I am feeling like I want to come back to this space again. I've missed it. 

Here are a list of things:

1. My mom is sick.

2. I had my first kiss when I was sixteen.

3. It was a bad kiss.

4. I was going to make my senior dinner dance dress and even started it and it was horrid. Sparkly red and horrid. My mom didn't tell me that, instead on a family trip to San Francisco, she took me shopping. I didnt' realize then how bad my dress was. My mom knew. She always knew.

5. I have red hair. I have never dyed it. But I have permed it. When I was younger. Over and over again. It was not good.

6. I am soft right now. Very very soft and I'm trying to be okay with that.

7. My husband is a much better dancer than me.

8. I never thought I was pretty. For a long long time. Then things changed. Right now, even with my softness and my straggly hair and my tired eyes, right now, I feel pretty.  

9. But I don't want anyone to take my picture. So maybe I don't feel pretty.

10. I wish I could go on teen mom right now. i would show them why they should wait to have a baby. Wait wait wait. It would be convincing.

11. I just had a baby. I love my baby. It's still hard. So very very hard.

12. Sometimes I cry for no reason but then I think there must be a reason and I think of a hundred reasons but then none of them are THE reason but all of them are part of the reason or maybe there's no reason.

i think that's all for now. Maybe twelve or less a day. I wish I had a book I couldn't put down right now. I need one.  

Warning: Inappropriate discussion to follow. If you do not like potty talk, please do not continue. I’m serious.

Hello.

Here are some happy things and thoughts that have happened so far this year:

Last night my two older boys (six and four years old) decided they wanted to sleep in the bottom bunk together. Fine. Cute. Whatever.

At three in the morning, four year old was crying. Help me! Help me!

I went in to help him and he had wet the bed. Pee everywhere. Six year old was still asleep. I wondered what I should do. Wake him up? Make him move to the top bunk? Leave him there? I helped four year old get cleaned up and then put him in the top bunk and left the six year old. I knew four year old was going to be embarrassed when six year old found out what had happened. Six year old was sleeping soundly and I didn’t want to move him.

Happy thing that happened: Six year old peed the bed also! Yay!

Later when we were all getting cleaned up (again) we had an in-depth discussion about what was worse, both of them peeing the bed or their baby brother going poo in the tub. We all agreed that poo in the tub was the worst (as a mother, this is my biggest fear when I put baby in the tub). Then things got a little out of hand.

What was worse, poo in the bed and pee in the tub or vice versa? What about poo down your leg or pee down your leg? And so it went for quite a while.

At first my inclination was to stop this bathroom talk. It try not to encourage this kind of thing, of course . . . but then it was quite interesting and we were all laughing so hard I thought I was going to cry. I think this is bad. And good. And happy. And gross. But mostly happy.

I am having a baby boy in a few months. I already have three baby boys. I am so excited. And scared.

I also have been thinking about how visceral our life is right now. There is always crying and screaming and laughing and throwing and running and hugging and climbing and touching and peeing. In beds.

One day, this will all be gone.

I wish i could remember better this part of my life when I was little. When I climbed on my mom or my dad. When we talked about poo and pee. When we laughed so hard we cried.

Sometimes I want life to move faster. I want to have more time to myself. I want more time to write and think and clean and enjoy bites of food and exercise and write. I want to be able to go to the store by myself and maybe the bathroom by myself and I want to go on dates and trips with my husband and family and we don’t take strollers or diapers.

Sometimes I want life to hold still. I want to lay on the floor with legos and books and blocks and tinker toys and so many stuffed animals and three rowdy boys jumping on me and saying inappropriate things. I want them to never grow up. To always want to spend time with me and cling to me and need me. I want them to be small and squishy and just like this, forever.

And sometimes I want to go back. I want everything to be how it used to be. A mom who made me vacuum the stairs and clean the bathrooms every Saturday. Who taught me how to read. How to love. How to study. How to put together a meal. A mom who wore toilet paper around her hair at night so her curls would stay in tact. A mom who read to me in her big huge waterbed the Secret Garden and Ann of Green Gables.

how can I want so many things at the same time?

What do you think is worse? Pee in the bed or poo in the tub? It’s an important question.

Write about what you do when you don't want to do anything. 

Write about a time you gave into the feeling and a time you didn't.

For your kids:

 Have them write about something they've done that they didn't think they could.  

Write about seaweed. 

Write about worms.

Write about spaghetti.