Blessings and Plagues

After having had a first child who didn't sleep through the night until almost 18 months and a second child who was serious to the point of gruffness as a baby, I can't tell you how it warms my heart to have a baby who wakes after a five hour stretch of sleep, then grins and squeals delightedly at me as I pick her up. Life has developed a Biblical atmosphere around here. Daphne was baptized a week ago. Jack has taken to reading his children's Bible by himself and giving us oral book reports. His current favorite stories include Jesus's temptation in the desert, Peter's betrayal, and Solomon's sins of building temples to his many wives' pagan gods. Rather macabre fare. He has a relative sense of humor about it, though, as apparently yesterday at his preschool's VBS, he announced that he felt sorry for Noah's family because they had to live on the ark with the likes of Mosquitos and flies and bees. Graham is following Jack's interests as usual. Angered at something his brother was doing a few days ago, Graham decreed, "I'm going to throw you into the lion's den!"

Who needs delivery?

Graham just made pretend pizza and served it to me. A few minutes later, after we had cleaned up that "meal," he asked if I wanted "leftover pizza."

Introducing...

Daphne Catherine! She was born April 20 at 2 a.m. and she is amazing. An unbelievably easy baby who only cries when hungry or needs a diaper change. And I need it, as her birth day was also the day we moved into our new house, and because Ben didn't have any paternity leave since he just started his new job at Energizer two months befor, and because my Aunt Jane, who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer only a month before, had died a few days before Daphne's birth and her funeral was that afternoon. There's been a lot going on in our lives the past few months! Just as an observation, no one has yet said the completely unhelpful but seemingly universally used phrase, "Wow! You've got your hands full!" since Daphne's birth. Interesting, since just about everyone I saw for six months after Graham was born said that to me. I'd like to think its because I now look so competent with the three of them that it doesn't look difficult. More likely it's because I have a crazy, don't-mess-with-me look in my eyes at all times. Although I suppose people may actually say it but I'm just too distracted to hear them.

Heard Around Our House This Week

Jack: (to Ben, when "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" comes on) Daddy, this is The Bugs! Have you heard of them? The Bugs?

I've just started introducing the boys to The Beatles, obviously not soon enough...

Graham understands that Daphne is not yet born and that she's in a belly, but he seems to think that she's in his belly, as well as mine and Ben's and possibly Jack's. Today at lunch Graham was sweetly offering to share some food with Jack. Jack rejected the offer with a simple "No," which Graham corrected, "No thank you, Jack?" Graham proceeded to offer food to Ben and to me, and then we asked if he wanted to share some with Daphne. Graham, with a big smile on his face, pushed his sandwich gently up to his shirt on his belly and said, "'ere go, Baby Daphne!"

Graham's other favorite words lately include: "Haa-boot" (caboose) and "All 'Board!" imitating the conductor in The Polar Express with perfect inflection. He's also learned to put train tracks together impressively well for his age. Looks like we'll be making lots more trips to the Transportation Museum in the near future!

Surprises

1. I'm blogging. I'm going to try to do that more this year.

2. I'm pregnant. With a baby girl.

3. A ton of other things have happened in the past 9 months.

Well, I suppose that last point is not too terribly surprising. But in the interest of not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good, those things will (hopefully) come out over time.

For now, updates on each child.

Daphne, our baby girl still in utero, is due April 26, making her the fourth Angelette birthday within a two week span. I'm 23 weeks along with the easiest pregnancy I've had thus far. At least the easiest for me. I've been horribly moody, so Ben in particular and Jack to a lesser extent may not agree that it's been fabulous, but morning sickness was mild and short lived, and I had very few food aversions. Amazingly enough, both my brother and my sister are due to have their first babies on the same day, 6 weeks after Daphne's due!

Graham is 20 months and at a completely adorable, chattering stage. He loves to talk and is learning what seems like a million words a day. His favorite phrases right now are, "Christmas lights," and "Lego guy." Yesterday morning when I walked in the door with Starbucks for Ben (who had the day off) and me, Graham lit up and came running toward me shouting, "Chocolate milk!"

Jack is reading like a fiend. He started really reading well around his 4th birthday and has improved about a grade level every 2-3 months since then. Right now as best we can tell he's reading at a 3rd-4th grade level. He loves it. Legos were the Christmas theme this year, and we've just started reading Harry Potter together. J.K. Rowling is a genius writer--it's thrilling to see Jack's reactions to hearing the story for the first time. His amazement and excitement are definitely contagious.

Ben's company, Savvis, was sold to telecom giant CenturyLink last summer, so his job responsibilities have been changing significantly and for the better. He's been taking so much vacation that today is only the fourth day of work for him in the past two and a half weeks. I'm missing him a lot today!