A Running Collection

I’m sure there is spit up in my hair. There is definitely spit up on the couch and on the game that George Wilder and Amelia left on the floor. There is more on my pillow and some on my shirt. I’ve sat down for the first time in a week, unless sleeping sitting up, which doesn’t count, or nursing. Meals are speed races. So is the cleaning up, cooking, laundry, and showering if showing occurs. I’ve burnt food several times and soured the laundry. Amelia and George Wilder now pick out their own outfits. George Wilder lives is costumes, Amelia, in some assortment of stripes or pinks or blues. I’m not sure we’ve brushed hair in the month of December. Teeth? Yes, but not with accurate supervision. They have also learned how to unload and stack the dishwasher, sort the laundry, fold the clean clothes, and read books by themselves even if they don’t know the words. They need me less. It breaks me. I’m lonely. They need me right? Not as much as I thought. I’m lonely without them right with...

Wow. Here we are. Still admiring the side view, still thinking tonight is the night. Still pondering, dreaming, reading books with the children, waddling from room to room, tiding EVERYTHING, EVERY night before bed, and living in a bright orange pair of old Umbro shorts as long as no one but us is around. This passage is long and, I must admit, most draining. I honestly didn't think we would get to this point, so, although being late isn't abnormal, I feel abnormal. Every contraction grabs my attention. Every movement -- does the same. Very little can take my mind off of this process. Sleep deprived some nights, banking sleep others, I wonder how this will play out and there is simply no way of knowing. I've lost trust, worked on having trust, lost joy, gained it back. Lost patience, searched my heart for more, and found I am so very very dependent on strength that is not my own. Oh how I want to meet our child. I want to feel skin, hear cries, see a face, and ears and toes...

Costumes. George Wilder loves costumes. He would rather be in a costume than in regular clothes. His imagination is so vivid. We just peeled off Winnie the Pooh, which he wore for 48 straight hours. He was determined to be a jet for Halloween, but he also wanted to wear a few other pieces with the jet costume. He was basically a red knight jet. He loved it. He flew everywhere. Amelia, our bird lover, wanted to dress up as a turkey vulture – and so the turkey vulture costume was born. She studied pictures of turkey vultures on the internet. She drew pictures of them. She gave specific directions into the making of her costume. My mind couldn’t quite grasp what this turkey vulture would look like, but I made some wings, we had bunches of black feathers and black clothes and painted her face. It looks nothing like a bird face. Within minutes, she fell and had tears running down her cheeks. A few more minutes passed and her dangling tooth fell out. Bloody mouthed and smeared with pai...

George will be back tomorrow. He's been in London for five days. Five days of Oxford and presentations. Five days of pubs with ale, good steak and mushroom pie. Five days of tea and coffee in little corner spots That are so tiny, he can't hardly sit inside. There was camping out two nights in a tent Then visits with friends from Durham days. We've made it through. We've taken care of the sheep and chickens. We've played outside under a warm sun. We went on the perfect hike across the pasture and through the woods Harvest Fests. Hay rides. Grandmother. Drawing. Dancing. Spinning in new skirt. Airplanes. Big boxes. Music. Shooting darts at balloons Then target practice on the white board bulls eye. When the children sleep, the silence is golden and awkward. This task -- raising children and waiting for one to come is massive. We've all missed daddy with tears, with frustration, with trying to buck the system. The days that were slow, slowed again. And now with 3.5...

Saving Christmas It was a surprise. I came home after a morning out and there stood George, our friend Brandon, and the children with proud faces. Across the the table, hooked on chairs, and spread out on the counter lay piles of charred Christmas ornaments. "We saved Christmas mama!" They did. All the ornaments were there. Some totally fine, some yellow, some black with soot, some coated in something, some already moldy from the rains - but they had saved them. A mama's eye's and heart should have rolled with it, but it was the kitchen and it was covered in a large black mess. I shared my thanks and looked through the piles and joyfully found some favorites in tip top shape. It was hard to avoid the thought process of the aftermath it would create and my attitude sort of showed. The children saved Christmas for mama and I saw a mess to pick up. It took not just a few days, but four to catch the spirit. We've cleaned what we could and tossed the rest. There ...

The barn/shed burned to the ground in the early of Friday morning. I stood on the back porch as 10 firemen fought to control the blaze. The wind was blowing and the land is dry, but it didn’t come to the house. It didn’t hurt the animals. We are all safe. It is a blow to normalcy. A blow to the ebb and flow of every day. It was an extension of the house. Storage for Christmas, bikes, our summer produce in the deep freeze, tools, cages, suit cases, furniture, a crib, high chair, car seat bases, booster seats, brewing supplies. Animal fed, garden supplies, lawn mowers, double stroller, double bike chariot, tent. Of course it was all well used. Of course it was a collection of years of hobbies. But we look at it and all is a pile of rubble and it is okay because we are here, we are together, we are not hurt, we are not destroyed. We are safe. We have beds. We have each other. It is time to think through what is most important. It is time to have a Christmas ornament decorati...

Play. It sets the ground for crazy creativity, hilarious ideas and conversations, and remarkable inventions. I watch this morphing of ideas and suddenly I realize we are in a dream world filled with a completely unique set of rules, manuals, ideas, ways of traveling, ways of communicating and collecting. Oh the collections. Amelia is our collector. George Wilder is our dreamer. A visit to Amelia’s room might lead one to believe we kill birds for her feather collections. I’m sure in the last month she has collected enough cardinal feathers to supply one cardinal with a new set of wings. She has emu feathers, peacock feathers, goose feathers, turkey, chicken, sparrow, blue jay, dove, cardinal, mallard duck, Asian pheasant and a great horn owl. They are in groups; they are in vases, in bags, and in baskets. George Wilder dreams. He dreams of riding on the back of a wolf, of becoming a vulture bat, of flying jets all around the world, especially to Africa. He has a book from grandmother th...