While working on a craft project in the other room from the kitchen, we were suddenly informed that James might have a bead up his nose.
Some of the siblings were certain; others thought perhaps he was paranoid.
John and I were surprisingly not panicked but simply picked up a flashlight to peer up his nostril while the other three ate their pancakes (and added extra syrup because we were distracted...)
Sure enough, John confirmed that there was in fact a small bead lodged up his left nostril. We didn't even bother to try and uncover the reason for it's placement, but simply went to work devising a plan on how we could pry it out.
Tweezers just didn't work. Fingers were even worse.
"We need something with a small hook to latch in the hole in the middle and yank on it," said John.
Evie just couldn't look. She was disgusted, worried and totally upset by this whole thing. But then, as I thought about what John said, I immediately thought of Evie's little crafting hook that she uses to weave pot holders.
Immediately delighted by this solution, Evie jumped up from her chair and ran upstairs to retrieve the tool.
Amazingly, this tactic worked and the title orange bead fell on the floor beneath him.
Evie refused to go near the bead or the pot holder hook; but nonetheless, she was proud that she could be of assistance in this endeavor.
Upon debriefing about the situation, we all agreed that putting beads up your nose is not a good way to do the beading craft.
Later in the day, I went upstairs to try to escape the craziness that was taking over the house. John was preoccupied with fixing a leak in our basement, and I was exhausted; so the kids had the run of the house. A few moments into my attempt of "zenning" out alone, I heard an absurd amount of laughter coming from downstairs.
I felt obligated to investigate. Sure enough, the kids had found a HUGE spool of fishing line and had run it all over the house creating invisible trip lines everywhere.
It went out of the house, into the garage and they had managed to string it around the front bumper of the van. Even when I thought I gathered it all up and tossed it in the garbage, I found myself tripping and getting tangled up in it throughout the rest of the day.
Later in the day when I pulled the car down the driveway, a Styrofoam cylinder attached somehow by the fishing line trailed along with me, wound around the bumper. Getting out of the van, I yanked at the garbage attached to my vehicle. Unable to snap the line and getting progressively more frustrated, I looked ridiculous as I stood in the middle of the street pulling and kicking.
To sum up this day, I came out of the house to an abandoned toy jeep that Caleb was riding only moments ago, left in the middle of the street. Perplexed by this sight, I shaded my eyes and scanned up and down our road, wondering where he went off to. A few moments later, a woman five houses down informed me that Caleb had knocked on her door and wanted to play with her son, but informed her that his "mom didn't know where he was." Thank you Caleb for suddenly getting the epiphany to surrender your jeep to the road in order to engage with a new playmate.
Caleb and James both learned how to ride a two wheel bike sans training wheels, and their new found freedom and abilities has created a desire to be independent and seek out thrills. I find that I've been spending a large majority of the afternoons trying to figure out where they are and praying to God that they don't totally wipe out as they fly down the steep hill near our house on their bikes.
I think having four kids has made me way more chill than the average Mom when it comes to my kids falling, getting lost and seeking out dangerous activities.
I just pray...and hope for the best. 😳
Sunday morning I walk all of the kids into church, weary from the morning hustle of getting there and fatigued by the chaos and craziness in our home. Finding a brief moment to chat with some friends in the foyer while the kids burn off energy running around me, I am interrupted by Levi handing me a small sticky bead. "Here Mom," he says. "This fell out of my nose." He immediately runs off again to play with the other kids. I stand there, almost unfazed because my life has suddenly become a constant fountain of declarations I never imagined I'd hear stated with such normalcy.
My friends, who just had their first baby, just stare at me, and I tell them that this is what they have to look forward to. (Although, they just had a girl, and I'm not sure girls shove beads up their nose..) So far I've known about %50 of my kids doing this and %100 of them are boys.
Boys are great. I love my Evie, but the dudes and I spend a lot of time together since older sis is in school all day, everyday.
My pack of boys and I do a lot together.
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