Daniel James

We were so sure it was a girl. At least I was. Karen waffled at the end and as it turns out we’re a family of five and now Karen is outnumbered 4-1. At about nine o’clock in the morning on 4/8/18 we welcomed Daniel James O’Connor into our family. I don’t know how the doctors come up with their projections, but they were a bit off on this one. They told us to expect an eight or nine pound baby and as the delivery doctor was calling for backup, he alerted us to the fact that he thought there was at least a ten pound baby in there. The Doc was right, and when they finally pried him out of there he was in fact, ten and a half pounds. He was swollen and bruised from the ordeal, but still sweet as pie.

His weight has continued to be an issue and the injuries are mounting up. I’m in physical therapy for some sort of shoulder impingement. Karen has an undiagnosed disc issue in her lower back. Thomas and Jack have developed hunchbacks.

I don’t remember a lot about those early weeks, but he was in our bedroom, which apparently we did with the other children as well and somehow survived. I bought a sleeping mask, and we had a sound machine in our room but I think we were pretty much sleepwalking for those first few months.

Danny will be eight months old next month and his personality is really starting to blossom. His absolute favorite thing to do is watch his brothers, which usually starts our peacefully but quickly devolves into wrestling. He loves baths and showers and we imagine the pool. He loves food and has basically skipped over mushy baby food and gone straight to meat and potatoes. Karen has taken a second job as a late shift telemarketer so we can feed all these kids.

He’s been able to roll over one way for  a while now, but just this week figured out how to complete the maneuver and now can basically log roll to freedom or danger or whatever he likes. He started talking a little bit too, but only really between the hours of 4 and 5pm which seems kind of odd. Mama and Baba are his two main utterances, so maybe our nanny is speaking Arabic when we’re not here. His voice is a little bit gravely, but perhaps that's on account of him catching a couple colds this year. We can't wait to hear what he sounds like when he starts talking for real. If he takes after his big brothers, his first word will be, "WHAAAAAAAAAT?!?!?!?" in an irritated tone.

But apart from all the things he likes or things he’s learning to do, the thing we’re most excited about is his happy disposition. Danny cries when you don’t feed him or when he’s tired, but mostly he’s all smiles. When we pick him up in the morning, when we come home from work… if you just leave a room and come back two minutes later, he greets you with a huge toothless grin that makes you feel like he’s been hoping you were just around the corner. He’s easily our sweetest boy currently, and frankly he’s in the running for sweetest ever. To be fair he’s running against two caged jackals and the judges are people suffering from sleep deprivation fueled memory loss but he’s sweet nonetheless.

I don't have any good quotes from him yet, but they're not far off. Enjoy these pictures of a big happy baby.

Baby Makes 5

We read a lot of Berenstain Bears around here and I've got a lot of thoughts about them. First of all, I've got to assume that Stan and Jan Berenstain didn't think they had a multi decade hit on their hands when they created this family, based primarily on character names alone. Mama, Papa, Brother and Sister Bear live in a town with Lizzy Bruin, Cousin Freddy, Teacher Bob, Farmer Ben, Too Tall Grizzly, Queeny McBear, Professor Actual Factual, and Mizz McGrizz, just to name a few. Are we to believe that nobody ever asks this family about their first and last names? Was Papa Bear's name at birth, Papa? His last name is Bear... in a world of only bears? Like if I was James Human? When other cubs on the playground yell for Mama, does Mama Bear always come a running? I love these stories, but I think the Berenstains could have benefited from some story-boarding here. Some of the good ones are Too Much Vacation, Too Much Junk Food, Trouble at School, Double Dare. Bad Dream is pretty good. In Crowd is probably the best one. Baby Makes 5 was released in the early 2000s. After 25 years of raising 2 grade schoolers, Mama and Papa Bear expanded the family to welcome Honey Bear, which is very long way to go to announce that Karen is due with our Baby Makes 5 in about 36 hours.

This pregnancy has been a little different than the other two. Just like everything with Thomas, the first pregnancy was new and exciting. Everyone had a million questions for us. We had even more questions for doctors and other parents. It was the first grandchild on the OConnor side, not to mention the entire thing was a bit of a surprise so it was all hands on deck. Same story for Jackie obviously, but the all hands on deck there was more of a medical necessity than a first time around excitement.

I suppose having our hands full with 2 kids is probably the biggest difference. There just wasn't time for the traditional maternity photo shoot, so instead we have pictures of an exhausted Karen with her feet up to reduce the swelling in her ankles. I'm not sure any of them will make the fireplace mantle. Instead of everyone rubbing Mommy's belly we get a lot of "I'm not really in the touching mood today," which takes a little of the fizz out of your soda pop. Instead of "I really think it's a girl this time," I get a lot of "You said you would switch the laundry, but you're a liar and you never do anything for anyone ever." So it's been a rough go, especially for Karen Marie, who fell down the stairs and broke her foot, got the flu, got an ear infection, was quarantined in our room for a week, and has primarily subsided on a diet of ice cream and Lucky Charms. At this point, if it's not a girl, I can't imagine what kind of boy we've got in there. All that comes to mind is the Incredibles baby that is literally engulfed in flames and shoots lasers out of his eyes.






















Despite the physical discomfort, we did have some good times in the last few months.

We took the boys overnight camping for the first time. We stayed at a campground by the water, which was pretty peaceful if you could ignore the decrepit closed down nuclear power plant 2 miles up shore. Jackie learned to ride the balance bike, which has led to a lot of trips around the neighborhood. He's not quite ready for a pedal bike yet, but maybe in the fall. Tom rides way too fast for the group so half the trip is spent with everyone screaming "CIRCLE BACK" at him.

We Trick or Treated our neighborhood for the first time this year. Living in the woods has some nice bonuses, but an unforeseen one was that most houses give out an absurd amount of candy, including a lot of full size candy bars since there are so few of us out here. For my birthday, Jack took me into the city to the Shedd Aquarium, where we saw the most amazing things... Piranhas, Nemo fish, crocodiles, spider crabs, corral reefs, starfish, jellyfish, turtles, sharks, stingrays, eels. We watched a dolphin show, saw a sea lion do tricks and heard the call of a giant beluga whale. It was a great day. Afterwards, Jack took me out to lunch at the Shake Shack where we shared burgers, fries and pink and brown milkshakes. Lot of debate as to which milkshake was better. I say pink.

Then my building partner Kenny came up and we built a deck off the back of the house by the French Doors. He's coming back in a couple weeks to turn it into a screened in porch. One of my favorite things to do is build stuff with Kenny. I'm going to twist his arm into helping me with the kids fort up against the woods and he doesn't know it yet, but I've already got designs on one of those off the grid houses that we're going to build in 2024, just in case some of my worst fears come true and we have to go live in the real woods.

We hosted both families at our house for Christmas and New Year's, and while I can't find any pictures of it, it was really nice. Grandma and Grandpa and the Harjers were here before Christmas and we had a huge feast and all the kids played together. From behind Jahsa looks like she's wearing a wig from an 80's hair metal band and Irie has a perpetual smile on his face. We're glad they're back in the Midwest.

Tom started basketball this year. A few practices followed by a few games. Tom is taller than a lot of the other guys on the court which gives him an advantage, but he also gives some of that advantage back by his love of sprinting back on defense as soon as anyone else but him shoots it. By the end of the season though, he was pretty great at dribbling, passing and especially stealing.

After basketball season, I decided it was time to teach him to ski again, this time on his own. We went up to Alpine Valley for the day and both learned some valuable lessons. Tom learned that Dad is a real pain in the butt about not quitting stuff that's hard and Dad learned that Tom responds better to patience than to preaching. We spent about an hour sitting in the snow crying that morning because learning to ski from an un-certified ski instructor (but perhaps a certified jerk) of a Dad before getting up and slowly making our way back and forth down the hill. By the third time he had it and we got on a chair lift and hit the slopes. He was breezing down the hills, winding edge to edge and it was as proud as I've been of him. So many things about parenting that you can't appreciate until it actually happens, but watching them figure something out and fly on their own a little bit is particularly special.

The baby should be here any day now. I hope the ? carved into the cement by the shed tells them that we were excited to meet them before we knew they were coming.

Best of the boys:

Jack: What are these rocks?
Me: That's from our driveway. It's falling apart and we have to get a new one.
Jack: So if we to go to the driveway store we can pick out a new one?
Me: Yeah that's a good idea.

Me: I've been alive for 34 years and I've never gotten sick from not wearing socks to bed.
Tom: Oh Dad, it's a Mommy night and I just want to make her happy.

(first curse word alert)
Tom: KFC... what the hell is KFC?

Jack: Daddy, my heart is special but right now my heart is itchy.

Jack: Daddy we have to order a big pizza and the meat guy puts sausage and pepperoni on it and the sauce guy puts sauce on it and the over guy puts it in the oven but we tell the dairy guy no cheese because Tommy can't have dairy Daddy.

Jack: Are you married Daddy?
Me: Yes.
Jack: To a girlie girl?
Me: Kinda.

Me: Oh, yuuuuck.
Jack: What Daddy?
Me: There was a dead animal in the road, and I had to swerve around it:
Jack: Was it a baby giraffe?
Me: No, Jackie.
Jack: What shape was it?
Me: It was a rectangle. Kind of looked like a squashed bird.
Jack: Birds aren't rectangles, Daddy.

Jack: I not pick my nose! I put my finger straight in. It's only picking in you bend it.

Tom: For a snack I picked us the really salty pretzels but since you like to have salty and sweet I also picked us each a fruit snack.

Me: What should we call the baby if it's a girl?
Jack: Michael Jackson.
Me: What made you say Michael Jackson?
Jack: It was just in my brain and then came out of my mouth.

Me: I kind of look like a mix of Grandma Tracye and Grandpa Greg.
Tom: No you don't. You don't have long hair, you don't look like a girl, and you don't have glasses.

Me: So then you go to the doctor, they knock you out and then they do the operation.
Tom: They knock you out? Like with a baseball bat?
Me: No they use medicine now.

Me: You are so silly, Thomas. You will be married to a girl.
Tom: No I won't, you will be married to a girl!!!
Me: You will too.
Tom: NO I WILL NOT.

Karen: There are two types of water; fresh water and salt water.
Tom: What if there was pepper water?

Tom: I went and talked to Mom and she said it's okay, she's just mad at you Dad.

Me: What is your favorite thing to do at Montessori?
Jack: Play with my friends.
Me: That is such a great answer. I wish I could play with my friends more.
Jack: Daddy you need to ask your friends at your work if you can play with them and if they say no you just have to go back and sit down at your desk Daddy.

Karen: There is Tommy's doctor's office.
Jack: Is it his heart doctor or his cleft doctor?

Tom: Mom doesn't want a dog that has too much hair.
Me: They make dogs that don't shed now. They mix a Labrador and a Poodle and get a Labradoodle. They mix a Sheep Dog and a Poodle and get a Sheepadoodle.
Jack: You could mix a dog with a leprechaun and get a lepre-boodle!

Me: Boys if you marry someone, make sure they are as clean or as messy as you or you'll often end up frustrated.
Tom: Yeah and don't marry a robber.
Jack: You could marry a dog, though.
Me: Both good points.