Zane's 3rd birthday party!

Everyone gathered to celebrate BIG ZANY! Zane's best friend cousin Hallie, accompanied by family, was in attendance.

Baby Scarlett was excited for the party, too!

 First order of business, get the kids decorating the cake!  Everyone stripped down to their undies and got a knife.  I made a big batch of red (ish...) fluffy frosting and made some eyeballs with the intent that the kids could make an Elmo cake for Zane.  We let the kids go at it, and with plenty of red dye, skittles, and eyeballs, this is what they proudly presented:

What IS this thing?!

 It's so ugly it makes Scarlett cry.  And the rest of us laugh until tears.

Next... presents!

Zane in his fantastic Super-Guy costume from Auntie Lisa.

 Most kissable Super-Guy ever!  Oh my gosh I can't resist his manly charms!

 And last to blow out the candles.

Maybe we need a little help from big brother.

Happy birthday 3 year old boy!

This little man brings so much good cheer into our family.  I call him my "Happy Boy" and he has very much adopted that moniker.  I often ask him "What are you doing down there in the basement, Zane?" and he'll answer "I just bein' a happy guy, Mom!"  He is rarely, so rarely, fussy, needy, or cranky. Zane can entertain himself for seemingly infinite lengths of time, singing to himself, telling himself long stories complete with sound effects, apparently hilarious because he laughs at his own jokes mid-narrative.

After a summer in the sun, usually in a state of total undress (can't keep clothes on this kid for any length of time!), Zane is one honey-brown little boy, with blonde-highlighted sticky-up hair and a permanent look of exuberant surprise.  He runs on strong sturdy legs and clenched chubby fists and a scowl of focused determination. Did I mention his feet are huge?  He grew out of his size 11s this week... so now he and Zoe wear the same size!

To the confusion of randomly approached unfamiliar adults, he proudly announces that his name is ZANY and that really fits him quite well.  He is one crazy, noisy, busy kid.  He really didn't start talking in earnest until about 2/3 of the way through his second year, and now he is making up for lost time. A constant stream of near-shouting narrative and exclamation fills our home from dawn until dusk, punctuated occasionally by impressively formed sound effects.  

Zane's favorite toy is a plastic hammer.  He is rarely found without one of his hammers to "do my work!"  Except maybe when he's outside, and then he's always got a stick or two clutched in each hand, brandished and banged with wild, noisy, joyful abandon.

Zane knows the last word to every phrase of our Declaration of Independence memorization. All the other words, he points out often, can be easily replaced by his favorite fill-in words "What-ay-what-ay-self-evident!"

In the last month, Zane has started coming up to me, climbing into my lap, and throwing his arms around my neck.  Nose to nose he declares "I love you, Mommy!  I love you! I kiss you Mommy!" and then he peppers me with delicious, sticky boy kisses.

He also love love loves his "Baby Van." At the grocery store, he will often walk up to passing old ladies and shout, pointing to my belly "DIS MY BABY VAN!!  HE COME OUT SOMEDAY! Uh-HUH!" He pets and kisses and shouts at my belly all the day long.  I can't wait for him to meet his baby brother.

Whenever he leaves my presence, Zane cheerily shouts to me his travel intentions "I goin' downstairs Mom! I'll be back soon, Mom!  See ya later, Mom! Bye, Mom!"  Yes, this happens nearly every time he leaves the room, and I never tire of hearing him.  See ya later, Zany. Happy Birthday!

I Am Pregnant

In case you didn't pick up on this earlier, I am pregnant.

Here is me at 33 weeks.  My belly is gigantic, still measuring about two weeks big, but I feel grateful this last few months I have been feeling great.  I haven't gained too much weight, probably thanks to daily swimming controlling the swelling this summer, thank you neighborhood pools! I am generally sleeping better this time around than any of my other pregnancies, too, for which I am very, very grateful. 

All of my kids have had distinctive personalities in the womb.  Little Van is no exception. This is the squirmiest baby ever.  He moves and wiggles and kicks and punches constantly!  I love it! At his 20wk ultrasound the tech kept laughing because she couldn't get a shot of his head.  She said she had never had a baby so wiggly that she literally couldn't get a lock on him, it took about a dozen tries.  So it sounds like I'm going to be a very busy mom in about a year.

All the kids are NUTS about Baby Van! Especially Zane.  He probably talks about the baby thirty times a day, and is constantly running up to hug and kiss my belly. Zoe already has vast plans about how she will be babysitting once the baby comes.  Jed is excited to share a room with the baby once he is grown enough.

And a gratuitous matching shot because we are so cute together.

Zoe's Birthday

We had a quiet at-home Sunday party on Zoe's actual birthday.  At her request, we made a fluffy pink princess cake.  She helped decorate it and couldn't stop squealing and gazing joyfully at it all evening.

 Blow out the candles, Zoe!

 And of course licking off the princess.

Since we didn't have any family available that evening, Zoe was totally on board with having our friends the Woods and their two boys over for her very feminine party.  Because she is the coolest kid ever.

A giant pile of presents ready to be opened.

Jed had been shopping garage sales for weeks and weeks to get Zoe just the perfect gift.  He spied this little stuffed white unicorn, which Zoe is insanely wonderfully crazy over. Jed is just like his dad, he is an AWESOME gift giver.  He earns all his own money for chores and spends a ton of time looking for just the right thing that will make his sister or brother happy.  He is such a cool kid!  And look at Zoe's happy face!

I bought Zoe puppies.  

 She liked them!

 The theme of most of her gifts, however, was her BIG gift, which was a complete rearranging of our bedrooms and now she gets the top bunk in a room with Zane. Jed and I found a bunch of darling pillows for her bed.  Her Great-grandma Janete sent her some super cute girly Minnie-mouse sheets.  The pillows were a HUGE HUGE hit.  I am pleased to say that I think I spent three dollars on Zoe's birthday this year.  Thank you garage sales.

 This is actually a sweet little book for Baby Van, sent from Granny Zo'An, but everyone loved it so much already.

 A baby doll from Granny and Poppa.  Zoe squealed "She has brown eyes just like me!!!" when she opened her up.  She named her baby Isabelle and carts her around everywhere.

 I didn't get photos, but Zoe also got a darling "first princess" Belle doll from her Auntie Lisa and she has been so happy with these two new dollies! This little girl has a strong maternal streak and it makes her mommy proud.

Five-year-old Zoe Ann Stanfill

 This beautiful creature is my five-year-old daughter.  My long, honey-skinned, strong minded joyful runner.  Her sunny, affectionate personality hasn't changed at all since she was this happy little flower:

She still emerges from her room every morning with a leap and a grin, a hug for her mom, a little "newborn" baby of some variety cradled tenderly in her arms.  This girl overflows with love and care for other people.  She revels in the strength and capability of her strong, lithe body.  She runs and jumps and rides and swims and embraces every bit of her self.  She makes and keeps friends as easily as breathing. Whenever she runs, she laughs and squeals with joy. She reads little books with gusto, sleeps deeply, strewn across her bed, and sings her heart out all day long.  She overflows with passionate emotion for everything in her life, and in the best way.

Probably my favorite part of Zoe, though, is that she self-identifies as a person who serves others.  She LOVES to help.  Everyone. Any time. Eagerly, with total enjoyment of the act. Just this afternoon she crept up to me on the bed, eyes alight, grin pasted on cheek to cheek.  "Guess what, Mom!"  What Zoe?  "Look behind those towels, and you will see I did a SERVE!"  Sure enough, she had sorted out my laundry and folded my washcloths while I wasn't looking.  

She has an eye for service opportunities.  She gets her brother toys, she carries dishes over to the table, she hugs people who are sad, she befriends children who are lonely, she rubs tired feet and backs, she helps cook dinner, she cleans up other people's messes and unlatches little brother from his car seat.  If you ever deprive her of an anticipated act of service, watch out, because you will have a storm of tears on your hands. She tells me every day the ten thousand ways she has already planned to serve mom and her new brother after the baby is born. This girl frankly loves to serve. When you ask her, she will tell you outright "I am like Jesus because I do serves!"

I've never met a woman full of so much love as my little Zoe Ann.  There are no words for the feelings of joy and pride and honor I have to be her mother.  She is a truly remarkable person.

 Happy birthday, special girl.

Dill

Zoe's BIG bubble party

This year, since we didn't go to Montana for the month of July like we usually do, Zoe got to have her first "friends" birthday party.  Talk about excitement!  We settled on a "slip 'n slide and bubbles" theme.  All the girls wore their swimsuits and the whole party was in the backyard.

As has become customary, we had a birthday pan"CAKE" breakfast with all her friends.  Everyone gets a candle and enough insanely sugary toppings to make any child's heart beat faster. "WHAT?!  I get CHOCOLATE SAUCE on my pancake?!"  

 This was the first time we've ever filled up our ginormous picnic table.  I guess Michael did know what he was doing when he made it like 10 feet long.

 Then opening presents with "hot potato."

 Happy birthday girl with chocolate mouth wearing her "champion" swimsuit.

 Big belly mom with giant 2yo brother.

 I expected the slip 'n slide to be the hit of the party, but I have to say the giant bubbles were a HUGE success!  Look at these monsters Savannah was making!

 I had to make more and more bubble wands because all the kids wanted in on the fun. The little ones just enjoyed chasing them around and popping them.

 Look what Jed caught!

I love these simple birthday parties. I like morning parties, I like pancakes, I like kids outside, I liked that there was practically zero cleanup and that all the little ones went home with giant smiles on their faces. Zoe declared it the "best birthday party EVER, Mom!" Success!

Peaches and fireballs

Since Jed was feeling better today, he got to help finish up processing peaches.

Today we decided to freeze some for cobbler. He wanted to help, but not skin peaches (since obviously that is a 5yo girl job...) so I let him be in charge of chopping. It wasn't the prettiest job ever, but it was certainly the proudest. 

Jed and Zoe took turns helping, sometimes taking a break to go scavenge tomatoes or check on whatever dad was doing outside (which admittedly was far more interesting, involving tires, Barbasol, lighter fluid, matches, running frantically for the hose and Top Gear. Jed at one point came in jabbering wildly about fireballs and the lawn on fire, but all I heard from Michael's end was that something didn't work because he didn't "totally commit". I didn't ask details but apparently we need a new lawnmower tire.) Inside all was quiet and lovely and I finished off the peaches easily with all the help. I love quiet Saturday afternoons. 

Canning peaches with Zoe

I felt a little overwhelmed this morning gazing at my 50 pounds of peaches on the kitchen counter. My original plan was to can them with a friend this afternoon, but now that Jed was busy barfing in the bedroom I knew that plan was out. I felt tired. I didn't want to do it all by myself! Ugh. But I slowly got things out and started blanching.  After about twenty tired minutes, though, this little beauty showed up at my elbow with a chipper offer of help. 

She pulled up a stool and soon we were working elbow to elbow peeling and chopping as Zoe cheerily kept up conversation. Turns out five year olds are perfectly capable of peeling peaches. So fast mom couldn't keep up! 

At some point I realized, midway through a new tale about her amazing snake ("She kills lightning! That's because she can fly really fast and high! She hates loud noises. She attacks my enemies when I am scared! My only enemies are spiders. She is taller than my arm! She is taller than me! She can kill trees! Actually she lives in trees!") that I was really having a great time. Time was flying by and we finished our batch giggling and chatting together. Turns out this little woman is great company. 

Random summer bits

Michael promised Zoe that she could be his special helper building shelves for the basement this evening.  So when she woke up this morning, the first thing she did is start shoving plastic play tools into her underpants and run around, brown eyes shining, crowing how she had on her work underpants and she was ready to help dad NOW!

Speaking of underpants, we pretty much have resorted to wearing just underpants around the house.  It's hard for mom to enforce any sort of clothing rule because let's be honest, more clothing=more laundry and that's the last thing I'm incentivized to increase. I am super mean and insist that they wear both shoes and underpants if they are going to ride their bikes outside. I know, I know, "Tiger Mom."

Jed has his own bedroom now and it's nigh impossible to get him to put the comic books down and go to sleep.  Last night I caught him at 9:45 PM with the light on.  Then this morning I got the crankiest sad-faced pouty pants ever, ugh.

We went to a super fun and completely empty pool today.  There was a small toddler-sized frog water slide.  Zane went completely nuts over this thing.  He and Zoe ran and slid for an hour straight, they must have gone down that slide 3,000 times. Every single time Zane would shout at the top "Hi, Mom! Here comes ZANY!" and then when he got to the bottom he would come and excitedly inform me "Mommy, dis froggy slide is just right for ME!"  He is too cute for words, I can't stop kissing that busy little brown body.

Meanwhile, cranky tired Jed groused and complained at length through the whole trip, which lasted all of two hours. Even going down the big water slide by himself only lifted his scowl for a bit. Then when Dad got home, he raved and raved and raved at length about how it was the BEST DAY AT THE POOL EVER.  Mom had a hard time restraining her eye rolls, though she did send several same-table-dinner-texts to Dad informing him that all children would be having an early bedtime tonight.

I have 50 pounds of peaches sitting on my floor, a refrigerator full of squash, an overflowing and somewhat neglected garden, an barely-started basement refurbishment in a vast state of disarray, and I find all I want to do is go sit at the pool with my kids and hug their little brown baby perfection and then come home and take a nap.  This has been a deliciously luxurious summer!

Potty Training Zane

After many months of failed lazy side efforts, the time has finally come.  The time for POTTY TRAINING.  Zane was ready.  Jed and Zoe were ready to help.  The potty and the treats were ready.  But mom... mom had a fairly significant enthusiasm gap.  But I know time is getting short before baby 4 makes his big appearance, and so I bit the bullet and put on a very convincing act of excitement and we went for it.  Jed was so excited he helped me get all the new undies and treats out and organized before Zane even woke up Monday morning.  He also volunteered to make this potty sticker chart, which he pointed out several times was WAY cooler than the one I was going to make.  Of course he is absolutely right.  This is the coolest potty chart ever.

Zane met his new "cool car unnerpants" with great enthusiasm and proceeded to spend Day 1 wetting through them with wild, messy male abandon. I had to go down and dig through clothing boxes in the basement to find an extra dozen undies when it quickly became clear that ten pair was NOT going to be enough.  Here is my fb post from about halfway through Day 1:

 We got some cool treats and they are out and ready... Everyone is enthusiastic (or at least pretending, in moms case)... But even though w have sat on the potty a dozen times and drank half a gallon of liquids... no success yet! Just one very impressive flood of an accident. Come on Zaners!!!

Several hours later, the enthusiasm had waned even further, but gritty determination set in.  I have wood floors. I can do this: Well, I think Zane's ready. I personally cannot wait any longer - he pees out of his diapers at least once, often several times a day, since he holds it for so long. He constantly has his man bits hanging out and has accidents on the floor, so I get the pleasure of changing diapers AND cleaning up pee! Nope, it's time. He's ready, I'm fed up. It's gonna take some time but we will get it done. No success yet today but he is still super happy and cheerful about it. We have done the naked thing (last time we trained) so I know he can do it. This time we are focusing on keeping undies on and figuring out how to keep them dry

Finally about 3 PM we finally had a success!  And when I say "we" I mean "Zoe" because she is a way better potty trainer than her momma, I'm afraid.  By that night, I think the score was Potty:3 vs Floor/Couch: 12.  This was a long day.

But Day 2 dawned with new hope and we spent a lot of the morning outside with a darling dry pants kiddo with his "cool fast car flag unnerpans" showing off his moves on the big bike.

And surprisingly, those pants stayed dry all morning long!   We did have a little poop incident at the park, but that's to be expected when mom and boy are both distracted.  But the whole day felt much, much more hopeful. I found a 2-minute Elmo potty song clip on youtube that has been very helpful.  He watches it over and over with wonder, marveling in breathy tones "Dat Elma have tiny potty just like ME!"

To my joyful surprise, though, the most motivating thing for Zane has been pleasing his mommy.  On the second day, after a successful "pee-pee" experience, he came running over to me and threw his arms around my neck.  With glowing eyes he turned his face up to mine. "I make you happy, Mommy?"  Yes, Zane, you have made me SO happy!  "I make you happy!" He gave me a huge hug and said "I love you, Mommy!"  Yes that will melt any mother's heart.  He only started saying "I love you" spontaneously about a week ago, so every utterance is so precious!  All week long, he has been asking again and again "I make you happy, Mommy?!"  He is the sweetest little man ever. He wants to potty train because he knows it is important to me.  Love this affectionate, earnest, cheerful child.

 Day 3 was even better, so we ventured out to the little library downtown and even had a successful public restroom experience there (wheeee!  Much cheering!  The librarians must have had raised eyebrows for that one.)

By day 4 he was waking up with a dry diaper every day and only having very occasional (<1 a="" accidents.="" and="" been="" bonding="" day="" experience="" first="" from="" great="" guy.="" has="" it="" little="" long="" my="" nbsp="" p="" painless="" per="" really="" side="" spending="" the="" time="" virtually="" with="" zaners="">