It's a GIRL! Elsa Anne Rhodes

Our 5th baby arrived at 8:00 AM, on March 15.  (Yes, I realize that was over a month ago.  Do you realize how hard it is to find time to blog when you nurse 8 hours a day and have four other kids?? :) )

This baby took her time in getting here.  My charts said I was due March 7.  I thought it should have been March 14.  (I was right, obviously.)  But starting about the first of March, the baby started shoving and making things very uncomfortable.  But at each appointment, after examination, the doctor said I wasn't even close.  She even did an x-ray to make sure the baby was head-down. 
Wednesday, March 9, I was sure was going to be "the day."  I woke up about 3, having light contractions.  They were uncomfortable, but not intense, but very regular, about 10 minutes apart.  I laid in bed, timing them for two hours, and then when Paul's alarm went off at 5 (for him to go to work), I got up and ate breakfast with him, wanting some nourishment before going in to the hospital.  Paul called in to his supervisor and told him he wouldn't be coming in.
And then the contractions stopped.  Completely.  Not a single one the rest of the day, although the baby was still giving me the "pushing down" feeling.  But even that lessened as the day went on, and at my regular appoinment that afternoon, the doctor examined me and said I was barely even dialated and the head wasn't any further down.
What???
So move forward to the weekend.  I hadn't had any more contractions, but the baby continued to make me very uncomfortable.  But I was okay with no contractions!  My doctor had left Thursday night to go on vacation, and she wouldn't be back until Monday afternoon.  Although I was sure I could give birth with a stranger delivering, I would be very uncomfortable.  My doctor is the only female that delivers babies in our town, and any of the other doctors I don't know AT ALL.
Monday came and still nothing, but I laid down that afternoon, and then had a few contractions.  They again were about 10 minutes apart for about two hours.  Paul again called into work (he was going to nights this time).  My sister came and got the other kids to stay the night with her.  The contractions continued, steady but not intense, but then stopped at 7 PM.  Then about 9 they started up again, this time irregular but stronger, 10 minutes, then 6, then 20, then 3, then 10.....  I'd never had this happen before - all 4 other babies, once contractions started, they were steady and grew stronger and we had a baby within a few hours.  I called the hospital and asked their opinion.  They could look at my charts and know my history.  But the nurse said it was up to me.  If I was worried about delivering at home, to come on in, but otherwise, I'd be more comfortable having my early labor at home.  (I later found out that I called just as they were delivering another baby.)
Then at midnight, my contractions stopped.  Again.  At 1, I gave up and went to bed, figuring I needed whatever sleep I could get.  I finally fell asleep about 2.  Paul came to bed at 3 (he was well-rested from sleeping all day to go to work nights), and then I woke up at 4 with a "real" contraction.  When the second one was 6 minutes later, I got out of bed.  Another came 5 minutes later, and so I woke up Paul.  "I think this is the real thing."
Everything was ready to go to the hospital, and the kids were already gone, so we just left.  Once we got to the hospital, the contractions kept growing in intensity, but still weren't really regular.  They'd come steady, then would be a longer break, then two or three close together.  Any way, I could tell this was "the real deal" and knew we'd be having a baby that morning.  My guess was by 6 AM.
Six o'clock came and went.  The nurses called the doctor before shift change at 7, and she came immeditately and did paperwork while waiting.  Seven o'clock passed.  Then finally, IT WAS TIME.
Gideon had been such an easy delivery, two half-hearted pushes, that I assumed this labor would be easy.  Everyone got in position and I pushed, and.... Nothing.  The nurses encouraged me, "Push as hard as you can," so I gathered my strength for the next contraction and gave it my all and..... Nothing.  What the deuce?  How much of a wimp am I?  Several pushes later, I finally felt the head starting to crown, and then another push and the head was out.  I heard both nurses and the doctor exclaim, "Sunny side up!"  My contraction and strength ran out, but then the next push, she was out. 
Paul kissed me and said, "You've got another girl!"
What??  I was so sure this was going to be a boy.  Not that I was disappointed, but so much for mother's intuition!
So.  A "sunny side up" baby is born differently than a "normal" delivery.  I researched this, because I've never watched my babies come out. I didn't know what was normal or not, and why the doctor would be surprised.  Normally, babies are born face down, and then turn to the side as their shoulders come out.  A "sunny side up" baby is born face-up.  Instead of the crown of the head (the back top part) being the first part out, the whole top of the head presents, so it's a bigger part you're trying to push out.  (Which accounts for my inadequate pushing.)  Also, since the round crown isn't pressing against your round cervix, it applies pressure unevenly, which can cause irregular contractions.  Often there are other complications, which thankfully we didn't have to deal with, but my lower back was a wreck afterwards, and I've had bowel issues ever since.  I think the back of her head pressing into my spine all the way out caused some of the issues.
But she's here!  And she's perfect.  And that's all that matters.

Brand new!

I love this man!

Family of SEVEN!

 

Bright eyes.

 



Back asleep.



She was our heaviest baby, weithing in at 8 lb 5 oz, but our shortest at only 18 inches.  In features, we noticed immediately that she has the same hair that Nathan did in infancy.  She also has a very strong neck like he did, lifting her head off my chest and looking around.  Her cheeks and chin look just like Zadie's did in her baby pictures.  And her nose looks like Gideon's.  It's going to be a while before we can tell whose eyes she's got - the Rhodes eyes with the killer lashes, or the Eichenberger puppy eyes.

The first few weeks were rough on sleeping - or NOT sleeping, to be more accurate.  Miss Elsa wanted to be held all the time.  The only time she would cry is if you put her down in her crib.  So I spent a lot of time on the couch.  A LOT.  Which made my back hurt even more.  Finally, after about 5 days, I couldn't do it anymore, and she moved to our bed.  Bad sleep with a baby next to you is better than zero sleep on the couch.

The sleep issue has worked out since we re-tried swaddling.  We did it the first week, but she'd kick out of the blanket, even the swaddler wrap with velcro, so we stopped doing it.  Last week, I decided to try swaddling using some larger cotton muslin blankets a friend sent over.  BINGO!  Elsa thinks she's still being held when she's wrapped up, and I can usually guarantee a minimum of 3 hours, but last night got six amazing hours alone. (But of course we wasted the first two watching Downton Abbey on DVD......)

Really, she's a pretty happy baby, only crying when she wants to be held.  She's only had one night of inconsolable mystery crying.  (All 3 boys regularly had several-hours-long screaming bouts, most nights.  I don't remember it as much with Zadie.  I know she slept through the night early on.)

Elsa had the hardest time of any of our kids at gaining back the weight she lost after birth.  It took a full four weeks.  Part of the problem was she was tongue-tied and couldn't get a good latch.  (Which she could have done had she not been too sleepy/lazy to open her mouth wide.)  The doctor clipped her frenulum at her one-week checkup, and that immediately fixed the latch issue.  The other part was I am  having milk production issues, despite previously nursing four babies with zero problems.  One side is barely producing, so since I was only nursing on one side at a time, she was essentially only getting fed half of what I thought she was.  But once I discovered this, I started nursing both sides every time and she has steadily gained about an ounce a day.  (Everyone asked how I figured out the production issue.  It was after she went four hours without nursing for the first time since birth.  One side got very full, and the other didn't.  At all.  Too much information??)

As to the name....  She is NOT named after Disney's Frozen character.  However.... Zadie did suggest the name.  Because she loves Frozen.  At first, I said ABSOLUTELY NOT.  But after spending hours and hours on name web sites, and nothing really grabbing me, I came back to Elsa.  (I had liked the name Ilsa, but Paul wasn't on board.)  I looked up it's meaning - "dedicated to God."  Fitting.  I looked up it's popularity (my main reason for rejecting it - I figured it would be wildly popular because of the movie) - it was ranked in the 200s.  Looking better.  "Elsa" sounded good with the middle name we'd picked out long ago - "Anne," a middle name also shared by Paul's mom and sister.  I ran it by Paul, and it was settled.  Elsa Anne.  (And because the boys were sure that Zadie had gotten to pick the girl's name, they decided that if it was a boy, his name would be Luke Skywalker.)

So that's the birth story of our 5th precious baby.  We're settling into the new normal, and trying to get back to doing the necessary things like housecleaning and outdoor work.  And physical activity in general.  We'll get it figured out soon.

Those CHEEKS!

Education about babies and belly buttons.

Surprise..... Five!

Something I've been asked a lot since Gideon, our 4th child, (who just turned 2) was born, is the question, "So, are you done?"
I'm not sure how I feel about it.  Is it judgment?  (You shouldn't have more than four kids.)  Is it curiousity?  (Are you one of those "big family" people?)  I usually just gave a vague answer, because.....  We're weren't sure.
About a year ago, I was feeling pressure from people (and maybe myself) to decide for sure.  Everyone says, "You'll know when you're done."  But I didn't know.  There were a lot of comments about how I needed to get on birth control or Paul needed to have "the operation" done.  (Which I did consider rude.)
We had trouble getting pregnant with Nathan.  I only had one period in the year after I went off newlywed birth control.  That meant one chance to get pregnant.  I had no idea what was going on with my body or what medical interventions it would take to get pregnant.  It turned out that for me, it was relatively simple.  After one round of Clomid (an ovulation drug), I was pregnant.
But in that year, I spent a lot of nights crying out to God with many tears to give us a baby.  All I had ever wanted, my whole life, was to be a mother.  I recently found a poster I made in 3rd grade about my likes and dislikes, and what I wanted to be when I grew up.  I had written "a mommy" and drawn a picture of me with a little child.  I wrote my "career paper" for Senior year on motherhood.  Being a mom was all I had ever wanted, and all I had ever felt "called" by God to do.
And then I got pregnant.  And the hormonoes of pregnancy and nursing apparently set my body in order, because obviously there have been no problems getting pregnant since then.  (Our kids are spaced 2 years, 2.5 years, and 20 months apart.  We had a miscarriage between our 2nd and 3rd, which accounts for the longer gap.)
So, being that God not only answered our prayers, but blessed us abundantly and beyond with four children, and healed my body, I felt like it wasn't my right to tell God to quit sending blessings.  So I left the decision up to Paul, who has to lead and provide for this family.  (And deal with me when I'm losing my mind from dealing with kids! :) )  I had some minor health concerns as well, considering I've had two surgeries to repair hernias caused by pregnancy, and also have severe varicose veins.  But I felt God reminding me that He made my body.  He can heal it and help it carry another baby.
Shortly after I had gotten these thoughts in order in my head, but not really shared them with anyone, Paul sat me down on the couch, last April or so, and said, "We need to talk."  My heart dropped, because previous "we need to talks" had been about very upsetting subjects, and I was not ready for one of those talks.
Paul said, "What do you think about having another baby?"
I just laughed.
I told him that I had left it up to him and God, so this was the answer.  Paul explained, "I've never felt like we should have more.  I was good with one.  I was good with two.  I've always felt it was up to you since it's your body.  And I'm not saying right away.  Let's give you a break and get Gideon older and maybe potty trained and next spring (2016), we'll start trying."
In May and June, my cycles messed up, and in July, after several weeks of suspicion, I found out I was pregnant. (And Gideon, showing God's sense of humor, started potty training himself in August.)
So, basically, what we were saying was, "Yeah, God, we heard you.  But we'll obey on our own time."  And God, being the good Father, decided to make us obey on his time.
So.... We're going to have 5 kids!
This little one is due sometime in mid-March.  The doctor's chart says March 8, but sonograms we've had say anywhere from 3-5 days later.
I actually didn't go see the doctor until I was 30 weeks (7 months) along.  Our insurance charges us for obstetrician care in both years, if you get pregnant in one year and deliver in another.  When we had Zadie (born in April) we paid an additional $700.  Last year's insurance, we had a higher deductible and had had zero medical expenses, so we knew we were looking at paying even more.  I decided that I knew now, after 4 babies, what was normal for me, and I wasn't paying a thousand bucks to go in for 3 or 4 visits, where all I do is pee all over myself trying to pee in a tiny cup, having them measure my belly, and say, "Do you have any questions?  Okay, see you in a month!"  Pregnancy is not an illness, so I didn't see a need to go in.
We did have a sonogram at a local women's life center, just for peace of mind.  That's where we found out I was due almost 2 weeks earlier than I thought I should be.  Even though it's not necessarily a medical sonogram, everything looked good.  We even have a video of our 15-week-old baby with hiccups.
After my first appointment (January 12), my doctor ordered another sonogram.  Given the activity level of this baby, I am confident of it's health. :)  But I went to have one for the doctor's peace of mind.  (She had recently had an unhappy surprise during a delivery.)  And I wasn't going to complain about getting to see this little one!
A baby at 32 weeks looks so much different than a baby at 16 weeks.  I could see the chub starting to form.  The technician pointed out the fuzz of hair - enough to show up on a sonogram, even though there's 8 weeks to go!  She said he's measuring about 4.5 pounds, which is right about where he should be for how how far along I am.  (I say "he", but we don't know if it's a boy or girl....  We're waiting to be surprised again.)
So here is our baby!  (And my excuse for such a prolonged absence from blogging.)

I can't wait to meet him (her)!!!

Do We Have the Time?

When parents are saying “I don’t have any time” to minister to youth, and the older generation is saying, “I’ve served my time” teaching kids, it leaves a generation of young people saying, “If nobody thinks it’s important enough to make the time, maybe this whole God thing isn’t worth my time.”

My Photos Got Hijacked.

Well, I finally sit down to do a big update, and I find that all my pictures are on the other computer.  And quite frankly, I'm too lazy to get up out of my comfy chair and go sit at the desk.
And I know for a fact there were other pictures on the camera, but apparently a certain almost-8-year-old who is also apparently really into selfies just pushes buttons when he doesn't understand what the screen says.
So of all the pictures previously on the camera, here are the ones from the last month that survived, and weren't selfie videos.

He wasn't in time out, but he looked like it.

Bible clubs had a good turnout. I loved working with these kids!

Magic Erasers, who knew?  Revived these 30-year-old My Little Ponies for my little daughter.  I was World's Awesomest Mommy.....for a day.

 (oops.  but you get the idea)

We have two of these window wells.  There is a never ending supply of critters that are available for viewing (from inside) and catching.  Those I can think of have been:  frogs and toads, spiders, crickets, mice, moles, and a salamander.  

 The frogs and toads get caught and released several times a week.  They range in size from thumbnail-sized to hand-sized.  This one is somewhere in the middle.

We adopted four of these mongrels.  Then three of them disappeared.  (We think they hitched a ride under Paul's truck.)  I found one in a tree about 1/4 mile up the road and brought him back.

We also have a bit of a mouse problem.  The cheeky bastard(s) don't even scamper, it's more of a saunter across the living room, while we're sitting right there!  So the mongrels have been invited inside for nighttime patrol.  One caught a mouse the first night in!  Tonight's the second night.  If we have more than one mouse, hopefully they will be eradicated by morning.

So it's a pathetic update.  And no pictures of the kids!  But maybe later.

Summer Craziness

I'm going to just quit making plans to do school over the summer.  The last two summers, I have had plans to do something at least, and failed completely.
We started summer with no plans, so no reason to NOT do some sort of reading plan/school every day.
June hit like a whirlwind, every week having an all-consuming project.  We ground and stained my parent's concrete back porch floor, we painted the boys' new bedroom downstairs, we painted the basement stairway and the boys' very battered bunkbeds.  By the end of the month, they were ready to move in, and I was sick from all the fumes. 
July came.  We knew we were going to a neighborhood VBS, but we also ended up helping with two other week-long outreaches, so it felt like we weren't home for a month.  (The house somehow kept managing to get dirtier, though....)
I'm not sure what's happened to August.  I think we've done a whole lot of the nothing we missed the first two months of summer.  I'm getting the schoolroom cleaned and organized, getting curriculum ordered, planning daily schedules, and getting ready to start school next week.  Awana starts the following week, so I've been contacting parents, getting supplies ready, and looking at lessons.
September will hit with it's own craziness, but somehow I'm looking forward to it - ordered craziness, where every day and every week is basically the same.
So that's our summer in a nutshell.  I'll try to post pictures of some of our projects soon.  And we can look forward to more time to blog when there's not so much to do outside!

Wisdom from the Garden

We had a ridiculous - and I do mean ridiculous - amount of rain in May (I think I heard, only 4 days all month it didn't rain), and a good amount still in the first half of June.  So we have been trying to recover our garden from the weeds. 
During yet another round of tilling and weeding, Paul asked me, "Are roots deeper when it's dry or wet?"  (I don't know if it was a retorical question, as I thought the answer was common knowledge.)
"There's no need for deep roots when it's wet.  Plants put down roots to find water, and when the water is right there all the time, the roots don't get very big."
"So, it's kind of like that with us, right?"  he mused.  "When things are going well, and we have all we need, we tend to not develop good roots.  It's when we go through a dry spell and tough times that causes us to dig in and rely on God.  So really we need those dry times to make us stronger."

Perfect analogy. 
Just a bit of wisdom from an evening in the garden.

I'm Still Here.

Okay, so it has been pointed out to me (Ahem, Carlsie....) that I am not doing a lot on my blog lately.  A myriad of reasons, really.
Even though our family life has not been crazy, my personal non-mommy obligations have been on overdrive, it seems, ever since the first of the year.  I can't tell you what all it has been, exactly, but it seems like every time I'm on the computer I'm working on something else.
And then we have the fact that I have cut my recreational computer time, drastically.  I wasn't doing a lot already, but basically I check my email and that's it.  No blog (obviously), no reading other blogs, no Facebook stalking through Paul's account.  No useless Yahoo news.  I didn't really resolve to cut those things out, it just happened.  Lack of blogging is also due to the fact that most of the stuff I want to write about requires pictures, and I have a lack of motivation and time for finding and uploading them.
I have really, really been making a concentrated effort to keep the house clean.  Today, it's still reeling from the crazy week we've had this week, and I can't quite motivate myself to do the stack of pans on the counter.  But for the first time in months, perhaps years, there's not a box full of unorganized crap sitting somewhere.  I went through every box and basket and got it put away, thrown away, or filed.  That's a good feeling.  And I am trying not to let it happen again.  Inevitably, a box or pile gets stacked together when we're having people over and I haven't gotten the table cleaned off, but I usually am getting through it in a day or two.  And why is cleaning off the table of clutter so hard???  Is it just me??
Recent projects completed (mostly) include both decks getting finished, finally finishing the basement floor, grinding and staining my parents' back porch floor, and getting my front flower bed planted (phase 1, anyhow).  In-the-near-future projects include painting both rooms in the basement next week, and moving the boys to their new room in the basement soon after.  We also need to stain the back deck, if it ever stops raining.  And we have started ripping up the linoleum to finally tile the front room. 
It has rained SO MUCH in the last month.  Seriously.  I think there were 5 days or less that it didn't rain in all of May, and maybe one day so far in June.  My garden is a complete wreck.  A lot of stuff is yellow, some has died, and the weeds are flourishing, so much that there are a few rows I can't even distinguish among the weeds.  I tried to step out there once and sank up to my shins.
Paul's parents celebrated their 40th Anniversary last Sunday.  Paul, Elizabeth, and I threw them a surprise dinner and reception, and nearly 100 people showed up to bless them. 
I guess also, a reason for not blogging is my discovery of Downton Abbey.  I'm a bit late to jump on the bandwagon, but I love that show.  It's not without it's faults, but they are much fewer than many shows - no nudity or crudity, and zero language.  I have even gotten Paul to watch it with me, not just here and there, but every episode.  We just finished Season 5, and I have to say, that was the BEST season finale of any show I have ever watched.  Since Season 6 is not on DVD yet, my evening free time should be a little free-er.  :)
We are about a week away from finishing school for the summer.  (It seems late, but let me remind you we didn't start til late October due to the house project.)  Close to finishing the seatwork, anyhow.  I'm still not sure what we're going to do with Nathan's reading over the summer.  I really would like him to do a full phonics/reading course so he can catch up, but I think getting him to do seatwork will be like trying to give him an appendectomy with no anesthesia.  And about as pleasant for me, too.  We'll figure it out.  Just daily practice will go a long ways.
Anyhow.  That's a bit about what's going on.  Now to find the girl-child and put her in bed for a nap.  She skipped her nap yesterday, and I now know what the term "hot mess" is all about.  That was her by 8 PM.  So today the nap is non-negotiable.