Easter 2012

7 months old already
My cute, stubborn curly girl

All my kids.

I call this picture "I have sisters"

My girls.

My oldest and my youngest

Can you say mischief?

Do you really want me to sit still?

Dan always does a "Mom" egg every year for me.

Alex admiring his egg

What's it like with 5 kids?

Well, at first I thought I was on the crazy train on the way to the looney bin. But now I've adjusted. :) Its great having 5 kids. A little crazy now and then, but I have no regrets.

I am constantly asked by people, "How do you handle 5 kids? I can barely handle my ____ (fill in the blank)". Well, there's no magic trick. But as I've thought about it, I've come to relate it a bit to running.

Right at first when you start running, it is really hard. When you first become a mom, it is really hard. You've never done this before. It wears you out. You don't know how other people who do more than you can possibly do what they are doing. But like running, you get stronger and are able to handle more. That doesn't mean that some days the miles don't seem harder than others. Some days feel like speedwork. But some days are more like the beautiful mountain trails. Overall things get easier. So, adding children to the family is kind of like adding miles to your workout. It is hard but gets easier. I can honestly say that each child has added so much joy to our family. I can't imagine my life without any of them.

Here's some recent pics from our family Valentine's party. Photos courtesy of Becca.

I think my blog is broken

Wordless Wednesday...from a month ago that wouldn't post

Sam's Birth Story

On Monday, I woke up just not feeling right. In the afternoon, I took a nap. When I woke up, I was getting mild contractions in my back. My contractions were erratic and never got consistent enough to go to hospital. About 10 pm, my contractions stopped except for maybe once an hour. I was a bit bummed, but since I had a scheduled induction for Tuesday morning, I was okay.

I woke up Tuesday morning at about 3 am and never got back to sleep. We had to be at the hospital at 6:30 am.

We got to the hospital and they hooked me up to the pitocin. I wanted them to break my water so things would progress faster, but said I had to be on antibiotics for 4 hours first since I was positive for Group B Strep. So, for the first 4 hours, I stayed at about a 3-4 cm. That's the same that I was when I checked in. Dan and I were actually starting to get bored. And the contractions weren't even as painful as the ones from the night before.

Around noon, my doctor had another doctor come break my water. That's when things start to get painful.

I am not what you'd call "crunchy" or a naturalist, but I decided that I didn't want an epidural this time. Epidurals take like 12 hours to wear off of me. They make me feel like crap. And after a lot of leg/back problems in the past year and half, I didn't want a needle in my back or my leg numb ever again. So, I didn't get an epidural.

My sister Jenny went without an epidural about 6 months ago when she had a baby. She went without because her insurance wouldn't cover it and it would cost her like $1000. She gave me a book and a lot of advice. She said that she would breathe deep 3 times and then the contraction was over. This is what I did. Except I had to breathe deep four times per contraction. I would count, and sometimes out loud. I knew that if I just made it through the 4, I would feel fine again. And I felt totally fine between contractions. I could talk and carry on like normal. Until the next contraction hit. When I was dialated to a 6, the nurse offered me a birthing ball. It was actually quite comfortable to sit on. And it made the baby drop down fast. And I suddenly felt nauseated. The nurse said its common to get nauseated during the transition.

After 2 contractions while sitting on the ball, the doctor arrived and they decided to check me. The doctor said I was 7-8 cm. He then said that he wanted to check me during the next contraction. He wanted me to push just a little so he could check the cervix during the contraction.

Well, I pushed a little, and my body took over. I couldn't stop pushing. The doctor only had one glove on and the nurse had to try and catch the baby with a towel. The doctor quickly put two gloves on and finished delivering the baby. The pushing/delivery was one of the most intense things I have ever been through. It was such a shock to me, I'm not sure how painful it was or wasn't. I don't really remember since it was so fast and intense. I think it was one of the fastest deliveries the doctor has ever had.

Poor baby Sam ended up with a bruised face from his quick exit. I felt bad for him.

After a 24 hour stay, we came home from the hospital. Our kids our so excited about the baby. Alex doesn't seem jealous at all yet.

Sam is such a sweet baby. I feel extremely blessed to have him. And I am so thankful for Dan and his support.

Summer Fun

We went camping at Payson Lake for a couple of Days. The lake was really beautiful. It was perfect for swimming and rafting. We saw some people with surf boards and oars. That looked fun! Maybe next year.

Dan bought a gigantic bag of gummy worms. I think that's what Anna and Alex subsisted off of.

Caleb being silly like usual.

This was the first time we actually brought our dog along. Our kids loved having the dog along. Our dog liked it, but wasn't happy that he wasn't allowed in the lake too.

I must say that Dan is much better rowing the boat than me. Its a lot harder than it looks. He took a lot of trips out to the middle with the kids. I only went out once or twice, and not very far. I mostly rowed in circles. I gave up on the oars and rowed with my hands for a while too. Rachel jumped out in the middle of the lake (its not that big) and swam back. She was wearing a life jacket, so we weren't worried she was going to drown. She thought that was great.
A couple of funny things that happened:

First, in the middle of the night on the first night, our bed in the tent-trailer partially collapsed. I guess the previous owner fixed it, but obviously not very good. We were sleeping---well I wasn't cause I had heartburn---and all of the sudden our bed dropped a foot. Dan was startled awake and said a 4 letter word. One of our kids happened to be awake and heard this. Let's just say, Dan probably hasn't heard the end of that. We made do with sleeping with the bed mostly pushed in the trailer instead of pulled-out. Dan is going to fix it the right way. I keep telling him we should get one last camping trip in before I have the baby, but he's too worried that I'll go into labor while we're camping.

The other funny thing was Alex. He decided that he wanted to go wash his hands in the faucet by the outhouse without telling anyone where he was going.
We suddenly heard him screaming and running hysterically towards us. Right as he got to me, he tripped and fell. (Ok, that wasn't funny). He said that a giant truck was chasing him. He happened to be walking right down the middle of a one-lane road, so the truck was slowly following him since he didn't get out of the way. I guess he thought they were chasing him. Probably doesn't sound too funny, but it was so laughable at the time.

We had a great time and will definitely go back camping there again.

Alex on a ride at the SL County fair.

Cassie, Caleb and Rachel decided to try out a ride that was a bit scary at the fair. Rachel and Caleb did not feel well after this ride. I guess they get motion sick. They didn't want to ride anything else after this one. I stopped at Wendy's for a frosty for everyone on the way home. Neither of them felt good enough to eat theirs. They did eat theirs later after recovering on the couch for a while.

Anna riding the motorcycle. My nephew Jake is in the background. Part way through the ride, he decided he didn't like it, and screamed the rest of the time. Anna and Alex didn't want to get off.

36 week appointment

I am still measuring big. I am measuring 38 cm when I should be 36. I am dialated to 1 and 50% effaced. I sure hope this baby comes early. Here's a picture at 35 weeks. In all of my other pregnancies, I avoided ever getting my picture taken. This time, I figure that it won't last forever, and I want to remember what I looked like.

My sister Angie just highlighted my hair today. Jenny is going to give me a haircut later today. It makes me feel a lot better to get my hair done. Last week was ponytail week, as you can see from the pic.