The Ranch Files: Zadie Wonders About the Afterlife

Zadie and my dad at my Granddaddy Kirk's grave.

My mom with Zadie in front of the old ranch house, where my Great-Great-Uncle Arthur used to live.

Zadie got to stay a few extra days at the ranch with my parents, while Tori took the two boys home to L.A. and I (the clear victor in this arrangement) went to Austin for a few days of glorious adult time (more on that in a later post).  Zadie loved all the special attention from her grandparents and they had a picnic in a deer blind one day and got to watch the wildlife from way up high in the sky (sitting very quietly so as not to scare off the animals).

But as they were leaving the ranch and heading to the airport, my parents took Zadie to Tilden's Hilltop Cemetery, where many of my relatives are buried.  My Granddaddy Kirk, with whom I was extremely close, is buried there (see above photo of my dad and Zadie in front of his grave).  When my dad told me that he took her to a cemetery, I asked whether this caused Zadie to ask a lot of questions.  "It sure did," he said.  From the cemetery to the airport (about an hour's drive), Zadie interrogated both of my parents about the afterlife.

What happens after people die?  Why do people die?  Why are they buried underground?  Do they grow back?  After all the people die, will there be any more people left?  Am I going to die?

My dad said he tried to dodge some of these questions, but that Zadie was a very skilled interrogator.  He tried to tell her that these were questions that she needed to be asking her moms.  But, since she would not relent, he finally told her that no one is 100% sure what happens after someone dies, but that he believed the body died and the spirit continues living.  When I got home a few days ago, one of the first things Zadie asked me when we were alone was, "What happens after people die? Granddaddy Hal said there's a spirit inside you that runs away."

As my dad said, "In retrospect, maybe taking her to a cemetery wasn't such a hot idea after all!"

The Ranch Files: Granddaddy Hal in Full Splendor

My dad is really good with kids.  He has no compulsion about being totally goofy and making a fool out of himself to entertain children.  His most famous trick is "checking for bugs," which is when he finds imaginary bugs running all on kids' stomachs and under their arms and he tickles them while trying to kill the bugs.  I've seen many a child make a request for a bug check.  He also counts ribs to make sure there aren't any serious medical concerns, which is also a very ticklish experience.

This past week at the ranch, Granddaddy Hal was in full splendor.  He must have taken the kids on 25 rides in the electric golf cart, full of all kinds of antics like launching attacks on the people at the campfire, singing songs, and starting and stopping.

In this video, Skip kept hiding a wooden snake in the bushes to try and scare my dad.  My dad would then act really scared and scream.  Unfortunately, this time Zadie cut the game short by telling my dad it was just a pretend snake, so this wasn't quite as extended of a performance by my dad.  But you can get a little taste for how crazy he can be.  Part of why I'm posting this is because I would love to have a video of my granddaddy playing with us as kids -- he also had some signature tricks (namely turning into a gorilla).


Granddaddy Hal & the Wooden Snake from Kate K. on Vimeo.

The Ranch Files: Christmas Day

Sophie, Zadie, and Izzy showing off their Christmas presents (they also got the matching polka dot outfits).

As part of a Christmas Eve tradition that we've taken over from Tori's family, all the kids get to open one present on Christmas Eve and it's always pajamas.  How cute are these five kids in their matching outfits?

My mom has a knack for making every occasion very special, so of course she wasn't going to let having Christmas at the ranch thousands of miles away from home, with limited provisions, stop her.  Christmas morning she had the kids' stockings all laid out and everything wrapped neatly in tissue paper with names on everything.  I did not inherit my mother's ability to present things beautifully and personally, but I'm certainly a beneficiary.

This Christmas, I think the very favorite gift was the cameras that the three girls received from Santa (my parents).  The girls felt very important photographing their experience and I love the photo above with them showing off their new gifts.  My mom also bought some fun musical instruments in the stockings for the kids.  And each adult couple received a new iPad, so that was very exciting but I'm also a little embarrassed to write that because I feel so spoiled by my parents.  I guess it's better to know you're spoiled, right?

Tori and I aren't real big on giving our kids lots of presents.  We gave Skip and Zadie their own water bottle to put in their lunch for pre-school and also some arts and crafts to work on while they were at the ranch.  Charlie, you didn't get diddly-squat from us, but you didn't seem to mind much!

The Ranch Files: Charlie Starts to Walk

As I've previously written, I'm really excited for Charlie to learn to walk, and I have very high expectations for how our life is going to improve once that happens.  Well, it hasn't fully happened yet, but he definitely did more walking at the ranch than he's ever done before.  Maybe the fresh air inspired him to be more mobile.

This is a video of him taking a few steps.  I love the sound of my Aunt Dana's Texan accent in the background saying, "Ride 'em, cowboy!"


Charlie Walks! from Kate K. on Vimeo.

The Ranch Files: Mud, Mesquite Thorns, & Campfires

My nephew Austin driving my parents' electric golf cart, along with my other nephew Nick and also Tori -- and a slew of children!

Skip felt like the king of the world on this tractor.

Here's a glimpse of the muddy conditions.  This is Zadie with her cousins Jonas and Max.

We just spent the past five or so days at the ranch in South Texas.  This ranch has been in the family for 100+ years and, though I only visited a few times when I was a kid, it was very significant in my dad and granddaddy's childhoods.  And it's very important to me that my kids get to spend time there not only because of the history but also because I want to have a place where they can run "wide open and sideways" (as my dad says) and also engage with nature.  According to my naturalist uncle, South Texas is one of the best wildlife spots in all of the United States.

Tori said she thought that was baloney because she's now been there twice and hasn't seen much nature.  It's in a very low rainfall area and is in the midst of a long-term drought, but somehow every time we visit it rains buckets, which means that Tori hasn't been able to see all the wildlife we've been talking about.  The local government should pay us to vacation there just to help them out with their drought.

Lots of rain means serious mud, so our vacation was full of rubber boots, muddy clothes, and the constant battle of trying not to get your vehicle completely stuck in the mud (which happened numerous times).  South Texas is also full of mesquite trees, which are great for more flavorful barbecue, but not so great for having around small children.  Each of our kids had to have mesquite thorns removed, which made them a lot more careful about where they were walking.

This is the first part in a series of blog posts I'm going to do about our trip to the ranch.

Catching Up: Thanksgiving

I fell behind on posting about Thanksgiving because I was waiting for a great photo, and now I have one!  Tori's sister Katie is always responsible for getting a group shot and it's amazing that she manages to get all of us together and even knows how to use the timer function on her camera.  Far beyond me.

We rotate holidays between my family and Tori's family, so this year we spent Thanksgiving with her family in Seattle.  Her brother Zach has a big house with lots of room for our enormous group and her mom rented a 15-passenger van for all our adventures.  Our adventures were cut a bit short by the fact that it rained most days, but we made the most of it.  This photo was taken during a break in the rain, when we all scrambled to a beautiful park and played kickball (a family tradition).

It's fun to just take a few minutes to look at all the people in this photo.  Now that is a big and crazy family!

Charlie is Officially Adopted!

 I'm happy to report that Charlie was officially adopted on Friday, December 16th.  We've been eagerly anticipating this moment for a very long time.  I'm fortunate to have a wife who is very talented at pursuing social workers and lawyers with her own personal blend of friendly stalkerism -- without her follow-up there's no way that this could have happened before the end of the year.

What does this mean?  First and foremost, this means that Charlie is officially our child and no one can ever, ever take him away from us again.  As they said in court, we have all the rights and responsibilities of parents and Charlie is due any inheritance as a "natural" child.  Sorry about that last part, Charlie.  Not sure how much help we'll be in that department.

It also means no more visits from social workers, no more paperwork, no more locking up all our knives, and no more smoke detectors (just kidding about that last one!!).

This tuxedo that Charlie was wearing was a hand-me-down from a friend and it happened to fit him perfectly.  He was quite adorable in court, especially after they gave him his little teddy bear (all kids get teddy bears when they're adopted).  The judge and other staff were quite smitten.  And so are we!

Mom to the Rescue

Five days ago I crashed my bike with poor little Charlie on it.  Although I say "poor Charlie," actually the whole thing was his fault.  We were going down a big hill and he was giggling with joy about the wind in his face and the whole experience.  I was turned around smiling back at him and saying, "Woohoo!"  Then I turned my eyes back to the road (where they should have been in the first place) and swerved to avoid a big pile of dry leaves and branches from our recent windstorm.  The bike skidded out, and we crashed.  So my point is that if Charlie hadn't have been such a cute, giggling ball of joy, the whole thing never would have happened.

In all seriousness, I learned my lesson and will be much more cautious in the future.  Not only because I feel like a totally irresponsible parent and bike rider for crashing with my baby on the back, but also because I got five stitches above my eyebrow and lots of painful road rash and I've been a total wimp about the whole thing and don't want to ever go through this again.  Charlie, I'm happy to report, is 100% fine and he was safely ensconced in his bike seat and helmet.  It would have been MUCH worse if something bad had happened to him.  Awful to think about.

Anyway, the point of this post is that my mom kindly offered to take all three kids for three whole days this week.  It's true that the road rash on my hands makes taking care of the kids difficult -- and Tori basically has to take care of me and the three other kids -- but the truth is that we could have managed.  Tori felt guilty about my mom taking all three, but I felt sorry for myself and decided to take her up on her offer.

So thank you, Mom, for juggling all three kids all by yourself (my dad was out of town).  The kids had a great time and are anxious to return.  And Tori and I got to go on two date nights and sleep in!

When Charlie Starts to Walk...

I've always been pretty good at being content.  I know some people who struggle to enjoy the moment since they're kind of preoccupied with the next thing, whether that's a new adventure or a new material good or a change in status.  Unfortunately, since I've become a parent (of multiple children at least), I find myself guilty of the same compulsion.  I often find myself looking forward to the next developmental stage because I like to imagine that life is going to be soooo much easier once I get to that next stage.

When Charlie was an extremely unhappy newborn, I was very focused on making it to three months because I had heard that's when all that colic-y stuff ends.  As my dad would say, I was in "survival mode" to make it to that milestone.  Turns out that crying stuff didn't go away until the six-month mark and when it did, life was definitely much easier but I quickly found something else to focus on.  I remember one big milestone I was focused on was when we could transition him off the bottle.  I thought that was going to be a big life-changer.  I did a Facebook post about never washing another bottle again for the rest of my life.

But somehow I don't think that really changed much (it's not like you don't have to wash sippy cups!).  My latest preoccupation is Charlie walking.  This child is pushing 15 months and still not walking (although he has definitely taken steps and I need to catch it on video).  It seems like I've been telling anyone who would listen for the past six months that as soon as Charlie starts walking, things will be a lot easier.

This time, I can't help but believe this is going to be a game-changer.  First of all, he's really heavy.  I think he weighs around 35 lbs and that's a lot of weight to be lugging around all the time.  Secondly, he's really happy when he's playing with his siblings, but he gets sad when he gets left behind all the time because they're running around without him.  I have a vision that involves my three children frolicking together, skipping around and running, just as happy as can be.  When Charlie starts to walk, they'll be so happy playing together that there won't be any crying or fighting and there probably won't even be much need for parenting, really.  I think I'll just sit at the kitchen table sipping my green tea and casually reading the newspaper while glancing up occasionally to watch them frolicking around in the yard.

It's gonna be great.

Adoption Court Date Set for Charlie!

We're very happy to report that Charlie's adoption hearing has been scheduled for Friday, December 16th.  As of that date, he will be officially ours!

I'm so thankful that my wife is talented at gently harassing all the social workers, lawyers, and assistants in the system to make this happen.  We really wanted to get this paperwork completed by the end of the year (for a number of reasons) and it definitely wouldn't have happened without Tori's very frequent phone calls.

It's crazy to think that we lost custody of Charlie for a month.  I just re-read the blog post that I wrote when we lost him and I feel a little embarrassed about how at terms we were with everything.  It's kind of bizarre to understand my mindset at that time given how attached I am to him at this point.  I think that, as much as I wanted to think otherwise, there is just a difference in how connected you can be to a child when you know that you may not get to keep him or her.  It must be some kind of self-defense mechanism.  We definitely experienced loss and sadness, but it did not debilitate us like I think some people thought it would. And, unfortunately, I feel like our experience losing Charlie for that month has turned a few prospective foster parents that we know away from becoming foster parents because of the twists and turns that they have witnessed us go through.  I really wish that wasn't the case because I think that you do figure out how to deal with it -- it's sort of hard to explain unless you've gone through it.

Anyway, the point is that now I cannot possibly imagine losing Charlie.  You know that song, "(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman"?  Charlie makes me feel like a natural mother.  He is the only one of our three kids who has a clear preference for me, so I have to admit that it makes me feel special to have him always reaching out for me or crying until I hold him (though sometimes it's both a blessing and a curse!).  On a deeper level, Charlie has not been an easy baby and so the fact that he has challenged us and that I've still managed to be a loving and (mostly) patient mother gives me confidence.  Because I have certainly wondered whether I have the proper personality for being a good mother!

That's just one reason that Charlie is so special to me.  I also love his great cuddling skills, the way he crinkles his nose when he laughs, his willingness to eat anything and everything (except hummus), his pure joy at laughing with/at Skip, and his adorable face.  We're so excited for him to *officially* become our son, although of course he's already been a member of our family before we sign any of these documents.

Now if he would just learn to walk!

Thank You For Not Choking

On this Thanksgiving weekend, I am feeling very thankful for all the items that Charlie has NOT choked on.  Here are some of the items I have found in his mouth:

a safety pin
a screw
a pushpin
a hairball
a small bouncy ball
endless piles of sand

And, of course, the most frightening of all was the tiny lava rock from our fireplace.  Had to call the paramedics on that one.  We try really hard to have a safe environment for him, but it's pretty challenging with older siblings who leave things out.  And many of the items on this list were when we were visiting other people's houses who do not have children.  The hairball unfortunately was at our house (Zadie is the only one with long hair!).

Soon I think we will be in the clear and we'll not have to constantly be ripping things out of his mouth.  We've got him trained pretty well -- we just say "Open your mouth!" and then he spits the item out.

Enjoying the Kids

Today we were driving the kids back home from a friend's house in Long Beach and Skip and Zadie were behaving terribly.  They were fighting, crying, and whining.  I told Tori that I was really surprised that our kids weren't better behaved.  I really thought my children would be such model citizens.  I don't know if this is just normal kid behavior or if our kids are more whiny than other kids, but I just really don't think that my brother and sister and I could have acted like that when we were kids.  I'm not sure what my parents were doing differently.  Were we just too afraid to act like that because of being punished (not that my parents were overly strict)?  Do Tori and I coddle our kids?  I don't think that's the case -- most of the time it seems like I get better results being patient than being really strict and upset with them.

Then we came home and had lunch (it's another rainy day) and lit a fire in the fireplace.  Skip sat on a chair near the fire and stared into the fire, mesmerized as if he was watching a really good cartoon on television.  He let me sit with him and cuddle next to the fire and we read books together.  They all ate well and were very excited about getting crackers as a reward for eating their lunches (such a treat!).

Suddenly our kids seemed so sweet and well-behaved.  I don't know what to make of all this.  I just wish I could figure out how to make our kids sweet all the time.  I often feel like Rodney King: "Can't we all just get along?"

New Family Photo

My sister Kim recently did a photo shoot with our family and I really loved this photo she snapped (so much so that it's currently the header on our blog).  She got some other nice ones, too, but I think we'll use one of the others for our holiday card, so you'll all just have to be on pins and needles until then!

If I could make our kids less attractive in exchange for being better behaved, I would make that trade in a quick minute.  But I'm not aware of how to make that happen, so they just continue to be good-looking but poorly behaved.

Occupy L.A. & Questioning Authority

This past Friday we had the day off because of Veteran's Day, so we decided to take the train downtown to visit the Occupy L.A. protest in front of City Hall.  This was mainly Tori's idea, but I thought it might be a good civics lesson and memory for the kids.

Side-note: I have a lot of great memories of time I spent with my grandma in Texas, but one of my very favorites is taking her to a huge anti-Iraq war protest when she came to visit me and my sister in San Francisco.  Now that was really something to see, with hundreds of thousands of people pouring into the streets and marches and artwork and music.  Imagine you're an 80-year-old woman who was raised on a dairy farm in East Texas and your crazy granddaughters make you push your way onto a ridiculously crowded train to see it all.  Actually, she loved it because of the great people-watching!

Anyway, I think Tori maybe had some visions of a big movement with a drum circle and people passionate about their cause.  Instead we found lots of tents and a scattering of people, but most of them were clearly homeless and mentally ill.  Tori was really disappointed about the whole arrangement.  Still, we took this photo to remember the occasion.

Before we arrived at the protest, I tried explaining to Zadie what a protest was and why sometimes people decide to protest against a government or a company or whatever the case may be.  But I didn't delve into too much detail because I realized I didn't want to plant any crazy ideas about questioning the authority figures in her life.  I have enough trouble without her deciding she wants to start protesting her parents' rule.

And I speak from personal experience on this because when I was about 10 years old I remember spending a Saturday morning watching Bridge on the River Kwai and being so deeply moved by the hunger strike of the main character that I was inspired to start my own hunger strike.  My cause?  I demanded that my mom make me pancakes and vowed not to eat anything until she did.  I gave in around late afternoon, I think.

Skip and Zadie

I like this picture for many reasons.  First of all, I like the way that Skip is looking at Zadie.  Although they are often quite competitive with each other, they also do have a very deep connection and much prefer to be in one another's company than not.  When we put them to bed at night, they laugh and talk to each other for about 30 minutes (or sometimes longer) before falling asleep.  And in the morning Skip always wakes up first and yells for Zadie to wake up.  They can't actually get out of bed until their little alarm clock lights up, so then they lie in bed talking and playing for a little bit longer.  It's pretty cute (except when it happens way too early and also wakes Charlie up).

Zadie is definitely the prototypical oldest child in terms of how she bosses and cares for Skip, some of which he completely disregards and some of which, surprisingly, he really seems to appreciate.

I also like this picture because I like both of their outfits, but Zadie's in particular.  I can't remember where we were going on this day, but it was a beautiful and sunny day and Zadie was stylish in her little jumper.  And Skip is quite a looker, too!

Rainy Morning

When the kids woke up this morning, Tori said, "Guess what?  It's RAINING outside!" and they squealed with delight.  On rainy days,Tori lets them watch movies, which is a very exciting occasion in their lives.  It's quite exciting for me, too, because then they just sit happily on the couch and watch Kipper on our laptop while I get to read the paper and drink tea.

It has rained all morning and the kids watched two episodes of Kipper (my sister gave me the tip about that show because so many of the other kids shows are way too annoying, like Barney or Caillou), played a board game with Tori, and then basically ran out of indoor activities.  I suggested watching more Kipper, but Tori got Skip and Zadie all bundled up in rain jackets and boots and she took them out for a wet adventure.  They stomped in puddles, found new waterfalls, and generally mucked around in the rain.  They were gone for about an hour and just came back for a nice warm bath.

The rain stopped just now.  It's been a fun morning!

Charlie Loses His Curls

Charlie has very, um, distinctive hair.  It's red and curly.  Not tight curls but long curly locks.  We were kind of attached to his curls, so we didn't get him a haircut for a long time.  Recently he started to resemble Bozo the Clown with the curls sticking out on the sides, so Tori took him to get a haircut.

I'm wondering if Tori asked the lady to cut his hair just like hers.  The similarity is remarkable -- they both have pixy cuts!

Halloween Photos

Finally getting a chance to post some photos from Halloween.  Tori did a great job on Zadie's costume -- she was Pippi Longstocking -- and Skip's costume also turned out well.  He ended up being a farmer/cowboy, even though originally we were going to make him Pippi's friend Tommy.  And Charlie was Pippi's monkey, which worked out well since it kept him warm on a fairly cold (for California) trick-or-treating night.  So we didn't pull off a theme like we try to every year, but they were still pretty cute.

And I was particularly proud of Tori for telling the kids they could eat an unlimited amount of candy that night IF they ate all their dinner.  We stuck to our promise and Skip, in particular, completely gorged on candy.  I don't think he's ever experienced anything remotely like that.  It's kind of funny for me to think about how all his food is so tightly regulated and healthy and then all of the sudden his parents dress him up in a funny outfit, tell him to go knock on people's doors, and he gets to eat all the candy he's ever wanted.  Seems kind of overwhelming, but he adjusted just fine.

It was a really fun night and one of those times when I tried to stop and pinpoint why exactly I was having so much fun with my kids.  Frankly, I wish I felt that way more often (instead of being tired or hurrying or nagging) and so when it happens I really try to figure out what is making me so happy and how I can replicate it in the future.  I think it was fun not to have any rules and just let the kids do whatever they wanted.  It turns out that I enjoy my children way more when they're eating tons of candy.  I'm sure that goes both ways.

Fall Weekend w/the Grandparents

We're fortunate that we get to spend a lot of time with my parents, but I guess because we see them so frequently we always forget to take photographs.  So I made a special point to get at least one good photograph for the blog this weekend.

This is a photo of my parents taking our kids to a little pumpkin patch in their brand-new MOTORHOME!  They drove up to see us Saturday afternoon and spent the night in their motorhome nearby our house.  It's a special treat because they haven't really had any incentive to come visit us in L.A. since we don't have any space to accommodate them.  Now that they have this motorhome, hopefully we'll be seeing a lot more of them.  

We went on a mini-road trip with them today to the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area and the kids got to run around in nature for a little bit.  The kids were very happy cruising in the motorhome because it has a television and so they watched movies the whole time.  The best part was that we didn't have to pull over when they had to go to the bathroom!

Charlie's First Words

As odd as it is, I would have to say that Charlie's first word was "uh-oh."  I wish that it was "mama," but although he can definitely and occasionally does say "mama," he doesn't really say it with the proper context.  On the other hand, he totally understands the uh-oh concept and says it at the perfect moment.

The other word that he has just started saying is "bye-bye."  Once I thought he said it when Zadie was making him wave goodbye, but maybe that was a coincidence.

He really is hitting all kinds of developmental milestones lately -- my favorite is that he now uses the proper sign for "more" instead of just screaming like a wild man.  That is a huge relief and hopefully he'll learn some other signs, too.

I'm eagerly waiting for him to start walking because I think that will be really fun (hopefully I don't eat my words).  But he's rather on the heavy side, so it will be nice when he doesn't need to be held all the time.  And I also know that he'll have more fun keeping up with his siblings once he can walk.

I seem to always be creating these light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel scenarios, so my current version of that is that our lives will be soooo much easier once Charlie can walk.  Fingers crossed!

Flashback to Port Angeles Trip

I finally downloaded photos from my camera and found all kinds of fun memories from our trip to Port Angeles, WA this summer to see Grandma Linda.  

It's great to have a yard.  Makes parenting much easier and less stressful!

 I love this red table.  It was great for having a sunny breakfast together or a quiet cup of tea.

 Two of Zadie's cousins slept in the backyard in the tent (we had lots of people visiting Linda's house) and so of course it was quite the fun place to hang out.

Love this photo of Zadie with her Grandma Linda.

No Standards Whatsoever, Part 2

A long time ago (when we only had two kids, which seems like a really long time ago), I did a post about how Tori and no longer had any standards when it came to our normally clean house.  I had a photo of me reading the newspaper on the couch in my pajamas while surrounded by a messy array of toys and other items.

But that was nothing compared to the lapse tonight.  Charlie was constipated and crying while trying to poop, so Tori and I had to put his legs in the proper position and then kind of massage the poop out of him (I realize this must sound awful, but I assume every parent has had to do this at some point).  Anyway, some time passed and I was rinsing my dinner plate.  That's when it hit me that I had not washed my hands between massaging the poop out and eating my dinner.  Really disturbing.  Even more disturbing?  We had fish tacos for dinner...you know, the kind you eat with your hands?

Charlie One-Year Appointment

Because I try to use this blog as a baby book, I try to always enter the info for the kids' appointments.  You may have noticed that Charlie is a tad chunky, but actually his weight was only in the 85th percentile (25 lbs, 12 oz), his height was the 55th percentile (30 inches) and of course his enormous head was in the 97th percentile (19.25 somethings).  He and Zadie are two peas in a pod when it comes to big heads!

He's on track with everything developmentally, though he doesn't seem to be in any rush to take steps.  He's pretty content crawling around (he finally crawls the "real" way now).  Unfortunately he still has to take lots of medication for his childhood asthma, but all in all he's doing great.

His favorite thing in the world watching his siblings romp around.  A close second is feeding himself...that always seems to entertain him for long periods of time.

MY very favorite thing about Charlie is his great belly laugh.  It's almost husky and it makes me happy every time I hear it.

Charlie Turns One!

Charlie turned one year on September 20th and we had a small party in the park with some dear friends.  I felt a little differently about this milestone than I did for other two kids, as you can kind of gather from the Evite text below:

It's been a tough first year. Between the emergency stomach surgery at three weeks, the non-stop crying for the first six months, the emotions of the court taking him away for a month, the chronic ear infections and childhood asthma, and then that time a few weeks ago when he swallowed a tiny lava rock and we had to call 911...let's just say that we are ready to celebrate a very important milestone.

Homeboy is a survivor. He made it. We made it. Let's have a party in the park!

So, as you can tell from the invitation and the photos below, we had quite a bit to celebrate and we are thankful to the friends and family members (including my parents coming up from San Diego and my Aunt Dana, who was in town from Texas) who attended.

Here is the man of the hour.  Unfortunately, this wasn't his most photogenic day because he got suncreen in one of his eyes and it was kind of red and goopy.  And, in an unfortunate wardrobe choice, he was shirtless the whole time and that isn't his best look for obvious reasons!

And here is the quite tasty cake that our friend Sidney baked.  My mom also made some homemade lemon bars (from her own lemon tree) and those were great, too!

We've made it a tradition to have pinatas at all our kids' first birthday parties.  This year I stuffed it with trail mix, organic gummy fruit treats, and apple sauce "crushers."  The parents seemed relieved, but I must admit it's the first time I've ever seen that many kids neglect to pick up everything that came out.  Oh well...

Unfortunately, we managed not to take photos of any family members, but we did get some shots of friends who turned out.  Here is our friend Shafiq and his dapper son, Zak.

And our friends Allard and Richard, who we first met in our foster-to-adopt class about four years ago.

Zadie Portrait

My sister-in-law took this great photo of Zadie over the 4th of July weekend.  I love this girl's smile.

When people see this photo, I have a feeling they will say that she looks just like me.  Like I've said before, I really don't see it.  Maybe it's hard to see yourself in another person.  At any rate, I take it as a compliment because Zadie is far more beautiful than I have ever been.  And I'm not being modest.

Tori and I marvel about her beauty all the time and I tell her sometimes that she is beautiful or that I love her smile, but we don't want her to necessarily grow up focusing on that too much.  And, frankly, I don't want her to be one of the super-popular beautiful girls in high school because I think they get into too much trouble and have to face a lot of peer pressure.  I hope she can be a bit of a nerd in high school, like I was.  Not the kind that's picked on, but enough a nerd that she's a bit sheltered from the scene in high school.  Fingers crossed!

Beach Days

We like our kids best when we're at the beach and least when we're in our house.  At the beach, all three kids are really good at entertaining themselves.  Our routine on the weekend is to pack lunches and lots of snacks and try to get to the beach around 10am and then leave about 2pm for naps back at home.  We're not sure how long we're going to be living such a close bike ride to the beach, so we're trying to make the most of it now.  It always amazes me how many people live in L.A. and never go to the beach, since I think it's one of the main benefits of living here (then again I rarely went to the beach when I lived in San Diego).

Here are some of my favorite photos from the beach over the past few weeks.

It's always so special and rare when one of the kids wants to stop playing and just chill.  I was a little bit jealous of this moment.

Check out Charlie's weird kimono robe thingie.  A friend brought this back from China as a bathrobe when Zadie was little, but it's thin and cool and perfect for keeping his pale skin out of the sun. 

Hooray that Skip has a boy cousin his own age!  Here is cousin Gavin, who will soon be moving to L.A. for more beach days! 

I think this was a day when we came to the beach after work and didn't have bathing suits.  I like it when Tori wears this cute hat instead of the other, totally awful Korean hat she typically wears.  Had to document the occasion.

Sophie and Izzy Visit & Weekend Mornings

A few weekends ago we had a nice visit with Sophie and Izzy.  They came to L.A. with my sister and mom to connect with an aunt who was in town.  We hung out at The Grove, had ice cream together, and then my mom and sister drove back to San Diego.  And we got to keep the girls overnight!

Even though we're kind of overwhelmed with our own three, it really wasn't too much extra work to have the twins here because they are really well-behaved and they kind of keep Zadie busy.  And actually Sophie is really good about playing with Skip, although Zadie tries her hardest to exclude him at every opportunity.  Sophie is interesting because she is very independent and often breaks away from the group, or decides to spend time with Skip or Charlie.  Everybody played well together and I was happy for Zadie to get some quality time with her cousins.

Tori and I trade off taking all three kids out of the house on the weekends, usually from 6:30am (when they're allowed to get out of their beds) until about 10am.  It's hard to manage all three, but at least somebody gets to have one peaceful and restful morning per week.  So I don't mind taking on the challenge since I know that I'm going to benefit from the system.  I usually take the kids to the park from 6:30am to 7:15am and they ride their scooters while I feed Charlie.  Then we go to Jamba Juice and they also eat some of the steel-cut oatmeal there.  Then we go to a different park afterwards.  Tori usually takes the kids garage-saling, though I really don't understand how she manages all of that, especially because at that time of the morning the kids are always needing to pee or poop (and never at the same time).  Apparently she just asks lots of people if she can use their bathroom and I guess she's pretty hard to turn down with three kids in tow.

Anyway, I was quite proud of myself for taking all five kids away on the Sunday morning when they were here.  First we went to the park and they ran around for a long time.  Then I actually took them to that evil restaurant that has the playground, but annoyingly doesn't open until 9am.  I figured since I was so desperate to manage them all, it was pretty justified.  And they were pretty excited about that whole set-up.  The other people in that restaurant were quite curious about my five children -- lots of questions about that.  And looks of pity.

I've taken Skip and Zadie to "the restaurant with the playground" a few times but I really try to avoid using it's actual name because I don't want them to start asking to go there or building some associations with it. Lord knows I was the biggest McDonald's addict of all when I was a kid and, even though I know how bad it is to eat there, I still have to go there like once per month out of some chemical addiction.  And then Tori sees it on our credit card bill and is appalled, month after month!

Here are some photos from the weekend that my sister took:

Zadie and Jake Forever

A few weekends ago we went to San Diego with some very good friends from L.A.  We had a great time and one of the best parts was how well Zadie played with Jake.  This was really fun during the day, but kind of an issue at night since they were sleeping in the same room and they would keep each other up late chatting the night away.  But this was a really cute photo we snapped of the two of them sleeping while holding hands, probably after chatting for like three hours.

On this particular night, my nephew Nick was babysitting and he couldn't get the kids to go to sleep.  He said that Jake kept talking and talking and that Zadie told Jake that she was really tired and that if he didn't stop talking then she wouldn't be his best friend anymore.  This made Jake really sad and he came out of the room crying to talk with Nick, who was sort of at a loss for what to say.  I wish she wouldn't have said that to him (telling people she's not their best friend anymore is her new favorite insult), but it's also kind of amusing to me!

Skip's Cool New Shirt

A friend of ours gave us some really great boys' hand-me-downs and our kids have been really stylin' since then.  All of the clothes are really great collared shirts and most are actually more formal than this, but this is one of our very favorites.  That Skipper is a handsome little devil.

I think most people would be surprised to know that Tori is quite strict about the clothes our children wear.  She's really into them being sharp dressers and the boys almost always wear a collared shirt everyday.  I think most people (including myself) would assume that Tori would not really give a hoot about what kids wear, but it turns out she's quite discriminating.

Charlie Adoption Update

Two weeks ago, Charlie had an important court date that Tori and I attended. It was our first time to actually go inside the courtroom because for some reason in the past we've been relegated to the waiting room. Anyway, there was quite a bit of drama and anticipation as we listened to the back and forth between lawyers appointed to represent Charlie, his birth dad, his birth mom, and the county. We didn't understand all that was going on, especially because the judge was a major mumbler (seems like judges shouldn't be allowed to mumble), but ultimately we got the outcome that we were hoping for: the parental rights of Charlie's birth parents were terminated.

This is a major step in the adoption process, so we were excited when Charlie's appointed lawyer told us that the adoption should be complete hopefully before the next status hearing in January. Knowing that things often take longer than expected, we were thinking we'd for sure have this all completed in the next three to six months.

Then last week the county social worker came out and told us that they can't find his birth certificate, which is a huge issue and could be a major source of delay. I could tell she was nervous to tell us this, but it's definitely not her fault (she was just assigned to the case), so there wasn't much to say. We're disappointed about the delay, but since the parental rights have been terminated we're still very confident that it's just a matter of time until we can legally adopt Charlie.

Zadie Wants Two Sisters

Zadie was only 17 months when Skip arrived, so she didn't really think much of it. When Charlie arrived she was initially very excited about being a big sister and helping to take care of such a tiny baby, but that gave way to indifference and then, I think, minor resentment because Charlie was such a high-maintenance baby who demanded so much of her time. She quickly realized that it was due to his arrival that we had less time available for reading books and playing puzzles with her.

For a long time now, whenever I ask Zadie if she wants another sibling, she always says no. She won't really elaborate, but she's always very firm in her answer. But tonight when Tori made some comment about saving baby clothes for the possibility of a future child, I asked Zadie to weigh in.

Me: Zadie, do you want us to have another baby?

Zadie: Yeah!

Me: You do? Really?

Zadie: Yeah!

Me: Would you rather have a brother or a sister?

Zadie: A sister.

Me: But what would you think if you had another brother?

Zadie: That would be okay...but I want two sisters and another mommy.

Tori: Why do you want another Mommy?

Zadie: So that one could take care of Charlie and one could take care of Skip and one could take care of me and one could take care of the sisters [We didn't point out this more than three mommies].

Kate: So you want another sister even though that would mean we might have less time for playing games and puzzles with you?

Zadie: Yes.

So I guess Zadie is on board for another child, but I'm not making any promises. At the moment, the answer is no way, Jose.

It does make me happy to know that she's in the mood for another and isn't feeling so deficient in attention from her parents. She's a great big sister...most of the time!

Time Alone

Whenever I have time alone or, more accurately, time away from our children, I feel a big countdown clock looming above me. As in, you have four hours of adult time that you must take full advantage of. There's a certain amount of stress involved because there is so much urgency and (self-imposed) pressure to make the absolute most of the time.

Yesterday Tori took the three kids to a party at her aunt's house and I had from 1:30pm to 7pm all to myself. That is an extraordinary gift and I was a little unsure how to use it. Here were some of my thoughts on how best to use the time:

--Do absolutely nothing so that I became so bored that I was actually excited to see my family when they came home and wishing they would hurry up and arrive. I quickly dismissed this option as unrealistic.

--Catch up on sleep. This was very appealing, but I didn't feel tired in that particular moment and it also seemed like a bit of a waste.

--Go to a coffee shop and read. This was very appealing, but I only had my bike and the tea house I wanted to go to made for a very traffic-filled and unattractive ride.

--Spend the whole time doing a major cleaning involving toilet scrubbing and bathtub scrubbing. I dismissed this because it seemed against the whole point of my time alone.

--Go to a movie. This is the option I ultimately chose because it just so happened that I had two good friends ready and willing to go to a 2pm showing of Stupid, Crazy Love, a film I had really been wanting to see.

After the movie I still had even MORE time to maximize and, as the time comes to an end, I feel an even more intense sense of urgency. So I also read the whole Sunday paper and an issue of LA Weekly, washed the dishes and picked up the house, and started my new Spotify music account.

All in all, it was time well-spent and I owe Tori big-time for this special treat. It's way less stressful when it's a big chunk of time and you can do a couple of different things.

Big Month for Charlie

Untitled from Kate K. on Vimeo.

In the last month, and really more like the last week, Charlie has learned to crawl (not in perfect form, but he gets the job done) AND finally gotten two teeth. So there have been a lot of new developments.

It's cool to see him scooting all over the place, but it's also a little stressful that he can get into places that are unsafe and he's constantly scouring the floor looking for the most disgusting and dangerous items to put in his mouth. It was kind of cool when he just sat there and smiled. Now he's kind of possessed with an inexhaustible need to explore and see things. He's also really into standing, so he's not quite as chill as usual. But hopefully this will get old quickly and he'll start being a lazy blob again. Haha. Just kidding...but part of me does feel that way.

The other upside of him crawling is that maybe he'll start to lose some weight!! It's cute that he's so plump, but it can also be hard to lug him around. Gosh, pretty soon he'll start walking and we won't have to worry about that!

Skip Turns Two Years Old

I'm really far behind on my blogging -- it's been a very eventful month, not the least of which because Skip just celebrated his second birthday. Many thanks to Aunt Katie for taking these photos.

As part of our annual 4th of July tradition, we went to Tori's dad's house in a small town in the Central Valley and we had a really great long weekend of rafting on the river, jumping on the trampoline, and doing the slip 'n slide down into the river. It was a physically exhausting and joyful vacation and we enjoyed every minute of it. We thought we had a long drive at 3.5 hours, but Tori's brothers drove from 17 to 22 hours, so we should be counting our blessings.

We got back home on the actual 4th of July and had previously arranged to have a big party at our house. I was thinking that was pretty poor planning to return from a long vacation at 1pm and have a bunch of guests arrive at 4pm. Oh well. We had a really nice group of people come over for the fireworks show and some gourmet burgers.

Skip got a cool scooter from my parents (see photo below) and a big donation towards a new kid bike seat from his Grandma Linda and a little bathrobe from me and Tori.

Skip is doing really great with regards to his talking. He speaks in pretty whole sentences and is way far ahead of where Tori was at the same age. He's not big for his age, but he's extremely athletic and coordinated. Tori hopes he'll be an Olympic gymnast. I can see him starring on the high school wrestling group in one of the lower weight groups, though Tori says wrestling is weird and she doesn't want to watch it!

Charlie's 9 Month Appointment

Chubby Charlie had his nine-month doctor appointment last week and weighed in at 24 lbs, 2 oz (93rd percentile). He was 28 and 3/4 inches long (72nd percentile) and his head circumference was 18 and 3/4 somethings (95th percentile).

Charlie is a very lazy baby who rolls over about once a month and still doesn't crawl. Skip was almost walking at this age! But I think the fact that he's so hefty make it hard for him to be too mobile. The doctor said that he may just skip the crawling phase and go directly to walking.

Either way, Charlie is a sweet and wonderful baby. He brings me so much joy with his random giggle fits and his sweet and chubby face. I love him!

Vacation to Washington State

Enjoying s'mores in Linda's backyard.

Grandma Linda took all 7 kids to the park and managed them all by herself. Impressive!

Charlie and Skip hanging out on the playground, trying to stay warm!

We've been enjoying our week-long vacation to Port Angeles, WA and only have a few days left. Tori's mom is a great host and keeps us and our kids busy with lots of fun games, mostly outdoors.

Zadie has got to spend lots of quality time with her other twin cousins (only "other" because she doesn't get to see them as often), Bailey and Rihanna. And this weekend Zach's whole family came to visit and we were a full house!

We had some great games of croquet and Shanghai (a card game), ate s'mores, went for long adventure walks in the blustery cold, and somehow ended up watching lots of YouTube clips together. Fun times.

And now for the grand finale: Tori and I are going camping for a day and a half while Linda watches our three kiddos! Linda lives right next to Olympic National Park and we're excited to see it, but truthfully we're more excited just to get away. I could be camping in a landfill for all I care! Well, that would be kind of stinky, but just the idea of getting away is the fun part. No offense, children.

Weekend in San Diego

We had soooo much fun playing in the pool and the jacuzzi. Zadie made great progress with her swimming and didn't even want to go in the jacuzzi. And Charlie was as happy as a fat little pig in mud.

Skip fell asleep on my dad's chest for a whole hour. Very sweet, but I think my dad was starting to feel like a prisoner after a while since he was completely stuck.

Charlie is in a really fun stage right now. Nice photo with my madre.

Last weekend we had a work event in San Diego, and so we brought all the kids down and had a great time with my parents. Not sure if they can say the same. On Saturday we told them the great news that we could stay an extra day since we got permission to work from home on Monday, and I think they probably didn't think it was as great as we thought. They've been on extra duty as grandparents lately since my sister's family is living with them temporarily, but of course they were great sports and we spent a lot of time in the pool and tried to give them a break from our horde.

Enjoy these photos from our weekend!

Charlie Adoption Update

I don't think I've given an update about Charlie's adoption status since I got back from Italy and things were really up in the air. The good news is that we feel really good about the direction things are going and feel like we will be able to adopt Charlie and have him as our forever family. Hooray!

We got to meet Charlie's biological sister, who took care of him for the month that he was away. She is a very nice person who I think has a good heart and I want Charlie to always know that she really wants to raise him and be close to him. But after meeting her, we were able to have a frank heart-to-heart in which we shared with her a few of the reasons why we thought that Charlie would be better off being raised by us. Although I know that it was emotional for her, she ultimately agreed with us, which I think shows that she is really thinking of Charlie and what is best for him.

I am feeling really happy that things are looking so positive for us and I feel really excited about getting to keep Charlie. Nothing has happened in the actual court system to make us any closer to this reality, but this is just a really strong feeling that I have and is also based on the fact that now that the sister isn't going to contest our custody, there really isn't another candidate because of the issues with the biological parents (the birth dad is currently in jail and the birth mom is not easy to locate). I think it's going to take a long time to work it's way through the system, but I think that this is really going to happen.

Although having three kids spaced so closely together is really a challenge and is still a bit overwhelming, I'm really happy with our family and love our three little kids. Can't wait until it's all official!

The Five of Us

Yesterday we went to our friend Suzan and Fernando's house (otherwise known as "Suzando") for a gourmet brunch and time at the park. I wish we had some photos of all the stuff she made for brunch: french toast with fresh berries, nutella, and mascarpone; fritatta; and chicken sausage. Tori brought a watermelon/feta/mint salad which sounds gross but is actually very good.

Suzan took a bunch of photos of all us, including these two family photos. It's funny because I can't really remember the last time I saw a photo of all five of us (maybe our holiday card?). When I look at it, it makes me think, "Is that really my family?"

It seems like we became a family of five really quickly and I don't even know what happened. All of the sudden we just were. And it's still weird for me to think of myself as a mother, although sometimes that part of my identity feels like it threatens to suffocate all the other parts of me (like the me that used to have adult time). When the past three Mother's Days came around, Tori and I both never thought of that holiday having anything to do with us because it's like we still don't realize that we're moms. We just think of it in relation to our own mothers.

The other thing that stands out to me about these photos (and particularly the one at the park) is how we look a bit older and worse for the wear. Especially me. I wonder what I'll think in five years or ten years when I look back at this photo. Maybe I'll think, "Wow, look how tired I look. I'm glad I survived those years and made it to the more fun part of parenthood." Or maybe I'll think what everyone says I'm going to think, which is, "Awww, I sure miss when the kids were little and cute like that. Those were the days." But I really hope I don't think the latter.

The majority of people who come up to us when they see us with three little kids in tow say something to the effect of, "Treasure this time because they grow up so quickly." I know they're just trying to be nice and I'm sure there's a lot of truth to what they're saying, but I find it annoying to hear that because right now I'm sort of in survival mode and I'd like to think that this isn't the peak of the parenting experience and that I'm always going to miss this phase. Having said that, I realize I'll probably walk around saying this to young parents in 10 years, so I shouldn't judge!

But there are also some mothers who will come up to us, especially when one of us is alone with the three kids, and quietly reassure us, "Don't worry. It's gets easier. It really does." And those are the people I want to hug and say, "Thank you for saying that!"