plus her:
So this is me, every single day:
**”Why does gray hair happen? Gray or white is the base color of everyone’s hair. There are pigment cells at the base of each hair follicle that produce the natural dominant color of our youth. Usually around middle age or older, more and more of those pigment cells die and color is lost from individual hairs.”
from the back of the generic raisin bran cereal box I read this morning
I don’t have good genes when it comes to the gray hair situation. Family lore is that my paternal grandma had a gray streak in her hair when she was 17. Uncle Jim was been totally blonde gray since I can remember (probably his 30s?) and my dad wasn’t far behind.
However, I am an eternal optimist. I seriously thought I wouldn’t get the wrinkles heritage that comes from being Irish, English and Danish, the Munk hips, or my mom’s bad eyes. So I, of course, was completely surprised and irritated when the first gray hair started appearing around 27.
I remember discussing this with Adrianne at the time. She, too, was shocked at my gray hair appearances: “Seriously? You’re so young! I don’t have any.” And then I remembered that she is blonde (read: can’t see the gray hair, more frequent dye-ing) and called Tammy (a fellow brunette) who nicely confirmed that she was getting some, too.
And you know what makes it worse?
Kids.
My hair grows all lovely and thick while I’m gestating them and then, at about 3 months, it all falls out. All over said baby (she deserves it), all over the shower, all over my clothes. Gross.
And you know what grows in?
Yep. White, wiry, granny hair.
I hate it. I really can’t think of an aging thing I like less (except, maybe this tortoise-like metabolism). Wrinkles? Not that big of a deal. Sagging stuff? Can be hidden and pushed up. Varicose veins? Can’t see them on the back of calf anyway.
But gray hair really really really makes me feel old. It’s like I can envision the 70 year old staring back at me.
I like the wisdom that that 70 year old has. I like the experiences she’s gained. I like that she’s done potty-training.
I really don’t like her hair.
Faith, let’s be honest, has been extra hard the last few weeks. Lots of crying (especially for nice people who are trying to give me a break by taking her) and NEVER wanting to be put down. In her spare time she’s been…
rolling over (no picture, sorry),
setting the fashion trends for the under 1 set (thanks to Lauren for the super darling Ugg knockoffs):
learning to attack her frog with her hands:
having her first taste of sherbet:
and not nursing:
(this is what looks up at me 75% of the time I’m trying to feed Faith. I took this during a “nursing” session last week.)
Despite hosting preschool at our house this week:
Seth has been completely confounding us with his ridiculous speech. We have serious worries about his ability to understand English.
By way of example:
Emma, frustrated with his taking of her stuff, tries to explain: “Seth please don’t take my stuff without asking. You ruin it!”
Seth: “Emma. I was in Mommy’s tummy last day. Did you know that?”
He is the king of taking 3 different sentence fragments and combining them like they actually make sense: “I was going 3 blocks with Daddy in his bed I am eating french toast.”
Maybe his brain cells are freezing when he’s doing this:
(yeah, it’s 7 am, frost covering the net, and there is snow on the ground, but Seth’s happily jumping on the trampoline)
Jane, despite her overflowing cuteness, only got one (?!) picture taken of her these last few weeks.
This is Jane, watching from the stairs during preschool. She’s got a long, fatiguing, lingering flu and so she was quarantined upstairs while non-family members were present. I caught her sneaking a peek. It’s a bummer when she’s sick because she’s my big preschool helper (awesome at singing the clean-up song, passing out water: “You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit, and assumes the yard duty, or, as she corrected me: “It supe-oh-vise-oh, Mom!” role during free play time.)
Gabe, as usual, was Super-Scouter.
He got his Wolf badge, in half of a year, and while fighting the flu last week, completed enough electives to earn him 2 arrow points. He and his dad, completed this beauty
for annual the Blue and Gold Cub Cake competition. It earned him the Most Stately award.
Continuing in his father’s goal-achieving footsteps, when he heard in Primary that he could check off a Faith in God/Religious knot achievement, he and Emma put together this Family Home Evening re-enacting the Creation. Days 4 and 2 seen here:
Emma was the birthday queen this month. The day of her birthday:
we had coffee cake for breakfast,
the Daines over for donut cake and presents.
For her “friend birthday party” we had an ALMOST sleepover, that included
a Self-and-Mallory decorated birthday cake:
a pizza dinner:
dance dance revolution:
decorated pillow cases:
and breakfast at 10:30 pm, right before everyone went home (ebleskivers, of course):
Ryan and I were slightly surprised at the yelling, wrestling, and spazziness of a bunch of 10 year old girls:
but everyone seemed to have fun.
I successfully completed the 14 Days of Valentines (the relief I feel when that’s over…!)by taking the kids to lunch one at a time. I forgot to take a picture with Jane and Seth at the restaurant, so we did a hold out at home (why do they look so crazy?):
Emma got Pizza Hut
and Gabe wanted Quiznos
I also came up with the best costume idea EVER, for the Albrecht’s First Friday party. The theme was Rockers and we were…
ZZ Top. (We made the beards out of yarn and no one could tell who we were). Go here to see a group picture a la We Are the World, if you want.
I also completely stressed out the whole month over being in charge of the above-mentioned Blue and Gold banquet. (When you’ve attended a total of 6 Cub Pack meetings in your life, you are a little overwhelmed at having to put on the most important one of the year.) It went, of course, completely fine. Here’s a re-enactment of me giving out an award to a deserving Cub Scout:
I ask you: Is there anything sexier than a Cub Scout shirt??
Ryan has lost a crazy amount of weight and finally shaved the beard. He looks about 27, again. Which is probably why he didn’t mind using the Sharpen feature on all of our photos, while I was disturbed by all the forehead wrinkles that kept popping out of my forehead. (I have continued to lose weight as well, with the Biggest Loser contest, but, man, it’s slow…16 lbs in two months. I know, I know, it’s the healthy way to do it, but tell that to all the sad and lonely size 8 jeans in my closet.)
He had a good birthday, he says, despite his wife’s laziness. We did some shopping for things he’d been wanting and then took all the kids to Melt-the-Pot (as Jane calls it) for a birthday dinner. We dressed them all up, left (a screaming) Faith at home and gave long manners lectures as we drove. They were well behaved and we had a fun night.
I realized that Ryan didn’t get a birthday cake, so I whipped up some lemon meringue pie, at about 9 pm that night. Here’s me, giving him his only birthday serenade:
For Valentines Day, (here’re most of the kids in their V-day attire)
we took the kids to the local museum. It was Victorian day and they had fun playing parlor games, making fans and Seth got to dance with the Victorian dancers. He kept asking Ryan “are those weal princesses, Dad?”
That night Ryan and I headed out to dinner.
Kevin, aka The Best Uncle Ever, invited all local cousins over for the evening and we arrived to find this sign:
The kids each received tickets
and cashed them in for chicken nuggets, movies, games and candy.
How awesome is he?
And now we’re caught up. I realize I lost the funny after Seth. Thanks for sticking around anyway!
