Lotte, Safina, Chase and Dolma

Oddly, I slept better than I have in years while up north even though both girls were sleeping in my room. Anyway, here’s a little video of the kids together.

Lotte learning uke

Here’s one of Lotte’s slightly outdated ukelele lessons. Now she’s got five cords and even has a couple of 2 chord songs. She’s getting pretty fancy. It seems like a great confidence builder.

Scooch Leg…

Dolma has learned how to get her bouncy seat really going by kicking her right leg rhythmically. Unfortunately, she only kicks her right leg so I’m a little afraid she’s going to get scooch leg (1 min 35 secs into vid). Here is a clip of her bouncing and because I am a total dork I put it to “house of pain,” the much scorned 90s throwback.

It is hard to believe that Dolma is THREE MONTHS OLD!!! She is so sweet, heartbreakingly sweet. And Lotte is the best big sister in the universe. Here she is sleeping on top of her baby sister… Ok, so she’s not perfect. What do you want, she’s three.

We took a trip to Mongomery so that Christen, Jo Anne, and Dave could meet Dolma and we could get all the kids together. Chase is GIANT. Biggest baby I ever saw. He’s also super duper cute. Dolma and Chase had a great time together on their changing mats. They pretty much spent the entire time like this…

Dolma slept in the Bunting that I slept in when Mia and I were in Norway. She loved it.

It was a great trip until we got back from an outing (Chris and I got to go out by OURSELVES!!!) and Lotte had spiked a fever. So stressful. Anyway, we all made it home ok and I can’t wait to see them again. xoxo

Fall Photos

These are really late but I thought, since I’ll be posting stuff from Christmas, that I should really put these up to maintain some chronological order. The first photo is from the Putney Grammar School’s Medieval Faire. Each year they have rides and games and costumes (all homemade and very creative). Lotte got her face painted. Good times.

Lotte and Simon had a blast being little birds in the fallen pine needles at the Atkinson’s. We carved pumpkins and they even made a scarecrow!

Here is Lotte’s costume, which actually saved me from having an unscheduled home birth. She wanted to be Holly for Christmass. It was too specific for me to buy a costume so I made it. It is the five mama costume: the hoodie was given to me by Sheila, who got it from Debbie (who basically delivered Dolma), The material for the paws was given to me by Robin, Mia got the black boa (for the tail) and I added the black patch on the head, made the ears pointy, made the paws, baught the pants, and sewed stuff together. Lotte, of course, had lots of creative input. She was right about all of Holly’s markings. I, apparently, have either never seen our cat or I am blind.

This is awful but while I was working on the costume I kept thinking how tedious the whole thing was. That Lotte might not even notice after the whole thing was put together. Boy was I wrong. She loved it and was extra excited because I had “made it.” I’ll never forget how good that made me feel. What a sweet kid.

A short time…

So that lovely time that I wrote about on the 29th ended abruptly in a new baby! It is one of those stories that (as Brandt said), when I tell you, you’ll call me a liar to my face.

A real snowstorm started around 4 pm. The roads were terrible and getting rapidly worse. We were supposed to get as much as 15 inches. Earlier in the day Brandt asked whether I thought I’d go into labor during the storm and I said “definitely.” We weren’t kidding either. It seems as though labor is like that. It always comes at the least convenient time. Still, somehow I forgot this conversation as the day progressed.

I started to feel heavy, unable to walk around without sitting frequently around 5 pm but I really didn’t think that much of the feeling. I’d had that feeling earlier in the pregnancy. A friend of mine called, who is incidentally, a nurse at the our birthing center. She was calling about Lotte’s Halloween costume but as the conversation progressed I mentioned jokingly that I might be having some serious contractions. She told me to just come right in.

I went downstairs to talk to Brandt. At the moment that I was opening my mouth to tell Brandt I was probably in labor, an out-of-control Volvo crashed into Brandt’s Land Rover that sat parked in our driveway. Brandt ran out the door to deal with the situation. I sat on the couch and just tried to breath through the contractions. Eventually I got Brandt’s attention and told him that I was in labor. His eyes got really big and he started running around trying to complete the checklist of things we needed to do to get to the hospital.

Lotte was running around like a maniac and, before I knew it, the Volvo woman was in my entryway using Brandt’s phone to have an argument with her husband. Brandt was running in and out of the house trying to pack things into the car, get Lotte dressed, and deal with the car lady. Meanwhile, Alexis called and we started chatting about… maybe birthday parties? I can’t remember. All I can remember is that I was thinking “this is not at all like my first labor.”

Finally, we got into our Saab (which has wonderful snow tires!) and started off to the hospital. Lotte was laughing, thrilled about the snow. She thought the whole thing was a wonderful adventure, as did I. We drove up Canal St. toward the hospital. There were about 15 cars scattered across the road, all unable to move. It was like an obstacle course. Brandt drove the car up the middle of the road, then through the line of cars and onto the sidewalk. He wove his way around, narrowly avoiding crashes with other cars until we finally made it to the hospital entrance.

I couldn’t walk so Brandt, with all the bags dangling from him except the one that Lotte was carrying, pushed me in a wheelchair. Lotte then hopped on to my lap, giddy with delight. We got to the birthing center and my buddy, Debbie, met me at the door.

About twenty minutes after we got to the birthing center I started to feel a strong urge to push. I hadn’t even moved out of the outpatient room. Brandt was down the hall with Lotte and my midwife wasn’t there. Debbie looked seriously surprised and ran down the hall to get Brandt. They got me into the birthing room and Brandt came in. The power failed, the generators kicked in, but the phones were out. Somehow they reached my midwife Lois, who arrived soon. She said to just push whenever I felt the urge. So, yeah, about 55 minutes after we got to the birthing center my baby arrived. Her name is Dolma Violet Kurowski.

It was pretty amazing. I picked her up and held her to me. She was absolutely beautiful. She was clearing her lungs and nose with powerful hollering. When Lotte came in she was beyond thrilled. She loved Dolma and was fascinated by her umbilical cord.

This whole experience seems as though it came right out of a cheesy parenting movie. Happily, its one of those feel-good cheesy parenting movies. Lotte’s labor was quiet and serene. It felt magical. I felt very little discomfort and we were listening to Thomas Tallis. This one felt like I was bungie jumping. I was very uncomfortable because I couldn’t get into the right breathing rhythm (it all happened too fast) but I did use the relaxation methods. I actually had one of those moments where I thought “I don’t want to do this. I’m going home.” but I felt miraculously as though I hadn’t just given birth right away… very surreal. Both labors were amazing in VERY different ways.

This time

It is beautiful and snowy outside. Lotte, Brandt, and Albert are out for a walk in the woods. I wish desperately that I could go but my belly feels so heavy, the baby so low, that I know I’d need to turn back and Brandt would insist on getting me home. That would cut their fun short. It is nice to have a little quiet. Even freedom from the dog barking.

I keep going back and forth between feeling antsy and zen about the coming of the baby. I’m huge and I’m not a huge fan of all-night false labor that makes it impossible to sleep but this is sort of a magical time. I get to focus my attention on Lotte. Soon it will be much harder to do that.

Lotte’s imagination is so much fun. Every day our house is something new. Today we live on a giant horse, yesterday we were adrift on the ocean on a boat. Her animals all have complex relationships to each other and she does hilarious and creative voices for all of them. She’s started making up her own language: ka-ma-uk = no, sa-uk = yes, shi-an-a = jump. I don’t remember the other words but I’ll have to start getting good about writing them down.

I am grateful for this time.

My little pegasus/unicorn thingie….

Lotte had a BLAST at her friend Zoë’s Birthday last night. She was hilarious romping around in Zoë’s pink pegasus/unicorn costume. Our friend Robin took this awesome photo.