Boheme & Reverie, Eight Months

I'm a week late with this, which might just be the way things are for a while. Last week was an emotional one for me and I realized that a lot of it stems from the fact that we are moments away from being legitimate home owners. For some reason, marriage never felt like a commitment to me. I think because our wedding was a hysterical joke. We got married in jest. And although we've managed to rock this thing for seven and a half years, I have never felt "tied down" to my husband. More like "loose drawstring(ed) to". And kids, sure. Kids are a commitment for life. But they're pretty easy to be committed to, in my experience. I don't have to hustle to love them and even though some of them do not sleep, taking care of them is pretty much a no-brainer at this point. 

But home-ownership? Thirty-year mortgage? HOLYI'MANADULTNOW SHIT. It's scary, man. Exciting, yes, but scary. Maybe it's because we got married and had a kid before we knew whether or not we wanted to be together. We didn't have time to family plan, to get our ducks in a row. TODAY. We're sitting down at a table, surrounded by screaming kids pledging to thirty-year mortgage each other. 

"...You may kiss the paperwork."

So, this isn't JUST about me closing the last book in a trilogy of decades. It's also about opening a new one, that includes hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. It's about my fear of commitment, my inability to stand still, my want to wander... It's about sitting down with myself and recognizing that this is our next step as a family and we are READY to do this. We can afford to do this! We are doing this!

Anyway. Once again I have taken a post that was supposed to be about one thing and turned it into something else. But, here we are, eight months into Boheme and Reverie's life and besides them crawling and clapping and and and and... we're also about to move. And I'm slowly packing things up and trying to color coordinate my thoughts so that I can recognize my fears and invite them for tea. 

Here, fears. Have a cucumber sandwich! More sugar? 


There.

And now for a hundred thousand baby pictures.

In the last couple of weeks Reverie's eyes have gone from grey to green. She's the only one of our kids with eyes to match Hal's and mine. Fable's are brown, Archer's are hazel and with Bo's blues we have all our bases covered. I love that. Four completely different windows to ze souls of ze children.  

We can't figure out where Bo's blues come from (I don't recall a threesome with the UPS guy) but they're definitely invited to the party.

She's still intense as she's always been but softer, happier, peaceful... She reminds me of Archer as a baby, how he'd read everyone with his eyes. She's cautious and careful and as of last week, can clap her little hands. And SHE IS PROUD of that. Extremely proud. She is proud and giggly and easy. Hugs with both hands, falls asleep instantly with a face next to hers.

She is love to the nth power, sensitive and friendly, smiles for all, will sit quietly on laps, cling to fingers, coo and watch the birds out the window... 

She's always laughing, mainly for no reason, sometimes hysterically because life is a hoot.

She's very happy being a person, contrary to what those early months suggested. A HUGE relief. 

... Happy. And serious. 

 

And happy.

 

Then there's Revi.

 

Oh, boy. This one... 

 

This one is a HAND. FUL.

It's funny looking back on some of these earlier posts when Bo was impossible and Revi was the easiest baby in the history of babies because EVERYONE told me. "You wait! They'll switch." And, even though, at their core, they're still the same babies: Revi, independent and Bo, who does NOT like to be alone, even for a moment, but Revi's infancy was a guise, I think, for this little person who HAS ARRIVED. Revi is a force. That "i" in her name, an addition that makes perfect sense given it is but an upside down exclamation point.

She's always had a twinkle in her eye and those first hours I spent with her in the NICU, her eyes WIDE open I remember thinking, "Oh, this one. This one is our impish little dickens."

She's also unbearably cute.

She's playful and interested in everything. Except for strangers. Strange faces make her hysterical and in recent weeks has become very attached to me. I've probably enabled it more than I should have. All those early months with Bo and I felt guilty for spending minimal time with Revi but we are MORE THAN MAKING UP FOR THAT TIME NOW I'LL TELL YOU WHAT. 

Where Bo will happily snag a lap and sit there for hours, Revi has no time for snuggles or cuddles or rocks. She is awake pretty much all day and while she is wants to touch and kick and bang her head into every single corner that exists and grab and play and not sleep and crawl into boxes and hide there and eat paper and andand...

Bo is Ferdinand the Bull:

   

and Revi is a bull in a china shop. 

    

The other day, when (under miraculous circumstances) both babies were asleep at the same time, Archer looked around at the four of us and said, "Remember when this was our family? That was so weird."

I knew what he meant because it was kind of... weird. I can't even begin to remember life without them. And for all my nostalgic craziness lately, my sleepless nights and whackadoo-ness, I have zero desire to imagine life without them.

Our four were meant to be siblings and Hal and I were meant to be their parents. That is perhaps the only thing I have ever in my life been completely sure of.

"Hooray for eight months!"
Hip, hip...

***
seven months
six months
five months
four months
three months
two months
one month
one week old.

***

GGC