Starting up again

Sometimes it is hard to do things that I know other people would enjoy and appreciate but I can just never seem to find the motivation to do. Sharing pictures and stories about my family on my blog can just be so difficult sometimes! But at the same time when I get comments I get all giddy (so leave comments!) and I also love reading all of your blogs and seeing the pictures of your families that I am so far away from. So, thank you for sharing and posting so that I can still see some of what is going on in your lives even though I am so far from home!

Sarah

Boredom

During the summer it gets hot and humid. And I don't like it. Period. It makes me never want to go outside unless we are in the water but not every day because then that would get boring. 

Last year I found the website Play at Home Mom and I saw this idea for the boys that I finally got the guts to do. My boys can be a little... messy... rambunctious... 

Dallin definitely liked the trucks the most. 

Tristan liked rubbing his hands in it and saying rice! rice! rice!

It sure kept them busy on one of those scorcher of a days that we had in August that I did not enjoy. 

New journeys

It is amazing how quickly time flies. It is amazing how quickly my boys grow. Especially Warren. When you think about the fact that he has doubled his body size since he was born, time is just flying by! 

This cute little munchkin is finally old enough for solid food. He isn't a big fan of oatmeal but he likes sweet potatoes and bananas! Tomorrow is a big day, butternut squash! 

Just a few months ago he had no control over his whole body but now when he sees a spoon he GOES for it!

He just instinctively knew what to do when the spoon started coming towards his mouth and definitely makes the least mess out of any of my children.

It is amazing the differences between children though. Dallin wanted his pacifier, Tristan wanted his finger and Warren... Warren is happy to not need anything, except maybe me. 

Brothers

 My dear sweet boys love to have me take pictures of them and will sit there happily posing for me for picture after picture until the camera is full. 

I think this is one of the best pictures of Tristan EVER! So happy looking when he shows his happy face! 

Tristan loves to hold Warren and snuggle him and kiss him and share pillows and blankets with him. Dallin has recently started to become interested in him, playing with him and singing to him and reading books to him. I can't wait until Warren starts crawling and how much more Dallin and Tristan will want to play with him. Until he starts to destroy their train tracks and towers and such... 

I think that my boys will be good friends as they grow up, especially if Chris and I are able to help foster that relationship and encourage it to grow now while they are young. 

And Dallin as the oldest will be a good example and a help to his younger brothers, like teaching them patty-cake. 

And they might not always appreciate the help, crying a bit, but I am pretty sure these boys of mine will be a happy bunch more often than not and grow up playing together. 

Dallin skiing at the Lake

Going to the Lake is lots of fun and we haven't been back since the end of July. I hope we can get down there to swim one more time! But I kinda doubt we will make this year when it is warm. Anyway! 

Here is Dallin with his cousins and Grandma on the boat on Dallin's first ski trip!

Me and Tristan and Warren. I love how Tristan just sits there and sucks his finger. Who cares about being on the boat, having fun, I have my finger!

Here is Dallin on the boom trying to go. He always let his feet drag behind his body but he considered it a success. 

Swimming back to the boat with Daddy and Grandma.

Sitting in the front of the boat going vroom vroom! Warren wasn't a big fan of the wind but it was nice to get out for a bit that day. 

Bumble Bee... Or is it?

So for the 4th of July we went down to The Lake with all of Chris's family. We all had a good time and pretty much the only thing we did was be in the water. Tristan is not all that fond of the water. And so we bought this floaty for him. He saw it and was convinced it was a bumble bee. I am not quite sure what it is but I do know that I have seen bugs of approximately the same size here in Maryland... It is a scary place to live! 

Swing high!

Chris recently took down the swing in the front yard and found the only other spot in our yard suitable for a swing and put a new one up. We even bought fancy rope for it. Ha! Dallin picked out the green color. It is much taller than the previous one and more level. Though you can see all the growth behind the boys that they can potentially swing into. Beggars can't be choosers though when it comes to available swing limbs on trees. 

 Tristan does love a good swing. He will always say HIGH HIGH HIGH! And he won't stop saying it until either you push him or walk away from him. 

Can you tell Dallin dressed himself? Or Chris might have... Either way, I would never put my child in stripes AND plaid. *shivers* Dallin does love to swing too and always asks to go so high that he can touch the sky. Where does he come up with all these catchy phrases?

Growing up so fast.

I feel like it has been unusually cool this summer so far, but I am not complaining! Far from it! I love the cool weather. Anyway, one evening we were outside and Chris got home from work and were taking pictures and I wanted to get some of Warren so we could see how big he is getting!

I look so skinny in this picture but really I am just sucking it in! I have all this baby weight I need to get rid of but it is so hard to motivate myself to do anything more than just limiting my intake. Though I will admit I have gotten better about sugary things since I can't have dairy while nursing Warren. He and I don't do well on dairy. It makes Chris sad. 

 My happy smiley flying boy! 

He is now 3 months old! I finally feel like he has been in our family "forever". It is hard to imagine what life was like without him. He is really laid back and doesn't mind that I have to ignore him lots to deal with the older boys. He sleeps from 8:30 to 7:30 and wakes up usually once in there to eat around 2 or 3. He had been going all night long without waking up but then we went on a trip to the Lake and it screwed him up but we will get back there. 

My little monkey

As usual it has been a while since I updated my blog. I wanted to take a few minutes and post some stuff that we have been doing lately. I won't put a lot of text on, just a few photos here and there to let you know that we are alive and healthy and the boys are all growing up and let you know what my little boys enjoy. 

This is Tristan in the tree right in front of our living room window. He loves to climb in it and swing and be a little monkey and then he yells at me Mommy! Monkey! Ooh ooh ahh! Too cute. Dallin swings too but he doesn't say that he is a monkey. 

Tristan is quite the climber. Dallin was never much for climbing, preferring to escape with speed rather than up a tree. So it is fun to have Tristan so good at climbing, always willing to scale the wall or playground or bed. 

Warren Lee's Birth Story

I was anxious about having Warren come close to the time that my mom, Nana, came into town because I was nervous that I wouldn’t be able to handle lack of sleep and three children on my own. Sometimes I still wonder if I can… My mom flew in on Easter Sunday, April 8^th, 2012. We left church early and picked her up at the airport and went home and had Easter Egg hunts and food and just a nice relaxing day. I remember Dallin and Tristan did not want to go to bed that night and I was afraid that my mom would think that I was raising little hellions. Eventually though they did calm down and go to bed and so did the adults.

At about 10:30 p.m., about 15 minutes after we had gotten into bed, Dallin woke up complaining about growing pains. I pushed Chris out of bed to go check on him and Chris didn’t know what Dallin wanted. So I was called in and I immediately knew what Dallin wanted. He wanted the “comfy oil”, some massage oil I got for the hospital, and a massage from Mommy. So I sent Chris back to bed and I got some oil and as I started rubbing Dallin’s leg I felt my water slowly start to break and leak down my leg. I didn’t remember it feeling so gross when my water broke with Dallin but it was!

So I go clean up and call the hospital and my midwife was on call until 8 the next morning and I was hoping she would be able to deliver me again. No such luck. She told me to wait until the contractions were regular before I come in. And if the happened to stop I would need to come in to the hospital in the morning. I figured I would have contractions for quite a few hours and then go in and have Warren, easy peasy, just like when I had Tristan. No such luck.

I had contractions from 11 p.m. until about 4 a.m. That was the last time I had looked at the time before I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until 5:29 a.m. when Dallin and Tristan both started to cry. I quickly realized that I wasn’t having contractions anymore. I didn’t expect that. So I called the hospital and talked to Kay again and she said eat breakfast and get ready and then come in. By the time we got there she was going off duty so a different midwife was going to deliver me when the time finally came.

We got settled in and I changed and eventually the midwife came in and had me sign the consent to treatment form and immediately I realized that I didn’t like her much. She was kind of a downer. And my nurse was too bubbly for my taste as well. I didn’t want someone who wanted to talk to me the whole time I was in labor. I was nervous though because it had been a few hours since I had last felt a contraction. We told the nurse we were going to walk around and she said great and so we walked and walked. Mary Beth, the midwife, wanted me to start the pitocin at 10 a.m. because that was about the 12-hour mark from when my water had broken and she wanted to get things going. I understood that but at the same time she hadn’t given me any time really to get my body going, trying to start contractions. So I declined and she didn’t seem happy with my answer. I understood that I needed to have Warren come out but I wanted to have the birth go my way as much as possible. I didn’t like being pushed in the doctors direction when I had Dallin, I didn’t get a chance to let my body work on its own and I didn’t want to do that again because I felt pretty unfulfilled after Dallin was born but I felt great and empowered after Tristan was born. I knew what I wanted and the midwife wasn’t listening. Phooey on her.

So I declined the Pitocin and Chris and I started to walk and walk and walk. Lots of walking. We even did stairs at one point. But the stairwell was like 15 degrees hotter than the rest of the hospital and we couldn’t handle it so we went back to walking the halls. At this point the maternity ward was getting busy and when we walked back into our room I heard them telling a woman in labor (early labor) to go back to the waiting room and just try to relax, put her feet up and they would come get her when they had a spot for her. I would not want to have been her!

I forgot to mention earlier that since my water had broken the midwife didn’t want to check me. So when I got there she didn’t check me and the nurse wasn’t allowed to check me and Mary Beth didn’t want to check me until I said I had to push. I didn’t like her… Anyway, so Chris and I walked and walked and nothing was happening. Nada. Nilch. No contractions. So at 12 o’clock I had to be monitored again and Warren was doing great and I said that 2 hours of walking was enough, start me on pitocin. After about an hour my nurse got the go-ahead to start me on it and Mary Beth finally checked me and I was at a grand total of 1½cm dilated and 70% effaced and at a -3. Which meant that I had not progressed at all in the last week. So Chris and I walked a bit more after the pitocin was started but it was so hard because the monitors on my belly were just such a pain. Eventually we just ended up back in our room and I just lay in bed. Waiting for things to progress.

But nothing happened. At 5 I was starting to feel uncomfortable so I got the epidural, which I didn’t want to do. I hate the feeling of not feeling. I like to be able to move and feel when someone is touching my legs and most importantly I like to be able to push in any position, but that wasn’t going to happen with an epidural. It was a slight blow to moral but honestly the bigger blow was just having to get the pitocin. So after 15 minutes I couldn’t feel anything and was stuck in bed and bored. I had a book and I read some of that and Chris pulled out his laptop and we watched Heavyweights, a movie from both our childhoods that we wanted to watch again. I was bored and I couldn’t move. So I was kind of grumpy. But it was nice to spend the time with Chris, who knew how bummed I was that nothing was going my way. We were alone a lot because Mary Beth was in with another patient delivering (it took like 2 hours of pushing, that is just crazy to me) and my nurse was in with someone who was actually progressing and then delivering so we just got stuck on the back burner.

Mary Beth was supposed to come in at 10 p.m. and check me because that was the 24 hour mark from when my water broke. She was an hour late because another mother was delivering (that one took an hour of pushing, still crazy to me). When she finally got in to me she checked me and gave me an update of how I was progressing… I was at a 4. A big whopping 4. Can we say depressed? Because at this point if I had had an O.B. they would have started prepping me for a c-section. Since I had a midwife she told me that I had two options. I could go ahead and have a c-section while we knew both Warren and I were healthy, or we could wait until either I spiked a fever (my temp had started rising and I was at 99.1 at that point) and hit 100 degrees and have a c-section or if Warren started to show signs of distress I would have a c-section. I didn’t want the c-section so we chose to wait until the fever or fetal distress. They started me on triple antibiotics since that is routine procedure for someone who has had their water ruptured for 24 hours.

At this point we were feeling pretty certain that we were looking at a c-section and I was emotional, to say the least. I called Carolyn and my mom and Becca since I had been talking to them all earlier. I cried like a baby because I just didn’t know what was going to happen at this point and I really didn’t want to have a c-section for two reasons. 1- the recovery time is longer and my mom could only stay so long before I had to take care of all 3 boys on my own and 2-Warren would have to go to the NICU immediately and they weren’t certain if he would be accepted there because it would be full. If that happened Warren and Chris would be transported to the Johns-Hopkins hospital in Baltimore and I would be alone at the hospital until my mom could come keep me company. I really really didn’t want that to happen. To not have Chris by my side would be bad enough but to not even be able to see my brand new baby and not take him home for a few days would have been a killer.

There was lots of crying and praying at this point and eventually we decided to try to get some sleep. The nurses kept coming in to check my temperature and see if I needed anything. I was so scared of what was going to happen. I knew that in the end what was most important was to have a healthy me and a healthy Warren but I didn’t know how we were going to get there. Sometimes I wonder if it was the Lord’s way of letting me know that he is in charge of things… having everything go wrong, or at least differently from how I had imagined things going. I was leaning very heavily on him at this point and just wanted Warren to come and to not have a c-section even though with each visit from a nurse or Mary Beth it didn’t seem likely.

So at about 2:30 a.m. my nurse came in and kept telling me that I needed to get off my back and onto one of my sides. Not an easy feat to do when your lower extremities are numb. I kept telling her that I didn’t want to because it hurt to be on my sides. She told me to press the epidural release button and I kept saying I had and that it wasn’t working and that it still hurt. I figured that since this birth was not going in any way shape or form how I wanted that I was going to at least lay on my back. She didn’t like that response so she moved my legs and rolled me onto my back. I didn’t like that nurse… I told her almost immediately that it hurt though and that I didn’t want to lay on my side. She left and came back a few minutes later with another nurse and they were going to check my epidural to make sure it was working properly. But she decided that she would go ahead and check me. I was surprised by this because Mary Beth had said she didn’t want anyone checking me except her and even then it was going to be infrequent. So I say whatever and she checks me. And says to me, “Well that is why you are so uncomfortable, he is right there, you are ready to push!” I say what? And she repeated that I was ready to push and at a 10. In 4 hours I had dilated 6 cm. In the previous 10 hours I had only dilated 2 ½ cm. It was totally unexpected. So I threw a pillow at Chris and was crying and said “I’m at a 10! I get to push!” I was soooo sooo happy!

So at that point it was 3 a.m., 29 hours after my water had ruptured. And then it took the next half hour for her to set up the room for the delivery. If I had not had the epidural she would not have kept me waiting for a half hour. I should have just started pushing without their consent… Anyway, she sets everything up and then wants to see me push before she calls Mary Beth. So I push and with one push she could see his head and she told me to stop and she called Mary Beth, who showed up and wanted to see me push before she got ready. So I pushed and she could see his head and so she got ready. Why she couldn’t just get ready before that is beyond me. I did not like Mary Beth. Or my nurse. But whatever. So she gets ready and tells me I can finally start pushing, so I do. Then she tells me to stop and she told Chris to lower the bed. The I could push again, then she told Chris to lower the bed again. I think she did it one more time and I wanted to kill her. After the second push Warren’s head was out I believe and I just wanted to meet him and hold him after the emotionally trying day I had had. So finally she said I could push him all the way out and she handed him up to me and I was just bawling. It was such a great moment. I enjoyed getting to hold Dallin and Tristan for the first time but this time around I had been waiting and so scared about how it was all going to happen that the emotional relief from being able to have a vaginal delivery and finally getting to hold him was so great. I don’t think I cried with my other boys but this was a very emotional birth for me and I was just so happy that things had worked out how they had in the end. I would have preferred a birth like Tristan’s but to not have a c-section was pretty awesome!

So now Warren is 3 weeks old and I feel so grateful that we have this little boy in our house. Dallin and Tristan love him so much already and they love to hold him and kiss him and touch him. Right this moment Dallin is telling me that Warren likes him and he likes to play games with Warren and he loves him.  It still seems so new to me that he is here and it still doesn’t feel like Warren has always been here but we will get there and I am just so glad for my health and Warren’s health and for my wonderful family. 

My shower time

I have to take a shower every day. If I don't, we are lazy all day and doing anything from diapers to feeding us is a monumental task for me. So I always try to take a shower before or right after breakfast. Unfortunately I am usually joined by at least one if not two little boys. So my showers are very quick. 

Tristan has been letting me take a shower by myself this week though and it was pretty nice. But then I realized that he must be getting into things that he shouldn't be getting into while I am in the shower. Such as, yesterday, he came in sounding very pathetic, saying "please". I look out and he is holding two packs of gummies out to me. I had left the cabinet open and he noticed it while I was showering and went and found his favorite food. 

And then today, as I was heading in to take my shower, I asked Dallin if he would share his cereal with Tristan. If Dallin wakes up before Chris leaves for work they always eat a bowl of cereal together. So I hop in the shower and am almost done when I hear Tristan coming into the bathroom saying "help". He walks over to the edge of the curtain and holds Dallin's cereal bowl in to me, asking me to please help him get the last few pieces of cereal. So I am sitting there in the shower, feeding Tristan the last of Dallin's cereal. When it is all gone he says "thank you", takes the spoon and bowl from me and puts them back on the table. What is he going to do if I ever start locking the door?

No fear!

Our windows have great sills for little feet. I find little footprints on them all the time. Thankfully they aren't up very high, only about 2 feet off the ground. But the amazing thing is that Tristan got up here one night without standing on anything to climb up there. Dallin must have helped him. Talk about brotherly love and trust. 

He can get up but getting down is a little tricky for him and I think he is too heavy for Dallin to help him down. 

Do all kids do this?

A few nights ago Dallin, after we put the boys to bed, he came to his door and was asking us to please come see his room because he had put his books away. 

Imagine our surprise that he had actually picked all of his library books off of the floor, put them in his bed and arranged them in a very organized fashion. He was so pleased with himself and even suckered Chris into reading him another story that night. 

Wii are Fit

When Chris gets home from work some days, or on the weekends, he will play WiiFit with the boys. They LOVE it! Dallin has favorite ones and so does Tristan. They even have their own balance boards, my cutting boards. Occasionally I will play it with the boys though and I let them try out being on the real balance board sometimes. This is Tristan helping work out my arms. I don't remember what game I was playing with him, I just knew that afterwards my arms were tired from leaning him all over the board, trying to finish in time. I think we were doing the math one. Either that or the bubble one. 

Tristan's favorite one is the obstacle course and he does surprisingly well by himself. He just doesn't know when to stop in time but it's okay because he thinks it is hilarious when he falls off the edge. 

Daddy is so cool

There are lots of differences between Mommy and Daddy and the boys know this. They also know that Daddy is a lot more fun and interactive and more of a play thing than Mommy is. But only Daddy could make wearing his shorts around on your head an awesome game that takes up half an hour. 

Mommy must be really boring in comparison if she can't make shorts seem as much fun as Daddy can... 

Potty Training Round 2?

In January I decided that I wanted to have Tristan potty trained before Warren comes along so we took a few days and tried to work with him. I have decided that it isn't going to happen quite yet even if I want it to happen. He doesn't show enough interest in going in the potty and if we do sit him on the potty, it totally throws off his poopin' groove and so then we wind up having 2 poopy diapers instead of 1 but they are an hour or two apart... I can live with the idea that we will continue diapering him but he WILL be trained by the time he is 2 since he has some massive thighs that put him in the largest diaper size before you have to move to pull-ups (a rip-off). It is just so interesting the difference between Dallin and Tristan though. Dallin has a very small petite patootie where as Tristan fills out Dallin's undies in a way that Dallin probably won't be able to achieve until he is at least 5 years old.  But Tristan does look pretty stinkin' cute in them. 

Computing

One of the boys favorite past times is to steal my lap top. After having half the keys taken off at one point I am usually pretty good about closing it and putting it off to the side of the couch. Tristan is especially dangerous to lap tops these days. Dallin just wants to look up pictures of trains but Tristan likes to "compute"  as Chris calls it. 

In this instance I believe I had to go help Dallin on the potty and Tristan was left playing with his toys in the living room. I had put the lap top on the back of the couch, leaving it open, thinking I would be back in just a moment. When I came back Tristan had grabbed it and was sitting there quietly saying a word over and over again. I couldn't understand what it was but I think he was trying to tell me he was computing. 

Wild and Crazy?

So Chris and I have been discussing our parenting lately. Mostly in regards to the fact that our children don't sit still (really only a problem in Sacrament meeting so far) and sometimes they get into situations that cause pain and suffering. Pain to themselves and suffering for the parents. 

This happened to be one of those instances. Dallin climbed over the arm of the couch and started running on the couch and dove nose first into the opposite arm. Needless to say there was lots of crying. And blood... We couldn't tell if his nose was broken or if it was just bloody because he was in tears and bleeding and wouldn't let us near his owie. He did calm down a bit after he asked for a band-aid for his nose. I wish we had gotten a picture of the swelling... 

We are pretty sure that his nose isn't broken, just a tad sore and I think he might have torn some of the skin. If I just take his shirt off over his head without care and consideration he cries and reminds us that he needs a band-aid... 

All in all I don't feel like we are bad parents but I do feel at times like these that maybe we do let them run a little... wild...