Maybe it’s the snow. Maybe it’s the headache, and the impending cold. Maybe its the day rough evening yesterday. Maybe its the cold. Maybe its the lack of coffee so far this morning. But for whatever reason, I feel down today.
It’s been three weeks since my D&C. I’m still bleeding. Did you know that? It’s just spotting, but I’m pretty over it. Especially considering I bled for about a week and a half before I had the D&C from the medication I took to avoid the D&C altogether. Whatever. It doesn’t matter, and its slowed way down, but I’m done with it. Its been a month. The only time I bleed this long is postpartum, and in those cases, I have a baby to overshadow the discomfort that comes along with it. Not this time.
I had my HCG checked a week after my D&C. It was nicely down from the previous 55,000 and was sitting at 1,700. Great progress, but not at the <5 I need it to be. So we continue to wait for my body to return to “normalcy.” Whatever that is.
I also need to get to RUH soon to get some bloodwork done. Genetic tests. The OBGYN I met at the hospital was really wonderful and straight forward with me. She encouraged me to get the bloodwork done for myself, more than anything, so I feel like I’ve done everything I can on my end. The genetic testing is a “normal” next step after three miscarriages. But the OB brought me to her perspective, where I have five children, and very likely have no genetic issues. Which is good news, but annoying to have no answers, yet again. Like always. Ugh.
So one day I’ll hopefully be organized enough to get in to the hospital lab to get that test done, and then wait a month or so for results. That being said, the last time I had bloodwork that was supposed to take a month for results, I got results in EIGHT DAYS! Let’s pray for that instead!
I’m sorry for the pity party. I don’t want to be a whiner. Seasons passing is odd. My children aging is odd. And no joke – passing up the formula sale at Costco is odd. I never pass that sale up. I’m always either bottle feeding a baby or pregnant with the next one. And I’m currently neither, and passing up the sale I eagerly wait for, as it only comes around twice a year.
I’m in a new boat. The “no babies here” boat. And that’s fine for many who are in that next chapter of their life. But I didn’t choose to be here. I know many others haven’t either. Many of you know my grief and understand why my heart hurts this way. I know the day I am done having babies will be a big change, and I am already praying it’ll be somewhat positive and I’ll be confident in it. But I’m currently not confident that it’s all over. Quite the contrary, in fact. Yet, I’m in the baby-free boat.
I hate this stupid boat. I LOVE the people in it, but I don’t belong here.
It’s been a really, really nice morning <3 I spent it chatting with my neighbour over coffee while we watched Waverly play. It was a first coffee date for us – the first of many, I hope – and we had a really time. Christmas music played as we chatted kids, family, plans, work, etc. Wavy didn’t last, unfortunately. She was a little on the fussier side, as she rubbed her ears and cried on and off. She went down for a super early nap in the late morning.
My mom came and joined us, and as lunch approached, my neighbour headed back home to her husband and son. My mom asked if she could help with any lunch set up and I realized I needed to come up with an actual lunch plan. It was already after noon! Whoops!
I settled on waffle grilled cheese. Have you guys had that? It goes like this.
Make a waffle in the waffle maker. Once its done, open the waffle maker and put cheese (sliced or shredded off the block) on half of the waffle. Fold the waffle in half to sandwich the cheese, and lean the waffle maker closed until the cheese melts. Boom. Waffle grilled cheese.
These things are ridiculously delicious. They’re like butter. My goodness.
We all ate lunch, except Wavy, and the nappers napped. As it tends to happen, once everyone was down, Wavy woke up. While Brady and I played cards with my mom, Wavy ate her waffle grilled cheese. And that aaaaall on its own could be a blog post.
It was pretty much adorable, and while it doesn’t look so appetizing here, I think Waverly would vouch that her lunch was delicious.
My mom left after a couple of card games, and Wavy couldn’t fathom her leaving. She kept reaching up and grasping with her hands, wanting up. They had a really nice snuggle before mom hauled out.
Look at her little arm, holding onto grandma so tight.
The afternoon will be super chill and restful, or at least thats the plan. Maybe I’ll knit. Maybe we’ll finally pick out the kids Halloween costumes from our dress-up clothes. Maybe the music will keep playing all day long, now that we were gifted Spotify. Either way, its going to be a lovely end to the day and start to the week.
I’ve been eagerly awaiting carpet for a lot of reasons. One reason was more unconventional than the rest, but I admit, it was towards the top of my list. And last night, we got into it.
Yesterday, once the little kids were in bed, Brady, Cher, and I went downstairs with ALL of the Lego, ALL the old instruction books, and some treats. Dekker came along for the first half hour, as he has a later bedtime than the others, and he helped us get started. We dumped the Lego out onto a sheet and we began the work of breaking everything apart. Everything. We also made a pile of tires/wheels, and one of Lego guys. (Does anyone elses kids disassemble the guys?? Yellow. Hands. Everywhere.) Dekker helped as long as we let him, and was disappointed when bedtime came, but he’s such a good kid and understood. Once he was off to bed, clicked on the Office, episode one of season one, and got things moving.
I separated the books out and found which ones went together. Brady did another task before he joined us for the Lego. And Cher began the gruelling job of separating colors.
Brady and I each grabbed a set and got to work. Cher opted for separating rather than building, and once I had completed my set, I passed it to her with a ziploc bag, where she broke it up once again and bagged it. Boom. One set done.
A truck, two quads, a trailer, and I’m pretty sure a keg…
I gave Brady the biggest set to work on so he didn’t compete his in the one sitting. Considering we’re sifting through maybe 10-ish sets, I won’t heckle him on it too much 😉
We probably worked (played) until 11:30, maybe midnight, when we hit and wall and no one could find pieces anymore. It was time to pack it in. Plus we were all completely exhausted, haha! It was so worth it, though. I had so much fun playing (organizing) Lego, watching The Office, and drinking vanilla Coke. (Anyone know where I can get cans of that stuff? Because I need more.) I’m also really excited to present my kids with these sets all separated back out. In the beginning of their Lego days, they’d build the set once, and then we’d just bust it up and play with the pieces. The kids are getting so much better at Lego and enjoy the sets so much more, I think they’ll love this! Its going to be so worth the work. Aaaaand if I’m wrong and its not, at least we had fun!
I had so much fun this afternoon. I worked on a gift for the homemade gift exchange, flopped it, chucked it, and worked on it some more. I was disappointed at first, but was able to make it work even better than my first run!
While I did that, Cher worked on a project, too. She overtook the island and carved…
Brock.
Brock fits in
Brock is hilarious and happy and well loved by his family. He’s a little old, perhaps, based on the security of his teeth staying in his mouth, but we’ll do our best not to beat him up too hard. He seems happy to be here.
Was a fun productive day of projects that we both enjoyed doing and didn’t have to do. It was fun! A good way to spend a Friday. And there is so much more fun to be had! I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.
Not so long ago, Rowan didn’t care to color or draw or anything like that. No way. He’d sit at the island and watch the others, and at the most, he’d scribble or draw a couple of lines and call his masterpiece complete. Its changed recently into crude drawings of “vehicles” that are basically just squares. But just the other day, he discovered our book that shows step-by-step instructions of how to draw animals. And wouldn’t you know – he’s pretty great at it!! This was his first animal.
Pretty awesome, hey?? He was SO pleased, as was I. Its escalated from there, and sometimes I don’t actually know what he’s drawn, but he’s always super proud. And really, I can usually figure it out. Its mountains above where he started! But we al start somewhere, I suppose.
This dog definitely looks like its pooping. Awkward. But its back legs are just little, lol!
He’s getting braver to try new things, and its almost always geared towards the crafty side of things.
Of course I had a lapse and didn’t take a picture of his finished product but he took genuine time with it.
Maybe its a pro of him being left handed 😉 I hear those kids tend to be extra creative. Now that he’s started, he is such a natural!!
Great job, Rowan!! Keep practicing! Its paying off!
Isn’t it pretty?? It still needs baseboards, so it looks a little naked, but we’ll get there shortly. This needed to come first, and I’m SO happy with the results!
We couldn’t resist, though. The couches already came down, too 🙂 That was a labor of love. I don’t think my wrists are going to work for the rest of the week…
Was worth it! Eek! Its like people could actually hang out down here!!!
So, here’s how it went.
We were under the impression that the carpet guy could come Monday morning, work all day, and the job would potentially run into Tuesday morning. But it didn’t quite go that way. I waited for the guy for a couple of hours before I texted Brady at work that he wasn’t here yet. It felt a little odd, but we hadn’t nailed a time down, so we figured maybe he had a previous job to finish up that morning. We get what its like to work in the trades. No big deal. But truthfully, we were pretty antsy and eager. He finally showed up around 11:00. He introduced himself and headed downstairs. And he just kind of hung out down there for a while, measuring and such. Then he went to his truck and brought a bunch of stuff in, but he was really quiet about it. Had headphones on the whole time. While that was happening, the kids tidied up the toys and had lunch. And as it tends to happen, the moment they were all down and quiet was when the hammering began. So he hammered and hammered and naps were kind of shot, but sometimes my kids rest even better when they have something to listen to, so they rested and listened and it kind of worked out.
And then he left around 4:00, which kind of surprised me. We were constantly told that the prep was WAY longer than the actual carpet laying, and that was only a five hour day…
But ALL the prep was done!!! Wooooot! Underlay and tack strips were all in place. The underlay was so soft, and the tack strips were straight with no gaps. It already felt so much homier. It doesn’t echo anymore, which sucks for our band practices but rocks for the rest of our life.
Tuesday was the last day our carpet guy was scheduled to be here. And once again, he showed up after 11:00! Gah! Whyyyyy?? I decided to trust him, because, being that he wasn’t the youngest guy, he probably had experience and knew he could finish in the time he had left himself.
He worked later on Tuesday. It was just after 5:00 when he surfaced with a load of stuff to take to his van. And then to my surprise, he only had one load, and he never came back in! Just left without saying a word! I felt kind of crappy that I didn’t thank him or speak to him about his work, but I had no opportunity! Totally missed the mark :/
As crappy as I felt, you better believe I ran downstairs and checked out the situation immediately! And guys, it was just SO NICE!!!
We broke it in my letting the kids loose down there, where they ran laps and raced through bedrooms and slid around and wiped out without crying. They LOVED the new carpet. I invited our neighbour to pop over to check it out and her son joined the fray while the rest of us talked basement renos and motivation and project goals. It was pure chaos and awesomeness. I loved it. We all did.
We love it. The kids love it. It smells a little funky, thanks to the adhesive he used to close the seams, but that’ll dissipate soon enough. I can’t wait to truly finish it up!! The reality that we’re actually on our way to being done is crazy amazing and a bit surreal. And this is one HUGE step taken! Eek!
I went to Edmonton this last weekend! Cher was going on the hunt for some Christmas things, and invited me to tag along. So I did! It was really refreshing to get away from my house and all the sad things we had been dealing with, and get some real relaxation and rest. We stayed at a really comfy, quiet hotel and ate yummy food for every meal. We stayed up late and slept in. We watched a movie and ate cheeseballs and dried pineapple. Its safe to say our first sleepover was a huge success 🙂 Hopefully she agrees.
Ya, we match. We’re cool like that.
Our first day in Edmonton was spent at the mall. Neither of us were rolling in money at all, so we moseyed slowly, ducked into whatever store caught our eye, and were pretty choosy with our purchases. That first day, all I purchased were a few little dresses for Laela. She has recently discovered a new love for dresses, and she only has one dress at home that isn’t a tank top style. I’ve kind of nixed the tank top ones for the season, so she requested more long sleeved dresses. Old Navy took care of that.
To jump ahead to the last day, we headed back to the mall, where I purchased Solly one of his four category Christmas gifts. Just a little cheapie but he’ll be pretty excited, I think 🙂 We even hit up Value Village that day, but didn’t buy anything.
Ok. Saturday. Saturday was Ikea day. I LOVE Ikea. Could’ve spent the whole day there, haha! But I did enough damage in the few hours we did spend. That being said, very little of it was frivolous shopping, so I don’t feel so bad about it. Here’s a run down of my purchases 🙂
I got two boxes of small drinking glasses. They’re the ones the kids use, and while they haven’t broken any themselves, they’re kind of fragile anyway, and we had a few break within a few weeks of each other just in the dishwasher or in the sink. Merp. So, more glasses. Might only open one box at first but we have extras. They all stack into each other really nicely, which is why we wanted to get Ikea ones again instead of going to Walmart or somewhere like that.
I bought dessert bowls. Like, just little bowls. Our cereal bowls are really big, and sometimes we just need a small bowl, and we don’t have any! We have two or three, but that’s not enough. So I bought some cute matte pink ones, because the boys in my life are tolerant. I somehow came home with 13 instead of 12 though. Whoops! One for good luck, I suppose. At least they were only $2.
I bought an oil and vinegar set, not because we really do much of that, but because our beautiful oil drizzler thing clogged forever ago and no matter how hard I worked, I couldn’t get it clean and had to pitch it. And now, I just have a big jug of oil that I have to heave out of the pantry and pour from every time, and I’m over it. So I bought the set to have an oil drizzler again. And a back-up, I suppose, unless someone wants one!
I bought napkins. Three packs, I thought. But I definitely only came home with two packs. Oh well!
I bought more hanging baskets! Have you seen that we keep apples and bananas and other food in hanging baskets under our cabinets now? Its SO pretty, and I love having the food off the counter. Plus the apples being in the baskets frees up room in our fridge for more veggies! Lettuce almost always lives downstairs, and now it can live up! Our current baskets have been great, but these are deeper and fit a little better. I like them better. The old ones will still be useful, though. I think they’ll end up in closets! Maybe for sock and underwear. Maybe. We’ll see.
I bought Brady and I a new duvet. We’ve had the same one for several years, and it has been a picture of luxury, as its a real wool duvet. However, a small drawback is that is gets lumpy over time. A large drawback is that is it NOT easy to launder, and after years of babies feeding and changing on our bed, its getting pretty yucky. I found a beautiful heavy, warm, washable king sized blanket at Ikea with rave reviews. I also purchased a new duvet cover with matching pillowcases that I LOVE that is Brady approved. It’s floral. Eek! I love it. The blanket and cover was more than half of my bill at the end of the Ikea shop, but hopefully it takes us a good few years. Luckily, our pillows are a few years old and still amazing.
I bought some massive ziploc bags that hold a whole batch of granola bars.
I bought another duvet cover set for the kids. We have four kids currently using twin sized bedding, and we have seven fun sets. Changing bedding out is a bit frustrating when we have to do laundry before putting fresh bedding on, so ideally we’d have two per kid. And now we do! I bought a robot set.
I bought Wavy a Christmas gift 🙂 Her “want.”
Aaaaand I bought myself a pair of cute craft scissors, because my scissors that I use for knitting and crocheting barely cut anymore. So I didn’t feel TOO bad spending $4 on a fun new pair 🙂
No joke, I’m probably more excited about these than anything else!
I’m genuinely excited about pretty much everything I got. I mean, I’m neutral on the napkins, lol! But everything else 🙂 I feel productive and like I made good, informed decisions. Win!
It feels like things are coming together. Finally.
I figured I’d make a little jot note list of the things Brady worked on while I was gone, and I’m almost embarrassed at how extensive and impressive it is. That guy has such work ethic, and he does it all with such a happy heart. Yes, men like him do exist.
When I go away for a weekend, which happens a couple of times a year, he often uses that time as an opportunity to get stuff done. Sometimes its chores around the house, and sometimes its a project. He made me makeup lights once, and painted a new front door another time. The mug shelf was also a “weekend away” project. Its always pretty wonderful to see what he’s going to do. Not that he can’t do work while I’m home, but we tend to like to spend that time laying low together, not crushing all the jobs we can think of. I’m SO grateful for his work this last weekend. My goodness.
Let’s break that down now.
Brady finished the Christmas lights, but you guys know about that from his blog on Saturday.
Brady’s emptied out our basement (except for the furnace room, of course) and swept it to get it ALL ready for carpet. He patched a couple of holes in our concrete floor with a few layers of tile grout. I know thats not optimal, but it was our best option at the time, and it’ll be fine. Alongside that, he also did some more patching on the drywall, mostly in our entrance and the stairwell. It got pretty beat up a couple of years ago already when we brought materials downstairs, and then we added a light fixture in the entrance and needed to cut two holes in the ceiling, once which needed to be patched. So he did that. And two in our dining room from about a year ago when we took down Waverly’s name sign and it took some paint and drywall with it. Whoops. LOTS of patching.
Another big thing Brady worked on was our laundry area. We have a big beefy closet that encloses our machines, and a long time ago, we bought an industrial track system for the doors. It was annoyingly expensive, but it’ll be the perfect system for us. Brady took time this weekend to place the track on the floor so the carpet guy knew how far to go. He also called the place from where we ordered it, and ordered one more part that will make it perfect. That last part will make the area more versatile and there will be no dead space. It’ll even free up space for a small linen closet area maybe! We have a linen closet upstairs but with all of our people, we have a lot of linens. Having two spaces will be huge for us. Maybe one for towels and one for sheets, or maybe sheets and towels for each level? I’m not sure yet. But the freedom to actually have some cabinets in there is just awesome.
Speaking of laundry, Brady took it upon himself to try and get the smell out of my clothes that I foolishly washed with my post-op underwear. If you remember, I had a pair of underwear that I wore right after my D&C when I was still slathered with that orange anti-septic, and I washed them together with pretty much all of my finicky, slightly high maintenance laundry, and for the life of me, I cannot get the smell out. Brady worked at that for a full day, laundering them 5+ times. They still stink. Not as much, but some. Its ok, though. I know what I’ll try next. Unless someone has experienced this before??
Brady called the vacuum store we recently ordered a part from. Our vacuum broke a while back, and Brady ordered a new part, but it turned out to be the wrong size. As you know, our plate has been pretty full lately, and we haven’t gotten around to returning and reordering the part yet. But he called and made a plan with the vacuum store. Another thing off the list. Which is important, considering we’re gonna need a vacuum to get all the little bits out of the new carpet pretty quick here.
Some things Brady did outside, besides the Christmas lights, were based around the garage. First, we installed the garage key pad. I mentioned to him the other day how odd it was that everyone around us had one, but we didn’t. And he said “Oh, we do. I’ve just never installed it.” So he installed it! Haha! Easy peasy. And then he painted and replaced the door leading from the garage into the house. Thats a bit of a long story, but the Reader’s Digest version goes like this: When we built the house, we chose beautiful doors all through our house, including the entrance closet doors. When we actually got here, they took off the construction doors and put on the real exterior doors, and they looked SO BAD next to our beautiful closet doors. Almost immediately upon moving in, we ordered a new doors for our entrance. And then they sat forever, because it wasn’t a priority. Last year, Brady painted and installed the purple front door, and this weekend, painted the other one white and traded out the last ugly entrance door. Woot!
And because there was still time on Sunday afternoon, Brady kept on going. He got the tv mounted on the basement wall, which seems premature, but if you’ve spent time at our house, you know it isn’t. We don’t watch much tv, and we’re more eager to have it out of our main living room than anything.
Going to be SO much nicer!
Plus, as soon as the carpet is in downstairs, we have those beautiful, cozy couches to move down. We may accidentally start watching tv again, hahaha! Just as accidentally as we stopped! When the tv was on the wall, he decided to run the cables and get it working. And once it was working, he decided to be a sucker for punishment and move the whole big stand downstairs by himself and slip it into the furnace room, so we can have the storage space there as soon as carpet is in.
Can you guys tell we’re really excited about getting carpet installed? Where is that guy?? He’s late…
Beyond these things that I’m super excited about, Brady also worked on invoices and completed his quarterly GST report.
Aaaaand if that wasn’t enough, he was also a top notch, involved, loving dad to our children. Which shouldn’t be so unbelievable to so many, but is the thing I’m the most grateful for.
Brady took the kids outside to play. He bathed them all and took them to church.
He took Wavy on a donut date while the little ones were in Sunday School.
He made them baked oatmeal.
He helped Dekker hang a poster on his wall. He wrote a blog for me.
This man is unstoppable.
I am SO grateful for all he has done, and all that he is.
Wasn’t Brady’s blog yesterday so good? <3 I would be SO IMPRESSED if that was all he got done while I was away, but as usual, he crushed WAY more. I’ll tell you all about it, maybe tomorrow.
In case it wasn’t obvious, I’m home! Cher and I got home tonight around 9:00ish. Brady helped me carry everything in, and I ran a couple of things next door to my neighbour that I had picked up for her. Now we both have the same dishes! Lol! Maybe I’ll tell you about my purchases tomorrow, too. We’ll have to see how I lay the blogs out this week, because there is going to be a LOT to talk about!
Carpet starts tomorrow! We are SO ready for that job to begin, and hopefully to end pretty quickly thereafter. So we’ll have that to talk about. And there is so much in the works to get that place up and running soon. Gah! I can’t wait! I think I had written off the basement, somewhat, almost as though it was just never going to happen. I’m SO thrilled its on its way.
Tonight I’m so thankful. I’m thankful for my husband and his work ethic. For my friends who I can travel with, and the ones who check in and love me when I’m gone. For my kids who I miss. For my break from my life this weekend, that I was excited for but didn’t realize I needed. And for home, because this is always my comfy, safe place to fall. And its only gotten better with time. I love it here.
Tomorrow will be great 🙂 We’ll talk soon, friends.
This is Brady, Hailey’s husband, and I’m filling in today because is away for the weekend. I’ll let her fill you in when she gets back.
So this last week I was scheduled to be working for a general contractor that I’ve only worked for a couple times and they seem a little disorganized. Unfortunately, this week they were incredibly disorganized and out 3 days scheduled I only worked 2 hours on Tuesday afternoon. Of course I can always fill my time at home when I get a day off here and there. Thursday I chose to get up on roof and put up Christmas lights.
After a bit of messaging with our neighbours I was able to borrow roofing harness and made the 20’ climb to the roof over our living room.
It didn’t take me long to realize that I’m much more confident on our roof than I was 3 years ago when I did this the first time. I was comfortable getting close enough to the edge to easily reach the eavestrough to attach the lights and move around confidently.
I was able to get the in a groove putting up the first 66′ string because it was just a straight line up from the lowest eave.
Pretty quickly I found myself out on the corner of our front porch roof where I struggled the hardest with my fear of heights last time. I went like a breeze and I took the opportunity to text Hailey for a photo op.
Is anyone else so impressed how clean our eavestroughs are? 😉 Protip: They’re brand new. 🙂
And it didn’t take long to finish off a second 66′ string.
I knew I had less than 66′ to go to finish the upper level of the house so i switched to a couple of the 20′ strings and it couldn’t have worked out more perfectly!
I was able to run a couple extension cords do the back of a downspout to the lower level of the roof. This was even more ideal than how it turned out a few years ago. I was pumped. I called a day at this point as we had some awesome new couches to spontaneously go pick up. 🙂
On Friday afternoon with Hailey headed out on her weekend away, the big kids in school, and the wee three in bed, I was able to get back outside and finish the lower level.
I started from where I wanted the lights to end over top of the walkway to our front door and worked back from there. Starting with the last 66′ string followed by the last 20′ string I was able to get it finished in an hour or so.
It didn’t turn out quite right as the last string ended about 3 feet from the end of the eavestrough where I had run my extension cords down to the day before. But luckily I ended up with about 3′ of extra extension cord. 🙂
So now we have a fully Christmas Lightsed house!
And it looks even better at night than I remember it looking. 🙂
