Baby Joule

 

Yesterday Levi touched my belly while I crunched on the yoga ball. He rubbed back and forth, “Hi, Baby Joule! I touch Baby Joule!” He’s quite the proud big brother. Lincoln does his part by chanting “BABY!” and searching them out. Baby Joule, as you heard, is fifteen weeks along and due on October 22. We (I) assume he’s a boy until proven otherwise; we’ll find out in the beginning of June and keep you posted. When we had the ultrasound (at eight weeks) he just danced away. Dr. Loar raised her eyebrows at me, “This isn’t common!” I wanted to invite her over to see Levi and Lincoln. Joule will fit in well. This fetus name is for the science side of our life. And it makes sense to call our baby after a measurement of energy. So, welcome Baby Joule! 

Happy birthday to my dad this week! Every now and then I see an expression cross the boys’ faces that I recognize from my dad and it just tickles me. Is there a genetics of mannerisms even when you live far apart? I’ve always been grateful for Dad’s determination, diligence, and drive, but I don’t think I really appreciated anything until I started parenting. Thanks for being my dad!

Much of this week blurs together. We caught the flu—except Lincoln, amazingly. Wes still went to school but we all know that was silly. I came to pick him up and hurled all over the parking lot (poor guy who drove up right next to us as it happened! And many thanks to the ticketer who skipped our unpermitted park and didn’t even flinch at my sound effects!). The combination of not eating/pregnancy and the flu just doubled everything up. By Tuesday morning I wondered how the boys and I would make it. Thankfully, Wes is ever prepared and worthy to give blessings. He and our friend gave me a blessing and since then we’ve all steadily improved. A few days later I opened my Primary manual: the lesson this week is on Christ’s power to heal and the reality of the Priesthood. I don’t think any of this was a coincidence. My 14 class members all gaped at me as I told the story today.

Wes recovered, but it took a while to catch up on sleep. Shocking. He came home early with flowers and food and patience. We’re all very spoiled.

Lincoln bounds around and babbles. He climbs chairs and tables. As a result, all the kitchen chairs line blank walls. He says nose, slow, blanket, dog, book, no!, cup, milk, among other things. I asked for a kiss one morning, he grinned, shook his head and said, “Nooo…” all soft and silly.

Feeling better yesterday, we spent our wholesome recreational activity wandering downtown Austin. We rode a blue bus (their favorite part), walked by a saxophone/electric guitar/drums band grooving next to a giant chess set, stopped at Jamba Juice (Lincoln ate most of the apple strudel thing and carrot-orange smoothie), enjoyed the Faulk library with real computers for little kids, and then walked back to the bus. Levi trooped the whole way and loved it. He pointed at all the beards, buses, motorcycles, and joys of being out and about. This morning he continued praying in gratitude for the buses.

We’ve decided to take the Lehi in the wilderness route for our Colorado excursion. We’re putting everything in storage here and taking only the essentials: boys, clothes, a frying pan, etc. The rest we’ll patch together from Craigslist when we get there. This way we’ll save on the truck and gas, we can all ride together, and we don’t have to unpack and haul stuff quite as much. I’ve been laughing about leaving all my “precious things” as I look at my boxes and boxes of books—and I’ve only packed a shelf and a half! We feel a little crazy, but confident, about this choice. It adds a little tang to our adventure.

Here’s a thought Christine said to add: somewhere during conference someone (one of the Seventy?) said something about Sariah and Lehi succeeded as parents. Obviously. But then I thought about how well they succeeded because generations hundreds of years after them continued to seek to be an eternal family. Their hearts were turned to each other. They yearned to share the covenants. The people living the gospel in the Book of Mormon never forgot or forsake their brothers and they always thought of them as “brothers” and “sisters.” That kind of commitment to each other and to the Lord is major, major success. I’m sure Lehi and Sariah had days that they wondered how to respond to the choices of their children, but they pressed on with the Spirit.

I started the Book of Mormon again this week and thought about the Labans in my life. Sometimes we have Labans in our lives. Those things that annoy us, block progression, anger us, etc., but are difficult or awkward to completely destroy. They hinder us spiritually, but often we (I) don’t’ know exactly how to proceed, or the potential consequences seem too much, or the action we’re prompted to do goes against what we initially expected and believed. So I hesitate and question. Bless Nephi for going forward anyway. He used the good to eliminate the bad, he took the power (the right to the records, the family history, Laban’s sword), and learned from the trial to grow individually but also to improve his relationships (with brothers, with Zoram, etc.), and bless generations. My question now is what do I do with the Labans in my life and how do I recognize and utilize what I should take from the experience to bless others? I’m still thinking on this. Weird that it has taken me 25 years to recognize how symbolic Laban is. Good grief.

Much love to you!

Expanding Cole Crew