My Older Two

Emry: 

There is a story in my family of a trip we took when I was a teenager. I can’t remember where we were headed (probably either to or from Tennessee), and we stopped at Cracker Barrel for dinner (because on a Sturm trip, a meal at Cracker Barrel was required). When the waitress served the plate of corn muffins and biscuits, she set the plate down near me. One of my younger sisters (whose name shall remain untold), called down to me, “Melissa, can I have some bread?”

“Which one?” I responded, expecting the answer of “corn bread” or “biscuit”, but that is not what my sister said. With a tone of the obvious, she replied:

“The one next to the other one.”

The other day, I felt like I was talking to that sister. Emry is imaginative, but she is usually more down to earth that her unnamed aunt who had an imaginary juggling clown living in our basement when she was 3 or 4. When I ask Emry a question, I usually get a very precise answer. On this particular day, though, she couldn’t find her stuffed elephant. First of all, you should understand that this elephant (made by the unnamed aunt) is nearly two feet in length and bright red. In essence: next to impossible to loose. So, I told her to go look in her room again. Sure enough, she comes back with it.

“Emry, where was your elephant?” I asked, curious to know where a toy of that size and color could possibly hide.

“Where my turtle was,” she answered, speaking of a toy that is all of four inches in length and often gets lost.

“And where was your turtle?” I asked.

Again the obvious tone: “Where my elephant was.”

Duh, Mom!

Ethan:

Truly, you have to love kids. We live in a world full of gray. You wonder if you can believe anything you read. Are the people around you ever sincere? And when I listen to the stations Ed frequents on the radio, I often scoff at how musicians never say what they mean…or, if they do, have next to no common sense. (For instance Ed had oldies on the other day and John Lennon was sounding like a broken record as he belted out, “Why can’t we give peace a try?”, speaking of the Vietnam era. Meanwhile, Ethan and Emry are bickering about something in the backseats. I had to ask out loud: “How can he – and others – possibly think world peace is remotely feasible when a brother and a sister can’t even get along?”) But kids? To them, everything is literal.

So, this week, we were headed somewhere. It was raining, so Ethan begged to hear one of his favorite songs. Entitled “Thunder” by some group with a weird name, it’s something Ed once pulled up on his phone when the kids were talking about thunder and lightning. (Ed does this all the time, pulling up songs from when he was a kid or teenager that I’ve never heard of and I’m glad I’ve never heard of.) In this case, the song has its hidden message, but I’ve yet to fathom all of it and the kids only like it because of the rhythmic chorus, “Thunder, thunder, lightning and the thunder.” But Ethan, sitting in the very back row of the car, was listening to the other words. The singer, using metaphors, talked about how he was in the back seat. And Ethan pipes up:

“I’m in the back seat!” 

Oh, to take things literally again!

Emry:

In the past month, Emry has proven to be quite the artist. She could spend hours with paper and markers, sketching things in her head or pictures she has seen. In fact, she draws better than I do (which is not saying much, but she’s only five). But sometimes her artistic skills are not put to the best use.

Annoyed at Ethan for whatever grief he was currently causing her yesterday, Emry took off to her room. There she grabbed her paper, scissors, tape, and a marker. On this paper, she did a quick sketch of Ethan and wrote his name. She then crossed them both out. Cutting her drawing to size, she taped it to her door. She then informed both Ethan and myself that this meant Ethan was no longer welcome in her room, except for storytime at night.

To be honest, I’m not sure Ethan got the message. 

Ethan:

I cannot take him anywhere these days without him exclaiming at every discovery he wishes to show me (which is just about everything he lays eyes on): “Mama, check it out!”

Our First Pet

For quite a while, Emry has wanted a pet. Particularly a dog. A little yellow one. Named Biscuit. But since we have told her she can’t have a dog until we have a house of our own, she simply reminds us of the promise on at least a weekly basis. This summer her desire for a pet has grown. Every rolly-polly, lightning bug, and butterfly that has found a temporary home in her bug box has been released with tears and drama. After she had to let go her last butterfly, I promised her we would talk about a fish, something we could have in a rental home. This past Saturday we fulfilled our promise.

Much to our amusement, Emry and Ethan had very different ideas of what it meant to get a fish. Emry understood that we would go to a store, purchase a little fish and bowl, and come home with it. Ethan…well, Ethan thought we were going fishing.

For days Ethan spoke of nothing else than going fishing with a pole, and worms, and whatever his three-year-old mind figured that fishing entails. He was sorely disappointed to find we were going to a store to get a fish, so disappointed we had tears. So, we have promised that we will take him fishing.

Gone are the days when you go to a store; buy a cheap goldfish, food and bowl; take it home and call it a day. In fact, by the time we were done, Ed and I decided this was going to be an early Christmas present. But Emry is delighted with her dark pinkish/red Betta fish that has been named “Pink Flower”. And, so far, she has been a very good caregiver as she feeds the fish and happily talks to it several times every day. I’m not sure a fish is good practice for a dog, but it is a start!

Happy Birthday, Dad!

 Me and Dad: 1981

Happy 34^thBirthday, Daniel!

 Interpretation of the picture: “Touchdown, Dallas Cowboys!”

The Great Pie Bake-Off

When my sister Katey was visiting last week, my sisters decided a pie bake-off was in order. Although not very confident in my baking skills, I was happy to join in. I don’t know if I’m just so focused on my kids, work, growing to-do list, etc. that I didn’t realize what all was going into this…but I didn’t. Or maybe I’m just sometimes too firstborn.

First, Katey made t-shirts for all of us. I was swamped with work. (My boss e-mailed the day before Emry turned a month old, remarking how amazing it was she was already a month old, and…could I take on some projects? It was okay if I couldn’t, but…you get the picture.) So with two proposals due at work within two days of each other, I couldn’t even think of something creative about a pie to put on a t-shirt So, my “It’s Pie, Y’all” is not to be compared to the creativity of Katey, Sally, Jenny and Abby. Which only showcased how dull my pie was going to be.

Again, with my workload I quickly decided a coconut cream pie would be best, considering I didn’t make one for Valentine’s as I usually do since I couldn’t stomach sugar when I was pregnant with Elly. That pie calls for a basic pie crust, so there was nothing fancy about that. And it’s great because the whipped cream on top covers the crust, which I can barely manage to roll out and get in the pan without holes, or tears, or total disaster let alone crimp the edges to look all beautiful. I knew from the start my pie would get no points for “best looking” especially when up against art-teacher Katey and seamstress-extraordinaire Jenny. But at least it would taste good!

And it did taste good, I personally think, but – again – I was up against Sally, whose hobby and side-job is baking so I don’t think any of us actually beat her Peanut Butter Reese pie. A basic pie crust like mine fell short of the shortbread crusts of Katey’s Strawberries ‘n Cream pie and Abby’s Key Lime pie. (And since I love shortbread, even I concur with that.) Jenny’s Banana and Strawberry pie had a cake mix based crust, and the combination of strawberries and bananas was unique. I think the only points I scored was for nostalgia. My dad loves coconut cream and recalled the days when my mom would make him one. Which caused us kids to recall what a common dessert coconut cream and chocolate pies once were for Sunday dinners. 

In spite of that, we had fun. We even decided that we could be a hit reality TV show: Sisters Bake-Off. Or something like that. And since my brothers are pretty decent cooks as well, we could broaden the scope and invite them as well. But the idea was short lived when Jenny noted all the family drama that would be unearthed and broadcast on national television in our little side interviews. I mean, the stories we could tell about each other! And no one wants to be the Duggars. 

So, who actually won? Well, because my nephew Jay had decided the prize should be the winner gets to take all the grandkids to the trampoline park, we all voted for Abby’s pie. No one deserved the prize more! J

 The pies…

…and the Sisters (with Emry)! 

Cousins!!!

For the past week and several days, my sister Katey and her boys have been in town. Which means all of the cousins have been together, which is both fun and exhausting as they dash about with endless energy that can end in fights and tears when pride is hurt or weariness sets in. Thankfully Elly isn’t in on all that yet. We just have to protect her from being over-loved.

My parents now have six grandchildren and the first five are almost stair-step in age. Jay is now 7. He’s tall and lean, sometimes bossy as the firstborn and more prone to be on the outside of the other four at times. Strangely enough Emry, who is next in line at 5, doesn’t seem to mind if Jay bosses her around. She thinks he’s great and one of the funniest things to see was the two of them sitting in their little lounge chairs conversing about who knows what. Next is Beto, my sister Abby’s son, who is almost exactly one year younger than Emry at age 4. He, Emry and Ethan are frequent playmates but he had some moments of disillusion as he learned to share with Jay and Curtis. But he and Curtis, Jay’s younger brother who is only a month younger than Beto, are good friends usually. And I think Curtis was delighted that Jay had others beside himself to boss around. Ethan, at 3, is nine months younger than Curtis but, for all intents and purposes, is the “baby”. He’s been Emry’s and Beto’s third wheel for over a year. When Jay and Curtis are around, he becomes a fifth wheel. But now that he’s three, he puts great effort in keeping up with everyone else. And sometimes he actually does.

Having never had cousins very close to my age and not being around my cousins very much growing up, I love to watch the five of them together. Even though it’s exhausting to keep up with not only the endless activity but the drama. Much of our time with them was spent at my parents’ house, but we wiled away some hours at the pool and we all went to Fair Oaks Farm one day where we saw the cows but mostly enjoyed the outdoor activities, ice cream, and the ropes course. We love having them visit…in fact, Emry and Ethan are already asking when they’ll visit again!

 Jay and Ellyson – the eldest and the youngest.

Emry, Ethan, Curtis and Beto hearing instructions before going on the low ropes course. Jay was allowed on the high ropes…Ethan longed to join him!

Eating ice cream!!!

 Jay and Emry: what are they talking about? The pros and cons of face masks, perhaps?

The six grandkids: who they really are…

…and the only halfway decent picture of them.

He Does Listen!

Around the time Elly was born, Ed and I realized that Ethan was raising his voice whenever he spoke to us quite a bit. We would tell him something quite calmly and he would respond with a loud voice edging on anger. It didn’t take us long to realize why he was doing this. Quite simply it’s because we do this to him. Why? Well, he never seems to be listening to us. So, we raise our voice in hopes that volume will compensate for the fact that his attention is elsewhere. In essence, we’ve had to change our ways so he will change his.

It is true that I wonder multiple times a day if Ethan hears two words I say. I feel like a broken record as I repeat his name hundreds of times a day just to get him to look at me and respond. However, I am learning that just because he seems to be focused on something else does not mean he isn’t listening. 

For instance, a couple of weeks ago, I was reminding Emry that God “never slumbers of sleeps”. I didn’t even know Ethan, who was bouncing around on the couch, was listening to the conversation until he piped up, “But Jesus sleeps.” I opened my mouth to correct him when he elaborated, “He fell asleep in the boat in the storm.”

I couldn’t argue with that.

A week later I took him with me to my parents’ guest room to feed Elly when we were visiting because he needed to take a break from playing with his cousins and calm down a bit. Some of our old toddler toys are in a bin in that room and he proceeded to raid them as I fed Elly. He found my sister Grace’s old Speak ‘n Spin and started pulling the lever to hear the nursery rhymes. Since the voice box is a little unclear after nearly 30 years, I repeated each one after the recording played so he understood it. One of the rhymes was, “Little Bo Peep has lost her sheep, and doesn’t know where to find them.”

Ethan replied, “Jesus can find the lost sheep.”

I had to laugh, but I was also inwardly rejoicing that he remembered that story and really does listen!

At least, sometimes…

One Month!!!

In some ways it is hard to believe that Ellyson is now one month old. It seems like the time has gone by both quickly and slowly, but I think that’s 2020 as a whole. One day, I pray, we can look back on 2020 and laugh!

Of course the craziness of the world means little to Elly. Her days are full of eating, sleeping, and listening to her siblings laugh, play, fight, and mostly just be two young kids. I honestly think if she can survive the craziness of her own two siblings, there is very little she won’t be able to handle.

She is growing and changing, keeping pace with her both her siblings at the same age. While bigger than Emry at one month, she is just slightly smaller than Ethan was as she weighs in at 7 pounds and 3 ounces. And she has grown a whole inch! Ed may be right: she may prove to be long and lean.

Our little Elly seems to be a serious little thing, observing the world around her. She will smile for Emry or Ethan, but if Ed or I try to tease a smile out of her, it almost comes to her face but then she quickly takes on her serious look again. It’s rather funny.

Meanwhile, I have managed to somewhat fulfill my obligations as a mom and take pictures of my third just as I did my first and second: