Feeling wordy...

  So I had said the next time I blogged it would be the birth story of my youngest.  I still plan to share that, but I decided to share something else instead.  I have been seeing adults bullying each other all the time online.  Everyone thinks their way is the only way or the right way and they judge, belittle, and bully other parents.  3 things in the last month have just pushed my already dwindling patience for this nonsense over the edge.

1. That darn Similac ad!  It had some great points.  You honestly wouldn't even know it was a formula ad.  However, I have seen women tearing it to shreds.  Why in the world are they making a bigger stink about ads for formula then ads for cigarettes, alcohol, cars that are not hybrids.  (I do not drive a hybrid BTW).  The ad shows moms (and dads) with all different parenting views verbally attacking each other and in he end they come together.  It did make the "crunchy" moms look angry, but do you really think that is how all working moms act?  Those were all stereotypes!  However, is it really a stereotype when you then start acting that way because of a formula ad...?
2. The f-ing measles BS!!  Seriously?!?!?!  I have never seen so many people decide they have a right to tell other parents what they need to as much as I do right now.  I see pro-vaxers attacking & cyberbullying anti-vaxers.  They say the anti-vaxers just keep going on the defense.  Um, can you really blame them?  The way people are talking to each other in all of this is ridiculous!  I am not going to say if I do or do not vaccinate my children.  Why?  Because it is none of anyone's business except myself & my husband & the doctor.  Saying it should be illegal not to vaccinate, do you really want to give our government that kind of control?  Do you really think that if that became law, that it wouldn't open the flood gate of other constitutional rights being taken away?  I can say this, when you come over to my house, I am going to ask how you are doing and if you want something to eat or drink, I am not going to ask if your child or you are vaccinated.
3. I have seen a friend of mine fall prey to bullying recently.  She wears her heart on her sleeve and she very much lets others dictate how she feels about herself.  She allows these women she once considered friends to make her feel like a bad person.  She is not a bad person.  She is a kind & caring woman.  She is a good mother and from what I see a good wife.  She may complain more than others do online, but it is because she is looking for camaraderie.  She wants to know that in this cyber world of perfect family pictures, "I have the best ever husband" status updates, and look at me I am a stay at home mom, who homeschools, has a perfect house, perfect kids, i grow all my own food and never eat from a drive thru or processed food portrayal...that there are still real people out there.  Not perfect people.  People who struggle with their kids behavior sometimes, people who feel like maybe sometimes their husband doesnt always pitch in as much as he could.  Instead of saying "I feel ya!" she instead gets anonymous texts and hateful messages from these supposed friends and most who tell everyone openly how Christian they are and they behavior does not reflect that.

  We are grown woman, Why do we behave this way?  Why do we feel in order to lift ourselves, we need to tear others down?  I say 'we' and include myself, because I am in no way perfect and I am sure I am guilty of saying or thinking judgmental things at times.  But why?  Do not get me wrong, I do not think we all have to magically "get along", but can we at least act like adults?

  So since this blog is already like my typical loooong post, I am going to share with you my post today to social media.  It was me letting loose and getting somethings off my chest, I had no idea the reaction I was going to receive.  Many comments of others who felt the same and never said it and even a few who were so moved they decided to share on their own pages.  I don't think I have ever been so vulnerable & open on my page and I have never had anyone share a simple status update.  I don't believe anyone actually reads my blog, as I have stated it is more of an online diary for me, but if you do.  Thank you.


  Being a mom is hard. Being a mom of 1, 2, 3, etc is hard. It does not matter how many kids you have. I have been told by some they admire me and they couldn't do it. I don't feel deserving of admiration and was not seeking it by having children. I definitely fall short of my own expectations of myself in many areas. I am trying to learn that not only is perfection unachievable for me, but also for my kids. I had always been told that my kids are a reflection of me, so I tried to make them appear perfect in public. But they are not perfect, i am not perfect. That is ok!

I may not complain on facebook (although sometimes i do), but it does not mean i am not struggling with things. I may share plenty of pics of my kids & life, but it is as much for me as for anyone who chooses to look (and i do not expect anyone to look at the obscene amount of photos i share). You may think you know me, but you dont really. You know the me I choose to share. You dont know what is going on in my mind, so please dont presume you do. You know the most important part of me and that is my love for my children. My life is far from what i would have considered perfect at one time, but it is MY perfectly imperfect life and i love it.

I choose not to share many of my parenting choices, not because i am ashamed of them, but because i do not need to be judged on how i choose to raise my kids. I have undoubtedly made mistakes and I have to hope that along the way I can make up for those. I continually try to improve myself for my kids. I do not care what you feed your kids or at what age, what kind of diapers, car seat, or anything else you have. I do not care if you vax or not. I do not care how you choose to school (or unschool) you children. It sounds harsh...but I DO NOT CARE! I care that I surround myself with caring parents that love their children and do their best to take care of those children. I may seem more passionate about somethings like breastfeeding, extended rear facing, etc However, that does not mean I am judging those who choose a different route than me. I am making very different parenting decisions now than i did almost 13 years ago, and i am still constantly evolving.

congrats if you have made it this far, i am almost done.
We need to stop measuring our self worth by those that think the least of us, and start by seeing our own worth and that in the eyes of our children. We need to stop judging each other. When you spend too much time looking at what everyone else is doing, you are not spending enough time on self reflection. I am not perfect and my life is not perfect and i am okay with that. I love my husband, I love my children, and with lots of work ahead of me, I am trying to learn to love myself. I am incredibly lucky and blessed that although I don't feel worthy, God has entrusted these kids to me.

Please disregard typos, grammatical & spelling errors, etc. It is nearly 4am and I once again was fortunate enough to get to pull an all nighter with an adorable little sweetheart since her older brother woke her up. I was skimming the news feed and its one post after another of moms arguing about vaccinations, of being bullied by other moms, and I just can't take it anymore.

2 years later...continued

  So, I left off with the birth of Turtle.  With her pregnancy I learned of inductions.  It sounded pretty great.  Ask the doctor to start your labor for you with no risks or complications.  For much of the last trimester my little turtle had her foot stuck up inside my rib and was causing a lot of pain and a bruised feeling.  So nearing the end, I asked my doctor about being induced.  She explained she couldn't do it before 41 weeks in case anything happened she needed to say she had a medical reason for the induction.  (Should have been my 'red flag' that I should look into it further, but I was due on 1/1 and excited to meet my baby as well as "done" being pregnant!)  I let the hype of complaining about pregnancy really cloud any enjoyment I should have been getting from my pregnancies.

  I couldn't sleep the whole night before.  I showed up for my induction at the time I was given and even though I was told to fast, they still administered an enema. (For those that don't know...they squirt a liquid up your bum hole, make you squeeze your cheeks and hold it in as long as possible, and when you can't anymore you EXPLODE on the toilet.  Humiliating and disgusting!)  I had many other things put in and on me.  I was told I was already having contractions that I just wasn't feeling (which means I probably would have gone into labor on my own within the next day or so).  I was there for 2 hours before the doctor even came in and broke my water.  Lots of walking later the doctor decided to administer pitocin...which immediately had me BEGGING for the amazing epidural.  Let me tell you, pitocin contractions are no joke!!  Imagine a drug so strong it can cause your muscles to contract without your help.  Once I made that choice, I was confined to my bed, once again on my back to sleep through much of the rest of my labor.  Wake up, push baby out, watch as they take her away from me to do all their checks.  I was trying to see her, but hubby, my mom, & nurses were all gathered around the warmer while I heard whispering "we need to tell her".  At this point I start freaking out.  Well, my baby had what they thought at the time was club foot.  After many specialists visits, braces, & therapy we discovered it was actually they way she had folded herself in the womb.  Her foot was flat up against her leg because she had crossed her feet.  By her first birthday, all was fine and she was able to walk as normal.  I was able to try to nurse her before we had any of my visitors come in to see her, and she latched right out & nursed like a champ.  I only made it about 4-6 months nursing her.  I went back to work & started pumping, but even though my work provided a room to do this in, there was a schedule and you were only allowed to pump for so long.  Pumping moms know, it can sometimes take awhile.  I did not know my rights, and they harassed me about taking too many unpaid breaks for pumping.  So I let her finish out the stash at the sitter and we quit, happy we had made it work for that long.

  For Monkey's birth I was determined to not be induced.  I had started to learn a little more.  I learned that having an induction increases your chances of a c-section.  With Turtle I had her a few hours before they were going to have the "talk" with me.  In between these births, my best friend had gotten her doctor to agree to induce her around 37-38 weeks because she would be losing her insurance.  The baby was clearly not ready, and my friend ended up with a cesarean section.  That was NOT going to be me.  I was still reading my "what to expect" book like a Bible.  With my first baby...we will call him a surprise, after him I got the mirena iud for about 2 years, never even got a period after getting it out and ended up pregnant.  I had such a great experience with the iud the first time, I decided to get it again.  This time for the full 5 years allowed.  We were expecting to just get pregnant again right away.  We tried for 11 months!  When I finally got that positive test, I vowed I would not complain this time around.  I would enjoy and soak in every bit of this pregnancy.  I had come across so many who would have loved to have kids of their own and were struggling, it was an insult to them to complain about something they could never experience.

  I spotted at the beginning of Monkey's pregnancy, and because I was concerned the doctor did an internal ultrasound to verify there was a little bean in there with a beating heart.  The rest of the pregnancy was uneventful for the most part.  I was always excruciatingly hot and I would go from not hungry to starving in 10 seconds flat and if I didn't eat immediately, I would be nauseous.  He is the same out as he was in.  He came out knowing what he wanted, and if he didn't get it right away he threw a fit!  So back to the pregnancy, about 2/3 done I did the dreaded glucose test.  I have a bad gag reflex so forcing myself to drink something I don't want with a time limit to finish it...let's just say is not something I look forward to.  For the first time ever, I failed the 1 hr glucose test.  Actually, I was borderline and the doctor decided to make me do the 3 hr one to be sure.  This one came back that I indeed had gestational diabetes (GD).  I met with a dietitian and learned how to control it with a better diet.  My numbers were fine the rest of my pregnancy and when comparing them to my step-dad who recently was diagnosed with diabetes himself...the numbers i was expected to maintain as a pregnant woman were far below the numbers he had to maintain.  I went in for my 40 week appointment and I was sick with a respiratory infection.  My doctor informed me that because of the GD she insisted on inducing me on my due date.  That had been her plan when I showed up that day, but because I was under the weather she wanted to give me a few days to 'kick it' because she was afraid I wouldn't the energy to make it through.  I came back 3 days later and because you can't really take much while pregnant, I had developed bronchitis instead.

  I once again showed up to all the same actions that were taken with Turtle's induction.  However when the nurse tried to put the IV in she couldn't...3 times.  She called in someone from the iv department to come up and do it.  They were able to, but also made me bleed ALL OVER!  It was on me, my bed, the floor, her scrubs, her shoes, etc.  I again was told i was already having contractions.  The doctor again waited a few hours before coming to break my water.  This time, however, I was not permitted to walk to help things progress.  I was told that they needed to keep the baby on the monitor and that he/she (this time we didn't find out) wasn't cooperating.  I have degenerative disc disorder, which never bothered me until sometime in between these 2 pregnancies.  I have discs in my spine gone so it is bone rubbing on bone down near my tailbone.  I cannot lay on my back, or really in any position for too long or it hurts A LOT.  The rest of this labor was a blur at the beginning in the order things were done.  I was told the baby needed an internal monitor because even though they tried me in all these positions, they couldnt keep baby on monitor.  I was given pitocin again, but this time I wanted to try to hold off as long as possible for the epidural.  I started getting intense contractions one on top of another...as in no break in between them.  They ended up turning the pitocin off because it was making the contractions ineffective.  I know I finally asked for the epidural and because of my back trauma I kept flinching just with him putting the iodine on.  He wouldn't let my husband be with me, who probably would have given me that comfort I needed to stay still and instead kept yelling at me to stay still.  After it was in I was told could take up to 15 minutes for it to work.  Well, I waited and waited and nothing got better.  I received no relief.  The nurse paged the anesthesiologist over & over, but he never came back.  She ended up increasing the medication herself as high as she was allowed.  I did finally start to feel numb...from my knees to my toes!  I felt every bit of the rest of my labor, even though I was falling asleep from exhaustion in between contractions.  I kept calling the nurse in to tell her I felt ready to push, but was told over and over again that I was a 10, but I still had a cervical lip there and my doctor will not allow me to push while that is there.  After so many times of calling her, she felt bad for me and wanted to help, so during a contraction I pushed and she physically moved that lip out of the way.  After this we were able to call the doctor to come.  Now, I love my doctor, but she is episiotomy happy.  She told me to stop pushing (because she was going to cut me).  Now remember, I had bronchitis, which had already caused to throw up during the labor...in the little boat and all over the bed and floor again.  Well, this time it caused me to cough...out popped baby.  Clearly, I needed to be cut, right? 

  Once again, baby whisked away to the warmer.  Well, the hospital was going through some changes.  In the 6 six years since my last baby they now had a photographer on call, who made it known to me she was called away from her daughter's sleepover, etc making me feel guilty she was there with me.  So they decided to bathe baby before letting me try to nurse.  They took so long and still had not bathed him, that they 'allowed' me to leave recovery to watch it as well.  Then I was told it was time to go to my room.  I am talking having a baby around 11pm and not able to try nursing him until 4am when I got in my room.  We had our struggles and fought and cried with nipple shields, pumping, supplementing with formula, etc for 5 weeks before throwing in the towel.  I was devastated.  It was shortly after this I learned I have fast letdown, which was the cause of him screaming shortly after latching on, that I was waiting until he cried to nurse which is the last hunger sign, I had oversupply which could have been corrected...but I found this stuff out when I found the support from local mom groups on facebook and found La Leche League.  I tried to re-lactate around 4-5 months, but it was too much of a struggle for me & my little guy and I just wasn't mentally strong enough.  I decided to take this time to learn everything I could about breastfeeding as well as natural birth...because even though I had an epidural I still felt everything and realized it was not nearly as bad as I thought and I found out I could do it.  No more taking chances of the risks that come along with getting an epidural!

Again, such a long post...I am being paged now by Turkey & Monkey so i will end this extremely long post.  I have one more birth story for you.  It is my favorite so it will be long, I know that already.  It is beautiful and it helped me realize my true passion in life.

Until next time,
Zookeeper

2 years later...

  It is 2 years later and I am again finding the need for an outlet.  Not that I have the time to be a "blogger" in the true sense of the word.  I am now a stay at home mother of 4, homeschooling 2 of the kids, trying to maintain 2 households on one income while we get one house ready to sell...basically we are nuts!

  So much has happened.  During my pregnancy with #4, right around 7 or so months along, I lost my job.  They put a temporary increase on our quota that magically never went away...that is until 2 weeks after they let me go.  Makes sense right?  We are talking a 25% increase in production overnight.  I was also given new accounts I was unfamiliar with and had accounts that I had been handling for the last 5 years taken away (not because I mishandled them).  I was NOT the only one unable to achieve these new goals with the speed bumps that were given to me, but I was the only one let go.  It, of course, had nothing to do with the fact no one in that department had to take a maternity leave ever, and I had the nerve to have 2 in 2 years.  In the over 15 years I had been in the workforce I had never been fired from a job...EVER!  While I hated the company and the industry I was in was never meant to be a career...I worked my butt off to provide for my family.

  I was a mess when it first happened, but I try really hard to believe in "everything happens for a reason, even if we can't see what that reason is at the time."  It didn't take long to see this as a blessing.  We figured out finances and got rid of unnecessary expenses to see if we could make this stay at home thing work for us.  I was a different person.  I went from being constantly stressed and more angry than I even realized I was, to being so happy and feeling a ton lighter.  I had no idea how much that job had been weighing me down.  I was able to spend the last bit of my pregnancy solidifying my bond with baby #3 who would turn 2 just a month AFTER baby #4's arrival.  It was AH-MAZING!

  My oldest was in 5th grade at the local public school.  This was his 2nd year in public schools after being in private school with the same kids since pre-3.  I had noticed a huge change in him at home though.  He was coming home and wanting a "snack" that was the size of a normal person's meal.  He would tell me he hadn't eaten all day.  I know that he preferred to sleep as late as possible over having breakfast, but I also knew he was getting lunch because I was being charged for it.  Needless to say I was not very understanding and would not let him have these after school/before dinner meals.  He was also suddenly a very angry child, more so than ever.  He was especially mean to his younger sister.  I knew something was wrong, but when I would ask him if something was going on at school or if he was being bullied he would deny it.  I talked with the mother of one of my daughter's friends and she asked what grade & school my son was in.  When I told her, she told me to watch out because that sounded like her son at that age and he was at the same school and he was being tortured by his peers. I decided to share my concerns with my husband and that was when he told me our son had confided in him what was happening at school, but didn't want me to know.  I understand he was trying to keep his promise to our son, but this should have been the exception.

  The very next morning I got up a little early to have a one on one talk with my son...after a little prying I was able to get him to open up (and we were both bawling).  He let me know that the reason he had been so hungry was there were kids who would take his milk and pour it on his lunch making it inedible (yes, there were teachers in the lunchroom, but they never saw it happen apparently?).  He was constantly called fat and various other terms, which resulted in him wearing a hoodie to school even when it was 80 out (which was another thing, that before I knew his reasoning I scolded him for).  One last example was that, as I mentioned in a previous post my son gets along better with girls as he has no interest in sports or super heroes, this caused kids to call him gay, fag, swag (although 'swag' to me meant a goodie bag or such...these kids decided it means 'secretly we are gay').  I shared with him my experience with bullies, but I also had to share something with him that I had hoped to keep from him.  In high school, I had let my problems get the best of me and after multiple unsuccessful suicide attempts I had ended up in the ER with a very close call.  He now has a family history of depression & suicide attempts.  Seeing that so many kids kill themselves as a direct result of bullying, I did not want my son to become one of those statistics.  I called him out of school that day (a Friday) because he was visibly upset.  My husband & I took the weekend to talk things over, but we had already talked about it before and really our weekend talk was more or less just making sure we were still on the same page.  Monday morning I had a meeting with his principal, in which I pulled him from school and started our home school journey.  We chose to have kid #2 finish out the school year with her class, but the following year she joined us in home schooling.  She was not accepted by the kids in her class.  She was not being "bullied" in the same way her brother was, but was instead being excluded from all activities.  At recess she was not allowed to sit, so she would stand around and just watch the other kids play.  At her birthday party at our local children's museum the other girls would leave an exhibit as soon as my daughter would try to join.  She was hurt and spent much of her own birthday party hiding in corners to cry.  Our family is very against it, but they are very mainstream and don't understand or agree with most of our recent parenting decisions either.

  So I have talked about how I came to be a stay at home mom, how I came to be a home schooling mom, and lastly, I have found my calling, my passion, my goals for my professional life.  I have found a love for natural childbirth, breastfeeding, etc.

  As far as previous births, I had my 1st kid at 19.  I took the hospital's lamaze class and thought I was prepared to have a drug free birth, but they taught us that we will get to a point where we may not know what is going on so we should rely on our partner to help us make decisions.  Fast forward to labor...hospital having the busiest week in over 100 years and me apparently getting loud (you know, like you see on tv) led me to have an extremely rude nurse coming in every few minutes to push me to get the epidural and inform me I am scaring the other mothers.  I was forced to lay on my back in bed and was not allowed to get up and move around, even though I pleaded because the rocking chair felt so much better.  Eventually I gave in, but because they were so busy the anesthesiologist was preoccupied with others who made the same choice.  The nurse came in to give me demerol to "quiet me down" as she put it.  When it didn't work the way she liked, she gave me another dose and shortly after the epidural was given.  I don't have many memories of the rest of my labor.  I have never done drugs, got drunk, anything like this in my life.  I don't like not feeling in control.  I would be talking to my husband, blink, and suddenly it was my dad standing there instead.  You get the idea, I was not present at all.  I was a very modest person, and when pushing time came I was asked if a few EMT students could observe in order to help get certified and much to my husband's surprise I agreed.  They had me so drugged up that when it was pushing time the epidural had to be turned down so I could feel to push.  Instead by this time they had me so scared that I couldn't do it without medication I was afraid to try so I just watched the monitor and pushed when it told me I was having a contraction.  At the time, I thought, well thank goodness I did what they told me and I have a healthy baby.  After he was born they kept him in the nursery so I could get some rest and proceeded to give him a bottle (because they told me I couldn't breastfeed yet as my milk wasn't in yet) and gave him a pacifier even though I specifically asked them not to.  I tried to pump one time at home, using a poor fitting hand pump...not knowing there were different fits.  Decided it hurt too much and being modest like I was, I didn't want to sit alone in my bedroom to pump while everyone including my baby were in the living room.  Looking back, there is so much I wish I knew or had thought to look into further than "what to expect" book.

  In what I have proven to be my true fashion I have written an extremely long entry again.  I am technically trying to catch you up on not only the last 2 years, but also a little bit more background on me too.  However, I will have to share the other 3 birth stories with you another time.  I have resolved that this family needs to get on a schedule the best we can.  Last night I got all 4 kids in bed by 9:45 and the 2 youngest were asleep by 10!  Sounds late I know, but if you only knew what time they normally consider their bedtime.  Anyway...I stayed up for a while more silently on my phone as to make sure my older ones were truly asleep.  They are known for sneaking around after everyone else is in bed.  Sure enough about 11:30 I bust them, but manage to wake the baby by leaving her to catch them.  She then decided that was merely a 1.5 hr nap and is wide awake.  In an attempt to keep the 3 yr old asleep, I brought her downstairs.  Shortly after, the inevitable happened and he woke up also.  What else should a mom do in the middle of the night with a 3.5 yr old & a 20 month old, but blog while watching Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood and eating graham crackers with whipped topping?  The time is now 4:30 am and both children finally appear to be tired enough to attempt sleep...again.  Much to my disappointment I am still planning on "trying" to start our schedule starting at 7:00 am.  Pretty sure it is going to either be a day of sleeping in or a very, very baaaaaad day for all of us being so tired.  Plus the big kids still didn't go to sleep until after 2:00 am and the young ones woke them up just now.  Fun, fun, fun...

Night, or morning, or whatever for now...
Zookeeper

From now on, I will assign animals to my kids instead of the numbers.

Kid #1, boy, currently 12: Sloth (he currently moves at the rate of one when asked to do anything)
Kid #2, girl, currently 9: Turtle (she has an hard outer shell, but inside is soft & fragile)
Kid #3, boy, currently 3: Monkey (he climbs EVERYTHING)
Kid #4, girl, currently 1.5: Turkey (something I find myself calling her often)

Been awhile...

Well, if you have actually taken the time to read my ramblings...I am sorry! ;)  I did in NO WAY hold out to tell like I wanted.  Kids were told days later, family was told another couple days later, & facebook was told when the t-shirts came in.  I did manage to wait to tell work until I was 11 weeks (almost the safe zone).  Wow I am a terrible news keeper!!

  I went for the first OB appointment and the doctor did an internal ultrasound.  All we saw was a little bean with a beating heart & that was enough for me.  Proof I was carrying a blessing! <3  I went back this week for my second visit and she just did the sonar...but could not find a heartbeat besides mine.  She said it was fine that sometimes this far along (11.5 weeks) it is hard to locate so she is allowing me to come back in 2 weeks & try again (for peace of mind).  I said ok & left...not realizing that as more days pass I do not have peace of mind-but rather get more & more worried.  I have a wonderful network of mamas I have become close with online and they are all very re-assuring as well as offering up prayers for me.  I am sure everything is ok and I am just being my usual Nervous Nelly self.

My Bean

  We picked our boy's name and without even trying it is 6 letters like I wanted!  I passed it up in the baby book & kept reading on...only to realize I wasn't reading on, but rather repeating to myself that name over & over.  Like the girl's name it is not something you hear often, but not so off the wall that they will grow up having a hard time.  Now, however, my mom & mother in law are tag teaming me to change it.  They said I have "plenty of time" and every time I see either one of them I hear how they "heard the perfect name" for us.  Except in my book...if you heard it, it probably is not a name I want.  If you haven't figured it out already...I am kind of high maintenance!  LOL

  Away from the pregnancy talk, I wanted to share a little about my family.  My oldest is 10 and in no way a boys' boy.  He is artsy & into technology/electronics.  He got straight A's all year, except for a 1 B each quarter (in a different subject each time).  The final quarter he did get all A's & was very proud of himself.  It goes without saying, that I was beyond proud.  He gets along great with girls, hates sports & super heroes.  He loves to sing & dance and absolutely adores children/babies.  He used to want to be a male model when he grows up, then a teacher, and now he wants me to open a restaurant so he can go to school for 2 things...to be a chef & to manage the "family business".  He is so much like me that we bump heads A LOT...but I love how much he likes to be an individual.

  My middle child is my "tester".  She has been since day 1!  I like to call her my Girly Tomboy.  She like to have her nails painted, hair "done", cute dress and then go run in the mud!  She is 7 and crazy!  She is the opposite of her brother.  I cannot keep this girl inside.  She loves to be outside all the time & LOVES her sports.  Dance (tumbling is her strong suit), softball, swimming ... you name it & she has pretty much wanted to try it.  She knows who she is and is very self confident.  She is a hard worker too.  If we ask her to pick something up she will do it and pick up stuff around it too...if the mood strikes her.  She started the school year behind coming from private school into public schools.  Sounds backwards I know, but it was true.  She worked hard to catch up to where she was supposed to be, eagerly went to "summer school" to maintain her level & not lose what she learned and managed to get almost perfect scores by advancing even further.  I am so proud of her and all of her accomplishments!

  My youngest is a mere 16 months and cute as can be.  he is at the age he is into EVERYTHING.  he picks up on things so quick that you can say it only once or twice in front of him & he will repeat.  Or learn a whole rhyme within a day (the tune as he cannot say all the words yet).  I am amazed at how well i can communicate with him once I learned what some of his "words" mean to him.  He is the same outside the womb as he was in.  I was telling people his personality before he even appeared to show us he was a he.  When he wants soemthing-he wants it now...not in 10 minutes, now!  He can be the sweetest little man stealing everyone's hearts and in seconds throw the kind of fits that before this I had only seen in the movies!!  There is so much I could write about him since he is the baby that I had better stop while I am ahead!

I am truly sorry to all those I bore with these crazy long posts...but this is really more of a diary for myself that you are peeking at...

Night!
Zookeeper

This is hard...

  Wow, this is harder than I thought!  I was the one insistant on not telling family/friends about the pregnancy until we hit the "safe" territory, and I am the one struggling with it!  Ugh!!  So I took one final test today and within 30 seconds it was a very BOLD positive..no more of this faint maybe results.  So I decided it was time to make the call to the OB to set up my first prenatal appointment...thinking it would be the end of June they want me in, instead they say June 1st!  That is like 2 weeks away!??!?! This is way earlier than I have ever gone in before?  Of course, after making the appointment I remembered my cousin works in the OB office, so I had to quickly text her to call me and let her know NOT to tell anyone in the family at all!!!  Hopefully she will...hopefully I will.  I wanted to wait until July, at this point I am hoping to make it at least until after the first doctor appointment.

  It has been the hardest not to tell the kids.  Every month when Aunt Flo came I would cry for days and they would ask why.  I told them and they have been so supportive.  They really want another too and have even requested a certain sex (that they both agree on this time, like I can help that)  We have decided to order them t-shirts to wear to announce to the family & showing them the t-shirts will be our way of telling them.  So I just need to control myself until the order gets here!  So far things are going good...I wanted to be done having kids by the time I was 30.  We revised that to I wanted to be preggo by the time I was 30 & done having kids by the time hubby was 30.  I turn 30 early next month (so this was my last chance of conception before 30) and the approximate due date is 1 month before hubby's birthday!  Making myself sound even crazier...i don't rely on the chinese gender chart, but it was right for 2/3 of my kids and for all but like 2 of my many cousins.  This time around it says I am having the gender my 2 older kids keep saying they want.  Wow!

  My first 2 pregnancies went off without a hitch, by the book, etc.  My third pregnancy I developed gestational diabetes.  That was a wake up call that I was not doing what was best for me or my baby (not to mention I did not want a 12 pounder coming out).  I did much better taking care of myself, not probably the absolute best, but better.  I was able to control it on my own with no medications.  Because of the diagnosis they decided to induce just days after my due date to be safe...and I delivered my 3rd healthy child.  I have been so blessed to have all 3 of my kids healthy so I am scared that my "luck" is running out.  I am beyond ecstatic to be pregnant again, but cautiously so.

  On a separate note, while TTC #3 we have mulled over names and had picked out a boy & girl name since we didn't know what we were having until delivery.  We figured whatever name we didn't use would carry over to #4.  That is not the case...LOL  I am not such a fan of the boy name we picked as it is too similar to one of our son's names now and I have kind of fallen out of love with our girl name too.  One thing is certain is that this child will in some way have my maiden name incorporated into its name...probably as a middle name.  Basically our name picking stategy has always been...I say names I like & hubby says yay or nay, with not much more input then that--no matter how much i ask him he just says "I like the names you pick and would tell you if I didn't.".  Sweet huh? <3  Our kids names all mean something to us.

#1: I picked a name I always wanted for a boy (but spelled it "different") and his middle name is same as hubby's

#2: I had said without a doubt that this would be my girl's name--after a city that had always stuck in my head as beautiful (spelled "different" also) with my middle name (same spelling)

#3: We ended up with a name that just kept coming back in my head while I was preggo even though I didn't know what we were having beyond my mother instincts.  His was a little different on how we made it meaningful as we did not just want a straight up Junior.  The last 2 letters of his first name put together with his middle name = Hubby's name  Sounds complicated I know, but hey-it works for us. = )

#4: Beyond the maiden name thing I am drawing a blank.  We like to be different, but not so different that our kids would have a hard time.  I think tonight we stumbled upon our girl name...we like the sound of it & it is not a name you hear often (plus if you put too much thought into it the name is kind of like adding hubby's name to my middle name...but that is just my OCD talking)  The boy name we are struggling with.  We think of a name & wonder why it sounds familiar...and then remember a cousin, friend, etc has that name already.

  My one cousin has the same maiden name as me & named her daughter that already (probably why I no longer love it as a first name for us) and another cousin ended up preggo at the same time as me for #3, had a boy 6 days before me, and gave him the same first name as ours who was born a few days later!

  My new obsession with the name too is 6 letters.  All 3 kids have 6 letters in their first names, the name we like for a girl does too.  So now I need to find a boy name I like with 6 letters (but our top picks right now are 4 or 7 letters).  I like numbers and here is why I want another with that many letters... 6+6+6+6=24. 2+4=6 it is like coming full circle ... like it is meant to be.  My FAVORITE number is 23.  2*3=6   ; )

This is so long, but it feels great to have this outlet...
The Zookeeper

Wow what a Mother's day!

  After past years lacking in feeling special, this has got to be my best Mother's Day yet!  My day started out with my husband getting the kids ready and  I went to a very filling brunch with my husband and kids.  Even though I had to finish my work when I got home, I kept my window open so I could talk to them out front.  I even snuck outside a few times to play, talk, and help my daughter start to learn to ride her bike with no training wheels.  I finished work in time to even get a short outing to the park with all the kids!!  My gifts were them straightening most of the house (with dad's help!) and my husband cleaning my car (getting all the cheerios, etc out).  I only asked for the clean house so the car was a bonus! = )
  I was supposed to get a monthly visitor on Saturday, but she failed to appear.  I took a test first thing Sunday morning only to have a big fat negative.  Hours later I told my husband & pulled it out of the trash to show him and there was a faint line that wasn't there before.  After many tests when TTC #3 I know that normally a line does not appear (at least for me).  This sparked my curiosity so after we put the kids down for the night I took another...this one came back with a faint positive.  I went to bed so excited!  It took 10 months to conceive #3 and now it had taken another 9-12 months TTC #4.  When I woke up this morning, I being me, took a third test.  This test also came back with a faint line.  I went to add it to my "collection" to compare, only to find that the test from the night before had changed.  The faint line making it positive had DISAPPEARED!!!
  I spent all day upset & confused.  I still hadn't had my visitor, but what is up with these tests???  My hubby pointed out that while there were not expired, they were "cheap" ones (Dollar store & Walmart brand) and I had stored them in a bathroom cabinet so the moisture could have messed with them...maybe?  I, of course, took that to mean head out to the store & buy a name brand test.  I went with E.P.T.  That is what I used with all the other pregnancies...it is my "lucky" brand.  I mean how can you go wrong when the name of the test is ERROR PROOF TEST!  He wanted me to wait until morning...which I can still do since it is a 2-pack...but I couldn't wait.  I had to take one test tonight!

  The best gift for Mother's Day that I got was finding out I am pregnant!!!!  Obviously, it is only the size of a poppy seed right now & so much could happen.  We have always rushed to tell people.  This is our 4th (and probably last) pregnancy.  We want to revel in it, enjoy it, take it all in.  We are waiting to tell family & friends until the second trimester.  I am going to do my best to wait that long, but I think my kids might notice...maybe?  It will be hard, but I hope I can do it.  I waited until delivery to find out what #3 would be and I NEVER thought I could wait.  It was amazing not knowing and finding out at the end.  I found I am stronger than I knew.  If, by chance, someone who knows me reads this...please do not tell anyone.  Please respect our wishes. 

The Zookeeper

This is a first...

  So, here I am, doing something I never thought I would do...joining the world of blogging.  I don't have anything particular to say.  I don't think anyone will be reading this.  I need a place to "think aloud".  Not much for my first entry...I guess I am more of the dip your toes in the water kinda gal then the jumping in kind.  Now that I have started though, I think this could be a great way to get some of these thoughts out of my head!! 

Nighty Night
Zookeeper