Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Now That There Are Four

I've been thinking a lot about life with 4 kids.
Why?
Well, we got our new medical insurance cards in the mail. I punched them out and fanned them out in my hand.
6 cards.
I showed them to Noah.
"When you look at these cards, it looks like there are a lot of people in our family"
He laughed.
Yesterday we split the kids up. I had the older ones, he had the younger ones.
Sometimes its "you have the boys, I have the girl"
Sometimes I say "I have the middle ones, you take the others"
About an hour into our activity Roman suddenly stopped and looked up at me with an alarmed look on his face.
"Where is Berean?" he asked.
For a split second, I panicked.
"She is with Daddy." I said, while frantically searching through my brain files to verify that that was indeed true.

Sometimes I feel like I am constantly counting children. Looking in my rear view mirror to make sure that they are all there, stopping when I get somewhere to make sure everyone is accounted for, mentally going through each one and verifying that I know their whereabouts.

I am sure this will happen more and more as they get older and we are taking them to separate activities. Things weren't that hard before Berean could move ( I remember saying that with Lincoln too!) Adding a new immobile baby for me isn't that big of a deal, it is adding a toddler to the mix when things suddenly get more interesting.

And, boy, has it gotten interesting.

I feel like I say, "where is that girl?" 20 times a day. I can be putting on her snowsuit and suddenly she will be on the other side of the room. She watches for opportunities to escape.

I have learned to appreciate the little things more: things like when I only take 2 kids somewhere or when I go to work alone. When Noah and I take them all somewhere, but we are together.
When they are sleeping at night.

6 comments:

Lauren said...

I love this! I use to ask Taylor and Abby what Avery was doing while we were driving. I just wanted to make sure I didn't leave her at home. (I didn't want them to be scared knowing that I for the life of me couldn't remember if I put her in the car or not.) It has gotten easier, but I still count heads everywhere we go to make sure I have all 5 of them :)

Elise said...

I only have two, and I still look forward to everyone asleep at night!

gma pam said...

You probably need to start teaching them what to do if they are left somewhere! Little role playing never hurt...it happens...just ask Karla!

The Three 22nds said...

Lauren, that is so funny! I do stuff like that too... "what is Berean doing? Is she smiling? Are her eyes open?"- just to make sure she is not choking etc. Noah was telling me that he counts heads too, but he sometimes accidently counts other tow-headed boys and church instead of ours...

Elise, I know I should go to bed earlier, but once everyones asleep I get a second wind and can stay up for hours...

Mom, yeah. We have several lessons to teach them. Today we discussed pen pals and instant messaging.

LS said...

GREAT POST! I could have written this one myself...except the part about the baby being mobile at the end. But since I often babysit for others I usually have 5-7 kids to keep track of and am always counting kids. I always panick and wonder if the baby actually made it into the carseat in the car if she's not screaming. So, I often lift up the cover and try to check while driving.
We often divide our kids into boys and girls or the two littlest and two biggest too!

joolee said...

Fun catching up on your posts, as always:) I have to say, I watched Glee last night.....not sure that it's appropriate, but one of the main guys on there reminded me of someone and I couldn't figure out who!?! After seeing your pics on this post, I've got it! It's NOAH! Noah looks like Finn? (I think that's his name).

Keep counting! We often refer to our kids by their "number." Not sure they've figured it out yet.....good way to semi-discreetly talk about issues.