Robin's Chicks

Nudge The Nest & Pray They Fly

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Sleeping Sadie

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I groan as I get out of bed, temporarily forgetting the prize that summons me from my slumber. As soon as I enter her room, I am reminded and smile at her. Her smile is so big and so automatic, her eyes crinkle and she is unable to hold the pacifier I am trying to place in her mouth. I pick her up, glad to have the time to snuggle with her, while everyone else she knows, sleeps. The inconvenience of being pulled from my bed…forgotten.

As much as I grumble and complain about the demands of breastfeeding, I can’t quit. She loves it so much…to nestle against me with one hand propped up on my chest and her other arm wrapped around my side. She closes her eyes so tightly she looks as though she is faking sleep…playing possum.

Her face is my past and my future. I see my own baby pictures as I look at her button nose and Moon-Pie face, as round as if God drew it with a compass. I see my Grandmother in the arch of her eyebrows, The McNeil Eyebrow- my Grandmother called it. I see my older daughters and know that God didn’t “break the mold” but found one so perfect, He decided to use it three times. I see my sister and my best friend in Sadie’s sleeping profile. Her imitation so perfect I want to whisper a childhood secret in her tiny ear. My mother’s lips on her tiny face make me pray she will speak with the wisdom and kindness of her Grandmother, and use her mouth to worship God with all the fervency and passion my mother continues to show. Sadie stops nursing, milk dribbling down a chin kissed with her Daddy’s dimple and hinting of her Pop Pete.

She sighs.

I sigh to inhale her sweet baby’s breath. I prop her on my shoulder to examine her more closely and to nuzzle the warmth of her cheeks. Sadie Plum. I pray that she will have the tenacity of her namesake, never giving up against all odds and being a loyal Christian, sister, friend, wife and mother. Her hand swipes at my face; before I tuck it into her blanket I see her hands and fingernails are scale reproductions of her Daddy’s. I wonder if she will use them to create, to build, to heal the way he does.

I groan as I rise from my chair to place her back in her crib, her head on my shoulder…her hand on my heart.

Aubrey Said: Ewww Gross…

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You’ve been warned, this is a little grody. Aubrey yelled at me from the bathroom this afternoon, “MOMMA! Come here!” I went running in there to make sure she was OK. As soon as I walked in the door she said, “Ewww, gross. Momma, smell this!” Seriously? You can NOT convince me that having boys is worse than this. GROSS. ME. OUT.

Emma Said: Translation Included

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“I wuv be a big sthisther, buh I hab to wearn to wisten and fowwo da wules. wike a big gull- wike stay in da pence….”
Translation: I love to be a big sister but I have to learn to listen and follow the rules like a big girl- like stay in the fence..

Aubrey Said: Sadie is Special

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We were in the car on the way home from the gym and Aubrey(4)says:
Momma, Sadie(5 mos) has a belly button just like us, huh?
Me: Yep, she does. How’d she get it?
Aubrey: By God. He made her SOOOO special. Sadie is a very special woman to us.

Update: The Moultrie News

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Just in case you were wondering, I am still going to be an online columnist for The Moultrie News. They are totally rebuilding their website and have had a few delays, it should be up in running in the next week or two and I will post the links and info as I get it!

Aubrey Said: You’re Making Me Nuts

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Yesterday’s rainy day activities lead to me saying “CLEAN UP. Pick up your toys. NOW!” “If I have to pick up your markers ONE MORE TIME I’m going to throw them in the trash, do you hear me???” -about 100 times.

By yesterday afternoon, we had ALL had enough of each other. The kids were tired of me telling them to clean up and HEAVEN KNOWS, I was tired of saying it. I was in Aubrey’s bedroom with her, “helping” her to put her books back on her new book shelf The Best Hubby in the Universe just built.

Me: Aubrey pick up your books now! I’ve told you about 20 times, I’m not going to say it again. The next time I say it, I’m going to take ALL of your books out of your room again…remember that?
Aubrey: (growls at me, literally)
Me: I’m serious. You’d better get busy.
Aubrey: (throws her hands up in the air and ROLLS HER EYES) UGH! You are making me nuts!
Me: (giving her the “Momma-stink-eye” which caused her to flash back to the Hot Sauce Debacle of a few days ago…)
Aubrey:(smiles REALLY big) Hee–hee, I’m JUST kidding Momma…You make me GOOD nuts. I LOVE my new bookshelf SO much it makes me crazy nuts, like that Momma. It’s SO cute it’s nuts…hee–hee–hee.

Emma Said: Poo-Poo Head

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Emma has learned a new phrase…poo-poo head. (Responsible party- you KNOW who you are.) This is almost a 4 letter word and definitely the worst word she knows. Our good friend TJ (4) has been hanging out with us a lot this weekend and whenever he and Aubrey get distracted and aren’t giving Emma enough attention she’ll scream at the top of her lungs, “POO-POO HEAD!”

Which leads to a chorus of whiny, nagging voices singing in unison, “Emma said poo-poo head!” (In the tattle-tale-tone-of-voice…you know the one.) We have tried time out, sending her to her room, ignoring her (by ‘we’ I mean me and the two 4 year-olds) and ostracizing her when she talks “ugly.” All to no avail.

Finally, at lunchtime today, Emma said “poo-poo head” one too many times. She wasn’t even calling anybody a name, she just said it for the shock factor. In a fit of desperation, I swept her off of her seat and on to the kitchen counter and did something I’d only heard about before…I grabbed a bottle of hot sauce. Aubrey elbowed TJ at the table and said, “Ohhhh, this ISN’T going to be cute!” I dabbed some hot sauce on my finger, pried her mouth open and put it on her tongue.

Emma’s crying was short lived but she was traumatized enough to tell me about 100 times:
“I not say poo-poo head anymore!”
I’m thinking if she’s repentant it doesn’t count, right?