"Celia will you help him clean his blood up please so we can get on with our evening?"
"sure" she replied and under her breath "now that's something you don't hear everyday."

I wanted to post properly today but I have many excuses. Of course, no excuse is really acceptable and having read my archives last night I'm bemused by just how many times I've used the "my computer is in the shop" excuse. So - the first thing I'm going to tell you is that my computer is in the shop. No seriously. Look people, I'm currently a commercial for why not to buy Dell. I'm hesitant to really brand Dell badly here because once upon a time I was very fond of them. However, their customer service and their attempts at fixing their own problem is bordering on being a spoof on computer lore. Though, I've taken it into consideration that my specific (3) model(s) that I have in my possession is (are) just a lemon(s).
That was as diplomatic as I can currently be. Oh wait, that's not counting the work laptop I'm currently using that is also a Dell. Though, you can blame its ineptitude on my husband's IT (ahem) "department."

So where was I? Oh that's right, I was in last year. I've updated this very little and the actual reason is I have a hard time fixating on one thing in my head and typing about another. So my superficial daily posts are distracting to me only momentarily and have become farther and fewer between. Last year, I was pregnant, and I was keeping that out of the blogosphere - well under this profile anyway.

I've already stated in this blog that I'm not great at throwing myself out there. I mean, this blog itself is already bordering on too personal for me. I'm shy, I'm a shut-in. I'm the kind of person who doesn't feel like a politician or celebrities' families should be fair game. Let alone innocent citizens such as ourselves.

Excuse number 3: I wasn't particularly well after the baby was born, and during the pregnancy I had the occasional malaise. I don't like talking about being unwell until I know the facts, all the facts, the full facts, etc.. I don't like people offering me suggestions or asking me to tell them not to worry about me. In my experience, people don't like worrying. They find out you're unwell, and immediately need you to comfort them. Them, not you, the unwell one. So why would I burden you with the weeks of bed-rest I had after this baby, or why would I bother you with me being down when even I didn't know why? Why would I do that? To share my pain? Yeah, no. I'm not good with the receiving empathy department. It makes me feel slightly edgy with unease and focal attention on me. You know me, the one behind the camera. So, there you have it, I've been unwell and it's still being sorted. The short of it is I'm lucky to have made it this far, with 5 glorious babies. Like winning the lottery 5 times over.
Also, I might at some point in the future start rambling incoherently about food allergies/intolerance. This isn't a promise to shift the theme of the blog. I'm not focused enough to be focused. I have an entire focused blog, stashed someplace else about the internet and if you're bothered I'll link you. In the meantime, this one is just pure d, unadulterated me - semi abridged. At this point you're thinking "you do ramble on, Good God woman! I'd hate to see you fully bridged!"

The thing I was thinking though, after I read myself last night was how sort of moody I've been. At least this last year. The baby was sort of a healing process for me, and not the baby herself (though she's some kind of salve for the soul, let me tell you that) more the process I went through to ensure myself a healthy pregnancy. I genuinely believe that stress and pain affect your baby and your pregnancy. I am positive it is true. When we decided to have another baby I made a conscious choice to alleviate my immediate stress. This put the genetically engineered Pollyanna character in me thrown into the nearest fire. It was painful at first. The guilt, I mean. However, I got used to it very quickly. "I'm sorry honey, I can't deal with him/her right now, it will cause me great stress and the baby doesn't deserve it." I kept my endorphins as true and clean as possible.

Now, I myself, was moody as all get out, as you can see in the lurid and languid, shiftless posts that lie herein. That was hormones and that was me wrestling with the massive snaking thought process and wonder about a 5th child. Everything kicked in from, "can I do this" to "what if I'm taking that much more attention from my existing kids" to "but I thought I was done" to "who doesn't love a baby?" From "I need a break, I need some down time as a new mom to I never want to stop having children and I'll be sad the day I'm "done.""
That also cast a light on how ill I was after having this baby. How could I feel bad about the possibility of not being able to cap us off at 6? Isn't each one perfect enough to be an only child?

Then, the wonder the kids themselves. How could I possibly imagine a 5th personality. They're all so different. They're all so the same. Where will she be on that scale?

So I became a hermit, a sleepaholic and a stressaphobe. Yes, those are real words, would I make words up? In the process though, I did manage to eliminate and identify a lot of broken things in my life. Like the house, the chaos, the people for whom I once worked. I am now reluctant to let them back in. I've decided not to. You know what that got me? That got me called "selfish" by the people are famous for once dropping an urn of my mother's ashes in the trash. Result!

The stress and the vitriol this blog has contained to now have been in a way, detoxifying. It's coming out of me, to oooze out into the vague memory of cyberspace where nothing older than 6 months is taken seriously on google.

I thought of a few things at this point (3am last night). Do I start over, scrapping this? Do I vow to make myself a better person? Do I just keep on keepin on and hope I learn to lighten up? Well really, you know I'd go for the path of least resistance right?  I truly don't believe in New Year's resolutions. For one thing, I have issues with the secular calendar. For another thing, I believe that we should endeavor to be better people as the mood strikes us and not once a year. For another thing, I think the fall-out rate of something you tell yourself when you're drunk and besotted at half past midnight on a holiday is too dramatic to convince me I should partake in said telling.
I think that people should be able to hear their own eulogies and that people should be able to decide from one minute to the next, on a Monday morning that they're never going to shout at traffic again, or never depress people in their blog again. I also believe that broken resolutions are easy to abandon. If I were to start a new bright blog and find I'm not quite ready to be that person, would I then abandon it? Yeah, probably.

This is a day later now. I'm writing at night again. I've struggled with this for a couple days and I fear until my schedule changes this might be the only time I have.
Along with not writing my blog, I've stopped following blogs. I can't put my finger on why, maybe I wasn't in the mood to see happy/bubbly people with ten thousand followers and praising each other. Or maybe the more I logged in and read them the more I felt behind myself. I don't owe anything to my blog. I'm not famous in the blogosphere. However, I do want some accountability, I want some continuity, I want to see the years and days documented in some way and this was why I set about this. So - I'm off to take my happy pills and go back out there. I might move this blog at some point, I'm not totally in love with blogger. We'll see I guess. In the meantime - Happy Ish New Year Ish, if you abide by this calendar and to each his own and same to you, Jack.


And now for something completely different - 

The Butterfly mentioned in past blogs, that only Leif had faith in and the rest of us thought was dead. Who knew they could take that long? Worth the wait.

This was a visit to the frog pond we go to, it was May of this year. It has a purpose - really it does -

Let us start with tadpoles

the frog as he regards us - as we regard him

algae has uses

Trying to see how many types of things, including 4 types of tadpoles we can see

another frog regards us

studying one of many dragonflies

There are so many of the kids looking in the water, I wasn't sure which to show you - this is Buttercup and Queak peering in

and now Leif and Celia peering in

Nothing is truly random without utter randomness incorporated

I have lots of series of pictures like this to be dug out. These are just the most recent. The kids love frog ponds - this was May.

Okay, I had other post titles in mind but I've lost them completely. Maybe they'll come to me, maybe they won't. Who knows? Right now, I'm tired of small melodramatic souls who need to show me their toothbrushes to know that I love them. Actually, that kind of thing is part of what keeps me going, the Mommee need, but on the other hand, it's after 10 and small melodramatic souls should have been in bed quite some time ago.

So -- here I am -- acting like life is normal and that I haven't been off the blog for a few...ahem...weeks. I can do that, I can act like it's normal because that's what they do on TV shows, and it's not like anyone reads this. I mean, I know no one reads it - no one comments on it. I know that no one I know cares AT ALL about run on sentences, run on sentences are of course the stuff America is made of, not donuts, America runs on donuts, but it's not made of them because if it were it would just melt in coffee and that would suck really, where would we all be, floating about in the coffee, getting fat off donuts, not running...wait, where was I? Yeah, you know who you are (I'm pointing east).

No really, where was I? So, in this episode, I rename the familia(rs). That actually is part of what kept me off for so long. I'm not all about honesty. Well actually, honestly, I am, I'm honestly about honesty (I have to stop waiting to write these so late), I'm just not about exposing my honesty to people. I don't want to feel exposed.  I am honestly too (anti-social?) shy to share to some my little writing  debacle exercise.

So I'd like to introduce you to the new cast

(I was going to call her Toulouse but she liked it too much, and if she ever gets the link to this she will be thoroughly annoyed with me, which is the point really)

know one, know em all

his choice, believe it or not. It was that, Squil or Hurriquean (Hurriqueak?)

if you know her, you know why.

Though, this last one - all of them really - are subject to change with time. I have a feeling this one is just holding back and waiting to lull us into a false sense of security.

That's enough for now. I need to sleep and catch up later.
I probably had a name for the spouse but I have since forgotten or blocked it. Suggestions?

Still catching up mentally and physically 5 weeks in now (which sounds like nothing when you say it like that) and I'm still just struggling to get my days back on track. Feeding a baby 4 times a night does put a kink in the long part of the day. I'll admit. Though I don't think I've slept through a night for easily 15 years. You think I'd be well conditioned.

Anyway, there is not a lot new or moving quickly amongst us, it's off to a slow start for a school year, but that is simply a left-over from my forced calm during the summer. If I wanted it to move quickly it would, too quickly. My calendar has things on it 3 out of 5 days for the next 2 months. However, it feels slow because I've not given into the chaos.
It's easy to give into chaos for those of you who've never tried it. Easier than becoming addicted to a drug, because you don't actually have to go through the step of ingesting or inhaling anything. Chaos is already there, all around you.

The kids are in another year of school. Celia has chosen to homeschool this year for a combination of reasons. I could list them all here, and I might yet, but she is being pressured into starting her own blog and maybe she could consider that as a post.

Leif is with the same teacher in a loop. Luckily, we adore his teacher and she's a good match for him. He has announced that 3rd grade is nothing like 2nd grade and is very hard core learning.

Ash is in a six-of-one holding pattern. He can't decide if he's happy and most days he's half happy and half fretful. He feels he's not good enough and not smart enough to hack his class. Funnily enough the thing I thought that would have stressed him, being in a 50/50 dual language class, doesn't bother him at all. He's at a great age for language. What bothers him is that some of the kids are smarter than he is, and it makes him feel stupid. His teacher is not contributing to this at all and has told him he's not holding himself up fairly to his peers. Some kids are just early readers or have parents who spend hours a day teaching them to work through chapter books etc.. Most kids, his age, are actually not that clever or far along. He is actually doing very well she tells him, and he needs to realize he's in the actual majority - not with kids who freakishly could read at 2. However kind - and accurate - her words are, he is still finding himself crying before school and miserable after school due to his lowered self-esteem. I'm not sure how to handle this yet, I work with him but he acts very discouraged and working at home just increases his depression.

Buttercup is mouthier and mouthier by the day.  On the one hand - I remember my oldest daughter (when she was Buttercup's age) who was incredibly sweet natured shouting at a stuffed rabbit.
We were at an Asda and the easter displays were out. She saw the giant stuffed bunnies in a basket and wanted one. She wanted one so badly but I wasn't prepared to get one that night. I told Brian about it when he got home and he said she had to have one. So he went back to the Asda, bought the sweetest one he could find - a big pink bunny, very girlish and sweet. He snuck it home, and put in the bed with her. When she woke up she looked at the bunny, perplexed.
I told her - "He knew you wanted a bunny, he saw you in the store and he followed you home." She processed that and then shouted "YOU STUPID BUNNY! I WANTED THE GREEN ONE!" My husband was a bit heartbroken and I was bemused at best. However, to this day he's her Ducky MoMo and she sleeps with him and threatens to take him to college.
So, I try and convince myself that my 4th child's sweetness will overcome her mouth at some point. That she'll find some balance. Today when I threatened to return her to the families store and either find a new daughter or find her a new mother she lost her grip and began grabbing at me and sobbing. So I guess she loves me despite the fact that she's absolutely not afraid of me, or afraid of telling me off at length. I'm guessing having 3 older siblings makes for an excellent vocabulary, a thick skin and a defensive New York style verbal delivery.


As for Ms. 5 (wks) her current caption is "I'm sterved - very sterved. I find this whole thing hugely sterving."(Leif circa 2006)

We have learned to push ourselves up on our arms - we have learned to make small noises in response to noises made by other people. We have learned to take in our surroundings. We have learned to smile, even when we're pretty sure the person smiling at us is doing so because they're making fun of us. Note to self: do not outgrow clothes in public. Note to self: "it's like stuffing an overgrown grub in a sock" is probably not a compliment.

In the meantime - I leave you with this. I'd caption it, but really it doesn't need one...