Raeford, actually.

I love this little boy of mine. He's funny, he's smart, and he's trouble.

A couple of stories to illustrate.

Lately, he's taken to putting his mouth over my arms or legs. Whole mouth, with all those shiny, new teeth. This worries me, legitimately so, because he could bite off my limbs--or at least take a nice sized chunk. But, he doesn't bite, and I would just shove his head out of reach of my limb.

Till one day, I got curious and waited to see if he would bite. He didn't. Instead he got a goofy grin on his face and tried blowing raspberries. Who taught him that?

Oh, right, that was me.

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Baby-proofing the house must be an art form, and we're still working on it. Just when I think we're doing good, Raeford learns a new way to get into stuff. Take the peach vinegar, for example.

Mr. Graff made peach vinegar and let it ferment on the porch. I put it up out of reach and let Raeford run in and out of the house because I'm too pregnant to want to go to the park everyday, and Raeford is too little to not want to be outside. I thought it was a nice compromise.

Well, I heard glass shatter on the concrete and knew Mr. Graff's peach vinegar had gone the way of all the earth.

I ran out and picked Raeford up, but he had still managed to cut one of his little fingers on the broken Mason jar. Cuts on little people are upsetting to me, but was he upset about the cut? the blood? Nope. He was mad at Mom for taking him away from the broken glass. He thrashed his feet violently in the air then went limp and threw his arms up to wiggle away.

But Mom was going to win this battle. I hauled him to the bathroom, held him down and put on a CVS band-aid from the cupboard. Then, thinking that he might get one band-aid off, I put on a second for good measure.

For the rest of the afternoon, Rae would come over to me, whimper, and point to his bandaged finger as if asking for the band-aid to be removed. It was sad looking, but I was not persuaded. He did rip them off only to repeat the bleeding-all-over-the-bathroom scene, so I put masking tape over the next two band-aids.

Take that.

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My last story, though, is the favorite. 

Lately, I've been sanding, staining, and sealing book shelves for our study. I take the shelves out to the porch in the morning and Raeford watches me work through the glass sliding doors. 

One day, I'm going to town on my project. I sand two six foot boards and put a coat of stain on each. I'm so engrossed in the project that Raeford stops trying to convince me to come back inside. Instead, he reaches up to the door handle and locks me out. 

I don't notice until I clean up and get ready to come back inside. Then I notice. Rae is barely tall enough to reach the handle, but he has locked me outside. Then I notice that Raeford has climbed into and gotten stuck in his bouncy seat. He has both legs in one leg hole--and can't get out. Oh, and the front door is locked. And the windows are locked. 

I also notice that I have no keys, no shoes, no phone, and am not really dressed to go out, anywhere. How did my 15 month old son lock me out of my house? I start walking towards the office then realize it would be better to ask my neighbor for help. She loans me her phone and offers me a ride to and from the office. Then we watch Raeford through the glass and wait for the porter to unlock my door. 

All I could do was call my mother-in-law and laugh. 

Peaches and Manassas

Squid, Steve, Rae, Mr. Graff, and I went a peach-pickin'. 

Squid played in the trees. 

And we got about 40 lbs of peaches. 

Getting ready to go, Rae attacked a Pringle. 

Then fell asleep holding one. 

He liked feeling the peach fuzz. 

And Mr. Graff made lots of yummy peach things: peach habanero jam, cobbler, peach sauce, and canned peaches. Oh, and vinegar.

I like how red the centers look. 

Everyone got to help; Squid and Steve sliced peaches. 

Icie took pictures. 

Peach sauce (something like applesauce, for peaches) looks like vomit. 

Bubbling vomit on the stove. 

Rae loved Auntie-time.  

And then we all took a nap. 

We went to Manassas, too. 

It turns out that neither the Union nor the Confederates had any idea of what they were doing. 

In fact, the battle could have gone either way for most of the day. 

But Stonewall Jackson rallied his boys, charged a Union line, and stole four Union cannons--

because nobody thought to stop him. 

And the Confederates won. 

Did you know that the Confederates named their battles after railway junctions or towns? 

The Union called this the First Battle of Bull Run, after the nearest river.  

I think it's funny that the battle site is referred to by its Confederate name, Manassas. 

That's okay; Virginia also has a Robert E. Lee Parkway.

We ended our day with mustaches. Even Widget got one. 

Rae's mustache was attached to his pacifier,  

and Squid need more than just lip fur. 

Pickle Splash

Squid says when a bomb is launched in the Navy, the crew will say, "pickle". When it lands, they say, "splash". So bomb goes out, "pickle," lands, "splash". Pickle-Splash. When baby comes, he'll be my pickle-splash.

~ : ~ : ~ : ~ : ~ : ~ : ~

Shopping at IKEA, a lady arrested me with this question:

"When are ya going to BUST OUT?"

I look that pregnant. I feel that pregnant, but I'm not ready to bust out just yet. I've been routinely measuring (fundal height measurement) about 4-6 weeks ahead, for months. I would measure myself daily just to confirm that I was not crazy. Fundal height measurement, though there is a lot of room for error, is generally within a +/- 2 week window for the vast majority of moms. Rae was 0-2 weeks ahead for all of that pregnancy. Beyond measuring large, this baby moves A LOT more than Rae did.

So, I did get the ultrasound.

I liked seeing Widget move. He (yes, I did find out I'm having a boy!) didn't hold still for the tech at all. I could feel him turning, punching, and kicking and then WATCH it at the same time. Now it's a lot easier for me to understand what's happening when I'm feeling it. Makes more sense. Two sets of feet in my ribs really is Widget lying transverse and kicking for all he's worth.

He was about a week ahead and weighed four and a half pounds-ish.  Pretty good for a 32 week fetus. I liked watching the tech take measurements. Each measurement would correspond with an estimate for gestational age. So, like his head measured at 35 weeks, 6 days and his legs measured for an older fetus, too. Big head, long legs. That's my baby. Overall, he evened out to about what a 33 week fetus would be expected to look like, about a week ahead.

With this pregnancy, I try to remind myself that the good days are more frequent than the counting-down-the-hours-till-Mr.-Graff-gets-home kind of days. Mr. Graff is good about reminding me to take care of myself, do yoga, eat, sleep. He says that I am more frustrated about what I cannot do than he is. I'm glad he's there for me.

So, since I look ready to bust out, lots of people ask me when I'm due. I hate telling them November. November seems far away and inevitably they look surprised. Whoops. I think I'm going to start saying Halloween because that seems a lot closer.

Widget wiggled down and buried his head in my hip,
then refused to move no matter how much the tech bopped his head.
So, you see the back of his head and arm blocking her in his pictures. 

I'm ready for my Pickle-Splash.

Pregnancy, so far

I feel like I'm ready to explode baby. 

Just not yet. 

So, in the last few weeks we've been back and forth on the twin thing. Am I/ Am I not? The real answer is, I have no idea. Which leads to my next thought: ultrasound. I've been opposed to ultrasound for a long time. I just don't want one. I'm also opposed to hospitals, doctors, and IVs--things that most people don't think much about.

After Rae was born, the nurse filling out paperwork at the ped's office kept asking which hospital Rae was born at. 

"He was born at home." 

"Yes, but which hospital?" 

My choices are unconventional. Though, not that many decades ago, they would be fairly normal. Just saying. Back the ultrasound. Since we do have the technology and Widget is big enough that I am not worried about what exposure to an ultrasound will do to her, I'd rather know that I am having twins before they are born. 

I like Mr. Graff's bus driver, Judy. I waddle down to drop him off most mornings and wait outside when he gets dropped off in the afternoons. 

"You're getting big," Judy says, "and not due until November?" 

"Yup, got a couple more months left." 

"Are you sure it's just one baby in there?" 

"Not sure at all." 

One baby would be nice. 

But I'd like to know how Widget can have two sets of feet in my ribs at the same time.