Ring Around the Rosie

I have been thinking a lot lately about my role as the mama and the wife.  It is no secret that when the "going gets tough"  I get down (not in the groovy sense).  I completely shut down and lock myself inside my head with my pessimistic thoughts and throw away the key.  A kitchen full of dirty dishes and a sticky floor is enough to send me straight back to bed with two toddlers body slamming me and begging for an adventure.  Laundry is absolutely haunting.  Everywhere I turn there is something that is begging to be lugged down to my basement and don't get me started on the basement. Throw in a few weeks of throwup and diareah and well I am done. 

I am sure that I need a system.  There is no doubt in my mind that my household and life screams ORGANIZATION!  I am not unfamiliar with how to organize and prioritize.  That is not the problem.  The problem is that I am locked up in my head like Rapunzel without the key or the hair.  My determination and desperation has to kick in in order for me to get out.

Sometimes all it takes is a new beauty product to get me out of bed in the morning. The thought of new eyeliner or a fresh tube of mascara can carry me right through a morning.  Other times it is something as simple as the sound of the garage door opening and a little voice saying "come on Wydia, come on Wydia" to get me moving before my chicklets escape into the cold 7 a.m. air.  Always a simple game of Ring around the Rosie can make everything seem glorious.

I have decided today that I am just about organized and motivated as I have decided to be.  That seems to be good enough for the people I love.  I am grateful beyond measure.

My Daughter

This is my daughter's feet when I layed her down for a nap the other day.  That is mud from somewhere outside;  the garden, the neighbor's sandbox, the mud puddle in the driveway,  who knows!  

 

My daughter is sweet and loving and she is tough and sassy.  I love her from the top of my head down to my toes.  She brings so much happiness to our family and she has expanded our ability to show loves to one another. 

She has had so many milestones lately.  She is going pee in the potty (not potty trained, just keeping up with the big boys!).   This is mostly because we are trying to convince her older brother to do the same thing.  She picks up on stuff so quickly.  She went to nursery yesterday for the first time all by herself.  She looked so big when I peaked back through the door window to check on her.  I felt proud of her and grateful to have her in my life.  



Swimming with the brothers at Grammy's hotel


 When I think about what I want for my daughter I get overwhelmed with mostly my responsibility to be a good example to her.  I want her to be herself and love who she is no matter what.  I want her to have compassion and confidence and to shun vanity and embrace true beauty.  I want her to love others unconditionally and choose her closest friends carefully.  I want her to understand to her very core where true happiness comes from and radiate that to others.   I hope she make choices about how she uses her pain and experiences that will bring her closer to Heavenly Father.  I love her so much and can't believe she is a part of our life.

Roles

How do you feel about your role in your family or home?  Did you choose it, or was it assigned?  I am the oldest but in a family of only two siblings, so that doesn't really qualify me as an authority on oldest children.  I feel responsible for my family of origins decisions to this day and I am almost the big 4 0!  I feel uncomfortable with silence or when someone needs to step up and take charge.  I worry about family get togethers and being a good hostess even if it is not my party. 

I married a ''younger" sibling--2nd youngest of 9 to be exact.  It has been the best thing for me.  I am exploring a whole new world of sitting back and letting others make the decisions and doing the worrying.  It has been very therapeutic and annoying at the same time. 

My children are all confused in this business.  We have an oldest or "first born" child who is really a middle child right now and an oldest child (in this family) who is by birth the baby child right now.   The princess, well she is comfortably riding it out as youngest right now.  I worry regularly about what they may have to write on their blogs about or tell their therapists. 

I am told all the time that my current role in this family is very important.  I would have never imagined that I was solely responsible for filling up four tummies all day long, or picking up the same toys over and over, or teaching manners, or washing folding and putting away the same clothes over and OVER!  This is a very interesting role.  When this role changes I imagine that I will miss it, believe it or not.  Right now, I have to offer myself rewards to get through it, such as a little diet beverage from the gas station or a few moments alone with the door closed in the potty.   I just spent the morning making oatmeal, toast, sandwiches for lunch, cookies for lunch, driving to school, changing diapers, sweeping, spraying down 20 toes covered in mud, building a jump for a two dump trucks, folding the same basket of laundry twice, trying to read scriptures, swaddling a cabbage patch baby over and over.  I think it is time for a diet pepsi.

Homebody

When you leave for vacation do you feel the need to pack the entire house so you can have all the comforts of home?  Do you feel the need to clean your house top to bottom before you can even think about packing?  Maybe you are the type that just waits until the last minute and throws together a bag of the essentials and charges head on into an adventure.  Not me.

I have travel anxiety.  I won't waste time blaming it on my parents or childhood, but I have my suspicions where this may have developed.  I have traveled a little bit, once over the pond and once to islands of Hawaii, and my big adventure to Canada as a missionary.  I haven't traveled much since settling down to marry and raise children.  Just a trip across town to Grandmas is enough to cause a mild panic attack. 

I love to stay home.  Yep, a bonified homebody that is me.  Upon closer inspection of my migratory patterns it may seem that I am anything but a homebody.  From age 0-17 I moved 12 times and changed elementary schools three times and junior high twice.  Age 17-21 I moved 5 times and lived with 23 different roommates.  Age 21-23 I dont' really count because it was my mission years.  Ages 23-34 I moved 10 times and lived with 18 different roommates.  That is a grand total of 27 moves and 41 roommates.  I should be a PRO--an absolute interpersonal communication genius.  Instead, I am a homebody with a pathological fear of packing up and traveling. 

Tomorrow I am taking my three kiddos and going on a little 4-day vacation just over 100 miles away sans my husband.  I am not certain which part of that sentence gives me the most anxiety.  Instead of preparing by doing laundry and packing I have cleaned out drawers and closets, loaded my dishwasher twice, and wrote three blog posts. I am thinking about making some cookies.  I have got to get a grip. 

My oldest was following me around this morning asking if he could take this and that.  I found myself getting frustrated with his constant nagging to take more and more toys and things.  Then I realized that this was right up my alley.  He has some travel anxiety as well.  So, he now has a backpack for himself and his brother and sister each packed with all the comforting things in their world.  I am totally fine with that.  I am considering packing one for myself.  Just the thought soothes my soul. 

Madame Jopo Harriseenie

Cousins are special people around this house.  In several instances cousins have trumped neighbor friends.  Mostly that is because of the big boy who lives at our house.  His cousins have been everything to him in his seven years on this earth.  We have been known to encourage eating of vegetables on the basis that so and so cousin eats that particular vegetable all the time and LOVES IT!  When you say the word cousins around here there is a pause, then silence, and then an uproar of when are we going or when are they coming.  It really is magical. 

As I remember it I was always the "older" cousin.  Now with some perspective I see that I wasn't that much older, but I was extremely bossy.  With bossiness comes a sense of being much older and wiser than your actual years.  During one particular summer reunion at our Grandma and Grandpa Rassmussen's I was given the very important assignment to be Madame Jopo Harriseenie.  I wrapped a towel on my head and put a afghan around my shoulders and with a upside down glass bowl I sat on a lawn chair inside a tent and I told the fortunes of all the "little" cousins. I felt very important.  I know there is a picture somewhere of my moment of glory, but I can't find it right this moment. 

The Petersen family is putting together a last minute end of summer reunion. As we try to come up with fun stuff to do for cousins young and old I am reminded of my moment as a fortune teller.  It was a essential part of my character development.  I see now that those moments are when you begin to know you belong to a family who recognizes your strengths and weaknesses.  That is when you feel like you can be yourself and still be loved.  I am positive my aunts and grandma were painfully aware of my bossiness and tendency to want to always be where the adults were.  They did a good job of making me feel like I was special and needed in our family even though I mostly drove them nuts. 

I know why cousins are so important at our house.  My little ones are still not too sure about all this cousin business, but I am going to encourage them to be a part of the cousins so they will know that love and acceptance that will carry them throughout their life. 

We are Family

Belonging to a big family is a dream come true.   I guess belonging to a family in general can be a dream come true if it circumstances allow.  It is something I think I really want to write more about.  I love to see the children in our home begin to realize that they belong to a family with brothers, sister, grandmas and grandpas, cousins, aunts and uncles.  It feels great to be adopted into a family tree with roots that are deep and nourished.  I don't think our children will understand for a very long time that there is more to all the fun family parties that we have.  I am just now beginning to understand how it was even possible for my extended family to get together and create loving memories and traditions.  For now our kids just expect it as a part of their safe and secure environment and we are going to continue to nourish that expectation. 



Our Rider Boy turned three on Sunday.  He had two parties, one at each grandparents home.  He isn't really a big fan birthday parties, and I dare anybody to try and sing Happy Birthday to him without getting slugged.  One thing is certain--he loves to visit his grandparents and great grandparents homes.  He has his own little special traditions at each of their homes.  This year he was old enough to actually open his own birthday presents before his big brother opened them for him.  He  sat still long enough to open presents and blow out candles and then he was gone on the four wheeler with Daddy for most of the night.  Somehow we left his party last night with some Monster Trucks, a toy four wheeler, an Elmo kite, and three cousins with their jammies.  We got home at about 11 p.m.  and I think everyone finally snuggled down for the night at 12:30 a.m.  I felt overwhelmed at the idea of having six children in my home for one day and two nights, but I felt so excited and grateful for our kids to be with their family.  It is really what this life is all about.  At this point I think I would do just about anything to make sure my kids are always a part of this huge crazy family tree.  It is the only way they will be happy--I know this for certain.