Hindsight

It seems like a good number of conversations between Maryann and I revolve around what life was like pre- and post-children.  Our present table arrangement has Maryann and I sitting across from one another with children on all sides.  "Isn't this romantic," I ask as if it were just the two of us sitting down for a quiet dinner and a 3 year old boy wasn't regurgitating food all over the table and then playing in it, or a 1 year old girl grabbing our clothes with her grimy hands, or a 4-yr-old girl trying for our attention to tell us how her food arrangement looks like a nativity scene, or a 6-yr-old wiggling her crooked front tooth at us and giggling about how she talks with a lisp now and every time she says a word with the letter L her tongue pushes her tooth way out.  Yep, life has changed. 

Yesterday we rolled into church 5 minutes late instead of the usual 15 and noticed a vacant section of seating up front.  "Awesome, padded seats, we've got to sit there," I thought.  So we disruptively made our way to the front and just as we sit down the bishopric says something to the effect of, "please take your children out of the chapel when they're fussing".  You can't really blame the bishopric for making these almost weekly announcements given this ward has soooo many young children in it.  Seriously, I've never been in a ward with more little ones before and I think the bishopric is a little unnerved by it really.  There's a constant background noise, almost a dull roar, of children throughout the service.  I've long since learned to tune it out.  But whenever a visitor comes to visit our church it's one of the first things they comment on, "My, there are a lot of little children here."  I remember back to my college years sitting in a church without a single baby in it.  It was almost intensely quiet during those meetings.  Nothing like our ward here in Michigan.  Well, immediately after sitting down I realized I had made a strategical error in choosing to sit in front of the bishopric on those padded seats.  We'd forgotten the baby's pacifier and didn't have nearly enough room to spread out all the coloring books and whatnot, which led to a lot of elbowing and pushing and fussing.  The snacks that we thought had been packed into the Sunday bag were definitely NOT in the Sunday bag.  Not to mention the multiple bathroom trips our children wanted to make this particular Sunday.  Nope, from now on, we're going to plop this family down in the back on the hard folding chairs, even if they haven't opened up the curtain yet.  Maryann told me that things had actually gone pretty well compared to last week when she had to bring them to church by herself because I was at work (which may have accounted for the bishopric's announcement this week). 

So here are some more pictures of the monsters we are up against at home.  They're a lot of work but we love it... most of the time.