Little Fi Fi

I spent the day Saturday looking for Halloween costumes. The only ones who really needed them were Malachi and Aylah. I found nothing for them, but I did find a pink dog costume for Gabs. I didn't know if I should get it for her, because she had already decided to be a cat and use the costume the other kids have used in the past. BUT her favorite color is pink and she pretends to be a dog all the time and I found it at a second hand store, so I had to get it. It has a name tag on the collar that says "Fi Fi". The child literally lives in this costume. Not only does she wear it all the time, but she never breaks character. Woof woof!

Almost Baby Time

I can't believe it's already been a week since Ezekiel went to the hospital. It's been a fast week, but the days that we spent in the hospital felt like an eternity. We're so happy to have our little guy back home and even happier that he's doing so well and besides his cough, he's pretty much back to normal.
I had a doctor's appointment today. When you get to the end of pregnancy, the appointments seem so pointless. All they do is measure you and listen to the baby's heartbeat. For some reason, my doctor's office always runs behind, so I ended up waiting for an hour and half. With Gabs and Zekey. They were wonderful- as wonderful as a 3 and 2 year old can be in the doctor's office. By the time it was over, I was so stressed out I started having contractions. Which have since gone away. But I wouldn't mind if they came back and I went into labor. I've gotten so much done in the past two days. Things that don't really matter too much- like organizing and cleaning. But it makes me feel so much better and I definitely feel ready to have the baby. Although I still haven't packed a bag. I'm going to do that tonight- just in case :)

Zekey

The past week has been one of the most difficult weeks ever. As soon as Aylah got over her sickness, Ezekiel got sick. He had the same thing as she had, but his fever went away much faster than hers did. I thought he was getting better, but last Sunday he started getting even more sick. His temperature went back up and he had this horrible cough. The worst was that he started to not be able to breathe. He was still acting like himself and running around, so Nathan and I thought that if he just sat down he would be better. But that wasn't the case. One of the hardest things as a parent is trying to decide what your child needs when they're sick. We didn't know if we should take him to the emergency room or just wait until the morning and take him to his doctor. Finally, Nathan and I both agreed that he needed to go to the hospital. Nathan took him and by the time they got there, Ezekiel's throat was almost completely closed up. I can't even think about what might have happened had we not taken him to the hospital. They gave him a shot of a steroid, epinephrine and oxygen. He was there for a couple of hours, but was able to come home. The doctor at the ER prescribed some insanely strong steroids for him. Little did we know that it was too much for his little body to handle and by Wednesday he was so dehydrated, we had to take him back to the doctor. He was admitted to the hospital on Wednesday and he had to stay there until Friday evening. Our poor baby! He had croup, but the main problem was how dehydrated he was. Nathan stayed both nights with him in the hospital. And I spent the days with him. I started having contractions on Wednesday from the stress, but thankfully once I laid down, they went away.
He's home now and he's doing so much better. It was so scary when he was that sick. He was like a little rag doll.
My doctor is going to induce me on November 1st if baby doesn't come before that. I think I'm ok with staying pregnant for a little bit longer. I feel like I have so many things to do before he comes. I'm excited to not be pregnant, but I still want to enjoy these last couple of weeks of pregnancy. As long as everyone is well, our baby boy can come whenever he wants!




Malachi and Aylah on picture day



They have the same smile :)



Gabs loves her little brother. She was a good care giver

He was so exhausted, he couldn't even keep his eyes open

This makes me sad to even look at. He was very brave though!

Malachi and Aylah at "Kids in the Kitchen"
Feeling good enough to be silly!

Sick Family

It seems like everyone is sick right now. And isn't it too early for the sick season to start? The weather went from warm, summer weather to cold, yucky weather. Which is probably why everyone is sick. The sickness has hit our family hard. So far the only ones who aren't sick are Malachi and Gabs. Hopefully we can keep it that way. Aylah has been home from school since Wednesday. She's had a consistent fever and flu like symptoms. And then yesterday, Ezekiel got it too. So every night I've been up with them. Not necessarily because they actually need me, but mostly because I've been checking on them every hour. I hate it when the kids are sick. But it we've made good use of our get well time in the house. They've made forts in their beds, decorated some delicious looking cookies, watched way too many obnoxious kids shows and gotten in lots of snuggle time with Mommy.
I've definitely hit the exhaustion part of pregnancy. There's something about pregnancy exhaustion that is unlike anything else. I would much rather have a newborn than have the constant drain of pregnancy. He's gotten so big and it seriously hurts when he moves. I have almost everything all ready for his arrival, so hopefully he'll be here in the next 3 or 4 weeks. I'm so excited to see what he's going to look like. All of the kids have blonde hair excpet Aylah, so I'm very curious to see if he'll have brown hair like her. I'm sure he'll be chubby and have huge cheeks like all of the other kids. I can't wait to get my hands on him!

Fall

Fall weather has finally made it's way to Ohio. We've been enjoying the change in seasons, although it has brought some coughs and sniffles. I had a doctor's appointment yesterday, and I have an upper respiratory infection. Thankfully I'm taking medicine now that should clear it up quickly. Gabs and Zekey are both very good at playing together (or by themselves), so I'm able to kind of get some rest. I've been consistently measuring a week bigger. I'm not sure if my doctor will use that as my due date. If so, I'll be due on Halloween. I hope he doesn't come on Halloween though! I'll go back on Monday to see when I can be induced. This is the first pregnancy where I really feel in no hurry to have the baby. This has really been an easy pregnancy (as easy as pregnancy can be) and even though he's big and it hurts a little when he moves around, I absolutely love feeling my baby inside of me. I really feel like he will come when he's supposed to. I would love to say that I'm going to try to not be induced this time, but with four other kids, it's pretty important to be able to plan when I have the baby.
This past weekend some good friends of ours got married. Malachi and Aylah were the ring bearer and flower girl. They were so cute. Nathan and some friends brewed some special wedding beer. Everyone was amazed at how good it was. It really is impressive that Nathan has gotten so good at brewing amazing beer. I'm looking forward to having some in the future :)
One of our favorite things to do as a family (actually, there isn't anything we *don't* do as a family) is to go to a local store called The Anderson's. They have great samples the kids love, a great selection of food and beer and they have all of their fall and Christmas decorations out which we all enjoy. It's always funny to see people's expressions when we walk in with so many kids. But having a large family is something Nathan and I feel called to do. We sacrifice a lot, but there is nothing better than being able to be with our kids and raise them to be the absolute best people God wants them to be. Fall is filled with so many little family traditions of ours. We have just as much fun doing things with the kids as they do. And it's exciting to think that in a few weeks we will be adding another member to our family. God has been very good to us.

Our camera is the worst ever. I don't know what happened to it,but it just doesn't take good pictures anymore. The pictures of Aylah and Malachi at the wedding didn't turn out well at all. :(


This was the end of funny pictures in the van. Aylah and Zekey had enough.











Malachi and Aylah look like twins.

Update

I've once again been bad about updating my blog. I haven't been feeling the greatest the past few weeks. The pregnancy was going really well, up until about 3 weeks ago. I have horrible asthma and allergies and they get even worse when I'm pregnant. The change from Summer to Fall is the worst time of year for me. So I've had this ongoing asthma/allergy/cold thing for the past few weeks. I have to do breathing treatments several times a day. Yuck. And my body is finally feeling the effects of growing babies so many times. My feet hurt, my hips hurt, my lower back hurts. Ok, pretty much my entire body hurts. I've had to modify my exercise, because my body just doesn't move right anymore. I was afraid that the baby wasn't growing properly, because I thought my stomach was smaller than it should be. But at my last doctor's appointment, he was actually measuring a week bigger. Wonderful news for me! I'm just carrying him differently than any of the other ones. He's all out in the front, not all over like I've been in past pregnancies. I really, really don't like the way I look when I'm pregnant, but this little guy has definitely been kind to me. I crave really weird things like raw vegetables and ice water. It's so strange. I could honestly eat cucumbers and celery all day long. I guess if I'm going to crave something, it might as well be something healthy! My next doctor's appointment is on Monday. I'm going to ask her when I can be induced. I was going to try really hard to be patient and let the baby come when he wants to this time, but I really want him here in no more than four weeks. In the meantime, I'm going to try to enjoy every last minute of being pregnant. I feel so blessed to have five kids. It's amazing to me that God has given us so many little lives that bring so much joy and happiness into our lives. But I'm also really glad that this will be the last baby. Unless God really wants us to have more. But I'm pretty sure my body is done growing babies! :)

Back to School

Last week was the beginning of school for Malachi. Kindergarten started a week after everyone else, so we eased our way back into the school year. Malachi's first day was great. He has a good teacher this year and we're very excited for him to be starting first grade. He likes to pretend like he doesn't like school, but I know he does.
Yesterday was Aylah's first day of Kindergarten. I've been so upset about her starting school. She still seems like a baby. I had to try my very hardest not to get emotional in front of her- I wanted her to be excited and not be scared or upset about starting school. So yesterday morning I made them all special breakfast (strawberry pancakes with whipped cream) and I got all of the kids ready to walk Malachi and Aylah to school. We had about 10 minutes before we had to leave and I started feeling a little weepy. But Ezekiel kept me from letting my emotions get the best of me by puking all over the girl's floor. I had to quickly put him in the tub, gather all of the kids up, take some pictures of Aylah and run out the door before we were late. I think this was a blessing in disguise though, because it definitely kept me from crying!
Once we got to Aylah's classroom, she walked right in and put her things away and sat down at her seat and started working on her morning paper. She acted like she had done this a hundred times before! I was so proud of her. She came home yesterday and wanted to do her homework right away. She is going to be an excellent student.
The past two days of having only Gabs and Ezekiel at home have been amazing. Gabs loves being the older sibling- she gets to boss "baby head" around and she gets to play with all of Aylah's things. I didn't realize how difficult the summer was with four kids at home until yesterday. Gabs and Ezekiel both take at least 2 hour naps, so that has allowed me to have a few minutes to rest and also have some time to myself. Spending the summer with four kids meant that I had zero time to myself. There was always a child with me. If the other kids were napping, Malachi was still up and talking my ear off. I didn't realize how much I need a little time to myself until I actually got some time to myself. It's been wonderful. :)
I'm very excited for this school year. Although the kids don't go to the best school, Nathan and I both trust that this is where God has us for now and our kids will be protected and get a good education. It's hard to believe that we have two kids in school, but I'm so thankful for how incredible our kids are and I'm excited to see what kind of people they grow to be in the next year.