Trunk or Treat

Last night we had our church "trunk or treat" activitity. It seemed a little early in the month to be trick-or-treating, but our ward has a comparatively small parking lot, so I'm sure there were some scheduling reasons for having it a week-and-change early.

The girls were so excited for the party that they couldn't quite decide who they were going to go as. In the hour before we actually got in the car Kaitlyn changed from Snow White into Cinderella and then finally decided to dress up as Belle from Beauty and the Beast. Ali decided to break tradition and go as Sleeping Beauty rather than Cinderella this year (although I'm sure she'll change her mind again by the 31st). I went as a scoutmaster and Megan went as an attractive-young-mother-recovering-remarkably-well-after-her-third-child.

Alison has been learning some interesting things on the bus. The other day she came home with the following modified nursury rhyme:

Row, row, row your boat
Gently down the stream
Toss your teacher overboard
And listen to her scream. Aah!

I asked Ali how her teacher would feel if that happened, and she rightly concluded that it probably wasn't the nicest song to sing, and agreed not to sing it anymore.

However, she came home the other day with yet another one, this one Halloween-themed:

Trick or treat, smell my feet
Give me something good to eat
If you don't, I don't care
I'll pull down your underwear.

Kaitlyn immediately learned this little rap, but adapted it as follows:

Trick or treat, smell my feet
I don't care, I'll pull your underwear down!

And then, last night as we went from trunk to trunk to collect candy she shortened it to just, "I'll pull your underwear down!" Fortunately, she mostly kept that to herself as we actually faced the kind sugar donors, although she did manage to let, "Trick or treat, smell my feet" slip out to one family. I think I would have just preferred that she say "thank you."

Kaitlyn is also enjoying being a big sister. She will frequently run over to Max to give him a little hug or kiss. As she skips away back to her dolls she'll say, "I just love him."

You know how you have that 8-inch high pile of bills and papers that needs to filed from since you moved in to your new house a year ago? I actually decided to tackle that project this week. At about 9:00 p.m. on Friday night I thought, "Oh...I'm, sure can bust this out and be done in a couple of hours while we watch a movie." I went to bed at 1:30 a.m. determined to file things as they come in.

Early this morning, right after I first woke up to get ready, Megan came running upstairs from eating breakfast (I assumed) and opened our bedroom door with the camera in hand. "You have to come down and see this" she said. I came down and was amazed to see...nothing. But then she turned on the camera and said, "Look at this bug that was right here! It ran pretty fast. I thought I'd come get you to come kill it." It seemed strange to me that her first reaction was to get the camera rather than the flyswatter. She said, "I wanted something for my blog." Uh huh. (Note: Undoubtedly, Megan will dispute some of the facts of this story.)

Download and Listen

Last week I tried to subtly post a plug to download my song and have a listen. This post isn't so subtle. Click here to download and listen. Then post a comment and let me know what you think.

End shameless music promotion.

Kuh-Kuh-Kuh Max

Kaitlyn is learning the sounds that each letter of the alphabet "says." She's gotten especially proficient at identifying any letter "K" or anything sounding like "K" since that is the first letter in her name. Now, part of this, I must confess, is driven by our insistence that she practice the hard K sound, because she still tends to pronouce her name "Taitlyn" with a "T" instead of a "K." So, often Kaitlyn will say her name is "K-K-Kaitlyn."

Well, we were driving in the car the other day and talking about Max, when Kaitlyn felt like practicing her pronunciation. She loudly announced, "Kuh-kuh-kuh...Max!" I wasn't aware of the hard K sound that the "M" makes. I'll have to ask Ali about that since she's become our little grammatical expert--just ask her about the silent "E", and how vowels steal each others' sounds.

Speaking of Kaitlyn, I was working on the computer this afternoon and I heard her say, "Dad...it's almost ready. It's almost ready. It's almost ready." I turned around and found that she had set up a little tea party and was inviting Ali and I to attend. In addition to dirty toybox cups brim-full of water she also served pretend "peanut butter and sandwiches" (for some reason she doesn't like to give the all important jelly any credit). What a treat!



Later today, Ali sweetly called me upstairs and asked me to stand on a "magic towel." Upon following her request I discovered that she had set out an elaborate scheme to capture me and take me prisoner utilizing some sort of magic towel as a cover for a jump rope ankle trap. "Did you like my booby trap?" she asked me. She's a clever one, alright. Speaking of Ali, she also loves math these days. She wrote out her times tables for the number 3 in her notebook up to 3 x 20!


It was great to have Megan's family in town this past week. On a personal note, it was a huge help to me. We had Max on the second to last day of classes for first quarter, which left we with significant preparations to do before being ready to take exams this past week. Megan's folks were quite helpful with Megan and the girls (and the boy), which took a lot of the stress of exam prep off my shoulders.

Speaking of exams, I feel like they went well enough on the whole, but I have to admit that I most enjoyed a project that I had to for a leadership class: coming up with some sort of creative project to turn in. Of course, I did a song. If you want to download it to have a listen, click here. At this point it's just an instrumental. And it's not perfect. But, I think this is going to become Max's song since each of the girls got their own songs when they were born.

Megan was doing spectacularly with recovery, but the last couple of days have been a bit more difficult. She's been freezing one minute, then burning up the next. I think we'll have her go in and see the doctor tomorrow. Since I've had to hold down the fort while she's been recovering (and resting most of today), I've developed a newfound appreciation and awe for everything she does as a mom. Let's put it this way: I couldn't get the girls ready for church on time on my own this morning (we were 20 minutes late to the meeting), it took me 2 or 3 attempts at each individual ponytail, I can't remember if the girls had ended up in matching outfits or not, and I forgot the critical "church activity bag." And that was just the "usual" before 8:30 a.m. routine!

So, let's recap: despite the usual challenges that make life interesting, we're doing kuh-kuh-kuh...great.

Mr. Max Photo Gallery

There have been several requests for more pictures of Mr. Max--especially in this, his first week of life. Since we've never been ones to disappoint, here you go America (or rather, here you go few sporadic readers):

Day 2 in the Hospital

The Call Children ("This must the one they call 'Kaitlyn'.")

Hey Baby...

Held by Grandma Carlson

Talented Dad Able to Hold Boy and Take a Picture at the Same Time

My Crib Rocks

Happy Birthday Mr. Max

9:30 a.m.: Megan calls. She's at Kroger. She's been having some light, but regular contractions since about 8:09 a.m. this morning, and she has meticulously kept track of the time and duration of each one. She talks through a contraction while we're on the phone. She says she'll call me back as soon as she gets home from the store. I tell her that I'll be sitting by an exit in class, as opposed to my usual seat, so that I can make a quick exit when she calls.

10:30 a.m.: Megan still hasn't called me. I'm thinking of all of the worst case scenarios, and can't concentrate at all. I grab my stuff, duck out of class, and call Megan. Contractions have continued, but she thinks she's still got time, and suggests I stay on-grounds. I'm already 25% of the way home.

11:45 a.m.: Megan seems to be in early labor, but it doesn't seem to be getting bad yet. I'm not keen on Kaitlyn seeing Megan in any pain, so we decide that I should take Kaitlyn to the family housing playground--which is nearby--for a little while.

1:45 p.m.: We decide to make a trip in to visit Megan's doctor (not the hospital) to see how she's coming along. Megan doesn't want to go to the hospital unless she's going to stay. This was a lesson we learned from being sent home when Kaitlyn was born.

2:20 p.m.: Megan finally gets in to see the doctor (or nurse, or medically trained individual). She's at a 3. Contractions are about 60 seconds long, 5 minutes apart.

3:00 p.m.: After racing home, Kaitlyn and I pick up Ali at the bus stop. Megan is starting to hurt. I come home, quickly feed the girls and then load them up in the car.

3:14 p.m.: Megan is in pain. We're headed out the door.

3:15 p.m.: Megan asks me to take a "before" picture:


3:16 p.m.: Megan is in pain. We're in he car.

3:30 p.m.: Megan is in pain. We finish dropping the girls off and head to the hospital. Both Ali and Kaitlyn are being so sweet to their mom--giving her hugs and offering love and support.

4:07 p.m.: I look up at the digital clock in the triage room and notice that it says 4:07 p.m. Megan is at a 4.

5:10 p.m.: Megan's epidural is in.

5:15 p.m.: Megan is having a regular conversation through every contraction and trying not to fall asleep. She's at a 9.

6:30 p.m.: We finish watching an episode of the Simpsons while waiting for our baby to hurry up. Megan has been at a 10 for a while.

7:09 p.m.: After 3 rounds of pushing, Maxwell Nathan Call is born. He weighs 8 pounds, 4 ounces. (I still don't know how long he is; they still hadn't measured when I left).

And, here he is:


7:25 p.m. (or so): Max is already eating like a champ.

8:00 p.m.: Megan's epidural is still working and she's cracking jokes. She comments that this labor was the easiest of the three. (That's funny because Max has been the biggest of the three.)


9:30 p.m.: It's way past Alison and Kaitlyn's bedtime, but I go get them (thank you to Amy Sorensen for watching them all afternoon!), and bring them to meet their little brother. They are both a little apprehensive, and don't know quite what to expect. Both saw Megan in pain earlier and aren't sure what to think.

But, Megan and Max are doing fine. They both start to warm up to the idea of having a little brother.

9:50 p.m.: Kaitlyn is acting really funny--but it's late, she's had a long day, and Megan is hooked up to a bunch of machines still, and I'm sure that's contributing to her uneasiness about what is going on.

10:47 p.m.: I'm writing this blog and ready for some sleep, as I'm sure Megan and Max both are. Ali and Kaitlyn are in bed (asleep, I assume). I'm hoping that Megan and the boy are doing well in the hospital.

Princesses, Putt Putt, and Pancakes (Waffles Doesn't Start with P)

Ali and Kaitlyn have been counting down the days for October. I'd like to think that it's because they are so excited for their little brother to arrive. However, the reality is that they know that Halloween is in October and they can't wait to get more candy than they can carry. And, to give them credit, who can blame them? We still have some of the leftovers from last Halloween, they got so much! I'm going to have to implement some sort of parent tax. If tithing is 10% and the marginal tax rate for their income bracket is probably 15%, or so, I think I should collect at least 25% of their reciepts, just so they get used to the idea.

But, parent candy-taxes aside, the best part of their Halloween anticipation has been how excited they are about being able to wear costumes. After several years as twin Cinderellas, Kaitlyn is breaking ranks this year and going as Snow White. She's been so excited about it that Megan has already taken her (and Ali, to be fair) out to get their costumes. Kaitlyn reassures me that I can be Cinderella this year. I keep telling her I'll be Prince Charming, but she's not buying it; I guess I'm not that charming.

Since I've been very busy, and since we're all going to be busy once this baby comes, we decided that we ought to go out and do something fun this weekend--as a sort of last-hurrah before Megan and I devolve into sleep-deprived, use-the-TV-as-babysitter parents due to newborn care. So, we decided to take the girls to the putt putt course, aptly named--Putt Putt Golf.

Ali is going to have a monster swing when she's older. She's got quite the swing already! Her baseball playing is really paying off in a coordinated swing. On this hole, she actually whacked a hole-in-one (with no cheating, as on the other holes). Unfortunately, I missed the whole thing taking these pictures:

As I noted in a previous post, I'm quite the culinary artist. This week, rather than try to duplicate my masterful chicken pot pie, I made my famous Tweety-bird waffles. Kaitlyn and Ali really wanted to help make them.

Unfortunately, Kailtyn was more interested in helping to make the waffles than she was in actually eating them. Fortunately, Ali picked up the slack.

Speaking of Ali, have you ever had to sit down with a lawyer to review a contract or sign any documents? Ali had her book fair at school this week and was apparently given a "wish list" to complete with spaces for her to write down 15 books. 15! She asked me to come sit at the table with her, and had pulled a chair up close to hers on the same side of the table. After I sat down, she proceeded to highlight which of the books on her wish list she wanted most--which ended up being only 8 of the 15. A few minutes later, when I was upstairs she came running up to me and said, "Dad, I accidentally really want this one too" as she pointed to a ninth book on her list. I'm glad she only accidentally really wanted it. Fortunately, Megan was able to come to an agreement with her about scaling back purchases at this book fair in exchange for future purchases at subsequent fairs. I really need to find out who the marketing genius is who came up with this racket. I wonder if he/she went to Darden?

You know, I think Ali sums it up well, when she said, this past week: "I'm ready to beat someone up...like Dad."

Recent Events

Kaitlyn is excelling in her negotiation skills. I can tell that I'll be able to contribute significantly in my "Bargaining and Negotiating" class next quarter after having come to several successful agreements with Kaitlyn. Perhaps she could try her hand with the UAW.

For example, tonight we were trying to persuade Kaitlyn to eat her dinner so that she could participate in the FHMM treat. In a very matter-of-fact way she responded, "When I wake up, then I can eat my dinner, OK guys?"

As we were walking home from the field she kept saying "Ow. Ow. Ow." I looked down and asked her what was wrong. She said, "My baby keeps hitting me" as she took the baby doll's right hand and continued pounded it into her own chest. It was so cute and funny, I had to take this picture:



This past week Ali had her first field trip. She went with her class to the apple orchard to pick apples with her kindergarten class. Megan was able to switch babysitting with a friend so that she could go as a "room mother" or "teachers helper" or "mom who wanted to go have fun, spy on her daugther, and take pictures." Ali was very adamant about the fact that we needed to ask her before we could eat any of the 5 lbs. of apples that she picked.


Tonight for FHMM we went to "the field" that is close to our house to play baseball for our activity. Ali is actually getting very good at hitting the ball when you pitch it to her underhand. She can even throw it up in the air and then hit it herself. As we were walking home I said to Megan, "I love it--she loves making cards and playing baseball." Ali overheard and said,"Yeah...now it's my favorite sport."



I needed a thank you card to send to a contact today, so I asked my beautiful, creative wife if she had any thank you cards already made that I could use. After perusing her file of over 150 cards, I decided that pink and purple with flowers and ribbons, probably wasn't the most business appropriate card to send. So, I decided to make my own card.

Here it is (there is nothing on the inside):

I told Megan that she should use my design at one of her next card parties. She said I've really got talent and should consider becoming a demonstrator.