Lack of two-handed writing time is not the entire reason for not posting as often. Part of it is that I struggle some days to know what to say. The fact that I'm writing a blog post already puts the day in the "more positive than negative" category. If I'm feeling good enough to attempt to articulate something about my/our life, then it is probably a pretty good day. I have a desire for this blog (which I do mostly for us, and particularly for the girls when they are older) to be as close to an accurate reflection of our life as possible. However, it's a public space and not my journal! In the last few weeks I've been unsure how to not paint an overly rosy picture of this time. It would be easy to do - the cuteness abounds! Sweet photos are easy to come by as you can see here. There are so many fantastic moments - I've had so many little surges of emotion where I feel so very grateful to be alive at this time, in this place, with these people. On the flip side, I've had a good number of moments/hours/even days where I feel completely strung out, tired beyond belief, not able to articulate much of anything, and just do my best to muddle through. Yesterday was one of those days, today is a day where the brightness of life is shining through more strongly. So maybe all I want to do here is acknowledge that life is a big mixture right now. I guess if one of my girls is reading this some day down the road when she is a young mother herself, I want her to know it is ok if every day doesn't feel amazingly wonderful. And I'd like her to extend to herself more grace than I often am able to give to myself. And I want her to know that none of these stages last forever and it's ok to soak up as much of the beauty as possible and it's ok to wish for some of the aspects of particular stages to pass as quickly as possible!
One of the things I've been urging myself to do is to keep trying stuff! That process can be exhausting because a whole day can feel like I'm just trying various things and some things work and some things don't so I'm just bouncing from one thing to another sometimes. I'll put Terah in her blue seat and get about two dishes done before her protesting makes it clear that she is not pleased with that plan. Then I'll cart her around and start setting the table and then she'll need a diaper change and be hungry. Then I might sit down to catch up on a few emails and she'll be content for half an email and I leave that undone or sign off quickly. Each day is highly unpredictable and calls for a lot of letting go of expectations. Sometimes there are also big surprises, like the other day when I put her in her little seat to set up the corn grinder. I was going to ask Kali to grind corn for polenta as I figured the grinder would be way too loud for Terah. But I cranked it a few times and watched her - immediate calming effect. The grinder kind of jiggled the table and therefore her seat and she seemed soothed by the sound and the motion. It practically put her to sleep and I got all the corn ground in no time.
Last Saturday was the older girls' last soccer games. I really wanted to get to one more game. So speaking of trying things, I decided to try taking them on my own so Jason could work. Terah slept to and from both games and in the pack for both games. She transferred to and from the carseat like a trooper. I was very glad I tried it. I felt exhausted that afternoon, which seemed silly as everything went perfectly well. But it was the first time I'd gone out with all three girls on my own, and we managed to do it twice in one day with the first game requiring that we leave home by 7:30 a.m. 
As I mentioned above, Jason has started working. He's enjoying chipping away at Emily and Jonas' project list a few days a week, and even more than the work I think he is enjoying the 2 mile bike ride to and fro his job! It couldn't be a more convenient location and he couldn't have more flexible and kind bosses! I felt rather emotional the first day he road off. While most days he has been working on homesteading projects that I can't do with the girls, it kind of felt like saying goodbye to my security blanket. But it has gotten easier, as most things do, with a few more days practice. Kali and Alida are great company and a big help (Kali pretty much always and Alida when she wants to be).
Terah is still sleeping a lot. Her days are a string of naps until mid-late afternoon and then she has settled into having a number of evening hours where she is awake and more demanding of attention - wanting to be entertained, fed, changed, walked around, nursed for comfort, etc... She normally finally sacks out close to 10 p.m. and has been sleeping really well at night. I'm still mostly in the recliner with her as that is where we fall asleep together and I can't muster the energy most nights to transition to the bed. I've gotten one or two blocks of sleep closer to 3-4 hours and that has felt wonderful. Most nights I don't get up until about 5 when I need to pump and then if Terah wakes we do the first diaper change of the night. If not, I just let us continue to get each other wet and try to fit in a little more sleep (her diaper is always sogged through by that hour and I've normally leaked milk onto her). Her mornings tend to be her "happy time" where she is relatively content and I can often get in a little morning burst of getting laundry started, food preparations under way for the day, breakfast on for everyone and cleaned up. The older girls have been waking earlier ever since the time change. They even both woke before Terah the other morning and were cuddling with her in bed. Yes, that was one of the "sweetness in abundance" times. Pretty much anytime Terah is with one of her sisters, it's a beautiful site to behold. 
Most days after lunch, I'll put Terah in the pack and Alida in the jogger and Kali and I head off down the road for a walk. I'm treasuring those walks - the exercise, fresh air, time to chat with Kali (and often with Alida as the frequency of those walks turning into a nap for her is decreasing to almost zero). I often think while we are out walking how grateful I am that Kali (and soon it would also be Alida) are not away from our home many hours a week. I can't imagine her missing out on a lot of this time in our family's life together. She feels so central to the workings of our homestead and it seems she packs each day full of learning. And I've also unofficially turned Alida's schooling over to Kali. I'm amazed at how great Kali is at answering Alida's many questions. On the flip side I'm rather appalled at my inability to do the same. I hate what a sucker I was for rewards and how those grades on my report card was my main motivator for learning (which only necessitated short term retention until I aced the test). The other night Alida wanted to know why it gets dark earlier at some parts of the year. I got a little snippet of Kali explaining, complete with a drawing, the reasons to Alida. The video is shaky because, as you can hear in the background, this was during the evening fussy/needy times! John McCutcheon has been helping out some and Terah and I have enjoyed dancing together on a few occasions. In the video Jason is in the background working on a venison broth canning project.
Okay, Terah is starting to squirm in the pack so I'm thinking this particular nap-stint is about to come to a close! Just one more quick note on how happy we are for what a fit homeschooling is for our family right now. I was marveling at what great kids we get to interact with when the girls' friends were over the other day. They often play "birthdays" where each kid gets to choose what everyone does together for a set amount of time when it is their "birthday." They noticed the corn sitting on the dining room table and wanted to help shell some. They got so into it that after lunch M wanted to do that for her "birthday." As the kids were giggling and shelling corn so rapidly it was spraying all over the floor, I felt so in awe of how cool they are! I feel like I'm a better person just by hanging around them - and hopefully having them rub off a bit on me.I should note for the record before signing off that Jason is busy processing chickens today and tomorrow. On Sunday he butchered 27 chickens (6 of them were for a neighbor's customer and one for Emily and Jonas but the rest will find their way to our freezers and canning shelves). It's nice to have lowered the number of non-laying hens and roosters we'll be feeding through the winter.
I keep hoping we'll wrap up some of these projects that are taking up most of Jason's time and he will get in on more baby cuddling time (for his sake, Terah's sake and my sake). I'm thinking we are going to need to start planning it into our days, as the projects just seem to be never ending and while we are wrapping up things earlier in the evenings, that tends to be when Terah is mostly interested in being near her food source just in case she wants another snack. Kali will be cashing in a birthday coupon this weekend for her and Alida to have a double sleepover with Aunt Emily. As soon as I finish this up, I'm going to write "Daddy time with Terah" on the schedule as one of the things we will attempt to carve out time for in their absence.
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