party of four

Hello all, and sorry for the hiatus. In case you didn't keep up, we now have a family of 2 children--making us an official "family of four." Lillian was born (well, extracted) on April 22, and she's a beaming, smiley, bright, shining example of why people continue to have babies when they know full well how bad it can be. It's gross. She's so gorgeous that we continually say, "well, maybe 3 wouldn't be so bad" (okay, that's me--hubby says "Call the Dr. for me and make 'the appointment.'") Sometime in the future when we're at a restaurant and they ask us, "How many?" we can reply, beaming with pride "Family of four." In the meantime, it's more like stammering "Uh, well, us two, and her [pointing to Helena]--uh, one toddler who needs a booster seat but she won't actually use it, and the baby, but she's not, like, eating, but she has this carrier..."

The carrier in itself is an entirely other story. So, I assume since my husband was brought up in the 70's and 80's and I in the 80's (okay, 1979 but just barely in the 70's), and we were put in the car in (what I assume was entirely safe at the time) laundry baskets, that parents then are still shocked by what we need to do now. Now, we strap that child into a seat that would make an off-roading competitor jealous. A huge, plastic, cage, with roll bar, a 5-point harness, and padding which completely immobilizes the child. And it also defies the laws of gravity and physics: the carrier weighs, maybe, 10 pounds. Lilly, the new baby, weighs approximately 12 pounds. And together, they weigh 65 pounds. Go figure.

You'd think, wouldn't you, you smart person, that all this lifting would make you thinner and svelte and amazingly ripped, with biceps to kill for, but (and I'm not sure how) I think it actually makes you fatter. Well, not you. I'm pretty sure when you've been lugging around 65 lbs. of children all day (not to mention said 3-year-old) all you want to do when you come home is sit on the couch and eat chocolate. Actually that's not what I want to do, but it just happens. And it's sadly not even chocolate that I get to eat, usually, it's a quarter of a peanut butter sandwich, half of a lukewarm hot dog, and some "aminal crackers."

But still, so much is here to be thankful for. I love the girls, ("the girls!") and I'm super delighted that I was able to give Helena the gift of a sister. I'm very close to my own sister and she's one of the few people who will really tell me like it is. It's not all super easy, with Helena getting to the "terrifying threes" at the same time as Lilly hits the teething mark (my kids get teeth early!), but it's blessings galore, when you take a minute to just drink it in. Next to the carrier, and across from your toddler and hubby..."party of four?" That's us!