Last week Tuesday

I'm reposting this... an overview of last Tuesday...


7:30 ~ first three children arrive8:00 ~ feed them breakfast8:30 ~ older one is off to school10:30? (i'm already losing track of time ~ ahh! lol) ~ next two children arrive (Darwin gets one baby, Janique gets the other one)10:45? ~ next two children arrive
Somewhere in that time frame, we discover the banans on the banana holder (the hanging thingy) are beginning to peel themselves ~ falling down ~ so we decide to make banana loaf. (Would've done muffins but i don't like cleaning muffin pans, and i'm out of liners).
11:15 ~ one more child arrives ~ Brenden & Reagan will run after him and "try" to keep him out of trouble.
By this point, "time" is kind of a blurr between changing diapers, helping Janique settle the little baby, trying to keep the preschoolers away from the table & dishes until i've actually got lunch ready for them (i'm working on it), helping Reagan & Brenden with Robbie because when he doesn't cooperate, he's more than a handful for either of them, and just in general trying to make sure everyone is doing ok... except, i'm still watching the time because i need to bring one of the 4yr. olds to preschool by 12:45.12:30 ~ Scrambling to figure out who's coming with me, who's staying home with my kids (previously ok'd by the parents either way), getting enough safety seats into the van, shoes on feet, several children out the door, but baby's crying again (can't leave him like that, but i can't really take him along cause his infant seat goes on an attachment that i don't have) ~ ok, "Darwin, please get the kids in the van buckled while i try to settle baby again"... finally decide he's getting close enough to feeding time that it won't hurt to warm a bottle for him ("quickly please Janique ~ yes, i know, there's a pile of dirty dishes in front of the microwave, but hurry anyway" ~ lol)... by now Darwin is back inside, I hand him the baby and bottle, baby seems happy with that, and i'm off. The time in the van says 12:45 ~ i'm thankful it's about 5min. ahead. The drive to preschool is about 7min.Back home in 20min. Everyone was fine. Darwin had trouble burping baby, so Janique took over and did wonderfully. (She LOVES this baby cousin! and i'm seeing her mature so much and becoming more responsible ~ quite a good babysitter really). Darwin is really good with babies (and older children too), but i guess he just hasn't been in the situation too often where I help/ offer suggestions like Janique has been. I think Darwin is probably better with older babies where there's more interaction and action.Anyway, the rest of the afternoon kind of just happened. The older kids played fairly well ~ I held Robbie for a while, hoping he'd fall asleep, but not too determined yet. After a bit (movie was done) i let him play again for a while.About 2:30 the first mom showed up for her two boys. Before she left, the next mom came for her son (who had gone downstairs just minutes earlier, and now came up smelling sour ~ lol ~ so his mom quickly changed him), and during that time my sister showed up for her babies. It was a busy few minutes, but after everyone else had left, my sister chatted with me a few minutes, and really blessed me... she said something like "your family is like a rare gem" referring to how our children are learning to take care of other children, and babysitting and all. I don't always see it that way ~ sometimes i focus on areas where i don't see them being responsible enough (doing their chores, for example), but i guess it's true that they are learning responsibility in other areas too... and mostly doing well. This morning they are playing with the two little ones that are here now... all just "playing" together. So anyway, thank you Mary for the blessing!So after all that commotion, it was pretty quiet with just Robbie. I tried once again to get him down for a nap, and he did finally give in.3:40-ish, I drove Darwin & a neighbor boy to work (since our friends moved away 2 weeks ago, i'm happy to have someone else nearby to carpool with ~ this guy started on Monday).5:00 ~ wake Robbie to take him home since we're going to his town anyway for a 5:30 appt. to do our income tax.I had stuff in the fridge to make for supper, but i was so spent I suggested pizza and Jonathan totally went for it ~ we swung by the pizza place and just hung out while waiting for our order. The kids loved the pizza too... and i loved that i didn't have to cook :-)So there was our very busy day...And Andrew will be here shortly, so i'm off.

Tomorrow should be a relaxing Tuesday in comparison... we think.

But I'm really hoping that the rest of our adoption stuff arrives at the agency tomorrow so that our file can be off to Ethiopia. We're waiting for our payment to arrive (mailed it registered on Wednesday, so if it's not there by tomorrow i'll be a bit nervous), as well as the corrected letter of approval from the province. The last one only took a week, and tomorrow will be two weeks for this one, so i'm feeling a bit impatient.