What I (and Hannah and Sarah) wore on Sunday

 Dave tried taking this Sunday's photos; however, he is almost six inches taller than me and all his attempts produced a strange hovering-above-me aspect to them.  Hannah's shots are much better.
Shirt:  The Loft, bought in Texas.  This shirt represents a moving out of my comfort zone moment.  It is the first shirt in a long time that I have tucked in (it looks much better tucked in), and it screams Judith Light from Who's the Boss?.  Remember that show?  She was forever wearing flow-y shirts with flouncy ties at the collar.  Well, look who's wearing one now!  Who was the boss, anyway?
Skirt:  Reitmans, bought sometime before Isaac's pregnancy.  It has some lycra in it and a comfort waistband so it works for the early stages of pregnancy as well as my normal size.
Boots:  Eddie Bauer, on-line.  These were the first tall boots that I ever purchased.  They revolutionised my wardrobe - not joking.  In Dave's words, "All your clothes look better with those boots."  I bought them the winter after Isaac was born and they have held up wonderfully.
Jewellery:  Vintage Miraculous Medal (complete with silver filigree), purchased at Madonna House gift shop.  If you could see the earrings... they are beautiful.  They were a Christmas gift from my parents from almost ten years ago.  They are, gasp, Swarovski Crystal and have a lovely vintage look to them.

 Dress:  Old Navy, it has the cutest pin-tucks all across its front.
Scarf:  umm, maybe Mark's Work Warehouse?  I truthfully can't remember.  We are at the point where scarves and hats have become interchangeable.  I don't think that this will ever be the case for our clothes; she is a very different build than I.

 Joe was dive-bombing this photo from behind, and Isaac was trying to do the same in front.  Sarah wasn't very happy about posing, and it was all we could do to get her to stop moving.   Thus, the blurriness.
Dress:  Tunic from Old Navy, Texas.
Cowboy boots:  Gift from my sister in Texas.  They, too, revolutionise her wardrobe!

What I Wore on Sunday

 Pants, pants and more pants.  This could be alternatively titled What I Wore When I Had to Pee on Sunday (based on my cross-legged stand).

 Break it down:

Shirt:  another Winner's find.  I love the lace detail; the shirt has a very vintage feel to it.  It is also extremely feminine in a Downton Abbey sort of way.
Belt:  the same old belt (look forward to more of it).
Pants:  cropped navy blue pants bought last March Break at a GAP outlet in Halifax.  Unfortunately they were accidentally place in the dryer and really needed to stretch back out.  I never feel entirely comfortable in them.
Shoes:  Dansko Mary Janes bought on a clearance table in Halifax.  As my mother has concluded, I only come to Halifax to shop.
Isaac:  all Old Navy; all worn by the last brother.

So sorry about the nostrils, but the iPad died before Hannah could get any better shots of the jewellery up close.  I tried blocking out my nose using the edit function, but a photo of me noseless was even worse than the above.
Earrings:  real amber from the Russian-American Store in Sitka, Alaska bought 15 years ago when I was on the road with NET.
Necklace:  once again, real amber (and thus concludes my collection of anything real); Christmas gift from my parents last year.

Some more photos

Oh winter, when will you end?  The long range forecast seems to be providing little hope, so I will show you a grainy photo of some snow that began to melt and then re-froze:  metaphor of a stunted Lent.

 I hope you can see the determination inherent in the character of this little girl.  She is the definition of putting her head down and ploughing through whatever life hands her.  The only problem is that she literally puts her head down, moves at top speed, and often barely stops before she runs into an obstacle in her path.  And, sometimes, the obstacle stops her.

In that case, she looks around for mommy and puts up her hands for comfort.

I could title this photo What I Wore on Sunday because, for the last four months, this really is what I have been wearing on Sundays.  My other title is:  to cut or not to cut?  I'm getting tired of all this hair.  My hair is incredibly thick and has grown increasingly curly with each baby.  The problem is that the real curls are all underneath; the top layer is mostly frizzy.  Sometimes I wonder if I were to have just one more baby, would that be enough to coax that top layer into joining its more hidden brothers and sisters.  Or, is it time to cut it above my shoulder and get a whole lot of layers?  Any thoughts?

This is not Dave.
However, I do believe that this is what Joseph will look like in 80 years.  This is Dave's Uncle Ambrose (on his father's side); he is 86 and I ran into him and his wife at the dentist's office a couple of months ago.  I asked his permission and snapped a photo for posterity.  Very well preserved, wouldn't you say?  Joseph comes by his perpetual smile honestly.  (And his eyebrows.)

There is another blogger somewhere in this photo.  There is also a little Isaac trying to set up his future. Woo them with nachos and salsa, and then take the girls for a ride - Isaac's already got his dating plans mapped out.  Hopefully he will have moved past plasma cars by the time he is interested in the fairer sex.  (Sorry these photos are so grainy.  There are no Canons in this house.)

I trust that he will also move beyond dress shirts and pyjama pants.

However, judging by this photo, I am not sure who will trust their children into the bosom of our family.

My mother's heart screams, "Jacob!  Posture!"  This is Jacob's sheepish look:  a look that says, "I just won third place in public speaking."  (The competition around here is small and not fiercely competitive.  Showing up really is half the battle.)  He chose the Halifax Explosion as his topic (suggested by his mother).  The father of the second-place winner asked him why a boy from the Ottawa Valley would choose to speak about the Explosion.  Jacob, momentarily confused, could not for the life of him remember that his mother is from Halifax and muttered, "Umm, it was interesting."

Almost-two-year-old girls are just perfect for dressing up as terry cloth flowers.

Here are Jacob and Hannah competing in a county-wide (plus two groups from Ottawa) competition called Destination Imagination.  They came in third place...

... losing to the twin daughters of this lady!  Tracy and her husband are the godparents of our little Isaac and Dave and I are godparents to their fourth daughter.  Her twins, identical girls, were born just under six months before our twins.  I never imagined that they would one day compete against one another.  We were so surprised to have our paths cross in this way that we whipped out the iPhones and took some selfies.

And here are my fraternal twins flanked by Tracy's identical twins.  Hard to believe that I once held those girls when they both hovered around the four pound mark.  Amazing how life keeps plodding along.

You asked for it

 Well, a few of you have asked for it.  Specifically two people said to me, "I really like when you post what you wore on Sunday."  This, apparently, is enough of a response to motivate me to post pictures of myself (something about which I feel a little strange). So strange, in fact, that my effort to curb the over-closing of my left eye by squeezing the right eye a bit more has resulted in a Katie Holmes sort-of look. You don't know what I'm talking about?  Click here - the Katie-Holmes smirk that sparked wild rumours on the internet that she had suffered from Bell's Palsy.  Well, I'm not quite there yet, but keep in mind that I have deleted many photos before choosing these two.

Ok, enough of that; on to the outfit.
Shirt (oh yes, I do love black and white):  Winners, purchased on Monday at the new store in Pembroke.  $16
Earrings:  the silver hoops (of which I once wrote) bought in December with the leftovers of a gift certificate won six years ago.
Watch:  my dress watch broke after Christmas leaving me with Dave's Christmas present of a Radiant Orchid Ironman stopwatch.  It is perfect for Isaac to bother people with at mass.
Belt:  bought twenty years ago at the Farmer's Market in Halifax from a leather craftsmen.  See what you get when you buy quality!  I bought it when I weighed 45 pounds more than I do now (gr. 10); it has been cut down to size and has made it through highschool, university, NET, Marriage and six babies. As well as high-waisted pants, evidenced by the distress on the leather about four holes left of the buckle.
Pants:  Reitmans, 9 years ago (?), at least before I was pregnant with Ben.

A week later

 Friends, who also happen to be neighbours, had their third child (and first boy) a little over two weeks ago.  We had the honour of watching the two sisters as their mother was induced at the hospital.  The little one on the chair with Jacob is just over four years old and has a very special place in her heart for dear Jacob.  She told me that if the new baby was a boy, his name would be Jacob.  Alas, twas not meant to be.  However, the failure to name her baby brother after our first-born has not hampered her love for Jacob.  She waits with baited breath for his appearance on the altar (as a server) during mass and sits on her deck watching the road to see him walk home from school.  In this town, where anyone with the suffix 'skie' is likely related to the next 'skie', should I tell her that they are, in fact, distant cousins on their fathers' sides?  Kissing cousins, at least.

 The generous new mother (third time round) gave us these lovely tea roses as a token of her appreciation.  I quickly killed them.  On visiting new mommy's house, I noticed that hers are still alive and blooming weeks later.  Her baby's age can still be measured in days; my baby is almost 2 years old.  I have no excuses.  And, as an aside, those photos in the background, you wonder?  Yes, those are our first family photos in five years; the last ones were taken when Joseph was not yet one.  Oops.  The photo shoot was part of our parish's 100th year anniversary celebrations:  a parish directory.  One had the option to buy any of the photos (for an exorbitant price) or just accept the free family photo that would arrive months later.  Since we had literally pulled into town 20 minutes before the photo shoot (after having driven from Halifax through the night:  no showers, so sleep), the only words we could muster when faced with choosing between poses were, "We'll take them all."  Thankfully, the 'all' that arrived in the mail shortly before Christmas turned out pretty well.

 We have quite a large house.  Nevertheless, the kids still manage to gravitate to wherever I am sitting.  Dave says that I indulge them and should tell them to get off.  I really don't mind; it all comes to an end far too quickly.  And, yes, we do have themed piano music for all aspects of our life.  This one is titled, "Don't assume they'll be there for ever"; either that, or "A Still Life".  (Points to anyone who can figure out the allusion.)

This shot is of random school children at the kids' (and Dave's) school.  (I can post them because this blog is private.)  I just thought it was a nice shot of the last vestiges of winter (we hope!) and an example of the incredible schoolyard in which the kids get to spend their recesses.  (Off to the right, there is a large outdoor skating rink lovingly built and tended by 'poor Dave'.)  Growing up, my schoolyard (which was shared by at least five of my readers) was simply a huge asphalt parking lot with some basketball and tennis courts.  Fortunately, Halifax spends most of its time in cloud cover, otherwise we would have been scorched alive whenever it wasn't 'inclement weather'.  (Points to anyone else whose first experience of the word inclement was on the school announcements at Oxford Street School.)  Lots and lots of points.

(I just looked at the title of this post and realised that I hadn't explained what is a week later.  Simply, a week later we are stomach-flu free.  Everyone went down with the exception of Sarah.  Unfortunately, my fate struck while on our only March Break excursion to the big city.  We were visiting the Museum of Nature when I was overcome by fatigue and nausea.  The kids hoped that this meant another sibling.  I knew otherwise and collapsed outside the frog exhibit, becoming a bit of an exhibit myself.  We quickly changed our supper plans and hightailed it back home where I convalesced with Inspector Barnaby and the murder capital of all small English towns, Midsomer.)

Eight Months

Last school year I was beginning to fear that this blog's name might be changed to the Puke Monologues in reference to the number of times a stomach bug had hit our home.  This year, thankfully, has been a moment's rest and we have been stomach-bug free for the last eight months.  Last night provided the first dent in our otherwise healthy record.  The arrival of this bug was no surprise (it has been moving through the families of our town at an astonishing rate).  Fortunately it is a fast one and has hit four of children almost simultaneously, thereby speeding up its stay at our house.

However, when these stomach bugs hit I am always left wondering about the connection between the puke fairy and the labour fairy:  why do both seem to hit right when mom and dad are ready to call it a night?  The scenario plays itself out in the exact same way every time:  the kids are sleeping peacefully, dad is watching a movie, mom is reading in bed, and then a desperate cry issues from one of the children's rooms.  Bowls are fetched, towels laid and dad chooses a second movie to accompany him through the 'early' shift.  Dad finally crashes and mom is awakened by the second wave of the bug (plus, this time, a frantically barking dog who causes mom to set booby traps at various windows and doors).  Strangely, this same dog also throws up in the morning.  (Should I report this inter-species  virus to the CDC?)

Those of you who have been party to the miracle of birth have also, lucky you, endured the trials of labour and its rotten timing.  This timing seems to be exactly that of the stomach virus.  Just as mom and  dad toddle off to bed the first labour pang hits, the water breaks, and the night is over.  Alternately, mom and dad snatch far less than the desirable number of sleep hours required to function well as an adult only to be rudely snatched from slumber by a baby who just has to get out.  There must be some connection between these two middle-lower abdominal phenomenons.

As an aside, to all of you whose children either don't puke or choose to do so during the daylight hours, I congratulate you.  If your labours hit only after a full eight hours and produce a baby by nightfall, I also give you a hearty pat on the back.  To all you c-section moms, you are not exempt:  oh no, most of you endure not only the trials of labour but also the particular trials of the blue-plate special, labour followed by the scalpel.  And let's not mention your recoveries.  I bow to you.

I suppose that stomach bugs and labours are trials specific to our younger years.  They toughen us up, remind us of our lack of control over our lives, and, hopefully, shorten our time in purgatory.  The other possibility is that they simply raise the water and the coffee bills.  I choose a life with God (and caffeine).

The inevitable pre-Lenten post

It is Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday is tomorrow.  This is the latest that Lent can start and the ground is still frozen, covered in more than a foot of snow and it is -15 degrees outside.  Do I really have to give up something for Lent?  Isn't living in the wilds of Siberia penance enough?

Apparently, it is not; so, in the interests of a little pre-Lenten levity, I will tell you what some of the kids have commented regarding the upcoming season.

Joseph told me that he is giving up lying for Lent because, "I lie a lot, Mom.  I really have trouble with lying."  He then proceeded to tell me that he was also giving up 'lectronics  for Lent.  This sacrifice amounts to no TV on Saturday during quiet time which might actually be more of a penance on my part than that of the kids.  Take note, Joseph renounced 'lectronics with a huge smile on his face; given that he always wears a grin (and actually tearily lamented the other night that he can't stop smiling so no one knows when he is sad), and that his decision to give up electronics followed the admission that he has a problem with lying, I am unsure what to expect from Joseph over the next forty days.

I haven't talked to the other kids about their Lent, but Ben did suggest that Daddy should give up Homework Helps (his four- hour [offspring-less] tutoring sessions on Tuesday and Thursday nights) because, in Ben's perception, "Daddy likes them so much."  Perhaps Ben is more observant than I.

The joys of Siri

Dave recently enabled the Siri function on the iPad.  For those of you left confused by this new name, let me explain.  The Siri function is a voice-recognition system that allows us to descend to new levels of laziness.  No longer do I need to find your email address, now I can just say your name and up pops the possibilities.  I am shocked by how accurately Siri recognizes what I say; truthfully, I expected a lot more funny interpretations than she has produced.  I also discovered that she has some great canned responses to difficult questions.

For example, before the kids left for school today, I was checking my email.  I closed my account and Siri popped up asking if she could help me with anything.
I thought, "Sure, you can," and asked, "what should I serve for supper tonight?"
Siri replied, "I can't help you with that."
Of course, I kept asking, "Where is my husband?"
I loved her response, "I do not know who your husband is.  In fact, I do not know who you are.  If you told me, I could help you."  Are there really people working at Apple whose job is to devise possible questions and their answers?  What sort of qualification does one need for such a job?
I finished off my morning conversation with, "Siri, I love you."  To which she replied, "I am only here to serve."
This might possibly be a solution to the loneliness of the stay-at-home mom.  At least a short-term one.