marcos in a month

Marcos is changing our family. His arrival has changed Tony into Superdad--no kidding. Superdad does things like fly to Utah with the baby, single-handedly get all the kids ready for family pictures and offer to take the baby to church meetings. Superdad uses his new powers to see things that need to be done without the Mom asking. Superdad has even shown signs of multi-tasking. (He was once sighted feeding the baby and doing charts at the same time!) I'm falling head over heels in love, again, with our new family hero.

Other miraculous Marcos-inspired changes have shown up in sweet tenderness from Wilson and Cooper. The other morning I was getting ready for teacher-conferences and asked Wilson to dress the baby. I couldn't help but do a quick peek and saw a tender moment when Wilson carefully bathed, lotioned and dressed his baby brother. I wish I had been quick enough to catch on film Maxwell feeding Marcos his breakfast the other morning. He did a great job with an estimated 50% of the food actually making it into Marcos' mouth. Maxwell's biggest problem is that he loves to climb in the crib and snuggle with Marcos. Inevitably he wakes him up and the wrath of Mom is kindled. Marcos loves the feel of Max's hair. Eliza, in her continual role as family librarian, engages Marcos in personal story-time every day. Cooper was born kind and tender, and Marcos brings out all of his best traits.

I on the other hand, reached a low parenting moment the other day. Wilson was dishonest with me about his homework and hid his book in his closet on the highest shelf. I indulged in extreme overreaction and called the town Sherrif to see if he would confront Wilson at the school, and hopefully take him to jail or something. Luckily for me he declined and I took the book up to school myself. I found out that two of Wilson's friends did the same thing on the same day. Those lucky kids don't have parents who call the cops. It's a good thing I was the first child, the guinee pig, because I sure am messing up a lot on Wilson.

We had to clarify with Maxwell tonight at dinner that we will not be "stealing Marcos from the temple on December 1st" we will be SEALING Marcos in the temple on December 1st." I'm glad we got that straight.

Marcos has reached a few milestones: two little teeth have emerged (just as Eliza is about to lose her first one!). Marcos has become an expert clapper and has learned reverse gear. He scoots backward on his tummy, as well as to the left and right for something he wants. It's a good thing he's my fifth or the fact that he won't crawl before his 1st birthday may have had me hiring physical and occupational therapists round the clock. Incidently, language skills are progressing nicely as well, with great vocalizations and verbal play.

My last Enrichment meeting was last Tuesday. I hope I learned the lesson intended for me from this calling because I think it will be the most challenging calling I have, or ever will have had. Today was my first day in Primary. It was like that feeling you have when you have been on vacation for a long time and you get home to everything familiar and sleep in your own bed again. I felt like myself at church for the first time in years. My greatest challenge is trying not to be too emotional everytime one of the kids says something tender. I need to try really hard to write down things that the kids say to tell their parents. I love it when people tell me things that show my kids are learning the gospel of Jesus Christ. This primary is particularly well organized, the music people are awesome and the majority of teachers really like the kids. I am happy that the structure is in place so we can just focus on how fun it is to live the gospel.

Tony spoke on gratitude in church and had such a good insight. He said that entitlement is Satan's replica of gratitude. I've been thinking about that and hope that this Thanksgiving we replace all entitlement with gratitude. Of course everytime I look at that sweet Guatemalan boy the gratitude spills over. I guess that's that biggest Marcos change in our family--we are just more thankful.