Springtime Sweetness

First, a little love note to record for the memory books:  a little over a week ago, Kassia and I were cuddling and she looked up at me seriously and said, "You know, Mom?  When you and Daddy told us that you had the new baby in your tummy?"

"Uh-huh," I replied, enjoying the possibilities of what she might say next.

"Well," she said, "I just felt like I loved you a little more."


* * *


Let's see, an update on our spring over here.  Well, Wisconsin apparently has decided to have a spring - or maybe a fall - or maybe we'll skip to summer.  The weather has been so unpredictable until this last week, which appears will be consistently hot for the next few days, that I don't know what is going on and how to plan for any outings.  Will it be a violent thunderstorm with tornado warnings?  Will it dip down at night giving us a frost advisory?  Will we need sunscreen and water to stave off heat exhaustion?  You never can tell in this state.

Luke has finally mastered how to pedal a bike/trike.  Now he just needs to learn to use the brakes while moving.  He is the most sensitive kid - if he gets scolded verbally, he will break down into tears and sob, "I'm really sorry!!"  He also whines the most of all the kids.  BUT - he is the sweetest cuddler and has shared some really thoughtful and long sentences lately - it's amazing to see and hear how much he is growing.

Sophia continues to skip being a 1 year old in hopes that being 2 years old is attainable if one wills it.  She likes temper tantrums and is stubborn to the extreme.  We still haven't been able to successfully teach her how to go down stairs or climb off of something.  Instead, she prefers the wail-and-screech-until-someone-picks-me-up method.  Her hair is suddenly growing really long now and the back curls adorably.  Sometimes she is a hard sleeper and wakes up with her hair curled up and plastered to her sweaty head.  It's adorable.  She also loves bathtime now and likes to suddenly flop back into the water, saying, "Wee!!"  So I always have to be 110% focused when bathing her.  Hopefully she take to swimming like a fish, too.

The girls have swimming lessons again this summer and I hope that Kassia gets really comfortable with it and that Nadia at least doesn't develop an allergy to it.  I'd also like to have Nadia learn how to ride without training wheels, but I was like her when I was a kid, so I know not to push her too far out of her comfort zone.  Wait - did I say I was like her?  I meant that I am like her.  Poor us!

Kassia is a master reader now and with schooling we both are starting to find our groove.  I still have to introduce a writing curriculum, but I am holding off until she gets used to more writing work as it is showing up more and more in other subjects on a daily basis.  Math continues to be a grow and stunt process.  She suddenly will have the concept "click" and will fly through it.  Other days, it was as if she never learned it.  I think she has a "retrieval" issue and, combined with her perfectionistic tendencies, she overwhelms herself if she information isn't at hand when she requires it.  Most days I have to remind her to relax and then I will rephrase the problem or question until I find that she is starting to see what I am asking of her.  We will continue schooling through the summer (except 3 weeks or so) as I want to keep going with math and history.  Then, when 2nd grade begins, we'll be in 2nd grade material for most things, and in the second half of 1st grade stuff for math and history.

Nadia will be learning to read, God willing, this fall.  I think she is ready now or will be then, but I am not convinced that she is convinced she's ready.  This will likely be our biggest schooling stumbling block.  She will shut down if she gets even slightly frustrated.  Was I like that?  I don't know, but it is a good thing for me - God is teaching me patience everyday and this reminds me that, though I thought I was a patient person, in some ways I really still wasn't fully on board with waiting until the time was right.

Paul and I are busy working on house projects.  Someday we'll hang pictures and personalize a little more, but for now we are just going day-to-day with just a few projects in our minds - like fixing our bathroom shower and Paul getting healthier and me being a better teacher and more disciplined in my own life.  I'd like to do some landscaping this summer - something I LOVE to do, but I also have a few scrapbooks I have to make for my last two kids because it just wouldn't do having that still undone come Baby #5's expected arrival in December.

I was supposed to do something more productive right now.  Grandma is with the kids at the park and I should have been running errands, but it seemed like a good time to slow down and share as I've been absent for awhile.  It's so hot today that they'll probably be back soon, so perhaps I'll take the rest of this quiet time to read some more of Wuthering Heights.  It's interesting, to be sure, but I don't think I'll really know what I think of it until I'm done.  Most of the time, I cannot read nonfiction - it requires too much mental energy, and it isn't relaxing.  But this fiction is also taking up more brain cells than most as it moves from timeline to timeline a bit and includes a bit of written dialect that is difficult for me to translate.  :-)

Oh, a final note, yes, each pregnancy becomes more visible earlier and earlier than the previous.  I'm near the end of my first trimester, but I've already worn some maternity jeans.  Yikes!