After dinner tonight, my husband took Rachel to her fiddling lesson, which left Hannah, Little Brother and I with some time alone. Hannah suggested that I give LB a bath at the same time as her, and I did. Then I got them both in their pajamas and we sat and read books together. I had been organizing my office, so I showed her a book I had found. It was a Dr. Suess “Me, Myself, and I” book that I had filled out when I was eight. On the page listing what I wanted to be when I grew up I had written: “Artist/cook/nurse/sailor/farmer/dog trainer/teacher/carpenter/mother/nun/artist/dancer.” It’s a bit weird that I put artist and dancer in there and left out singing since I can’t dance or draw, but I can put a few good notes together. And I’m not sure where sailor came from. Nun I can totally understand, since I wanted to be Julie Andrews. But get this. When I read the list to Hannah she got all flustered and “No, not a nun. They kill their children.”

Holy Moly. Who has she been talking to?; and I guess when I promised the priest who married us in an interfaith ceremony that I would raise Catholic children I lied. Big time. I’m raising an anti-nunlite.

In other news, I’ve got these big plans to write a three part series chronicling my pregnancy, labor, and post-partum period. I see though that it’s late June already and you are yawning out there thinking about it. Yes, you. But I will persist (yes, I will) with this plan, because I am weirdly ambitious about tedious things. Or maybe that’s just called compulsive. And I want to write about fluids. Yes, fluids. I don’t know how I can write about these things without including fluids.

The girls and their Dad just returned from a father-daughter camping trip with their Dad. This means that I had three days at home alone with the baby. I haven’t had this much time alone in this house - ever. Except that I wasn’t really alone. But it somehow felt like I was alone. This pretty much defines having three kids, I think. Time alone isn’t really time alone anymore. It means having one child with you instead of three. And that’s okay. Anyway, in between feedings and bonding time, I went on a huge compulsive kick. I was on an organizing frenzy. I mean, I was on fire. It was like I was possessed. I’d rock the baby and then get up and clean the garage. I’d play with the baby and then get up and clean a closet. On and on. But it was great. I soaked up baby, too. And through it all I watched movie after movie. I’ve pretty much exhausted all the good movies On Demand has to offer. I could talk movies with you for hours. (If you haven’t seen the Great Debater, see that; but don’t see Fool’s Gold, that was horrible; and the movie Fame is actually worth re-watching if you have time.)

Anyway, I was working hard until the last two hours before the fam came home. They arrived late on Saturday night and we tucked them in bed. It was great to have them home, but sort of jarring, too, after three days of not talking much. Now we have the whole summer ahead of us. I will have all three kids at home and the learning curve really gets big. It seems having three kids has made me suddenly awesome at efficiency and compulsiveness, but I feel like I have to learn how to be a good parent all over again. The only way I can describe it is that I need to learn how to juggle with the attention I give my kids. Another way to describe it is that I am a small party person (which is true) that needs to learn how to mingle at a big party. It’s quite fun, really, just a stretch, and I want to get better at it.

Because I don’t want to become a nun and kill my children or anything. (WTF?!!!)