Baptism

Genevieve was baptized yesterday. It's such a wonderful occasion to welcome a baby in to a congregation and into the body of Christ. We just love our church family so much and we are often overwhelmed by their love for us.

On to the pictures.

I got this one of the 4 of them before we left for church. The best picture I've gotten of all 4 of them since Evie was born.

Our sweet girl in her baptism dress.

I joked that this one looked like my 3 little convicts all ready for their court date.

The baptism.

A verse of the song the congregation sings to each child being baptized. I also sing it to the kids quite a bit at home.

The pastor and our family.

And this is what Sweet little Genevieve did to her baptism dress five minutes before the baptism. It's also the reason why she's wrapped in an ugly blanket for the actual baptism and why she's in different clothes for the pictures afterward (including the one just above with the pastor).

Other than the huge blow-out, she did great. We had lunch with our family afterward and it was really just a wonderful day. I think our church really needed that yesterday since a beloved member of our church passed away this week and his funeral was today. Many people told me how wonderful the baptism was and it was just what they needed to help with their sadness. For me it was a great reminder of God's promises and that not even death will separate us from His love.

I can't wait to see what plans God has for our little Evie. All I want for Evie, and for all of our children, is for her to love God and to want to serve Him with all her being. Yesterday was just the beginning.

Not boring, just not interesting

Aside from day to day details and me getting high from sweet baby smell (oh, and sweet baby breath), there's really not much going on around here that's worth blogging about. Nothing terribly funny or interesting or worth sharing. But I certainly wouldn't call what's going on in our home boring. So here's just a little brain dump, so I don't go too long without blogging:

• Evie's doing just swell. She's waking up a little more each day and starting to really look around. I think we might get a smile out of her any day now. She's doing FANTASTIC at night, which makes me want to dance at about 5am every morning. Um, but can she stop with the growing...? She's getting so big, and will be a month old on Sunday. I didn't think it would be because things have been so calm and easy, but the last month is a BLUR.
  

• Marc-Adam has been quite the challenge. He's still sweet enough that's it hard to stay mad at him for long, but oh my, that child makes my head hurt. We've tightened the reins a bit on him, and that seems to have helped...he's listening better and we're able to make it through an entire meal without having to put him in time-out *sigh*. We recently moved him to a twin bed and now the trouble he caused from his crib can now be caused anywhere in the room or hall. It's been quite the battle and Sweet Hubby and I are desperate to find a way to make bedtime a little more calm.

• Zachary has just been so funny and so sweet (but seems to have contracted a case of selective hearing). The other day, he wanted to sing a lullaby to Evie and he sang, "Little giiiirrrrl....with a head! I love you, sweet little girl!!" And then later at dinner, he started a conversation with, "Next time, when I grow up, if you're still my mom and dad..." Wha...?

• Stephen's *thisclose* to losing one (or maybe both) of his front teeth. 'Bout darn time. The things have been lose since Thanksgiving. It makes me slightly nauseous to think about it. I wish it would just fall out already. I've tried pulling it, but it's not ready so I've been telling him to wiggle it any chance he gets.

• I'm starting to get homeschooling back on the brain and am starting to plan out our next year. I think I'm going to try to relax our school schedule a little bit and not try to do every subject every day with Stephen. I plan on starting grammar this year (using First Language Lessons) and keeping up with our same math and writing curricula. So I think that maybe we might try doing math 2x a week and writing/grammar 3x a week with reading every day. I think he can handle that, but we'll see. For Zachary though, we'll be working on the same things every day because he doesn't have as much to do as Stephen. I also plan on sticking with Five in a Row...it's just a really good curriculum and we all enjoy it. There's a homeschool conference in August that I plan on going to...I just hope I don't get sucked in to trying something new. But I'm really excited about it. I didn't get to go last year.

• Next week is Sweet Hubby's last week home with us. I'm slightly panicked about it. I think, though, that if I plan it right, it might be a whole 'nother 2 weeks before I'm actually all on my own after he goes back to work. The good news is that he only ever works for 4 days at a time, and once he goes back to working days (instead of overnight), he'll only be working for 3 days at a time. Logically, though, I know that I'll be just fine on my own with all 4 kids, it's just scary to take that first step, especially since I have 2 very high maintenance children.

I think that's about it for now. Any questions?

Catching up...a picture post

I finally uploaded some pictures from my camera to the computer. So here's the story of the big things going on in our lives since Evie arrived.

Stephen had a big weekend last weekend. Saturday was "Mayfest" at the gym we go to for gymnastics. Mayfest is really just a time when the kids get to show off what they've been learning. Stephen's been working extra hard, so he was really excited to show us what he can do. (I apologize for the quality of the pictures...it's hard to get good pictures of moving kids and I also wanted to avoid posting pictures where other kids' faces are clear which cut down on my options.)

Stephen stretching...he's the one in the middle of the picture. I show this picture only so you can see just how flexible this kid is...he's almost in a full split with his head down.

"T"-what they do after they've landed and stuck it.

Salute

Rings

Pommel Horse

Mayfest Trophy

I love looking at these pictures because in the pictures of him actually doing something he looks so intense but in between he's all smiles. I think he really enjoys gymnastics. Jonathon Horton (winner of the silver medal in the all-around at the Beijing Olympics) trained at this gym way back when and is coming back to train for the 2012 Olympics...I heard that he may even be working with some of the boys. Stephen thinks that's cool and I'm super-excited about it.

Zachary and Marc-Adam performing their own little routines while watching Stephen at Mayfest.




Stephen also had his first performance in children's choir. He even had a line, "Look at that old shoe!" He did great and loved being in the choir. Again, not a great picture, and I have a ton more, but don't want to post faces of other kids.


Also happening this week, Evie's first bath. Her umbilical cord finally fell off so she got her first good bath.

As you can see, it was a family affair. The boys were so excited for her and kept telling her how brave she was....as if a bath were something to be afraid of. :)


And just for fun, Marc-Adam, wearing some kind of Batman scuba goggles.


And Evie and I were left alone for a little while last week, so we played dress-up. I started trying all her bows on her. They are all still a little big for her, so we're sticking to the little bows that I stick to her head with Karo syrup, but she still looks awful cute with these big ol' bows on her head.

Updates

I don't have anything fantastic or wonderful to say. But I wanted to let everyone know how we're doing.

Things are going great in our home...and not the kind of great that you say when everything is falling apart but you still tell people that things are going well. Honestly, things are really good. My hormones have been in check enough for me to not freak out too much, I guess. Or maybe it's just that this is our fourth child (and fourth adjustment to a new baby), my expectations were low. In any case, life has been calm and wonderful since bringing Evie home. I haven't been exhausted, the kids have been acting normally for the most part (there's been some major power struggles between Stephen and his daddy, but I'm not sure that's directly related to having a new baby in the house) and the new has not worn off Evie. The boys are still in love and still fight over her. The fight used to be about who got to hold her first, but now the fight is over who gets to hold her last because in order to curb the fights over who was first, I told them that whoever held her last got to hold her the longest. They even fight over who gets to take her diapers to the Diaper Champ. Sweet Hubby and I fight over her, too. Whenever the kids are in bed or visiting grandparents, we sort of race each other to see who gets Evie first when she wakes up. He normally wins. 'Cause I let him. It's an awesome feeling to see him with his daughter...he has been SO hands-on with her. Way more than I expected because he was sort of nervous about actually having a little girl. But he's changed as many diapers as I have and never once passes up an opportunity to change her or hold her or spend anytime he can get with her.

As far as Evie goes, she's just so precious. She's amazing. She's a very calm baby and rarely cries...when she does cry, 90% of the time she settles down before I can get to her to soothe her. I think she has a touch of reflux, which is no surprise since Zachary and Marc-Adam had it as well. But it really only seems to bother her when she's trying to go to sleep and it only keeps her from actually being able to sleep at night. The rest of the time, she just whines and winces for a few minutes and then goes to sleep on her own. For the last feed, I've started giving her Mylanta and that has helped her nighttime tremendously. She generally goes about 6 hours between her last feed of the evening and the first time she eats at night. Sometimes she'll wake up before then, but when I try to feed her, she goes right back to sleep. And then I doze off and we wake up a few hours later all snuggled up and she'll finally take a good feed. So considering there's a newborn in the house, I've been getting amazing sleep.

More brags on my hubby...Sweet Hubby is still home with us and will be for four more weeks. The only reason I'm able to hold it together is because of him. Otherwise, I'm pretty sure I'd be a weepy mess for the majority of the time. He's been amazing in taking care of me and the kids and the operations of our home. I haven't made a meal in almost 2 weeks...haven't done laundry, haven't cleaned anything, haven't wiped any butts, haven't given the kids showers, haven't done dishes. And yet, we've eaten well (and not just the dinners that have been made for us, but breakfast and lunches, too!), we still have clean clothes, the kids are clean (with clean butts), the house is semi-straight and we still have dishes to eat off of. And the kids are well engaged, not climbing the walls and are having fun. It's just been wonderful and such a burden off my shoulders. In addition to running everything for me, he has also just been an awesome emotional support for me. When I told him yesterday that I was going to take a few more days to take it easy, he told me to take as long as I needed because he was still going to be home for another month. He is such an amazing answer to my prayers. There will be many tears the day he goes back to work.

As for me and my recovery...well, it's abundantly clear that this is my fourth c-section and that my body is not the same as it was when I had Stephen. It took a little while for my incision to become comfortable and I've actually finished off the bottle of vicodin I got when I left the hospital. I've never done that before. Most of my current pain is coming from a muscle in my hip...it is extremely painful and I've woken Hubby up in the middle of the night a couple of times by crying out in pain. It's fine if I stay perfectly still, but I have to be very careful in moving around because if I move the wrong way, it feels like that muscle has been lit on fire. It's getting a little better slowly, but I'm looking forward to my 2 week check on Thursday to talk to my doctor about it. Other than that, things are healing up quite nicely. Nursing is going really well. My milk came in before I left the hospital and Evie has been fairly good at getting the hang of things.

So, for now, there is much peace in the kingdom.

For Alison (and everyone else, too)

I've been instructed to post more pictures...so I'm popping on quickly to show Evie off a little more. I think I have more pics that haven't been uploaded yet, but those will have to wait. So here's a few from the first few days:

I changed this picture from the one I had up originally...I hated that picture and it's been bugging me all day knowing it was up here...so here's the first picture Evie and I took together, just a few minutes after she was handed to me for the first time.


Couldn't you just eat up those cheeks?

Going home dress...such a pretty girl.

The proud brothers (Big, Bigger, and Biggest).


Pretty sweet, huh? :)

At last

We are home!! Just wanted to give a quick update. Evie's here and perfect and we're so overjoyed with her and all of our children.

More details and pictures to follow, but I'm tired and hurting a little now, so I'll just leave you with a picture of her. Jury's still out about who she looks like.

Love all around!

T minus 3 hours

Well, it's here. May 7th. We made it! We've got some last minute packing to do and then we're off to the hospital. C-section is scheduled for 7:30, so I'd love your prayers during that time, if you've read this by then.

I won't be back until probably Monday, but I may see if I can walk Sweet Hubby through the posting process so that those of you who won't be getting a phone call can get the deets of our baby girl a few days early.

I love you all and I can't wait to share our little girl with you.

To my daughter, on the day before your birth

There was a time when I would have laughed at the prospect of ever having a daughter. It seemed to me that I was born to be the mommy of all boys...being the mother to your brothers has changed me to my core and I couldn't ever imagine being anything different than what I was for them. The love and bond I have with each of your brothers runs so deep and I couldn't imagine what it would be like to love a child that was not my son.

But then came you.

And my heart began to leap at the ideas of bows and baby dolls and sweet little dresses. My soul aches for the kind of relationship that a mother can only have with her daughter. Our home seems to long for the girliness and softness you will bring when you arrive.

I'm not quite sure what to expect from you and how the dynamic of our family will change. I'm sure that in the beginning, life will be much the same as it was when your brothers were newborns. But as you grow, I can't wait to see how our relationship develops and how you change your brothers and daddy. They are all already so in love with you that not a day (an hour sometimes!) goes by without all 4 of them reaching over to feel you move, or talking to you in sweet voices or exclaiming how much they can't wait. Stephen declares his love hourly and tells me how sweet you will be and tells everyone that will listen that he is the most excited. Zachary told me yesterday that he's going to dance when you are born--complete with "jazz hands". Marc-Adam gets a sweet little smile on his face every time we mention your name, and he tells me he will hold you and kiss you on your head. And your Daddy? Well, let's just say that it won't take much for you to get that pony if that's something you ever desire. He's already wrapped around your little finger...he bought you your first outfit and shoes and his whole face changes when he talks about you. And I think your daddy is already your hero...you often calm at the sound of his voice. Your brothers used to roll around within my belly when Daddy talked to them. But you get still as if you are listening intently.

I look forward to our quiet moments together, although they might be few and short. But I can't wait to learn all about you. I want to smell your head and feel your breath against my neck. I want to play with your fingers and marvel at your little tiny fingernails. I want to watch you grow and learn and thrive. I can't wait to see what plans God has for you and how you choose to live them out. I can't wait to see how you fit into our family....however it is, whatever you bring, you are the missing puzzle piece in our lives.

My dear Genevieve, you are so loved and so cherished and our family is already immensely blessed from your existence within me. And tomorrow, as we celebrate you and your birth and finally meet you face to face, I hope you can feel that love....I hope you've felt it all along. You're coming in to a family with so much love already, that I think you must have some kind of understanding of it. You and your brothers are a dream come true for your daddy and I. I hope that with our love and guidance, we can help you make your dreams come true, as well.

I love you, Baby Girl. I can't wait to meet you.
Love,
Mama

Random tidbits

Eesh, I didn't realize it had been since Saturday that I last blogged. The days are all blurring together, I guess. So because I have nothing to really say, you're getting the bullet point list.

• We got a letter in the mail today saying that as of May 1st, out insurance is changing. Ahem. You might be able to see why this caused me to panic and maybe hyperventilate. Aside from all of Sweet Hubby's issues, I'm also planning major surgery in 14 days. Now's NOT the time to start making changes on me. I immediately called the benefits hotline and made sure that my doctor and hospital were still in network. I already had my argument all prepared that I under no circumstances was going to change my doctor OR hospital at this point in my pregnancy and that they were going to pay the same amount that the previous insurance company would have paid. The hotline lady assured me that everything (coverage, deductible, annual out of pocket, etc) were going to transfer over and that everything is going to be just fine. It's a shame, though, I really was in the mood for a fight. BUT, I'm glad I won't have to stress too much about this transition....it's still a pain, though.

• Tomorrow, Sweet Hubby and I are taking the two older boys out on dates. I'm taking Stephen to see Earth and Hubby's taking Zachary fishing. Marc-Adam gets a date with his Nonny. I've been wanting to do something special with the kids before Evie comes. This morning I had the bright idea that we'd take them to the children's museum (they've recently had a major overhaul and it's supposed to be really cool). Then I decided that wasn't a great idea, because the last thing I need to do is to take them to a giant germ incubator so that they get sick and can't come see the baby when she's born OR that I get sick from them and have to recover from abdominal surgery while also recovering from a cough like when Marc-Adam was born. The boys were so excited when we told them we're taking them on dates. I thought Stephen was going to cry...he's been dying to see Earth.

• Now that we're getting closer to "D-Day", I'm getting less ancy about getting this over with. I didn't even wake up this morning trying to remember how many days left. I've been stressing slightly about the stuff I want to try to get before or very soon after she gets here (but none of it is really necessary...more wants than needs), but other than that, the closer we get, the more calm I am. I'm feeling a little bit more anxiety, too, about the actual surgery part (I need to stop watching the baby birthing shows), so I've been in prayer about that a lot.
  

• In other baby news, I've been having lots of contractions (about 3-5 an hour) for the last week or so. Some (but not all) are pretty painful. I thought for sure that I would be dilating at least a little, but no. I had a doctor's appointment this past Monday, and I wasn't dilated AT ALL. On the one hand, I was glad because I'm still not technically full term, and I want her to stay in as long as possible (up to May 7), but on the other hand, it was frustrating that I'd been having all those contractions for nothing. I don't really want any surprises this time, so I'd rather not go into labor before my c-section date, but geez.

• We've been working on getting the house clean this week. It's actually looking pretty good, and if I can just maintain for the next couple weeks, I'll feel good about coming home to what it looks like now when I get out of the hospital. I'm proud of myself for getting as much done as I've been able to do this week. I still have the utility room to clean out and the boys room to straighten (they'll help me with that in the next day or so), and I'd really like to get in the playroom and weed out a bunch of toys, but other than that, things are looking pretty good. I even scaled Mt. Laundry and now it's just a little molehill.

Evie's Room

I posted this last month, a few weeks before Evie was born, so I just linked to this post for Kelly's Korner Tour of Homes. Evie is our first girl after three boys and we had the best time fixing up her room. Enjoy!!


Here's the big reveal of Evie's room finally. My mother-in-law helped decorate, add the accessories, and painted the flowers on the wall. My mom bought the bedding and lamp (lamp not shown in the pictures because we hadn't gotten it in yet) and everything else is stuff we already we had (the crib, dresser, mirror) or that we bought cheap from Walmart or IKEA.








This last one's a little blurry because of the weird angle at which I had to take it, but that door you see there is the closet. It turned out really cute.

I'm just so pleased with how it turned out. I find myself in there several times a day just looking at everything and thinking about her and wondering if this beautiful room will match her personality. I can't wait to meet her.

20 days and counting...

I had a focus for this post, but lost track somewhere and so it's all just babble.

I promise that I won't be blogging "all-baby, all-the-time" forever. It's just the biggest thing going on right now in our lives, so it's where most of our focus is. I hope you are patient with me and all my talk of all things Evie.

Anyway, we're in the process of putting all the finishing touches in Evie's room. It should be mostly done by tomorrow morning. I decided this afternoon, that the next thing to do should be to organize all her clothes. Last week (or two weeks ago...or two years ago...I've lost track), when I cleaned out that room to begin with, I just took all the clothes she had and shoved them in her dresser to get them out of the way while we started work on her room. So yesterday (two days ago...?) I put on the first load of Evie clothes to wash. That entire load was nothing but hand me downs. Today, however, if I wanted to keep washing her clothes, I had to start taking tags off. I panicked a bit at the thought of "Yipes, what if we end up bringing home our little Grant, instead of our little Evie?!? What in the world will I do with all these clothes that are brand new, but now have no tags?" Taking off tags makes the whole thing seem more real and like I'm more committed to the idea of having a girl. Nevermind the fact that we just painted the room pink and I've made more bows than she'll have hairs on her head when she's born.

Speaking of bows, I must take some more pictures of what I've been working on. I've finally gotten the hang of one style of bow that I was having trouble with, and they are turning out oh-so-cute. I'm making bows for outfits that she doesn't even have yet, but that I plan on her having. Like a black and hot pink bow for a black and pink Supergirl dress I want to make for her. And today I made two bows with the intention of picking one for her to wear when she gets baptised (unless of course we end up with something that she must have a bonnet for). Those two are particularly precious. Way back when, before I started making bows, I bought a bunch of little tiny baby bows (No hair needed!) off of ebay for her to wear in her first few weeks, especially for pictures in the hospital and for her coming home outfit. Now that I've been dealing with these bigger bows, those little tiny ones just seem incomplete or not enough. But I'm going to try to control myself in the beginning and only use the big bows for when I'm playing dress-up with her, and use the little tiny ones for when we go out or take pictures. We'll see how long that lasts.

And for those of you that care, I'm 34 weeks now and as of today we are 4 weeks from the scheduled Baby Day. I'm actually pretty impressed with how much we've gotten done in a short amount of time. I've been much calmer about what needs to be done this time around. Sweet Hubby, on the other hand? Well, he's the one that insisted on getting her room started and finished and this week he re-lanscaped our yard, and next week he plans on painting the exterior of our house. Meanwhile, I have vague ideas of what I would like to have done before Evie gets here (mainly just things I don't want to have to do AFTER she gets here), but I haven't done anything about them or even really thought through planning to get them done. For some reason, I have it in my head that I need a steam mop before I can really get anything done. As if the dirty floors in my house were my only housekeeping problem.

And for a closing thought, I know I must be getting close to baby day because I'm getting to the point in my pregnancy when I'm easily annoyed. The ones in my life that I love most are wearing on my nerves....and I know logically that it's not their fault and they're doing things that they ALWAYS do, but hormonally I want to yell at them for breathing too loudly, or chewing too loudly, or for sitting funny on the couch, or for asking too many questions, etc, etc. Today, I had to keep my tone in check when I told Stephen to quit making me think. The words were out of my mouth before I realized how ridiculous they were. And I said them just a mere few hours after telling him that he can always ask me anything. *sigh* I hope that I can not be such an ogre after the baby's born.

T minus 6 weeks

So. If everything goes according to plan (ha ha), exactly 6 weeks from right now, our little Evie will be here taking her first breaths...either being manhandled by the nurses or being all wrapped up and held by her Daddy for the first time. Baby day has been officially scheduled for May 7th (05.07.09--that's the date I've wanted all along) for 7:30 in the morning. We'd been talking about that all along, and the doctor even scheduled it for us earlier than she normally schedules c-sections so that we could ensure to get that day (she normally doesn't actually schedule until 32-34 weeks, but she scheduled it when I was 30 weeks). But when she told me it was official, I had a little bit of a freak out. It made it that much more real. And I'm acutely aware of the fact that we may not make it to that day at all. I've thought all along that we may not even make it to May. But I don't know. I guess we'll have to wait and see. All that matters is that in 6 weeks or less, our daughter will be in our arms.

I think we're just about ready. Her room's not ready and her clothes aren't clean or sorted, but we have everything we should need. The pack and play is still at my folks', but we can get that at any time and that's really the only thing that we need. Other than that, we have diapers and jammies. Since I'll be nursing, the food is built in, so if Evie Cate decides to come early, we'll be ready. Funny. Even just 2 babies ago, I wouldn't have even entertained the thought of NOT having the room and everything perfectly ready to go for the new baby. Now, I just want the house to be clean and I'd like to be done being pregnant. That's all.

I've been feeling as I think I should be feeling in the third trimester with the fourth child. Tired, achy, cranky. Morning nausea has also returned which is a nice little gift. I'm quite large, and Evie's butt or knee or heel or something equally bony has taken up residence under my left ribs. But in spite of all that and the fact that I feel like I've been pregnant for.ev.er. I really am still enjoying being pregnant with my little girl. I love having her as a part of me. I love feeling her kicks and nudges...I love how she's still and quiet all night (Lord, please let that continue after birth)...I love being able to watch her roll around and being able to share all of her antics with her adoring brothers and daddy.

Speaking of daddy, you have never met a man more excited about a baby than my Sweet Hubby is right now about Evie. I can't wait to see his reaction to her. I'm afraid I'm going to have to wrestle him to the ground to get to hold her....and the major surgery/anesthesia thing might hold me back a bit. Of course, I have the advantage of being her food supply, so I'm thinking I'll have to play that card in order to get my hands on her.

6 weeks, people....and I'm going to have 4 kids. And a daughter. Who'd've thunk it?

Mission: Christmas Food

I finally got my computer hooked back up after our illnesses (mine and the computer's). I didn't start feeling better yesterday until just a little bit before the concert, but I DID start to feel better, so we all made it. It was a great concert and we had an awesome time...if you're even a slight fan of TobyMac, I suggest seeing him if he comes to a town near you. It was a fantastic show. Even though he didn't get on stage until 9:30. And we didn't know the three acts that came before him. And the second act made me think that their music would be good punishment for someone like me. Other than that, we really did have a lot of fun. :)

So now that we've got one more holiday festivity under our belt, I've got my eyes squarely focused on Christmas Eve and Christmas day. The gears in my brain have been squeaking running all afternoon trying to sort out my food plans. I think I might be getting a little overly ambitious with it, but I'm really excited. This year, for the first time, we'll be staying home for Christmas and having my parents and my ILs over. So I'm hosting. Never thought I'd do that. But I can't wait and I want to make it really special and fun as well as relaxing and semi-stress free. One of the things I'm looking forward to most is staying in our jammies for as long as we want on Christmas day.

However. To be able to be relaxed on a day when one is usually frenzied about food and guests and such, it takes some serious planning. Which is why I'm starting to really get things planned 12 days out.

So, after I hit publish here, I'm off to find the recipes I want to use for our special Christmas Eve dinner, Christmas Day breakfast and all the little treats and snacks I hope to have. Once I get everything figured out, I'll post it here for those of you nosy enough to care. ;)

Have a great rest of the weekend, everyone!

Thankful

We all have so much to be thankful for.

This morning I spent a little time with each child telling him that tomorrow was Thanksgiving and that I was thankful for him and I told each one what I loved about him. And it's more than just being thankful for my husband and kids. I'm thankful for what I have because of them. This love, this life is all because of what I have with them. God has been more than generous to me.

I look around and regardless of the crappy or scary things that are going on in my world and the larger world outside, I know that life is good. Life is good.

And I can't give enough thanks.

YAY YAY YAY!!!

On Dec. 12, me and 3 (out of the 4) of my favorite guys are gonna be here.



Did I mention YAY!?

There's a chill in the air...

...which means we all start thinking about Christmas. My cousin Kelli was talking about her plans for Christmas on her blog and in the comments I started talking about my plans. But then I remembered I was planning on doing a post similar to hers and my comment was getting too long anyway. So, even though we haven't even said good-bye to Halloween yet (and thank goodness that's over this weekend!), I thought I'd lay out what we're planning on doing this year for Christmas.

For years, I've been trying to stick to "Jesus got three presents for Christmas, that's good enough for you, too", but it never works. I usually end up getting 3 "real" things, and then a bunch of little filler stuff. I think this year will be the same, too. AND I've budgeted well enough this year, that I'll be able to have most of my Christmas money the day after Thanksgiving, when we might be able to get some good deals. We tend not to go overboard anyway, so I don't think money will be an issue. Here's what we're thinking for the kids (and this is subject to change based on any new ideas they might have):

Stephen will be getting a Razor Scooter (and forgive all my Wal*mart links...that's where we'll doing most if not all of our shopping for the kids). He's been asking for a "cool" scooter for a while, and he's well out grown his other scooter and bike. So he needs a new set of wheels. He'll also be getting an Elmer's Science Kit, although, not necessarily that one in the link. I think he'll be really excited about that. And we're also looking at one of these Star Wars games, although I might get him the new Guess Who game instead. And we might fill in with some books from Half Price Books.

Zachary's hard to buy for. He's not really "in" to much. And most of the stuff we get for Stephen would be a gift to Zachary, too. But we're definitely getting this Batman set for him. It's really cute and I can just see the look on his face when he sees it. I was also thinking about a work bench and tool set, but I don't know. I don't think he would be really excited for it. But it might being one of those toys that don't garner a whole lot of excitement when it gets opened, but ends up being one of the most played with. It would definitely help on fine motor skills, which he could always use help on. He might get a game instead, I don't know yet. And because we're lousy, cheap parents, I was thinking that we would take the bike that Stephen got for Christmas last year that he was probably too big for back then, and paint it to look different (it still looks new because Stephen wasn't able to do much damage to it since he could barely ride it). I was thinking maybe painting it green and calling it a Hulk bike. I don't know. I'm afraid he'd be on to me. He wants his own bike, and I want to surprise him with one, but there's no sense in getting a brand new one when we have a perfectly good one in the garage. And of course some books and coloring books/workbooks.

And Marc-Adam. He's hard to buy for, too, because there's not much out there for his age that doesn't take batteries and that we don't already have or had at some point and then sold or given away. I've been wanting to get one of the kids a set of these blocks for a long time. I think I just might do it for him. I was also thinking about the classic bubble mower or maybe the grocery cart. I thought this was cute, but I read a review that it was smaller in real life than it looks in the picture, so I might go have a look at the store before making a decision. He'll probably be getting some coloring books and maybe a couple new Matchbox cars.

After adding all that up, we still have quite a bit of the money left from what we budgeted for them, so we thought we might get something big that would be a gift to all of them. I was thinking the Smart Cycle, but it's just so large and it hasn't gotten totally great reviews (too many people complained it quit working after a few uses and lots of people said it was a battery sucker). Plus, it might be a little too close to a video game for my taste. So, I'll have to think on that. We might just end up saving the leftover money or maybe get them something else they can all enjoy.

As for me, I've been hoping for a while that this would make it on to Sweet Hubby's idea list for our anniversary or Christmas. And since there's no money for our anniversary next week, I think I might have dropped enough hints for him to get it for Christmas. I seriously watch the infomercial everytime I see that it's on. I read some reviews and most were great but some weren't so good, but I'm still excited to see what I can do with it. Other than that, there's nothing else I really want, so that should be easy for him.

And I have no idea what Sweet Hubby'll be getting for Christmas this year. He'll probably do what he always does and just buy himself some stuff off of eBay or Amazon and then I'll wrap it and he'll act surprised. That's the only that he gets stuff that he's excited about. If left up to me, he would get jammie pants, a cap or a watch. All of which he likes, but all year long he looks at and watches stuff that he really wants...and none of those things are things that he can wear.

We have stockings, but they're not really a big deal to us. We rarely spend more than $10 on them. We'll probably just fill them with fruit and nuts and maybe a small thing of candy (when the kids get older, we'll do Lifesaver books since that's a tradition in our family....they're just entirely too young now for hard candy).

So there you go. That's a lot of links (and I haven't gone back to double check all the links...if you find one that's weird or wrong, let me know so I can fix it). I'll be posting more of our plans (food, decorations, etc) later, since we're doing something new this year and just staying at home both Christmas Eve and Christmas day instead of visiting family. That's totally new for us, and will take a bit more planning on my part.

SO glad to have that off my chest!

The news is out now! We're expecting baby #4 sometime in mid-May. My official due date is the 18th, I think, but I know I'll be scheduled for a c-section earlier than that, but who knows when the baby will actually come. Marc-Adam taught me to never be so sure of the plans that I've made. :)

I've known for almost 3 weeks now. The first few days it was terrible not to be able to tell anybody. I really wanted to wait to announce it until after our trip because we were planning on telling my parents and the kids while in Disney World. So we told my in-laws just before we left, and then broke the news to the kids and my folks the first night we were there. I actually got it all on video. The younger two kids didn't really care obviously (Zachary has yet to say anything about it), my parents got excited, but Stephen, who had been up since 3am that morning and had only an hours nap jumped up and yelled, "WHAT?! I already have to listen to him cry *pointing at Marc-Adam*! Now we're having another one?!"

Dork.

Not the reaction I was expecting. Especially since he's been saying for months that he wanted another baby. He's since apologized for acting like that and is acting more excited, but it would've been nice to have him really excited on the video. I feel bad for his future sibling to have to watch that.

But who knows....it might win us $10,000.

I'm baaaack!

Howdy! We're back from our fabulous vacation. Actually we were back on Friday, but I didn't feel like getting to all the e-mail and blogs again, so I had to convince myself to do it today. I have a bill that needs to be paid online anyway. So, I'm spending some time catching up with what's been going on with all of you while I was playing myself silly in Disney.

We had a seriously fantastic time. We came back exhausted and overstimulated. Friday night, we were all in bed asleep by 9pm. ALL of us! The kids loved it (even though the lack of normal sleep made Stephen terribly irritable) and we did everything we wanted to do. There were far more people than we had expected, but we still didn't wait more than 20 or 30 minutes for rides or shows. The weather was fabulous, except for one whole afternoon on Monday and for about 15 minutes on Tuesday. I did discover that my hair revolts against Florida weather and water. It looked terrible all week and there was nothing I could do about it. I did have a hat that I wore until the showers on Monday afternoon. At some point during that rain, my hat got wet and shoved into a bag, so that when I took it out, it looked like a hat that should be worn by one of the bears in Country Bear Jamboree. I left that hat in the trash in Florida. It made me sad.

I'll post pictures soon, but we got pictures with so many characters (no autographs though, because I didn't think about that). Just off the top of my head, we met Tigger, Pooh, Darby, Eeyore, Rafiki (the kids didn't even know who that was), Spiderman (at our trip to Islands of Adventure), the Cat in the Hat, Thing 1 and thing 2, The Grinch, Curious George and the Man in the Yellow Hat, Buzz Lightyear (twice), and Woody. There's more I'm sure, but that's all I can think of. If you aren't already thinking about or planning a trip to Disney, you should start NOW. Seriously. It's a lot of work, especially with really young kids, but it's so worth it. We're already planning another trip for 2010. Except then, we'll have 3 more people...my mother and father-in-law are joining us....and the new baby.

Due May '09.

:)

Getting back to normal...well, maybe not

Ahhh....things should be getting back to normal very very soon. I'll unpack everything that got packed up in case we had to make a quick getaway. Food will go back into the pantry where it belongs and the weather will clear up soon. I'm so glad this thing has finally passed and hopefully it'll be another 25 years before we take another direct hit.

And now that that excitement is over, I can let you in on a little secret that's got me REALLY exicted. 6 days from now, my family (including my parents) will be sitting on a plane heading for Disney World! The kids know we're going, but they think it's 16 days and that next weekend we're going to Dallas. That was my cover for the packing and planning that they're going to be seeing over the next few days. Then, next Saturday morning, we'll wake them up at 4am and tell them, "We're going to Disney World TODAY!" I bought them Leapsters that they have no idea about to help them stay busy and calm at the airport and on the plane. I think they'll all just be beside themselves. Stephen's been asking for some kind of video game player for a while and I'm pretty adamantly opposed to owning video games of any sort. But I caved for the Leapsters just so they can have something new and fun for the plane ride. And then in the future, we'll use them for situations where they might need to be entertained for a few minutes while I take care of business.

There are lots of surprises in store for the kiddos on this trip. Our days are pretty jam-packed but it'll still be relaxing and fun and leisurely.

We're praying off any more bad weather...for here AND Orlando. It looks like things are clearing up and the Atlantic is almost empty of anything that might cause us problems.

Home again, home again, jiggety jig

Well, I'm so so pleased to let you know that my cousin and her husband were able to bring baby Alex home yesterday. We are all so relieved that he's better and finally where he belongs...home with his wonderful family! Thanks to all of you who kept Alex and his family in your thoughts and prayers. I appreciate it and I know his mama and daddy do, too.