This New Year With Three Boys

I was coming back here anyway. Regular blogging in 2010 is one of my three resolutions. But Rachel nearly sent me an S.O.S. email. I kindly responded with no answers and told her to read my blog, because I am sensitive like that.

She asked if Son1 is back in school. I am sure she genuinely wanted to know. Everyone asks me that these days. But they don't just ask me. They ask me with a hopefulness, like that should bring me some relief from three boys at home. Nope, he is home until mid January, and I am thrilled. This house is rockin' like a jack hammer hit it. The walls are shaking, the floor is pounding, and my head is spinning. Not always. But a lot of the time it is loud. That is OK with me. Contentment is a choice. I am drinking life in, because for now, I have two little boys that still call me Mommy, and I am just not ready to give it up. When it is gone, a season will have passed, and I am not ready to be Just Mom yet. For now, I get saluted and called Captain by my pirates with wild imaginations. But the start of a new year reminds me that time is passing.

The other day we dined at a lunch buffet kind of place. On the price list kids 3 and under were free, kids 3 to 5 were a certain price, and then kids 6 to 12 were another price. Perfect. Hubs and I plus our five year old made for a cheap lunch. The cashier tried to correct us. She asked us how old Son2 was, though we told her he was free. Then she tried to correct us about Son1's age. Yup, he is five until August. She was not convinced. I finally apologized, noting that Hubs and I are short, and somehow we are blessed with tall children but we really were not lying. No one believes us ever. They are big kids. And because they are physically big, I wonder often if that will speed up their emotional maturity beyond their years. I truly hope not. I want them to be 5 and 2 just because they are only that old!!

So these winter days (it is in the mid 70s here) have been flanked by evenings around our fire pit, roasting marshmallows over an open fire, and squishing them into s'mores. We have had two children fall in the pool since New Year's on two different nights. Yes, both were boys, and no, neither were mine. That is no surprise; life around this house is active, with scooter riding and hide and go seek in the dark.

Son3 is just a gem so far. He seems to wonder when it gets too quiet, unless he is in his crib. He wants in on the action. He starts to squawk if he can hear us but cannot see us. He is happiest when his brothers are around and does not yet mind the chaos. The big boys are perfectly at ease when I am occupied with the baby to drum up some turbulence around the house. They have that "when the cat is away the mice will play" syndrome. I am grateful for their bond, though.

Life here is busy and exhausting. Feeding an infant, popping the toddler on and off the potty, and working on Kinder skills with the eldest is just a fraction of all that needs to be accomplished in a day. I fall in bed ready for the day to be over. In that moment, I choose contentment over worry, over frustration, and over life's curve balls. My life is full.

But that choice to be content can be so hard some days. Raising our boys is a two person gig. My Hubs steps up to the plate so often. He reminds me to be gentle, to be patient, to find joy in the moments that are not so joyous, because they are just moments. So it is with these fruits of the spirit that we have ventured out so much since Son3 has been born. Here we are, just before our little man's third trip to the zoo, just before Christmas.


LL recently wrote this post about THIS DAY.

I read it and I just kept thinking of this song.

Here's to Tomorrow!

My parents, sister, and nephew were all at our home tonight. We popped in Julie & Julia. I laughed to myself when Julie was so excited to get a single blog comment early in the movie. I wondered if I might get just one comment if I posted to my blog. It has been so long.

I fell asleep before the end of the movie. I said goodnight to the company and climbed the stairs. I was the only one awake. I slipped through our bedroom door and scooped up Son1 in my arms. He had fallen asleep in our bed. He didn't exactly end up in my arms. He was more dangling to my ankles. I nearly lost my balance as I took a step backward. I am only 13 inches taller and he is only five! How long had it been since I last carried him like this? Probably several months, probably before I had the baby, probably before I hit my last trimester. Wow. Images from the book I Love You Forever rushed through my mind. My baby he will always be. Sigh. Lord, please tell me he might remember the good things from today. Could he remember playing trains with his brother, or that his daddy rushed to the grocery store this morning so he could make him a special breakfast, or that we let him stay up late with his cousin? Could he remember spouting train whistle sounds and sirens, or the balloon he got tonight at church, or a baby brother that was truly amused by his antics?

Could he just forget a mama screeching over Christmas breakables? Could he forget that I was grouchy and sleep deprived with a touch of holiday stress thrown in for good measure? Those are not the Christmas memories I want for him this year.

I am so proud of him. He has grown so much in Kindergarten. He is thriving in school, in AWANAs, and as a big brother. His heart has grown by leaps and bounds for his two little brothers. He is so loved by his parents, particularly by an imperfect mother who needs tomorrow to come, so I can start again.

Where Have All the Farmers Gone? (Sung to the Tune of "Where Have all the Flowers Gone?")

Where Have All the Farmers Gone? Weeeellll....I had a baby. And I am alive. I am not freaking out. I already did that weeks one and two. He is our very last, and I am enjoying his little newborness to the absolute fullest. And I am in DEEP LOVE. That takes up my time. But for all of you Farmer fans that cheered me on during labor and on Facebook and on Twitter, don't worry...I am going to give you the birth story very soon.

In other news, in a moment of sleep deprivation, I decided to blog with a group of friends on a brand new blog. A long time friend read an article in the W--hington Post and was inspired to start a virtual baking group. I was so excited! I know most of the ladies from when we lived in the Northern Virgina beltway. Some I have never met, except online, because they are friends of friends. And some ladies I don't know, but I will! I just posted and you can read it here. It is all about my motorcycle riding with wind in my hair. See you there!

Welcome JK Farmer #3 to San Diego!

JK Farmer #3 was born on 9-3-09 at 5:37pm. 7 lbs 13.2 oz, 19 3/4" long, head was 13 3/4" Right now he is having some dinner...

Twas the night before my Induction...

This is the very last night I will be pregnant. And I am emotional for so many reasons. Seriously, I just stopped to wipe my eyes because the tears just spilled.

There are the medical reasons I am emotional. I am nervous about being induced. I was induced with my first child. He was born on his due date. And here I am again. With my second baby my membranes were stripped. He was about a week early. This is the longest I have ever been pregnant. I am five days overdue.

I am notorious for being picky about doctors. My OB is amongst the best. She has the pedigree to prove it. And I am delivering at the most "shee shee fancy" hospital in the county. I was born there, you know. But none of that brings me comfort.

I have wanted this third child for a long time, probably since I knew I was marrying my best friend. He was not so sure. But I just always hoped we could agree on three kids. Here I sit, with a completely healthy, whole, beautiful baby that I will soon meet, Lord willing, in a few hours. I am beside myself that God has blessed me a third time.

I wanted three children more than I wanted a girl. Shame on complete strangers that do not understand, but feel liberties in making faces when I say I am having a third beautiful boy.

THREE.

In a few hours the third baby will be here. I will hold him. His daddy will hold him. I will be more emotional. I just know it.

I knew this day was coming. And maybe I am just a little nervous that I will miss the early days of Son3's life, because it will all be a blur. I hope not. I want to feel every single moment of a newborn baby again.

I have had those same feelings about savoring the moments with my five year old, my two year old, and my husband. I have poured as much as I could into my family of four, my two sons, and my husband. I love them so much. I have not wanted 2009 to be "the year we moved to San Diego and we were busy getting adjusted and we just did not do anything but that." Nope. I did not want the days to turn into months, and then for us all to wonder how we got a year older. This pregnancy has allowed me to slow down, to appreciate every time we heard the heart beat on the doppler, and saw the baby on the ultrasound monitor. I have appreciated the minutes, the days, and the weeks. When I said "no" to anything else, I was saying yes to them. We spent long days in our new back yard this summer, laughed, hugged, and played for hours. I packed the kids up, spun them around town, and sang silly CDs in the car with them at the top of our lungs. We made trips to Coronado for an hour here or there, just because lunch with Daddy was possible. And often, very often, both the boys wanted to know about the baby wherever we were. He is at the forefront of their minds.

This pregnancy has meant something to all of us. Every single member of our family is excited. Every single member reaches often for my belly, to feel Son3. They press, he kicks. They are loud, he kicks. Both boys lift up my shirt and kiss my belly spontaneously, or talk to the baby, or reason that he kicks because he must feel trapped and he wants out. Son2 is convinced he can push him out.

One day Hubs totally surprised me. He told me how beautiful I am pregnant, how he wants to remember these moments that our family is excited, and he arranged for a photo shoot at Coronado Beach. These are his shots of me, of the kids, and I love them. Professional pictures will get posted one day, you know, when I don't have to get to bed. That night on Coronado Beach was seemingly perfect. It was warm. It was peaceful. It was about our family.


Wednesday morning I was up early with Hubs, the day before my induction. It was in the 6am hour, and he was ready for his work day, and I was ready for mine. I came down the stairs, and a slow smile spread across his face. He called me outside to take pictures. So here we are. Son3 and me, overdue.

The other side of my emotion is excitement. I cannot wait to meet the newest Farmer. I cannot wait to see his teeny tiny face in my hands. And most of all, I cannot wait to share him. I have had his kicks all to myself, his movements to myself, and even some of the discomfort to myself. Now he will belong to our whole family in a different way. His daddy will hold him, and his brothers will kiss him. I know my heart will be full. For that, I am emotional, too.

Last Day on the Big Island

On our very last day on the Big Island Hubs and I made a plan. Well, really he made a plan because he loves me so much. We would drive all the way around the Big Island, northbound to Hilo, and end our day in Kona, back at the airport before our very long flight back to the Big Rock. The plan was to stop at Hawaii Volcanoes National Park one last time. Could we find my camera?

We left our hotel in Waikoloa and headed to North Kohala, and into Kamuela, or cowboy country. I missed the shots of the Kohala coast that resemble the moon on our drive into Kamuela. Yes, the moon. The landscape all the way to the ocean is a crisp black, not green and lush. The blackness is dried lava. You can see some of it here, from a trip we took when we lived on Oahu, and visited the Big Island.

Hubs and I love Kamuela. We could totally see ourselves living here. It is at a higher elevation, and about a 20 minute drive to the beach. It is the "largest" city in the interior of the island, with a whopping seven thousand people. It is cowboy country, or paniolo country.
The cowboy town holds a strong Mexican influence. Living here is not cheap by any means. Parker Ranch is the largest privately owned cattle ranch in the United States.

The hills are rolling green. It is cooler up here. And there is all kinds of livestock. It is peaceful and my kids go nuts when they see all of the farm animals.
About here our two year old started crying for apple bananas. It was so cute to hear him plead through his tears for us to stop. We stopped days earlier here for apple bananas and he remembered. Hubs pulled over at an organic health store and bought a bunch for less than $2. And Son2 giggled through tears, and we all smiled. My kids love local Hawaiian fruit.


Between here and the Hamakua Coast much of the island is a two lane highway.

We emerged from the rolling hills of cowboy country to the majestic Hamakua coastline. Whizz! This was taken while driving...can you tell?Our direction, the highway continued in one lane, and in the other direction, the highway opened up into another lane.
Whizz! I could not risk dropping another camera. Son1 was screaming for me to check the wrist strap. Trust me, there are waterfalls down there.
Finally we came into a very wet Hilo. It rains most on the Hilo side of the island. Whizz! Still driving...we had a plane to catch that night. It takes roughly four hours of drive time without stopping to drive the whole island. This is the small historic downtown.
Just minutes from downtown Hilo is Volcano Village, just outside of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. We stopped at what was deemed the best Thai food in Hilo. The restaurant is very family style, and the Thai food is island style. This was seriously the best Thai food I have ever had. The summer rolls enveloped fresh pineapple, and the fried rice was garlicky and mmmm island style. Everyone ate their fill...Hubs, boys, and I were stuffed and satisfied. It was a very good feeling.
Love this sign at the park entrance.
Hubs made a quick turn at the entrance toward the Kilauea Iki Trail. The rain was really coming down, and the roads were packed with cars and slick with tropical rain. I jumped out and took photos of the trail head where we had hiked.
We hiked this entire ridge, down into the crater floor, and back up the ridge, before I dropped my camera.
I really, really wanted to see this steam vent on the floor of the crater, up close and personal. One day we will go back and we will make the whole hike out there, I just know it.
And that sweet Hubs of mine snapped my picture in the rain and in the steamy vog because I WAS THERE.
We crossed the parking lot by car to the Thurston Lava Tube. The tube was totally packed. The ground was slippery and muddy. We all came to the final realization (well probably it was just me that needed to accept) that my camera was deep in a crack in the tube somewhere. We knew we could not find it that day. It was gone forever. So I took a picture at the edge of the overlook, clutching my camera, exactly where I dropped it between these two signs.The camera tumbled down, down, down this canopy of ferns, and deep into the crevices of the lava tube below. This was pretty painful to be back. Instead, we left the park, and continued on our trip around the island.
We rounded South Point, the southern most tip of the United States, and up into the South Kohala Coast.We soaked up every bit of Hawaii we could, until the sun set. And we said aloha to what we once knew as "home." But in Hawaii we say "Aloha, Ahui hou." We do not say goodbye. We say, "Goodbye, until we meet again." And Hawaii, the Farmers will meet you again. We miss you too much to say goodbye forever.

Tropical Dreams at $26 a Gallon is Worth Every Penny!

Hubs and I knew one MUST DO on the Big Island was stop at Tropical Dreams ice cream farm. The short version is we stopped, bought our half gallon of Banana Storm, and ate it back at our vacation unit. The much better story is the first time we ever discovered Tropical Dreams.

On our very last trip to the Big Island before we moved from Hawaii, we kept reading about Tropical Dreams ice cream. It was supposed to be THE ice cream on the face of the planet. We set out to find the farm and forgot our guidebook! We remembered the farm was in Kamuela. Somehow, the idea of a FARM did not stick in our brains. We drove all over the small town looking for an ice cream SHOP.

We spotted a hot pink store front and pulled over. We asked if they served Tropical Dreams. NO. Before loading in the car, my kids spied a huge turtle coffee table in the real estate office next door. They wanted to pet him, but he seemed made out of Koa wood, and I thought the better of it. I steered them toward the car when Hubs slipped inside. I did not notice right away. He talked story a bit, and walked to our car with papers in hand. I thought he had property information. Ha! The realtor printed out map and directions to the FARM, less than two miles away. We found the farm in a few minutes. In the middle of this farm is a warehouse.
Now we just weren't sure what to expect. Hubs hopped out alone to check things out. A few minutes later he emerged from this warehouse, swinging a plastic bucket, clutching a brown sack, and making eyebrows at me with a wide smile across his face. This stuff had to be serious. In fact, it was. In his prized bucket was Banana Storm, at $26 a gallon. He had a half gallon, and paid $13. For some reason they were closed, but had the door to the warehouse open. The owner(?) sold him the ice cream anyway, with some plastic spoons and some styrofoam bowls. She said the ice cream was super hard, but should be just right if we made the drive to Hilo, 60 miles away. We were headed that way, anyway. She told him all about the ice cream. Mmmmm. I am getting there.

Hubs thought we needed a serving spoon because plastic spoons are just not the best for serving a half gallon of ice cream. It was a Saturday, and we rounded the corner from the farm and saw this sign:

Hubs flipped the rental around, and pulled over at a home in the neighborhood. I slid out of my seat onto the driveway, and he handed me a few dollars. I poked around a bit and found a handful of stainless steel serving spoons perfect for scooping ice cream. I asked the lady how much for one spoon, and she said I had to take them all for fifty cents. Deal.

I jumped back in the car, and we started the drive toward Hilo. Soon enough the kids were wise to our ice cream bucket, and were STARVING. Oh they just could not wait. Oh they were so HUNGRY. When were we going to stop??? Hubs caved and pulled over at a nice park along the Hamkua Coast. We grabbed a package of wipes, ice cream, spoons, and bowls and sat at a picnic table under a huge tree, looking down at the Pacific Ocean. We pulled the top off of Banana Storm. I took one long look and scrambled to pull the shirts off the boys. I could only imagine they might want to bathe in the ice cream, and I had not even smacked Banana Storm across my lips yet.
Oooh la la...Banana Storm. This is what we learned about this ice cream. The ice cream was named by an employee originally from Guam. When storms grace Guam, bananas fall to the ground everywhere. So it is called a banana storm. This ice cream is made with all kinds of local fruit. And it isn't like other ice creams where you get a little chunk of this or that about the size of a penny. No.NO.NO.

Oh. My. Word. I have NEVER ever had such frozen goodness grace my buds.

The ice cream is classified as "superpremium." Such ice cream is made with 18% butterfat and is "low overrun," meaning the amount of air mixed in while freezing. It makes the creamiest, densest ice cream EVAH. (Grocery store ice cream is 10 to 12% butterfat.) And the bananas are NOT the long yellow ones sitting out at your grocery store. Oh NO. These are locally grown apple bananas. There are half strawberry fruits and half oreo cookies in there. These are not little ground up chunks. NO. I am talking about half pieces of cookie from the top of the plastic tub all the way to the bottom. Mmm mmmm mmmmmmmmmm!
This was officially the beginning of the end of my South Beach diet in December. I am only going to confess to having at least two bowls. I will not confess more than that. My family had just as much as I did, too.
We were so thrilled to visit Tropical Dreams once again on our trip this summer. Hubs and the owner talked story again when he picked up the half gallon. We will be back, Tropical Dreams!