*sniff*

The luscious golden locks are gone.  It was a sudden, spur of the moment thing - I had just showered Peanut and brushed his hair - always a dangerous time, because it always looks much, much longer wet.  Much longer.  And, admittedly, it had been looking awfully long dry as well.  In my mind's eye, his hair was long but not too long.  Still more like this:

 Or even this - a little longer, but still not too long:

But, in reality, it was looking a little more like this.  Okay, exactly like this:

Until that fateful, wet hair day, I decided it needed a trim. 

I still wanted it long, just not.. so... "beautiful girl" long. 

So I tried to cut it shoulder length.  But cutting a wiggly boy's hair, who is screaming at you the whole time, is not easy.  Which is why I usually use clippers on my boys.  But I didn't want it clipper-short!  So this was the result.

Still cute, right?  Still long?  I loved his left side, his right side not so much - but it looked all right.  Until it dried.  Horribly uneven.  Huge chunks here and there.  It was a mess.  You couldn't tell as much when it was curly, but there were enough cold dry days that made every uneven hunk extremely apparent.  My poor child.  So, the scissors came out again and I had to even it up.  A lot.  

So know my cute curly headed baby is shorn.  Okay, not really.  It is still pretty long.  But much shorter than I intended it to be.  And it makes him look so old!!  More little boy than big baby.  The good news?  It is growing on me.  The even better news?  That beautiful hair grows extremely fast, is still curly, and will soon be back in all its glory.  Yippee!!

And yes, I am slightly embarrassed by how many pictures I had of just his beautiful curly long hair.  But not too embarrassed to wish I had taken even more. 

WARNING!! SANTA SPOILERS AHEAD!!

We have a complicated relationship with Santa in our house, starting in the wee hours of our marriage when my husband brought up his Santa issues.  Seriously.  He couldn't rationalize lying to our children about a mythical being coming into our house every Christmas Eve to bring presents.  Okay.  I could understand his moral and ethical position, I really could.  But what to do?  I don't remember any traumatic "There's no SANTA?!!" revelation in my childhood, so I wasn't worried about future repercussions in celebrating Santa. The thought of letting my children have a Santa-less reality was just too harsh.  But he felt really strongly about it.  So one of our first marital compromises was kind of a "Don't ask, don't tell" policy.  We wouldn't actively preach "Santa", but would also not actively deny his existence. 


Fast forward to 2006, the husband and the policy had relaxed to a point where Santa was mentioned on a seasonal basis as the bringer of fabulous things on Christmas.  Yay for Santa!!  But I didn't take into consideration the rational pessimism of my too-bright children.  Jace was 6 and was already vocally asserting that he didn't think Santa was real.  On the 23rd of December he decided to put Santa to the test - he wrote a letter to Santa pleading for a fish, and proclaimed to us that if Santa was real he would get a fish for Christmas.  Ok, we're two capable people, we can manage to get a fish for our belief-tottering boy.  The kink in our masterful plan?  The 23rd was a Saturday.  Meaning December 24th was a Sunday.  Since we don't shop on Sunday, this meant we had to get a fish immediately and keep it alive and hidden for two nights and a day.  So my husband ran out into a snowy night to Walmart after kids were in bed while I went searching in our storage for the old aquarium.  Success!!  Unfortunately the tank was cracked.  Lovely.  So it was my turn to drive slushy roads 10 miles back to Walmart to buy a fish bowl.  But Christmas morning arrived and a fish (later christened Herman) graced Jace's dresser.  Success!!  Boyish delight!!!  Santa's helpers have saved the day!!


Until two days later he realized we had probably manufactured the whole thing and was back to his Santa pessimism.  What, you ask, were his siblings doing during this trial of his faith?  8 year old Erik, who grew up when the original Santa policy was full force, has never had a strong belief in Santa.  He just goes with the flow, accepting presents, not really caring who they come from.  My 2 year old was clueless.  My 4 year old Diva must have been soaking it in, because now, three years later, at 7 years old she is a vocal disbeliever.  VOCAL disbeliever.  Enough so that her first grade teacher asked me to please, please ask her to stop telling her classmates there is no Santa.  This beautiful, elfin-like girl was gleefully crushing the beliefs of all around her.  Gleefully. 

So we had a chat, her teacher had a chat, and all is hopefully bottled up for another year.  My husband, in a complete reversal, has been "Santa"ing it up to my 4 and 2 year old boys.  We may have failed with our first three, but by golly our last two children WILL believe in Santa!!!!!!!!!!  Unfortunately, my 4 year old is the most rational of them all.  This is the child who, six months ago, declared he didn't believe in God because he had never seen him before.  We have dealt with that trial of faith, we'll see if he follows in his siblings' footsteps and has a different kind of trial of faith some future Christmas.

All Hallows' Eve

Halloween!!  I love Halloween.  Mostly because I feel like I won the Halloween lottery - 11 years ago my mom asked if I wanted her to make my baby a Halloween costume.  Yes!!  She may not have realized how tenaciously I would cling to this tradition.  So year after year children are consulted, costumes are made or bought, and I don't have to lift a finger.  I know.  It's awesome.  Do I feel I lose out in any way, missing out on treasured times searching for the perfect costume??  Um, no.

And now we come to the part where I talk about my kids' costumes.  Which means I have to talk about my kids.  Which means I finally have to decide what I will call them in this anonymously personal blog.  I know, confusing.  Oh well.  My eldest boy, (per his request, we shall call him Erik) was a Wii Remote with his friend.  They are on the verge of 12-dom and loved the attention this over-the-top idea brought them.  (Ignore the small ninja in front, we will come to him later.)  

 

My Erik is on the left.  (Erik?  Where in the world did that come from?  Well, JUST POSSIBLY this is the nickname all of his friends call him by, because JUST POSSIBLY this is the name he told his teachers to call him on the first day of school.  As a joke.  And JUST POSSIBLY all of the Substitute teachers still think it's his name.  But of course, we are just discussing the realm of possibility.  And yes, like father like son.)

And now we come to the Jedi of the bunch.  We seem to have a Jedi every year, sometimes more than one.  One year I want a quintet of Jedi, but that's the nerd in me.  Someday!!  Here is Jace (I know, you were just waiting for it) modeling his Star Wars garb as well as his dramatic flair.

 

 And then we come to the Diva of the bunch.  Which is her name.  And there were so many to choose from!!  Princess, Drama Queen, Fishwife (meant in the most loving way possible), Trumpeting Angel (the nickname given to her as a newborn by her then 4 year old brother) - my dear Diva is a character.  And for the FIRST TIME IN HER LIFE she was NOT a princess for Halloween!!  We were so proud.

I know, looks can be deceiving.  She looks sweet tempered and darling.  And believe me, she can BE sweet tempered and darling, if she so chooses.  But she has a Diva streak a mile wide, which guarantees she'll survive her life with 4 brothers.  And hopefully they will survive their life with her.

My little blond Dane was a "Dragon Ninja" this year.  What, you might ask, is a Dragon Ninja?  Oh goodness.  A ninja that fights dragons, I guess.  Though I've never heard of such a daring Ninja.  But I digress.

 

 Scary, right?  This pose makes you want to scream and run, NOT kiss him to pieces.  Because 4 year old ninjas are a force to be reckoned with.  Especially if you're a dragon.

And last but not least, my little Peanut.  He is SO CUTE.  I just adore him to bits.  He was a monkey this year, a handmade costume made by the aforementioned fabulous Halloween Fairy we call Granna.  She made it 8 years ago for a not-quite-two-year-old Jace, and it has since cycled through all the other monkeys in the house.  And yes, that is chocolate on his belly.  This is a post Trick or Treating picture, what do you expect a baby to do during the long candy trek?

 And there was our Halloween!  The kids got to dress up both Friday night for a church party and Saturday night for neighborhood Trick or Treating.  Earlier on Saturday we carved pumpkins and played in the leaves with Dad.  Or, more accurately, did battle with Dad and the Leaf Blower.  It didn't take long for all munchkins to find shields of all shapes and sizes.  It was one of those moments I thought - they have such a cool dad.  Awesome.

Plunging

Hmmm. A blog. 18 months ago, when asked if I had a blog, I said no way. I'm not a blog person. I am quiet, private, reserved, and have no interest in letting the world know what I think. Sometimes I don't even let myself know what I think.

Then facebook happened. And status updates. And slowly I realized it's kind of fun to send snippets of thought out into the world. I liked trying to decide "What's on your mind?" and explaining it to my friends in all corners of the world. Could I see myself with a blog? Possibly. Maybe.

Then more of my friends had blogs. Old friends, acquaintances, sisters of friends ... and I loved following them, reading them, lurking. But, if I did a blog, what kind of blog would I do? There are book blogs, journal blogs, recipe blogs, hair blogs, philosophical blogs, so many. Would I be able to untangle my thoughts into proper English? Would my blog be private or public? I don't want the world to see my business, only my friends. But private blogs are so hard to follow - I forget to check up on them when they don't show up in my Blog Dashboard. So could I make my blog public, but use pseudonyms to satisfy my need for some kind of anonymity? To pretend to myself that my family is still private, safe, because I don't use real names? Could I really do that without feeling like a fool, giggling incoherently, feeling ridiculous, or getting completely confused and confusing anyone who for whatever reason decides to read what I wrote?

So many questions, mostly unresolved. So here I plunge, not quite sure where I am headed. I'm going to try public, we'll see how it goes. Please forgive the pseudonyms I choose. Who knows how long they will last. This will probably be a Blog of Many Colors, filled with random thoughts, events, what-have-you. Hopefully most of it will make sense, though I'm sure not all of it will. I have no idea how often I'll update it. I'll try once a month on for size, see how it feels. It will probably sometimes be more, sometimes less.

Lastly, the title. I like the Psalm - "As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them." Why? Because I like kids. Enough to have five of them. And I love archery. I know, strange. I even have my own bow. And my own quiver. They are cool. Too many stories of Robin Hood and Susan Pevensie as a child, probably. Modern Austen adaptations haven't helped. So there you have it. As with this blog, we'll see how long it lasts.