Part of My World

Every so often I have a truly terrible day. Today was one of those days. I could see it coming early. I woke up in the early hours of the morning in a puddle of toddler pee. It was the second time this week. I stormed off in a semiconscious tantrum to sleep on the bed Toby was supposed to be sleeping on in the kids’ room. I was awakened a couple hours later by our nearly deaf downstairs neighbor hammering incessantly on my next door neighbor's door to advise him of a leak. This also woke up Giannina, who refused to give me any peace about her crib confinement. She screamed for 30 minutes while I laid there pretending to be asleep. Off to a rough start, I tried every approach I could think of to getting a fresh, cheerful start: devotions, prayer, a jammin’ gospel album, goofy dancing, and a fancy scrambled egg breakfast. I took Toby to the kids room to get a head start on picking up and Dominic and Noemie did their routine chores of clearing the table and sweeping the floor. The hour that followed was one disaster after another that all started with a cup of spilled orange juice that was left carelessly abandoned. Before it was all over, there was juice in my (reupholstered) chairs, in the dust pan, and on Noemie, who was not involved in the matter in the first place. There was also a wide trail that led to the kitchen. Giannina took advantage of the distraction to empty the middle shelf of her bookcase. Toby, meanwhile, found Noemie’s secret stash of Disney Princess stickers and began to decorate. Naturally, this threw Noemie into a fit of rage that resulted in her throwing herself into a dramatic heap on the craft table, but she overshot and landed her shin against the marble window sill. To make matters worse, Dominic spent the whole morning responding slowly, rudely, and half attentively because his nose was stuck in a Star Wars reader. (I hate those things. Their literary value is akin to the nutritional value of a marshmallow. Which I also hate.) Before the afternoon was over, Gia had thrown up, Toby skipped his nap by playing in my make-up, Dominic and Noemie had been banished from the lunch table, and Gia shattered a jar of baby-food.  I decided to lose myself in a book for a few minutes while I called for a global time-out, (I even texted Danny at work to tell him he was in time-out too for going to work), but couldn't remember where I placed the book. I found it when it fell on my head when I opened the freezer door. Then Dominic dropped yet another cup of water. Why?

Ten years ago Danny was sitting on a bench beside a lawn somewhere in the center of UF's campus, sending me an email on his brand new grad school laptop. Wireless internet? It seemed so strange. Almost suspicious. Here we are 10 years later, 4 kids later, 350 miles away. Who would have thought Danny would go into law enforcement? What a ridiculous thought. (He was supposed to be an engineer. And I was supposed to be an engineer's wife, living in an engineer's house. With a french au pair. But alas, I have to get by on a little less than expected. Most regrettably, the au pair. And I must keep my head high, my smile straight, and my composure firm as I carry wailing children from the minivan, as I carry on an adult conversation over the hysterical shrieks of a girl who muddied her knees, as I try to schedule appointments on my tablet PC while a toddler throws furtive swipes at the touch screen... to say nothing of spilled juice.)

And who would have thought, in a million years, that I would run a 5K? (And by run, I mean mostly run. But it was a tremendous feat nevertheless. A lifetime first. A lifetime best! Because I'm pretty sure I'm never doing that again. Oy!)

If I could witness today, 10 years ago, what would I have thought? I am glad that days like today are really not the norm.  In fact, there have been many more celebrations than anything else in the past few months. Noemie cried with disappointment when I didn't win first place in the race, but I was so proud to have been in it at all, that I gave myself a hearty pat on the back, once I recovered. We also had the opportunity to host friends from North Carolina, Afghanistan, and Argentina. And of course, Cristovan turned three this year so it was his turn to party with "Mi'Mouwh".  That was quite a celebration!

We made the traditional trip to Disney, but with the recent promotions they had, we ended up scoring 3 days of park action! With abuelo and abuela, we had enough hands to hold babies, a caravan of strollers, and hands to make yummy dinners. 

We had fun conversations while we stood in the lines and shared in some joyous experiences- like Dominic's Turtle Talk participation, Giannina's face on it's a Small World or Noemie's rollercoaster hysterics.

Despite the drizzly weather, EPCOT was a perfectly pleasant experience. We caught the tail end of the Garden Festival so the grounds were extra beautiful. In Magic Kingdom, Big Thunder Mountain was the favorite ride of all who went on it, though the new Barnstormer was a close second. Looks like I have some roller-coaster junkies on my hands. 

By day three I was dreaming of Mickeys. You know it’s time to go home when your instinctive reaction to a scraped knee is to say “bippity boppity boo.”  We were thoroughly exhausted by the time we left.

We also finished our year of Awanas Wednesday night children’s church program. There’s nothing like dropping off your crazy, sporadically obnoxious, whiny kids to get fed the Word of God by people who are much better equipped with fresh, patient spirits, while you escape to a grown-up Bible Study. Even if it’s only for an hour. I’m always wincing as I pick them up, expecting to hear of the horrors they’ve rained upon the workers, but find that everyone has only glowing reports of them. Noemie, in fact, came home with the Cubbies Excellence Award at the end-of-the-year ceremony last week. She was the only one to receive it of the 20 or so Cubbies in the program. One of the teachers testified that Noemie was a brilliant assistant, always prepared with her memory verse, and eager to help the other kids learn their own. “Repeat after me...” Noemie would say.

Meanwhile, my parents are on a grand tour of Europe. We have been enjoying tracking them on our map- Germany, Estonia, Russia, Finland, Norway… and going strong. They’ll hit up the Alps before their return.

We are expecting some changes for our family soon. We don't know what or how exactly things are going to change, but we know, the way the wind smells different right before the autumn, that a new chapter is getting ready to begin. We have some excited summer reading to go along with it. The list is based on a list of books that “build character” that I found at my in-laws house last weekend. If you have young children and would like to follow along (or like to read children's books anyway) here's our list for June and July. Hopefully this will expand their appreciation of civic virtues, as well as their vocabulary so they never have to resort to abusing the English language "irregardless."

The Selfish Giant (Oscar Wilde/ illus. Zwerger)

Sleeping Beauty (Mercer Mayer)

Marcella’s Guardian Angel (Evaline Ness)

The Little House (Virginia Lee Burton)

The Little Brute Family (Russel Hoban)

The High Rise Glorious Skittle Skat Roarious Sky Pie Angel Food Cake (Nancy Willard/ Watson)

The Boy Who Held Back the Sea (Lenny Hort/ Locker)

Clancy’s Cloat (Eve Bunting/Caulry)

And now it’s time for an Espinosa family soundbite. You can see my conversations with Noemie are getting more interesting.

Tomorrow we’re going to have visitors!

Ooooh! Is it Karn?

No, farther.

Tjay?

No, farther. 

Tia Amy?

Nope, father than that!

Abuela Marta and Abuelo Wilmo?

If you can believe it, even father than Berlin.

Prima Meli?

No, not that far. But it is another country on the other side of the planet.

Russia?

South of Russia.

China?

West of China.

Japan?

No, west is the other way.

A coniferous forest?

[awkward pause]…. The country is Afghanistan.

[Suddenly realizing who it is...] You know what? When I see them I am going to SCUH-REAM! I don’t even remember what Mr. John looks like!

Well, he has orange-ish hair…

YUCK! Carrot hair!