You sweet, sweet darlings!

Tonight, after your showers, you joined me on my bed as I played Candy Crush. You two are the sweetest children! Gerard, you were cheering me on in the game, and blurting gentle "I love you" along the way. Aubrey, you were playing with my hair and making me feel good.

I am in looooooooooove with my darlings. 

As we walked to the shower, Aubrey asked if she could recite the Lord's Prayer. So she did, and ended it with, "the end."

When I think about my first glimpse at each baby of mine, it puts such a big smile on my face.
Since I don't have a picture of each of those moments, I'll describe it here. So that one day, you will somehow visualize how I saw you.

Gerard: My first glimpse of you, you were being pulled out of me by Dr. Rittenhouse. I saw your grimacing face, and your neck stretched up that very moment -- so stretched it concerned me at that very second if your neck was okay. I have never seen a human being stretch its neck like that, much less my own baby! You did not cry right away at all. Your birth was such an easy breezy experience for me. I felt you push yourself out, even though I was pushing just as hard. I felt you moving across!

Aubrey: My first glimpse of you, you were being carried like a human airplane (your chest was rested on the doctor's hand) -- your eyes captivated me! They were wide open and looking straight up to the light/ceiling/wall... but not at me (of course). You did not cry either. I had a sense of relief as soon as I saw you :) The delivery doctor said you weren't quite in the position you should have been right before you came out, so she had to stick her hand inside of me to try and turn you over.


Thank you for sharing your lives with me. I am ever enriched having you, and I will always keep my vow to love you forever and ever and ever and ever. 

April 15

I try, I really try, to spend the rest of my time with you children.

Sometimes I just get so distant because I do need the break, but it's hard for me to leave you so I can be my own self. Hence, you'll hear me say "I'm busy" or "I'll do it later" when really, I want to do everything with you all the time. It's just impossible.

I'm glad that our shares of "I love you" to each other are always present. I shall remember this for years to come, and I do hope that it continues for the rest of our lives together. Too many reports lately, of awful teenagers doing horrible offenses to others. I don't want you in that crowd. So, one day, if you read this, I hope you are reading it as good-hearted people. I do not ever want to hear about you hurting someone else, or invading someone else's privacy for your own pleasure. This is not right, and you will hear me say this each chance I have to. We teach you to respect, to learn patience, and most of all, to understand the situation. You shall be guided, and equipped with the tools to make decisions for yourself, and I hope you only choose the right ones. If you don't, well, I hope it's nothing so horrible that it lands you in jail. But from others, learn from them.

This is why it's important for me to spend all my time with you. But I know that we need our own time away from each other, or we won't learn anything.

Love you.

Love you very, very much.


And happy 5th birthday to Gerard. My sweet, darling boy. I'm so proud of you. 

Even though I am not always around or available to hug you kids, you should know that you're always on my mind. I am always thinking about how your hugs feel so warm, and your tight arms around me show that we need each other's physical touch. I go crazy holding your hand, or carrying you, although you always hear me say get off. =P

Those random greetings

You know what really makes my day?

When either of you randomly just come up to me to say "I love you." I will NEVER ignore that, no matter how busy or sick I am.

I am going to miss this a lot when you're both older and not saying this to me anymore. But I hope that you continue to do this, no matter what age you're in.

Because I love you both very much. 

As I sit here surfing the internet and encouraging Aubrey to finish some of her dinner, we're having a conversation about poop, her favorite subject as of late. ----- Both kids had gotten sick over the weekend. Started with Gerard vomiting in his sleep on Friday night, and then diarrhea followed. I took him to sleep on the couch so I could keep an eye on him, and he did vomit throughout the night. We took him to the afterhours clinic next day where he received a pill to stop the vomiting. He improved a whole lot, but by Sunday evening, I started to feel the funk. For the most part, I thought I caught what Gerard was having. But it ended up being a separate bug -- a flu! Then much later Sunday night, Aubrey vomited in her sleep. That sealed my decision to call in sick on Monday morning, when I felt much worse. Aubrey woke up almost every hour after the vomiting started, and I had to catch her hourly vomits with a steel bowl. We both slept on the couch so that she wouldn't vomit on her precious bed. At that point, all 3 of us were in the living room: Gerard on the red couch, Aubrey and I on the black couch. Monday morning came, and I asked Egan to stay home from work to nurse us, as I didn't trust my body to be able to do that. I was mostly bed ridden, but only after I woke up from Aubrey's final overnight vomiting. She had a major diarrhea accident but thank goodness that was as far as that got. We both had doctor appointments for the afternoon, and by then, we both had improved. I was up on my feet by evening time doing my usual chores.