Chalk & Math

I've been so grateful for the beautiful weather we've enjoyed this spring. We're pretty much stuck at home right now with a baby, so at least the kids have been able to go outside and play! One afternoon they had a great time making self-portraits out of chalk on the driveway:

Chalk Seth

Chalk Catherine

Chalk Aaron (love the flaming red hair)

Chalk Elise

We still had about a month of school left after Elijah was born. We kept it as simple as possible, but still tried to do a little bit of the basics every day. Aaron was very proud (and so was I) when he finished up this math book:

Brains are interesting things. This little guy has a language processing disorder that makes things like figurative language and new vocabulary difficult to pick up. Reading books is often frustrating as he frequently interrupts to ask questions about pictures or about words I've already defined for him 67 times ("Trousers are pants, buddy."). The storyline tends to get buried under a pile of interruptions, making it tedious for both of us. Since language and literature are my loves, I've mourned what I feel like is a huge loss for Aaron.

But math...math is his happy place. He picks up math in the way most people pick up language: almost instinctively. I have to kick him out when Catherine does her math so he won't answer her questions for her. His eyes light up when he solves problems (yesterday it was 28+28, a problem he made up for himself). Despite being in preschool, he insisted on doing a math workbook like everyone else. He just finished the first half of 1st grade math today.

He will probably never understand literature and language the way I do. But he already grasps math concepts I struggled with in middle school. So today I'm grateful for weaknesses and strengths and the beauty of individuality.

Easter

Our neighborhood Easter Egg hunt happened the morning after Elijah was born. Jon was a champion dad and headed home in time to shower and get the kids to the pond. And, once again, a million thanks to Uncle Timmy, who was the one running the show while Jon & I were gone. 

So much photogenicness...

I blame their father.

Apparently this year there were junky plastic toys and stuffed animals in addition to the eggs full of candy. Because heaven knows we can ALL use more stuffed animals in our homes...

I was really proud of my kids for listening and limiting themselves to 20-25 eggs instead of filling their buckets to the top. It's not easy to do that when everyone else is going crazy. But we just don't need that candy, and it gave some of the little ones a chance to actually get some eggs before they were snatched up. 

Even with a newborn, we had to sneak in some egg decorating. 

And the winner of "most enthusiastic egg decorator" is:

Shocking, right?

I normally am not one to go right back to church after baby, but I was feeling really good and it didn't feel right to not be at church on Easter. Thankfully our church is in the afternoon right now, so it was fairly easy to get there on time. 

Elise's awesome nursery leaders had an Easter egg hunt for all the kids in their class. They snapped this picture of Kelsey, Elise, Matthew & Anuhea enjoying the sunshine. 

Also, our first picture as a family of seven!

We enjoyed a lovely, laidback Easter dinner with Timmy & the Uhligs. We definitely had so much to be grateful for this year. 

Elijah Comes Home

Elijah was my first baby with the midwife group and I LOVED them. I especially loved that the morning after he was born, the midwife walked in and said, "I assume you'll want to go home as soon as possible, correct? We'll have you out of here by 8 am tomorrow morning." Normally I'm battling to get out after 24 hours--this time I didn't have to battle anyone! It did end up being closer to 10 am, but still! 

Going home is my favorite. The only thing I really like about the hospital is getting food service. I hate that our hospital won't take the baby to the nursery so I can sleep. I'm also not allowed to sleep with the baby in the bed with me. Which means...I don't sleep. Thank heaven for cell phones! I would put Elijah in the bed with me to sleep, then quickly snatch up my phone and pretend to be using it whenever someone walked in. See? Totally not sleeping with the baby in my bed! 

Jon came Sunday morning to pick us up. I got to shower, which is always the best thing ever.  Another fun coincidence: another nurse noticed my BYU shirt, mentioned she was from Orem, and eventually got brave enough to assume we were LDS, too. She goes the the local YSA ward, which meant she knew Timmy (of course--everyone seems to know Timmy). "We LOVE Timmy!" This kind of stuff didn't happen with my other kids!

Tiny little dinosaur, all ready to go home.

He doesn't look nearly as big in this picture!

Thanks to a harsh and long-lasting flu season, no one under 18 was allowed to visit Elijah in the hospital. I was sad not to see my babies for those two days and sad to have them miss out on meeting their brother for so long. So they were extra excited to see him when we finally made it home! Poor kid didn't even make it into the house before he was attacked:

And then it was time for EVERYONE to hold him.

(This is a good foreshadowing of how their relationship is going. Enthusiasm and terror.)

I wasn't sure how Elise was going to handle the new baby. On the one hand, she LOVES babies. But on the other, she was being dethroned. Catherine was not a fan when Aaron was born, so I was nervous. But there was no need: she was THRILLED:

Big sister (again) Catherine:

And Seth with his little mini-me:

Me & five (?!!) kids:

Silly faces:

I'm not sure any baby has ever been as loved as poor Elijah:

Three boys:

Seth & Elise may have fought over laying next to Elijah during his first tummy time:

Aaron especially loves Elijah. So, so much. If Elijah is awake (or even NOT awake), Aaron is there, rubbing his hair, kissing his cheeks, touching his nose... Poor Elijah rarely gets a break. It's kind of sweet, but kind of obnoxious, too. I really need to get a recording of the insane bird cry Aaron makes whenever he sees Elijah. It was especially fun when I was trying to put Elijah down for a nap and Aaron would make that sound over the two-way baby monitor. Thankfully it died and we replaced it with one that DOESN'T have that lovely feature.

Five kids...crazy!

Elijah's Birth Story

I was so, so sure Elijah would be born early. Seth was ten days early and Aaron was four days early. Both girls were late. Obviously another boy = another early birth.

Plus there was all the false/pre-term labor. Starting at around 35 weeks I had several nights of contractions that were 2-3 minutes apart, lasting almost a minute. They never started getting painful, so I never went in to the hospital, but I got a little nervous.

But as his due date approached, the contractions kept getting less and less frequent. The week before he was born I barely had any (but the ones I did have were getting stronger). At first I was frustrated to still be pregnant, but the extra nights of good sleep were very much appreciated!

I was able to make it to all the activities I was afraid we'd have to cancel due to baby. I was there to teach the (rather complicated) lesson on acids & bases to my co-op classes. We got to go to the luncheon that Elise's preschool teacher had lovingly prepared as a farewell to her class. We enjoyed the gorgeous April weather and went on some local "hikes".

On Thursday evening I noticed that the contractions were coming regularly, about every 5-10 minutes. Not painful, but didn't go away. Pretty standard early labor for me. I put my friend Melissa on alert (again, poor thing had so many false alarms from me!) and went to bed. I told Jon we'd either get one last night's sleep or I'd be waking him up at 1 am to go to the hospital.

Sleep won, which was a lovely thing. I woke up to more contractions, so I knew this really was it. It was just a question of how long before we needed to go in.

I happened to have an appointment scheduled that morning already. I was shocked to find out I was already at 4-5 cm and 75% effaced. Normally I have to walk through contractions for a couple of hours to get to that point! I told the midwife that I was having regular contractions and she told me not to wait too long before coming in.

Jon had the day off work and my friend Bente had already arranged to take all four (!!) kids with her on a field trip. We had a lovely, peaceful morning running errands together and assembling a shed for the kids' bikes. I even convinced Jon to take me out to lunch before baby arrived. Had to sneak in some Thai drunken noodles before the "no food during labor" fun.

I timed my contractions all during lunch. They were every 3-5 minutes and lasting around 1 minute. Still nothing intense, but Jon was a little nervous since I was already much further along than I'd ever been. He was very opposed to the idea of delivering a baby in the car on the way to the hospital for some reason.

Around 3:30 pm  we decided to head in, even though the contractions were still pretty mild. Jon dropped the kids off  to play at the Knoxes until Timmy could come to stay with them. Timmy was amazing: he dropped all his plans for the weekend to come watch our four little monsters. I really don't know what we would have done without him.

I was so afraid they were going to send me home since my contractions weren't super strong yet. I'm SO grateful the midwife checked me that morning--I'm pretty sure they would have at least made me walk. But since I came in at 6 cm, which was an improvement over that morning, I got to stay!

My friend Heidi mentioned that her friend worked as a L&D nurse at the hospital and thought it would be fun if she happened to be my nurse. I figured there was a very low chance of that, but when the nurse walked in, her first question was, "Do you know Heidi?" Kind of funny! Also a little odd to think that someone in my neighborhood has watched me push out a baby, though...

Since I have an atrocious record of epidural failure (I had one with all 4 kids, it only worked with Aaron. It was GLORIOUS when it worked, though!), I decided to try a natural birth this time. My hope was that things would progress more quickly if I could move around rather than being stuck in a bed. I did a lot of research on techniques for faster labor, but I was willing to get the epidural out of desperation if I needed it.

And so I bounced on the ball, and paced, and tried to stay upright as much as possible so gravity could do its work. It was SO NICE to not be stuck in the bed like usual! Even though the contractions were getting a little stronger, it was easier to cope with them since I wasn't flat on my back.

We were hopeful that he would arrive quickly since I was already at a 6. But around 10 pm, I started to lose hope. I felt like things just weren't progressing. The midwife came in to check and sure enough--after laboring for six hours I was still at 6 cm. Gah. She offered to break my water in the hopes that it would kick-start labor. If not, we were going to try pitocin (which I wanted to avoid).

Around 10:30 she broke my water. Within a few minutes my contractions got intense. REALLY intense. And the back labor that I'd hoped to avoid kicked in with a vengeance. It felt like someone was gripping the back of my hips, trying to break them into pieces. I tried all the techniques I'd studied for back pain relief, but nothing seemed to help. At this point I seriously considered the epidural, but I knew they'd have to pump me with liquids for an hour before I could even get the anesthesiologist in there. It seemed hopeless: I'd obviously be dead before then. Or at least passed out from exhaustion.

One article I read mentioned that kneeling on the bed, facing the head of the bed and hugging the raised head area could help with labor. It didn't seem to do much, but it did give me a good place to rest between contractions. I was kneeling, kind of draped over the top of the bed when I felt the pressure: it was time to push.

Jon ran for the nurse, who was thankfully close by. Within minutes the midwife was there and I was pushing, still on my knees, facing away from everyone in the room. Not how I imagined labor going, but I wasn't inclined to flip around in the middle of pushing. It took a few pushes to get him out, at which point I definitely said, "I can't do this!" So stereotypical. But of course, I did do it, and then he was here, just over 30 minutes after she broke my water. I might have sobbed, partially because I was happy to be done with the labor, but mostly because he was here and so perfect.

From the beginning it was obvious that he was our child, and obvious that he was a redhead. There would be no mix-ups at the nursery, that's for sure (not that our hospital will take the babies to the nursery, which is another story). He did cry a bit more and a bit more intensely than our other kids, which made me nervous. But he eventually calmed down and passed out for basically the entire next day.

So was the natural birth worth it? In the moment I would have said absolutely not, never again. But with the advantage of hindsight, I would say...maybe. My recovery was much, much better and much faster. It was a little weird to just be able to stand up and walk around after birth instead of being all wobbly or dead-legged like I was after an epidural. I also didn't tear, which was a first.  Plus I do think that labor went faster because I was able to stay off my back. I wish the midwife had broken my water when we walked in at 3:30 (she had mentioned that it was bulging). I think his head just couldn't engage because there was too much liquid in the way. We could have had a baby hours earlier! But it was what it was, and he made it here safely, which is what really mattered in the end.

Waiting for Baby

Baby boy was due April 11th (or 13th according to my calculations). I hadn't really gotten anything ready by mid-March, but after being up all night with contractions every 3-5 minute minutes at 35 weeks, I kicked it into gear. I packed a bag, cleaned the car seat, and got the nursery in order:

Of course, being extra prepared meant baby decided to stay put until the full 40 weeks. But on April 12th (right between his two due dates), he made his debut at 11:04 pm:

All my babies have been within 2 ounces of 7 lbs., so I was shocked when they told me he was 8 lbs. 1 oz. That's a full pound bigger than my previously biggest baby (Catherine, oddly enough. Although she was a week late...)! 20 inches long with incontestable red hair. To absolutely no one's surprise, he looked exactly like all his siblings. Jon saw a lot of Elise, I saw Seth. 

We had a few name options we were debating over. We knew from the beginning his middle name would be Mark, after Jon's dad. But Jon held him for a long time before deciding that his name would be Elijah Mark (which made me happy--that was my first choice. Or at least my first choice after Jon kicked 'Joshua' off the list). 

Sleeping like a champion the first night and day. 

Easier to see all the red hair after he got his first bath.

He wasn't a huge fan, but he didn't complain too much.

Traditional "Jonny with new baby" photo.

Elijah looks HUGE here!

We are so grateful to have this new little person in our family. 

Early April

Aaron, tragically shot down by his big brother using a perler bead gun.

This is what I find on my phone when my kids run off with it.

Celebrating Uncle Timmy's birthday.

Enjoying one of the first warm days of the year and trying to walk a baby out during spring break.

Hiking and Longwood

As spring finally made an appearance, we decided to enjoy a morning hiking the MA & PA trail with some Knoxes. Gabe was even kind enough to ditch school so Seth had a buddy.

Gabe also snagged my phone at some point and became the official hike photographer:

Aaron, Gabe & Seth

Gabe likes taking pictures of Elise.

He has a thing for redheads.

Me & Melissa.

36 weeks pregnant is not my favorite look, but I'm glad to have a picture with my friend.

And where, you ask, was Catherine?

At Longwood Gardens with my friend Heidi!

Catherine loves all things plant, animal or bug related. Heidi is also a plant lover and offered to take Catherine on a special field trip, just the two of them. Catherine was THRILLED!

Enjoying spaghetti with enormous meatballs!

We are so blessed to have such good friends!

KYA Show

This year we got to take a gymnastics class with a bunch of friends from co-op. I love that all four kids got to participate every week! Elise was especially thrilled--she LOVED all the climbing and jumping. 

As usual, on the last day all the kids got to run through the obstacle course to show what they've learned. Even Elise got a turn!

Balancing on the jib line

Happy to get her ribbon

Aaron made great strides this year with his skills. Even Miss Paula commented on how much more independent he is now (probably because I have to help Elise now, so he's on his own). 

Aaron balances

Aaron's triumphant finale

Catherine doesn't need Miss Paula to help her balance:

Catherine ribbon time:

Seth on the Bubble Bridge:

Scaling the warped wall (his proudest achievement this year):

We love KYA!

Catherine Fun

Our stake had a cute mother/daughter Activity Days evening in March. Part of the fun included an obstacle course and the command to come wearing exercise clothing. I was nervous about being able to do anything at 35 weeks pregnant, so my awesome friend Bente offered to be Catherine's "mom" for that part. Catherine had a lot of fun pretending she and Brie were sisters for the evening (Talia was home sick, so it was just Catherine & Brie).

Catherine in her beautiful outfit of tin foil, plastic tablecloths and toilet paper. 

The four runway contestants.

The stake Primary president expressly forbade me from participating in the obstacle course, claiming that they had no OBs present that evening to deliver a baby. But Bente did a great job with the girls and I cheered loudly from the sidelines. 

Me, Brie & Catherine, Bente, Anna & Leslie, Hazel & Geri

Cute "sisters"

In true Catherine fashion, she decided without any prompting to decorate my door for Valentine's Day. I loved coming upstairs and finding all these "conversation hearts" with hilarious little Catherine sayings on them.

I sure love this little Catherine girl!