She Fell In Love With The Drummer (s)

Yes, these are pictures of both boys playing the bongos at a young age. Ben is at the top at 7 months old and Nate is on the bottom at 6 months. Different set of drums, but the expression on each face is the same.

This past week Nate started sitting up on his own. We still put a few pillows behind him so if he does fall backwards it's a soft landing, but he's doing pretty well. I put him on Ben's bed with the drums the other day and right after I did it, I went looking for the camera, which happens a lot these days. After I took the shot I remembered having a similar photo of Ben and had to look it up. It's so amazing, four years later to have a these glimpses back into Ben's babyhood thanks to Nate's experiences. So often it seems that Nate does something, makes a noise, a laugh, a face, and it is eerily reminiscent of what his brother did at this age. It makes it twice as fun to watch Nate explore the world as we get to remember Ben's first explorations as well.

In honor of the theme here (Drums) I named this entry from the lyrics to a Wilco song that popped into my head when I started writing this. It always makes me think of Tim, as he was a drummer when we met (and I still consider him one even though he hasn't played in a while) and now we have two little drummers on our hands.

You've come a long way Benny!

Ben is now 4 years old! It's early on March 11th, he's still sleeping as I wrtie this which is keeping my brain from believing it's true. As of 9:34 this morning Ben will be 4 years old.

It's very strange and wonderful to look back and think 4 years ago at this time we were in the hospital, in labor and so close to meeting him! A lot has happened in that time of course, he's grown and changed so much, as has our family. I know it's a cliche but you can't imagine the way that children will shape your life until you have them. It's such an individual experience to have your own kids, to raise them, learn from them, watch them grow and at the same time as unique and personal as it is, it's also the most common unifying thing about us. We all know someone with kids, we all were kids, and most of us who don't have kids and are in a relationship are asked when we'll have them and those of us who do have kids get asked when we're having more. (we're good with our two by the way, just to answer that for family/friends who've been asking)

Shortly after Ben was born we received a present from one of my co-workers at PlusTime. The gift was an adorable blue, fleece outfit but to me, the words on the card she gave were the real treassure. It's stuck with me these four years and it's the most truthful thing about being a parent that I have ever heard. Well, that and "you'll never sleep again".

"Having a child is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body."

- Elizabeth Stone

Squirel Studies

We have three new friends in the backyard. They are the lovliest of rodents....We've been having a lot of fun watching them dig tunnels and figure out new ways to get to the birdfeeder to get seeds. Ben took to watching them through the window for about an hour the other day. We also decided to share some trail mix with them too, add a little variety to their diet. ;) We also tried to go outside to visit with them but funny thing, they ran away when we came outside. We still had fun being outside in the warmer weather. Hopefully winter is on its way out and there will be more warm weather headed our way and more fun animals to meet!

Pirate's Life for B!

Cabin fever has fully set in thanks to the very cold temps outside. We're doing our best to keep busy inside, but we're all aching for spring. The following was Ben's attempt at entertaining himself the other night. It worked well for all of us! We had a search for burried treasure and tried to figure out what you put in a treasure chest. It was very nice to be imagining ourselves on the high seas in the Carribean, when in reality we were awaiting a snowstorm and arctic air. Hope everyone else is getting through this last part of winter all right. If you're getting "the fever" too please feel free to join our fleet! Till next time me harties!

Star Struck

We were brave last weekend and ventured out to the Portsmouth Children's Museum. The reason I say we were brave is thanks to the incredibly long line that greeted us when we arrived. There is a great publication here called Parenting NH and each month I grab a copy at the library. In this month's calendar section it announced that Clifford the Big Red Dog was going to be at the museum on the 13th. Ben is a very big fan of Clifford's. So we headed out for a day of fun meeting the red guy and playing at the museum. We had to wait in line for about 30 minutes before we could get into the museum. Luckily the weather was still unseasonably warm and it was pretty comfortable. When we got in the place was absolutely mobbed. They were obviously having to regulate the number of people in the building to so that they would not violate their fire code. We heard from at least three employees who had never seen the museum so busy. Evidently Clifford drew a bigger crowd than Elloise or Curious George!!!

So we started walking around and waiting for the Clifford storytime (which is when we thought we'd see Clifford) when suddenly I spotted him walking towards us. I pointed him out to Ben and Clifford came right to us, and was ready to give Ben a hug and get his picture taken with him. But what should happen? Come on you know where this is going....Ben got STARSTRUCK!

He hid behind my legs as Clifford stood talking to me and then as Clifford moved on to say hi to some other kids Ben followed closely but stayed behind the safety of Tim's legs. Luckily we were at the Children's Museum which has lots of wonderful things besides Clifford. So although Ben didn't have an encounter with the Big Red Dog he did have a fun day.

A Cosmic Joke?

So, as many of you know we dealt with a little snow/sleet/wintry mix storm here yesterday. Well it didn't bother us at all yesterday but it sure came around to bite me this morning. Our friend Carl (6) slept over last night and I attempted to bring him to school this morning with Ben and Nate in tow. Carl's dad had to be at work very early today and his mom is away until this evening on a trip so I had agreed to do this favor weeks ago. Anyway, Carl wakes up at 5:45 today...he's used to getting up early to get to school. School had a two hour delay. So my day started off early but not badly, yet.

We left the house at 9:45 and I was quite proud of myself for getting all three boys ready and bundled and out of the house a few minutes earlier than I needed to. *this is probably what got the attention of whatever God or power decided to bring on the coming events.

We drove about 3 miles up 202 and were just about to get onto 125 to go to school when we got a flat tire. FLAT! It was baaaad! So I pulled over of course. All set to call AAA and realized I don't have my cell phone. Thankfully a very kind man from Metrocast stopped and let me use his phone and made sure we were safe. 10 minutes later the car was fixed and we were on the road. Only to realize that we had burned through a lot of gas while waiting for help and needed to stop. So I did and went to pump only to find the gas cover door frozen shut. I took out some of my aggression on the door and low and behold it opened!

We then got to Carl's school. I got out walked around the car and fell flat on my face and earned a nice blood blister on my left palm. I then had to navigate a 3 year old, 6 year old and 4 month old in a car seat across this terrain. It was challenging to say the least. We made it inside, got Carl set and as we left Ben fell down the stairs inside. KJids' snowboots are not designed for narrow stairwells. We made it home withou further incident but we have not left again. I plan to hide out inside until tomorrow. Hopefully I have paid my Karmic dues for the week.

Happy New Year!

Just want to wish you all a very Happy New Year. Typing much more is a bit of a challenge lately as Nate is teething and require more loving cuddles right now. I hope that pictures will be well received in place of text today!!!