Today Would Be a Good Day

The bathroom is clean, the kitchen is clean, the laundry is caught up (except for the three loads that are currently being worn), everyone is healthy, Dennis isn't hauling beets yet, and I went to the store yesterday. Today would be a good day for baby to come, don't YOU think so? I sure do...

Abram's Signs

Abram has learned only one sign so far.

He says he's "all done."

He thinks that's so funny...

Monday's Child

I need to update an old post since three more children have been born since then.

Do you remember that poem called "Monday's Child" ?

Three of our kids have been born on a Sunday: Isaiah, Christopher and Abram
Three have been born on a Monday: Andrew, Ruby, and Elizabeth
One on a Tuesday: Nathaniel
Two were born on a Thursday: Linnea and Elijah
and Ivy was born on a Friday.

I'm up in the middle of the night wondering what this baby will be?

Monday's child is fair of face,

Tuesday's child is full of grace;

Wednesday's child is full of woe,

Thursday's child has far to go;

Friday's child is loving and giving,

Saturday's child works hard for its living;

But the child that is born on the Sabbath day

Is bonny and blithe, and good and gay.

Wordless Wednesday: She Attracts My Lens

Bipper's 9th Birthday

Our Bipper has a birthday on 9/11.

He and I went to lunch that day, just him and me.

I am rarely one-on-one with the kids so this was extra special.

He was wanting something specific for his birthday from a sports store,

so we decided he should just pick it out.

We didn't find it in our price range at the sports store,

but we did find something at Target that he really liked just as well--

this shirt and some "sports" pants:

He also got Dispicable Me 2 which we watched together on the night of his birthday

with pizza and popcorn IN THE LIVING ROOM.

He had a great day!

For his "cake" he requested Special K bars.

Blowing out all NINE candles!

You Need to Try These

If you haven't tried these,

you need to.

Seriously.

I mean it.

They are sooooooooo good.

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

I had Linnea make some up and froze a bunch for snacks when the baby arrives.

Happy Birthday, Linnea

Happy 14th birthday to my horsey girl Linnea. 

You are a great help to me and I appreciate you. 

I love your honesty, your courage and your spunk.

(a picture of a picture, since Linnea was born before the digital age.)

Elizabeth has been wanting to wear a hat lately.

I don't wonder why.

ReCap

You may have noticed some time lapsed between this post and this one.

What was I doing?

I'll tell you.

A couple days before the boys' first football game,

my little people started coughing.

And coughing.

And coughing.

And coughing.

And coughing some more.

They all stayed home from the game with Linnea

but I really thought most were on the upswing...

sleeping better, maybe coughing less, etc.

Except when I got back from the game,

I could tell Abram was not feeling better--

he was worse.

I decided to take him to be seen

and since the facility where I decided to go has no urgent care,

we went to the ER.

He was admitted to the hospital.

Nathaniel was a "respiratory kid" and so was Andrew.

Elijah had a few bouts with this kind of thing when he was a baby/toddler, too,

so I knew enough to pack a bag with a change of clothes for me

even though I hoped we could just do a nebulizer treatment and be on our way.

It was a good thing I packed a bag,

and a book,

and my crochet bag

 because we were there from Saturday afternoon through Monday night.

If you've ever had a child hospitalized,

you know that sleep is hard to come by--

for both the child and the parent.

It seems as if every time one of you has just nodded off,

an alarm beeps, a monitor dings, it's time for vitals, etc.

And if you're a light sleeper like me,

even the most careful nurse who sneaks in to the room to do her check on the child

is enough to wake you.

I was tired, Abram was tired.

He was so upset at being confined.

He hated the oxygen tubing and constantly pulled at it.

He ripped his iv apart and had to have a splint-type thing put on his other arm 

(a "no-no board" they called it)

so that he couldn't bend either arm.

The meds made him hyper,

he wanted to walk around but couldn't because all of his

wires and leads would trip him up,

not to mention the small space of a hospital room

filled with a bed, a recliner, a humongo crib, iv pole, vitals monitor, etc., etc.

Linnea did a SUPER job holding down the fort in my absence;

I was so glad she was here while I was there!

Abram and I had to miss my family's annual hayride at my parents' house

and Dennis did, too, because hay was ready to be cut.

Bummer.

The younger kids were able to go and to tell you the truth, I'm not even sure how they got there!

Dennis handled it with my brother, I think. ;)

With all that sitting (for me), and basically no way to get my circulation going,

my legs swelled so, so much.

As in, I've never been that swollen in my life.

My legs were so very painful

and I was getting extremely anxious to leave the hospital.

The nurses, upon learning that I was 38 weeks along, would joke

how funny it would be if I had the baby since OB was just a couple doors down.

I didn't say much, I'd just laugh a bit,

but in my mind I was like, "No really--you don't understand..."

I was hoping and praying for Abram to get well enough for us to leave very soon

and for the new baby to please WAIT until I was home before deciding to arrive!

It took several days for the pain in my legs to subside.

With the help of a generous friend who supplied me with some oils for my issue 

as well as for the children's ongoing respiratory issue,

we were now on the mend.

Then it was Bipper's birthday.

And the next day there was no other option but to head to the grocery store for a few things,

which ended up being really taxing on my sore leg.

Then another football game.

Then church and a day of horseback riding for Linnea and a couple friends.

Monday was an appointment with my wonderful midwife.

That afternoon my other washing machine died too, leaving me  

days/weeks away from the arrival of my 11th child, with no working washing machine.

I cried.

However, I believe God whispered in the ear of someone we know

who then called me to say she wanted to buy me a washing machine.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!?!?!?!

Thank you, GOD!

(The new one will be arriving on Monday and is a bit smaller than either of my current non-working ones.

It will most certainly wash clothes well and Linnea and I will just keep that baby workin' all day long!

But if you happen to 

a) know someone who is good a appliance repair who would like to help a family out

or

b) have a functional washer just sitting in your garage for which you'd like to find a home 

let me know!

I believe the one washer is toast....not repairable or at the least, more expensive to repair than it would be to replace all the parts.

The other one I believe can be fixed; just waiting until after harvest to see if we can get that done.)

We met the person in town to get the details of delivery worked out

and now I excitedly wait until Monday for it to arrive!

I drove to my mom & dad's Thursday to wash several loads;

the kids didn't stop wearing clothes simply because

I had no working washer.

I did as much as I could before it was time to head to 

Andrew's football game.

Yesterday afternoon, Linnea and I went to the store for

enough-groceries-to-last-until-the-baby-comes-and-hopefully-beyond.

Honestly, meals are the hardest thing for me to wrap my brain around

when a new baby arrives.

Linnea has taken over much of the cooking

and can also do the shopping if the older boys will drive to town

so here's hoping this time will be a bit easier in that department!

So now I'm up in the middle of the night

(because it's common for me at nearly 39 weeks to 

pretty much no longer sleep)

and am trying to catch up on my some blog posts.

Bipper has a football game later this morning

and then we'll have supper with the grandparents to celebrate Linnea's 14th birthday.

Her birthday is on Sunday but with church,

a 4-H meeting, a provided golf date with her daddy-o,

and a youth group function that evening,

we're fitting it in when we can.

Of course,

any conversation or plan we make is followed by

"unless the baby comes."

Football

Our boys (and girls) enjoy football so much.

Our boys especially play ball on the yard a LOT.

They understand every inch of the game.

I do not.

But I get a kick out of their love for the game!

This year, it was made possible for Andrew and Christopher to play on a youth team.

Thankfully my oldest boys and my in-laws are willing to help drive them to practice and home again.

Watching these boys enjoy this sport on a team has been SO FUN.

Christopher, slightly built as he is, came home from the very first practice and said, 

"Some of the kids asked me if I was really old enough to play football because I'm so small.

And the coach said, 'You're a little guy....but I've had little guys do big things.' "

This is a picture from the first game day, September 6th.

~warming up before the game~

That's my boy in the middle, kicking his legs high!

Getting just a little nervous...and it was a warm morning, so he needed a little drink.

Christopher says it's hard to buckle the helmet once the shoulder pads are on,

so his coach is helping him with it.

aaaaaaaaand his shoes. :)

See that face?

That's the face of a boy who just got his first TACKLE.

Remember how I said those boys doubted him for his size?

This guy got EIGHT tackles that day!!

His coach told him "You're a MACHINE!!!"

We watched the other boys who had sized him up as too small

start to pat him on the back and thump him on the shoulder pads....

he was having the best time!

During half-time, I heard the coach say, 

"If you want to learn how to tackle, watch Christopher."

Such fun praise!

This kid is the smallest on the team by quite a ways but he plays big.

Christopher's game was at 9:00 and then we got to watch Andrew's team at 10:30.

He's number 44 and is warming up in this picture.

Christopher and his friend and two of his coaches watched the older boys' game from the sidelines.

Bipper stayed "tuned in" for the entire time.

I didn't get any good pictures of Andrew during his game because

he was always on the far side of the field.

But I did manage to get this one of my dad and him

after the game.

Those are some proud faces right there. :)

Andrew was named one of the captains

which makes us very proud.

He is a leader on his team and he's doing great things!

He got his first touchdown last night at a game

along with several tackles.

We are excited to see what the remainder of the season holds!

Wordless Wednesday: Elizabeth and Christopher

More Weekend Reading

Since birth is what's on my mind,

these links are all on that subject.

1.  36 Obvious Reasons You Are Capable of Natural Birth

2.  "I Would Never Have a Homebirth Because..."

3.  Women Speak Out About What's Gone Wrong with the United States Birthing System

4.  Lying-in:  Rest, Recovery, and Bonding

Miss Ruby had a Birthday

Ruby was born on Labor Day 2008.

This year, her birthday landed on Labor Day again.

It worked out well because we could have the grandparents 

over for supper on her actual birthday

because my parents had the day off from work.

Her godparents were also able to come for supper

and they brought her this lovely dress (among others)
and lovely PINK necklace.

 She needed new tennis shoes

and Grandma Cindy picked out the perfect pair!

 Her very own water bottle--

that the boys won't borrow!

This outfit is what we gave her--

it matched her new shoes perfectly.

On Monday (her birthday) I told her that we'd go outside and take some birthday pictures.

We kept spinning our wheels trying to clean the house in preparation for company

and then it clouded over and I just ended up telling her we'd have to do it the next day.

The sun was out and she and I had fun with these.

Ruby Kathryn--6 years old.

She wanted to be sure we captured her shoes. :)

She said over and over again that turning six was the best birthday EVER.