The Daily Hailey

Our first night at home was a bit choppy, but once we figured out that Rowan was ready to pretty well triple his feeding amounts, we got a six hour stretch! I definitely don’t expect such a thing this early in the game, but its nice to know its possible, and that likely our broken sleep was due to something we can help fix.

Ro slept through breakfast so we hung out with Dekker and Laela, and moseyed around the kitchen a bit, trying to maintain our routine of tidiness at least a little bit. It worked. It was nice to have the kids feel a little bit normal anyway. Dekker asked about Rowan right off the bat though. He wanted to know where his brother was. I love that.

Brady hung out downstairs with the kids for a nice chunk of the morning so I could phone date with my sister. It was really wonderful for me to be able to relive Rowans birth story with her. She has a really good understanding of what all went on with Laela’s birth, and therefore, a very clear perspective on the similarities and differences between this delivery and that one. She helped me feel very encouraged and loved and basically like I deliver babies like a rockstar, which is a great way to feel. It was so nice to visit with her. We always enjoy a great chat, but don’t get to them too often. Love you, sister.

In the early afternoon, a nurse from Healthy and Home came by to check on Rowan and I. She was a great sport about coming so far out of the city to see us, and the kids were super comfortable with her around. She was happy with all of our answers, and seemed to really trust that we knew what we were doing, which I totally appreciate. There are definitely those who act as though they know more than everyone. Not that I think I know more than her!! I’m well aware that she is educated as a nurse, and I am not, but I do know my kids 🙂 We had a nice time. Rowan checked out beautifully. He didn’t fuss once through the entire time she milked blood from his little heel, or with her cold stethoscope on his chest. He didn’t much care for being naked on the scale but recovered quickly. She also checked me over and said that everything is as it should be, without divulging too many details, haha! She was very encouraging, too, that I shouldn’t be afraid to take something for pain, and I am, but not as much as I thought I would be. I’m feeling better physically than I thought I’d be. To be honest, I’m finding more pain in all of the little sites (iv, blood draw, epidural, tired legs, mild contractions, etc.) than I am in my birthing bits. So far, Tylenol is seeming to be enough. Woot!

The nurse left around 2:00, and we put the kids down pretty much right afterwards. They weren’t exactly impressed, but it was a little bit later than their normal nap time already, and they actually fell asleep relatively quickly. Rowan was also ready for a nap, since we had given him a good drink while our nurse was out. So yes. On our first day at home, ALL THREE KIDS napped at once! Brady and I took that opportunity to lay in bed and watch some solid guilty pleasure tv. We have tons to do in this house, but today was not the day for it! Not that we were falling asleep standing up, or in awful pain, or generally miserable, but cmon! First day home! I had a baby Monday night. Wednesday afternoon is not the appropriate time to pull out the paint or scrub down a bathtub. Am I right?! Yes I am.

Rowan slept another uber-stretch through supper, and we actually got him up to come hang out in the basement for the last hour-ish of the day with everyone. We’re definitely still having to watch Laela really closely that she doesn’t poke him too hard in the face, or pull his hair, but when she is gentle, we clap like crazy and celebrate like maniacs and she LOVES that. Dekker still didn’t want to touch his baby brother, but he did sit beside the bouncy chair for a little while. He liked when Rowan was awake, and had his eyes open.

“Baby Rowan likes my airplanes?”
“Baby Rowan keeps looking at me!”
“Maybe Baby Rowan makes a funny face at Dekker and Dekker makes a funny face at Baby Rowan?!”

So its coming along nicely anyway 🙂 I didn’t have high expectations that Dekker would want to be especially hands on with him, especially in the beginning. This interaction is great for me!

The kids had a great evening downstairs, and even had a funny race up to their bedroom that seemed to make it a bit easier. I brought Rowan in for our usual few minutes of hugs and kisses and cuddles, and I could tell Dekker was a bit uncomfortable with it. When he came to hug me, he more so draped himself over one of my shoulders instead of around my neck. I encouraged him to come around my neck, and showed him he could without having to hug Rowan. Maybe that sounds mean, but I know my kid. He gave me a big hug and kiss, and then out of the blue, pointed to Rowan and said “Maybe he could hug me, mommy.” I held Rowan out to him, and Dekker gave him a big hug, and a kiss on the head before bailing to the other side of the room. This encouraged Laela to come over and point madly at Roro until I held him out for her. She rested her head on him momentarily (her version of a hug) and kissed his face. Leaving the room to “Night night, Rowan!” was just the cherry on top.

I brought him back to our room where I lay him in a pillow and turned on some lamps. Brady called me back into the kids room, saying that Dekker had made a special request for “a mom and a kiss.” I loved that, and went immediately. My big boy met me in the hallway just outside of his room. Dekker wanted me to himself, just for a quick second. He gave me a really big hug, then grabbed me face and planted a big kiss right on my mouth. “I love you, mommy. Sleep well!” And he closed the door on me. My heart…

So its truly been a spectacular day. I felt a little overwhelmed going into it, now that my body hurts a bit more and I hadn’t had much rest in the night, but these kids are epic people, and they really make life incredibly rich and dare I say easy most days.

I know I promised everyone Rowan’s birth story when we got home, but today was about other things that I’d rather talk about. Don’t worry, I will not deprive you of the story of his birth. It will come! But I can very genuinely say that this evening, my adrenaline is wearing off, and my hormones are amping up. I was dozing amidst the family before 7:00pm. So this will be a scattered post, but something, nonetheless!

We had a shockingly smooth first night with Rowan! He gave us nice, 4-4.5 hour stretches between his feedings, so Brady and I could sleep. I slept pretty light, on my mommy-alert for my new babe, and I nudged Brady awake when I heard stirring and gurgling. (No, I’m not cruel, and would have happily got Rowan myself, but my epidural did funny things and my right leg was fairly dead to me for most of the night. Its back now.) Brady found Rowan, laying wide awake, quietly talking and sucking his hands. This kid is surprisingly relaxed.

We spent the morning passing all of the little tests and being checked for any number of things, which resulted in our being discharged right after lunch. We also were able to get my mom in to visit during the morning, which was so perfect! My dad is traveling with his work this week, so my mom was on her own and we really wanted her to meet the baby! Jerilee was home with Dekker and Laela, and we figured we’d probably be sent home before legitimate visiting hours started up at 2:30, so we made a point to call up my mom and invite her 🙂 We wanted a visitor and she wanted to visit! We had a lovely time with her, watching her bond with our beautiful Rowan Toby, and telling her all about our experience this time around. Really, really nice.

As I mentioned, we were allowed to leave right after lunch. Brady went to grab our coats and the car seat from the van while Ro and I had a little snuggle date and I ate my lunch. We left shortly thereafter, but not before my iv site bled through the bandage and all over the sheets. Good thing we got that mess out of the way before we were in the elevator or the van. I love not having to clean up my own blood.

Ro tolerated his car seat great, and travelled like a champ. Once we got home, we got him and his Auntie Jerry acquainted while we waited for the kids to get up from their nap. She snuck out before they got up, and she was the first thing Dekker asked about when we went in for them. We got in lots of hugs and kisses and we all got reacquainted with each other, while Rowan hung out in his cradle in our room, waiting for his turn.

And then I carried him in to meet his siblings. Dekker was very, very shy. He just wanted to sit on Bradys lap, a respectful distance away. I’m not too surprised. He did the same with Laela. It took a few days. He never disliked her, but was pretty cautious. I see the same thing happening here. But Laela was in there like a dirty shirt. My predictions were right. She really likes to poke him. We have to watch her. Her very first move was poking him right on the nose, then poking my nose, and lastly, poking her own nose. Yup, we all have noses, in case you didn’t know.

The kids had a really easy supper, and then we all played in the basement around Roro in his bouncy chair. Laela wanted to bring him everything and poke him in the face a lot, and Dekker wanted to sit on our laps and not a whole lot else. All in all though, it is wonderful being home! I am so comfortable here. While we had a wonderful room at the hospital, great staff, and even yummy food, I would so much rather be here among those I know and love the most. Plus, my bed and my tub and my food makes all the difference 🙂 Its good to be home.

Ro has successfully slept away the earlier part of the evening, and is having a nice long stretch of wakeful time right now. Hopefully that means he’ll give us a nice stretch of sleep before night feedings begin again. We have been without them for about ten months, but if having Rowan in our home means they’re back, bring them on!

For a while anyway…

Sometimes I keep secrets from you guys, and its really hard! Keeping my pregnancies under wraps for the first trimester never lasts the full twelve weeks. Things like that re hard to keep from you! So when I had my prenatal appointment on Thursday, and my doctor and I decided to put me on an earlier induction list, it was really hard to keep from you!! But we did it, and I’m pleased as punch to tell you guys that, today, our third child was born 🙂 I’m going to save the birth story for another day, as I really want to get in my cuddle time now. He’s wide awake, completely alert, and quiet. I feel like we won’t have tons of time like this, so I need to go enjoy it.

But first, his little details, or what I know so far. His name is Rowan Toby. He is our itty bittiest baby yet, weighing in at a measly 8 lbs 6 oz, but being a week early will do that to you. He’s 22″ long, making him the tallest one yet! He looks so much like Laela, but has big, Dekker-sized lungs. He is unbelievably beautiful!

I couldn’t have asked for a better labour. Truly, I have already found so much healing in the way he was born. It was all very quick, but not at all like last time. I have so much to tell you, but again, not tonight.

Just know that we are THRILLED and completely nauseatingly in love with this little boy. I can’t wait to share more about him with you guys in the days to come. But tonight, its just going to be the three of us 🙂

A while back, a friend of mine offered to take some maternity pictures of me. Jamie’s business can be found at ilwphotopraphy.com or facebook.com/ilwphotography, for those who would like to inquire about her services. It was a total hoot! We were both freezing and had a lot of fun. I’d recommend her far and wide! The pictures are edited and ready to be viewed, and I was actually quite taken aback by them. I feel very modelicious, and at a time when I am often feeling like a beached whale, she sure made me feel gorgeous. That all being said, this is a post for you to look at pictures of me, haha!

I have to say that I’m a bit bummed at wordpress. WordPress hosts my blog, and used to make my pictures big and beautiful quality, and now, since I upgraded, the pictures are only allowed up to 10MBs, so the quality will likely be ripped to shreds 🙁 But they are still so pretty and I wanted to share, even if you have to click on each and every one to enlarge them.

** Funny story! After I ranted about wordpress and their tiny pictures, I changed a setting, and BOOM! Bigger pictures! The quality is still not even close to how they really look, but its better than the teeny tiny pictures, in my opinion 🙂

Brady, Jerilee, and I worked our butts off around here today! There is so much to be done in this house, and I’m feeling pretty overwhelmed these days. So we worked this afternoon away.

After the great Finish dishwasher clean the other day, it would appear we’ve washed too much crud down the drain, and the water isn’t all draining out properly. Not at all. Clean the filter, I know. We don’t have one. Well, I’m sure he have one somewhere, but upon pulling the casing out of the bottom, the pump is right there. Whatever is blocking the pipes is way the heck down there. Because of this, the dishes aren’t coming out looking too great, so Jerilee handwashed our entire counter of dishes and put them away. While she did that, I got a started on the bathroom clean. I cleaned the basics, except the  tub, because that needs sooo much more help! If anyone has some great cleaning advice for hard water stains left WAY too long, I would jump at them! But after cleaning the counter and sink so beautifully, I decided to cut out the silicone around the vanity. Great order of operations, I know. There are now bits of silicone all over the counter, and while that can be wiped up for the most part, the ledges look awful. I did successful unclog the sink though! The water has been draining super slowly, and thanks to Pinterest, baking soda, and vinegar, it now runs out beautifully. One win for the day, anyway. Jerilee and I also took most of the tape down from the upstairs paint job. We’re shorties, so we left the top of the door frames for Brady.

Brady put the curtain rods up and I washed our curtains so we could finally rehang them. They look gorgeous against the grey walls! I can’t wait to show you guys pictures when we finally get the rooms put back together!! Brady ran around like a chicken with his head cut off today, and did so many jobs! He put our new microwave up finally, which included him rebuilding the shelf overtop of it and cutting all new holes where they needed to be. He tried to fix the dishwasher, removed the sink stopper in the bathroom for me, and washed the entire living room floor by hand to scratch off the little paint spots that had splattered that the mop wouldn’t pick up. All the light and outlet covers are back on, and just about all of the drape sheets are off and in a box. Even the one little tile that fell off of our table forever and a day ago is stuck back on. Really, we accomplished a ton.

But it doesn’t feel like it. I feel discouraged today. Like with any and every other house, its feeling very “one step forward, two steps back.” Tons of other little things keep popping up and adding themselves to our list. Actually, I’m specifically NOT keeping a list of jobs we need to do. It would be enormous and I know it would stress me out to just look at it. Instead, I know we will remember those jobs along the way. We KNOW we have lots to do still. Instead, I’ve began compiling a shopping list of things we need to buy in order to complete these projects. Its always more fun to view the work as a shopping trip, right? The list includes some cleaning supplies, a curtain rod for the kids room, a few lengths of trim, a new tub faucet, a few replacement light switches, and the list goes on. But it doesn’t seem too bad to look at it that way for me, so I’m going with it. One big Walmart/Superstore trip, and one Home Depot trip should do it, if we’re organized enough! Maybe that will come sometime next week. Its a very small way to look forward to getting work done anyway. Gotta start somewhere!

Today was probably the most fun I’ve had in a really long time, and the timing couldn’t be better. Coming up on our baby being born, my mom and I had a date planned. No deadlines, and just some general girl time.

Before anything, I hit up my waxing place for my usual. I always lie to you guys, by the way. I always say I get my legs done, and I do, but I actually get my arms waxed as well. They are sooo hairy and I always feel like they look dirty, so if $10 can save them, I’ll happily pay! I haven’t been in since before Christmas, which I know sounds pretty gross, but having been doing my legs for around eight years, my leg hair doesn’t grow as fast as it used to, so its not as bad as it sounds. My waxing girl is fabulous and works at warp speed, so when I saw that we would finish up ahead of schedule, I hesitantly asked if she could fit in an eyebrow wax as well. I’ve only had my brows done once before and loved the result, so I figured that I could justify the treat. She was done in moments, and they looks flawless. I’m so pleased to have no more strays and no more unibrow!! I feel all nice and fresh. Waxing was a great place to start today.

My mom and I wanted to hit the nearby mall to peruse Target. Its closing, and we love a good bargain. Plus, the sales just jumped a bit in the last day or two, so we figured it was a good time. But upon arrival at the mall, we walked past a nail place and checked out some prices, resulting in us getting pedicures together. Moms treat 🙂 It was so much fun! I’ve never gone to get pedis with my mom, and she is sooo ticklish!! It was funny to watch her squirm while the aesthetician laughed at her. We shared a color, even, both getting beautiful dark purple nails. I moseyed over to have a shellac mani done afterwards. I loved having a shellac french mani when Laela was born. I’m a bad nail biter, and lots of you will be able to relate how your nails become brittle and yellow immediately after having a baby. That, exhaustion, and the general life changes that come with a new baby result in me chewing my nails down to nothing, so the shellac is a good protector. And its pretty. Thankfully, they placed mom right beside me with a little foot fan so we could visit while I had my fingers done. It was so nice to get in a bunch of visiting and girl talk about babies and life and excitement!! SO much fun! And wow, did I feel shiny and polished afterwards!

We made our way to Target afterwards, as we originally planned to do. We took our time and walked most of the aisles. It was so nice not having a deadline!! I’m pretty bummed that the bedding is still so expensive :/ But I bought a backpack, a Christmas ornament, a few cosmetics, and a humidifier for the kids room. I finally found one that I like!! A Safety 1st, filterless, cool mist one. PERFECT for the kids room! Everywhere I’ve looked, they’re $40 and sold out, and at Target, it was $35, in stock, and 20% off! Can’t argue with that! Big wins all around.

We grabbed lunch in the food court afterwards. We had planned to make our way across the city and do a bunch more things, and hit any restaurant we wanted, but we were both fading a bit, and neither of us were super hungry! I’m pretty sure there is just physically no room left in my body for food at this point. Seriously, how much room does my stomach have to expand? Not much. So we ordered a meal and shared it, and I grabbed a booster juice as well. We probably visited for a solid hour, and I think I can safely say we lost track of time and just enjoyed ourselves. Soon, it was 3:00, and continually snowing. The roads had already been a bit sketchy on the way in, and didn’t exactly promise to be improving, so we made our way out of the city, and mom drove me home.

How refreshing was today?! SO refreshing!! I am not at all dreading having another child in my life and home and family, but I did enjoy this kid-free day with my mom. It was nice to get pampered and fussed over a bit before all of everyones fussing is directed at the baby 🙂

He’s coming sooooooo soon!!!!!

How often do days play out exactly as expected? Not too terribly often, especially at this stage of the game in a pregnancy. I’m 38.5 weeks along and I woke up this morning around 3:30 with contractions. Not braxton hicks, but painful contractions, one on top of the other. I went to pee, in an effort to relieve any pressure off of my body, and tried to go back to sleep. I succeeded in dozing for the next two hours or so, but very restlessly. Contractions weren’t letting up. They got worse for the next two hours.

Now one would think that, with our history of how Laela was born, I’d be racing out the door to the hospital. But I have never gone into labor on my own, and call it pride, or insanity, or what have you, but I really really dont want to have a false alarm on my third child. So I decided to wait it out. Brady delayed his work day and came to cuddle with me and watch a bit of tv in bed with me, while we waited to see what would happen. Eventually, things slowed down and pretty well quit. By that time, though, I had spoken to my mom and set up a bit of a plan. She came out so Brady could go to work, and I could potentially get a few things done, or the other way around. Once my mom had arrived, Jerilee texted shortly after, and came out to join us. Together, the three of us ladies kept the kids alive and fed, while blitzing a few jobs around the house. All bottles are washed and ready, and laundry got started. Plans were discussed and made as concrete as possible, which is incredibly loose for concrete.

Long story short, I had a prenatal today and am not in labor. Who knows what went on this morning, but I’m not super dilate for effaced yet, and nothing has really changed significantly. So no, baby is not here yet. While I still feel like things are far away, this feels oddly like the night before I delivered Laela, and was so confident that nothing was going to happen. How weird would that be?? However, I am not holding my breath one bit. I was induced with Laela when she was eight days overdue, and I am currently “due” on March 2nd, so while I know people say that you go faster with each kid, this would be quite a leap into early!

All of that aside, I’ve been awake since 3:30 this morning and am feeling completely wiped out. Now that this post is over, I am going to doze in front of an episode of Friends before I have to stand up and be an adult, and go finish the laundry. Sooo thankful for a husband who will feed the kids while I lay in bed.

Hoping for a long, restful night.

I really don’t feel like accomplishing anything today, to tell you all the truth. This last little while, I’ve been super motivated and just ready to get this place in order. Today, not so much. So instead of being too choked about it, I decided to roll with it and take the day. For the most part, anyway.

After being completely thrilled with how clean my dishwasher got yesterday, I got back in the groove of life and loaded it all back up with yesterdays dishes. The kids were so cute at breakfast! Laela insisted on wearing a hairband and Dekker pulled a chair as close to her high chair as he could at the small end of the table so they could be closer. He complimented her constantly, telling her over and over how beautiful she was and how pretty she looked.

I joined them at the table for the tail end of their breakfast, and we eventually all finished up and headed down for toys. Well, Dekker did. Laela wanted to doddle a bit upstairs so she hung out with me while I tidied up from breakfast and wiped everything down. I really do have a desire to keep everything in better shape than we have in the past, and that includes crumb-free counters. They are not always clean at all, but sometimes, it just feels better!

We did join Dekker downstairs right away after that, and kept it all pretty low key for the next couple of hours. The kids are learning to play together, which is sometimes smooth and sometimes not, so I feel like I’m up and down a lot, dealing with their little squabbles and the whole learning curve. So often, Dekker is short with Laela when she nears him, out of fear that she’ll take his toys. But then occasionally, Laela’s colors come through and she’ll rip of Dekker’s glasses and he’ll burst out crying and my goodness, it seems to never stop! So I mediate as much as I can, and otherwise, I just let them hash it out. We all had a bit of lunch downstairs before nap time.

The kids went down for their naps surprisingly well, and they have been quiet for two hours. I have taken their downtime as my own as well. I’ve watched a few episodes of Friends while I’ve had a bit of a snack and just rested my body. I think I’ll do a little bit of laundry this evening. Not much, but we’re accumulating enough that I’d rather do a load here and there instead of saving it all for a big laundry day and then going into labour and not being able to do it before I go. That was a really bad sentence. Hopefully it made sense, because I don’t care enough to change it. Either way, I don’t want to bring dirty clothes to the hospital with me, so laundry must happen. Maybe just a load or two tonight though. Also, the curtains aren’t up yet in our living and dining rooms yet, so I could wash those, but I’d rather wait until I know the curtain rods are going up the same day so nothing has to get folded and wrinkled. But I’m not sure today is curtain rod day. Today will hopefully be microwave day, though!! We got a new over the range microwave, but since we bought it second hand and didn’t think to check, the mounting plate is different than our current one :/ But Brady was able to pick one up yesterday, so that enormous microwave can finally be on the wall and off of our countertop! I’ll never appreciate counter space more than I will after this blasted appliance isn’t taking any more of it up! Woohoo!

So I suppose chores aren’t entirely lame. Maybe they’re just lame when you’re on your own doing them. I don’t know. Anyway, its been a really low key day, and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it. Tomorrow is also pretty chill, except for a doctors appointment in the middle of it, and Friday will be fun and full and I’m SO looking forward to it! I’m hoping I’m on the ball enough to even make it into a photo post!!!

Last night, Brady put up the curtains in our room, and I am SO pleased with the end result! Since not everything in back in its place, it feels pretty monochromatic in here, but very crisp and beautiful and I love the little design on the curtains. It gives a little bit of something different to the walls, and I love it. It was nice to wake up with a bit less light this morning as well.

Once the kids were up and eating breakfast, I went into my decently functional kitchen and unloaded the dishwasher. The dishes are just not cleaning the way I’d like them to, and as I mentioned on Facebook a while ago, my dishwasher is turning brown inside, and its getting progressively worse. So instead of loading the dishwasher with the dirty dishes from last night and this mornings breakfast, I put a Finish cleaning pack in it instead and ran it on the uber-load setting, aka pots, as hot as possible. I had my doubts about this method, since the people who recommended it said they used it when their dishwasher started turning brown, and ours has been brown for a while, but guys, it looks BRAND NEW!!! Unbelievable! Easily the best five dollars I’ve ever intentionally washed down the drain.

Then I called and booked a leg waxing appointment for Friday. Best get that in before I have to have my feet in the air in front of too many people whilst having a baby!! One more thing checked off my list of things to do!

The kids ate breakfast for what felt like hours before they wanted to be done and go play. We played downstairs for a while before Dekker decided he wanted to go play upstairs on his own for a bit. He does this sometimes when he wants some space from Laela. I think its great, actually, that he’s come up with his own way of fleeing, and I trust him very much not to get into stuff. Humorously enough, I heard him talking quite loudly to himself at one point, until I realized that Jerilee had made it out and they were bantering upstairs, when I hadn’t even heard her come in!! Friend fail :/ Sorry my son beat me to you, Jerilee!

The kids went down for their nap decently well, and Jerilee and I visited all afternoon, which is something we haven’t done in a really long time. Brady picked up a delicious supper on his way home and we watched The Bachelor and ate with the whole family downstairs. It was pretty fun actually. We rarely eat downstairs with the kids, because we can’t contain them the same way, and they get their dirty fingers on more things. But neither of my kids prefer to be messy, so there is lots of hand and face wiping along the way. Once they went to bed, the three of us visited a little bit before we watched yet another episode of The Bachelor. It was a two episode week, you know!

Now, Jerilee is on her way home and we’re just cuddling in for the night. Tomorrow will be a quiet home day for me again, and I’m trying to decide what jobs I can and should do. I really need to get around to packing at least the beginnings of a hospital bag, and I think I could maybe do some laundry, but we’ll see how I feel tomorrow. With the dishwasher cleaner going through, we have a full days worth of dishes sitting in the sink, waiting to be done, so maybe I’ll do that in the morning. I can only accomplish so much with these popping hips and all these contractions! Wish me luck!

Believe it or not, yes! My husband does have a job, and after a really beautiful stretch of time off that he’s used to help me feel more prepared to have our third baby, he is re-entering the work force for the week! While many people enjoyed spending their stat holiday with their family, my husband went to work. Stat holidays don’t mean too much when you’re self employed. Not bitter at all, honestly. I love the flexibility! But it does mean that sometimes, he has to work on a day that the rest of the world (or province) has off. Such is life.

I’m not going to lie. I slept like a log last night. I was dozing off by 11:00 and I slept solidly until 9:00am. The monitor was on but apparently we had turned the sound off, so while I could still hear them moving around and playing, it was a quieter, slower start. The kids weren’t in the best moods first thing this morning, but seemed really content to be back at home, even amongst the chaos that our upstairs continues to be. They both ate an unreasonable amount of breakfast, Dekker specifically asking for each and every kind that we have available to him, which is usually three kinds. I know that seems like overkill, but besides myself, our family LOVES cereal. We go through it really fast. Laela also drank lots of milk. In the last few weeks, we decided to get Laela off of her bottle. No judging, I know its considered late for her to still have one, but its like her one small comfort thing, she only had two littles ones each day, and it didn’t bother us! But since we’ve taken it away, she’s drinking considerably less milk. I know its an adjustment period, so I’m not too worried, and she’s getting her dairy in just fine. But today, she drank for breakfast what she often takes in all day. Yay Laela!!!

They didn’t finish eating breakfast until after 11:00, and then they were more than ready to go play toys downstairs, where they weren’t constantly being told “Don’t touch that!” or “Don’t drive your toys on the walls.” Downstairs is much more fair game.

I was amazingly tired after my ten hour night, and felt super conflicted about how productive to be. Let’s be straight up. I’m a 26 year old woman who stays home all day. I have every ability to clean or tidy or do laundry or any number of things that need doing around my house. Emphasis on the “need” here. However, while I find my kids to be incredibly easy and user-friendly, I am at the very end of my pregnancy and things like bending down, or chasing, or walking back and forth across the room tire me out and bring on painful contractions. I’m just about at the end – of my pregnancy and my proverbial rope.

Ask Jerilee. I annoyingly texted her throughout the morning, whining about my fatigue, and about the desperate need to get my house back in order. What to do, what to do?! She was really good, and encouraged me to do some little bitty things if I wanted, but that it was more than fine if I didn’t. So thats what I did. I made a short little plan and accomplished some of it.

Dishes. We hardly had any. I loaded the dishwasher but didn’t hand wash the few things that can’t go in, like the travel mugs. Then I planned to do some laundry. Now, we have lots of laundry to do in the way of sheets and towels and such, but everything is still dusty and messy, and that part isn’t quite over yet, so I opted out of that laundry (even though its the laundry that is bugging me the most!) and instead, I washed all of the new baby blankets and burp cloths that my mom recently sewed for baby Jim! Its one small thing I can prepare anyway. My second and final load of laundry was going to be the bedding that fits into our baby cradle, where he’ll sleep for his first few months, but too many things were stacked on top of it and frankly, I just didn’t feel like making a bigger mess trying to get the cradle out of storage. So I didn’t. The one load was enough. At least it was something.

In the afternoon, the kids and I ate good lunches and they went down for their naps pretty smoothly. Even though my chores hadn’t been quite as successful in the morning as I had hoped, I had already decided that I would rest when the kids did. I kept dozing off while the kids were playing, so I knew my body needed some rest. However, funny story. Our curtains haven’t been put back up since painting, and it was glaringly bright in our bed. I was so looking forward to some cozy bed time and some YouTube. I tossed and turned and tried to find a good position to be able to watch, but it wasn’t working out. I started to reevaluate my cozy plan, and thought I should rather make lists about…shoot, I dozed off again. And again, and again, and again. So instead of doing anything, I fell asleep. I literally lay sprawled out on my bed, the sun pouring down on me, like a kitty. I slept like that for a solid hour. I actually really hate sleeping in the day, because then I have a pretty hard time falling asleep at a reasonable time at night, but there was no turning back. I like to sleep in the dark dark, so if I could nap for a full hour in the bright, hot sun, it was necessary.

By the time I woke up, the kids were lulling and the sun had moved a little bit, so I could see again. However, I had slept wrong and am currently still really suffering for it. Dang pelvis. I watched a few YouTube videos to help me wake up and be less zombie-like. Brady came home feeling surprisingly good after his first day back, which was a nice sight for my sore tired eyes. We had grilled cheese and soup for supper, which was unbelievably delicious, and exactly what I wanted. Then we played with the kids for a bit before putting them down for the night.

Now, my loving husband is putting up curtain rods in our room so I can wash and hang our new curtains. I know the rest of the house is still a mess but its on its way! And I mainly just want our room back. I think its important to have a sane spot to go to amongst the mess. At least it is for me. So curtain rods, and then potentially a bit of touching up paint and a bit of cleaning. And THEN a soak and a snack. I made cake batter fudge the other day, which has been a delicious little sweet treat.

Tomorrow, the kids and I will have a date with Jerilee, which is SO much fun! She doesn’t judge our crazy house, and she fits into our family very well 🙂 Plus I’m looking forward to having some company in the day. I love my friends and family so much, and its sad going from having them around so often to having no company at all. Thanks for saving me tomorrow, friendy friend!