Daniel Hadfield: free spirit

Jack-attack!

The brothers think they can make me laugh by pushing my belly button.

Blast you, Pillsbury Doughboy!

So I'm fat. You got a problem with that?

Yeah, I know I'm adorable.

Check out my man boobs!

introducing the Hadfield Family Band

With Daniel on the drums and Joe on harmonica

And Lincoln on the ukelele.

Any requests?

(What about Jack and me? When they're jamming out, I make strawberry jam and Jack sleeps.)

mama mia

So, I spent three hours this morning trying to coax my miserable constipated four year-old to poop. No success.

Happy Mother's Day to me.

No, really. In the midst of his travails, my very unhappy little boy looked up at me with his big, teary green eyes and said, "You're pretty mom. I love you." A very tender Mother's Day gift, I think.

I'm the mom of that sweet bundle of boy and his brothers. Their mother. I love my job (usually). I'm not always good at it. Sometimes I'm impatient. Sometimes I let them eat cookies 10 minutes before dinner will be on the table. Sometimes I count down the hours (and minutes, and seconds...) until Joe comes home from work. But for the most part I'm okay at this motherhood thing. And almost all of the good things I do for my kids, I learned from my mom.

This is my mama, Jan. She raised 6 kids (almost. two are still at home-- the verdict is still out on them) as well as providing a foster home for developmentally disabled men for almost 20 years. She also ran an in-home daycare so she could be at home with us while she put my dad through graduate school. And she's currently the world's best nursery teacher. That adds up to a whole lot of mothering. I was so lucky to be able to learn motherhood at the knee of someone who was (IS) so thoroughly good at it. Here's a short list of the lessons I learned:

Don't sweat the small stuff. Most problems/concerns with kids will eventually resolve themselves with patience and a healthy dose of practicality. Stuffy noses and tummy bugs usually heal on their own; behavior issues are usually grown out of; picky eaters won't starve; and siblings usually grow up to like (or at least tolerate) each other. Stress and worry are rarely productive. Maternal instinct should be trusted.

Childhood should be magical. Kids see magic in everything: sprouting seeds, rising bread dough, sunsets, bugs, flecks of glittering mica in the sidewalk, etc. A wise mother encourages this and joins right in. A wise mother nurtures imagination.

Beauty feeds the soul. A home filled with simple beauty in all its forms (good music and the laughter of children, the scent of baking bread or clean laundry, cheerful colors, etc.) is a happy and peaceful place to be.

Family dinners are important. My mom is a wonderful cook. Wonderful. I could write a list longer than my arm of all the delicious food my mom makes. But the food wasn't the most important part of our regular family dinners-- it was the stories shared, the jokes laughed at (crass as they may have been), and the companionship. And man, that food was good.

Creativity can equal sanity. My mom seems to have a never-ending list of creative talents. She's an incredible seamstress, and an amazing florist. She can paint, embroider, cross-stitch, build cool stuff (she never met a power tool she didn't love...), and grow beautiful gardens. Motherhood can be intense, and having a crafty project or two going is sometimes the only thing keeps me from losing my mind.

Kids should be allowed to get dirty once in a while (or in Daniel's case-- all the time). Life can be messy. And really experiencing life occasionally requires getting messy. So, peanut butter smudged faces, sweaty hair, and dirt-caked bodies are signs of kids who are really living.

I used to worry about turning into my mom someday. Now I'm realizing that's not such a bad thing. Happy Mother's Day!

for the quote board

Joe: It looks like someone put a big wad of toilet paper down the toilet.

Lincoln: Yeah, maybe somebody did.

Joe: Was it you?

Lincoln: Maybe somebody did today, I don't remember.

Joe: That's funny, because you're the kid who always remembers.

Lincoln: I just remember Florida and sometimes to shower in the morning.

recap

Yes, we've been absent from the blogging world lately. Been a bit busy. Here's a quick recap of what we've been up to in the past month:

Big brothers worked hard to instill an early passion for Lightning McQueen.

We blessed Jack on April 4th. It was wonderful to have our families together and Daddy gave Jack a very special blessing. I made his blessing outfit out of two of Joe's old dress shirts and Jack wore the same tiny white moccasins that Joe wore when he was blessed 30 years ago.

We started a tradition of Sunday afternoon penny walks. The idea is that you flip a penny at every intersection to find out which way you should go. Heads is right, tails is left. You never know where the penny will take you. We discovered a really neat little playground on our most recent penny walk.

(there IS a penny in the picture, by the way)

Jack realized that he'll need to gain a heck of a lotta weight if he's going to catch up to his brothers. He's been working really hard (and succeeding) at getting fat. And we're digging the cloth diapers, by the way.

Lovely Aunt Jessie dropped by for a visit and a quick round of The Farming Game. (Daniel won)

Jack slept. A lot.

Lincoln, the 4 year old phenom hiked 1.3 miles and 1100 ft up to the "Y" with his proud and amazed Dad. Yeah, he rocks.

4 weeks (already?!)

Here's our Jack. Four weeks old today and living proof that babies grow way too fast. He's obviouly well on his way to being a super-chunk.