Ethan's funny smile

Ethan is at such a neat age. His little personality is just bursting forth and he loves to do things that make us laugh. I was taking pictures of the big kids and turned to him and he said, "heeee" and made this face. It was his smiling for a picture face! I caught a couple of different versions.

Looks like he's winking in the second one. What a charmer!

Siesta

It's hard on the little ones to stay awake through lunch after church. Ethan fell asleep while working on a tortilla at On The Border.

Now that's my idea of a perfect Sunday. Church. Food. Sleep.

5 Things about Ethan at 5 Months

1. Look who's SITTING!

2. He's also got all the signs of teething - white line on his gum, loads of drool, biting things that he, er, shouldn't. But no teeth yet.

3. Still very particular about his environment while he is nursing. If it is the least bit loud, or bright, or distracting (which I assure you, my home is never) then he will not nurse. So he gets many bottles and I pump for those feedings. Somehow I am still able to make enough milk, which surprises me since in the past the pump and I have had a rocky relationship. Apparently we are now BFF (or friends with benefits?). Still, I enjoy nursing more, so I hang on to what feedings I can and hope we can have a nice, long, run of it.

4. He is showing signs of being ready for solids - drinking more than 6 ounces in a feeding, waking up in the night after sleeping through for many weeks. But he's truly not very interested in receiving food from the spoon - he just makes a funny face and lets it slowly fall out of his mouth. I will keep at it, and hopefully he will develop the same love that the rest of his family members have for all things food.

5. He is a sweet baby. His whole face lights up when you smile or coo at him. He coos back - lots of babbling and cooing! He is not a smile-all-the-time baby though. He can be pretty serious. He likes his naps (in the crib, thankyouverymuch!) Which is also a blessing, I realize, because he is a great sleeper at home.

5.1 His rolls are the most heavenly thing ever!

Smiley McGiggles

Shuga buga wuga. Ahh... boopy doopy doo! Who's my cute little bouncing baby boy?!? Who's my precious Prince Plumberbutt?!? Coo-coo!

Sorry. I go to my happy place when I see those rolls.

A girl and her baby brother

She loves him dearly.

The feelings are mutual. Really.

Oh so much...

Bigger!

Sweet Ethan is rounding out at about 16 pounds these days at 3 months old.  Actually this picture doesn't capture his total roundness as of today... I'm having camera issues* and grabbed this picture my sister took a few weeks ago from Facebook.

He loves to catch your eye and break out into a smile. His whole body responds - hands ball up and come to his face, legs bounce, and he gurgles and coos.

Check out those yummy round cheeks and rubber band wrists! And Ethan has total lack of neck. His head rests on at least two (there might be more hiding) fluffy, wonderful chins. Baby boy is not starving. I love me some fat babies.

*Camera issues: dropped the camera in a lake Memorial Day. Mark, with his sniper-like reflexes, yelped and threw himself into the water to rescue it as if it were one of our own children. It was very brave, a little terrifying, and hilarious. He actually rescued the camera. Then we let it dry out for a long time and it didn't work quite right (as most digital things are wont to do after going for a swim) Then it started to work! Fairly well, anyway. Then today, Hannah wanted to take my cute palmetto purse to a party we were attending and I let her and even stuck the camera in it, you know, so the camera would be handy instead of lost somewhere in my enormous black hole of a diaper bag. She nestled her stuffed hamster next to it. And then, of course, we left it at the party. Which, I am thinking, how random of the hosts to find? A cute little black purse with nothing in it but a camera and a very realistic looking stuffed hamster. 

Adam's first day at home with Ethan

Adam and Ethan have fun getting to know each other.

Health Update

Ethan with my OB

I know many of you have been praying for my recovery since Ethan's c-section and are waiting to hear how I'm doing these days. Since I'm not sure who exactly reads this blog, I'll try to keep it fairly G-rated. Still, I warn you, if you have a strong gag reflex, you might just want to skip this post.

As you may have read in Ethan's birth story, during the c-section my bladder was "nicked". The doctor sutured the cut and gave me a foley catheter with a bag to collect the urine so that my bladder could remain fairly empty until the hole had healed. Unfortunately I had to have that for about 10 days, which made getting dressed in anything other than sweats difficult and moving around pretty awkward. Last week, I went in for tests with the urologist and they could see that the hole had closed, so the catheter and bag were removed. Yay! I feel so much better being free to pee on my own. :)

My OB decided while I was in the hospital that since I had extra swelling and a longer healing time due to the bladder issue, I would need to keep my staples (at the incision site) in for several extra days too. I had a follow up with him last week and he replaced the staples with steri-strips. Huge improvement! I feel a lot less like Frankenstein now.

This recovery has been more painful and slow then my previous birth recoveries, but I've been so blessed by our parents' help with the children and meals from friends so that I could be on nearly complete bed rest the first two weeks. (*Not forgetting my amazing husband who took over all household chores and pampered me!) Starting this week, I'm slowly easing back in to "normal" life. I can now drive and watch the kids on my own here at the apartment. Next week I hope to start going on walks with the children and enjoy this beautiful spring weather we're having!

Ethan went in for a check up with his pediatrician yesterday. He weighed in at 7 lbs, 13 oz. So he has regained his birth weight plus some!  Everything else was healthy.  He is doing a great job nursing. He often gets fussy when left alone in his crib or car seat, but he responds quickly to being held. He is definitely a cuddler!

Last night: enjoying dinner and feeling much better. You might not guess it by her funny expression, but Hannah ran over to jump in this picture with her beloved baby brother :)

Ethan's First Days, Part 1

The hospital

A happy, peaceful baby

Daddy and Ethan cuddling

Ethan plays peek-a-boo. Look how tired I was! I should have played peek-a-boo too! :)

Small Group Guys: Mike, Chad and Mark

Chae and Mike bring us a bunch of goodies, including chocolate - yay!

Ethan sleeps pretty much all the time. He's a pro at it.

Amanda D visits us

Mark's dad Tom visits us

Grandfather and Grandson

Getting ready for the ride home. He is so little! I just love how even teeny-tiny clothes swallow him and the buckles cover his whole tummy.

Leaving Northside - headed for Home Sweet Home!

Welcome Ethan!

Welcoming with love the newest member of our family, Ethan Mark. He was born Saturday April 11 at 8:32 pm, weighing 7 lb 6 oz. We already can't imagine our lives without this sweet baby!

Ethan's Birth Story:

Saturday afternoon: After a month of occasional pre-term contractions, I passed the 37 week mark and now the contractions are coming more regularly. When they became closer than 10 minutes apart, I called the doctor and he sent me to the hospital - STAT!

Thank goodness we had just finished getting things ready for the baby at home. We quickly packed the kids bags and Mom and Dad came to pick them up. They were thrilled about getting to spend the night with Grandma and Papa! Hannah kissed my belly goodbye one last time and said, "See you soon Baby!"

Our last picture as a family of four:

Mark and I arrived at Northside hospital and got checked in. Our minds were racing but we were feeling peaceful. It helped that we have been through this before and knew what to expect. Secretly I wondered if I was just imagining this was really finally happening and hoped they wouldn't send me back home.

No mistake! I was very much in labor. When they hooked me up to the monitors, we could see the contractions were now 3-5 minutes apart and I was quickly dilating. They prepped me for the surgery and the on-call doctor came in for my delivery (my OB was unfortunately unavailable). Everyone was in good spirits and we had fun joking around with the nurses and doctors.

The c-section went relatively smoothly all considering. Unfortunately, as sometimes happens with repeat c-sections, connective tissue had fused my bladder to my uterus in a higher-than-normal position. When they began the operation, they accidentally cut into my bladder. This complicates my recovery a little bit, but it should heal just fine with time.

Additionally, the doctor said that my uterus wall was very thin, meaning that I was at risk for uterine rupture. Uterine rupture is extremely serious for the mother and fatal more than 50% of the time for the baby. We thank God that He kept us safe from this especially since I labored before the delivery. The bad news is that I am at even greater risk for uterine rupture with a subsequent pregnancy, no matter how long we wait or how well I heal. For this reason the doctor said that I should absolutely not have any more pregnancies. We felt pretty sure that this would be my last pregnancy before receiving this news, but I mourned the finality of it. At the same time, a huge peace has washed over us as we celebrate that our family is now complete and that God has blessed us so richly with three healthy children.

8:32 pm: Baby is born. Sweet joy! He had a little trouble breathing at first so after a quick cuddle, we had to send him off to the transition nursery for 6 hours of observation.

11:00 pm Mom came to the hospital to meet Baby. What an amazing lady - she had already fed Hannah and Adam, served in the evening services at church, and put the kids to bed. 

Mom and Mark get a sneak peak of Baby in the Transition Nursery while I am in the Post-Op Recovery room.

Baby is breathing well and doing great. They transfered him up to the nursery on our floor and eventually he got to come to our room. Holding him is one of the most wonderful things in the world.

Easter Morning: After our long night, we get a teeny tiny bit of sleep. We've been trying out our name finalists on the baby and now we know the one that fits him uniquely and perfectly: Ethan Mark. We rejoice in our risen Lord and in our sweet baby Ethan!

Mom and Dad bring the kids to meet Ethan before going to church. Hannah couldn't be any prouder of her new brother!

She is a fantastic big sister. She waits patiently to hold Ethan and then talks softly to him. Ethan already knows each member of our family by their voice. As he opened his eyes, he studied Hannah's face intently.

Adam meets Ethan. He squeals with delight and reaches out for Ethan very gently.

 He loves babies! 

We are now a family of five!

Siblings

Pop Quiz: Can you guess who is who? 

Answer: Hannah, Ethan, Adam

33 Week Update

I know - long time, no blog! Posting pictures and stories of all the cute things the kids have been up to has been way up at the top of my list lately, but somehow I just don't make it past the first few things on the list most days (1. feed the crew 2. get everyone presentable to leave the house 3. go buy more food to feed the crew 4. tell my husband how wonderful he is for taking care of everything else 5. fall asleep)

So I thought I would do a quick post to let you know we're still out here, and despite my silence everything is going great! I'm just past 33 weeks in the pregnancy and the baby is very healthy and active. I've been having a lot of back pain and contractions, but I'm not starting to dilate so they are not alarming so much as they are uncomfortable. I need to take it much, much slower and try to do as little lifting as possible, which is hard because I feel like I've scaled back already so much. Mark, both sets of grandparents, and some sweet friends have been tremendously helpful in this department. I am SO thankful for all loving arms taking care of my kids and the helpful hands washing dishes!

Adam is starting to walk and Hannah is just about to celebrate her 3rd birthday. Next chance I get, I will post lots of pictures and videos of them - they are so cute you won't be able to stand it!

Pregnancy Update - Halfway there!

We had our first appointment with a new doctor, whom we absolutely love, at the beginning of the month. It was an exciting appointment because they did the big ultrasound to check out all the anatomy (baby looks great!) and gender (BOY!).

Here I was at the appointment, then 19 weeks and still sporting a pretty small bump (it's getting bigger!):

I just ate a pie

I did have a little help last night, but really, I pretty much ate most of it by myself over the last 24 hours. It was cherry and from Trader Joe's and totally delicious. I started having dreams about four nights ago about pies and then I found out October is national dessert month so I decided to kick it off in style.

It didn't make me sick in fact I feel a little better so I guess that was just what Baby wanted. Anything for you, Baby!

Baby Update

Well, thankfully, I'm not looking like this yet! But my body seems to remember pregnancy well and eating frequently helps the nausea, so I'll probably be popping out pretty soon.

Yesterday we had our first doctor appointment. It was kind of fun because we've been overseas the first seven months of our first two pregnancies so this is my first time to get all the official prenatal stuff early on. They did an ultrasound to confirm the pregnancy and see how far along we are. I was really curious since this pregnancy was a (pleasant) surprise. We are, as of today, 8 weeks, 5 days and our due date is April 30. Since we know they usually like to schedule the c-section around 39 weeks, this will definitely be an April baby!

The baby looked amazing - big head, strong heart beat and little arms and legs developing. Seeing him reminded me that all these first trimester trials are well worth it!

New baby on the way!

Our family has some very good news to share: we found out this week that we are expecting another baby! While we are a *little* surprised by the timing, Mark and I had hoped for more children and are both delighted and humbled at the prospect of becoming parents again.

Please pray for us:

1. Thank God for His new creation!

2. I range from queazy to completely-loosing-my-cookies sick, and the latter can strike at any time of the day. It's hard for me to keep my blood sugar even and stay on my toes with the kids and household activities. Please pray I stay in good health and find creative ways to feed and care for my family. (By the way, the nausea reminds me a lot of my pregnancy with Hannah ... another girl?)

3. Please pray for peace of mind: adjusting to being pregnant again and preparing for raising three young children (Calling on the wisdom of all you parents of multiple kids!)

Here's the longer story of how we found out (if you have some time on your hands):

A few of us in the family have had colds the last two weeks and I thought this cold had just really taken the wind out of me. Then I thought maybe it was strep... or a stomach bug ... or food poisoning... Mark joked that maybe we were pregnant again and I just laughed and laughed... I reminded him, as I often do, that though I would gladly take another child (or two or three!) into our home right now, I am SO not ready to be pregnant again. I still have goals to reach: wearing my regular winter wardrobe for the first time in years, a daily exercise routine, complete systemization of our household, world peace, you get the idea. Then I started thinking... and calculating... oh my. I ran out for a pregnancy test, and I am telling you that red line jumped off the stick so fast I almost fell over. Actually that's just what I did; I went and just fell in Mark's arms and couldn't say anything. He gave me a huge smile and we both just smiled and hugged and couldn't say anything for the longest time. I am so glad he was there for that moment because a few hours later he was on the plane for Houston (business) and I needed a LOT of encouraging hugs before he left. All week long we called each other and giggled over this new and still somehow unbelievable news (though the intensifying nausea was pretty convincing). With Hannah and Adam, we waited several weeks to share our news with the world, but somehow (maybe because we're not on the other side of the world this time?) it felt like torture not to tell you all right away! So now you know our wonderful "secret" - and I'll be sure to keep you up on all the unfolding details here.