Wedding day!

Today Ted and I celebrate 12 years of marriage. The past 4 years have been a lot more interesting than the first 8 were, but we haven't had much time to reflect on that. For the past few days, our minds have been consumed by a much more recent wedding: Tia Glenda and Tio Bill finally tied the knot yesterday!

Arriving at the reception

The kids were supposed to be the ring bearers and flower girls, but things didn't quite go as planned. While waiting to get our pictures taken, Isaac realized that we'd put mousse in his hair and freaked out. He did not recover in time to walk down the aisle (hours later!), but Jude saved the day by marching to the front of the church by himself, carrying both his Bible and Isaac's ring pillow. (Witnesses tell me that he walked right up the platform toward his Abuelito, who was officiating the ceremony. After a bridesmaid delivered him to his daddy, he loudly declared, "I did it! But I walked too fast.") The girls, who were right behind Jude, got off to a good start, but when Dahlia ran out of petals halfway to the altar, it was her turn to freak out, and both girls turned back, crying.

With a 25% success rate, it feels like it was a whole lot of effort for very little return. But I am consoled by the fact that, by the time Glenda and Bill celebrate their 12th anniversary, all they'll care about is how adorable the kids looked in their wedding attire:

We love you, Tia Glenda and Tio Bill! Thanks for making us a part of your day!

It'll grow back, right?

A couple of days ago, our weekly angel Tante Gabi graciously brought me a copy of Haircutting For Dummies. I wish I could say that I read it before impulsively deciding to cut Jude's overgrown hair this morning, but alas—I'm afraid the results tell another story:

Sorry, buddy!

The poor kid was a model client, but his hair is just so much thinner (and, therefore, much less forgiving) than Isaac's. At least the back looks okay:

I'm thinking clippers would help a lot. Anyone know where I can find some super-quiet ones that won't freak out my boys?

Library rues

You know how sometimes your kids just make you want to crawl under a rock and hide? That's how I felt this morning, when I was crazy enough to take the Fab Four to "toddler time" at the library.

Story time itself actually went fine. Our crew met up beforehand with my friend Alysia, her 3-year-old son, and her 1-year-old triplets, and then we all parked ourselves at the back of the classroom to sing a song and listen to a couple of stories. Isaac, Jude, and the triplets stayed in their respective strollers, but due to our stroller's design, the girls couldn't see unless I took them out. Although Lucy was quite content to sit in Alysia's lap, Dahlia just wanted to run around, which meant that I spent the entire time trying to keep her under control (I know one of the stories was about a giant potato, but don't even ask me about the other one!). Even so, I was ready to consider our brief trip to the library a success:

Listening to story time

Then came the embarrassing part. It started with Dahlia freaking out when it was time to go back in the stroller, continued with Isaac freaking out when he couldn't see me (I had to push the stroller out of the library while holding his hand from behind), and culminated with Jude and Dahlia freaking out when I put them in the van. To make a stressful situation even worse, a woman pulled in next to us while I was taking apart the stroller (amid screams) and coldly informed me that my kids didn't seem too happy (really? I had no idea!). By the time I climbed in the driver's seat, I was dripping with sweat and deeply sorry that I'd attempted to do something normal like go to the library with my kids.

Remind me when it is that children learn to control their emotions—it's soon, right? Right??

Monkey leash FAIL

Dear people who saw our family in the church parking lot yesterday:

We know it looked bad. Four toddlers being dragged to church on leashes. Walking in circles, wrapping the leads around their necks and/or their siblings' necks, trapping their parents like mummies in a crisscross of brown stripes. Unaware of the laws of physics, trying to run and getting yanked back abruptly by the tethers, crashing to the asphalt and wondering what in the world just happened.

Thanks so much to those of you who offered to help us get the kids from point A to point B (we only declined because we need to learn how to do this on our own), as well as to those of you who so kindly held the doors open for embarrassed parents with no free hands. And thank you, thank you, thank you for not calling CPS on us. We promise to try something different next time.

Sincerely,
A traumatized mom and dad who will definitely wait until the kids are older before using the leashes again!

Before beginning our harrowing journey
(notice that Isaac is already trying to strangle himself!)

19 months old ... reining 'em in

This morning we FINALLY took the kids to church. We'd been meaning to try it ever since we dropped the morning nap, but we hadn't gotten around to it yet because, frankly, the idea was supremely intimidating. I mean, getting four toddlers ready for church—feeding them breakfast, changing their diapers, dressing them up, and preparing the diaper bag for an extended outing—while also having to get ourselves ready, all before 9am? A daunting task, to say the least.

But this morning I got the itch to try it and, since Ted didn't have any strong objections, we decided to go for it. After breakfast, we raced around to find outfits for the kids and make ourselves presentable before rushing out the door (right on time) for our first family trip to church since the babies were dedicated.

When we got there, we quickly unloaded the van and each grabbed two kids by the hand to walk inside (in the most meandering way possible, of course, as each child desired to walk in a different direction). We registered the kids in a flash ("yes, they all have the same birthday ... no, they are not two sets of twins ... yes, I do have my hands full") and dropped them off in the toddler room.

Notice that I have no pictures of the chaotic momentous occasion.

While Dahlia was thrilled to go in and make new friends, the other three cried as soon as they realized what was happening. Although I felt bad for leaving them when they were so sad, Ted and I quickly left the scene and made our way to the sanctuary. There I tried to put the kids out of my mind in order to focus on the message (which turned out to be a very interesting exegesis of a portion of Matthew 5—see, I paid attention!).

As soon as the service concluded, we booked it back to the toddler room to see how things went. I could hear Isaac crying down the hall and immediately thought the worst, but the caregivers claimed that he had been fine until just then. In fact, they assured me, all of the kids had actually had a lot of fun while we were gone. It would seem that our first church nursery experience hadn't been too bad after all!

My relief, however, was premature, as leaving proved to be even more difficult than arriving: Isaac was inconsolable, Dahlia repeatedly bolted at the slightest decrease in hand pressure, Lucy insisted on being carried, and Jude absolutely refused to walk through the double doors. Somehow, we were eventually able to get all four of them to walk back out to the van among a throng of exiting churchgoers, but it was no picnic!

To be completely honest, the whole endeavor left us sweaty and grouchy and utterly exhausted. But at least now we know that taking the kids to church on our own is not an impossible feat! We will be repeating the attempt sometime soon, but definitely not until we receive delivery of these nifty little contraptions:

The key to controlling our
four little monkeys in open spaces?