baby love and accomplishments

it's been a lazy day... noah will be a month old tomorrow and i think that this is the first day i've been home all day with all three kiddos, no appointments or "agenda", and no visitors... we're just hangin' out. i know we should get out of the house-- but right now it simply sounds like too much effort. L & M are playing together nicely, at the moment, and N is asleep-- not in my arms or in a carrier, but alone on the bed, for the first time all day. there's been a lot of juggling-- making lunch one-handed and changing over laundry with a chunky baby in the homemade moby wrap-- i don't mind it a bit, but my back and neck are definitely feeling it. he's going on 12 pounds already for crying out loud. but i'm holding him and wearing him as much as possible because i simply can't resist-- and want to savor this time.

as i've aged, i've begun to suffer from a tendency i inherited from both of my parents-- i'm not sure what to call it-- but i can't seem to escape it. when asked about her day, my mom responds with a laundry list of all the things she's "accomplished". she'll say: well, it was a pretty good day... i got a lot done... i... and then go on to list every errand, every checkmark she could make on her to-do list. i did not, repeat, did not, used to be this way. at all. i could lounge around all day with the best of them. back in my gypsy days, hanging out on the beach, playing volleyball in the sand, "working" on my tan, or simply hangin' out with friends, giggling and partying and simply being. not so much anymore. i don't know when the shift happened-- maybe when i started back to school and suddenly had to "get serious". at any rate, it's hard for me to just "be" now without "getting something done". so today, i vascillated between enjoying the kids, and housework, and since a clean house wouldn't be "enough" (it's not clean, mind you, nowhere near clean in fact, but anyway...), i had to *do more. so, i finally got the freakin' bike and ugly curtains listed on craigslist (the curtains have been in the "sell" pile since, oh, 2003, and the bike since 2006...), and i re-organized my bookmarks (my recent blog addiction has made that rather complicated) and i took some photos... so despite my intermittant crabbiness, the referee-ing fights between the big kids, the feeling of leaking milk mixed with sweat on my unshowered body... it's been a "pretty good day". it will be even better if the bike and the curtains sell...