After two years of nagging, husbandface finally helped me figure out our camcorder to share our videos. So I put them on youtube and watched them over and over. It brought tears to my eyes. The memories of my babies. How fast they grow.

Since the majority of the videos are Lily's babyhood, it brought back so many feelings. I cried because I feel like I missed her whole first year. I am so glad I have those videos. I was so wrapped up in the darkness of Post Partum Depression, I didn't take the time to look at her and say, "you are my baby girl." Now I have a toddler. Who is beautiful and smart and funny.

And her nap is over so I have to go play with her. Hehe.

Scared of the dark

Just now, I tried to go to bed. But as sometimes happens, I couldn't fall asleep because I was scared. I'm a grown up. I'm not supposed to be scared. But here I am admitting it. I am. Husband likes to tease me. But at night, in the dark, is when all the bad things happen.

It's when people rape and touch you. It's when parents yell and fight. It's when daddy leaves and never comes back. It's when men in space suits bust your mother's meth lab that you didn't know existed. It's when the mean girls from across the street jump you and burn your arm with cigarettes.

I've had people read this blog, email me and tell me to "just get over it already." I don't know if I will ever get over my chidhood. I'm just making sure my kids don't have a scary one.

Grace in small things

Yeah, I had a baby. I suck at keeping up with these things.

This month's small wonderful things:

Gamma's giggle

Lily saying, "Mommy!"

Eric telling me I'm beautiful.

A clean kitchen

The library with no children to chase around.

I'm on youtube. mwahahah!

This feels like the longest school year ever.

Eric still has three weeks of school. Many of my friend's kids are already out for the summer. They also got to have cute little graduation ceremonies for their precious kindergarteners. But our school doesn't do that. It seems unfair.

I cannot wait for school to be out. I love that he is learning and making friends but I'm a little tired of this whole get everyone dressed and out the door before 10 crap.

You know how I made a big deal about Eric having his own bed?

When I walked in his room to check on him last night before I went to bed myself, he was sleeping on the floor. So much for having a comfy bed!

Three months of being a Mom of three.

The transition from one to two was A LOT harder then two to three. Maybe it was the post-partum depression, or the lack of paternity leave for my husband. But these past three months have been blissful compared to what I expected.

With the other two, I let them sleep when they wanted to for the first year. But with a kindergartener who had to be dropped off and picked up every day, I had to have Gamma on a schedule. The first month, I woke him up every two hours to eat during the day. I think this helped a lot. I used to think waking up a baby was mean. But he sleeps longer at night then Lily did at his age. I also have them napping at the same time during the day.

I feel like life just gets better and better everyday.

Last night when I put Eric to bed and kissed him on his cheek, I started to feel guitly. I have a lot of guilt over not "doing enough" for him.

Then I started to think of my life when I was his age. My mom, mom's boyfriend, me and my brother lived in a tiny cockroach infested trailor. I remembered my mom's boyfriend taking off his leather belt to spank me with it when I wouldn't do whatever it was he had told me to do. I remember the sound of the leather against my skin. I remember my brother and his friends making fun of my ratty hair. I remember sleeping on the floor because mom slept in the only bed we had. I remember the cockroaches would scatter whenever you turned on a light. My mom was never home because she was always at work or out with her boyfriend.

I thought of all of that and my guilt went away. Eric has a great life. No cockroaches crawling on him when he sleeps. No sleeping on the floor. He gets a nice warm bed. Bought especially for him. He has a step- father who loves him and cherishes him. And he has me, every day.

Three months of being a Mom of three.

The transition from one to two was A LOT harder then two to three. Maybe it was the post-partum depression, or the lack of paternity leave for my husband. But these past three months have been blissful compared to what I expected.

With the other two, I let them sleep when they wanted to for the first year. But with a kindergartener who had to be dropped off and picked up every day, I had to have Gamma on a schedule. The first month, I woke him up every two hours to eat during the day. I think this helped a lot. I used to think waking up a baby was mean. But he sleeps longer at night then Lily did at his age. I also have them napping at the same time during the day.

I feel like life just gets better and better everyday.

My grandpa died on Monday. I've been mourning. But he was bedridden for two years and suffering. He is no longer in pain. And hopefully he is in a better place.

I am sad he never got to meet Gamma. He loved babies. He had six of his own!

Goodbye Gramps. Love ya.

I love my kids.

Just when I think I'm no good at this job things start to turn around. Eric's behavior has improved. My consistency is paying off. (or maybe it's the stomach flu, I'm waiting to see) Gamma doesn't constantly want to be held. I love holding him. But I like to have clean dishes too.

Lily is 21 months. She is a giant turd at times. But she's my sweet girl baby turd. I still call her my baby even though she is slowly losing her babyness. She says "I need _____." and fills in the blank with whatever she needs at the time. I need nilk. I need sit. I need hug. (the last one is my favorite)

I just love them so much. Tomorrow is Mother's day and I'm thankful I get to be a Mother.

Happy Mother's Day.

So on Sunday we go see a few houses. I think everyone is all better. Haha, I thought wrong. We come home and Eric throws up while brushing his teeth. I give him pedialyte and love and put him to bed. Lily and Gamma go to bed at 10pm. I go to bed an hour later.

Next thing I know it's 6 am. Gamma slept through the night? Is this a dream? I check on the older kids and Eric had climbed into Lily's toddler bed and was sleeping with his arms around her. Awww. I go check on Gamma, he is sleeping peacefully. My boobs are killing me so I change his diaper, wake him up and feed him. When I put him on my shoulder to burp, he barfs all over me.

So I change both of us. He barfs on us again. An hour later I try to nurse him again. He barfs. And it was like that all morning. I call the pediatrician when they open and they suggest only giving pedialyte in small amounts until he can be seen.

I ask Eric why he climbed in Lily's bed. He says "because I threw up in mine." My poor guy, he must have gotten sick in the middle of the night. I check his bed and sure enough, half digested spaghetti all over his batman sheets. I throw those in the washer with lots of oxy-clean.

I pack snacks and colors for the older kids and we head to the doctor at 1:30. Gamma is 10 weeks old and hasn't kept down any fluids all day. The doctor sends us to the ER. Where gamma barfs on every change of clothes I had in the diaper bag. When we are finally seen, Gamma is wearing one of Lily's shirts. Heh. Being a mom is all about doing whatever works, right?

He was given IV fluids. Let me tell you, I could not watch them put an IV in my new baby. I cried. And he kept down a little pedialyte so they send us home. So all night we give him tiny amounts of pedialyte. It is the next day before I can nurse him.

He is doing much better now. The weird thing about whatever we all had was that there was no fever or anything. Just a lot of barf.

He's waking up again. :)

Adventures in Valetaville.

The past two weeks have been an adventure, for sure. Last Wednesday I woke up with a stomach flu. I could not keep anything down. This spells disaster for a 102 lb nursing mother. I was dehydrated and was given an IV at urgent care. Yay fun. Then on Friday Lily was sick with the same thing. Poor tiny girl.

And as if barf everywhere wasn't awesome enough, on Saturday, I go out to the garage to do some laundry (gone are the days when I could do laundry once a week) and the whole garage is flooded. The garage. Which is also the playroom. And where every book And DVD we own were being kept. The water heater was rusted through and needed to be replaced. And I'm pretty sure it ruined my Twilight books.

Sunday we had to wait most of the day for the plummer. It just do happens Husband also scheduled an appointment with a realtor to go view some houses on Sunday. As it got near the time we had planned to leave and the plummer was not done, Husband actually suggested that I go ALONE with all three kids to look at houses. And I said something like if you ever want to have sex again we can just pretend you didn't suggest that. But the plummer was very efficient and we all made it on time.

Gamma is waking up so I have to go, but my adventures weren't over yet on Sunday. Oh no! Husband and I now have a game called "guess which kid is barfing today." and in this game no one wins.

Part 2 coming soon.