A close blogging friend remarked earlier that I had not written much about the children recently, and that I should - that she enjoyed reading about our experiences and thoughts so far.
Where to start?
We are now coming up to two months in the care of little ones who we now think of very much as our own. We wake in the dead of night at the slightest sound - invariably murmering to each other “wait to see if she cries again”. We know each child’s cry. We know the difference between dreams and reality in the tone of their voice - the sound of real tears ejects us from bed without a second thought.
The household runs on rails - forged by us to make the day pass with a little less theatrics than would otherwise occur. I run the morning, the kitchen, and general orderliness of “things” - Mrs Beckett runs meals, bathtimes, and magic stuff to rub on grazes, cuts and bumps.
The eldest continues to test our resolve. Some days pass without incident - others are an endless stream of wanting things “now”, of playing us against each other, and of tantrums. A sticker chart has helped, but not much. As much as we would like to be positive parents, we find ourselves continually pulling her up - “don’t do that” versus “wouldn’t it be better if”.
The middle child is by turns the happiest, the most jealous, the craftiest, the greediest, and the most manipulative. Anything anybody else has is more interesting than anything she might have, and attempts to obtain said item are almost always worth a theatrical sulk (which may involve shouting “RIGHT THEN!” and stomping off at high speed to a quiet corner to crouch face down). We are becoming very good at ignoring that which we don’t want to see, and praising that which we do.
The youngest is playing catch-up from her early life - visibly so. A few weeks ago she was learning how to make new sounds. D became L. D also became N. She greeted me from work yesterday evening with an excited sprint across the living room, accompanied by streams of fully formed sentences. A corner has been turned somewhere in her head. The silent child we knew in the first days is now difficult to shut up.
The younger children continue to express frustration that we cannot understand everything they want to tell us. Their stream of consciousness is punctuated with half words, hilariously exaggerated inflection of pitch, and the most determined frowns I have ever seen while questioning everything.
Nothing escapes their young eyes. Five minutes ago I sat down at the dinner table, thinking I had got away with putting brown sauce on my cheese on toast. “Daddy has got sauce on his cheese”. Immediate. They can see inside sandwiches too.
Things have turned around. Where we once chose to move forward - choosing to try and make three little people “our children”, they are now the instigators of that. It has become their choice. They are excited to see us open their bedroom door on a morning, revel in falling asleep while we read to them, and compete to squeeze in next to us when watching movies.
We are a family.