, because right now I'm envisioning Ella and I on vacations while Captain America and Natalie enjoy the silence of home.

Sweet sounds of Motherhood

I've heard that sometimes people who lose a limb have phantom pains in said limb. So it is with my children being gone. They have taken a week off of Camp Mama (a term I have stolen from the lovely Gretchen at Second Blooming), and gone to Camp Grandma for the week. And yet, this morning as I slept in, I woke up to the sounds of my girls. Could have sworn I heard them. Nope.

Sometimes they prepare me for their absence by being rotten and cranky. This time they were all sweetness. "I'm really going to miss you, Mama!" Plus hugs. So many hugs. A hug for me, a hug for the baby. Three times each. *sniff*

No doubt they are very busy this week, playing in the hose and eating pancakes with whipped cream and sprinkles for every meal, and getting conned by Grandma into some sort of actual hairstyle.

Yesterday the silence was a little unnerving for me. So. Very. Quiet. Today I'm getting more acclimated. Enjoying listening to some music while working, since I don't have to listen for fighting downstairs in the playroom. Not watching the clock. If I am hungry, I eat. There is no one to pick up anywhere. I got out of bed when I felt good and ready. I've done some laundry, but it's not accumulating like usual. Same with the dishwasher.

It's a lovely break for all of us. But come Friday, I'll be itching to see them. And I'm sure I will get to hear "NO FAIR" in the first 20 minutes. The sweet sounds of motherhood...

Non-milestone milestones

Everyone gets excited about the first words and first steps. First day of school. Those are exciting things. But there's all kinds of non-milestone milestones along the way too. Things you maybe wouldn't write home about, but it's exciting to you.

I remember when Ella could finally hold her own bottle. I mean, the pure joy I felt was amazing. An accomplishment for her, a little freedom for me. Technically I'm sure I was supposed to feel sad and still want to hold her 24/7. Instead I thought, "WHEE!! I can go to the bathroom again!"

And those little non-milestone milestones just keep coming. Like when Ella was able to figure out how to get to pbskids.org by herself. Or getting her own snack. And Natalie's never far behind her at this point.

And now I will admit the two non-milestone milestones that have thrilled my soul lately:

1. Ella can run the DVR. Just enough to play shows we've recorded. Translation: Saturday mornings we get to stay in bed, because Ella just puts on iCarly and they grab some cereal. Hooray! I'm sure I should not be so excited that my children watch enough TV to know how to run the DVR. But I don't care.

2. They're learning new songs. Our church kids did a musical for Mother's Day and it was precious and wonderful. They learned songs that have stuck in their hearts. Yesterday I heard Natalie singing one of them in the shower. Couldn't be cuter. I also felt a strange sense of pride when I first heard my girls singing a Dave Matthews Band song. I'm not sure why. But whenever it's on, they get so excited and ask to turn it up. Not that I blame them, click here. It makes me want to pack us up for some kind of road trip and roll down the windows so we can all sing it together at the top of our lungs.

It's the little things, isn't it?

Would you look at that?

It's summer. Huh. The children don't go to school anymore. Months ago I looked at the zillions of programs available and thought I'd book them solid for the summer. Then I realized I'd have to drive them to all those places and pick them up. Nevermind. Besides, I'd kind of like to hang out with them a little before it's not just us anymore. I know I'll realize the folly of that line of thinking in a few weeks, when I make my paper chain countdown to September 1.

The nice part about having two girls so close together is the built-in friend. They play together all the time. And like any two friends who play together all the time, a few times in a day they want to kill each other. Or just get the other one in trouble. Or never speak to the other one again.

Meanwhile, I am taking full advantage of our lazy summer schedule. Captain America leaves the house around 7 am. While the rest of us sleep. Then I lay in bed til my bladder can't possibly stand it another second. Because the moment I get up, that baby's moving. If I get up for any reason and try to go back to bed, I am assured at least 30 minutes of gymnastic activity. Who am I kidding? I still go back to bed just to lay there. After a while the girls crawl in with me. Usually just one. Whoever asks to play computer first runs off to do that, and the other one will start to whine "IT'S NOT FAIR" so I'll let her play games on my ipod in bed with me.

Honestly, I don't know what that baby is doing in there. Neither of the other two moved like this. It's constant. And often so powerful it makes me a little nauseous. I can already see my stomach move.

Ahhh...the blissful sounds of play have been interrupted by crying, with a side of "SORRY! SORRY! SORRY!" I wonder if I should look into that...

Lessons from baseball

Ok, this is going to seem odd coming from me. Just stick with me, here. Did you see the Detroit pitcher who pitched a perfect game, only not really? I try not to watch sports much, but with Captain America around it's often on. The other night I had to stop watching Parenthood on the DVR so we could watch Detroit Tigers' pitcher Armando Galaragga who was almost at a perfect game.

Perhaps if you don't care for sports and you're not married to someone like Captain America, you don't know what that means. A perfect game is when one pitcher makes it through a whole game without anyone getting on base. It's apparently incredibly rare (nevermind the fact that there have been two, almost three already this year - sometimes Major League Baseball goes years without one).

Anyway. Right as we turned to the game, they were showing replays. Long story short (you're welcome), an umpire blew a call so Galarraga didn't get his perfect game. The ump made the call he thought was right, but on the replays we can see that he made a mistake. If the ump had made the right call, he would have been in the history books, because it was the last out of the game. Now this is where it gets interesting to me.

Right when it happened, what do you think Galarraga did? Do you think he stormed the umpire? Called him an idiot (we all know it'd likely be much worse than that)? Nope. He looked at the ump. He smiled. He went back to the pitcher's mound. Pitched to one more batter, and ended the game. A few Detroit players got upset at the ump after the game, but nothing really happened. Until later.

In the interviews I saw, both Galarraga and the Detroit manager basically said, "We're all human. It's part of baseball. Everyone makes mistakes." The manager went on to say what a great ump the guy is, and that he regretted letting his emotions get the better of him on the field. Talk about grace. It gets better though. The umpire, Jim Joyce, goes back to his locker room. He asks to see the replay. He heads straight for the Tigers' locker room and apologizes to Galarraga for blowing that call. HELLO? World, are you watching? America? Is this thing on? This is how pretty much everything should be done. (Donald Miller has more to say about that here.) The next day Jim Joyce was the ump for another Tigers' game, and Galarraga brought him the lineup card in an extra show of "no hard feelings." Joyce was moved to tears.

I was mentioning to Captain America how badly I felt for the guy, that he didn't get his perfect game. He brought up a good point. Perfect games are rare, yet there have already been two this season. Did I know who threw the other two? Nope. But now I knew who both Galarraga and Joyce were. And people who don't even like baseball are talking about it. More people are talking about the perfect game that isn't, than are talking about the two that are. And yeah, I'm sure it doesn't hurt Galarraga's feelings that Chevrolet gave him a Corvette.

Like I said, personally I'm not a big sports fan. But sometimes there are some amazing lessons in sports. The grace and mercy shown by Galarraga, and the honesty and responsibility shown by Joyce are things we could all work on. Imagine what the world could be like if the Church as a whole operated that way - I think everyone would get the point of Jesus pretty easily.

Pink is not my favorite color.

Ella has pink eye. I think pink eye is one of the worst things you can get as a little kid. You aren't really sick, but you're contagious. And the maintenance is so high. Drops four times a day. FOUR. Everyone, wash your hands! No one touch your eyes! She missed one of her last days of school today. Instead, she stayed home. Full of energy. BUT UNABLE TO GO ANYWHERE.

Ella's been a real trooper. No arguing over the drops. And when she realized she would miss a birthday party she just said, "Mom, can you go and take his present for me?"

Tomorrow is Natalie's last day of school. I can't really tell you how sad that makes me. It not only brings me ever closer to the "I'm bored" and "Can we go to _______" of summer, but she's loved school so much this year. Both her teacher and the classroom para have been fantastic. I didn't realize Natalie had a shell, but her teacher has sure brought her out of it! I'm afraid in my fragile hormonal state, I will sob when I drop her off at school tomorrow. I will ugly cry over how much we will miss her teachers. We couldn't have been more blessed in the teacher department this year for both girls.

Also? It means my little Natalie is going to kindergarten! What on earth? How did that happen? I'd forbid it, but I'm going to need all the time I can get in the fall to take care of a baby. So, I guess, off she goes.

Peas in a pod.

Last week I had to call the cable company to get our internet set up in a different room. I was greeted with the standard automated messages. Starting with the "For English, stay on the line. Para continuar en espanol, primero empujen numero dos" or something. High school Spanish was a long time ago. And yet, I pressed two. For some reason I thought to myself, "Numero dos? Sì." And I wasn't completely surprised when Auto Chippie continued in Spanish, but I was somehow surprised I didn't understand her anymore.

Apparently Ella and I are peas in a pod right now. I stopped in to say hi to Natalie's class one day, and walked past a lost and found near the cafeteria. At which time I spotted one of Ella's gym shoes, that I had thankfully labeled so I could be sure. So I went to drop it in her locker. Only the other one was missing, too. So I checked the lost and found for the first grade section, and there it was. How on earth did she lose both of her gym shoes, but have them end up in completely separate and far away places? "Ella, how long have your gym shoes been missing?" "I don't know." "Why didn't you tell me you couldn't find them?" "I kept forgetting."

In other news, I think the baby reads my blog. Ever since I wrote about how much I love the baby movement, this kid won't sit still. I don't remember either of the girls moving this much. She's moving when I wake up, moving most of the day, and moving when I go to bed. While I'm still enjoying it for now, I am a little concerned this does not bode well for her sleeping after she's born.

The envelope please...

I had an ultrasound last week to check out Tiny Baby. Make sure it looked like a baby and all that. Captain America and I were still torn on whether or not we were finding out a gender, so we averted our eyes during that portion and had the tech write it down in an envelope. Procrastination at its finest. I have to say, that really took the pressure off. It was nice to just focus on seeing a healthy baby.

There are a lot of unpleasant things about being pregnant. But there is one thing I never get tired of feeling. Ever. Baby movement. Little kicks and rolls. I think I just like the reassurance that things are going well in there. I admit, every once and a while I just lay in bed or on the couch, and give my stomach a little jab to see if I get one back. Poor baby. Probably trying to sleep. So it was really fun during the ultrasound to feel kicks and see it on the screen at the same time.

Everything looked like it was supposed to, except the baby measured smaller than my original due date would account for. So it has now been moved. By two weeks. There's something about going from September to October that makes it feel like eternity. But if the bun's not done, it's not done. And I want the bun to be done.

So did we open the envelope? It took us a few more days of debate. Finally on Sunday we sat down with the girls, and let them open it. We found out by having Ella read it to us, which is way cooler than an ultrasound tech we don't know. Ultrasound Tech had clearly done this before though - the sticky note was folded into quarters and put in a sealed envelope.

So there you have it. That's what's been going on around here. Oh, I suppose you want to know what we're having...it's a girl. At least, she's 95% sure that it is.

Captain America is currently working on plans for his mancave, to be constructed in about 6 or 7 years. Apparently I should not get attached to having a basement.

Mommying. And Rainbows.

I don't know if you've noticed, but it's almost Mother's Day. I thought maybe for fun, I'd tell you how I got started in this biz, since it's even in my blog name.

Mother's Day is tough for a lot of people. People who had a rotten mother. Women who've lost a child. People whose mom has passed away, especially recently. Women who've had an abortion. Women who've given their baby up. Women who can't conceive.

In 2002, I think I was just starting fertility drugs around Mother's Day. I've been blessed to find myself in churches that recognize all the women on Mother's Day, for the role they play. But it was still hard to see all the proud mommies, and not be sure if I'd be one of them some day.

I was on my way to a Sara Groves concert that summer when I saw a rainbow. I knew it was for me. It was God's promise to me. I'd be a proud mommy someday. I got pregnant in July. I lost the baby the first week in August. That rainbow carried me.

I only waited a month til I started the treatments again. Soon I was pregnant with Ella. We decided not to find out if it was a boy or girl. We never really settled on a boy name, and I had a hunch it was because we didn't need it. I'd wanted a Natalie my whole life. For some reason, this wasn't her. Around 6 months, we decided she was an Ella. In June of 2003, she was born, perfect in every way (except for having broken her collarbone during delivery - sorry kid!).

The next year I was excited to learn I didn't need fertility treatments anymore - because, hey! Guess who was pregnant? 8 weeks pregnant, actually. This time we found out it was a girl, and she was Natalie from that day on. She was born in April, 22 months after her sister.

And now, Bun #3 is cooking away. After a few years of telling everyone we were done (sometimes people change their minds). My ultrasound is next week, and we still haven't decided if we'll find out boy or girl. We have zero direction on names (no matter how many times Captain America says "Baby Otis"). I feel like we're kind of winging it with this one, but I kind of like it too. I'm hoping I've mellowed a little. Maybe I won't have to split this one's Cheerios in half, for fear of choking. And with every little nudge, I fall a little more in love with the New One.

About a year ago, Ella got a Webkin. She was off with Grandma when they picked her password. Guess what word was in it? Rainbow. Which is especially funny, because rainbows have never been a big deal here. It's not like I gave them rainbow-themed nurseries (the girls had "place for you to sleep & keep your stuff" themes). I'm not sure I've ever mentioned that rainbow to anyone.

So there you have it. How I became Mommy. Who logues.