Today is the day I’ve been dreading since I first found out I was pregnant back in August of 2007.  Evie turns one year old today (one minute ago, to be exact, at 12:29pm).  She’s no longer an infant.  She’s growing up before my very eyes and today is just a physical celebration of that.

Celebration?  That seems like a strange word to use about a day that I have wanted to deny.  It’s not that I don’t want her to have a happy birthday or that I don’t want to watch her grow and learn new things.  It’s just that she is my last.  My baby.  No more babies after her.  And I will no longer have a newborn baby to cradle.  That, to me, is very sad.

But I don’t want to focus on that today.  Being out of town, visiting the in laws in Elko, helps.  It’s distracting and that’s what I need so that I don’t get too melancholy.

She is getting so big and doing so many new things all the time.  She won’t walk, but she’s playing around with pulling up (she grabs onto something with her hands and then “hangs” there, unsure what to do with her legs).  She doesn’t crawl but she commandos and will sometimes get up on her knees and rock back and forth.  She doesn’t speak but she has words… something that amazes us since neither of the boys ever said a word before their first birthdays.  She still nurses several times a day (and night!) and won’t have a thing to do with bottles or sippy cups.  But she has a wonderful appetiete and eats anything and everything she can get her hands on.  Table food is awesome, in her book!

She’s prone to crying if she feels she has been wronged, most often via Liam.  And it doesn’t matter if it’s an accident (Liam tripping over her on his way across the room) or on purpose (slapping her on the head when he’s feeling angstful), she will crumble in a pile of sobs and tears.  She also has a big smile and a happy temprament.  She wakes up in the morning with a big smile on her face.  She takes wonderful naps and is happy to go to bed at night (if only she would stay there!).  She loves her family and friends but has a special fondness for her mama.   I’m hoping she’ll be a mama’s girl for years to come.

She completes our family.  It’s been a crazy year and this next year promises only to be even crazier.  But I couldn’t imagine our lives without her in it.  Yes, I’m sad not to be having any more babies.  But I’m so happy that my baby is her.

Happy Bithday, Evelyn!  Mama loves you SO much!

I feel a day late and a dollar short today.  I’m drinking a Rockstar (Juiced, with mango, orange and passionfruit to be exact!) hoping that it’ll give me the kick in the pants that I’m needing.  My mood seems pretty stable today (honestly, from day to day, I cannot tell if I’ll have an “on” day or an “off” day until I’m having it) so that’s a good thing.  But I am getting sick.  I’ve been anticipating this.  Liam had a fever last weekend and was under the weather.  Before that, Harry had a slight cold.  I was worried that Evie would get it but so far so good.  Better me than her, right?  I just hope that I don’t give it to her.  Right now it’s a sore tickle in my throat, a tickle in my nose that makes me sneeze, a headache and a general feeling of uckiness.  Bah.

Still, slow as I’m feeling today I do have two niggling little worries pecking at the rear of my mind. First is Liam.  His speech delay.  We’re canceling with his speech therapist again so that’ll be two weeks in a row that we’ve begged off.  Not good.  But this month is just insanity around here.  Kile is uber-busy at work and I just don’t feel as if I could handle both children at that appointment by myself.  I need Kile there.  Plus, I feel like butt.  What I would like is if we get could get in with Early Intervention and find a program that would come to the house and work with him.  That would be ideal.  But dragging the entire family out and across town every week to pay a copay and watch a lady try to get Liam to say “milk” for an hour just ain’t cutting it.  I’m sorry, but NO.  I can do that at home.

Speaking of speech, the speech therapist at Harry’s school wants to work with him too.  He’s got a slight impediment that should have resolved itself by now but hasn’t.  I spoke to her on the phone and told her that, yes, by all means, work with him!  But she needs me or Kile to go down to the school in person during school hours to speak with her, possibly fill out some forms.  As you can imagine, this hasn’t happened yet?  Why?  Because it’s AUGUST and Kile is busy and I have two small children at home.  Harry takes the bus for this very reason because I can’t leave the house.  I read a phrase on Baby Bunching yesterday that describes it exactly.  I’m in the Nap Trap.   The Nap Trap happens when one or more child is sleeping virtually all day long, trapping you in the house.  She mentioned coming in before school starts at 9 or after it gets out at 3:30.  Well, at 9, Evie is in the middle of her morning nap and at 3:30, both Evie and Liam are taking their afternoon naps.  And, I’m sorry, but I don’t mess with the naps.  You mess with the nap, you throw off the ENTIRE day.  With Kile working late because he is UBER-busy at work, I’m not going to throw off my day.  YOU CAN’T MAKE ME DO IT.

So in the meantime, I look like a neglectful parent because I haven’t come in yet to sign some stupid paper.  So sue me.

Then there’s Evie.  Because my life isn’t complete until I have something to fret about concerning all of my children, right?  For the most part, she’s just perfect.  And, as far as I know, she IS perfect.  I don’t even know if this is something I should be concerned about or not.  But she turned 5 months old yesterday (sob) and she has yet to really laugh.  Sure, she has done a low chuckle, she has squealed with delight and she smiles at us almost constantly.  But no baby belly laughs.  Don’t they usually laugh by now?  Should I worry about this?  I want to hear her laugh.  But nothing I do seems to do the trick.  Ideas?  Suggestions?  Feel free to tell me I’m a worrisome nitwit.

So there’s my Thursday.  Full of child-related fretting and a few sneezes and blinding headaches thrown in for shits and giggles.  Don’t you wish you had my life??

It was a year ago, give or take a couple days, that I found out I was pregnant.  By total surprise.  After I had written myself off as an infertile mess.  Huh.  Then, just before New Years, I was surprised yet again to find out I was going to be having a girl.

I’d gotten rather used to having boys.  I sort of just expected that I would have boys.  That was the “default answer” and I was pretty okay with that.  There’s something so sweet about boys.  I’ve always said (and still do) that if I had to have children of only one gender, that I would rather have all boys than all girls.  I think, honestly, that it would be easier.  Girls, particularly more than one girl at a time, freak me out.  There’s a sort of “pack” thing that goes on with girls and I would fear for my sanity especially during the teenage years.

Not that boys aren’t a challenge.  But I’ve always felt that I could probably handle boys a lot easier than I could girls.  And at least I wouldn’t have to explain what a “period” is to a boy, right?

All of this said, I am really enjoying having a daughter.  I am truly amazed that it is a little different.  For me, at least.  She seems to have a different sort of temperment than either of the boys ever had.  Which isn’t to say she is a perfect angel.  Because she can be a needy, clingy, sharp (OMG the fingernails) little creature.  But, oh my stars, I just love her to death.  And I spend a lot of time looking into her eyes and trying to imagine the girl and woman she will become.  I’m truly humbled by her.

Taken with my cellphone after a nursing session in the van, she was interested in anything other than eating.

She has learned about the joy that is the ’saucer this last week.

Liam tries to show Evie how to play with his old ’saucer.

Evie tries to grab the camera from me.

The lace on this dress just KILLS me.  I love it so much.

Taking a wee snooze on the boppy.

OMG, that’s it.  I want to eat her.

I want to hold onto these days forever.

What is with these children thinking they can just go ahead and grow up right under my nose?  Frankly, I’m getting tired of it.  Every time I turn around, someone is having a birthday or surpassing some milestone or something and I’m going to start feeling Winnie the Pooh here soon.  You know, like how Christopher Robin grew up and outgrew him?  Isn’t that how the story went?  ANYHOW.

So here’s Evie doing something that I’m SURE she’s far too young for but that her pediatrician actually said was a good idea to introduce: eating rice cereal.

She’s not quite sure what we’re trying to accomplish here

Okay, that was weird.

A little more interested now…

Hey, that isn’t half bad!

So eating rice cereal has proved to be a sucess, so far.  Of course, we haven’t been at all consistant about feeding it to her.  OOPS.  Doesn’t help that I’m not all that excited to be getting into this particular stage.  But it is something we need to start making more time for.

In the meantime, I’ll be over in the corner rocking and sucking my thumb.  Until the little men in the white coats show up, that is.