Currently in October

Sewing: A surprising amount of projects. This has been probably my oddest nesting instinct...I've felt a very specific urgency to use up as much of my fabric stash of leftover fabric from previous projects as possible, and in the last month or so I've made a variety of items that I can't picture here because they are intended as Christmas presents, among them, the most adorable skater skirt for the littlest sister and a bunch of throw pillows. Also some fabric Christmas ornaments, and most recently, a couple of no-sew fabric garlands for Christmas decor. I've also got an embroidery project that I've been working on consistently after Cyrus's bedtime, but I'm not sure if I'll actually be able to finish that one in time...

Wearing: The latest in modern fashion, superglued glasses.

One of our room doors tends to swing on its hinges into the middle of the doorway, and one day recently I wasn't paying enough attention and walked straight into the edge of the door, cracking the frame of my glasses, popping the lens out...and also ended up with a tender bruise above my eyebrow for a couple days. Oops! These glasses had been bothering me for quite some time, I often found myself pushing them back up on my head at various times throughout the day because they bothered me, but I was really trying to hold off on new glasses till after baby...but a few days after this incident we went to an eye doctor and they said that my prescription hasn't changed, the reason the glasses have been bothering me is because they're just old (about 4 years old) and the UV coating was separating from the lens, causing strain. Who knew that happened?

Well, actually probably everyone knows you ought to get your eyes checked more often than once in 4 years but...life.

So, I'm getting new glasses, soon, and at Angel's persuasion, ended up opting for the more "out there" option of the two pairs I had narrowed the choices down to, so that should be an exciting return to being able to see clearly and a hint of quirky fashion once more.

Preparing: Well, we certainly ought to be preparing for the new arrival due in about 3 weeks...we have made some progress. We haven't given the birth plan to the doctor yet but intend to remember to do that on Saturday. We have washed Cyrus's infant car seat and readjusted the straps down to newborn size but haven't put it in the car yet. I'm kind of envisioning that we won't end up installing it ahead of time but will just throw it in the car on the way to the hospital...when you drive a small five-seater hatchback there is not much motivation to install a second carseat any sooner than necessary.

We don't have the crib set up in our room yet, either, but again, kind of thinking along the lines of space being at a bit of a premium this time around. We definitely started setting things up earlier with Cyrus! I have washed the sheets and all the smallest sizes of baby clothes and have packed a tiny bag for baby for the hospital, but I haven't really packed for myself yet, although I did get out a bag and put two toothbrushes and a sample size tube of toothpaste in it because last time, having to request my parents to bring toothbrushes to the hospital when they came to visit baby (because I forgot to pack them) just seemed a little bit ridiculous. ha!

I feel like a lot of moms worry about going to the hospital too soon or too early...for some reason last time I was not at all worried about that, or about waking Angel up to tell him to get ready within half an hour of my first-ever contraction. Which ended up being a good thing because we didn't have all that much time to spare. I don't know if this time I will end up less or more focused on getting to the hospital ASAP....

Anticipating: November appears to be shaping up to be an extraordinarily momentous month for my family. There's Thanksgiving, of course, and the baby, but then, also, my sister is getting married:

(photo by their photographer)

The wedding is in America, so it doesn't have that much physical impact on those of us who live so far away, but it's definitely an emotionally impactful and momentous event. Being a big sister and watching all of these "littles" grow up has been amazing, and I'm excited for the new life she's about to begin.

Also, my parents are the keynote speakers at a parenting conference in November, and they have long-time family friends coming to stay for a week, and my dad will be traveling out of the country for a different week, oh, and did I mention the baby that's coming due? Which is slightly more complicated this time since now there's a 20 month old who will need to be taken care of while we're in the hospital? 

And another sister is in the midst of busy preparations for her 4th-ever booth at an arts and crafts sale happening the first week of December. Over the past month, we've been working together on applying to colleges and scholarships and trying to figure out what her future might look like. Angel and I pretended to be responsible parents and took her to a college recruiting night being held at the school where he teaches. Again, with the big sister stuff--what an experience it is to sit there and watch one of my baby sisters asking questions of a college recruiter about financial aid options, dorm life, opportunities within the art department, etc.

They all grow up!

Playing: With Cyrus and the other kids. Angel's school had fall break recently and during his week off, we really tried to make the most of balancing adult responsibilities (doctor's appointments and getting our air-cons cleaned) with playtime at local playgrounds and at the beach, and with his new Mr. Potato Head toy that Grandma got him. To me, all of the faces he will put together on Mr. Potato Head look crazy, but what's funny is that he'll find some specific face combinations ridiculously hilarious and start cracking up at his own Picasso-esque face creations.

Planning: Future travels. Having been on the island for a solid 12 months at this point has left me with a certain amount of cabin fever. Yes, being home-bound has been well worth it and I'm so excited for the little guy we'll be meeting soon...and I'm also excited about the prospect of taking two little boys on adventures elsewhere. 

I think when Angel and I were more new to our relationship, my casual planning of adventures in the uncertain future unnerved him, but at this point, he thinks it's totally normal when I randomly bring up the topic of potential destinations for a 10th anniversary trip or things I want to make sure we do when we visit the USA. 

Writing: I'm trying to get a little bit ahead on my articles for the Sonlight blog, in anticipation of being a little extra distracted in the near future, but haven't yet managed to get as ahead as I'd like to be. In the meantime, my most recent article published on their site is about Keys to Foreign Language Proficiency for Homeschoolers!

18 Months with "Baby"

It occurred to me...just a couple weeks late...that I ought to write an 18 month update on Cyrus.

(This was the photo I took on for the day he officially turned 18 months, a year and a half, old. Only half of his body is in motion, so hey, not too bad...)

How big? 26 lbs and 32 in. Which, from the online calculator, appears to be something like 70th percentile for weight and 25th percentile for height. He's been wearing mostly 18 month size clothes for about half a year. We often get told how "tall" he is but I don't think he's actually tall, I think it's because we don't often run into Caucasian kids, who would probably average taller.

Words? In the last month he's started saying a few more words. I love it! Being from a girl-heavy family, I was a lot more used to toddlers who were big talkers and his silent observation worried me a little. This morning, as we were sitting in the dark waking up, he turned to me and said "Ball!" and pointed to the room where his ball is...then he said "Keys!" (this kid loves to use keys to try and unlock things...all the time)...and then he said "Papa!" and went to climb on top of Angel. He is definitely understanding a lot more of what we say, to the point where we've realized that we can't casually mention going outside or going swimming or milk unless we are prepared to follow through on our statements. His understanding of English is a little wider, I can tell, but he is following more of Angel's commands in Spanish (and I'm gradually getting more comfortable with the command form and attached pronouns...the bane of my existence in college Spanish classes).

Schedule?

A normal day looks like:

6-7 Wake up, and Cyrus immediately eats breakfast and takes a shower

7-9 Storytime, sometimes going on a walk or a swim with Angel while I get morning housework done, sometimes just playing at home.

9 Angel leaves for work, and Cyrus and I head over to join the homeschool crew.

9-12 Morning homeschool hours, so I'm mostly focused on the big kids,. My sister takes care of a little boy who is Cyrus's age during the day, so he has a buddy he can play with in the morning. Cyrus usually tries to interrupt and steal pencils and erasers. He loves to sit at the table with the kids doing schoolwork and scribble in an old school book, but usually gets kicked out after a while due to stealing too many writing utensils and calculators. He'll have a morning snack, play with blocks, usually do an art activity with gluesticks (his FAVE) or watercolor, and usually goes outside to play with my teenage sister or hangs out on the balcony with her and colors with chalk.

12-2 Cyrus and I head home for naptime (for him), and I eat lunch, write, hang up laundry, work on various sewing projects, or whatever is on the agenda for my quiet time of the day. Sometimes, I nap too, because pregnancy. His naps are actually really varied these days, sometimes 1 hour, sometimes 3 hours, but usually closer to 2.

2-2:30 If Cyrus is awake, I'll give him a cup of milk and we'll read stories.

2:30-4:30 I guide Mandarin lessons followed up by English lessons, and Cyrus usually gets passed around between whichever sister isn't in class. 

4:30-6 is the time that's really just for Cyrus and me, and has become "baby school" time at home. I sing the songs I'm teaching him with him, we read a couple stories, and then do some sort of activity, like playing with stickers or play-doh. Still working on NOT eating play-doh. Then I make dinner.

6 Angel's home! We eat dinner, and then I clean up while many evenings, Angel heads out with Cyrus and sometimes my littlest sister--to swim, to the playground, to the beach, for a quick little adventure before bedtime.

7:30 Shower, milk, brush teeth, bed!

Loves?

-Still loves birds. He has a fondness for books with birds in them. The books don't have to be about birds, there just has to be a random bird somewhere in the illustration on the page, and he will find it, and he will say, "Bee!" "Bee!" very distinctly means "Bird!" There was one evening Angel was making all sorts of crazy sounds for him to imitate, and he was mimicking everything perfectly, including random words like "Hola" and "Door" and "knock-knock". Angel said, "Bird!" and Cyrus said right back, "Bee!" We need to be careful or we'll find ourselves talking about Bees in public and everyone will be confused because they're actually birds.

- Kitchen utensils. One day a few weeks ago, he took the whole can of kitchen utensils while I was cooking, said "Bye!" to me, and simply left the room. He often asks for some spoon or ladle or pair of tongs to play with. 

- Grandpa. My dad is probably the person in my close-by family that he sees least often, due to work and traveling, but he is always amazed when he does see him, and instantly runs for the bookshelf, because he thinks Grandpa equals automatic storytime.

- Helping. (The activity that all moms hopes will last forever...but probably won't). He'll go grocery shopping with Angel and help carry the groceries all the way back to the apartment, and then he'll unload the bags from the kitchen floor and hand everything to me (which, at this point, is a legitimate help, because I don't want to bend my very pregnant self down to the floor a million times to grab all the groceries). He'll carry the trash down the hallway to the room with the dumpster. He'll throw trash away in the kitchen trash can and he'll take clean, folded laundry off of the ironing board and throw it into the washing machine (yeah...we're still working on that one...and I've learned to get laundry put away real fast!)

- Keys. In order to avoid him playing with our real sets of house keys, we've given him the little keys that go to the drawers in our built-in cupboards (because when have those ever needed to be locked). He will try them on every door in the house...dragging a chair up to the bedroom door and working really hard to try to get the key in the lock. He shut my bedroom door while I was doing makeup the other day, and he ran to me excitedly. "Keys?" he asked. He thinks if a door is shut, you'll likely need keys to open it. I've taken him down the hallway in our apartment complex and he's tried his keys in every utility door and roof access door. I gave him my old purse when I switched purses lately, and the first thing he did was run and get all of his keys and put them in the purse. It's so funny how much they are watching you!

- Visitors. He LOVES it when people come over and is very disappointed when they inevitably leave. He does love to say "Bye!" and wave, but he much prefers to be the person leaving, not the person left behind. My sisters stayed with us for a few nights while my parents were away and he was thrilled with the idea, other than the fact that it necessitated going to bed while his buddies were over. 

- Having ideas. This kid is full of ideas. He's recently been putting on two different shoes when we leave the house. When he hears the real phone ring, he'll have an imaginary phone in his hand and he'll answer it. He'll suddenly get an evil gleam in his eye and turn the balcony hose on one of my sisters, soaking them (it's true, I saw the evil gleam and everything). I've taught him different motions for some of our books. I.e., the picture shows a sun, we point to the sky outside. The picture shows a watermelon, we pretend to eat it. Mostly, he loves doing the motions do go with the words, but sometimes he'll purposely do the wrong motion, and then laugh. He occasionally tried to trick me by saying "cicak" and pointing somewhere where there is clearly no cicak (gecko), and then laughing hysterically when he "made me look." I had no idea that toddlers had this much innate concept of mischief, that pranks could begin at 18 months old. He is a constant adventure!

Belligerent Peace

Sometimes I think we cling so tightly to our problems that even God, if He were so inclined, couldn't pry them out from between our fingers. We look at what we're going through and spin identities defined by such experiences. Lost someone we loved. Work too hard and too long for too little reward. Not able to get along with the boss. Facing serious health issues. Constantly under financial stress and barely making ends meet. Dreams have not and will never come true. Traumatized by past experiences. Facing anxiety and depression and fear. We've been offended. Hurt by people who should have done better. Ostracized. Unloved when we ought to have been loved.

We experience hard things in life and these hard things shape us. But sometimes we continue to allow them to mold us and bend us more than they truly have a right to, and end up bent into a bitter mockery of what we could have been. Instead of seeing ourselves as persons separate from the crises we handle, we look at ourselves through a lens of trauma, a lens which gradually shrinks and distorts our very selves.

I suspect that when we cling so tightly to the experiences that we have decided to form into identities, God isn't actually inclined to attempt to pry them out of our fingers. Perhaps that's a better description of the situation. It's not that he couldn't force us to let go, it's that He made us free. Free to embrace the thing that wounds us, if we so desire.

But what if we chose not to? What if, instead of holding onto my hurt, I loosened my grip enough to start clinging on to the possibility of peace that isn't dependent on my circumstances? What if we realized that even if nothing about our pasts or our presents changes...even if nothing changes in the relationships that bring the most pain...we have not lost the freedom to see our own selves through lenses that are not warped by hurt and disappointed expectations. What if that was one of the keys to growing up and growing old without growing bitter?

We make the choice to cling desperately to our deepest hurts, like a toddler who is determined to keep hold of the scissors or pencil or whatever random and dangerous object is currently within his clutches. We scream and flail and demand that those around us see us through the lens of pain that we use when we look at ourselves. But what if we didn't? What if we let go, ran to the Father and confessed that we don't want to see ourselves this way anymore. That we don't want to live forever under the shadow of broken relationships, disappointed dreams, and frustrated lives. That we want to be able to walk into each day with the peace that surpasses all understanding. The peace that defies comprehension...that makes no sense given the reality of the situation...the peace that looks evil and brokenness in the face, puts up its fists, and says, "Try me."

We know this belligerent peace exists. But do we trust that it does enough to loosen our hold on a sharp object?