Being a Mom of More than Most...

I want to say first of all that I realize it's not a competition. and I'm not for an instant suggesting that. For one thing, I have a number of friends who have larger families than I do, so I wouldn't even come close to winning. But there's something about having five children that seems to nudge one over the "you must be crazy" edge. If people took note of how many children we had in tow before, now I can almost see their lips moving as they count us all up. "One, two, three, four...five?!" So it seems that five children is more than most people have, want to have, or can even imagine having. Hence the catchy title.

But this isn't meant to be a comprehensive look at all the ins and outs of being such a mom; it's just a snapshot of my first real week as one. The first week after Scarlett's birth doesn't really count, as I stayed in bed dutifully and let Dave, and then my mom, take care of the other kids and the house. For that week, I allowed myself to be a mom of just one, and I didn't assume my full responsibilities again until last Friday. After eight days of doing nothing but snuggling with a newborn, I was pretty well rested, we had no appointments or anything much to do, and Dave was off again the next day... so that day doesn't really count, either. Monday was my real inauguration into life with all five of my charges. I'd like to say that beginning that day we had a week full of peaceful snuggle time, with lots of reading to older children during nursing sessions. I'd like to say that, once more at the helm, I directed a cheerful flow to our day, that the older children were always happy and productive, and that the baby was blissed out in the sling while we all went about our orderly business.

But alas.

The reality, of course, is that Scarlett wasn't always as easy to please as is instructed in the fifth-baby handbook, and that often while I was attempting to console her, some of the older kids were fighting loudly (or pulling out every toy in the house, or raiding the pantry - again, or picking handfuls of green tomatoes out of the garden...) and other children, completely oblivious to the chaos, were asking me to help them locate Scotch tape or inquiring about random Star Wars trivia. The reality is that all the kids watched a little too much TV and played a little too much Wii this week. The reality is that sometimes when Dave came home I retreated to my bedroom to rock the baby...and rocked her for quite a long time after she was sound asleep enough to put her down.

Then again, there were plenty of positives - more often than not at least the beds were made (at some point in the day), everyone was fed, and they all enjoyed plenty of bonding time with Daddy in the evenings. We had two appointments this past week, one to the pediatrician for Scarlett and one to the dentist for Drew, and we made it to both on time. A friend watched the older four kids for the former, but the latter was my first solo outing with the kids, and we survived it!

And sometimes Scarlett was blissed out in a sling...