Sunday, December 7, 2014

Life as a Family of Five

Puzzle Boy's favorite job holding his baby brother.

Well, 7 if you count my parents in the same house. I do feed them! Happy Boy is now 10 weeks old and growing at an amazing rate! He is now about 13 pounds and fitting into 3-6 month clothing. What can I say? The kid loves to eat and I get to take full credit for that heft on his thighs.

7 weeks old

Logistically 3 is not that much harder than 2. Obviously there is more laundry and newborns will sleep deprive you whether they have older siblings or not (although 'sleeping when baby sleeps' is impossible with older kids). I have just started getting back to some little extra projects like...

Making fire starters from egg cartons, shavings and paraffin wax.

and...

Making a new recipe of laundry detergent that makes 12 quarts of concentrate.

This is how I managed to make said laundry detergent.

Honestly Happy Boy is such a good baby that if not for the other two hooligans I would probably get a ton done everyday! Mini Me is blossoming into a preschooler as she just a few months away from turning three. She is talking a lot and enjoys being a 'big girl' including helping Mommy with everything from laundry to cooking. Puzzle Boy will be turning 7 (!) this week and will soon be transitioning from being homeschooled to public school which I will elaborate on after the transition is done. I will say that it was a heart wrenching decision but I am now making peace with it and Puzzle Boy couldn't be more excited for this new experience.


One thing about having 3 children that I find amusing is the comments from strangers when we are out, especially in the grocery store. If I had a dime for every "You have your hands full!" I could buy them some manners. Now I am sure some are just remarking but it makes me realize that 2 children is still the accepted normal. But, I enjoy just flashing a smile and replying with a hearty "Gladly!" and moving on.


Being winter I have found it is really hard getting out to the animals with a baby in the house. Ashamedly I will admit my dad has been doing a lot of my chores for me for which I am most grateful. We haven't been getting any eggs since we have been letting the chickens free range so I am assuming that they are laying eggs in inconspicuous places. Once we have butchered all the roosters we will clean out the barn and stall, make new nesting boxes and roosts and I will then let the hens out around lunch time everyday so that they can free range but also hopefully lay their eggs in the barn! I would really like eggs from them again seeing as that is what they are for.


So all in all Montana Man and I are exhausted from our life and caring for little brood but are happy to do so. I am so looking forward to Christmas as this will be the first year that we will be staying home and celebrating just us. Until then I will be getting the house decorated and creating the perfect recipe for gluten free cinnamon rolls which I will be sharing. December is always a busy month around here because of Puzzle Boy's birthday and the holidays but also because I always feel compelled to 'wrap up' the year. Next year I would truly like to get all my projects out of the way so we can spend the month of December only doing things we want to do. We'll see!

Til next time.

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