Brethren and sistren

I used to dislike the word "siblings." It sounded like a pretentious word to me…maybe because I had only brothers, so every time someone mentioned "siblings" I would think, "Oh, you're all fancy-schmancy with your siblings, can't just say brothers or sisters like a regular person, eh?" Ha! However, now I am glad there is a word that encompasses both brothers and sisters. How convenient!

One of my friends asked me what the older kids in our family…thought of all the younger kids. How they felt about being part of such a big family. Well now. That is a tricky question to answer when there are deep feelings and complicated factors involved! I did try to answer it, to her, but I don't think I will do so here. I think it's pretty hard to sum up ALL of everyone's feelings in one answer anyway! However, suffice it to say that—while sibling relationships in our family, and any family, are not ALL sweetness and light—I think they are, on balance, one of the greatest blessings anyone could ever have. And I think the children, in their more lucid moments, know that too.

Anyway, no one, watching these siblings with their baby Clementine, could doubt the pure adoration and love they feel for this new little soul. Daisy was holding Clemmie the other night and suddenly burst out indignantly, "How could we have ever thought our family was good enough without her?!" It made me happy to hear my own feelings echoed so exactly!

The girls and I were at Old Navy last spring when we saw these yellow jumpsuits (rompers? jumpers? playsuits? what are they?) and since they're my favorite color, it didn't take that much convincing for me to buy them matching ones. Then we saw a tiny baby one that also matched! But we didn't know if the baby would be a boy or a girl! After a bit of superstitious agonizing that it might upset the delicate balance of the universe, we bought the baby jumpsuit too, reasoning that we could always give it away to some other girl baby. But deep down all of us were hoping we'd get to put it on our very own baby instead. And—happy day—we did!!

Tiny baby on a hill

Clementine in Daisy's daisy dress

There's always someone willing to hold a sweet sleeping baby!

Patient acceptance of millions of kisses

To make this suddenly a lot more sober of a post…For the past couple months I've been looking at fun, happy pictures on a blog I read, of another baby girl born a couple weeks before Clementine, who had seven older siblings. They were fun, joyful pictures like these I've been posting, with children happily crowded around and casual captions saying things like, "There's certainly no shortage of people who want to hold her!" And then suddenly a couple weeks ago, that sweet little baby passed away unexpectedly. Her mother wrote about how grateful she was that she had truly been able to embrace the joy of motherhood during the short sixty-eight days of her baby's life, that she had often sat and kissed and cuddled and gazed at her little baby, even not knowing how short their time together would be.

I know it could happen anytime, to any of us. You can't live a life constantly thinking about it. But this made me want so much not to take this time, these siblings, this baby, for granted. There's a lot of noise and commotion in our house. Fighting and sadness too. But I am grateful every day (or try to be) for these happy moments together that are such a gift!

Daisy was the first one of the children I told about the baby, when I was expecting. I asked her what she would want above anything else for her birthday in August, and she said immediately (as I knew she would), "A new baby!" I said this baby could be her very own baby, and she has taken it to heart! She often reminds me that she's just allowing me to help take care of her baby. (Like a wet nurse, I suppose.) And Clementine even reminds me of baby Daisy, with her big bright eyes and sweet temperament. Already, I just know these two have a special bond.

Teddy's a pro at walking Clementine around and bouncing her! He ought to be, now with three little siblings younger than him (how did that happen??)!

Gus's face here is so great. Skepticism blended with great forbearance. At least he didn't try to shove Clementine off of his lap, as (I am sorry to have to report) his brother did to him at this age!

Of course the sisters can pretty much always be found hovering around Clementine, like bees to honey, but don't think the big boys don't do their share of it too! Seb comes tiptoeing in to say goodnight to her even when he gets home at midnight from work…and he can be found exclaiming over her perfect tiny toes and her irresistible smiles nearly as often as the girls are. (Let us just hope he won't ever become confused as to which hand holds the baby, and which holds the hot dog.)

Malachi says "Toss her to me!" every time someone else has the baby. And while I frown upon any actual tossing (don't worry, it is only a figure of speech!), I will say that Malachi has a special touch. He can nearly ALWAYS calm Clementine down if she's sad…and often soothe her to sleep as well. He claims to be her "agent" and is always trying to negotiate some outrageous demand or other on her behalf, like that she should get paid a dollar per smile. As her agent, he would take a small cut, of course.

He even likes to hold her while doing his math homework.

This picture shows my children flocking around MY brother and sister-in-law, which I guess is another blessing of having siblings…their relationships with the next generation! But I also thought it was awfully sweet to see Kenneth holding and snuggling little Clementine, and hearing him say to his wife after she'd held her for awhile, "I think what you're doing now has crossed the line into hogging her."

And here is another of my brothers holding Clemmiekins. He is an expert swaddler and baby bouncer, having practiced his art on two sets of twins!

Junie and Clementine

Ziggy's love for baby Clemmie is a pleasant surprise. I wasn't sure quite what he would think, but he has fallen in love with her, wants to hold her all the time, and trots in every morning to greet her with a cheery "Hewwo, darwing!" It is pretty adorable.

Goldie and Clementine

I had to run out to the store one morning and left the three girls to do their schoolwork and take care of Clementine. When I got home, this is the sight I saw, with the bassinet moved into the living room between the three of them, and the baby sweetly asleep inside!

More sweet moments with Seb (all with bad lighting because he is never home at decent hours of the day and night)

The rule in our house is that everyone stays to help clean up after meals, but one of the allowed jobs is "Hold the baby." As you can imagine, this is a much-coveted job, and gets fought over vigorously. One day during cleanup, when both Malachi and Abe had disappeared, I called for them to come back and help clean up! They called back that they were holding the baby, to which I replied, "It doesn't take TWO of you to hold the baby!" Upon which I entered my bedroom to see them doing THIS:

Oh, okay. I guess it does take two.🙄

Comparing the weights of baby and bunny. (Nutmeg looks ENORMOUS in this picture, but it's just the perspective.) I think we decided they weighed about the same!

Abe and Clementine

Waiting for a post-race celebratory meal at Brick Oven

After-dinner conversation with Clementine

General Conference bouncing (goodness, Elder Golden looks scary in this picture, but he really isn't.)

General Conference snuggling

Morning snuggling

Porch swing snuggling

Bedtime snuggling (which one is the doll??) (also, Goldie's doll is named Fern, so Goldie claims that Clementine Fern should be her baby as well)

Piano-practice snuggling (and the view from below…you can see that Clementine was sleeping right through it!)

And…amazingly…the girls EVEN keep loving her when she constantly pulls their hair!