These days...

Time seems to be not marching, but skipping happily through our home.  While we still have one in diapers, there is no longer a baby in our home but a full-fledged toddler.  I think Brandon and I are especially aware of this new phase of life.  No cumbersome nap schedules or complex feeding issues to worry about when we head out as a family.  But also nothing to truly slow us down in the same way, and thus, the pace has picked up a bit.  Now, we have to fight it back ourselves rather than relying on a baby to tie us down.  Here is our new two year old, leaning over the dock at his grandparents house to explore the lake water.  It was a warm T'giving!

This is Hannah "reading" her book.  She too has seemed so old lately as her legs have finally grown a bit longer.  (She is truly a petite ball of fire.)  She calls her book, "The Fellowship".  She has asked us to pay her a penny for each book she "reads" at night.  Last week she insisted her father buy her a flashlight for reading at night.  She doesn't want to learn her abcs, or work on phonics, but she is certain that she wants to be a reader one day like her big brother and sister.  

This last picture is for me.  All our indians dressed up and playing together.  While we do have lots of days of bickering and quarreling, we also have some days where I marvel at how well the five of them play "together", across ages and stages.  They grow, they change, and they continue to learn how to work and play together in each new season.  Plus, look at that little indian on the left, isn't that face great?

The song in my head...

I recently have started playing a few of my old piano pieces from lessons I took as a child.  I hurry to sit at the bench for a few minutes while John Mac pulls out his cello and chair to practice, trying to get a whole song in while he adjusts his endpin. I have loved remembering old pieces, seeing how my fingers can still follow the old patterns better than I can read the notes.  The other day I found an old piece that I have played in my head over the years more than any other.  It was a comfortable pattern to go to and for years I have played it in my mind and on the invisible keyboard before me.  It's a piece that I would play on my fingers on a desk as I was thinking for a test, or in those moments of time where I was waiting anxiously before an interview.  I found the piece this week and it was just as I had remembered it.  It has a bright and regular tempo, but unusual notes that create a surprising melody for such a metered beat.  I guess the combination has a special key to some part of my mind.
As I watch my kids learn and grow, I feel like they each have a piece of music that God placed in their lives.  It is interesting to me that I actually see it best in moments of stress, just as my playing often came out at those times.  I watch as one child problem solves with such creativity.  Another builds and draws.  One is always singing and hugging.  Different melodies, different strengths...And here is the tough part...this momma resonates more easily with some pieces than others.  Some are quite catchy for me and stick in my head and others take work for me to follow.  I always knew mothers loved all their children, but I didn't know until I was a mother that the work load involved in loving and learning your kids can really vary.  Some children walk and live in a way you hear and understand immediately; others you have to study.  One of our newborns I was certain was out to be the end of all music in my life.  It is only after years of studying him that I am starting to hear the melody of his mind.  The piano piece that I found this week, that I have in my head for years now, was actually a lot of work for me to learn as well.  It was a piece I was to play for a recital and it took hours and hours for it to become fluid and smooth.  The work involved is actually part of what ingrained it in the crevices of my mind.  God uses all of our work unto Him for good, and He molds and shapes us as we learn new music.

Almost two...

"Liam", as he refers to himself, is almost two years old.  He is excited about his birthday and in a spirited (and very verbal) manner he goes about the house singing:  "Happy Birthday to me, I'm a hundred and three....".  This is because he learns so much from his older siblings and unfortunately this is the most common rendition of Happy Birthday that is sung in our home right now.  Every child is different, and after five kids, you would think I would no longer be amazed at this....but I am stunned by how talkative William is, how extroverted he is, how good he is at remembering things and people at such a young age.  He sings the alphabet and counts up to twenty; (he beat his three and half year old sister at this who could care less about the alphabet song).  He is a joy to watch as he soaks in all that is around him.  I am actually not sure what to get him for his birthday.  I don't know what "birthday theme" he would like the best.  I don't even really know what his favorite food is (although it's pizza for the rest of us).  William though is a great gift to the rest of us.  So glad that God knows best what a family needs.  Here's hoping Mommy has enough smarts and energy to train this one well....I think we'll be ending with a bang.