Yeaaaaaahhhh! I got a few pictures resized. Quick, quick, let me upload them before my computer goes haywire again!

Sisters!...these girls love each other so much,

it just melts my heart into a puddle!

Heres the three mo. pic that went with my last blog entry.

Just LOVE that grin...and she shares it with us often and easily!

My son has a new hobby, its call sleepeating...he can hardly stay on the chair,

but he refuses to stop eating and lay down.

Here´s a little story. Quite some time back a friend of mine mentioned on her blog that she is a tactile learner, in relation to this, she mentioned playing with her food and shredding napkins as a child (and driving her mom crazy). This stuck out to me because my daughter does both of those things obsessivly (driving me crazy on occasion). There is thereputic value for her in playing with food, which helps, but does not conquer the annoyance, but I may be the one in need of a therapist some day, in relation to the little napkin, kleenex and tp shreds I never finish ridding my house of. Anyhow, the other evening after a not-so-great oral meal I told her that if she ate one more green bean she could get down. I looked away for just a minute to put something away and when I turned back, there was one less green bean on the plate, she had vanished from sight and the below monument was left behind where moments before had been an innocent little pile of beans accross from a little blob of mashed potatoes on the plate. It made me chuckle...and snap a picture for the blog! : )
In closing, I thought I´d take a minute to brag on my husband. This picture is "before".

And this one is "after". Doesn´t he do a great job at his job!!! LOL

BACK!

Well after over a month without a computer again I´m finally back. I wanted to post a cute picture of my growing babe, but I can´t figure our new program out, so...stay tuned for pictures, hopefully soon!
But the little update that would have gone with the picture would have read something like this:
Baby D recently had her three month check up! She is doing great and growing like a weed. She weighed in at 5kg (11lb) and measured 53cm (21in) both measurments right on track for her growth curve. She is a terrible napper and a great night time sleeper! She gets up to eat once in the night and once in the very early morning--not bad at all. New favorite activites include sucking her fist, "talking" (she is VERY vocal), kicking and trying to move her body, riding in the car, tummy time (as long as its not too long), looking at and moving rattles and toys. She can bring both hands together on a toy now, she is very observant and she is very tight with her big sis.
Big brother went through a tough phase about a month after she was born, I think his age, the adjusment period and his personality all colided a bit, but I am so happy to be able to report that lots of prayer and some extra one on one time with him have helped tremendously in returning him into the sweet, huggable, independant and fun-loving little guy we were used to having around here.
Well, real life carries on as I write, Daddy and big sis will soon be home from swim lessons and wanting supper, so i'm off to stuff some chicken breasts to go with the mashed potatoes! ...More soon.

Old year, New year

2009...many exciting things have occured in this year. Early in the year we aquired our first car, passing us from that striking difference between "dependant on public transportation" to not--a real neccesity and help for our growing family and my husbands small business! Of course my mom's wedding and my third child's birth are also events that will go down in the family history and photo albums for 2009.

Yet, often times in retrospect the "unremarkable" is truly the most remarkable part of life. The area of highest impact in my life right now are my children, and when I manage to keep that at the forefront of my mind every task no matter how mundane, routine or unpleasant takes on divine purpose and lasting significance.

October of this year marked one whole year since we took Mic to Intense Feeding Therapy in Washington. We spent some time looking back and reflecting on "where we were" versus "where we are now". It was a surprising and gratifying experience to be able to tangibly measure progress. Days show no progress. Days turn to weeks and weeks to months and somewhere along the way I lose a concious measure of whether Mic is going forward, backward or in circles in her oral feeding progress. My mom's visit and added perspective helped highlight for us just how far Mic has come in this journey. All those weeks and months of tiny and intangible change have finally added up to some real measurable and secure progress. She is not there yet, but she has put in some real milage this year in the right direction. ...Thank you, Heavenly Father...

"ROUTINE" is something that us housewives need and yet try to escape from, our friend and enemy in turn. But this fall and winter as we had a flurry of medical checkups at the children's hospital for followup by Mic's many physicans never was I more happy to be able to declare at the end of each visit that it was "just a routine checkup". No traumas, no surprises, no out-of-the-ordinary concerns! While I try not waste any energy in consciencly worrying about these visits, I did find myself deliciously pleased and relieved to check each visit off of my mental checklist and move on with no further ado. Ahhhhhh, what a nice feeling!

2010. New. We all like new things. Our Creator made us that way and satisfied our need for new even in this detail, giving us a sense of time, a way to mark seasons...months...years... God is good. All the time. Just as 2009 held triumphs and struggles, sorrows and joys, I am sure that 2010 will also have both some unpleasant and pleasant in store for us. But as I enter this new year, I hold on tight to my Saviours' hand and thus so, know that all will be well.

Mic Unplugged!

...the last couple of weeks through one circumstance or another I have become aware of various people around me in diverse difficulties. Most of these trials happen to be a direct result of poor personal decisions and/or lack of family structure and support. My heart aches for these people.

However what keeps coming back to me over and over again is an overwhelming and profound sense of gratitude and humility. I am so blessed to have the heritage and family that I have. I would not be who I am today without them. There is no way I can express this new and deeper sense of appreciation and thankfulness for God's unending mercy in my life, for Grandma, who prayed for me every day, for parents who interceded for me many times, for Mom and Bob, who display continued support in so many ways, and for the friendship I enjoy with my sibblings. I am just so blessed and my heart needed to try and express that in words.

To end on a completely different note, I pasted some pictures below. All the children here (except homeschoolers :-p) wear uniforms to school. Someone gave us this hand me down uniform with nice heavy material and tons of wear left in in it. My husband decided to take some "school pictures" of Mic, and Oh! did she ham it up. I decided that there was no way to get the full effect just pasting one or two, so here is the whole series for your viewing pleasure.

And, in case its not obvious, here she is holding onto her "kickboard" while "swimming" : )

"5" !!!!!

Due to an "ill" computer I am behind and have all kinds of pics to share. I thought a fun place to start catching up would be my daughter's fifth birthday party. We waited to celebrate until Grandma and Grandpa could be here to join in on the fun. It was worth the wait! They also helped significantly in making my ideas for the party become reality. (Thank you, Mom and Bob!). I'm still not a fan of big parties, but we did upsize a little on the last celebration around here and had an inflatable for the day for the kids to play in. It was a big hit and made it possible for us big people to actually enjoy some uninterupted adult conversation as well, definatly a win-win situation for all involved! : )

I could hardly get them all to hold still for a picture,

this was a split second and that was the only chance I got! : )

There was plenty of "baby gazing" happening on the sidelines...
...and a rousing round of chinese checkers for the "big kids" The five year old princess, herself!

Good eats and good times!

The cake put us through all kinds of misery in its making,

but in the end I thought we rescued it quite nicely!

Blowing out the candle.

I need to pause for a story! The tradition in MX is that after the candles are blown out the birthday person take a bite directly from the cake, this position leaves them exposed and more often than not someone gives their head a little shove from behind and they end up with a face full of frosting. Every year (except last yr. becasue she was ill) I make a cake for Mic and every year she has refused to taste it in any way, shape or form. So imagine my delight and surprise when after she blew out her candle everyone told her to take her bite...and she did!!! Of course right at that moment we weren't ready and missed it with the camera. But she went on to eat the entire little piece that I served her in a plate too. ...made my heart warm, it did! : )

And the best part for last...a prayer of thanks and

blessing for this precious little girl's life!

Melted Mind

One of the most frequently asked questions to moms of new babies everywhere must be, "so, how are you adjusting?" The question doesn't bother me in the least, but it does leave me in a bit of a dilemma...how to answer?
"Fine", "I'm tired", "Honkey-dory! I have three children five and under, I change about a dozen diapers a day and clean up at least two puddles...", "If I arrive at adjusted I'll let you know", "Well, my hemorrhoids are finally going away, I think" ;-) ...How much honesty is too much? How elequent ought I to be?
And even worse, while my mind is scrambling for an honest answer with some real depth, my train barrels straight ahead, when it should have taken the curve at 30mph and by the time I get back on track sometimes I can't even remember the question I intended to answer. This gift of multitasking that God placed in the female makeup, is the key to any new mother's survival, and yet even this amazing skill can be shortcircuted by overload. Fortunatly for me I can simultaniously prepare supper, referee my children's quarrel and get the last load of laundry up on the line to dry, and all the while my mind is working on how to better teach my children manners, forming tomorrows to-do list, and conjuring up ideas for the next blog entry. My husband, bless his soul, would have burned supper and left the clothes to mold while untangling the children. Its not his fault, he simply wasn't given the same wiring.
My problem lies in that my mental capacity has a red line similar to the overheated line on a car dash, and anymore I always seem to be just below the red. Suddenly I realize that I have lost the capacity to prioritize! Of the eight things I needed to remember and six things I wanted to accomplish, I did manage to cover the trivial chore of refolding the sloppy clothes in the wardrobe...but forgot to give Mic an entire tube feeding which represents about a fourth of her needed daily calorie intake. This type of thing has happened more times than I care to admit in the last month and a half since little blessing #3 has graced our household with her presence.
So...I am blessed and spread thin and trying to remember...now, just where was I going with all of this!? : )

Bare & Beautiful

Sun bath

7 cm

Eyes!

And just because they are cute too! : )

oops!

...it took so much effort to write "the story" that I forgot to paste pictures! Here's a few to start with.

The Hand of God

We had a delightful Sunday afternoon/evening with some friends of ours and were getting ready to say goodbye and wind down for the day when they had a problem with their car alarm and couldnt get their car going. While Hubby was trying to help them figure that out I was cleaning up the kitchen and headed outside with some scraps for the animals when I suddenly felt a "GUSH". ...I knew right away that my water had broke, and thus from the get-go I knew that the much repeated statment that "each pregnancy and birth is so different from the other" was once again proving itself true--with my other two my water never did break on its own. I wasn't quite sure what to think since I wasn't having regular contractions or any pain at all. Nervous to the point of shaky and almost in denial that this was really happening, I called my doctor. Since I wasn't having pain or even many contractions she took it all very calmly and gave me all the typical doctorly orders to stay relaxed, count contractions when they start, make sure the baby is still moving regularly and all that good stuff. It seemed to not be long after we got off the phone that the contractions started to pick up a little more momentum. I set about packing our bag, attending to last minute details and writing down contraction times and lenghts.
By a little after midnight most everything was ready including the borrowing of the car with the now fixed alarm problem as our vehicle doesn't circulate on Mondays. And even in the nervousness of the moment we had enough presence of mind to recognize the first in a string of timing miracles! We needed a vehicle and God had it all worked out ahead of time!
By this time I was feeling confused. I KNOW each birth is different, but all I had to draw on was past experience... my contractions were getting harder, longer and more frequent, my pain level was DEFINATLY going up, but the contractions were still far from regular and sometimes still 12 minutes or so apart. In my past labor the contractions had been super regular, about every three minutes, but with much, much less pain. Finally by about 3am I told my husband that I didn't care if they were regular or not, they HURT and I wanted to go see my doctor and find out how far along the way we really were. The prearranged agreement was that she would check me at her small office which is quite near and all of us would wait to go to the clinic together, which it not at all near, until I was at about a 6, thus avoiding an overly long and stressful time away from home. She knew that my desire was for a natural birth and understood that I would be most comfortable at home for as long as that were possible.
The car ride was aweful! All I could think about was the fact that the clinic was SO far away and I was already in so much pain I had no idea how I would ever make it to the clinic if I could barely make it here to the little office. I just kept asking God for help over and over. We got there, she checked me and I was only at 4 or 4 1/2cm. She said it would be best to wait a bit longer before heading accross town that I should just try to stay calm and as comfortable as possible at home for another hour or so.
As we were leaving I think I must have mentioned to her that I felt like pushing, because I do remember that through the haze she reminded me that if I push before its time it will just wear me and the baby out and won't help us at all. I kept that on the for front of my mind and had a very painful frusterating car ride home, I no longer had control over the push factor. Whether I wanted it to be or not every contraction was a push and I could not stop it. I was certain that if this was only "half way there", that there was no way I'd make it to the end with out a dreaded epidural. Half way home I couldnt handle sitting anymore and actually twisted around and knelt on the floor of the car and just hung on for dear life.
When we got home I knelt again as it was the only position I could handle and I frantically told my husband, "I really think this baby is going to be born now!" He said," You stay here and I will go get the doctor and bring her here to the house". I panicked and made it clear that under no uncertain terms was he to leave me. I told him that I felt like the baby's head was between my legs, at that point he looked and could see her crown. I think from that moment it was only about another minute until out little princess was born and caught safe in Daddy's hands.
From there things get pretty blurry in my memory but our doctor arrived soon and took care of all the "after" details starting with the cutting of the cord and ending with stiching me up. By the time my other children were waking up on Monday morning things were mostly cleaned up and calmed down and they were quite surprised and pleased to meet their new sister!
.....theres a boquette of emotions inside of me, to rich and mixed to be able to put properly into words. So much could have gone wrong and didn't. In fact its hard to imagine that things could have turned out any better. I will treasure forever in my heart they way the Lord turned so many things upside down and made an impossible desire of mine, possible in the most unexpected way.

I never did get any fruit jam made...

...But I did have a baby! : )
Our precious little girl made her appearance 4:40am, Monday, Oct. 26. She weighed 5.6 lb and measured 17.3 in. And what a story we have to tell!!! I'm out of time and battery and have a little newborn needing Mommy's arms but I'll be back soon to tell all about it! : )