independence weekend

did everyone have a good 4th weekend? i think i can safely say we gerbickians did. let's see, i'll give ya a quick run down: drive to my parents in cinnamon lake (oh) friday morning, addy played like crazy & even took an afternoon nap (as did we all!), go to balloon lift off, watch adeline eat gobs of oreos & then have tantrum after we take oreos away, put girls down, stay up late with my hubby & parents, wake up at 10 a.m. (ooh yea), hang out in pj's for awhile, lunch, sister & brother in law arrive, talk with mom & sister for awhile, decide to go shopping with my mom to outlet mall, shop!, back to cinnamon lake where my dad's parents are there & my brother, sister in law & twins are also, eat dinner, give older girls a bath b/c they are so stinkin' dirty!, go to fireworks, come home, chat a bit while watching decorating shows, sleep, wes up early to canoe on the lake with my brother, i get up at 9 a.m. (again, oooh yea), breakfast (asiago bagel), pack like crazy & drive back to westerville, arriving at noon exactly. there you have it! (the rest is just boring boo-ha-ha.)

here is a hot air balloon lift-off, for all those who are not from ashland, ohio.

i believe there were 28 balloons this year(??) which seemed like a lot at the time...they just kept filling up & lifting off! adeline was over the top excited about it all, especially when pop-pop took her to see them up close. of course, she wanted to take a little ride in the balloon, which they do, but she wasn't tall enough or something. at any rate, it's a pretty fun time with little ones.

& i just love to give you cute pictures of my kids. so here's another.

& this was addy's 'job' all weekend: take stones from the ground, place them on the outdoor table. it was hard, dirty work but she did it anyway.

all 4 grand babies prior to the fireworks. as you can see, they were eating & chloe & zoe had these adorable white shirts on...so to eat, they were topless. if you have a kid, you know you've done this. what i'm not posting is a picture of the girls down to their skivvies running inside. imagine it, b/c it's a keeper. (for parents)

let me just say that driving even 90 minutes north drops the temperature 10 degrees. it was such a nice, cool weekend. i know it was cool in columbus as well, but this was even better. (sorry mom & dad, not enough to make us move). it was a fun weekend with my family...adeline has cemented her twin cousins as her first best friends in the whole wide world & amelia is trying her hardest to keep up with them.

which brings me to an amelia milestone announcement: she is now climbing up entire flights of stairs. age 10 months. when the 3 older girls were getting their bath, amelia heard the goings-on upstairs & she high tailed it up there (thankfully wes saw her starting & was close behind...but she didn't falter once). what a gal, that amelia.

anyway, we took the 3 oldest to the fireworks at ashland. the fireworks were good, not red-white-&-boom good, but small town ohio good & what's best is that you don't have to wade through crowds of people. we actually parked at the hawkins (a grocery store, for all you non-ashlanders) parking lot & sat on the surrounding grass (yea, by claremont). we were 'those people' but we wanted to ensure a quick exit in case chloe or zoe became frightened (last year, one of them was so scared! & this year chloe still shook from fear of the noise (maybe?), but didn't cry & calmed down quickly). anyway, we were classy, make no doubt about it. functional; that's what we were.

so, thanks mom & dad, for letting me sleep in until 10 & buying especially for me the asiago bagels from buehlers. yum yum.

***

& today we had a play date with a family down the street. they have two girls who are each a few months older than ours. how convenient! & i just have to say, it's great when to meet another family who's in the same boat as we are. 2 girls, dogs, etc. it's just sort of like holding a mirror up, ya know? well, adeline & her counterpart had a fantastic time together, when they did decide to play which each other. we didn't observe any fights, but we did let them play about 50 yards away in a sandbox together (we walked to a nearby park, did i mention that?) & i did see addy throwing sand, but there were not tears shed from the sand throwing.

amelia & her counterpart crawled around the ground, each eating their share of mulch, grass, sand, & dirt. it took about 3 minutes before the moms were comfortable enough to stick our fingers in the other baby's mouth to pull out an object. then the babies would try to climb & do the slides...all good stuff.

& my counterpart & i chatted it up about many things...from feminism & raising two girls to long hospital stays (hers was while pregnant with #2, mine coming up) to husbands who drive bomber old cars (& not the cool, run-on-veg-oil kind, either, sadly) & do cost analysis for nearly everything they purchase to growing plants in our neighborhood, where there is hardly any full sun (due to old, giant, & beautiful trees). she had some great advice about the upcoming separation between myself & the girls, from experience (she went to work one day & never returned home for over 6 weeks! can you imagine being in the hospital that long?! on bed rest?! while pregnant w/ hospital food?! gah!!).

then we come home for lunch. all is well, amelia is snoozing away but addy decides not to take a nap. not a big deal. somehow she snuck past me reading in the playroom & made her sneaky way downstairs to the kitchen. finally, as i'm drying my eyes after finishing the book thief (oh my goodness, a great book!), i hear some clanking of silverware. i hear an ever so faint beeping coming from our fridge. *crap* addy is downstairs. i decide not to get worked up, what could she be into already? wrong mama, wrong.
i found the blueberry monster in my kitchen. i think her hands, feet, & face were blue for quite some time after this (as is the grout in this tile & part of the carpet in the living room where she apparently briefly ate her find). these are the frozen packaged blueberries, not the tub-o-blueberries that we have sitting in the fridge. now those wouldn't have been so messy! but nope, she chose the messy, frozen version. that's just adeline, i suppose.

ball game. with 4 kids 2 & under!

we did it! last night we went to the columbus clipper's game & we even stayed for most of the game! we had our girls & then my brother's twins. you would think that a ratio of 8 adults to 4 kids would be a good one. it helped, but the kids won out eventually (we left early). highlights? well, there was this huge jumping-room thing for the kids. pay $1 for 3 minutes of pure jumping joy. then the kid must exit jumping thing. if the kid is adeline, the kid will NOT want to exit & will crouch in the corner of the jumping thing & scream like her life is ending. of course, grandma is with her & is not the most excited about crawling into the jumping thing to retrieve screaming child, especially since she had amelia with her. thankfully, uncle cal was walking by & offered to go in & grab screaming banshee child who is making quite a scene. (the dude running the jumping thing asked cal: are you her dad? of course, cal is not but somehow the guy let cal take her with a simple 'i'm her uncle'... not sure how i feel about this, know what i mean? could anyone have said 'i'm her uncle' & taken a screaming kid away? so glad it was cal, anyway.) wes & i were watching the game! (no worries, we soon resumed our parental duties). as usual, i have inundated you with pictures:

aunt kristi getting some amelia lovin'
the not-so-smiling mascot.

chloe & zoe, the smiling mascots

addy is so grown up
OR
big body, little girl head.

millie is a fan of baseball! the older gentleman sitting beside me, while i was holding the clapping & shouting baby turned to me after millie had *thrown* her rattle maraca at him (& as i tensely awaited his reaction, is he friend or foe of babies?). anyway, he turned to me with a smile & the maraca & said 'she throws better than half of those guys out there, get her a uniform!' (*mama sigh of relief, he's a friend of babies)

millie also got a heat rash yesterday, which didn't freak us out at first, but as it continues to come & go & then get worse, then much worse, we are starting to worry. we gave her a dose of benedryl to hopefully help the healing...
nose shot of cal & kristi & my dad.

part of the fam (left - right): cal (my brother in law), my dad, my brother, leila (sis in law), uh, chloe & zoe (i am a terrible aunt & can not for the life of me tell them apart).

cousin hugs!

the clippers did NOT win. ah well. when we left (top of 7th inning?) i believe it was 11 to 0. oops.

prior to the game, we all met at our house for some pizza & to ready ourselves for what we were about to do: take 4 kids 2 & under to a minor league baseball game. nope, we didn't need beer (yet) either. we needed our wits about us, lol.

here is 3 of the adults pushing 3 of the kids on the swings.

(aunt) leila holding the baby amelia.

***
my parents came here friday morning to take care of the girls during the garage sale. here is a peek into their fun times (hint: dora is on tv).

***

& this, my friends, is what adeline & i created a few days ago. it is titled "daddy at work"

& yes, that would be wes, the weird smiling thing in the open window. this was addy's idea, i promise.
the stupid freakin annoying fuchsia hollyhocks. grrr.

little bear playing the emotion game with adeline & i. she is *surprised!*

adeline playing the emotion game. she is *sad*

***

so since i last posted, i have put together a garage sale, sold nearly nothing during the 7 hours of garage sale operation, & then torn down that stupid garage sale. we made about $80-some dollars (if you count what my friend judy owes me still, ahem, lol). it's really a good thing that this garage sale wasn't about making money!!! b/c we didn't. what was it for, then, you may be wondering? distraction. & for that, it worked beautifully!

i went through the first 12 months of baby clothes. remembered all the times they wore this or that & where & when that certain stain came from. i put aside some of my mama-favorites, like the squirrel outfit adeline had & the 'love me' super soft outfit millie wore most of the first month. i put aside the first outfits grandparents purchased for the newbies & then also some outfits just in case my sister does have a kid in the next decade.

i am not so much an emotional person over things like that. for instance, during our wedding ceremony, wes was the one crying. i get upset over travesties of life (like harold) or a child/baby/anyone dying or being terminally ill, i cry over heart wrenching movies & when my adeline gives me that garbled up 'i love you' sound. but not over certain things that others do. so i didn't cry watching the very few people who did buy our clothes walk away with our memories. b/c the clothes are just that, memories. & hey, we have pictures right? well, for freaks sake, we have the kids still, that's enough for me.

i did love organizing the clothes & cleaning out the garage. what i didn't love is waiting & waiting for people to show up. then when certain people did & saw it was obviously a baby sale, & then quickly turned around to walk away or the quick drive by's...not that pissed me off. i was on the verge of throwing tiny pebbles at them *smile*. but i didn't. so within 1 hour of shutting the garage door, all the stuff was dropped off at 'once upon a child' & is awaiting our pick up to see how much stuff they didn't buy. at which point i will post those on free-cycle or give to certain ladies-in-waiting expecting girls. i called our local once upon a child store & wow those ladies are gummmp-y! yikes. i wanted to know how much they give for onesies & such. she said something along the lines of 'we're full, maybe you should wait until july' to which i replied 'well, i just want it gone, so are you buying or not?' (i said this in a nice voice) & she replied 'yes, of course' & i was like 'uh, okay, we're bringing our stuff then...' ??? but they refused our bouncy seats b/c they are 'so full' blah blah blah. so we have some bouncy seats! i think i'm going to try craigslist...

at any rate, what shall i do next? the way i explained this to some people this week, this urge i have right now to hunker down in my house & organize or clean or purge things: it's like nesting at the end of a pregnancy. i want to have pictures up of the girls, i want our bedroom finished (complete with pictures of the girls, lol), i want our basement organized & our garage cleaned & our windows washed. i dunno, this may sound crazy to some. but the less i focus on harold & the upcoming surgery, the less anxious i am, the better mom & wife i am. there is a time each day, or several times, that i let myself sink into the thought of this tumor. then i cry & try not to let myself think of all the possible outcomes of surgery (or the much higher death rate if surgery is not chosen). my mom called this 'mourning', taking time to mourn the loss of this part of my life, this short while & then move on from those thoughts.

i usually am not a busy person. a perfect vacation to me is finding a place to sit in the middle of some sort of beautiful/stunning nature scene & not moving for quite a while (usually a book would accompany this not moving part). so this whole business of being busy is unusual to me & is possibly wearing me out, but the other option of freaking out on a near constant basis is much less appealing. so what's in my plans for the next few weeks?

• finishing our bedroom
• pictures
• ikea trip (to help finish our bedroom...they have this hamper... & their picture frames are a deal)
• trip *somewhere* alone with hubby
• clean basement
• set up a daily schedule for adeline to follow. (this was recommended by our pediatrician as a way for her to cope with being moved from grandma to grandma & being out of her house for awhile & then also suddenly have her main caretaker -me- switched to her grandmas. it will be complete with pictures & rewards & snack breaks & such. wes is excited to help set it up & print it off).in between that would be a 4th of july out of town (w/ my parents & nieces) & a few gatherings with friends here & there.
• 4th of july in ashland w/ parents & nieces & brother & sis in law.
  

we also checked off our to-do list getting the grandparent visits organized & scheduled for around harold-abduction time. it's a relief to have that done.
gah, enough of harold-esque situations!

phew, long post.

just the two of us

strawberrys delight& what is that picture of these delightful strawberries about? well, those are our first ripe berries of the year!

that would be amelia & me, the mama. we stayed at home while daddy & adeline go off to a bbq party. *sigh* the joys of being ill. this cold has really kicked the bottoms off amelia & i. i was hoping yesterday was my worst day of the illness, but as i woke up this morning i knew that was wrong. maybe today is the worse (or would it be "worst"??) day? yes, carol, as you said in your email, having a cold when it's not cold outside is just wrong! maybe b/c in the winter, when sick, you don't feel so shabby staying inside in a near comatose position all day? but during the warmer months, particularly a spring holiday weekend...being sick just plain sucks.

anyway, blah blah blah sickness.

so wes & adeline left around 3, leaving me with the millie monster (who is the cutest monster ever). after her nap, we played peek a boo with laundry (yes, why am i doing laundry when sick AND holiday?!), read books...then i would sort of zone out on cold medicine & find amelia crawling on me frantically trying to get my attention. it was fun to just hang with the wee one, but i do wish we could've also gone to the bbq! i was looking forward to this for the past few days, hoping my cold would go away by now. i just feel so bad taking sick kids somewhere, ya know? well, apparently adeline had a wonderful time playing with the bunch of boys & another wee but tough toddling girl. (why is it that nearly all our idaho friends are having girls & nearly all the ohio friends have boys?!).

amelia is finally able to read books without older sister disruption & book swiping.

& yesterday we ventured to cinnamon lake (ohio) for my twin niece's birthdays! they're two, which is baffling to think about. i think i finally rid my brain of connecting their names with the vision of them as ohsotiny babies & now i have to add to their brainfile (a term i am now saying is a real word) that they are two!

so this is leila (my sister in law) & her grandma behind her, then chloe & zoe while we are singing happy birthday (which they were so happy to be sung to. heart melting moment, folks).addy running with a stick. brilliant. (where are her parents? lol)

chloe & zoe playing in/around/near my brother's new compost bins/piles. they are mighty spiffy & put ours to shame, sadly.

last week i finished "the book of ruth" (not the one from the bible) by jane hamilton. & i can't get it out of my mind. i have a very hard time watching violence on tv (law & order/ncis/heros/etc can give me nightmares & sad awake thoughts for days). anyway, i bought this book years ago at the vineyard bookstore, thinking it was a devotional or something of that sort. not so! & before i read it now i didn't really know what it was about...until the end. darn it! hate it when that happens. i sorta thought it was similar to "zippy" & "she got up off the couch" by haven kimmel (which are two books i highly recommend, btw, as is her "the solace of leaving early" novel). anyway, this book of ruth ends with a brutal murder (of the mother of ruth) & the wife/mother being beaten nearly to death while pregnant by her mentally unstable husband. (sorry, if i just ruined this book if anyone was going to read it. i do recommend it, if you can handle the violent end; this author has a way of writing in a midwestern dialogue, which made me laugh).

some may know, some may not know, but i was in an abusive relationship in high school (for 3 years! egads) & it just really pains me to even read a fictional account of abuse. but it has made me pull closer to god & wes & hold my girls a bit tighter .... knowing what i know, hopefully i can help them not get into the same situation i was in. but it's not really my choice, it's theirs, which is very hard to let go of. anyway, these are the thoughts that are plaguing the sickly mama right now.

& now, to bed!

the ZAC's

yesterday was the gerwig family monthly meal, this time at my brother's house. we were surprised with a new couch & a new flat screen tv; lucky them! (but they work hard & deserve it, for sure). as for the title of this post, for those who don't know, the ZAC's are zoe, adeline, & chloe (my brother & his wife have the twin girls). we are trying to come up with a name to include amelia: zaac's? azac? zaca? hhmm.
anyway, chloe & zoe are twins & are 21 months old, adeline is just 8 months older, then amelia is 15 months younger than the twins. i wasn't sure when the time would come that they would be in the same age range for playing...but this month was it. they all were excited to see each other (i'm not including amelia here, but zoe & chloe were very excited to have millie around) & immediately started playing with each other. they actually got along really well. we have speculated that chloe & adeline may team up on zoe, the more quiet & reserved one of the 3...that sort of happened a few times, but zoe seems to be able to handle her own (us shy girls learn how to combat those 'other' girls at an early age, go zoe!). i have a feeling that in a few years, zoe & amelia may learn to team up on adeline & chloe...let the girl wars begin! anyway, i am really happy that they get along so well & have each other to hang out with & play with for the rest of their days.

we are sort of planning a first over-nighter with the three girls maybe this summer. my parents don't know this yet, but i think i have chosen their house to start the cousin overnight parties. i think that night i will be sleeping in my own bed ;o) i guess now the cats out of the bag. i think by that time, hopefully adeline will have some more words in her vocabulary & i'm guessing chloe & zoe will be zippy runners as well (right now adeline has the dexterity & speed, while chloe & zoe have the vocabulary...they all seem to have the devious toddler minds, though). i just smiled most of the drive home thinking about how much fun they will have together over the next decade...

some pictures from yesterday: gram mum & pop-pop getting their exercise sitting down with the girls.

& this is our pizza that was very yummy on friday night (we have home made pizza every friday...wes loves it. i am more into our cinnamon rolls on saturday morning!). it is caramelized onion & pear, home made alfredo sauce, with goat, fresh mozzarella, parmesan, & asiago cheese. i TOLD you i have an affair with cheese. during the pinnacle of our income days (read: no kids, double income), we always had about 14 different cheeses in our fridge. oh the glory of it all. adeline usually loves this pizza,but for some reason she refused to eat it on friday. durn child.

this was adeline being sad that this was the pizza of choice.

now i'm going to totally change the subject.

so with wes' office moving to delaware, which is about a 30-35 minute drive (with traffic congestion, ya know), we have thrown around the idea of moving our family to delaware. not now, but in a year or so, once we know this office change is permanent. (lol, it would just be our luck to move & then have the office move BACK to columbus!). when we were moving back to the columbus area from boise, idaho we thought about moving to delaware. i was more for it than wes at the time. but we chose westerville b/c it was so close to wes' office. hardy har har. oh, the irony.

i am sad & a bit happy about this possibility, conflicted. wes & i have often talked about how odd it is that we live so close to this huge shopping mecca: the polaris mall, all the shops & stores & lanes of traffic. we find it incredibly frustrating around the holidays to live & work here; it is impossible to go anywhere on polaris & don't even think about trying to go out to eat...every restaurant is packed & the mall playground has standing room only for the parents. living near this shopping mecca just doesn't fit with us. we don't like to shop, shop, shop & we are more into thrift stores & garage sales than pottery barn kids. we are constantly commenting about how annoying it is...but at the same time, the mall playground in my lifesaver with these little ladies. having 3 starbucks nearby to boost my energy level is also a great perk! we really love to walk to uptown westerville & have at least 4 parks within walking distance. amazing! & we have even come to like our formerly 'ugly' house a bit more...after all, we have put hours & hours of work into this place & have more hours left.

it would seem fitting that now that i'm finally getting around to painting our bedroom & when i have ordered asparagus roots to plant (it will take a year of trimming & waiting for the stalks to be edible)...we will move. this is the third time this will happen; we spend time & money on getting the veggie & flower & herb gardens just the way we want, you know, figure out the sun angles & what works best where & we will be coming upon the third season, when things really start to bloom...& we move. in clintonville, we left behind a stellar compost pile & a wonderful clematis. in boise, oh my, it's hard to remember the 14 rose bushes we dug up from my co-worker's yard & painstakingly replanted successfully in our yard & the stone edged herb garden (the stones i dug up from around the subdivision as houses were being built...i would wheel around our wheelbarrow & haul a hundred pounds of river rock around...i'm sure i looked very odd, but our stone edged gardens were beautiful, i have to say) & oh yes, the again stellar compost pile & dessert plants we learned how to grow after the first year & the finally blooming clematis...& & &...it hurts to remember all of those plants. & it hurts to remember all the hours of painting & decorating & planning. & now we may move again?!

i know a 30 minute commute may not sound very daunting to some...but to us it is. wes loves to come home during the afternoon to hang out with us for his lunch hour. that's just him...he's a very involved daddy & we love that about him. we also like the idea of living & working in the same community & once the bike path is finished, wes was going to start biking to work (i was not about to let him ride his bike on the roads near this shopping mecca...people don't care about bicyclists around here). it bites knowing that he will be using that much fuel & producing that much carbon, etc just to get to work.

but is it worth uprooting our family again? moving & paying moving & realtor costs & packing & explaining to adeline & millie why we are leaving another home & then repainting & replanting. & lets not forget wes' treasured hop hut! he has worked so hard on it & has somehow achieved the near impossible: growing over 9 feet of hops in the ohio climate. we would have so much to re-do. is it worth it? would we find a house with better soil for the veggies & flowers & hops? this would be the 3rd season for my new clematis...it may finally start to bloom. i just don't know if i can do it again, if i can move again. will we be lucky enough to get such wonderful neighbors for the 4th time? i don't know. we just don't know the answers yet.

we could find a new home that has more room for full sun flowers & veggies & maybe a house that fits our style a bit more (country-colonial is not us) or maybe a newer house or even an older one with more character. who knows what we would find. a bigger yard? a larger pantry? smaller rooms?

so this last part of the post was a bit jarbled & not very well organized...i think b/c we are still in the thinking process. only time will be our answer. how will wes do driving at least an hour a day, being away from us, not being able to make it to well baby appointments & seeing his girls only 2 hours a day before they head to bed for the night. that's just not us. damn this economy, ya know?!