60th post!

OK, so I have posted 60 times. wow. My main purpose with Planet Little Joseph is to somehow have a bit of a recorded dialogue for our life, and currently the blog is standing in the place of the baby books. There is so much going on all of the time!

I get an F for the wedding weekend, as far as recording photos of this momentous event. All of the little projects that I particularly did on my own, or contributed to, were up for a moment and gone in another moment. I am so glad that I have plans to use the "calligraphy" later on, because at one point during the evening I felt this was an extremely insignificant detail that required many man hours at my house. Oh well! It was an experience for sure! But again, I did not take one photo! It was all that I could do to carry a diaper bag and have a child screaming, or in my arms all while wanting to wear my very fun and dangerous, shiny, and strappy stilettos at the reception. I am actually debating about selling them in our garage sale on Saturday. Do the words maternity dress and stiletto shoes even belong in the same sentence?

Of course it will be weeks before we even see and of the professional photos that were taken, and I do hope to catch glimpses of my handsome Husband, and darling babies all in their wedding finery. My little brother Zach did take a video of the wedding ceremony that still needs to be previewed, so there are the glimpses that we will see, and unfortunately the crying and uncooperative Joseph ring bearer and Joseph flower girl that will be encapsulated in video format for all eternity. When Fiona gets married, we can use her video as ammo that a flower girl should really be about 7 in order to walk the aisle, otherwise it is just torture for the mother of the flower girl and or ring bearer.

So they got married with a HITCH! It was an all day ordeal that was so exciting and greatly anticipated and we are all so relieved that it is over and done. As momentous as a wedding ceremony and wedding feast are in a person's life, there has got to be a way that the planning could be a bit less stressful. But there are always different circumstances and different angles and backgrounds that everyone is coming from. There is the merging of two foreign countries!

I missed the toast by my father in law, and according to my family, he referenced our wedding as well as me as his daughter in law. And there I...wasn't! I wasn't even in the room for the toast, but instead I was changing a dirty diaper on my little flower girl. I heard nothing. In fact, I entered the room as my FIL was passing the mic over to Husband so I missed it all. Husband gave a very funny, anecdotal recount of all of the crazy advice we received when we were getting married: When you argue, bake a cake and get in bed; always argue in the nude; a recipe for honeymoon salad-lettuce alone, no dressing. His next bit was a toast from the Elizabethan time period about a newly married woman who asks her physician when the best time of day to have sex. He responds by saying the morning is good, but the night is more sweet. So the bride deduces that they will "do it each morn for health, and each night for pleasure." The crowd laughed quite hardily, but Husband could never end with just one thing poetic, he had to throw in, "And the last bit of advice is from BJs own alma mater, Iowa State's fight song: Hit it hard, every yard, for ISU." It was quite a toast.My parents displayed their ballroom dancing prowess during the dinner hour. The dinner conversation on my half of the table was trying to keep Fiona fed the little bumble bee cupcakes since she was famished and waiting for dinner, and trying to figure out how each song could be danced. Overall, I missed the first toast, I missed the cake cutting, I didn't even see the wedding cake, and again, I have no photos to prove the wedding even happened. Even though, I wouldn't trade my babies for anything, it is very difficult to take them to a completely adult event. And since they were two out of six children at the wedding, they stuck out like a sore thumb!

After my darling babies were whisked away by Nanu and Mana (the new name for Grandma, coined by Iain himself) Jake and I spent the rest of the evening, field compliments about our current egg sitting, dancing a few dances, and sitting out in the bar watching the Iowa Hawks come back for a victory against Penn State. The whole day and evening made Husband very happy, but the wedding was an even bigger blur than my own wedding blur. I pray that I am not sinking in to my own "dark years" as my mother refers to the 5-7 year period of time from when #3 was born until #4 was 5 years old. Hopefully the blog will help.

Monday Dialogue

Iain and I have started having these adorable little conversations! I love them! Fiona is stepping right up and making even more and more sense as well. No longer do I feel that I am floating around in the grunting and screaming world, but rather, these vibrant minds are connecting what they observe in their world, mix in some of their baby perceptions, and ta da! We have some language! Jake and I are still acting interpreters, and I do feel that my grade has risen from an F in toddler translation up to a B-. If my brother was a reader of PLJ he would be wondering what page of Bunyan we have conquered...where did I put that?

After Iain realized there was a van sitting in our driveway, he became very curious and wanted to know what it was for.
Iain: Mama? A truck.
Mama: Yes, that is a van.
Iain: Ohhhh...a van! A go?
Mama: No, we aren't going to go in it. The van is for Poppa and Uncle BJ to take to the football game.
Iain: A game?
Mama: Yes.
Iain: A...hot dog? A corn?
Mama: Yeah, they might eat hot dogs and popcorn.
Iain: A...Sabie?
Mama: Aunt Sable is staying at her house to watch her dogs, so she isn't going.

Iain: Daddy! A doing?
Jake cleaning out the fish tank
Iain: Daddy! A DOING???
Jake: I'm giving the fish tank a bath.
Iain: Whoa! Fish a bath! A funny!!

Iain: Mama a shirt! *crying*
Mama: I know, that shirt was wet, so we need to get you a new one.
Iain: A FROG shirt!!!!
Mama: I've got the frog shirt.
Iain: Yeah! Libbit! Libbit!

Both Iain and Fiona have decided that they like knowing where everyone is and what their state of being is. Both are very eager to tell us that the other one is sleeping, or AWAKE if the case may be. Iain will tell us that Fiona wants out of a place, if he wants her to get out, even if she does not want to get out. He assures us that it is Fiona who really wants "out." They have both learned how to communicate with the dogs. Iain calls "Bruda" and "Cezar" and proceeds to scream "NO" and "BAD" when the dogs are interfering with something in child's play or stealing food from the babes.With our new swing set and the obsession with swinging, Auntie Doodie taught Iain some new swing vocabulary. It isn't about being "high" anymore, "unnerdogs" are all of the rage now. Fiona's latest obsession is diamonds. How on earth can an 18 month old already say "dImon" and then ask to wear Mama's diamond, unless there is something in the genetic code of that little girl! She is slowly learning her gem identification, and it will be limited, since compared to the world of fine jewelry, I have a limited selection of precious gems. We will have to send both babes off to the "jewelry" store to "work" with Poppa at some point and he can show them all of the pretties. When we pick Jake up from work at night, and the babes see the lights go off, Iain quickly says, "Night night a jewelry" and then he tells me quickly, "Mama, a jewelry a sleeping."With BJ and Sabie's wedding coming up this weekend, we had a little dress rehearsal to make sure the ensembles fit appropriately. We got on the dress and the socks and the perfect little shoes, along with the little tuxedo and saddle shoes. The two of them were quite a site to behold! I wanted to snap some photos, but they wouldn't hold still together. I asked them to hold hands, and then they took off walking together into the driveway. They were having a blast in their fancy duds, and Fiona had a full blown fit when it was time to take of her dress. She loves the "frow frow" flower on the sash, and I am a bit afraid that she will rip it off at some point. Hopefully we can have other distractions for her the day that she walks the aisle. We still need to procure a little bow tie for our little man.

Unleash the Photos!

Husband finally found the cord for the camera! *sigh* "Were you storing the camera cord in the desk drawer?" Well, either I was storing it there, or one of my little helpers stashed it there.Photos from the Iowa State Fair 2009

The big news around our house is the POTTY! I feel so degreatatated confessing that Husband and I would be excited about potty talk with the babes, but they are BOTH going for it, simultaneously! Fiona just asked to go one day, most likely after listening to us begging Iain to go and sit on the potty. It was terribly exciting to spend some of my birthday money on some new underwear that is gender specific for each of them. The selection for Fiona was annoying. My choices were Minnie Mouse, Tinkerbell and fairies, or Dora the Explorer. Hmmm. She knows none of these characters, plus the smallest size was 2T and my little babe is still in 18mo. clothes. The choices for Iain were endless! Bob the Builder, Thomas the Train, Lightning McQueen from Cars, but I settled on the Pixar pack which got us a two Lightning undies and then a Nemo, a Wall-e, the Incredibles and two Buzz Lightyear.

The Cliffy Swing Set-uncle Josh sweating like a butcher! It became even darker that night...

I was so excited to get home and present each one of them with their new potty incentive of character underwear that is so thin and streamlined, compared to the bulky cloth diapers we have been in since the beginning of the summer. Fiona got hers first and she oooed, and then Iain got his and immediately recognized "Lightning!" Fiona dropper her package, and went to Iain and also exclaimed, "Lightning!" I was a bit sad that Fiona did not recognize any of the fairies on her underwear, but why on earth should she?! We don't watch girlie cartoons or films around here. I realize I am starting to sound like an equal rights, feminist Mama here, but I have become much more sensitive to the fact that by default, Fiona is primarily exposed to cars, trucks, trains, oh and Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang.No shirts today? Someone gets an idea...and the other one follow suit.

She gets just as excited when we hear the garbage truck or a firetruck go by and stops everything to say, "Truck! Truck!" She plays cars with Iain as her baby dolls lie in a heap, longing for holding and pretend nourishment. Instead, their sticky polyester outfits are collecting dust and dog hair. Even at a trip to the library, she bypassed the girlie films I pointed out to her and was oogling over Thomas the Train with Iain and the all male Veggie Tales (oooo...I remember seeing another mom blogger complaining about the lack of female vegetables many months ago, and I thought, "You have way too much time on your hands to worry about the gender of the VeggieTales!")This has to be a case of who comes out first, sets the stage. I remember my brothers complaining about the "puffy dresses" films that my sister and I would always rent from the library, and how totally bored they claimed to be. They took tap lessons and wore leotards-only one year!-under their M. C. Hammer pants, and they know most of the words if not all of them to all of the musical show tunes that I know by heart. Both of them played soccer and football and are extremely macho, so my hopes of Fiona claiming her femininity is not lost. She loves wearing dresses, and she has recently become obsessed with her shoes. Since we are past the pulling on Mama's jewelry, I have been wearing more necklaces, and she notices my jewelry as well, saying "neck" when she wants to wear my necklace. The bracelet we got her when she was born, to match Mama's, not fits her and she is pretty taken in with it, until she rips it off. Phew! She will be fiiiiiiiine.8th annual theatre weekend to Spring Green/Dodgeville

During the last week, the babes have started changing their names for us. It used to be Mama and Poppa for us, and with Iain's latest Caillou craze, he now calls Jake "Daddy." I finally figured it out after he was watching and I heard Caillou talking about his Daddy. Fiona has switched from calling me Mama to just barking, "MOM!" I can handle the switches since they are coming up with their own names for us. As long as they never call me "Ma" I will be just fine. I hate hearing "Ma!" especially in older kids and even worse with adults calling their mother "Ma." To get our attention in the most ignored situations, Iain especially, will call Jake or me "Honey!" Fiona copies him and starts saying "Honey!" as well. We have figured out that Honey is used when they really need us and they know that we both answer to Honey when Jake calls me Honey or I call him Honey. We start cracking up when we hear our little 2 year old yelling "HONEY!" in the backyard and we just know that all of our nosy neighbors can hear our dialogue.

4 years ago....

With all of the cardinal and gold in the air...oh yeah, and the black and gold too...I get all revved up for the big rival game, which always seems to fall during my birthday weekend. It was 4 years ago today that my sister and I were at Jack Trice Stadium watching a great game and an equally great victory over the Hawks: 23-3. I had to call my boyfriend at work throughout the game, and try very hard to not rub the updates in his face, but to be more of a newscaster since he was under the bondage of retail sales.When my sister and I got back to Des Moines, we were planning a cook out with Jake's parents. The deal that Jake and I had prior to the game, was that the "loser" would wear the "winner's" shirt out to a restaurant and pay for dinner for the "winner." Jake decided that we needed to go and get him a T-shirt at Target before we went to his parent's house. We left Sarah to just lounge around, since our faces had been fried in the sun all day.

On the way over to Target, Jake got an interesting phone call from his mother, and they seemed to be having a bit of a serious discussion about A&E party dip. I was totally confused, but amused at the same time at the crazy antics of Jake and his mom. We approached West Glen, and Jake told me that before Target he wanted to show me some little frogs that had taken up residence at the fountain in front of Josephs. He told me to head over to the fountain, and he popped the trunk of his car. I remember looking at him saying, "How do you expect me to find these frogs? How big are they?" before I started towards the fountain. He said, "Just go over there, I am coming!"

I knew that something was going on, as I looked back at him taking off his T-shirt to reveal an ISU t-shirt already underneath his disguise. It was all very fishy, but he stayed in character and was pretending to look for these imaginary frogs. I said something like, what is with the shirt? You already have one, so why did we need to....

Jake started to make THE SPEECH, and was saying how the shirts we had on matched like we were on the same team, and how we would always be on the same team forever. He recited a poem to me, and whipped out a gorgeous ring and got down on one knee. I started crying and shaking, and I think I even said, "Stop stop" not meaning to stop, but to slow down because everything was happening so fast. When he did say, "Will you marry me?" I said, "Of course!"

You are so sensitive!

One of the true learned arts in life is dealing with people, and in turn the horribly rude things they can say. I seem to be plagued by these rude comments. I know I could be over reacting, and sometimes I do, don't get me wrong. The most recent comments that am I referring to are the comments about our current pregnancy.

I am sure that we are getting these because of some type of bad karma that we have circulating out there. Jake has taught me in our very short 5 years together, that when people do or say mean things to him or anyone that he loves, bad things happen to the insult giver. Jake finds parallels with the Jacob in the Old Testament, and since he has seen things happen to friends, acquaintances or people that intentionally try to hurt him by words or deeds, I have chosen to just sit as quietly as I can on his fence with him.

I come from a family with cellophane skin, but also a family that just continues to rub your nose in something. My dad's family has this saying, "He/She is so sensitive!" but this is coming from a family that can really dish out those difficult comments and makes the sensitive comment in a very mocking fashion.

So we know that we are sensitive about what other people say about the baby I am carrying. It is that delicate condition that people didn't speak of in the old days. I completely agree with the pregnancy confinement, where a woman would hide out in her house or a relative's house after she knew she was pregnant and started to show. Her swollen belly could just hang out, away from public view and condemnation from anyone who felt her "condition" was appalling in any way. If there were comments made, then she wouldn't have to hear them, or at least she wouldn't have to try to behave in an elegant manner after anyone would dare to insult her or her husband.

So yesterday I posted the good comments, and some of the mediocre comments. I am sincere when I say that I don't want a parade or a big deal made about the babies. We realize that others may not share in our joy, and that is perfectly fine. Of course we have received countless "Don't you know how that happens yet?" remarks and there really are too many of those to count. These are the "bellow the belt" barbs that have made the list, and just to amuse me in my delicate condition, please take a moment to vote on which one you think is the worst in my poll to the right side.

When I was pregnant with Fiona, Jake's Grandpa said to me at the family reunion, "What are you trying to do to that boy? Breed the brains right out of him?" (There was no laughing after this comment from the Grandpa or from me)

Jake's sister posting on Facebook: "I just found out my bro's wife is prego with baby #3! You're one kid closer to matching the Von Trapp fam buddy!"

Oh! and another one just rolled in, from another acquaintance: "Holy cow. They have triplets now."

One of her friends (who we are acquainted with) responded with: "Can you say 'snip, snip'!"

One of Jake's co-workers: "It's Mr. Can't Keep It In His Pants."

Those are the four worst ever. Since this is my little sound booth, I figured that I could vent about this. There are no wrong answers. Our fresh coat of Teflon is on order, but Jake is also checking into a system patch in order to prevent those knee jerk reactions.

I thoroughly enjoyed watching the original Cheaper By The Dozen yesterday afternoon while I was folding my laundry. Mr. Frank Gilbreth is constantly bombarded by comments of strangers or people that come in to fix something at his house. The comments that people make could be considered to be rude, and the oldest daughter Andy screams at one point, "I'm sick of being a freak!" I was watching the film from a new perspective as a parent, but still sensitive to the adolescent girl who just wants to be popular. "Gee Dad, how do you ever expect us to be popular?" He says, "POPular! POPular! No one wants to be smart or clever anymore, no! they just want to be POPular!"

My favorite quote yesterday was when Mr. Gilbreth is trying to keep all of the kids quiet after a serious disagreement and a man fixing a pipe is just amazed at all of the kids. The repairman says, "Are all these kids yours, Mister? or is this some kind of a picnic." Exasperated, Mr. Gilbreth says, "They are all mine, and BELIEVE me it is NO PICNIC!...QUIET!!!!"

It is officially September!

To say I haven't blogged in a long time, would be an understatement. How horrible that I leave any of my diligent readers hanging on the chickenpox photo of Fiona for the entire summer!Our summer has been jammed pack full to the rafters! Some of the biggest news, officially has been broadcast to all of the immediate family as of yesterday, so I can officially announce on Planet Little Joseph that we are expecting a new resident here sometime the end of February or early March of next year. I am around week 14 so officially in my 2nd trimester. Second trimester officially means that I am not exhausted or having any more nausea. Yippee!! This little baby has proved to be the very most difficult during the first trimester and hardest on my body. I have no idea what THAT is all about. It has been a touch more difficult having my little audience watching all of my heaving and groaning around the clock. I felt I had officially sunk to a new low, when Jake had to pull the car over, I was hanging out the side of the car heaving, and then Iain started to imitate me.
Jake and I feel very blessed, and Jake has been so good to help me stay in perspective when I haven't been feeling well. His emotional support has been my encouragement and on some mornings when I could barely drag myself to the toilet, he was helping change those horrible diapers that would put me over the edge...oh and the ones I would leave to spray out until the end of the day he also took care of!Iain with "the Hounds" Barney and Louie (Gooey according to Iain), at Auntie Sable's (Sab house

Some of our family and friends have all had those mixed reactions when we announce a new baby. We tried to keep it under wraps as long as we could to A)not make a big deal out of it and B) hold off all of those off color comments that people make when they think they are being "funny" but in actuality they are being really crass and impolite. We have known about this baby since Father's Day morning. I had to tell some people...so it has leaked out, and here are some of the reactions:

Very good friend, Deborah: Screaming and shrieking! Oh my goodness!! That is great!!!

Very good friend, Teresa: Gasp! Oh, praise to Jesus! Then almost sounding as if she teared up...

Good friends, Deena and Daren who are expecting their first babe in November I told over Facebook, and I kind of said that Deena jinxed me because she borrowed a non-maternity dress for a wedding, and when I said that it wasn't maternity and I would want to wear it this summer, she presumed I was already pregnant. I probably was. That was the Coldplay weekend. Deena and Daren also gave me much sympathy over the 4th of July since I was very sick, possibly with food poisoning and in the middle of our chickenpox outbreak. One of Daren's funny comments about us having our 3rd, as we were leaving the Gateway Market was, "So you are saying you will be moving from a man to man defense to a zone defense."

My sister, Sarah: Oh Doodie! Congratulations! Just don't turn into the Swansons! (Family friends who have 8 children)My brother, Josh, GUESSED, after I told him about Iain mocking me being sick: "You're pregnant, aren't you?! I said, Why would you think that? Can't a girl have food poisoning now and again? Ummm...no, you never get sick. You are pregnant.

My brother, Zach: WHAT?!!!! You're kidding!! When are you due? Zach was pretty excited, especially since his wife was expecting their first baby in February and knowing that our babes would be very close in age. Now we know that Erin Kathleen is expecting twins!!

I told my siblings in July, but asked them to keep our secret from my parents until we thought they might be more ready to handle us having another baby...I told my parents after the day at the fair. My mom said, "Congratulations!" I felt I respected her wishes and told her in person, since she doesn't like being told over the phone. I thought her response was slightly better in person, and much better with Congratulations instead of "I thought you were waiting" which is what she said for both Iain and Fiona. My sister had warned me that Mom noticed my belly the weekend before and it would be difficult to hide , plus my siblings were on me to tell my parents because they all felt they might slip up with the secret. My mom then said, "Lynn! did you hear that"! He said, Yeah, from where he was taking a nap, but then came into the room with us and after my mom expressed how cute it was that all of her offspring were keeping my secret my dad said, "Does Jake know?"Iain after his face plant at the library. He was so excited to check out books and DVDs that he was running and tripped on the cursed blanket. The photo doesn't do the wound justice.Jake has been keeping busy with our garden this summer. I have canned 14 pints of salsa and a gallon of marinara sauce all from our garden! I have another load of tomatoes waiting for me.

I always think that I might be able to pee on a stick and not tell Jake about it for a few days, or a few hours, but we are in such sync with each other he knows with the crackling of the wrapper that there is something brewing. Jake likes to keep secrets much longer than I am capable, so he broke the news to his family yesterday while at work. I realized that we told everyone about Fiona the week before Labor Day and she was expected the end of March...and since this baby is expected the end of February, we have been able to stay on the down low a month longer. Since Jake's brother is getting married at the end of September and I have already started wearing maternity clothes I strongly encouraged him to break the news before Fiona and Iain spilled the beans for us!My "spare time" project of dishrags, turned into my first order. These were the 5 that my customer bought.

Both Iain and Fiona have started poking my baby belly and squealing saying, "Baby!" It is the most precious thing! Fiona still is confused as to where the baby actually is, because sometimes she is confused when Iain is reminding her where she could get milk from and then learning where my belly button is. Iain has shoved her head to my breast, saying, "Baby! Milk! Go!!" We all get a big chuckle out of it, but the look on Fiona's face says, "I am totally over that!"

Fiona loved her tutu dress and was completely delighted to wear this all day. She really turned heads, especially running around Caribou Coffee.

We have tons of photos from the summer, but these are all mobile uploads.