Boys

Yesterday as we were driving to visit some friends we overheard this conversation (Note: the names have been "changed" to protect the unsuspecting "boys"):

Ellie: Lizzie do you like boys?
Lizzie: I don't know...what do you mean?
Ellie: I mean do you like any boys?
Lizzie: I know some boys.
Ellie: I don't like boys...except "boy A" and "boy B" and I know "boy C" so him too I guess.
Lizzie: yeah, they are ok since we know them, so they can be our friends, but no other boys.
Ellie: Yeah.

Happy Father's Day!

Thank you Allen for being such an amazing daddy to our girls.

We love you and are so glad you put up with all the drama and pinkness that goes on in a house FULL of girls :-)

Time Goes By So Much Faster with Four

I am starting to think I need to redo-rename-and renew my blog.

With Four Little ones running around (ok only 3 running, but the 4th is busy with her own needs, so that counts as 4 running...right?)...

Where was I going with this, Oh, yeah, running around.

Yeah I find myself often running around like a crazy person trying to remember why I left the kitchen in a panic headed for a bedroom, but unable to remember what was so urgent because before I reach the room that "needs" me I have been asked 1,000 questions;


none of which did I actually hear because after the words "Mommy I..." I began to pass another room that had the all too busy 2 year old who has apparently been left alone far longer than should be, because she is sitting in the middle of a room covered in shredded wet wipes. She immediately looks up in a moment of guilt, or manipulation (not sure yet) and says, "Sorry, Mama." and then hangs her head just enough to indicate shame, but not so much that she can't also glance up to see my reaction.


Where was I going? Just as I am about to lose my mind, I remember where I was going because the crying that started me in motion has begun again. I quickly silence the questioning, command the 2 yr old to put the wipes away and enter the bedroom of the littlest only to be greeted with a smell that makes me wish I could sit in a room alone quietly shredding wet wipes into microscopic bits trying to see just how small I can make them before they disappear into nothing.

All that to say, sorry for the neglect of this little blog. It has been a bit crazy :-)

UPS modes of Transportation

I have been needing new kitchen knives for sometime. With our recent tax return, we decided that now was the time to replace the ones I have been using and abusing for the past 10 years (yes, I DID put them in the dishwasher over and over again...now I understand why I shouldn't have). Anyway, I researched and finally ordered a complete set of knives in a wood block that both fit our budget and my kitchen needs. I have been anxiously watching the UPS tracking in anticipation of their arrival. But when the big day came and I checked our front porch again and again, only to find snow flakes and silence, my first thought was, "it must be the snow keeping them away. It will be here tomorrow." But the next day, the same thing, an empty and cold front porch. I finally went back to my original form of keeping up on my package and found this:

Shipment Progress

Location	Date	Local Time	ActivityWhat's This?
Portland, OR, United States	02/25/2011	1:16 A.M.	Train derailment.
Hodgkins, IL, United States	02/22/2011	10:24 A.M.	Departure Scan
	02/22/2011	2:54 A.M.	Arrival Scan
Palatine, IL, United States	02/22/2011	2:09 A.M.	Departure Scan
Palatine, IL, United States	02/21/2011	6:34 P.M.	Origin Scan
United States	02/21/2011	6:03 P.M.	Order Processed: Ready for UPS

That's right, my package along with many others is on a train that is no longer on the tracks. Hopefully everyone is ok, and no one was injured, and hopefully my package along with many other peoples' packages will be on their way again soon. Amazing what you can learn from tracking a package :-)

Lizzie's New Look

So a couple of weeks ago we began noticing that Lizzie was struggling to read letters and write clearly. After some more observing and a visit to the eye doctor, we found that Lizzie has a pretty bad astigmatism. We ordered her glasses and they finally came in yesterday.


Doesn't she look adorable?







So far she is doing well with them, though I never realized how many rules there would be for a pair of glasses :

- don't touch the lenses
- don't take them off and leave them lying around
- take them off when playing tickling games (with 4 girls there isn't much "rough housing")
- put them in the case when you go to bed at night
- don't let your sisters wear them



And I am sure there are more. Can you think of any???

Amazon.com Girl

So Ellie is our tall, active girl who is probably the girliest of our 4 girls (so far). She loves everything pink, sparkly and will ALWAYS choose a dress or skirt over a pair of pants or shorts. Generally she can be seen walking on her tip-toes, because that is what princesses and ballerinas do.

Well today my girlie girl was in the bathroom and all of a sudden I hear her yelling for me in a panic. "Ahhh!!! Mommy come quick. There is a GIGANTIC spider!!!!"
I run to the bathroom, paper towel in hand to find her on the toilet pointing and shaking at a small dot on the bathroom rug. After I disposed of this vile creature, Ellie asked me, "Wasn't that a HUGE spider!"

"It wasn't really that big sweetheart."

"But it was the most GIGANTIC spider I have EVER seen!!! It was SO scary!!!"

So apparently our Ellie isn't planning on living in the Amazon Rain forest anytime soon.

She is more of an Amazon.com sort of girl :-)

Clean-Up, Clean-Up, Everybody Everywhere...

So I have taken to sweeping up toys as I clean the kitchen floor. Rather than bend over every 5 seconds to pick up a toy that I have asked a child (or children) to pick up at least a dozen times, I choose to act as though I am going to throw it away. In order to prove I mean business, there have been occasions that I have had to throw away a crayon or other such items. The older two girls have learned quickly to examine the pile I am sweeping into, in order to be sure their beloved items are not going to be disposed of soon.

I was at it again this afternoon. Lizzie quickly grabbed some crayons, a drawing and a marble machine piece. Gracie appeared to have found something in the pile as well, and followed her big sister's lead. When I looked to see what she had decided was valuable enough to pick through a pile of kitchen floor dirt, I saw that it was not a toy, or a crayon or even a scrap of paper that a child had made into a piece of artwork. Nope, it was...a goldfish cracker.

Of course it was in her mouth before I could stop her, and since I was cleaning, I chose to let her finish digesting those germs, without putting my unclean hands into her mouth in an attempt to remove the already mushed up, floor-fishy.

Who knew that goldfish crackers were such a valued treasure?

Running

Well Christmas has come and gone, and now to get this post-pregnancy-post-holidays-post-life body into a shape that doesn't resemble a Christmas ornament.

I have NEVER been a runner. In fact, even those that are closest to me have probably never seen me "run". I was just too self-conscious about "doing it wrong" or "looking silly" to even try. Despite my lack of running, I have been intrigued at the idea of marathons. A tangible goal that I could reach for, even if it seemed super far away. Recently I have become even more interested in the thing called "running".

I read about friends' experiences and can't help but wonder if I could... possibly... maybe... Try... running.

Yesterday I mentioned this interest on Facebook, and in a very short period of time had more people respond than I would have ever imagined. The funny thing is that most of the responses lead me to the same place...a program called C25K (Couch to 5k). After looking at it, I think I am going to give it a go.

So tomorrow will mark Week 1 Day 1 for me and hopefully in 9 weeks I will be able to say that I can not only run, but run a 5K.

Anyone want to join me?

Ellie's Belated 4th Birthday Party

With Serafina's arrival taking place the weekend of Ellie's birthday, we put off celebrations until everyone was home together. Ellie was a trooper and didn't complain even once. She is such a wonderful little girl who has a very big heart, especially when it comes to her sisters. It was a joy to celebrate her birth this past weekend and to watch her face light up with all the attention put on her.

Here are some of the highlights from her family party:

Even opening the cards was a thrill for Ellie

The "strawberry shortcake" (or a white cake with strawberry filling :-)

The excitement of the gifts was almost too much

Gotta love the face of a happy birthday girl!

Home at Last

It seems forever ago we were impatiently waiting for our littlest girl to arrive. She is now 8 days old and doing wonderfully, despite the crazy labor that brought about her arrival and the strange disease (Neonatal Alloimmune Thrombocytopenia, or NAIT) she was born with, not to mention the way that disease was discovered.

Warning: Detailed Labor Story that may be boring to some and too much information for others.



Labor:
I was induced Saturday December 4th at about 9am. I wasn't thrilled with the idea, but being 2 weeks late, I felt I had pushed things as long as I would be permitted to wait. The Pitocin took immediate effect even at the lowest levels, but our little girl wasn't liking it, so the nurse had to continually shut off the Pitocin drip and see if the contractions would continue. After a number of hours back and forth with Pitocin, the midwife suggested we break my water and see what happens. This seemed to be the trick, but at 7cm things stopped progressing.

The next several hours are fuzzy to me, mostly because the pain was intense and I was exhausted. I cannot begin to count the number of times that I mentally gave up. Despite my own weakness, God pushed me further and used those around me to give me the strength I lacked. Allen was an amazing comfort during what would be my most difficult labor of the 4. And Judy Bufford was a lifesaver, as Allen needed to be with me more and more, she was able to support him and to be extra support for me during the truly trying moments (including a pillow when I couldn't sit up anymore, and my cold cloth provider when things got really rough :-) ). By this point it was the first hours of the next day and everyone was tired. I was 9cm and still only 85-90% effaced (which for those that don't know is the key to being able to get that baby out).

Realizing that I may not at this point have the energy to push, I decided that at the slightest twinge of a "need" to push, I was going to try now and not wait for 10cm and 100% effacement. After some of the most insane pushing I have done, and for way longer than I have been used to in the past (I have been blessed before to not have very long in the pushing phase) we were able to welcome Serafina Faith into this world. Despite her low heart rates throughout labor and very low heart rates during the last hour, she was strong, healthy and alert when she finally joined us.




Labor story over.




Once she was here we moved to the Postpartum room and tried to get some much needed sleep between feedings. We did the normal after-baby-arrived-family-visits and the typical nurse checking-in visits. During the first few baby checks Serafina was consistently cool, despite the efforts we were making to bring her up to 98.6. They checked her blood sugar, and found she was at normal, but her heart rate was also low at times (as it had been during labor).

Suspecting these were signs of an infection they took some small blood samples. The first would be cultured for 48 hours to see if anything turned up in the infectious category. The second sample was to check her white blood cell counts to see if they were up in an effort to fight off something in her system. Shortly after the second sample was processed they found something very unexpected, perfectly normal red and white blood cell counts, but off the charts low platelet counts. Her cultures were still processing, but this new news was concerning.

We would now journey with her to the NICU, where she would ultimately stay for the next 5 1/2 days. Once there, the nurses set to work placing two IVs and a few sensors to monitor heart rate, oxygen levels, and other needed facts. During that night they would begin two antibiotics and a platelet transfusion. Then, in the next days they would monitor her platelet counts, ultimately diagnosing her with Neonatal Alloimmune Thrombocytopenia or NAIT. The platelets given to her Sunday evening (the 5th, her birthday) would be enough to combat the bad antigens and allow her own immune system to take over in destroying these unwanted antigens that were eating up her platelets.

She came home Friday late morning, 6 days after being born, and is doing wonderfully. She is eating well, sleeping well (for a newborn :-) ) and per her doctor visit this morning, is gaining weight well. The doctors have informed us that she should never have this problem again, now that we have overcome it. Since the ultrasound done on her head showed no signs of brain bleed (the leading concern with NAIT), she should be a normal kiddo from here on out.

Lesson Learned:

What does all this mean? For me it has been an incredible reminder that God is in control and He is the provider of ALL things, including strength and health. This past week was filled with weakness, and lack of health, but now we sit at home, physically well and spiritually stronger. God got us through this tough week and now we can look back and see His hand in each moment. God is good all the time, even in moments where we find ourselves asking, "When?" or "How?" or "Why?" He is good!