Month: February 2011

Breakfast Adventures

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It used to be that Jeffrey slept like a teenager.  If left to his own devices, he’d sleep deep and late, requiring me to use a crowbar to get him out of bed for school.  Even on Christmas morning, he’d easily snooze until 7:30 or 8:00.

BUT .  .  .

Somehow in the past couple of weeks, his internal clock has been flipped around, and how he’s up and about at 5:45 almost every morning.  I suspect that it might have something to do with Katie’s crying at night, but Brian and I are suffering.  Dealing with a newborn in the dark is one thing.  Dealing with an overactive eight-year-old is something else.

We try to get him to go back to bed, but he more often wanders around the house, doing odd deeds which we don’t discover until we’re up and dressed a few hours later

Like: taking all the instruction manuals for our Wii games out of their cases and putting them in a pile.

Or: dragging a sleeping bag out of the basement and making a tent with it.

Or: taking the weather report in the newspaper and leaving it in some unfathomable place in the house.  It’s always in a different place each time.

On weekends, Jeffrey goes so far to wake up his siblings and then helping them make breakfast.  “Make breakfast,” of course, is limited by Jeffrey’s meager set of cooking skills.  Last Saturday, Brian and I emerged from our room to find the kids having a “tea party” in the sun room with sippy cups of water, two rolls of Ritz crackers, and 64 slices of American Cheese.

(“Mmmm  . . . 64 slices of American Cheese . . .”) <– five points for those of you who can name this reference.

The other breakfast trend is what the kids refer to as “Toast Buffet.”  Jeffrey puts in slice after slice of bread in the toaster, and then lines up a variety of toppings on the counter: butter, peanut butter, raspberry honey butter, honey, and whatever jelly or jam they find in the fridge.  The kids can put whatever combination of spreads on their toast and then munch down.  Evidence of a Toast Buffet includes about seven different table knives crusted over with multiple spready things, a bowl of rejected toast slices, and crumbs.  Lots of crumbs.  Everywhere.

Brian and I think this is ADORABLE, although, I will admit it makes our household supply of sandwich bread disappear faster than I’d prefer.

But why dwell on the downside?  I’m just glad they haven’t discovered the jar of Nutella in the pantry.

Wimmy and the Usurper

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The day little Katie was born, Brian spent time talking to the kids about how our family had changed.

“William, you now have a little sister,” he explained to them.  “And Eleanor has a little brother and a little sister.”

Eleanor, who has always been intrigued by the technicalities of family relationships, took it one stop further.

“Yeah, William.  Now you are a middle child, like me, instead of the youngest,” she said excitedly.  “Baby Katie has REPLACED YOU!”

Brian and I found this statement hilarious.  But William has been taking his status change a little hard.  He doesn’t take it out on his baby sister — he is as fond of her as the rest of the kids (although he did admit briefly that he “liked Baby Katie when she was in Mommy’s tummy”).  But his frustration at the changes in his life have come out in other ways.  He’s more likely to throw a temper tantrum, especially when it comes to leaving the house for church or preschool.  His usually hearty appetite has diminished, and he hasn’t been sleeping as well (although this is in large part to sharing a room with Jeffrey).

The rest of our children were too little to really register a change in lifestyle when their new sibling came along.  Jeffrey and Eleanor were just 2 1/2 or 2, and didn’t have the long-term memory to remember life before the new baby.  William’s the first to notice and be upset that he’s not getting as much one-on-one Mom Time as he used to.

We know it’s a phase, and he’ll grow out of it eventually.  But in the meantime, it’s hard not to feel for the little guy.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

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I like to think of Valentine’s Day as a celebration of love.  My love for baked goods.  Behold:

A successfully made Red Velvet Cake!  I attempted this same cake recipe last Valentine’s, and it was not pretty.  I didn’t have the right size cake pan, so the batter overflowed in the oven, and what was left in the pan collapsed into a big cake crater.

Oh, and I didn’t have enough red food dye, so the cake crater was the color of Spam.

But this year, I invested in the proper pan, and a full ounce of dye (that’s what you need, apparently) and lo!  A cake worth destroying! A happy Valentine’s was enjoyed by all!

Oh, and Katie felt the love, too:

Hmm.  On second thought, I think I’ll count this last picture as my Valentine’s present.  Yum.

 

Ten Days Old

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My sister in law, Debbie, came over this past Monday to take photos of little Katie.  Here are some of the results: whaddya think?

 

I’m a big fan of the one where’s she’s crying.  Maybe because it makes her cheeks look even more like dinner rolls than usual?  (Mmm, delicious baby dinner rolls . . .)