A Conversation

Me: I heard a story on the radio about a lady who gave birth to eight babies this week.
Abe: Yeah, I heard that too.
Me: What in the world do you do with EIGHT infants?
Abe: Give them away. Like puppies.

Hypnotizin' Those Babies

Some people have lists of things to do before they die: travel to India, complete a triathlon, make an appearance on an NPR show...I am one of those people. In fact, the above items might be on my own list of things to do before I die. Also on my list--item #3.2--is the following: "Give birth naturally." Yes, it's true: for all my cynical talk about natural childbirth, and all the acclaim I give the Holy Epidural (blessed be its named forever), I must confess that I really, really want to experience a drug-free birthing.

I want this for a number of reasons: First, it seems like a neat way to connect with my own womanhood as well as with the billions of women--from all time periods, from all cultures, from all belief systems; big, small, medium, ugly, beautiful, and in-between-- who have borne children. Second, I like to do hard things. Third-- well, maybe I should move to a new paragraph for the third reason...

Third, I feel that the way that pregnancy and childbirth have been medicalized in this country is ridiculous. I'm not going to go so far as to say that the "medical model of childbirth" is a horrible thing, or that it's doing irreparable damage to women or babies, but I do believe that it has overly complicated a simple and natural process, and that it does harm women and newborn infants to some degree on a regular basis. Many unnecessary C-sections are performed every year because of medical interventions that complicate labor and delivery...and because of medical personnel who are impatient with some people's naturally slower birth processes. (Click here for more information about rising Cesarean section rates in the United States.)

But, anyway, I bring this all up to make a confession that I find a little bit embarrassing: I'm taking a Hypnobabies class. Yes, that's right. I plan to use self-hypnosis to eliminate/reduce any birthing-related "discomfort" (I'm not allowed to use the "p" word that rhymes with "rain") and speed along my beeaauutiiiifulll (this is the way the lady on my CD set says it) "birthing time" (I'm also not supposed to use the "l" word that rhymes with "neighbor.") Less parenthetically, I'm learning techniques that will help this childbirth experience move along more quickly and comfortably.

Anyway, as you may be able to tell, I'm still a little skeptical about the whole thing, which bothers me. I feel that there is no room for skepticism when you're using your brain to alter your physical sensations. But take last night, for instance: I was sitting in the passenger's seat on the way back from a drive to SLC. I was tired, which means that my RLS was making my feet all twitchy and crazy, and my back was really bothering me. I thought to myself: "I know! I'll just use my hypnobirthing techniques to "breathe" my "powerful anesthesia" to the parts of my body that are uncomfortable! If I anesthetize my feet/back, I won't twitch/ache anymore!" So I tried breathing that powerful anesthesia, but my feet still twitched and my back still ached. This made me a little bit sad. It made me feel that I maybe should have saved the $140.00 I spent on the course and just put it toward an epidural.

Beautiful Birthing Time, here I come? I sure hope so.

Happy Birthday, Soren!

The highlight of Soren's birthday was his birthday song. He absolutely lit up when everyone started singing to him. He turned this way, then that, looking at the panoramic view of all of these grown-ups smiling at and singing a song....just for him. When we finished the song, he said, "Mer?" ("More") So we sang to him again. And again he requested "More?" So we sang to him one last time. This video captures his face during the final serenade, which is still cute, but not even close to matching the sheer joy that he expressed during the first round.

Soren's Birthing Time

NOTE: DON'T GET ALL EXCITED! THESE ARE NOT PICTURES OF THE END OF MY CURRENT PREGNANCY. SAID PREGNANCY CONTINUES TO PERSIST.

Since I talked a little about Soren's birth in the previous post, I thought I'd do a little commemorative post about the occasion, as I don't believe I was an active blogger at the time he came into the world.

Like I said, it took several uncomfortable hours to bring the little ninito into the world.

But Abe was an excellent support.

And we both took a post-epidural nap.


Soon this little tyke arrived, making the months of morning sickness, nights of frequent urination, and days of labor all worth it.

I think this is what Abe has in mind when he speaks of our newborn firstborn being less than attractive.

Though he did seem to like him anyway, in spite of his alleged physical flaws.

And now he's a two-year-old. Unbelievable.

Newsletter: Month 24

Dear Soren,

Before you were born, I worried that I wouldn't like you. I'd sit and look at my swollen belly and wonder what in the world I was thinking when I decided to have a baby. I don't even really like most kids, I'd think to myself. I don't even like kids! I feared you'd come and I'd resent you and think you were ugly and loathe everything you had changed about my life. Everyone assured me that this wouldn't be the case, but I didn't believe them. I was seriously worried. And then, on December 30, 2006, I started having regular birthing contractions. And I was in labor for the next forty-five hours. Maybe that doesn't sound like a whole lot to you, but let me tell you: it was. It was two consecutive nights without sleep, plus twenty-four hours of what the natural birth community likes to refer to as "intense pressure sensations" and I like to refer to as "something akin to having your entrails stirred and mutilated by a hot poker." But at the end of all that suffering, there was an epidural, followed by a sunrise, then a little nap, then fifteen minutes of pain-free pushing, and then....miracle of miracles...there you were. A little bald purple head popped out into the afternoon sunshine and started looking around. And even before you'd even wriggled your little way all the way out into the delivery room, I had fallen in love. And every day for the past two years, I've fallen a little harder.

Your dad and I will talk about that first day with you, and he'll usually say something like, "It was great to have him, but he sure was weird-looking." And I'll say, "Are you kidding me? He was beautiful!" And he'll say, "Rach, sweetie, he's cute now, but at the time....well....he was purple. And his face was all scrunched up. And he had a serious cone-head. " And again, I'll repeat, "Well, maybe, but that doesn't matter. He was beautiful!" And we'll even sometimes pull out the pictures of our little newborn baby, look at them, look at each other, and simultaneously say, "See? I told you!"

This morning you decided that it was time to go somewhere. With your current verbal skills, communicating this to me involved repeating, "Go? Go? Go?" multiple times while pointing to the front door. I was wearing my most hideous sweatpants and an ugly pink t-shirt and had not been planning on going anywhere, but your big blue eyes, like your father's, have a persuasive capacity that I am not easily able to withstand, so I relented and said that we could go for a little walk outside.

The walk morphed into a visit to the little boy (Koen) who lives next door. He is also two. You were a little shy about the visit and very sweetly acquiesced every time Koen took a toy away from you, handing it over and looking for something new to play with. But then Koen started hitting. What broke my heart was the look on your face when Koen would suddenly-- and without malice, really, just a sudden impulse-- wack you as hard as he could. I've tried so hard to surround you with gentle kindness, with an environment of love. Except after we've been bitten particularly hard, your father and I have always touched you gently. We work to emphasize the importance of touching nicely. And for the most part, you try to be gentle. You don't always understand, and sometimes you're just plain unempathetic, but for a two-year-old, I feel that you do pretty well. So when Koen hit you, for a second you would just stand there, looking surprised and hurt and heartbroken, and then crumple into tears and run into my arms. This made me want to cry. It was a reminder that I won't be able to keep you safe and little forever. I hate that it is inevitable that your innocence will slowly be broken down by the harsh realities of living in this world. I want you to live forever and ever with that crystalline shine in your eyes, with that glowing trust in your own safety, in the confidence that everyone around understands your worth and loves you. As I watched you play with this little boy, I worried that you would pick up on his behavior and start hitting him back. But you didn't. I hope that this is the way that you one day deal with all of the disappointments you will encounter in your interactions with humanity: that you will discover that a great many people are cruel, apathetic, self-centered, sarcastic....but that you won't even consider the possibility that you, too, could become like them. That you will continue to strive to be kind, aware, open, charitable. (And also come to your Mama for comfort and hugs.)

All month long I plague people with stories of your cuteness. And then I sit down to write these newsletters and they've all flown away. But these are the things that come to mind right now:

-Your vocabulary has really grown this month. You've begun to take more risks in attempting to say words that you understood before but couldn't/wouldn't pronounce. My favorite is that you call raisins "Ceecee," which is the same thing, as you might recall, that you call Jesus. You must find raisins truly divine. I also adore the way you request hugs: "Uck?," ask for more: "Mer?," and praise your own accomplishments: "Yeeeeaaaah!"


-You've taken an interest in the potty, which you refer to as the "Peepee." Whenever one of us mentions to you that we are going to "put our peepees in the potty," you always run to the bathroom gate and start removing your pants and diaper. I let you sit on your little toilet on these occasions, but the pottying act has yet to coordinate with the brief moments you spend sitting on the seat. I may start pushing this more heartily with you next month. On the other hand, it might be best if I wait until Liam has been around for a few months and things have settled down. I just don't want to miss any valuable windows of potty-training readiness.
-For some reason that I can't remember, you've begun joining me during my morning bath this month. I've been bathing instead of showering during this pregnancy because standing up for long periods leaves me breathless. Bathtime had become a special mommy-only time in the morning, in which I would bask in the water and periodically call out, "Soren? You still alive?" To which you would always reply, "Yeah!" So when you decided you wanted to join me, and I decided I would let you, I thought I would resent the loss of this alone time. On the contrary, your company has enlivened bathtime and made it even more fun. Now it's a special Mommy-Soren time. We play with bath toys (it is particularly fun to drive your little red bus over the cliff of my belly), sing songs, and splash. This morning we played a funny game that involved me peeking down at you from behind the mound that is your little brother Liam. You found this to be profoundly hilarious.
-Which reminds me: you have a delightful laugh. It is very full and round and hearty. I wonder if you will grow up to have a booming voice like the men on my mom's side of the family. Right now your voice is little and makes me think of the voice you might hear on an elf or a sprite or a brownie. I, of course, think it is sweeter than the voice of an angel.
-You love books, but not for the stories. You love them as a source of information. You are happy to spend large chunks of time on my lap with a stack of books on hand, pointing to pictures and learning new words. You love to make connections with the things you see in your books and the things you see in the world around you. For example, one morning you found a picture of a woman in a book. You showed the book to me, pointing at the lady and saying, "Mommy!" You then pointed at me and declared, "Mommy!" You were beaming.

-You take a profound joy in organizing and sorting things. You love to line things up. You sort your blocks by shape. I wonder, particularly in reflecting back on this summer, when you would insist on touching each pine bush in a neighbor's yard every time we passed in the stroller, if you've maybe got a little obsessive-compulsive disorder. Although if cleanliness is any indication, we don't have anything to worry about.


-You are at the lovely age in which all small children adore their mothers. I love to be your source of joy and comfort. We mutually light up when the other enters the room; that's a fun feeling.

You are my little darling. I'm so glad we've had these two years together. Happy birthday, baby.

Love,

Mommy

Christmas: Another Holiday Success!

Christmas was yet another delightful holiday. I completed all my shopping before December 1st so that I could kick back and enjoy the season. We didn't do much (there was a lot of driving around and looking at Christmas lights; Abe and I delivered cookies to a few of our favorite people; Documentary Night turned into Christmas Special Night; we briefly attended our Ward Christmas Party), but we did it calmly.

And I liked that.

Soren helped decorate the Christmas tree. He was shockingly well-behaved all season long around that tree. Aside from occasionally rearranging the ornaments (aka moving them from the tree to various locations around the house) and spending a considerable amount of time plugging in and unplugging the lights, he really didn't touch the tree very much. I had been planning on putting up fortifications around the tree (something like a four-foot-tall chain link fence with barbed wire on top), but such precautions proved unnecessary. It was a pleasant surprise.

Isn't he precious? Also, I must take a moment to brag here that I purchased that fully-lit Christmas tree, along with all the ornaments and the tree skirt, at a garage sale this summer for $7.00.

And this was our Christmas morning. Abe had to work for a couple of hours first thing in the morning, so everyone was dressed but me. (And I could have been dressed, except that I prefer to wear things without a waistband as much as possible, as I have swollen to proportions that don't lend themselves to clothing.)

Soren was particularly excited about the candy canes Santa put in his stocking. He was also excited about some of the goodies Daddy got.

It was so fun to have our little sweetie be somewhat aware of what was going on-- at least enough to enjoy getting some new toys. He even said, "Wow!" when he opened his "big" present: a 200-piece package of wooden blocks.

Abe told Quentin to look triumphant while he gloated over his Christmas spoils. ("Triumphant is double-chinned?" asked Abraham.)

Also...a few days before Christmas we received an unexpected knock on the door. My mom was standing on the doorstep. "Merry Christmas!" she said, as my dad backed his pickup truck into our driveway. "What the....?" I began, and then saw the box sitting in the back of the truck: "WASHER." My sweet mom and dad bought Abe and me a BRAND NEW washer and dryer for Christmas. I've been doing laundry at their house for the past year, hauling loads of clothing back and forth between our homes each week. Abe and I had been thinking we might start perusing Craig's List this summer for a used set after we'd recovered from being mugged by doctor and hospital following the birth of our new baby. Now we won't need to worry about it.
"It was just breaking my heart to watch you struggle around with that gigantic belly and your huge baskets of laundry," said my Mom. "And you'll really need this when the new baby comes," added my Dad. And so now we are the proud owners of a BRAND NEW Kenmore washer and dryer. I feel so fancy.

Later that evening--as he perused the contents of the package of goodies his mom had sent for Christmas-- "Lil' Smokies!" "Cabot Cheese!" "Cookies!" -- Abe proclaimed the day to be one of the best in his whole life. On Christmas morning, he declared, "I have achieved Nirvana through the attainment of material goods!"

Poet in Residence

Abe has taken to scribbling poetry in the kitchen late at night. It's always fun to stumble across a new poem by Abraham. I don't want to embarrass him by publishing his more personal works, but here is a silly (yet delightful) one I don't think he'll mind being shared:

Tender Bacon Love

When I wake
I smell watcha makin'
Breathe in flavor
Of cookin' bacon
Look quite hot
Pregnant and big
Front of that stove
Sizzlin' that pig
You've been seen by the long-legged stork
I can tell
As you flip the pork

In Which I Enter Adulthood

Nope: the marriage, the college degree, the mortgage, the baby, the second pregnancy....none of those pushed me into adulthood. What did it, instead, was preparing a Thanksgiving dinner entirely by myself.* I pulled giblets and a neck out of a turkey cavity...all by myself. I stuffed it with citrus fruit and onion quarters. I basted it every half hour. I served homemade rolls, jello salad, potatoes, several different types of pie, stuffing, and other delicious foods that I can't think of right now. I planned the menu, I executed the shopping, I scheduled all of the cooking so that everything would be ready at the same time. And I'm (obviously) pretty darn proud of myself.

For those of you who are growing bored of this post already, I will note right now that I'm really recording this only for family history purposes. I recognize that most of you will not be interested in my Thanksgiving. But I'm putting down the details here because it was a very nice holiday and I would like to remember it. So don't feel bad for stopping right here and visiting the "lol cats" website instead.)

Abe's from New Hampshire, but all of his adult siblings live out west. Abe had told his older sister, Natalya, who lives in Montana, that we would love to come visit her and her family sometime soon. She called and said, "Jacob's got time off for Thanksgiving. Why don't we come down and visit you?" That sounded like a good idea to us, so we decided to have a miniature Skousen Family Thanksgiving at our house. In addition to the Brown Family (Nat and Jacob and their three children (Hyrum (3), Lucy (2), and Heber (1)), our two LDS Busines College siblings (Quentin and Briar) also visited for the Holiday. I truly enjoyed having my house stuffed to the brim with guests.

We used to joke that Quentin could come live with us and be Soren's nanny, so we refer to him as "Nanny Q" while speaking with Soren. Soren has adapted this name to "Nan-O." They have good times together.

Briar and Hyrum spend some time getting to know each other. Or maybe Hyrum wants to play with Briar's laptop, which you can't see, due to the Thomas the Train blocking Briar's lap.

I was AMAZED at Heber's ability to nap in the middle of chaos. Soren, being a spoiled oldest child, must be laid in his bed with a white noise maker whirring in the background. This child, on the other hand, slept soundly in the rocking chair while Soren not-so-gently rocked him and his older siblings played nearby with toys. Most impressive.

(Please also note Soren's layered look. This is a cute habit that he has picked up on lately. He loves to wear short-sleeved shirts over long-sleeved shirts and shorts over long pants. In the morning he sometimes likes for me to put a second pair of pajamas on top of the jammies he slept in.)

Lucy looking very Aryan. She is an adorably sweet little cutie pants.

Jacob and Natalya were very sweet to help out around the house during their visit. Jacob fixed our dishwasher and helped Abe and Quentin repair our kitchen deck; Natalya, in addition to helping out in the kitchen, was dear enough to wipe some nasty Soren poopies out of the carpet when he experienced an out-of-this-world diaper explosion. (After dealing with similar poopies for a couple of weeks, we finally discovered that citrus fruit was at the root of Soren's bowel upset.)

And this is the spot where I would post a nice picture of Natalya and Jacob. Unfortunately, the only decent picture I got of their faces was a breastfeeding shot, which I thought Nat might not appreciate having posted on my blog. So just know that they're very cute people.

Anyway, to continue my narrative: The Browns left Friday afternoon. Natalya was sick for the duration of the 8-hour drive (I swear it wasn't my food!) and vowed never to travel that far with three small children ever again. (She also made this vow the last time she came to visit us, so I'm not terribly concerned.) Her children were also a little sick in the days following (I swear it wasn't my food!) Soren, though he enjoyed having visitors his age for the first twenty-four hours, had started to grow overwhelmed by the presence of so many other children, and was deeply relieved to have the house return to its usual quiet state, where he is the sole creator of all chaos, noise, and unpredictability.

Sunday night I took him out for a ride around Shelley so he could see the Christmas lights. These were met, that night and throughout the season, with many exclamations of "Ooooh! Lights!" and "Wooww!"

*My friend Nicholas came over the night before to help me bake pies. Also, Natalya was in charge of the Funeral Potatoes. But you get the general idea.....

Halloween Fun

I mentioned that my sister, Collette, and her family had a more successful Halloween experience this year. Here are her children, post-trick-or-treating.

Tessa, 6, dressed up as a kitty. She was pretty tired by this time of night.

Calysta, 9, was a beautiful fairy princess. Here she is enjoying a fresh homemade doughnut.

Marty, 8, was a pirate. Calysta made his beard and moustache herself. I was pretty impressed.

Arielle, 12, was some sort of scary creature with an obscured face.

Another Holiday Horror Story

This Halloween was quite a fiasco. It was really all my fault. I build up my hopes for events without really thinking them through and planning for all contingencies. This combination of high expectations with low planning can really only have one result: bitter disappointment, weeping/wailing/gnashing of teeth, and an overwhelming sense of failure. Halloween 2008 did not provide an exception to this formula.

So this it what I had imagined would happen:

Soren would be dressed in the adorable lion costume I purchased for him earlier this summer at a garage sale. We would go as a family to the ward "Trunk or Treat" activity, where Abe and I would fraternize pleasantly with the adults in our neighborhood while Soren frolicked adorably with the other be-costumed children. Afterward, he would skip delightedly from car to car, leaving a stream of delighted exclamations in his wake ("How adorable! " "What a dear little boy!" "Such a cute little lion!") while he collected a large round of Halloween candy which would later be generously shared with his favorite Daddy and Mommy and unborn little brother.

What happened instead was this:

Mommy and Daddy returned from work and picked Soren up from Auntie Collette's house, where he had spent the day wearing a series of princess dresses chosen by his cousins. He was loathe to exchange a fluffy violet dance outfit for the jeans and t-shirt I had selected for him that morning, so we brought him home dressed like a little girl, wondering if we should, in fact, simply allow him to go to the Halloween party as a princess. I decided against this course, as I thought it might confuse people about our child's actual gender, and also because I had spent $1.50 on an actual costume that I wanted him to wear this year.

Upon our arrival at home, Soren immediately started whining. Abraham had claimed a headache and threatened to stay home from all Halloween activities, so I sent him downstairs to take a power nap in preparation for the evening's festivities, which I did not want to participate in without my sweetie. I then turned my energies toward the little boy, wrestled him out of his leotard, and found some warm clothes to put underneath his costume so he wouldn't freeze to death while begging for candy in the church parking lot. I tried to add the body-portion of his costume, but his protests, twists, and screams reminded me that he hadn't had dinner yet and might be somewhat more pliant with food in his belly.

So I plunked him in his high chair, checked the clock (we had forty-five minutes), and smeared some peanut butter and jelly in a tortilla while he impatiently rocked back and forth, whined, pointed, and grunted. The high chair seems to bring out his autistic side. And then I remembered that I needed to decorate our trunk in some sort of cute Halloween fashion in order to keep up with the Brother and Sister Joneses. So I elicited a "please" out of Soren, plunked his meal unceremoniously on his tray, poured him a glass of milk, and then ran off downstairs to gather supplies.

We don't have a single Halloween decoration in the house, so I thought fast and grabbed a patchwork quilt that looked kind of harvesty to me. I brought that back upstairs and checked to make sure that Soren was till breathing. Then I remembered that the light bulb in our trunk had worn out. So I ran back downstairs, dug through Abe's tool room, and came up with a portable light that we could use for our trunk. I brought that upstairs and did another quick choke-check. Next I realized that, if Soren were unwilling to wear the lion mask that came with the costume, I would have to figure out how to paint Soren's face to look lion-y. So I ran back downstairs to check the internet for ideas. Then I ran back upstairs.

Now, this wouldn't have been so bad if pregnancy didn't turn me into something akin to an elderly hippopotamus with asthma. But it does. So every time I made it back to the top of the stairs I had to sit down and put my head between my knees until my heart rate slowed to something reasonable--like maybe 120 bpm--and I could breathe without gasping. Through my final bout of post-stair-climbing vertigo, I had a vague awareness of Soren in the kitchen, flinging pieces of milk-soaked peanut-butter-and-jelly smeared tortilla at the wall, at the counter top, and at the kitchen table. He was done eating.

So while I was scrubbing Soren's little face with a washcloth and directing him in the fine art of wiping milk off the floor, it came to me that he still needed a tail for his costume. This was something I had considered vaguely throughout the past month but never taken steps to rectify, always telling myself, "Halloween is so far away. You'll have time to do it later." But now Halloween was upon us. I darted into my bedroom, found some brilliant orange yarn, and, after some digging, came up with the only crochet hook I could find: one of those gigantic ones a person might use for crafting a rag rug. It would have to do. Only, it didn't. After several vain attempts at crocheting a tail that might be passably cute, I gave up, flung the crochet hook across the room in the same way that Soren might fling a cup full of milk across a room, and decided that the %&$*#$ costume didn't need a (@!*$& tail anyway.

And now it was time to get Soren dressed. This time around, I was allowed to pull the body portion of Soren's costume on without too much struggling. The mask, as I had feared, was another story. Soren would not have anything to do with it. If I even so much as got the thing within 3 inches of his head, he would commence screaming. So I moved on to plan B: makeup. I was able to successfully draw one half of one whisker on Soren's face before he started grabbing at the eyeliner I was using, shaking his head back and forth, and crying when I wouldn't let him have the pencil. I had a lipstick that I was going to use to pinken his nose, but that was also grabbed at and cried about. So after about three minutes of my desperately swiping at Soren's face with various cosmetics while he desperately thrashed, rubbed, and grabbed at said cosmetics, he looked less like a lion and more like a burn victim in ICU. So I gave up on the idea of his looking like anything but a little boy in tan fuzzy pajamas, rubbed the make-up off as best I could, and hollered down the stairs at Abraham to wake up.

Exhausted, I plopped into a chair. Soren, who was really just a tired little boy who hadn't been home all day, grabbed a book and brought it over to me. "Story?" he asked hopefully. "Story?" So I picked up book, pulled my little tyke into my lap, and started to read. And I also started to cry. I had failed at Halloween. I hadn't decorated. I hadn't bought any candy. I hadn't signed up to bring food to the Trunk or Treat. I couldn't get my child to wear his costume.

Abraham found me and Soren sitting in the rocking chair in Soren's bedroom, crying together. He immediately declared that this was no time for going out. Instead he sat down on the rocking ottoman and rubbed my feet while I read stories to Soren. It was really what our family needed: a quiet evening at home together. Halloween or not, we were worn out from a long week and really just needed to wind down. I wanted so much for Halloween to be fun for us, but I suppose wrenching a tired child, be-headached husband, and pregnant self around like holiday fun automatons was not the way to go about it.

(We did end up having doughnuts and cider at my sister's house later that evening. Her children were all costumed delightfully. I'll post about that next.)

This is a picture of me at the end of a harrowing Halloween day. Abe calls this the "Rachel doesn't want to be touched" pose. I really should post a more flattering picture of myself sometime soon. I don't always look so haggard and hunch-backed. Really.

Newsletter: Month 22 1/2.

Bubba,

You have--at long, long last--finally started calling me "Mommy." Grandma says you learned it watching "Tom and Jerry" with her one morning last week. Daddy and I stopped to pick you up after work and there you stood, at the bottom of the stairs, gazing up at me from under long lashes and saying, "Mom..mom...mommy?" I was, of course, enchanted. I ran down the stairs, scooped you up into my arms, and got you to repeat it for me a couple of times. So entranced was I, in fact, that you took advantage of the moment to snake a pair of scissors off the nearby bookshelf. "Mommy!" you said, reaching out and grabbing the scissors, while in my mind little bluebirds fluttered around your head. "Mommy!" you said, separating the blades, while while my brain's full symphonic orchestra rolled into a swelling musical phrase of joy. "Mommy!" you said, while I attempted to phonetically transcribe your unique pronunciation of the word. And then I noticed that you were holding scissors and could perhaps at any moment jab out one of your eyeballs. The phonetic dictionary snapped shut, the birds stopped twittering, the orchestra screeched to a halt. And the moment I was able to wrench the scissors out of your tight little grasp, you mutated into a flopping fish, writhed out of my hands, and began screaming and thrashing around on the floor. Grandma looked up to see if I was, indeed, extracting your toenails without anesthesia.

Soren poses in an outfit he found in Daddy's bottom dresser drawer. This was, apparently, the only non-blurry picture we've taken of him during the past six weeks.

This month you've also taken to referring to Jesus as "Ceecee" (pronounced "see-see"). Every time you see a picture of Jesus, you're quick to point out that it's Ceecee. Your father and I marvel at how quickly you little people pick up on the concept of Jesus. We imagine herds of little toddlers following him around Jerusalem, all referring to him with their own garbled little versions of his name. I'm thinking about starting up a new church and calling it "Ceecee's Place." It would be a very casual sect.

Other linguistic notes from this month:

-You learned how to say "anckoo" ("thank you") at a recent family home evening. So now you say "eese" and"anckoo." Next up, I suppose, is "erelcum."
-Many of your words are pronounced in a backwards sort of way. For example, "Truck," "duck," and "stuck" are all pronounced "Kkkuh!" Similarly, "Rock" and "Sock" are both "Kkkkah!"
-Also new in the vocab this month: "Oy" ("toy") and"O-oy" ("story"); "Beebee" ("Baby") and "Peepee" (the liquid, not the part").

Observing your language development up close has been fascinating for me. It's such a complicated process-- learning to associate objects, people, and abstract concepts with specific sounds; developing the motor skills necessary to form these sounds consistently; stringing the words together into grammatical structures. It's a miracle of the mind, and I hope you don't mind my obsessive documentation of every step you take in this process.

Another aspect of your development that has changed during the past six weeks is your playing style. You've begun spending more time focusing on individual toys, figuring out everything they can do and experimenting with them. The gear board your Grandma Skousen sent you several months ago has long been a favorite-- but this month you've really started focusing on it, building towers on the spinning gears, finding ways to stop the spinning of the gears, matching colors, and pushing buttons until the toy plays a song you want to hear. You've also really started to be interested in "helping." You want to push the vacuum. You want to sweep the floor. You want to mop. You help combine ingredients in baked goods. You drag the table bench over to the kitchen sink when you see that I'm doing dishes. I had heard other moms complain about this stage and always wondered why. Wouldn't it be great to have a little helper instead of a little hinderance? But now I'm discovering that little helpers can be little hinderances. Everything gets done more slowly and less thoroughly with a 22-month-old on your team. You've got your own ideas about how things should be done (the vacuum needs to be turned off to really be effective; the dirt needs to be spread out by the broom, not gathered together; the dishes in the drainer need to be put back in the rinse water and the dishes in the rinse water need to be returned to the dirty dish pile) and no amount of explaining on my side seems to impact your opinions on such matters. Though I don't want you to misinterpret: I'm not complaining. I enjoy having you there with me while I work. I'm glad that you want to help and I know that you're developing a sense of autonomy and self-confidence from your practice. You're my little sweetheart and there's no way I would rather do the dishes than with your little body standing on a stool next to me.

In other news, your biting problem has diminished significantly this month, thanks to a series of family home evening lessons about what teeth are supposed to be used for (eating and smiling) and are not supposed to be used for (biting people). Unfortunately, you forget yourself from time to time. Sometimes at very inappropriate times. For example, Auntie Loriann, who had just been laid off from her job, came over to visit. You ran over to her and hugged her legs in a gesture of warmth and welcome that would have been just what she needed-- had you not then turned your head and chomped into her upper thigh. She was then forced to wind up an already-rotten day by screaming "SHIT" very loudly, spending a little time crying in the bathroom, and then passing the remainder of the evening with a pack of frozen peas pressed against her crotch. You seemed largely unrepentant, despite a brief stint in time-out and a quick refresher lesson about how Ceecee wants us to touch each other nicely and not bite other people's crotches.

I'm told that you are an unusually active child. I believe it. I am sometimes amazed when I observe other people's children your same age. They're allowed to do things like sit on the kitchen counter while their mommies work, wander in and out of the bathroom with adult supervision, and eat at the table with grown-ups. You, on the other hand, are not.

If I were to put you on the kitchen counter, you would immediately grab everything in sight, examine it, cling to it passionately if dangerous and throw it away if uninteresting. You would want to empty/squeeze/splash in/sample anything in any nearby containers. You would then attempt to crawl over to the sink or the stovetop. This would all quickly dissolve into my putting you back on the floor and your throwing a fit about not being allowed to do anything fun.

The bathroom is completely off-limits to you because, even with close adult supervision, you quickly find ways to empty the comet containers onto the floor, unravel the toilet paper, shake the over-the-toilet cabinet so that things fall off, splash in the toilet bowl, and sample the toothpaste.

The kitchen table provides similar opportunities: cups and pitchers to sample from and dump, plates and bowls to grab, napkins to eat, an entirely new surface to crawl/walk/dance on. Despite our best efforts to show you you to sit nicely at the table, I'll admit that there are times when-- after you've finished your meal in your highchair--we'll set you outside the kitchen, move the hope chest in front of it, and exclude you our dining experience. This usually results in your crying, which makes me feel like a big fat meanie.

My friend Holly tells me that when her little Aubrey sees a cabinet door open, she'll close it. You, on the other hand, will pry cabinet doors open and scatter the contents of said cabinet as far around the house as possible. If I'm ever foolish enough to leave the pantry door open, your trouble radar immediately beeps, and you're there as quickly as your little legs can carry you, hoping to throw several handfuls of flour and sugar on the floor before an adult notices what's happening and apprehends you.

One of your favorite activities this month has been unlocking, then opening, the oven; using the door as a step; and unplugging all the heating coils on the stovetop. I left Nanny Q (aka Uncle Quentin) to watch you for a few hours one morning and later discovered an entire jumbo pack of batteries that had been emptied into the stove. There was also a package of chalk in the oven. And several unusued diapers in the trash can.

I say this all with chagrin, but also with a note of amusement. You certainly keep things lively around here. I love your curiosity and activity. I love your stubborness, intrepidity, and individuality. Sometimes these characteristics make me pull my hair out and scream, "How long until the gypsies come to town and I can trade you for a bag of magic beans?" But that's okay. It's good for me. I like a challenge. And you're such an adorable challenge.

I love you, baby. Happy 22 and 1/2 months.

Mommy