Eleven days later we really did have a girl.
Marike Grace.
Marike is the Dutch version of Mary, meaning bitter - and bittersweet is an apt description of my memories of the first four or five months of Marike's life. Yes, she was a gracious gift from God, and we loved her so very much... yet what stands out most from those days is the more or less weekly bundling
up of all five children to go see the MD’s at the breastfeeding clinic, where
we all crowded into a tiny, curtained cubicle and I tried (generally without success)
to keep from bawling over my sweet baby girl’s too slow growth.
What with also homeschooling the oldest three and Wills
needing speech-language therapy, life was busier than ever before.
Sisters
January 31, 2011
As Carole put it so nicely as we filed out of church
yesterday, "Quite the dramas going on in your family!"
I had arrived a half hour late to church due to Baby
creating two messy diapers in quick succession (resulting also in the need for
a whole new outfit), and had no sooner sat down when the sideshow in our row
began. Joseph apparently had a sore eye, and with not-so-subtle moans sat
squinting grotesquely at the ceiling and writhing Uriah Heep-like in his chair.
Wills, meanwhile, who had joined us in the service for the second time ever,
was endlessly popping off his chair to arrange and rearrange the books and
bulletin and his own little self. Of course Jo was too far off to be whispered
to discreetly - and, just as we were trying to deal with him, Baby decided to
start squawking - and the upshot of it all was that M and I had to have a
whispered consultation as to which of us was going to go out, and just who
should all be included in this exodus.
All this in our usual second-from-the-front row. :z
Jim Takes Part in the Dinner Table Conversation
Jim is a third child. That means he has to fight just
to hold the floor for the duration of a sentence. This may be why he talks much
louder than is customarily deemed necessary. As well, the fear of being cut off
mid-sentence may have contributed to a certain panicked choppiness in his
delivery. Because of this, I now and then try to referee the family babble in
such a way that allows a little extra time for him to get his words out.
Tonight at dinner, while everyone was engaged in the
popular family pastime of admiring baby, he managed to insert this word
"in edgewise":
"Someday - "
"Yes, Jim?"
"Some d--ay...when Marike is a mom..." He
smiled his cheeriest Jim-grin at me, clearly glad to be holding my attention,
while mentally composing a sentence that he considered profound.
"Y--ou... and Daddee--ee--ee..." he smiled
fondly at each of us in turn.
"Yes, Son?" I said, grinning back at him,
anticipating his observation that Marike's becoming a mom would make us
"Oma and Opa", and patiently preparing to respond with delight.
"Y--ou and Daddy...." he repeated
painstakingly, then grinned triumphantly, as one reaching the finish line,
"....will be dead!"
My smile turned to a rather rueful chuckle over this
unexpected ending...
March 11
Babes still doesn't like nursing, but she loves me, at
any rate. Remember, you moms, those priceless moments, where at a glimpse of
you your baby's heart seemed to beat a little faster, and she seemed to be
holding her breath - waiting, hoping, for a word or kiss from you? Well,
strangely enough, Marike would rather look up at me just so than drink, so I must
sneak in the drinks when she's sleeping!
It's precious.... but you can't live on love, babes!
The visits to the breastfeeding clinic continued until it
struck me I should get a second opinion on baby’s growth from our own dear
family doctor.
I brought baby in to Dr. D's, and he thought she was
fine. He tried to extract from me a promise that I would quit worrying about
her. That's easier to do with his reassurance, but I still don't like the fact
that I have to nurse her when she's sleeping or she will not nurse at all! Of
course this means she doesn't really ever cry to be fed, which in some ways
makes her a very easy baby. We all just love her to bits. Jims reflected the
other day, "I always wanted to have a cute baby like Marike, but I never
knew I'd actually get one!"
Big Brother
At church, one of Jim's friends kindly observed several
times, "Your baby's really cute."
Rather than thank him for this compliment to his baby
sister, Jims replied pointedly, "Yeah, well, she doesn't like other people
- she only likes US."
I Don’t Know How You Do It
When people used to say things about homeschool moms
like, "I don't know how you ladies do it!" I was happy to accept the
implied compliment. Now my inward reaction is, "You're not kidding! I'm
not sure how people do it, either!"
The Inaugural Camping Trip
Though M and I had both grown up going camping for
family vacations, we had taken a break from camping during the years with all
littles. Now, with a gift from Mom and Dad
providing the means to purchase a tent trailer, and with our older children's too-fast growing up providing the motivation, we decided to take the plunge into family
camping adventures, for better or for worse.
Well, we did it. We survived a camping trip with a
baby, a Strong-willed Warrior, and three other kids. We endured scalding sun
and intense thunderstorms. Our towels never had a chance to dry. Willie ate
sand. Jo roasted fruits and veggies over the fire. We boiled water for dishes.
We ate food that was slightly scorched but still tasted great. We woke up with
the sun (in other words, way too early). We collected empty beer cans.
We had spent days...weeks... months... looking forward
to this trip; "flying up on the wings of anticipation", Anne-like. It
would almost make up for the seemingly inevitable thud, I observed to M, as en
route we commiserated over the forecast of rain, rain, and more rain.
But there was no thud. The weather was iffy, and we had
moments of doubt (as in, "if this rain keeps up, we're leaving"), but
in the end we were were never confined to our shelter for long enough to go
crazy.
So, inasmuch as we did not go crazy and even managed to
have a good time despite some drawbacks, our inaugural camping trip was a
success! There were even some peaceful, restful moments, if you count walks to
the comfort station (especially when I took the long-cut along the beach).
Willie spent a good part of the first couple of days
standing at the road staring at and serenading two little French girls at the
campsite opposite (who were standing on their side of the road, staring back).
Finally their dad brought them over to the empty campsite beside us and invited
Willy to play soccer with them. Naturally Willie was happy to do so, and soon
they were busily chasing after him and the ball...
Of course the older kids were not to be left out, so
eventually Willie and the ball were fazed out, and the bigger kid games were fazed
in. You know - more mature games like "Poison Ivy", wherein you
pretend that Jim is a guy who's touched poison ivy and is trying
"get" everyone with his poison ivy hands, while everyone else has to
run away screaming...
Marike was as super-sweet and cheery as ever, in her
house on wheels.
She wasn't perturbed by the storms... unlike Willie,
who wailed over and over during one thunderstorm, "We hap to doh! We hap
to doh!" (As soon as the rains had passed, however, he tried to explain
away this outburst as mere brotherly protectiveness, by patting Marike
condescendingly and saying, "Baby don't Hike thunderstorms.")
It was so nice to have Mom and Dad camping just down
the lane. We shared lots of cozy campfires and cups of tea, and they were so
sweet as to often pick up the kids for a beach walk while we cleaned up from a
meal, or to oblige the kids with UNO games during rainy spells, or to feed the
baby, or to pitch in on our dishes.
Dad would tinkle his bell whenever they biked by our
site, and all the kids would enthusiastically call, "Hi Opa! Hi Oma!"
:)
