Today one of my best friends Sage came to visit with her two kids. We hung out for awhile and then I went and picked up Belén from school early so she could play with Sage’s daughter, Maite. Soon after another friend, Sarah, stopped by and we packed up all four kids to walk to Sarah’s child care provider to pick up her son. Once we had returned to our house we had five children under the age of five, walking, toddling, crawling, swinging (Eloise) and playing.

Our attempts at conversation were incredibly disjoint and interrupted. It was truly a juggling match where each of the moms attempted to appease their own children as well as any other child near them in need of something.

With three highly ambitious girls turned women turned moms corralling active young children, toddlers and babies, it didn’t take long to find the humor and amazement in the current scene.

“Would you ever have believed ten years ago that we would be sitting here with all of these children running around?”

The answer, a collective NO.

This collage pretty well sums up what we have been up to. I got back on the mountain bike for the first time in a very long while last week when I met my sister, Anna, to ride Friday morning. Unfortunately I ran into some bike issues which prevented me from shifting to the three lowest (read most essential) gears. After a valiant, yet unsuccessful attempt to fix the shifting problem ourselves, we ended up trading bikes on the uphill as she was able to push the big gear and make it. She was quite impressive!

Not a lot has changed in our nursery since it was Belén’s but I don’t believe I ever posted photos of the room. We have added a few things like a mobile we picked up from a beach vendor during our trip to Puerto Vallarta last May as well as the addition of a new quilt from Nana. Of course there are new clothes, shoes and books from the baby shower and a few “I cannot resist how cute this is” purchases.

Saturday morning we were walking through the Capital City Farmer’s Market when I found myself next to a woman from my Hypnobirthing class and her baby born just three days before Eloise. After some initial pleasantries we immediately began asking each other how our birth experiences went.

I started by saying I flunked hypnobirthing and she said she did too but then proceeded to tell me how she survived 21 hours of labor, including three hours of pushing, without an epidural.

Um, chick, you didn’t flunk.

When I told her that my contractions were immediately so strong and so close together I asked for the epidural minutes after arriving at the hospital, she kind of said, “Ooooh really?” in a nice way that oozed with “Wow, you suck!” beneath the surface. Or maybe I was reading too much into her response but I agree it is a little lame that I spent five weeks taking Hypnobirthing classes and then so quickly gave into to the allure of pain-free birth.

Piggy Tails

Last weekend we traveled to Ponderosa State Park in McCall, Idaho for our first camping trip of the season. Andy was so giddy I couldn’t help but be excited myself even though I couldn’t fully put aside the nagging dread of exposing my front side to the freezing cold to breastfeed in the middle of the night.

Andy did all of the preparations while I took care of the child’en and we timed our out of town exit perfectly to coincide with Belén’s nap. Both she and Eloise slept almost the entire two hour drive and Andy and I even managed to have something we used to know as conversation.

At long last, I pulled together a little video to share some of our favorite photos from our newborn session when Eloise was just two weeks old. It is amazing how much she has already changed since then.

Photos by Tamara Kenyon Photography

Music is Lullaby by The Dixie Chicks.

Believe it or not, today was the first full day I have been home alone with both of my girls. Usually I am home with Eloise while Belén is still in daycare. While it is so nice have the special alone time with Eloise like I did with Belén when she was a baby, I have to admit I do feel guilty sending Belén to be taken care of by others when I am at home. It’s my Super Mom desire to be able to do it all…have a tranquil day with Eloise while also keeping a two-year old entertained…not possible.

Camping photos of Gracyn and Belén from Ponderosa State Park, Idaho.