It is just under 4:00 a.m. on Halloween. What the hell are you doing up, Jake? Good question. I'll tell you. It may seem humorous next year or maybe even next week, but I tell you this in disgruntled, sleep-deprived pissy-ness.

Went to bed at 9:00 p.m. yesterday. After consoling Emma from "something" scary in her room, thanks to the holiday decorations somewhere, and soothing the lingering hunger pains from Ellie, I slithered into my warm bed with fresh flannel sheets. Abbie had her weekly addiction of ER which put her to bed about 10:00 p.m.

At 10:38 p.m. I awoke to the sudden screeching of Ellie explaining that she was hungry again. I did our routine and was sitting in the living room nursing her, when suddenly one of the five fire alarms beeps. It beeps a single piercing beep. Ellie keeps sucking unhampered. I look at the only alarm I can see from my seat. It is the highest of them all and I quickly pray that it is not the one making the fuss.

"Beep."

"That wasn't it, Thank you, Jesus!" I can hear Abbie rustling in the bedroom, obvious moved by the new noise. Ellie is just about done eating and falling back into her food-induced coma-like slumber.

I deduce that the beeping is coming from the hallway alarm going into our room. A little red light is occasionally
flashing. As I replace the cheap brand nine volt battery I realize that it is the original battery from when the house was completed about eight months ago, as I accidentally hit the button to test the alarm. The house is reminded that these are the sound-sensitive smoke alarms that get set off by smoke or the sound of another alarm from a specific distance away. All of the alarms sound off just the way we would like them IF there was a fire. Good test, Jake. Way to go.

I go back to bed. It is a little past 11:00 p.m.

At 1:00 a.m. Abbie does Ellie duty.

At 2:00 a.m. I wake up from Emma's Jedi-Dog Mind Trick and her nasal whispering, "Daddy, Daddy, me need covers up. Daddy, Daddy." I roll out of bed. "Will you carry me?" she asks like she does most every night. It is really the nicest part of the night, besides the whole dreaming part. She comes in with her doll of choice for the night, sometimes also with her nightly book selection, and other times with her blanket. Most of the time she comes in with all three. A few hours ago it was just the doll and blanket.

I carry her slowly back to her room not because of her weight or my drowsiness, but because of the aching and sharp pain shooting from my left ankle. It is the ankle I broke about this time, ten years ago while partying with a bunch of friends in the forest. With the sudden change in temperature, I write it off as arthritis and quickly think of the pains that Abbie's cousin, Craig must has from his few hundred various bone breaks and fractures. Sickly, this makes my ankle feel a little better and I cover my big girl back into her bed. I limp back to those warm flannel sheets.

About fifteen minutes later, the alarm above our doorway in our room begins to beep. "Abbie, look to see if the red light is blinking," I muttered to my wife since I am blind as a bat without my spectacles. "Yes, it is blin-"

"Beep."

This one is about 12-14 feet off of the ground, and we both know it. Luckily, Ellie is not concerned with the nuisance and sleeps on unscathed. We both get up and Abbie holds the garage door open in her pajamas as I carry in my ladder from the garage.

"Beep."

Weaving through the house, gingerly placing weight on my barometer ankle, I finally, three beeps later, get the ladder up and pull the battery out. On my way down the ladder there is another defiant, "Beep" from the same alarm I just pulled the electronic life source from. I climb the ladder barefoot, again and yank the entire device from the holder on the wall. I am reminded that there is a hardwire into each of these damn little contraptions!

Is it just my late-night/early-morning reasoning, or is it extremely ridiculous that my smoke alarms' batteries are all dying when they all have a direct electrical feed to them? Shouldn't the batteries be there in case there is no electricity coming from the house? Kind of like the battery back-up on a radio alarm clock? What the hell? And because the batteries were all placed in at the same time, they are all going to be dying at the same time, and the nine volt death parade begins pulling through my house at the earliest hours of a wicked little holiday. great. At this point I am just hoping that the rest of them will just hang in there until daylight.

Wide awake from the girls, the ankle, the beeping, the cold garage and the realization of what could still come, I half jokingly tell Abbie that we might as well make a pot of coffee and enjoy each other's company until the day officially begins. But, unlike my body, Abbie's body believes that when it is dark outside, she should be asleep. Easily convinced his time, we both head back and snuggle into bed.

I did fall back into a pseudo-dream-like-state until 3:30 a.m. when Ellie began her quick descending out of peaceful bliss and into horrific hollering for more liquid food to be crammed down her gullet. About that same time another familiar sound entered my ears:

"Beep."

{One sec... the baby is crying right now. It is 4:36 a.m. ...
Trying to type with drinking baby in arms, will speed this up.}

Yep, this time the alarm is in the living room... the really high one begins and it is setting off the first one in the hallway that I replaced the battery earlier, uh, yesterday. I sit and feed the baby in the living room, being jarred every minute or so from the incessant beeping. Abbie, somehow attempts to sleep through this. I can not and will not ever understand that path of reasoning; it just frustrates me to try and sleep through things and there is no way to actually do it. Either way I still had to come and roust her to help me move the ladder out of our room and into the center of the living room for the next surgery. Hell, I traveled throughout the entire house and disconnected every single smoke alarm and their batteries. All five are sitting on our bar in the kitchen and I begin to fold the ladder up. Abbie had taken the baby and was finishing the feeding and like a bad sitcom joke we hear for one last defiant time:

"Beep."

So, I am here now with a child in my arms and a fresh pot of coffee finishing brewing and beginning my Halloween.

Trick or Treat!

The sensation of fatherly elation at the early hours of the morning has shriveled, discolored, and fallen by the wayside like the leaves outside, or like the umbilical cord on my newborn daughter's belly.

Survey says it is the number one phrase of advice handed down to new parents, "Enjoy your sleep while you can." But how can the unsuspecting new parent even comprehend this? We certainly couldn't fathom our life constantly interrupted for the need of 2-3 ounces of liquid every couple of hours. (one exception is for the fraters during rush week).

Even as veteran parents, the constant recommendations give to us by young and old was to enjoy our sleep. With a two year old, we have not slept a solid eight hours for quite some time. One or both of us have always had to get up at least once a night to re-tuck our potty-trained girl back into her cozy bed. So I thought, "Sleep? Scoff! I can handle a new little critter just like I can handle this current situation."

Maybe it is the three years of age I have gained since Emma first blessed us. Maybe I have grown to appreciate solid sleep finally. Maybe this baby has a much higher pitched howl than Emma ever did. Whichever you may choose, I have to admit that Ellie is kicking my butt on the sleep deprivation circuit.

And to make matters worse, she has her mother's uncanny ability to know the fluid level on my bladder. Ever since I have fallen in love with Abbie, she has consistently called me whenever I am using the water waste receptacles. I could be sitting at my desk at work all day long waiting for her voice to travel across the phone line. As soon as I get up to relieve myself, she calls and is forced to leave me a message.

Ellie, on the other hand, calls me in another, ear-piercing way, and at ungodly hours of the day so that all in the house can be shaken from their dreamy slumbers and made aware that I am not on duty, but instead, doing my duty.

It seems that the worse I have to go, the louder and more impatient she gets. And it is nearly impossible to sit calmly at 3:42 a.m. soothing your two week old back into unconsciousness while pinching it off.

It does come in handy, however, for bouncing her tiny body just enough to get all the burps up.

Thank You's

We are not real good at thank-you cards, but we honestly try all the time. Abbie has really been on top of the thank-you list so far for Ellie and for Emma's birthday. Emma was "signing" her cards today and asking Abbie who each one was for. Then she got all excited and demanding one more card. Abbie asked her why, and she said, "because I need one for my Mommy and Daddy because they gave me a bike!"

And she is only three. Look out Mother Theresa!

proud poppa

"This is the b-e-s-t biscuit I have e-v-e-r had!" I exclaimed at our dinner table tonight. Trying to entice Emma into placing her roasted meat inside the biscuit so that she at least had a little meat for dinner.

"I l-o-v-e this meat inside this biscuit! I could eat this a-l-l the time!" I reinforced the deliciousness.

Two blank blue eyes with a stale frown replied.

I ate. Abbie ate, and Emma sort of ate with our constant nudging and encouragement.

About five minutes later we hear from the little one's side of the table:

"Dis is the d-o-o-d discuit! I nub dis discuit wit all da budda and no meat! It is da b-e-s-t discuit ebber!"

At 8:09 A.M. yesterday, October 8, 2003, at Flagstaff Medical Center in Flagstaff, Arizona, Abbie delivered a healthy,
19 inch long
7 pound, 7.6 ounce
Baby Girl!

Her name is Ellie Rae Grace Weien and you can see her in all her glory at:
http://users.commspeed.net/weien/Ellie/

Ellie is a form of Helen, which is both Abbie and my grandmother's name.
Rae was my Dad's mother's name.
Grace is a name we have liked for quite awhile, and especially for it's meaning during the past nine months for our family.

Not to be outdone by her big sister, Ellie Rae came exactly 12 days before her due date. Emma came exactly 12 days before her due date almost three years ago. We had a scheduled c-section for tomorrow 10/10/03, which Ellie, just like her big sis, decided was too far away.

Both Mom, and Baby are resting well and are expected to come home Friday, October 10th.

Within the hour of my last posting my sniff-hound daughter pulled another one out. She was sitting at the breakfast table. I was in the living room, and Abbie was getting dressed in the bedroom.

"sniff, sniff, snort - daddy, what's that smell?"
Laughing to myself I answered, "I don't know, did you fart?"

"NO! YOU DID!"
"I did not."
"Yes you did, you smell."

Thanks baby.

On another note, she told both Abbie and myself last night about the story behind a hideous brown blotch painting she had made at preschool. They are studying about Autumn and the colors of Fall. They were restricted with paints of the season. Her painting style is to layer color on color over the entire page, so with these hues, she ended up with something that will look like a diaper in a week or so.

Her story was a very precise depiction of a monster in her closet that I killed with a pink gun. Of course there is a lot more to it, but that was the whole of it. When she told me, I was shocked to think that she had picked up this gun notion, but not really surprised considering the five o'clock news and the Newsweek magazine covers that come in our mail. Then she later told Abbie the nearly exact same story. I could feel the air thicken as Abbie responded,

"A WHAT?!"
"A monster." she replied, equally amazed.
"No, what did you shoot?"
"The monster!"
Abbie was defeated and did not want to say THE word to entice the fragile eggshell mind.

So Emma started over from the beginning, and just as sure as I was the first time, she said the word again.

"Who told you about guns?" Abbie questioned.
"Paige has a pink gun." innocence stated. Paige is the four-year old girl next door that has two older brothers.
"Paige and her brothers play with water guns." Abbie clarified.
"Hmm. hmm." Emma mumbled.

Wow! We have been faced with something we weren't planning on so early in age. It disturbs us both, but I am trying to be as level headed about this as possible. I tried to make sure that I did not overreact to the news in hopes that I don't scare the shorts off the little girl so that she doesn't begin to fear being completely open and honest with us regardless of the situation or topic.

whew- and just in time for a second one!!!

My daughter has a very bloodhound-like sense of smell. She does not, however, obtain the adulterated ability to refrain from vocalizing to the world when she discovers a malodorous function. Case and Point:

My wife is in the kitchen preparing dinner. I was outside. My daughter is preparing a "tea party" on the living room table. All is quiet. Emma is talking to herself as she runs to her room to get more plastic food servings for her party, then she returns. She is only wearing her panties and her most treasured plastic princess glass slippers, her attire for our home during most of the summer this past year.

When she smells or sniffs, she practically snots out of her nose instead of inhaling. It is amazing she catches any scent at all, maybe it absorbs into other locations in her body? Like a reptile or shark. Anyways, she definitely was tracking something down at this moment.

With a curled up nose she turns to Abbie in the kitchen and says, "What dat smell?".
"I don't know, what does it smell like?" my wife answers.
"I tink it is my butt!" Emma ejects.
"Did you fart?"
"Yeah."

And she continues with her lady-like function in the living room. End of Story.

SINGLE LINE POINT: We call the tummy baby Scoobie. Emma calls it "Doobie". No, we are not reefers, but it sure is funny.

There is something about food and my daughter's bottom. For whenever she is feeding it activates tiny little spring in her buttocks that do not allow her to sit still and eat quietly. You would think that we have laced each piece of food with sugar or speed. Take a whiney girl, give her dinner and whala! you have a happy, glowing, floating speed freak child. At times it is a amusing. At most times after a long day, it is annoying as hell. It is even worse when the pregnant momma bear is exponentially loosing her patience just as fast as the cub is gaining her speed. It is a recipe for disaster.

One night, as the junkie was beginning her meal dance. You know the one, that starts with the head bobbing as she is chewing, which spreads to the shoulders swaying and shrugging. The dance that seems to expand her little frame like Popeye when he swallowed a whole can of spinach. Emma had two bites and Wham! Bamm! Alacazam! Head bobbing, shoulders shrugging, and bottom bouncing her right off of the seat; literally. Before I had time to drop my fork, she was head over heals off of the chair. By the time the fork did drop, she had caught herself with her hands while her butt and kicking legs were stuck straight up in the air, supported by the kitchen chair. She was screaming, food falling out of her mouth. Abbie and I were vengefully laughing at the sight. Then we got to share the warm glow of telling her, just like the generations of parents before us had done to their food induced speed freak children, "See, I told you so."

On another instance at the dinner table, I knew the dance was going to start again, because Emma was already on and off the kitchen chair and the food had not even been placed in front of her. She was making fart noises with her mouth and laughing hysterically. Then she had this mischievous look in her eyes.

"What are you doing?" I asked sharply.
"I'm going to fart." she informed me as she appeared to be lifting her leg off of the seat.

Then her eyes widened, her jaw dropped, creative humor was replaced with sheer terror on her face. She jumped from the chair holding her bottom and screaming as she ran out of the kitchen to the bathroom.

"Poop-oo is coming! Poop-oo iiiiiissss cooooommmmmiinnnnng!!!!!!"

Again, my wife and I sat and chuckled uncontrollably until guilt fell upon us, and we checked on her.