what's up weekly.

This week's post brought to you by the word, "Brevity," and the feeling, "Very Pregnant."  Even if I did have the energy to write more, you wouldn't want to read it - I'm pretty hormonal these days and vacillate between incoherent rambling and crying/raging/back-to-crying.  So you're welcome for deciding on the front end that I will keep this short and sweet.

Last Friday, the kids' afternoon walk looked a little different than it typically has.  It was our first Hats/Coats/Boots outing, and I realize that I am woefully underprepared for winter.  Everyone needs hats AND coats AND boots.  I need to switch out their flip flops for real shoes (which I may or may not have on hand in each necessary size).  I need to order coats for the big kids, and I'm hoping there are some good deals on GOOD coats around Black Friday - I can't keep spending money on plasticized flannel.  Call me an Iowan, but a coat should be a COAT.  (But prices for real coats are outrageous.  Thanks, Obama.  I mean, whoever is currently in charge here.)

Isn't our neighbors' yellow tree just GORGEOUS?!  I love staring out at it from my perch on the couch each day.

Friday was also the sixteenth anniversary of Todd's and my first 'real' date in 2005 - we went to a theater movie (Chicken Little) and I had some issues (explosive influenza).  We relived one of those things at home with the kids on Friday night.

On Sunday, Todd took the kids to Leavenworth for church. 

 I don't travel well at this point, so I stayed home.  I cleaned and organized, I watched a movie, I dinked around... and I got so bored.  It was nice to learn about myself that I am no longer as introverted as I used to be.  There is apparently a limit to how much alone time I can stand - that's a newly discovered development.  BUT I will say, it was nice to have some leisurely time to get a few things accomplished - I cleaned the girls' room and Juni's room, I cleaned out the girls' closet, I added some bins to our new bookshelves and organized curriculum, I hung some art and pulled out some decor for the basement, I sorted our basement pantry shelves... it was pretty amazing what I was able to accomplish with a whole day at my disposal.  Not that those things are what I would typically recommend doing on a Sunday, but I did find it restful.

Sunday night after their return, we did our monthly popcorn-party-for-dinner night and watched The Sound of Music.

Will you believe me if I tell you we don't only subsist on junk food?

The week itself has been pretty uneventful around our house.  School.  A bunch of appointments as I try to check things off the list before the baby's arrival.  (Dentist appointments for all the kids, midwife appointment for me, speech therapy for the bigger boys.)  There was some drama with a stranger at the dentist over masking the kids, but I'm not going to relive it or force you to read about it.  But it was A Whole Thing and I'm still ticked off.  I cancelled their eye appointments for next week because of mask requirements, but I really need to formulate a plan for getting their eyes checked soon - none of them has been seen since before Covid and their glasses are getting too small for their faces.

In other dental news that did not make me want to pregnant-punch a stranger, Rocco lost a tooth!  He pulled it out himself and named it Dr. Gums.

I think my next midwife appointment is the one where they will come to my house, bring the birth tub and all the birth kit supplies, and then it's just a waiting game.  It is nuts to me that we're so close to the end.  On the one hand, I'm SO READY TO HAVE THIS BABY.  This third trimester has been the most challenging I've ever experienced.  This week was especially hard.  But on the other hand, there is still so much to do, especially with all of the holiday prep thrown in there.  So I go back and forth about how quickly I want the next few weeks to pass.

Fun fact: Paige Van Voorst Without Makeup is all one color.  My lips look like Voldemort's.  Also, I have Preggo Face, which is hard to disguise without contouring.  The moral of the story is that I look better with makeup on, but I also could not give enough darns to motivate me to put any on, so here we are, lipless and swole.  But that look will be 'in' someday, I'm sure, and then I will be glad I have this photo.

And lastly, I did get some holiday and baby prep done this week - I put some egg casseroles in the freezer for holiday breakfasts, and so that I have something to feed the kids and midwives if I'm in labor at breakfast time, so that feels good.  I also received Ophelia's charm for my initial necklace!  (I'm also getting liver spots.  That's 'geriatric pregnancy' on display for you.)

And that was our week!  I suppose that wasn't exactly 'short and sweet,' being in that it was neither short nor sweet.  But whatever.  It's fine.  Thanks for hanging in there with me.

what's up weekly.

Hi friends! 

Last weekend, we headed up to Iowa to celebrate Rocco's 6th birthday with a Spiderman party with family.  The weather was beautiful, so we got to spend lots of time outside in the evening before heading inside for cake and presents.

Biggest girl cousin and littlest girl cousin!

The next day, my sister's oldest daughter had a party to celebrate her own upcoming birthday, so we got to party it up again!  Having cousins makes everything twice as fun!

Juni had some potty accidents over the weekend, which was really discouraging.  I told Todd that I was going to give it one more week, and if it still hadn't 'clicked,' we were going to just quit and wait a good long while until things settled in after the baby.  (Ironically, he had told me a few weeks ago that I should consider this, and I had a meltdown at the mere suggestion.  Just to give belated credit for wisdom where it's due.)  On the drive home, Juni started crying out that she had peed, but we weren't anywhere near a gas station, and it was dark, so we had to drive for close to an hour before we could stop.  We got out, I changed her clothes and put her in a diaper, and put her back in the carseat.  But before we could drive away, she kept asking to go potty, so I took her inside and she immediately went when I sat her down.  She had held it for an HOUR.  And we haven't had a single accident since then.  It finally seems to have clicked!  GOOD JOB, JUNI!  Got the last one out of diapers just in time for the next one!

On Monday, we jumped back into a half-day of school.  Everyone was exhausted from the long drive, missed naps, and Daylight Savings weirdness, so we did morning school but were done by lunch time.  I took some time in the afternoon to run to Aldi and Hobby Lobby to continue to pare down the lists for prepping for the baby, getting Atticus' birthday present, preparing for holiday meals in advance, and having all our Christmas gifts on hand.  It turns out this is a major undertaking and I am still far from finished, but at least I'm inching ever closer.

Tuesday was a normal school day, and then while I had planned to use our open Wednesday to make up the time we missed on Monday afternoon, Wednesday quickly took some surprising turns.  The boys had a spur-of-the-moment speech therapy appointment, and then I met with a few friends through the afternoon.  Then Thursday was back to normal.

I am at the point in pregnancy where I swing wildly from having no energy to do anything at all, and school has lost its luster, and cooking is physically painful... to climbing on counters to Goo-Gone my upper cabinet doors... and then obviously back to having no energy.  I took on a few big projects this week: I cleaned out two of the three freezers, I cleaned my kitchen cabinets/floors/walls, I fitted out an ugly laminate storage cubby with a pretty stained-wood 'skin'.  I also spent a lot of time laying on the couch or sitting in the bathtub or laying in my bed, and heating up pre-made meals that had been intended to be used in the postpartum days.  I just don't have it in me to 'normal life' anymore.  I have to be living at one extreme or the other.

And yes, to answer your question, I DO wear this sweater all. the. time.

I can tell pregnancy hormones are in the final push of things.  I am back to being absolutely nauseated by most smells - why does everything smell so bad?  The fridge, the food, the trash can, the houseplants, the kids' breath, the laundry, EVERYTHING STINKS.  If I have to smell one more stinky smell, I am going to lose my mind.  I also hate my skin at the moment.  Not how it looks, just the fact that I have any.  It is crawling all the time.  I just want to scratch it all off.

You can guess I've been quite pleasant to be around lately.

Want to know the most recent thing to make me cry?  A slipcover.

We needed to buy one in kind of 'this is an emergency' kind of way after the last remaining intact side of the couch cushion started ripping.  (And that's not to even mention those arms!)  The couch is genuinely falling apart and I needed to cover it before it just disintegrated.  But because it has T-cushions, options are VERY limited.  I could pick between an old-lady damask white one that looked like a table cloth, or one that was 'microsuede' in the color 'concrete.'  So I picked the concrete one.

But unless concrete is PINK AND SHINY, this slipcover looked nothing like concrete.  It looked like the inside of a seashell.  Or like a couch in a Vegas motel that was decorated to look like the inside of a seashell.  The pictures don't do it justice; it was awful.  Plus, the microsuede felt absolutely disgusting - I hate that texture anyway, but right now with my skin not even being able to handle the texture of sweatpants, it was completely overwhelming.  So we'll be sending it back, and we are now on the hunt for an entirely new couch. 

If you are even remotely tempted to tell me it doesn't look that bad, then this photo is lying to you.  Take this photo, add greasy/sticky/plush/sweaty texture, increase the pink balance, and then add plenty of "bunch" that is hidden behind the pillows.  THAT is the reality that isn't adequately communicated through the screen. There is so much grip to the fabric that I couldn't even straighten the blankets out all the way.  So I gave up.  And cried.

It makes me sad.  I love this couch.  I adore this couch.  It is sturdy, it is comfortable, it's pretty, it is a great size and shape and silhouette.  It has held up well over the course of fifteen years and four moves and millions of kids jumping on it, and if you don't count the uphostery fabric itself (which has always been my least favorite characteristic of this couch anyway), it's still basically like new.  If reupholstering it didn't cost more than just replacing it, I'd have it reupholstered in a heartbeat.  But alas.  I am not optimistic I will find anything I love so much, or that will hold up so well as this guy has, but it seems to be time to move on.

I will probably cry about it again at some point, so I'm happy to say that I have some beautiful family photos to look at to help assuage my grief.  (Thank you so much to my brother-in-law for being so kind to take these for us!)

And with that, I'm off to lay around some more.

what's up weekly.

Hi again, folks!  Another week in the books, hmm?  This week was kind of busy for us, with school, plenty of appointments, a feast day, and even a birthday to celebrate, so let's jump right in!

Last Saturday was busy, but super fun.  We headed up to the Amish early, so that we could get back in time to do some trick-or-treating at Shelter Gardens in the afternoon.  

Little Red Riding Hood, an unconvinced and unhappy Mr. Peanut, a soldier, Dorothy, Abe Lincoln, and a bumble bee.

Same as above, except here you can really taste Mr. Peanut's displeasure, and you can also see the first Van Voorst to age out of trick-or-treating.  Excuse me while I go cry about the cruel passage of time.

Juni got a pen with her trick or treat bag, and it was an instant love affair.

This was the first year Atticus didn't dress up, and it was kind of sad.  The end of an era.

Sunday was Reformation Day, marking the culmination of our October readings on influential reformers, and also marking the beginning of our big season of feasting!  We kicked off the night with a cheeseboard...

... and finished it off with some popcorn and a screening of Luther.

Early in the week, the big boys had speech therapy consultations.  We were seen at a new clinic, and they seem pretty confident the boys just need three or four appointments each to teach them how to say their R sounds a bit more clearly.  That seems unrealistic to me, but I suppose we don't have anything to lose by it.  

Also, I would just like to offer my two cents here and say I find it outrageous that the speech therapist expects them to copy her tongue, lip and cheek motions when SHE IS WEARING A MASK AND THEY CAN'T SEE HER FACE.  (She even tried to show them specifically how she wanted them to stick out their tongues... with her mask on, and then tried correct them by DESCRIBING how she wanted their tongues to look.)  How can they copy her "R" sounds when they can't hear her properly?  I'm sorry, but when are we going to call a spade a spade?  This is ridiculous and unnecessary.  But Atticus is almost 13, and our current strategy of "waiting until the Covid insanity blows past" has lost us nearly two years of time we could have used for improvement, and shows very little sign of sobering up anytime soon, so we're going to go now anyway, to see if it helps at all.  However, we might start looking into things I can do myself to help them from home, and we can continue to extricate ourselves from the idiotic medical establishment as much as possible.

After their appointments, we stopped into Salvation Army to look for stuff for the new baby.  I don't like buying used baby clothes, but I do find nice flannel sheets and pillowcases, wool blankets, and other things that can be used to fashion more practical baby items.  This time I found a soft, thick, quilted cotton pillow sham that is the perfect size to use as a sheet on the bassinet mattress.  We also found a toooonnnnnn of great chapter books for the kids - lots of biographies, Newbery Medal winners, classics that are assigned by Ambleside... and maybe a Martha Stewart Christmas book or two for me.

Today I have a midwife appointment in the afternoon.  I am coming to the end of things, and I feel it.  I am big, and achey, and spend a large portion of my time lying in bed.  I am getting bad pregnancy brain - I must have left a cast iron pan on my (heating) stovetop to dry after washing it, and forgotten to turn it off when we left for the Amish, because three hours later we returned to a house full of smoke and the blaring of smoke alarms.  I say "must have" because I still don't actually remember washing it or putting it to dry, but there it was, so I must have?

I am starting to gather supplies for the home birth.  It's a bit staggering to try to think of all the things that the hospital usually just has on hand that I now need to be responsible for myself.  Food, clothing, bedding, cleaning supplies... but I'm honestly enjoying thinking through it all.  As long as I have time to gather it up before labor begins, I think I'm mentally ready for birthing at home.  As ready as I can be, anyway.  (In some ways, it feels like a first delivery, though!)

Lastly, we had a few fun opportunities to celebrate!

Penelope turned eleven-and-a-half!

Todd conquered aging.

And Rocco turned SIX!

This brother is a highlight.  He is a delight to be around, and he is just so darn easy to like.  He is easy going, good-natured, joyful.  He is soft spoken and funny.  He is smart and articulate.  He is both tough and gentle, and he is unafraid of almost everything except the basement bathroom and the neighbors' Halloween decorations.  He is affectionate, and his bones are filled with concrete, and he is almost never found far from Finneas.  Those two are thick as thieves.  I am forever grateful for this little one's presence in my life, and just can't get enough of him.

For breakfast he asked for donuts, so I ran to the store to get some fresh ones from the bakery yesterday morning, and when I returned he was already complaining of a stomach ache.  Visions of chocolate-frosting-sprinkle-donut barf danced in my mind, but luckily Penelope was on hand to talk his stomach off the ledge, and everything ended up being fine.

He requested homemade alfredo for lunch, and Cheddar's for dinner.

And last but not least, Atticus, Finneas and Callista being very Atticus, Finneas and Callista:

This kid is Entirely Legs.

Finneas used up three entire rolls of scotch tape, and also as a side project made himself a mask.

Listening to Jumanji for the seven kajillionth time.

And that was our week!  Now that I've been upright this long to write this post, it's time for me to go lie down again.  It's a rough life I do lead.  See you next week!