April

So how can April be almost over?  Spring is just flying by, and this month without question has been a wonderful one.  Mostly beautiful weather, a real Minnesota spring, which has been rare over the last few years, and a new glorious little baby to love on.  Yeah, not complaining over here.

We've finally figured out where Gus is going to Kindergarten, and in a highly anticlimactic decision, we've chosen the local public school. ;)  Ha!  After all of our back and forth, the STEM school magnet lottery that we didn't "win", the in-district transfer to the "better" school near his daycare that is a total cluster-f#$! of a process that I just can't wait on anymore, and even going so far as registering him at the Catholic school down the street that we were feeling lukewarm about... it's all over.  I'm done with all of that and it feels GOOD.  The local school does not have the best test scores.  So effing what.  Our little community school really is lovely, Dan and I met with the principal and walked around looking in on classrooms and lunchtime in the cafeteria and the beautiful new and bright media center, talking about positive discipline and a kindergartner's schedule, and the early years I.B. program that is a part of the school's curriculum.  The staff members we met are kind.  The principal knew every child's name that we passed in the hall.  The children we met appeared happy.

Kindergarten is coming and I'm finally feeling ready to embrace it.  Parenting and parent involvement has much more to do with how well a child does in school than the demographics and test scores of the school he attends.  Our baby is going to be fine.

I also talked to the neighbor whose son catches the bus right outside our house, and learned that our bus stop is the last stop in the morning, and goes right to school, and is the first stop in the afternoon.  For some reason this news helped calm this mama's heart in a big way.  Our neighbor also offered to potentially get Gus and her son on the bus every morning at 8:30 when I told her that I was trying to figure out how to make my work schedule and commute and daycare drop-off all work with this whole new school thing.  This could be huge for making it all work, and I feel so relieved to have made this connection.

Oh sweet child of mine, where in the world did the last five and a half years go?  How are we here already?

In other news, I'm really looking forward to preschool being over for the year and a less hectic schedule for all of us.  Louie's last ECFE class is tomorrow and although I know he and I will both miss it, especially the people we've met there, I will appreciate less stressful Mondays.  Then in mid May the school year will end for Gus, which means a little more leniency on bedtimes and more evening walks to the park, and I'm really excited for all of that as well.  Looking forward to a more relaxed schedule, knowing that I'll probably be missing the structure and routine that school gave us all, at least a little bit, by the time July rolls around.

What I'm NOT looking forward to is returning to work.  Man.  I can't even think about that right now.  Work is not what I'm dreading, it's the more stressful schedule and the hurried weeknight dinners and the fact that ANOTHER ONE OF MY BABIES WILL NOT TAKE A BOTTLE!  I must have some really amazing nipples huh?  (Har har har.)

Oh Olive.  Pull it together girl!

She is 8 weeks already!  I can't even fathom that, these weeks have just FLOWN and they have been so magical, this time with our girl.  I love her so much.

Quite a ridiculous looking bunch, no doubt.  Laundry and signs of a supremely messy house surrounding them... life with three littles for sure.

Parenting with the perspective that being a third-time mom brings is really a gift.  I am so much more relaxed about... basically everything... when it comes to this girl.  Even the bottle thing, while a bit stressful, is something I've not allowed myself to completely panic about yet.  We've been here before.  This girl will not starve.  We will figure things out, keep on trying, there will be a resolution to this problem eventually.

In all honesty, it's really easy for me to be relaxed because I am well-rested.  This chick sleeps like a DREAM, I hesitate to talk about it for risk of jinxing it... but yes.  At 8 weeks old she is consistently sleeping through the {finish this sentence}.  Not going to even type it.  Poor Dan has been up with Louie multiple times a night over the last few days, and I, the parent in charge of the newborn, only have to contend with engorged leaky boobs.

Oh Louie, that is not a good angle.  ;)  Look how huge his hands are though, compared to hers.  CRAZY.  He was my little guy just moments ago it seems.

Shopping with my girl.  Maternity leave with the big kids at daycare is an extravagance that I am so thankful to have now experienced.  Three days a week of just me and her.

She is not one to give huge crazy big gummy smiles.  That is definitely not Olive's thing.  Rather, she enchants us these little soft, sweet, gentle little smirky smiles and quiet coos that make your heart swell.  

This is why 3rd babies are so easygoing.  They have to be.  The above little nap happened when an afternoon nursing session was interrupted by the sounds of her two brothers pounding on each other and arguing in the basement, resulting in excessively dramatic tears from a certain three year old which had me running to see what had transpired.  I plopped her down on our stripped bed in haste as I played referee, and when I came back, this is what I found.  Totally zonked.  This nap lasted 45 minutes and I was able to get dinner in the oven and the kitchen cleaned from top to bottom.  So awesome.

Gus and Louie went to a birthday party last Saturday that freed up four hours on a perfect spring weekend for Dan and me.  We should have gotten some projects around the house done, but instead we went for a walk, met up with my brother and his family at the park, and then all walked to a neighborhood lunch spot.

I can officially say that I love drop-off birthday parties.  So excited that our kids have reached this milestone.  ;)

Ridiculous attempt at our first mother-daughter selfie.

Olive's first visit to the library this past Friday had to be documented.  (Mostly, I was just bored, annoyed that Louie was pulling all of the Berenstain Bears books off of the shelf, and she was wearing a cute outfit... so there you go.)

Big bro Louie immediately got jealous.  "Mom, take a picture with ME in it too!  Mom!!!"  Beautiful.  That one's definitely going in the scrapbook, buddy.

The rest of these photos were taken today, we had a truly incredibly evening at my friend Kate's house with the whole crew of college girls that live here in the cities and all of our families.  Kate lives on a pretty large chunk of land in Burnsville and has the backyard to end all backyards.  I mean, we're talking a zip line, a huge swing between two trees, and woods to go exploring.  These children all had the time of their lives and it was so good to get them all together, and of course the husbands and all of us girls.  It just doesn't happen often enough, as evidenced by Corey's departing words... "See you all in 2017!"

Carter and Olive are 11 weeks apart (I think?).  Lisa and I are about 10 months apart.  ;)

Gus went crazy for the zip line.  Could not get enough.

Kate's daughters are both OBSESSED with the babies.  "So many babies! Look at all the babies!"  (Epic Olive cheeks happening here.)

So many children.  So many trees to climb and mud piles to trek through.

Louie finally got up the nerve to try the zip line!  I was so proud, he was really really nervous, and it took a lot of coaxing and thinking about it, but when he finally did it an hour later he loved it.

Ladies' man.

It is just so surreal that all of these children are ours.  Us.  Girls who hosted massive drunken graffiti parties and Hawaiian parties out of our college apartments.  Girls who drove up to the cities on a random weekend and pressured each other to get tattoos.  (Ahh yes, my first BIG college mistake!)  Girls who slid down the halls of the dorms in their pajamas out of boredom.  Girls who knew every single word to Salt 'n' Pepa's Shoop, and would bust out their skills as a party trick.

And somehow more than ten years have passed and we've grown up and become civilized adults and spawned all these children!  It's just wild, love these girls and their families all so much.