Where Jake Stands

I'm sure Liam made some silly rookie-in-charge mistake like using the recent chunks of time he's been left with siblings while I'm out to declare a general authority over Richard, because I overheard Richard say, "NO, you aren't in charge of the kids. MOM is! You're only in charge when Mom's not here."

Pause.

"And usually then it's DAD who's in charge of us."

Got that? It's not "Mom and Dad" who are in charge of the kids, it's Mom and THEN Dad when Mom's not here...and even then, only it's only "usually" Dad.

I personally would argue that if I'm leaving the house and Liam and Jake are both home, I would do best to put Cory in charge. Today G came out of the playroom to tell Jake that Timmy had a poopy diaper-- a REALLY smelly one, too, it's not like Jake should not have been able to smell it. Jake praised G for alerting him about the diaper, called to Tim, "HEY TIMMY! LET'S CHANGE YOUR DIAPER!" and went back to eating his soup. Guess what? Timmy didn't leave what he was playing with in the playroom to come for diaper change. I nursed the baby, came out to lecture G on not scripting in the playroom, couldn't find any oxygen in the playroom due to the methane off- gassing from Tim's diaper, felt Kayliegh do a diaper-bursting expulsion of her own in my arms, and headed to the bathroom to do a total diaper-outfit change, advising Tim that he was next.

Jake poked his head in the bathroom where I was wiping down K and said,"Oh, sorry, I was going to change him, then didn't. Um, I'm ready to take the kids to the library now, you don't need me for anything else, do you? We'll just head out." Jake apparently thinks that even though we have seven packages of baby wipes, two changing tables, plenty of floor space, and different-sized diapers for Tim and K in three different rooms so that one has non-competing stockpiles of diapers for each, and two adults who have diaper- changing experience, clearly changing diapers on two separate kids is a one-at-a-time activity and consecutive changes must be completed by whomever starts the first in line. Cory would be bright enough to get that nothing prevents simultaneous changes, and that attempts to ditch a poopy diaper (that smells like someone brought a cowpie in from a meadow, mixed it with dog poop, boiled it in cat pee and let it simmer on the stove) on me through either real or feigned ignorance of the possibility of simultaneous changes would NOT go over well with me.

So, Jake stands just ahead of Liam--usually--in the chain of command, and, if he's wise, out of my line of fire when I'm holding poopy diapers.

My Work Is Done...

OK, Timmy is two and a little bit. He is not yet potty-trained, he still spills any cup without a lid on it (less because he isn't able to coordinate but because he likes to observe gravity and the motion of fluids), he makes a red disaster out of himself every time he eats pasta, he still lashes out occasionally to hit Dunc when Dunc pisses him off ("pissing off" defined as "not handing over what Timmy wants", which is frustrating because Dunc is big on the whole look-how-nice-I-am thing and if Timmy asked nicely in front of me, Dunc would hand it over every time just to be fussed over by Mom for his excellent sharing), he has to give the baby her pacifier all the time even if she's sleeping peacefully, has no idea how to whisper (in Freivald-speak "whisper" means "speak so that you can't be heard across the church over the priest, organ, and choir") and in general is not yet at all a civilized human being.

However, there are two developments that tell me that in the ways that count, my work is done. First, he can recognize and join in singing at least three Clancy Brothers Irish folk songs that mention whiskey (yes, believe it or not, some of them don't), and he identifies and verbally begs for any Calvin and Hobbes book. "Skews me, Mom, ree CALveh en HOPS!" Clearly we have set him on the right path early.

(Jake's work is done because he loves Dilbert--he'll watch Dilbert videos over and over, muttering a few phrases after the characters say them with an amused and knowing shake of the head, as if saying, "Hah! Oh man, isn't that just the way it is?!?!)

Why There's A Drawback...

...to the usual advice to instill in young children a love of reading.



(And of course he was looking for one of the tiniest books in the avalanche!)

Kayleigh Freaking Freivald

That's really "Kayleigh Regan Freivald", but one of the kids called her "Kayleigh Freaking Freivald" and somehow I think that'll stick for a while.

6 lbs 8 oz, 18.5 inches, 12:36 PM on April 7.

Update: Jake here. I posted under Sue's ID earlier, and as Elena Svitavsky pointed out, I had the wrong weight (I said 8 lbs 6 oz). It's now corrected.

My Latest Impulse Buy

I am breaking in my most exciting purchase since--I can't even think of the last thing that was this neat. It is beautiful, gleaming, still clean and pristine and the best part as I sit and wait is wondering, "Once the water has boiled, I wonder if I can fit four pounds of pasta in it? Dare I try six?"

A stainless steel, 16qt stockpot, bought with the express purpose of being able to cook more than two pounds of pasta at a time. I know, you'd think we'd have a nice BIG pot by now, lots of people don't even have kids and they have big stockpots, but I got by with what I had and most nights for a while two pounds of pasta was plenty to make it through kids and Jake. Then Liam became a big kid, Mark moved in, and Timmy proved himself able to eat as much pasta as a people 14 or 40 times his age. (No, seriously.)

So now I'm getting ready to make a couple trays of ziti for company tomorrow and my one hope is that I won't have to boil two batches of pasta consecutively--lots of pasta, all at once. WOOHOO!

Look, Jake gets new Blackberrys, I get a new pot. It's work-related gadgetry all the same, and I get to be excited even if I'm unlikely (though tempted) to wear my pot on my hip all the time. But if you pity me because of this, feel free to send a Blackberry or iPhone if you must...

Jake's Shoes

So, at some point after Christmas Jake realized that he was missing his new dress shoes. If I haven't mentioned it already, Christmas was the blessed birthday of our Lord and also the day I found myself, pregnant and with a cold and a minimum of sleep, as the only conscious adult out of five in a house with seven kids and the person packing about 98% of everything into the van. When others stirred from their places, and I had just hit the point where the van was almost stuffed full, a couple people, Jake being one, noticed the boys' blazers and dress shirts hanging in a closet and thought somehow that in my lone competence I must have overlooked them. Um, no, if I can make sure that every piece of Lego from every new set given was compiled and put in Ziplocs so that each set remained intact and distinct for at least the rest of the first day, and all the dirty laundry was packed and beds were stripped of their sheets and useful toys for keeping kids occupied in the car were placed in the appropriate seats a full hour before boarding, I assure you, I was not "missing" anything--I had taken my dad's offer of leaving behind anything we didn't need right away for them to bring down or us to retrieve during the next visit. It seemed that in the grand scheme of Christmas break, there would be little need for the blazers and the kids would rather have their gifts than their dress shirts.

* * *

This was a fine plan, only it turned out that we never went back to LI during the rest of Break, and then my parents went to visit a friend in Florida during the first week of January--which was when Liam was going to visit a potential high school and needed his blazer. I didn't figure it out until the night before his visit, which was also Liam's birthday, and though Jake and Mark might think that birthdays just involve showing up for dinner and cake (and in Jake's case, even dinner is optional, because what's the big deal about taking a later train on your kid's birthday?), there's actually a lot of planning that goes into the food and cake and presents that Jake thinks appear out of thin air from the Birthday Fairy, so being distracted by all that I didn't notice that the blazer was an issue until fairly late in the day. But sometimes God provides in spite of my resentment and pissy attitude, because Liam's friend's mom had dropped off two suit jackets her sons no longer fit into into over break, and one of them just barely fit Liam. As I was expressing both relief at our good fortune and disbelief that I didn't realize we WOULD need the blazers, Jake mentioned, "Yeah, and i think I left my good shoes at your parents', too."

"Your shoes? The new ones from Lands End that cost an arm and a leg?" I had reluctantly accepted the fact, after Jake went to Macy's and found their shoes even more expensive then LE, that for appropriate business attire that Jake would be wearing daily, it was in fact not unusual that they cost more than all the shoes I've ever bought in our entire marriage. (This is both a reflection on how much good business shoes cost and how infrequently I buy sneakers. The last time I went shopping for them, I was shocked that I couldn't find a decent pair of Adidas shoes for under $25.) And Jake, like the kids, often forgets that things don't get replaced when worn out by magic or, if they do remember that such things usually involve me, that sometimes I actually need a heads-up when, say, Jake's shoes are coming apart at the soles, because I don't do daily checks on every item in the house. In fact, I doubt Jake even thinks to register the state of his shoes when he puts them on each day until he's walking around and realizes that there's a lot more air circulation than one should have in closed-toe shoes. This time, instead of an all-out shoe failure like a few years ago when Jake rolled up some duct tape to hold the bottom of the shoe to his sock while he ran out to Macy's in the city, Jake noticed the decrepit state of his footwear in time to keep the shoes together with glue or something until we got him new shoes, which is progress I had to applaud and reinforce. Which is why i was so proactive in getting his new shoes ordered in a timely fashion even though it was right in the middle of Christmas gift-buying and an economic crisis and all.

"Yeah, I haven't seen them since Christmas. Or my nice black belt, either."

So anyway, by the time my parents got back from Florida later that week, Jake was still walking around in his old shoes. Being the wonderful wife that I am, I did in fact remember to ask my dad just before they came down a week later to keep an eye out for a pair of Jake's shoes. And when they arrived at our house, I asked after the shoes and got a negative from my dad who still promised to look more closely around the house. Jake never thought about his shoes in all this time.

So Wednesday, as Jake was putting on his shoes to go to work, I saw that one of them had no tongue.

"Jake, that shoe has no tongue! Are you still wearing your old shoes?"

"Yeah, I keep forgetting to ask your parents if my shoes are there."

Saying nothing about my almost certain knowledge that the shoes were NOT at my parents' house, I asked, "Do you know for a FACT that they were left there?"

"Well, no."

"And have you looked around THIS house for them, then?"

"I haven't had a chance to yet."

"You haven't had a CHANCE? You can watch clips of Jon Stewart making fun of Obama and read about ancient farm practices before bed, but haven't had a CHANCE to look around for a missing brand-new pair of shoes so that you're not wearing a shoe that's missing it's tongue to work?!?"

"I just keep forgetting, and these shoes have been missing a tongue for two months and no one's noticed, by the way, so it's not like it's making me look bad or anything that I keep wearing them--"

"If it doesn't matter that these shoes are falling apart, why'd we spend the money on the new ones in the first place, then?" Clearly years of living with me have not improved his skills at reasoning and arguing nearly as much as one might think.

"Fine, I'll email your dad tonight and ask if the shoes are there--"

"Which is a lot easier than actually looking around yourSELF--you need to thoroughly check this house as well, and it's YOUR job to remember this stuff, not mine. This is just silly."

Needless to say, he did not look or email my dad that day or night, and of course i felt somewhat responsible because I didn't remind him. Yesterday, no worry about shoes--Jake comes home, takes shoes off, forgets shoes. Me, I don't get to forget things once they're not being used, because if I do, I end up with a situation like I had this morning when Duncan was telling me he wanted his mittens and I could not remember where I put the pair he'd last worn or the unused-but-matched extra stash of mittens in the closet. Did I then go three weeks without doing anything about mittens? No, I began going through the closet to find the mitten stash...

Which is how I came to look inside a plastic CVS bag hanging from one of the coat hooks in the dead center of the closet, which had inside not mittens but a nice pair of black Lands End men's dress shoes, and coiled in one of the shoes, a nice black belt. In the front closet, which is where all the shoes are kept, go figure. Granted, they were hanging up in a bag, not piled on the floor with the two dozen other shoes, but then, to protect the brand-new shoes on the way home from Grandma's they would have been put in a bag, and a thorough search would have included looking in various bags and things whether or not one realized that they were likely to be in a bag. In fact, I seem to have a recollection of Jake heading out the door into snow and slush and telling him there was no way he was going to walk two blocks to the shuttle in that mess in his new shoes, which means they may have been worn after Christmas but put into a bag for the walk home from work and then hung up in the closet by Mr. Forgetful, whose brain then saved him from the trouble of looking for them by assuming that they must be at a house where someone ELSE should look for them....

I think I'm going to hold them ransom. What I'm going to ask for, I'm not sure, but I'm open to suggestions....

There is no try...

This morning I noticed Liam's sneakers on top of the heater in the kitchen, and asked Jake what he wore to school. (Today is a Free Dress-down day--no uniforms--and I have never known LT to opt to wear his dress shoes on such a day.) Jake hypothesized that Lt wore his hiking sneakers instead, but we both agreed it was odd since Liam had actually remembered to come to us the night before and ask for help getting the dog poop off his shoes (as opposed to coming up in front of us at 6:30am ten minutes before departure and saying, "So, weren't you guys going to clean off my shoes?" which would have resulted in the shoes being placed someplace that was not on his feet and not un-poopy) and Jake had gone down to the basement sink to show him how to use water and a brush to clean off the shoes.

See, Mark had originally put forth the idea of leaving for Kandy's the Monday before Thanksgiving week, but asked if we needed him for anything before then I admitted that I had planned on him being around so I could go to my OB appointment and G's parent-teacher conference, so he kindly waited till Thursday. Now I realize what his real plan was--from his perch in the Red Room he could see the progress various neighbors were making on their leaves, and figured at SOME point we would realize that OUR leaves had to be done, so he spent from Monday to Thursday hoping he'd still escape before we got around to noticing ourselves. Sure enough, we didn't have a chance to think about leaves until Sunday, when I realized that everyone on the block seemed to be hurrying to get their leaves out to the curb (around here, leaves merely have to be piled at the side of the road, and then trucks and things come by and whisk them away by the truckload) and figured, correctly, that our street was scheduled for pick-up within the next few days. So Sunday afternoon, after mass and teaching religion and Liam serving a later mass and Cory's basketball practice, I came home and informed everyone that all was not done, as we had to do the leaves. Jake (inefficiently) used the blower, I raked, and Liam and Bot hauled garbage cans full of leaves back and forth between filling them at the backyard piles and dumping them off the curb while Cory babysat everyone inside. We got it all done in just two hours, but of course, a few of us got some dog poop on our shoes thanks to--well, the dogs.

Liam had been excused while Jake and I took care of the last bit, but when he noticed the poop on his shoes and tried the hose, he found the hose frozen. I told him that we could use the basement sink for washing any poopy shoes off, and to hang on while Dad got the brush which we'd uncovered in the leaves so he could use it on his shoes. But Liam had already turned and gone inside, thinking the message was that "we," Jake and I, would use the basement sink for washing his shoes and thus, knowing the shoes should just go in the basement, went inside to dump them there and forget them. I also forgot them. (Jake's strategy for poopy shoes is to take them off just by the back door, put them on a bench to expose them to lots of rain and weather, and then leave them there, well-seasoned, for the dogs to eventually chew up, at which point he tells me he has no idea where his sneakers are and he needs new ones. At least Liam is ahead of him on that front.)

So last night we found the brush again when Liam brought up the sneakers and Jake escorted him down to tell him what to do and pick up a bit while Liam went to work. Instruction was given, but apparently little direct supervision of the task was provided. Liam emerged with his hands held out in front of him like they were full of the plague and then made a turn toward the stairs.

"Where are you going?"

"Upstairs."

"Why are you holding your hands like that?"

"Because i need to wash them." Apparently there was no hand soap by the basement sink, so my brilliant child thought that the answer to making his hands free of the germs, real and imaginary, that had him holding them away from his body as far as his arms could go, was to traipse up three floors, opening safety gates and doors along the way with these same hands. I pointed out the obvious conflicts that this plan and his aversion to germs and dirty things posed, as he'd be handling those same gates and doors on his way downstairs eventually, admirably avoiding the actual word "stupid"--though, like Matt, I am very good at using many words to convey "stupid" as clearly, if not even more obnoxiously, than if I'd just said the word. He used the kitchen sink sitting a foot to his right, and that was all any of us thought about the shoes last night.

But now Liam was off to school and his shoes were at home and Jake and I were looking at them. As i served breakfast to G and Dunc and Tim I eventually had a chance to make my way over and pick them up, at which point I exclaimed, "Ugh, they're soaked!" Then, having just stuck my hand into yucky soggy teenage shoes, I turned to find someone besides myself to blame--Jake. "Didn't you tell him to keep the water on the BOTTOM of the shoes, not to get the body of the shoes wet?"

"Yeah! I told him to try not to get the shoes themselves too wet--UCK!" He had found the shoes as unpleasantly soggy as I had. "They're just SOAKED!"

"Jacob, you don't tell him to TRY not to get them TOO wet--this is the kid who 'wets the brush a bit to brush his hair' which turns into making his hair soaking wet while showering the whole bathroom with the water he flings around with the brush trying to get a half gallon applied to his scalp. If you tell him to TRY not to get them wet, and they'll get wet! You don't tell him to TRY not to, you tell him 'Don't get the shoes wet!' and then we'll have a manageable level of damp to deal with!"

"I can't tell him not to get them wet at all, they're going to get a little wet most of the time, so I can tell him to TRY hard not to get--"

I held up the soaking shoes before plopping them back on the basement steps to spend a few weeks drying. "TRY?!?! There is no 'TRY,' there is only 'DO!' "

Apparently resorting to citing Yoda as an authority on how to instruct a youth to wash poop off his shoes without making them soaking wet was very amusing to Jake, as he just laughed, and when he spoke again after I took this chance to make exclamations about soaking wet shoes and hair and how our son takes to both verbal instruction and water, he agreed that telling Liam to "try" not to get his shoes wet was not the way to go and he, Jake, would be more commanding in the future of the lack of wetness to be expected in any tasks involving water.