7 Quick Takes-- Long Over Due Pictures and other things

One--pictures from the hospital

This baby is so big that she fits the baby bunny already. It took several--many many many--weeks for Marigold to fit it. Here she is all ready to go home from the hospital. Amazing.

 Marigold was VERY SURPRISED by her visit to the hospital and not terribly delighted. She's been tantruming pretty regularly the last two weeks and by regularly, I mean several times a day. Never had a baby seriously fling herself down in anger and hysteria this young. I feel terrible because she was so Happy before (I know, I know, happiness is totally overrated) and sweet, at least as compared to Gladys who started her tough girl act so early in life.

I know we'll all recover and eventually she will enjoy Baby as much as the rest of us, but I reserve the right to cry about it as much as I want to until then.

Two--The night before going to the hospital

Look!!! The children are wearing their Christmas PJs. It might be Christmas!
Coming Soon--the children in their Christmas clothes. 

 Having had extra days waiting for Baby to turn, I baked three batches of cinnamon rolls, made a vat of oatmeal and turned half of it into breakfasty scones, and made two trays of rice krispyish treats (fancied up--peanut butter, raisins, peanuts, and whatever else I had in the cupboard).

 Three--A Snow Day

We've had many many chances to be in the snow. I need a good way to hang snow suits. Right now they get piled in a corner of the playroom in between snows. Here's Elphine and Alouicious.

 Gladys

Marigold trying to stand before going in the snow. She was very surprised by the whole activity--the clothes, the cold, everything.

Marigold in the snow really for the first time without screaming.

 Picture taken through the window.

 Cat from the inside.

Four--This last week

If you're on facebook you'll know that I got sick on Monday--well, I don't know if you can call it 'getting sick'. I wasn't paying careful attention to the fact that this huge baby doesn't really eat ever 2 hours like a newborn should. She really eats every 4 to 6 hours. I thought this was great until Monday night when I began to be in such massive pain that I figured I was going to die. So we went to the walk in Tuesday and I came home with a nice ten day antiobiotic, some more motrin and the dreaded and bovine breast pump which I still refuse to use when there's not an actual emergency. I actually spent Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in bed and then yesterday hobbling feebly around moaning and whining.

Five--A Sweeping Generalization

It is true that if men had to breast feed they just wouldn't do it. Matt looks wonderingly at me every time I grit my teeth and attach this massive mewling infant to the most sensitive part of my body. It is nuts. Men are just more rational than women, besides having a lower tolerance for pain. How is that for a couple of broad sweeping over generalizations?

Six--Another Snow Day

I'm sitting here in my warm office watching cars trying to pull into the church lot. Three have slipped and fallen back into the road with cars coming surprisingly fast behind them, but so far no accidents. The snow is plunging from the sky and yet everyone is driving along as if there is no weather. Crazy north-easterners.

Seven--I am reading books but I'm not having a good time

I HAVE to catch up on Treasure Island today. Managed never to read it as a child and am having to read it now with my class. Of course is a wonderfully written adventure story that every child should read. I just so dislike adventures--both in books, in movies and in real life. Having managed to get through the Hobbit this year my cup of adventure is virtually full and yet after this I still face Robin Hood, King Arthur, and The Shadow of the Bull (maybe, maybe I'll weasel out of that one). Jessica wrote an excellent post about what we're paying the writer of fiction for, what is it that we want? As I reach the midpoint of Treasure Island I've discovered that I'm willing to pay for brilliantly funny writing. That's why I'm always reading at least one Wodehouse book and sometimes nothing else at all. For me, Wodehouse is the Last Word in Funny.

Have a great weekend and go check out Jen!

Resting Up

I was persuaded to stay home from school for another day, ostensibly to get some rest, but in reality so that I can seriously clean the boys room without interference from them. Alouicious and Elphine, both, are already developing into pack rats--sequestering little bits of cardboard out of the recycling into strange nooks, and gathering broken bits of whatever they can find to "save for later". I am deeply against this habit. The more stuff you save and hang onto, whether bits of cardboard or broken bits of china (my particular hoarding vice), the more you have to be prepared to walk away from should Jesus suddenly decide to come back. I have this fear of being caught in my kitchen with a basket of broken saucers trying to decide to put it down so I can be caught up in the air to meet my Lord.

Anyway, so I'm going to at least get started on their room, and also take a nap, and maybe bake a pie. I don't know.The little ones need to learn to read so maybe I'll just do that today too. Personally, I don't understand why Matt keeps calling me "irrational" just because I'm all weepy from being "too tired" by the evening to "do anything more at all".

You know what! I think I'll chuck it all and go straight for the pie. That baby is going to want to eat again in an hour and I don't think I'll be able to really provide for her unless I've eaten a whole pie myself.

Have a great day!

That is a baby

I hope you'll congratulate me on the birth of our new baby...girl who looks just like Mr. Churchill, scowl and all. We have a real name but not a blog name yet. Some of the contenders are Ermentrude and Hyacinth (because she was born on the same day as the actor who plays Mrs. Bucket's poor husband). She weighed, at birth 8 lbs 13 oz (one ounce off of the last ultrasound in spite of being consoled over and over by the doctor, all the nurses and most everyone else, that those things are like a pound off and completely inaccurate). She's not very long and, I would say, not very big, just solidly heavy and covered in layers of fat.

I really appreciate all the prayers that she would turn--which she did without help from the doctor. I actually fell heavily in the snow right before going in to the hospital which shook us both up very much and immediately made everything feel different.

So, in case you're thinking about having a baby any time soon, I thought I would suggest some things you can do while you're in labor and then maternity.

While Laboring You Can
Listen to Matt read sermons by John McArthur about women being saved through child birth
Listen to Palestrina
Sing the Fruits of the Spirit song over and over in your head and realize that having all those things isn't actually supposed to be a passive activity but something you make an effort at (a little).
Have the hymn Come Labor On become permanently lodged in your head (I'm not kidding, I began to be hysterically unable to get the words to go away.)
Whine about being in pain and how much you hate labor and giving birth
Gaze out at the landscape and realize that Binghamton in the winter looks just like Communist Russia
Hear over and over that you 1. have a proven pelvis so everything will be fine and 2. have a tired uterus because you have had SO MANY children already
Seriously consider hugging the Epidural person for making it feel a lot like Christmas
Reminisce about growing up in Africa with the nurse who is also an MK only from the Philippines
Finally give up and give birth

While in Maternity You Can
Eat two dinners and then two breakfasts
Spend the night praying for the baby next door who is not eating, not sleeping and unhappy about everything
Read all the Father Brown Mysteries you were intending to read while laboring
Discover something called Percocet
Remodel the Maternity ward in your head
Count the seconds until you can go home
Continue to be completely amazed by how fat your new baby is
Freak out that your awesome new Kim Kardashian approved Belly Bandit will be way too small
Finally be allowed to go home

Pictures to follow!