still kicking

here i am poking my head back out of the sand.. it's been awhile!  i hope you'll excuse the long silence, whose cause you've no doubt heard:  baby #3!  due date, march 23, 2013, three days and five (?!) years after c's original due date.
 
i can't possibly catch up on on the last three, four, six (?) months, so that will have to wait -  probably till this baby turns five =p  for now, i just wanted to record a few thoughts..
 
#1.  God provides.  when that first test came up positive, i knew i had about two weeks before i'd be down for the count.  i tried to make some preparations, stocking up on trader joe's meals, doing some laundry, getting in a last blackberry-and-flower-picking excursion with the girls.  the funny thing about memory though, at least for me, is that i never quite remember what it's like to feel lousy till it happens, and it's forgotten nearly as soon as it passes.  i remember the facts of course, spending 16 hours a day in bed or on the couch, microwaving soup or noodles or kimchi (oh yeah) at midnight or 3 or 5 am, having a day's goal of getting a shower or taking out the trash.. i'll spare you the rest of the details. 

naturally, any kind of activities with the girls stopped abruptly.  in fact, most activity on my part stopped, period =p  and here's what amazed me:  meals, childcare, even money appeared out of nowhere, better than i could have planned, had there been a way to.  i can't count the number of times when i'd be looking at the day or the week with some despair, wondering what i was going to do with the girls, when some sweet friend would come pick them up and take them out for most of the day, or offer to share babysitters for an afternoon, or show up with an extra casserole.  i never would have made it without my surrogate mom, m, who brought me home-cooked chinese food two or three times a week for months.
 
on the financial side, moving into a more expensive ground-floor apartment (which happened in june), combined with not working for weeks on end is not exactly the way to solvency, but once again, the Lord provided, without my even thinking to ask really.  our new apartment required a much smaller deposit than our old one, putting forgotten money in our pockets, then ben got a completely unanticipated raise at the start of his second year, an unexpected monetary award at work, a unlooked-for travel reimbursement, to name a few things.
 
#2.  i married a good man.  of course, we all knew that already =), but he endured two months of loneliness, chaos, and just plain mess, without a word of complaint.  i don't think we had a family dinner all together for a month or more.  evenings were the worst for me, and i was often in bed before the girls were down.  on days he'd have to stay late, he'd come home to me on the couch, the house unkept, dishes undone, and have to take care of girly bedtime (a lot of times i couldn't make it through a bedtime story without running out) before scrounging around for his own late-night dinner.  so many saturdays and sundays he'd take them on some excursion or to church and lunch, and i would just sleep and eat and savor the quiet.  he took over completely when g&g nicholson came to visit for a week, adding tour guide and meal planner to his resume, almost completely without me.  a few weeks ago, he looked around at the living room and said to me, 'well, as the mommy starts to feel better, we need to re-establish some standards around here.. '  haha, that was an understatement.. what a patient man.  we love our daddy in this family! 
 
#3.  kids can do a lot of things.  a lot of things themselves, i should add.  of course you never wish for your mother to be incapacitated, but it surprised even me how little the girls actually need me to do things for them.  when put to it, two three- and four-year-olds can get their own meals (we're talking yogurt, granola bars, dried fruit, cheese), cheerfully fold and put away their own laundry, entertain themselves for hours at a time with crafts and books and imaginary play, even wash themselves with the exception of their hair.  and of course, the usual tooth-brushing, dressing, cleaning up after themselves (sort of).  now please don't go reporting me to family services ;-)  i just mean to say that they adapted amazingly well to 'mommy's not feeling better', as lu put it, relishing all the time with friends, and making the best of it in a way i'm not sure most adults would. 

 #4.  remember the sick.  i, like most of us i think, usually take it for granted that i'll have plenty of physical and mental energy to do the things i mean to.   i don't want to forget the thought that crossed my mind the one and only time i vacuumed the apartment during those foggy days:  'this thing is so heavy and so much trouble.. when this is over, i'm going to volunteer to clean house for some old lady or other.  there's no reason old or sick people should have to do this!'  there's nothing like physical illness to bring us back to reality on our human frailty.  i've done nothing to deserve my good health.  i'd better make good use of it!

we're in a different stage now, thankfully.  at 20 weeks, i'm feeling much, much better (though i had to interrupt this post to heat some dumplings at 6 am - been up since 3:30 with ben leaving for an interview =p).  and the baby has been kicking for some weeks now =)  we're in the heat of interview season, which also, thankfully, will be drawing to a close in a few weeks.  but that is a story for another time.. =)