Bald Spots and Lukey Piggies

You know when you start a new job, or a new relationship, and you sometimes have to pinch yourself in the beginning because it just hasn't sunk in yet?  Normally that wears off as new becomes old, and fresh schedules fall into routine.

Well we're going on 10 months with the twins now and I still have to pinch myself daily, or let one of them do it, because having three little boys still seems so surreal.  Me, Emma, I, have three children, three boys.  I haven't even begun to understand what blessings and challenges my little wolf pack entails, but I'm starting to get small glimpses.  So.....here are a few glimpses straight out of the loudest home on Goodview Ct.

Last night I walked in at about 4:15 from work and Charlie greeted me, along with every pair of shoes he's the proud owner of, at the front door (which I could barely swing open due to said footwear).  What do I see?  Glasses on his face that I'm 110% sure he cannot see through with all the fingerprints and . . . food?  I hope those are food chunks?  What else do I observe on my four year old?  Why none other than the very same shirt and shorts he's worn since Monday.  Four days, one outfit, not bad.  He gives me a big hug and says, "I missed you mommy!  How was work?  Are those guys just drivin ya cwazy?"  Someone's been listening in on mommy and daddy's conversations about mommy's work.  I quickly kiss the clean spot on his face and carry two babies upstairs.

Since the arrival of our twins, our home has lost it's cozy clean feel; it's now cluttered with baby things, the largest obstacle being their 'kennel.'  Judge away, but Andy and I are all for the kennel.  It keeps hot-wheel cars out and babies away from stairs.  I plop my purse, the diaper bag, my laptop, and the car seats down and put the babies in their respective jail cell, on separate sides of course- gotta buy myself a couple minutes.  I then grab a cold glass of pineapple juice and head toward the couch to convene with my husband about dinner plans.  No sooner have I attempted to sit when Charlie's lion toy "Alvie" makes an appearance out of nowhere under the burp rag I sat on.  Ouch.  Every dang day I manage to sit on Alvie.

I then hear screaming from the kennel and look to find Sawyer making a snack out of Luke's toes . . . again.  Luke's still a little gummy bear but Sawyer has popped through a set of beautiful chompers and I'm not sure if it's because they're so pink and plump, or if it's revenge for Luke pulling his comb-over hair chunk all the time, but Sawyer's very favorite things to chew on are Luke's toes.  Where Luke puts everything in his mouth, Sawyer is particular.  He'll take a pacifier, or a plug as we call it, and other than that it's just Lukey Piggies for him- no teething rings or rattles.  Poor Luke.  The twins spend at least an hour each evening in a vicious circle of toe chomping and hair pulling, which they can conveniently do simultaneously while lying side by side.  Socks and hats you say?  Oh they're far beyond figuring out how to remove those, and barriers like that just make the forbidden fruit all the more enticing.  Good grief.

As soon as I remove swollen piggies from Sawyer's clenched jaw the crying stops, and the silence allows me to hear what's going on in the kitchen with Charlie, and what I hear is spitting, a lot of spitting.  I choose to ignore and let the problem come to me- never a good decision but sometimes all my patience, or lack of, allows.  It doesn't take long and Charlie comes running in.  I'd say nothing surprises me anymore, but that would be underestimating a four year old boy.  Charles runs in with a mouth FULL of cat fur.  I bypass the pointless question, why, and go straight to how.  He's gagging and spitting and attempting to pull fur out of his mouth- so I take him to the toilet and we start pulling it out together.  This was quite the task and by the end of it his four day old shirt was soaked with sticky drool and fur.  When his condition was stable, I asked him if he bit Tink.  His reply was simply, "No, she scared me so I grabbed all her fur and put it in my mouth."  Well alright then, seems reasonable.

We made dinner and after eating I was sitting at the table and Charlie walks up and puts his finger about a half an inch from my eye and says, "Mom I love you, this is for you."  By the time my eyes focus on his finger, and the giant booger on the end, it's too late and I now have a Charlie booger on my eyelid.  I can't help but wonder if this happens to other moms.  I explain why it's not okay to put your boogers on other people, a concept I've explained before, and one that is completely confusing to Charlie.  He sees it as a true gift, a piece of him has been shared.

The rest of the evening was relatively low key, mostly consisting of Charlie telling me Jesus wants him to have a cell phone and following me around with his extended Zebra jaw clincher.  He uses Mr Zebra to bite my butt and speak ridiculous nonsense like "Luke and Sawyer want Zebra teeth for their teeth mom" through his zebra friend, directly in my ear, wherever I'm sitting.

Alas, the evening finally quiets and my three little gremlins settle in for bed around 10 and my husband leaves for work.  Tonight in my cluttered home you'll find a sticky four year old with all the best intentions, a smiley bald chub of a baby with teeth marks on his toes, and a toothy baby and paranoid kitten both sporting bald spots.  They're so sweet when they sleep and I cherish their little calm faces knowing tomorrow is coming with a new set of fabulous adventures, and if we're lucky, a different shirt for Charlie.

Tink

Well hello fellow victims of this ridiculous winter!  Endless snow- endless shoveling- endless cold.  What on God's white earth were we thinking buying a house in this vast tundra?  It takes me 53 minutes to bundle up three children, hook up two apnea monitors, and desperately plead with one cat to not run out the door as soon as I open it.  I know it takes me 53 minutes because I've timed it, 4 times, and 53 minutes was our fastest.  God forbid the house ever catches fire- at least we'll all go together.

So speaking of the cat- this is the story of how our kitty came to be Tinkerbell Bryan Helmer.  (Charlie thought it fitting that she shared his middle name)  In July I was pregnant and suffering from terrible morning sickness.  I tried crackers.  I tried toast.  I tried Unisom and B6.  I tried warhead candies and tea.  .  NOTHING worked, so naturally . . . I adopted a kitty.

It seemed only fair I had some fuzzy cuteness in my world while spending days and nights by the toilet.  When Andy agreed, I was overcome with joy, but mostly surprise because I never expected him to be on board.  It was the combination of these confusing emotions that hurdled me into a momentary lapse of sanity and I shouted out in the restaurant we were in, "Oh thanks baby!  Since you're letting me get a kitty I'll get you a PS4!"

Dumb. Dumb. Dumb.

He had already agreed!  And to think I'm a business woman.

So one gray fuzzy orphan and one PS4 later, here we are.  Tinkerbell was unable to eat on her own when we adopted her, or walk, or clean herself- so we resorted to turning into Mommy Cat 1 and Mommy Cat 2.  I bottle-fed Tinker, and Andy used a warm wet painting rag to clean her so she would get used the coarse feel and learn to do it herself.  Yikes.

Charlie had to be careful at first, but as soon as she was big enough to handle, they instantly became best friends.  The problem is they have one of those unhealthy friendships.  He attacks her, she attacks him, and yet they just keep at it, neither side retreating.  I've seen Charles pulling Tinkerbell Bryan Helmer by her whiskers, tail, ears, armpit fat, and the skin above her tail on her butt.  When she was first born Andy carried her by the nape of her neck and Charlie didn't necessarily draw the connection that you can't just pick her up by any old chunk of fat and skin.  More often than I tell him to not pass gas at the table, more often than I tell him to push his glasses up, more often than I tell him to not walk out of the bathroom butt naked with Pastor over . . . . . .  I tell that boy to QUIT PULLING TINK'S TAIL.  I've even sunk so low as to pull on his ears and legs so he knows just how it feels.  That usually works, for 3 minutes, and then they just keep falling back in their abusive patterns.

My parents and sister came to help with the twins these last couple weeks, and while company was visiting I noticed the background noise subside and become 'naughty quiet.'  Every mom know what 'naughty quiet' is.  I began my normal search in the laundry room where Naughty Tink and Naughty Charles can usually be found.  Nothing.  I checked Charlie's room, the crawl space, the downstairs bathtub, and my closet.  All empty.  Finally, I ended in the kitchen where  I heard a giggle and a hiss- two sounds best not heard together.  I followed my ears to the pantry, a small closet big enough only for some Mac and Cheese, a jar of Ragu, a naughty little boy, and his naughty little kitty.  I peeked through the crack of the door and found Charlie sitting under the shelf, feeding my dad's raspberry icebreaker mints to himself, as well as to Tinkerbell Bryan Helmer.  People I have THREE of these boys- just imagine what will be when I have two little besties watching their big brother and egging each other on.  Retirement housing may be in order for Tink before too long.  I will say this- the mints did add a nice touch to the odor coming from Tink's litterbox.

I have to get on with my job that pays, but I'm going to try and add some pictures to this so you can see what Charlie and Tink have been up to.  Yes she's been buckled into the bouncer.  Good grief.  Thanks for reading!

L and S

I can guess how much poop is in an infant size ostomy bag before I even have to suck it out with a syringe.  Do you think I could put that on my resume somewhere?  These last few months have been a surreal experience and I cannot WAIT to tell you all about it. 

So in May Andy and I started talking about maybe trying to get pregnant again.  We were thinking we would try in July so that the timing would be ideal for my work season.  No sooner had we uttered the words, "maybe" and "baby" when God decided, "NOW."  June 8th I discovered I was pregnant.  June 21 I discovered I was pregnant with twins.  September 3rd I discovered I was pregnant with twin boys.  Every day in between I was sick.  October 22nd I was admitted to Mother-Baby in Abbott for pre-term labor.  I was 23 weeks pregnant and I stayed in the hospital for a week on a lot of IV anti-labor medication.  I went home at 24 weeks and sat on my butt for 2 weeks.  At 26 weeks exactly, I walked from the basement to the kitchen, did a couple dishes, and walked back downstairs.  The doctor that discharged me insisted that this would be fine as new studies proved true bed-rest to be less successful as previously determined.  I knew better.  My friend from church drove me back to the hospital where I was taken by ambulance to Abbott Northwestern, the only NICU to care for infants born between 23 and 32 weeks.  I sat for 3 days in the hospital on more medicine and on November 13th the same doctor that discharged me the first time was rounding, so I told Andy to pack my bags.  Sure enough Dr Wagner came by and said to start thinking about discharge and he wanted to pull me off all anti-labor meds as I was having some mild side effects.  Not even an hour after he stopped my Nifedipine, I began contracting again and within an hour of that the emergency C-Section was ordered by none other than Dr Wagner himself.  Andy had the day off so he and Charlie had been in my room spending a little time with me before I came home.  I had a remote attached to my bed with power controls for the drapes on my window.  Andy had convinced Charlie earlier in the visit that Charlie could control the movement of the drapes with a certain voice command.  Charles loves the show, "Jake and the Neverland Pirates," so Andy told Charlie if he stood facing the drapes and yelled, "AHOY!" they would go up and down- all while Andy was pushing the remote buttons.  I watched the power of Charlie's voice command and Andy's manipulation go straight to both their heads and it proved an entertaining mix-up for my otherwise boring day.  Everything changed when the C-Section was ordered.  You would think with all the pre-term labor I experienced I would've expected to probably deliver early, but I couldn't believe it was happening.  I knew the odds of survival, never mind living a normal life were rough for babies born as early as mine would be.  Labor nurses were scurrying, Doctor Wagner was checking my progress every few minutes to make sure I wasn't going to deliver two upside-down babies my own way.  The TV was still on and Stephen A and Skip Bayless were going at it, and I was in some of the worst pain I've ever felt.  Andy was on the phone with close family letting them know what was happening and finding someone to take Charlie for the night.  With the chaos, I feared all this was too much to take in for a 3 year old and I looked for Charlie around the room.  My eyes found him in a fit of frustration standing over at the window.  "AHOY!   I SAID AHOY!  DADDY IT'S BROKEN!  AHOY!"  Okay so he was fine.

The twins were delivered in a whirlwind and the C-Section is something I'll never forget.  You ladies who have had those really had me thinking it was rather easy... not so much.  They were yanked out, yes YANKED, and then they both cried for a moment before being whisked away to a waiting team of Neonatalogists.

Two months later both boys are over five pounds and doing far better than I ever could've prayed for.  Churches across the country put us on their prayer lists, church family stepped up and provided meals and childcare for Charlie.  Family and friends came from afar to help in any way they could.  Entire communities gave in encouragement and support and God provided.  Lucas Andrew and Sawyer Rodney will see, hear, smell, taste, grow, run, laugh, and love for as long a life as God gives them like any other little boys.

The boys are still in the hospital but will hopefully go home in a couple weeks and boy are we ready.  The commute to downtown Minneapolis and back, sometimes several times a day is consuming and my heart hurts every time I pull away from Abbott with empty car seats in my back seat.  I realize we aren't going to come up with any more time when they come home, but at least they'll be home.

Soooooooooo- I guess all this means I will have a lot more to blog about.  I'm fairly certain three little boys won't disappoint for some good stories and lessons learned. 

Bra Straps and Piddly Problems

Once upon a time there was a happy, healthy, energetic girl inside of me. 
Once upon a time my skin glowed from the sun and my 6 hours of sleep was plenty. 
Once upon a time I'd throw on shorts and tank and walk to the lake with my little boy.
Once upon a time my house was clean and my hair was done nicely.

Once upon a time I didn't pee my pants on a daily basis.
Once upon a time .....

Andy and I had talked about the possibility of another child before my son got too old, we liked a gap but didn't want it too big.  No sooner had we tossed the idea around in a prayer or two when I got the hunch and took a test.  Positive.  I shared my news with Andy in a very carefully-laid out performance and he was overjoyed, as was I.  This is obviously what God wanted! 

Two weeks later Andy left for Las Vegas with a friend while I got hit the night before by the morning sickness truck.  I was tired, sick, and not looking forward to a week alone when I decided to go the doctor and ask for the medicine they'd given me last pregnancy to help retain some of what I ate.  Andy was still on the plane when the doctor ordered an ultrasound to check dates and look into a small concern he'd noticed in my abdominal exam.  The tech was taking her sweet little time telling me what was going on and 20 minutes into my ultrasound I finally asked if she could see my baby and whether or not she could verify my dates for what my due date would be.  She hesitated for about 5 seconds, which was more than enough time for me to think about each and every terrible thing that could be wrong with my little one...twice.  She finally clicked one last click on the keyboard and looked at me with an expression I couldn't read.  I blurted out, "Well can you see my baby?!"  She slowly replied, "Well, honey, do twins run in your family?"  This marked the first of many episodes where I peed my...well...gown in this case.

Since my six week ultrasound I've come to accept a lifestyle I never in a  million gazillion trillion poopillion years expected.  For one, I was popping out of my pants and shirts two weeks later at just 8 little weekers.  My bras started making it nearly impossible to breathe, and it's always fun to walk into a bank with an unsnapped bra up at my chin- I ALWAYS remember to unsnap them in private, but not always to RE-SNAP them.  My poor husband and close friends have gotten real used to this oversight. 

Another big adjustment I've made, and it still surprises me how easily I've desensitized myself to this- I get peed on A LOT.  Let me explain.  Andy just potty trained Charlie and let's just go ahead and call him a dripper.  Without fail,  he pees on me every single time I help put his undies back on after going potty 497 times between getting home from daycare and bedtime.  It doesn't phase me, I wipe it on whatever is closest and move on without flinching.  Then there's me, I pee a little every time I sit down, every time I yawn, every time I sneeze, every time I cough, walk down steps, or slam on the brakes.  It's gotten to where I bring extra pants everywhere I go, which is tough when I only have 3 pair that will embrace my new body. 

Pregnant with multiples, Angelina Jolie has done it and if the tabloids are correct, she's doing it again.  M Carey did it.  They all bounce right back and look so chic while doing it. Not this whale.  No way.

My Husband's Underwear

There are days when things just couldn’t be better.  There are days where the sun shines a little brighter and you sing a pop song in the shower and your hair falls just right.  There are days like say a girl’s wedding day when she has every high hope there is to be had about the future.  There are days when you step on the scale and you’re delightfully surprised and then you get a miscellaneous check in the mail from last year’s tax refund and you just look up at the bluest sky and say a prayer of thanks.  There are days when you randomly feel extra appreciated and life’s unfair moments seem to finally find their balance.

And then . . . . There are days like yesterday.   Oh. My.  Lanta. 

Yesterday was one for the books.  Well let's see, I woke up to my husband’s clenched fist colliding with my ear and jaw while dreaming of chasing a Tyrannosaurus- Rex in a John Deere Gator.  He’s a real active dreamer and for whatever reason he’s usually playing some kind of combination between Indiana Jones and an Ace Ventura role.  The other side of his strange random dream patterns is this little-girl belly giggle he does.  I’ll feel the bed shaking and look to end where his toes are wiggling like he’s being tickled and then the giggle starts and the high pitched gleeful sound is just about enough to make my already irritated mood from waking this way just a little more irritated.   No wonder he’s so giggly, he’s happy- he’s sleeping.  How nice for him.

With a pounding headache I got out of bed and stumbled from the bedroom only to step directly on Charlie’s John Deere tractor model, you know . . . the kind with extra sharp exhaust pipes coming out the top.  So to recap: it’s now 7:03, exactly three minutes after waking oh so abruptly and I’m already cursing my throbbing face and the bright green farm supply company I typically proudly support- this is how I know it’s going to be an excellent day.  

My luck continued as I walked out of my house and it was pouring rain on my roofing material I left exposed in the bed of my truck- the one time I don’t put my cover up.   I drove my wet tools to the gas station where I had barely opened the door before I had an experience unlike any experience I’d ever had.  All in one beat, a senile older gentleman clapped his hands loudly maybe a half inch from my nose and yelled while spit flew out of his mouth, “Who do you think you are?! . . .Eleanor Roosevelt?!” 

Um . . . what?

I decided instantly against staying and making the purchase I was planning to, so I turned on my heel and walked through the still open door back to the safety of my truck.  I got to the Convention Center where the trade show for my business was being held and I began inviting people to play the game my exhibit had on the display table. I said nicely with a smile, “Pick a duck!  Would you like to play Pluck a Duck?  Just pick a duck!”  The very first person I encountered at the show was a nice looking elderly woman pushing a walker and when I asked her if she wanted to pick a duck, she looked me dead in the eye and with all the spite her 80 years of life had piled on her tiny frame she said slowly and deliberately,“YOU pick a duck and see how YOU like it!”     

Alright then.

I finally got my run in and then picked my son from daycare.  We went straight to the local grocery where he got his little “Customer in Training” cart from the dispenser and preceded to smack multiple shoppers in the face with the long plastic flag that stuck up out of the corner on it.  I walked behind him, apologizing as I went, and I started noticing that I was getting the most interesting stares from a couple men my age. They weren’t the “Mmm mm” type stares, oh no.  They were the, "What is wrong with her?  Quick- look away” type of stares.  I thought maybe I had something on my face or legs so I checked.  Twice.  The second time I checked I shuddered as it all clicked.  

 I was wearing my husband’s underwear.  In public.  Oh good grief.

I often wore Andy's black Adidas boxer/briefs to work-out in my home as they don’t ride up, they’re just long enough to be comfortable, and they breathe real nice.  Go figure.  I can’t imagine what these guys were thinking, seeing me wearing what they probably had in their top drawer at home right here in the grocery store.  If that wasn’t bad enough, my husband clued me in later that they were also slightly transparent.  He called it karma fo rstealing his underwear in the first place. I called it another small miracle adding to an already epic failure of a day.  I’m going to try and fall asleep thinking about a Tyrannosaurus-Rex this evening and maybe he’ll learn just what karma is all about.

Here’s to tomorrow!

Thank You

Let me start by saying thank you mom for passing down my insomnia.  It was thanks to this insomnia that I thought of all of these wonderful things I'm thankful for.

1.  I'm thankful first and foremost for a God whose mercy knows no limit.
2.  I'm thankful for Aasics running shoes, they're the only trainer that doesn't kill my broken L5 vertebra.
3.  I'm thankful for all the little space heaters in my life that get me through a cold Minnesota winter.
4.  I'm thankful for Netflix for letting a budget-conscious family still enjoy TV time.
5.  I'm thankful to my truck for listening to my random 'Carrie Underwood and Steven Curtis Chapman reluctantly featuring Emma Kay' concerts on a daily basis...sometimes more.
6.  I'm thankful for bathroom acoustics.
7.  I'm thankful for God's amazing artistry when it comes to the contrast of bright green birch tree leaves and the bluest morning sky.
8.  I'm thankful for Charlie's little dimple on the left side of his smile, the one and only physical trait he inherited from me.
9.  I'm thankful for my childhood friends Charlie and Jenna and our siblings for making growing up an adventure in the woods speaking made up native languages and naming cricks and ponds by combining all of our last names.
10. I'm thankful to the United States of America's Armed forces for bringing my parents together and making a little government baby.
11. I'm thankful for the Green Bay Packers, the legacy of Brett Favre until 2011, and the legacy of Michael Jordan until his hall of fame induction speech.
12.  I'm also thankful for the book Lance Armstrong wrote that got me through my high school hospital visits with my heart condition and being benched most of my basketball season junior year.
13.  I'm thankful to Oprah for then calling that lying son of a biscuit out so he doesn't keep leading injured high school juniors to believe you can be as amazing as he was without performance enhancing blood transfusions.
14.  I'm thankful for my husband's dry sense of humor and that he has finally stopped resisting to my asking for his advice on my bathroom concertos. (music, not the other type of bathroom concerto)
15.  I'm thankful to Wells Fargo for firing me so I could go on to do something I love and stop manipulating 18 year olds into destroying their credit before they had it all so I could feed my family.
16.  I'm thankful for Zofran- the amazing little pill that helped me gain weight during my pregnancy ensuring that my already premature son would one day fill his wrinkly skin with cellulite like his mommy.  Just kidding, he doesn't have cellulite.  But I did.  Don't look for that on this list.
17.  I'm thankful for Natalie Grant's rendition of 'How Great Thou Art' two years ago at the Xcel Energy Center.
18.  I'm thankful to my Mama for raising me to dream and be confident and comfortable as a daughter of the King.
19.  I'm thankful to my Daddy for his consistency and his understanding.
20.  I'm thankful to my college friend Becki for helping me grow up and letting me take out my issues on her for so long.
21.  I'm thankful to Hannah for her God-given wisdom- and her back massages.
22.  I'm thankful for Boomtown, Missouri for being the place my cousins and I would stop to load up on firecrackers for the farm in Mississippi- I think snappers are still floating to the surface under Pappa's dock.
23. I'm thankful to Matt, Abby, and Bass Lake Camp for the rock-solid foundation in Christ, teaching me to play three guitar chords for worship, and bringing my then-rebellious teenager husband and I together.
24. I'm thankful to whoever has preserved the First Century Synagogue in Capernaum, Israel. 

That is all for now, until insomnia strikes again

Adventures of a Reluctant Minnesota Toddler

Good morning yall!  After my ranting on the Saylorville situation I figured I probably spoke a little too harshly and it's time for a lighter topic- Charles, who else?!
So here's what we're up to these days, Charlie is two and a half and up to no good.  For one, Charlie HATES snow.  Every day he wakes up and looks out his window he sinks a little deeper into his winter depression.  He's very clear about the fact that he does NOT want to wear mittens, he does NOT want a single flake to touch his face, and the look on his face asks what kind of maniac intentionally rolls around in the stuff.  I tell Andy that Charlie has my blood and we simply don't belong north of Kansas and that is that, but he's not buying it.  We've been watching Duck Dynasty and Andy has quickly adopted the term coined by Si, "yuppie" into his regular vocabulary.  I think I hate this as much as he did "weather alert," but I could be wrong.   My poor son and I are constantly being nagged at for our winter blues.  Charlie will only shuffle his boots in the snow, he won't actually pick his foot up off the ground for fear of slipping, so as you can imagine, it takes some time to get from the door to the truck.  Sometimes I'll be inside and I'll hear Andy outisde saying, "come on you little yuppie... it's snow, not lava."
Andy begged the Lord for a son, and now against my manly husband's constant prodding, my little boy has taken up none other than professional shopping.  As I finish getting ready in the bathroom upstairs in the morning, I'll hear him crack open his bedroom door and after checking if I'm indeed up he steps out, blankie in hand, and says, "Oh! Hiiiii mom."  The inflection in his voice suggests he's perfectly shocked that of all people I  happen to be at this mall today too and it's a crazy coincidence to see me here so very early.  Of course he hasn't gotten any pants on (he insists on removing anything touching his diaper when he sleeps- he likes to chat with 'mickey mouf ' on the front of his diaper in the middle of the night, and when we switched up the brand and Winnie the Pooh graced the front of his diaper he started talking with "weenie and poohs"...........so we donated the rest of that diaper pack to daycare and switched back)  After greeting his mother he marches his blankie and bare legs down the stairs and places one of three of his stuffed companions in his shopping cart, legs through the front holes.  When he can't get their legs through the holes he gets frustrated and says, "No no baby, HEP ME HERE!" which I recognized as my same frustrated reaction when he doesn't help me put his legs through the shopping cart holes at the local grocery.  Scary how they watch so closely.  His three favorite tagalongs at the moment are good ol' Baby the Brazilian Aardvark, Elmo, or an African American Cabbage Patch doll we've named Becki, as we had an African American Friend in college and that was her name.  Becki was a gift from one of my cousins,  I stinkin love watching Charlie shop with Becki.  Charles then starts strolling the aisles of our townhome for all the latest deals and big buys- hips sashaying back and forth all the way.  I'm not positive but I think my dear hubby loses sleep over this.
Charlie does the tractor thing and will ask perfect strangers on our couch to roll up their pant legs so he can drive his hot-wheel cars around their knees, but nothing quite compares to a day of filling and emptying his cart with the same old crap as yesterday.
We had Charlie at the doctor the other day, just for a routine checkup, and she said he is growing very nicely- he's very tall.  The one thing she mentioned is that she'd like him to really work on pronunciation and letter recognition, which I think is jumping the gun, but what do I know, I run a construction company.  After she mentioned this though, things started coming to mind that might very well back-up what she was saying.  For example, we've started attending a new church in Lakeville and we were pleasantly suprised by how much Charlie loved "Chuch!"  He is in his first Sunday School class and the mother in me was warmed every time my little man asks me if he can go to church.  Every time we'd get in the truck, Charlie would ask, "Mama chuch or Tishas?"  Tisha is his version of Tricia, his daycare lady.  After about a month of this, one of the couples we'd gotten to know a little at church invited us out to their farm for dinner.  Andy and I were nervous about Charles being shy at first when we got there as we hadn't done much visiting since we relocated to the cities.  We walked in the house and Mr. Carlberg opened the door and took Charlie's coat.  Charlie got a glimpse of his face to which he lit up and put his chubby little fingers out for  a handshake, (we truly don't make him do this) and to my demise, he yelled, "Oh!  Hiiiiiiiiiii  Chuch!" 
Shoot. 
So this was 'chuch.'  His Sunday School teacher.  Misunderstandings are normal in a house with a small person just learning to speak, but I was bummed.  All night long Charlie would speak to and refer to Paul as Chuch.  "Scoose me Chuch."  "Tank you Chuch"  We all got a good laugh, but maybe I do need to work with the little one on his pronunciation and comprehension, all in good time.
Anyway, every stage is fun for all new reasons and we thoroughly enjoy watching our little prince grow every day, I'll try to be better on posting his adventures.  Have a great weekend yall!