Pictures

Over Thanksgiving my brother-in-law brought up the fact that I hadn't been blogging lately. Unfortunately while my life has been interesting enough to blog, it has been too interesting to give me time or energy to blog. How about some pictures from last month to tide you over?

My mother's birthday was 10-10-10 this year and she requested family pictures as a gift. Here are some of them. More interesting stories soon.





The Sloths







The Parents



Demand



Mr. Sloth & Happy



Happy & Demand



Me and my bros



Happy




Pax




Me and the Mr

New Digs

Mr. Sloth finally nipped it in the bud and requested a change of roommate. Not with me, with Pax of course. The grunting, snorting, gagging was keeping us up more than necessary so I spent all of last Friday converting our packed closet into a bedroom and beginning a serious home-wide purge. I had decided, excitedly, a few months ago that Pax would never move into the closet. By seven months (the time he'd need a full size crib) Demand and Happy could have a bunk bed. Plans change though.

I'm sure you remember Happy living in the closet, and my mother still has panic attacks just thinking of living in a closet, but remember we have a very large closet and this time Pax has even more space. I moved the dresser/changing pad from the 'kids' room into the closet and gave Pax a night stand as well. He even has a make-shift mobile.

This addition of space unfortunately only gives Mr. Sloth and I 1/3 use of the closet which leads me to my next topic. The house-wide purge. I know you hear of my purging every few months but this one is different. I'm reading the book "It's all too much" and finding it very inspiring. I'm accepting that even if it's in good condition, functional, a gift, or if I once loved it, it's OK to get rid of it if I don't use or love it now. Getting rid of stuff is incredibly freeing and can make even the smallest space seem livable.

So Pax is loving his new "room". I even hung a toy from the closet shelf to it's within his reach on the changing pad and he thinks it's the bees-knees. Best of all we're all sleeping a bit better. It also helps that he's eight weeks old now and starting to get over his painful gas stage.

 

 

 

 

Prayer Requests

For some reason I've been bombarded with depressing news this week. I won't go into all the details but I do have two college friends for you to pray for.

Pray for my friend "G" I don't want to go into details here.

My other friend is Emily. Emily is "G's" best friend and last December 3rd she was in a car accident with her son. Her one year old son is fine but she is not, she's been fighting in the hospital every since. She's mostly likely paralyzed from the neck down and blind. She might have more damage but she keeps getting pneumonia and every time it is life threatening. The constant battles with pneumonia keep them from finding out the real seriousness of her injuries. Please keep her and her family in your prayers as they approach the one year anniversary.

Here is her Care Pages site http://www.carepages.com/carepages/Emily_and_Max

So pray for both of my friends who are truly suffering.

All the depressing news I've heard this week have at the very least mad me realize how blessed we truly are and incredibly easy my life is compared to some....most.

No fantastic updates to share but I thought I would post a few videos and pictures. We took the kids to a corn maze yesterday as is the fall tradition here. There is a corn maze, giant slide, petting zoo, camel rides, pig races, tons of food and music, pumpkin sling-shot, hayrides but best of all is the corn pit. So much fun for kids of all ages. Happy took some time adjusting but it was hard to get him out in the end. It was a great day to go weather wise, a little windy but great temperature and best of all it hasn't rained in a while. We've been there years past pushing a stroller through a muddy corn field (no fun). If that wasn't fun enough we then drove to Grandma's for playtime with cousins and dinner. It was a long day for everyone but totally worth the effort.

Other than that the Sloths have been trying to settle into a routine. In addition to Monday ballet class and Tuesday Good Shepard class we've been homeschooling Demand. We try and read about a saint every day at breakfast and celebrate some feast days. The Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary was a really busy day for us but I found time to improv an art project that Demand loved. She received dot markers for Christmas so I covered the table in paper and we made a giant rosary using the dot markers. She loved it so much we made another one later in the week. Some days (if I'm prepared) we do "Preschool". This past week we learned about fall and read poems and books and a bunch of activities all with a fall theme. Other days we do Math and/or Reading. Demand loves math especially since the program we're using has a video for each lesson. Reading is trickier. If you tell Demand you're doing a reading lesson to tenses up and basically refuses to do anything. One day I asked her to read me a book while I nursed Pax...a book she already knew how to read and I tried to encourage her by saying "You can do it!" She said "I can do it!" and then started crying.

Gee-whiz, kid, relax a little.

So I'm learning to be creative about things. We've already bribed her saying that if she reads 10 "pink books" she can buy any book of her choice. While interested she still resists. I did manage to get her to read one of the books (5th of the 10) by telling her she'd get ice cream. She'll do anything for ice cream. 5 more books to go...


Pax is learning a routine of his own. He takes hi morning nap in the swing across from the laundry room while his siblings play about. Even though he gets very little belly time due to safety issues with over-loving siblings he can hold his up really well just like the rest of the Sloth babies. He's still a pretty good sleeper but could be better.

Happy is learning how hard it is to be one and half and Mr. Sloth and I are learning to be patient parents of boys. Happy has a totally different temperament than Demand. If you told Demand "No" she'd stop. If you tell Happy "No" he laughs and does it again. So Happy is starting to learn about time-outs and toy removal. Aside from disciple issues the new joke around the house is that Happy tries to get people to "look into his dimples" almost as a means of hypnosis. Works on me more than I care to admit. Stinkin' kid is so adorable even while causing mischief.







Pax at his first Baseball game. Isn't he cute?




I drew a cross to start the Rosary for Demand. I told her to color it and when I came back to the table she'd drawn the Corpus. Impressive, huh?







The proud artist.

Due to technical difficulties, videos will be updated later

Diving In

Today I decided to brave my first trip out of the home with all three kiddos on my own. I was debating going even as late as this morning but, as Mr. Sloth said, I have to do it sometime.

The real motivator was the underwater aquarium exhibit at the mall which is usually $18/person was only $5/person for homeschoolers and today was the last day to get in on the offer. I'd been wanting to take the kids for years but not at $18/person. So this morning I woke up around 7:30am (an hour earlier than the past week or so) and started my usual day I had decided to go and was pleasantly surprised to find out some of my homeschooling friends were going as well. I kicked it into high gear to meet them there. I must say I did an awesome job (as will be the theme this post) at getting everyone ready in record time. It was pretty easy getting the kids dressed since they got new clothes last night and were eager to try them out. Pax was up late with Mr. Sloth last night so he was all about sleeping and I managed to find clean fitting clothes and pull of a good outfit if I do say so myself. I even remembered to pack everything, diapers, change of clothes, sippy cups, baby carrier, double stroller, cameras...

Off we went. We were even there before they opened. Turns out, offering a 75% discount to homeschoolers really brings 'em in. We waited a half an hour just to buy our tickets. So instead of $18/ticket I paid $12 for all four of us (Pax didn't count). I thankfully discovered yesterday that Pax actually liked one of my baby carriers so I was able to logically manage the kiddos. Pax slept in the carrier the whole time and Demand and Happy rode in the double stroller. After doing the aquarium once we headed for lunch. Here's where I continue to get awesome. The Sloth go out for lunch almost every Saturday mainly because we are out and about running errands that day. Eating at the mall with Demand and Happy has always been difficult for me AND Mr. Sloth this time I was +1 kid, -1 husband. Yikes! I bought a piece of pizza and bread sticks for the kids to split and then sit them at a table right next to where I wanted take-out. Happy was awesome and sat in a big boy seat eating his lunch peacefully while I bought my food (Panda Express, Yummy!). Oh, and by the way, it being a feast day the Sloths were free to eat meat today which made it all the more easy for me.

The kids ate peacefully and then we packed up, had a bathroom break and headed back for another round of underwater adventure. I was more nervous this time because the clock was ticking and I was afraid of breakdowns. Would Pax wake up? Would Happy have a breakdown? It was even more fun than the first time. The kids were really into it and I even let Happy out of his restraints towards the end. He did a pretty good job too. He only ran off a few times, and much to his loss he ran in a dark room full of mirrors. (That was actually fun to see...only because he didn't get hurt of course)

Then we headed home. Pax woke up and cried the first few minutes in van but then fell back asleep. Happy was asleep by the time we got home and transferred to his crib just fine. Pax then woke up to nurse and fell back into a deep sleep.While Demand and Happy peacefully played, I spent the entire afternoon super-cleaning the house. We're talking pre-baby nesting energy. It was FANTASTIC! I even managed to improvise an awesome snack for the kids. Apples and carmel dip in honor of the Feast of St. Therese. (Demand is still wondering how carmel and Carmelites are related)

Mr. Sloth came home to a clean home, happy children, and of course and awesome wife.




Demand looking at Nemo and Dory fish.


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Happy looking at Nemo fish.




Happy admiring Nemo fish.




Shark nursery (There are baby sharks in there!!)




Happy wanted the camera back.





Umm, Happy took this picture...I'm nursing Pax.




Demand being Demand.




Happy being Happy.

The Birth Story

Here it is The Birth Story.

I of course won't let you in on all the details of the birthing process, but if you are that squeamish I don't see why you'd be reading my blog anyway. Here goes....

A few days before my due date I had already 3 cm, but knowing that dilation means next to nothing as to when baby will arrive I tried to ignore the information and only told a few people. I was however excited to have dilated that much without noticing though. Less work later, right?

My due date came and went as mentioned in my last post and in one week I had dilated another cm. Sweet! We started to have a feeling that baby may come late, but would probably come faster than the other two. (We were right) Having gone past my due date before I was thankfully emotionally prepared for it this time only having one bad day. I had a feeling I would go between five and ten days late. (Demand was five days late, Happy was ten.)

Saturday was five days past my due date. I felt nothing the night before and I felt nothing all morning. Shortly before nap time I suggested going for a walk to get my body a little more prepared. I walked while Mr. Sloth and the kids slept. After that we all went to Target to get some groceries. Just as we got back from Target I started feeling 'different'. No contraction, just pressure. This went on for hours. It got to the point where we discussed going in just to see if anything was going on and get a status. Without having any contractions I felt silly going in obviously not in labor so I suggested we get the kids to bed and then see where we were. The kids struggled to fall asleep that night and since I had a feeling that they'd wake up without me there, Mommy-guilt kicked in and I laid with Demand until they fell asleep. Things were off an on all evening. No contractions just some pressure and light, irregular menstrual cramps. At 10:30pm Mr. Sloth asked me, "This baby is going to come at 3am isn't it?" "Yep." I said. I just had a feeling. So we decided to go to bed early (for us) so that we'd at least have some rest. Mr. Sloth, has an understandable yet exaggerated fear of "catching a baby" or worse having the baby in the car. But we both agreed he could get a new car if I gave birth in the old Saturn. So I promised that the first real contraction I had we would go to the hospital. Around midnight I woke up with a contraction but fell back asleep, around 12:15am I had another one, a bit stronger. I quietly got out of bed and started getting ready letting Mr. Sloth sleep as long as possible. Mr. Sloth and his "spidysense" caught on fast and nervously asked me if everything was O.K. I told him we should probably go. We called our friend to come over. I had to leave a message, but she called right back. Apparently in her sleepy state thought what everyone thinks when someone calls at 12:30am.."Who the heck is calling me??" We finished gathering our stuff while she walked over. I went in to say good-bye to the kiddos even though they were sleeping. It surprised and embarrassed me how hard it was to say good-bye to sleeping children. I guess I just knew how hard the next few days would be for them and I felt particularly bad for Happy. He had NO IDEA what was about to happen and as he slept peacefully his reign and 'baby' would be stripped away and his routine would be turned upside down. So with tears in my eyes I decided it was time to go get a new family. Besides contractions seemed a bit closer.

I remember the ride to the hospital being much more pleasant than the last two babies. Our plan was to leave earlier this time so I'd be sure to make it in the water birth room and just in case I went faster than expected. (Apparently leaving at contractions 4 minutes apart in a snowstorm two hours before Happy was born was cutting it close for him) The weather was great outside and traffic was clear. Mr. Sloth called the hospital on the way to let them know we were coming. He told them my contractions were 10 minutes apart, but they seemed to be picking up. As we stood in the lobby waiting for our escort upstairs we also noticed that they seemed a bit closer, but nothing too strong. We got in our room and got settled. The nurse finally checked me 5 cm, only one since Thursday. It looked like I had done it, I was in labor but not too far along. They started getting the water birth room ready and said they'd check me in a half an hour and then I could get in the tub. That was around 1:30am. We worked on some paper work between contractions. Then they decided they'd start moving furniture over to the waterbirth room and I could get in but baby had other plans. Just as everyone left the room my body just started pushing. At first I didn't believe it, but after another push Mr. Sloth called people back and everyone else believed it. Then there was a scurry as they moved all the furniture back into my room and called for the on-call OB. A few minutes later, at 2:17am "Pax" entered the world. 9 lbs 3 oz, 21 inches. Thankfully, my doctor didn't wait like she said she was going to do but came right away making it just in time to catch the baby. Even though I didn't get my waterbirth I'm more than happy with my two hour labor. I went from a few contractions to pushing, skipping that whole seriously painful part. If the rest of my babies could be like that I would be a happy girl.

In case you are wondering about the name "Pax". It of course means peace in Latin (Catholics and their Latin). He's such a peaceful little guy. Easily pleased and easily soothed.

So there you have it people the birth story. My apologies for the delay. I had 80% written when things went downhill around here. Life goes on I guess.

Tick Toc

I honestly don't have much to say but it's been almost two weeks. I guess I'm just waiting for something exciting to talk about, like a new baby. I don't even have many pictures because I have the camera packed away "just in case".

My due date was Monday and wouldn't you know it I woke up feeling the same way I felt the day I had Happy. We actually thought we might have a baby on their due date for once. Learning from history and slightly playing Murphy's Law.I hadn't tied up some loose ends that first time moms would have done months ago. I hadn't printed out a birth plan or packed clothes to come home in, cosmetic bag, etc. Before Mr. Sloth left for work (yep he worked on Labor Day) we realized that we needed to find the car seat base and I needed to wash the car seat cover. Sure enough we couldn't find the base. "Oh, well!", I thought, "It's a minor price to pay to have Murphy's Law work in your favor."

Mr. Sloth found the base in the trunk of his car at lunch (Don't ask, we don't even know why it was there.) By naptime I had finished packing my bag, the car seat was clean and ready to go and the house was spotless. By the end of nap time contractions had stopped.

It's like a superstitions tradition doesn't even work anymore.

The rest of the week has been off and on, but since I was a little more prepared this time around and I'm progressing more than usual I'm a little more ok with being past due this time around. Plus I have a cold. I wake up most days thinking "I am in no condition to have a baby today". The other problem is the children between the usual "Mom at the end of pregnancy" shenanigans and the hot close to summer the kids are a little out of sorts. I've resorted to TV and sugar just too many times and their routines and our meal plans are kaput. Plus Demand is getting very impatient waiting for this baby.

So we wait and hope we can keep the other kids happy and the house somewhat livable.

Tick-Toc, Little One.