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Author: dee

Celebrating Four

While I was off in LaLa Land (otherwise known as maternity leave) Miss Evie had her fourth birthday. Turning four was a VERY. BIG. DEAL. It was the first year that she really grasped the concept of what a birthday is and she was crazy jealous that her cousin turned four a few months before her.

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She insisted that her birthday party be held at a place that had bounce houses and inflatables. Most of her cousins have had these parties and she was not going to settle for anything else.

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The place was a bit crowded (and HOT!) but Evie had an absolute blast bouncing and sliding with her friends. Her theme this year was Tangled (I couldn’t tell you how many times she has watched this movie!) and, as usual, her Aunt Tanya made her an awesome cake!

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She received some awesome gifts from her friends and bounced and played until she was completely worn out.

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Caleb made things really easy on me by sleeping through the entire party on his cousin’s lap.

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I’m both excited and sad to see her turn four. This year has started out pretty rough so far behavior-wise, but there have been a lot of changes in our house with a new baby around and it was expected. She is growing up so fast and tries so hard to act older than she is, pushing all the boundaries. I want to enjoy this year with her because I know that year five brings so many more changes and my little girl will soon be a big girl.

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A Captured Moment

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On Easter, while we were relaxing at my Dad’s house, my sister picked up my camera and took a few shots of me and Caleb just after a feeding. I have very few photos of the two of us. There are a few during those first days at the hospital, but other than that just a couple I’ve managed to click on my iphone.

I love these photos my sister took, not because they are particularly good of me, but because of the moment. When I look at this photo, I could tell you exactly what I was feeling. I love those moments of pure contentedness just after Caleb has nursed. He is totally comfortable and snuggley, usually about half asleep. These are the moments when I love to just sit in amazement of this little thing I have created. It is one of the things I miss the most since I’ve been back to work. I miss out on 3-4 feedings a day while he is at day care. When we get home, the evenings are so busy that I don’t get time to just sit and relish in the happiness of those sweet moments. This is what I was thinking about when she snapped those photos – how special that moment was and how grateful I was to have it captured.

Going back to work after maternity leave has been difficult with all three of my babies. It is so hard to leave them after only six short weeks, however, staying home has never been an option for me. In some ways, it was much easier this time, but in some ways it was much harder. After all, this time I know that there will be no more babies. Caleb is the last one and I want to cherish every single second.

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Unblocked

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There’s something about pregnancy that seems to give me a creative block. I’m not sure if it is simply my body just being too tired to care or what, but during my last two pregnancies, I’ve been blocked. My ability to write, or create anything really, just seems to disappear.

Fortunately, after the babies are out, it all comes back. Right now my head is churning with all of the things I want to write, create, and photograph. There is so much going on up there that I can’t decide where to start. Perhaps the best place to start is to take a nap so I can stay awake long enough to complete a thought.

One thing that needs to be a priority, is the design of this blog. For some reason, I suddenly hate the layout and look of the whole thing. My writing and frequency has changed a lot over the last couple of years and I feel like it is time to change things up a bit.  So, as soon as I can find the time to sit down and think, there will definitely be some changes.  A change in design tends to encourage me to write more as well, and I’m told that people actually do like to read what I write so I suppose that’s a good thing.

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Anybody Out There?

Unless you’ve been following along on facebook or instagram, you might think that I’ve fallen off the face of the Earth. I’m still around, I’ve just had my hands a little full with this precious little thing.

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Caleb Joshua was born at 39 Weeks, on February 19th, 2012, at 11:52 p.m. He was 10 pounds, 0.4 ounces at birth and 21 inches long.

I’m back at work today and missing him like crazy, but I don’t have too much longer to go before I get to snuggle him again.

More later (now that my hands are free for a few hours a day again).

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38 Weeks

38 weeks

The waiting is indeed the hardest part. Well, that and trying to keep this ginormous belly covered since I’ve outgrown nearly all the maternity shirts I own now.

After my 36 week sonogram, my doctor gave me an induction date of February 15th – as in tomorrow. I was quite pleased with that date and very much looking forward to finally meeting this little guy growing in my belly. Considering he was already measuring at about 8 pounds, I thought two more weeks of growth was more than enough. Then I went in for my 37 week checkup and was told that she looked at the dates wrong. There was no way she would induce me before 39 weeks, and the induction date was pushed back to the 22nd. Apparently it is mandated by some hospital regulation and is non-negotiable unless there is a serious medical issue. Ugh. So I wait.

I feel like he will come before the 22nd on his own, but I also thought Zach would be early and he came 4 days late. I am so ready to have this baby that I pray daily for contractions. They come off and on, but nothing steady enough to actually believe I’m in labor.

Some serious nesting has kicked in at home and everything is ready to welcome the little guy home. There are more clothes, blankets, and burp rags than any baby could ever need, plus a healthy supply of diapers, wipes, and all that goes along with a new baby. His big brother and sister are so excited they can barely stand it. They want this baby to come just as much as I do.

I am as caught up at work as I’ll probably ever be. There is always more that can be done, but absolutely nothing pressing. I can’t believe how hard I have worked the last few weeks to get it that way, but it feels pretty great to finally be there. I can leave knowing that it won’t be a huge burden on anyone else while I’m gone.

My hospital bag is packed and in my car. I’m even toting my camera with me to work every day “just in case” something starts happening. Maybe I’m a little too prepared.

I’m tempted to Google “how to induce labor” but am almost scared at the results I would get. Although, aside from chugging castor oil, I’d be up for just about anything right now. Got any suggestions? Lay them on me.

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34 Weeks

Baby Love

So you guys know by now that when I promise to write you might as well just look away and come back in a couple months, right? As my OB told me to yesterday, I’m letting go of the things that take too much effort. Writing shouldn’t take that much effort, but when you are completely sleep deprived and can barely stay awake past 8:00 p.m., writing becomes difficult. And yes, I know that this is just the beginning of the sleep deprivation. Right now, I’m blaming it on stuffy sinuses that aren’t allowing me to breathe and the fact that I’m not supposed to be sleeping on my back. I never realized just how much I slept on my back until I started waking up during the night realizing that I was on my back when I started out on my side. But! I did get some sleep last night! In fact, the last two nights I have mostly slept through the night and my head (although still a little sleepy) is much clearer than it has been lately so I’m taking advantage of it and spewing out some words.

Want to hear more about my pregnancy? I thought so. I’m just going to be totally honest here and say that this third pregnancy has by far been the hardest one I have experienced. I really have tried not to complain (because complaining about such a blessing seems like the wrong thing to do) but I can tell you with absolute certainty that this body will not be carrying any more babies. Ever. I remember being extremely uncomfortable with the the other two pregnancies in the last couple of months, but this one has been uncomfortable from the beginning. Now that I’m in the home stretch? I can barely walk across the room without being in pretty serious pain. If I didn’t know better, from the amount of pelvic pressure, I would think this guy was making his appearance within the next few days. And yet, I still have probably at least another four weeks to go.

On top of barely being able to move, I have been way more tired this time around than I remember being in the past. Because of that, I am totally unprepared for this baby to be here.  I run out of energy by the time I get the older two kids taken care of and have nothing left for baby prep. I did finally go out and buy a few diapers and essentials, but I haven’t even managed to wash one baby blanket or onesie yet. The crib is piled with baby things that I’ve gathered as I ran across them in the house, but I have yet to sort through the tubs of baby stuff sitting in my basement. Somewhere in all of that is a stash of baby blankets, burp rags, bottles, an infant bath tub, and all the other baby things I couldn’t part with “just in case” there was another one. I am so thankful that I saved all of that now, even if it is taking up way too much of my basement. Every night I think I need to start sorting through that stuff, and every night I end up falling asleep in my chair before I can even make an attempt. At the very least, I need to get a few little outfits washed up for him. As long as I have diapers, wipes, and a few clean clothing items to put on him, the rest can wait, right?

I also had every intention of documenting this pregnancy better. I bought a new journal and started out writing at least once a week in it. Of course that didn’t last long at all. I also planned to take better belly photos this time around seeing as I actually know how to use a camera now. I had all these ideas for fun photo projects. And yet, almost every photo I have taken has been on my iphone. I had grand plans of doing a fancy self photo shoot at about 32-33 weeks and, well, that didn’t happen either. I did set up the tripod earlier this week and let Evie snap a few. She thought that was lots of fun. Then I put it on the self-timer and got a few fuzzy pics of the two of us together. The one posted above is about the best one. Oh well, at least the other two kids won’t feel like they got the shaft when it comes to preggo pictures!

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