Twizzlers, Processed Meats and Lemonade...

At nearly 19 weeks I am in full swing with all my weird cravings. My sweet husband puts up with them, indulges them a little,  and discourages them when necessary. It's often necessary.

Meg was caramel apples and spaghetti. When I say spaghetti, I mean, three times a week, spaghetti. My mom was very patient with this, and obliged me. The rest of the family still has a hard time choking down spaghetti, over 20 years later, and a family dinner of spaghetti and meatballs never occurs where someone doesn't mention my obsession.

 Kenzie was this peanut butter ice cream that was so good, it made you wanna slap your mama (I have never used that phrase in my life, but that's how good that stuff was!)  and canned Chef Boyardee (gross - but my Grandma Karcher had just died, and it so reminded me of her).

Jonah was all about lemon pie, but my usual need for some sort of pasta left me instead with a severe aversion to anything with red sauce. Jenna was maraschino cherries and barbecued pork ribs. As I have mentioned, we live in an area where there are no stores open late. This meant that any late night cravings, such as the cherries would have to be taken care of by someone who had access to a grocery store. I actually made my sister go buy me maraschino cherries and take them to my husband's work so he could bring them home to me at the end of the night.  I have no idea why.

Ah Kolbe - the Mexican restaurants probably quivered with a mixture of fear and anticipation of a big check when I frequented them... and the cole slaw - still makes me crave it when I think about it.

Luke Christopher wanted raw green peppers and Taco Bell. Prior to this I had never eaten a raw green pepper in my life - didn't like them cooked, either. I still totally love them, though. Thanks, Lukey!

Benjamin, the little darling, had me running to Dairy Queen on a nearly daily basis for a banana cream pie blizzard. I decided that was okay because I also couldn't get enough salad. Caleb - oh my. The bridge mix addiction was BAD. Then I was diagnosed with gestational diabetes and no longer cared what I was craving. I ate mostly salads, with enough protein to keep me from being nauseous, and BANANAS like crazy. Often accompanied by sugar free jello and peanut butter, which usually is one of my aversions.

My sweet little twins, I don't remember if I craved anything with them. I am not sure I was even paying attention to that - I was so nervous and nauseous the whole time, I don't think I had cravings. This baby however, has made his or her preferences loud and clear. This child wants meat. Not lean turkey or anything healthy. He/she wants pepperoni. And pastrami. And capicola. Kielbasa!And any other spicy processed meat you can think of. I was watching Diners, Drive Ins and Dives last night. Guy was eating an all beef hot dog topped with pastrami, sour crout, and swiss cheese. I was salivating. I had to make Doug change the channel before I sent him out (which, here would mean to a whole other town where stores stay open past 9pm) and get me the stuff to make that sandwich. Oh my...I am still thinking about it. How twisted is that, though? Processed meats? I mean, I have nothing against them ordinarily. I certainly would not say I have ever been hungry for any of them before, though.

The other very horrible craving has been apple fritters. Our grocery store makes the BEST APPLE FRITTERS IN THE WORLD. And I am in there almost daily. To my credit (ahem), I have only allowed myself to purchase them twice in nearly 19 weeks of pregnancy. And I can't eat the whole thing - they are huge. But so, so delicious. They have loads of apples and plenty of cinnamon. The outside is all crispy and the inside is all soft and wonderful. You want one now, don't you? They are so good, and I have always loved them, but I have never had dreams about them before.

I just wrote an entire post about food. I am not sure that even pregnancy is enough cause to write and entire post about food, but you will have to forgive me.

Bed Hogs...

In my 21 years of parenting I have discovered that there are three main types of bed hogs. Yes, I am the mom (we are the parents) that let their children climb in bed with them for just about any reason. Bad dream, tummy ache, fever, lonely, wanting snuggles...you name it.

The first type of bed hog is the "heat seeker".  This is the child who will cling to you, burrow into you and somehow find you in the bed no matter how you try to evade her. My first heat seeker was my daughter Meg, now 21 years old. She would climb in bed with me (actually, I never bothered to put her in her own bed, even though she had one),  and just go straight for the throat. Literally. I would wake up in the mornings with downy soft, blonde baby hair tickling my nose because she would fit the back of her neck sideways over my throat. I have no idea how I endured this, because I am a little claustrophobic, but I actually enjoyed it. She was my baby. I was going to school full time and working several jobs, so I soaked her up every second I could, even if that was while we were sleeping.

She doesn't sleep with me anymore - she's kinda huge. I have a new heat seeker - 7 year old Luke Christopher. He doesn't climb in with us often, but when he does, you know you are in for a long night. He burrows. He clings. He plasters himself right up against you. Lukey is going through a growth spurt right now, and having the bad dreams that seem to accompany growth spurts in children his age. We pull him in, and his dad scoots over as far as he can to accomodate for the big boy climbing in between us, and he puts his sweet head on my arm, and I know I am trapped until morning. There is no escape, even if I ease my arm out and scoot away, he will find me in his sleep, and burrow in once more.

The next kind of bed hog is what I like to call "the sprawler". Four year old Benjamin is one such bed hog. Climbing into bed with us, usually under the guise of needing to snuggle, as soon as he falls asleep, he flips sideways, so his head is in the middle of his dad's back, and his feet are kicking me. No matter how many times we rearrange this child, he always flips back to his sprawl position. This too, makes for a long, uncomfortable night. We have tried putting him back in his bed, too - but if he wakes up and catches you LOOK OUT! He is kinda mean when woken. So it's not really worth the effort, especially if he manages to wake the third kind of bed hog...

Yebbi - aka Caleb, our 2.5 year old, is the worst kind of bed hog. He sometimes wakes in the night, so we bring him into our room before he can wake the other kids. He loves being cuddled. Until he falls asleep. Then he is ALL OVER THE PLACE. This kid does NOT like sharing a bed. He wasn't one to be held while sleeping as a baby, either. He wanted to nurse, and then lay down in his own space. Fine by me! His bed was within arms reach, close for me, alone in his space for him. He is still the same. He wants to sleep in our bed. But, he doesn't want us in it. While the other kids would not want to sleep without us, he would much rather be in our bed, and he is just fine you go find whatever empty slot there is, bed wise. All the better so he can toss and turn at will. He doesn't sprawl. Yeb still sleeps with his legs tucked under and his butt in the air. I love that. But, he doesn't want you, your blanket, arm or hair touching him while he sleeps. He will go to great lengths, apart from actually leaving the bed, to not be touching anyone, including just pushing you repeatedly in an effort to scoot further away.

While we have had many, many nights with a bed hog of one type or other, we never send a child away. We both know that all this...this glorious existence where we are the parents of small children, will be over all too soon. I hate that thought. I think all parents do. We've been incredibly blessed. We've been parents of small children far, far longer than most people these days. I'm still not ready for it to be over. So, when they come creeping into our room at night we never, ever send them away. We pull the covers back, tuck the bed hog between us. Ask them if they are scared. Check for temperatures, and snuggle them in. Tell them they are safe, mommy and daddy are right here. Breathe that magical scent of a small child. And are grateful for the long, sweaty, crowded night of nurturing a tiny soul who needs us that night. And thank God for the opportunity.

What I Want For All the Mommas

Today was a weird day. It was the March For Life in Washington DC. The March remembers the 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision that effectively made abortion legal. My 14 year old daughter was at the March. She was our family representative this year. So, I spent the day watching the March, tweeting and texting her, and trying to get the media to pay attention, or forgoing the media altogether, get the word out via social media.


Interspersed with all of this was my usual day of schooling and mothering. I was privileged to spend most of the day with my five sons, aged 13 all the way down to 2. Here are a couple of the conversations I had with them today:

Benny, age 4: "Momma, Does God laughs because you and I are in true love and He is happy about all us kids?"
Yes, my Benny, I believe He does...

Later, when we were doing our teeth-stories-prayers-bedtime snuggling Benny says; "Mom, are you snuggling my brain?"
"I sure am. I love your brain." says I.
"Well, that's horrible! Stop it! I am trying to focus!" (he was telling me stories).
"Mom, know what I am gonna do when I grow up? I am going to be a race car driver and win lots of money, and buy a sucker!" I love a boy who knows the value of a dollar.

All this time, Yebbi was rolling all over us, intermittently barking and counting "one, two, fee, four!" or yelling "ninjago!" Ah Yeb, when will you learn to talk? Or at least do more than bark?

Luke, age 6, was at his lego table, building away. He brought one of his hero factory/ninjago creations over to me and says, "Mom, this is a girl. Know how you can tell?" he says to me with a sly, conspiritorial look on his face. "No, how?" I feel compelled to ask, even though I am a little afraid of the answer - this boy likes women, ya'll, and he's observant. Or so I thought: Luke grins and points to the two round, but up and down shapes on the front of the figure. "Bra!" he whispers to me so the babies don't hear him. A minute later he is back with a boy hero factory/ninjago creation, and the two figures are held together in what looks like a pretty risque embrace. Luke says to me, again in that conspiritorial whisper, "Look Mom, they're kissing. Isn't that romantic?"  He had me laughing as I remembered days of Barbie and Ken, and all the "romantic" situations we had imagined them in, however his tone was actually trying to find out whether his little lego creations were being romantic. He was on a fact finding mission! My beautiful, sweet, ding dong, woman loving boy. He is going to get his heart broken plenty, that is for sure.

This day had it's challenges, not the least of them the lack of coverage of the March by the media. One of the goals of Catholic social media this weekend was to try and get people to understand why the abortion issue is so important. This, these silly moments in my day, the thrill of realizing how funny, sweet, loving, and hilarious my children are...the absolute joy that zings through my body when they say something funny, or declare that we are in "true love", or even step on my head when I am trying to listen to brother's stories...this. This is what I want for every momma. This is simple, basic mothering. It doesn't cost a thing. This loss of it, though. The loss of these moments is something you can never get back if you throw it all away. No one's life is perfect, but every life is worth living. Every little moment of that little life is a treasure. Abortion robs a mother, a child, a father, a family of all of these little moments. It can even make the moments that come after so bittersweet. Please, if you are considering abortion, or know someone who is, email me, or someone else, or contact a local pregnancy center for help. There are all kinds of choices. The best choices will never rob you of the joy of your child.