Going again

We take a lot of little small vacations if you haven't noticed. Local areas and only for a few days but they are enough to be refreshed. John works as a restaurant manager so his days off are always varied and never a typical weekend. It makes for a very unstructured week but we always write on our big kitchen calender when he works so the kids know more of what to expect.

Saying that, we are leaving this afternoon to go to the beach for 4 days! We always go on vacation this week in July because it is our anniversary (7 years!!) and John's dad's birthday. We always have a family vacation with them and sometimes John's brother's family will come too. It is only an hour away at Indian Shores but the beaches are private and beautiful and we love it there! So expect a lot of pictures this week :)

7 years. wow. Don't they say there is a 7 year itch? What exactly does that mean? After 7 years you are tired of your spouse and explore other options? Why 7 years? I see it happen to folks married for one year....or 30. I don't like the saying and there is no way in hell that is happening in our house. John is perfect for me, he may not always understand me but who will ever understand women, we don't even understand ourselves! He never picks fights and squelches me when I try. He is kind and selfless and strong and amazingly ambitious. His children look up to him and worship him. He is a pretty good guy all around! I couldn't imagine anyone who would be more perfect for me :))

Birth Ramblings

For those that have been following me since my pregnancy with Ian, you may remember that I had planned a homebirth but was made to transfer to the hospital to have him....and you may have noticed that I never posted a birth story.

Today when me and the whittles were driving home from Sam's, I took a shortcut to bypass traffic. That led us by the hospital where I was stopped at a red light and looked over at the entrance to the woman's center where I went in that night. I was instantly taken back to that night when I went through those revolving doors and had to kiss Johnny good bye and tell him next time we met again, he would have his brother. Sounds sweet enough right? No, it is very heart breaking on both of our parts. You see, Johnny was looking forward to the homebirth almost as much as I was. He had tears in his eyes and was very sad that he was not allowed to be a part of it anymore. It was ripped away from him in the same way it was ripped away from me.

He was there when Ava was born and never left my side throughout her 17 hour labor. He was there when I looked down in that birthing tub and saw we had another girl! He was the one to cut the cord after she was born. He is so proud of that and I hope it is a memory that he will always have, especially since he was only 4 at the time. He was so happy to be having a brother and to be able to do it all again. He was at almost all of my prenatal appts. sitting on our couch watching Anne do all her things to his mama carrying his brother.

My emotions over the loss of my birth are still so raw and I am not sure when I can open up and write Ian's story. You see, it is still special to me, I just need to finish mourning the hopes that I had and the struggles I went through. When I was about 28 weeks pregnant with him, we learned he was breached and he stayed that way for almost the rest of the pregnancy and I was so angry about it. I just was so focused on getting him turned and keeping him that way, that I couldn't enjoy the pregnancy as I had hoped since it was to be my last. I really enjoy being pregnant and this time I did not because of the stress. I wanted the homebirth again so bad that anything to threaten that, made me uneasy. I was so worried about cord issues and fluid levels and where his feet and hiccups were supposed to be that I just couldn't relax.

In the end, he did flip and was in great position and labor was smooth but things happen that we can not control. And I think back on it all the time and replay it and I am pretty sure that no matter what other things could have happened, we were suppose to be in that hospital for him to be born. Everything fell into place the way it should have and I still see connections of events that show me why we were in the hospital.

But it still hurts. When I had to come home and see my deflated liner for the birth pool laying on our back porch, it hurt. And when I looked at all my birth supplies in the box waiting to be used, it hurt. And when I had to tell all the naysayers who never believed in homebirth that I had to go to the hospital, it hurt. And when I had to go back to the hospital 5 days after his birth to have them draw blood from 2 spots on my arm and then from my wrist and put it into my spinal column to hopefully cure the fluid leaking out and causing a spinal headache, oh yeah, that really hurt.

Well, that's enough self pity for one night. I've got some paypal burning a hole in my pocket so I am off to find some bigger cloth dipes for my 20 pound 4 month old!

I promise, one day soon, I'll write it.

Lots o'pictures

Finally ordered Ian an amber necklace from Inspired By Finn. The one and only color that I wanted was out in the smaller sizes so his is too big for him but I have been keeping it tucked into his shirts anyways so they are fine. He doesn't even seem to notice it but I think it might be doing some good, he hasn't been as fussy A little bit of lovin
Lot o'cheese
I did have permission to post this picture....we call it peas on the deez. John had his Big V done on Wednesday and he is still pretty swollen and black and blue down under but he is feeling better. He did have a couple of weird days on the Vicoden but is off those nasty things now!
Yes, we went back to Disney Ft. Wilderness again. Man, I love Disney too much, I could be a bit obsessed, I would go every weekend if we could. Madeline actually let me take her picture this time at the Campfire singalong! Ava calls them "Chicken Dale" and I let her because it's too cute and soon enough she'll say it right and it won't be cute anymore :( I ate too many smores :( Not looking forward to my weigh in Monday morning!
Me and the kids (John was in bed with peas on his deez our whole trip, yes it was planned that way, I figured I could entertain the kids better there than I could at home if I was going to be a single parent for 3 days) we went for a bus ride to see the petting farm and the horses they rent out for rides. We got stuck out in a massive thunder/rain storm so we found a nice place under cover and I taught them how to play checkers. Madeline didn't really care so I gave her my camera to take pictures of Ava and J and I played instead. It was pretty cool.
Rain, rain go away
Waking up in the RV on the pull out sofa
Naked heiny butt....he peed on my bed while I was taking this picture

I thought I would try out the bath seat to see if it worked out any better than the infant tub. Not so good, he just can't hold himself up well enough and kept falling to the side and trying to get all the toys. He did love it though!
He was smiling at Ava
"I'm a G money"
Another first in the same day as the bath. I stuffed a blanket in front so he wouldn't be so floppy but he was strong enough to push himself backwards. He loves being upright with the kids now. Ava loves to push him across the floor too!

4 months old!

2 days before he turned 4 months old, his two front teeth popped through! See the drool dripping off his chin? Poor thing is pretty miserable during the day but I have been giving him Hylands teething tablets and they seem to be helping.

We got a slip n slide and prime time to use it and it started raining! The kids didn't care, since there was no lightening. They plus the neighborhood kids had a good time.

Ava with her best friend Noah from next door. He's almost 2 years older than her but they don't care! They play together almost everyday.

4th of July

My in laws neighborhood had a bike parade for all the kids to show off their spirit. The kids had a good time decorating their bikes and the wagon. Too bad this is the last time they were to ride these....everything was stolen out of the back of the truck when PopPop stopped at the store to buy ice. I really hoped that guy just needed to bikes to make his kids happy. That would make me feel better about it because my kids needed new bigger bikes anyways so this just speeded up us buying them. I am still mad about the wagon though.

AND Ian's bouncy seat was inside the wagon for the parade @@ We've had this seat since M was born!

This was how Ian watched the parade!

Our town does a parade for 4th of July, nothing fancy, mainly churches, schools etc with some floats but my kids have gone every year and they love it....all the beads and candy and seeing it all, they look forward to it the same way they look forward to Christmas!

We set up a canopy and a tent next to each other to get out of the sun. It did help out with the heat a bit. Plus we had coolers and ice cold watermelon, yum! The little boy is our neighbor next door, then Grandma holding Ava and of course Madeline.

He did wake up to watch some of the parade.

Tall, medium, peanut ;)

We ended our day with a cookout at the neighbors and gave the kids a good fireworks show (although I think the men enjoyed it even more ;P~)

A very rare picture of Ian in his crib! He doesn't sleep in it, only plays occasionally. I need to start making him take his naps in there because he is starting to scoot himself by pushing his toes. He can get across the floor in no time between rolling over back and forth and pushing.
Just like his daddy....loves to look at himself in the mirror!

What do you think...has he outgrown his bath seat?? I have a seat he could sit in for the actual bathtub but I love being able to be this close to him for baths. It is also really good bonding time for daddy. Plus he still loves it :)

Ava is finally starting to gain a little height, she has always been our little peanut. Here the girls are practicing their fishing with Papa.

My Granny is down from SC for a visit for a couple of weeks, staying at my mom's. I love her so much and don't get to see her as much as I'd like.

I always feel like I never post enough pictures of Johnny. He is always busy, too busy to be hanging around on the couch holding a baby. He always make silly faces too...or too serious faces. It is hard to catch the real him in photo. Anyways, here is is grinning toothless sitting on the couch holding a baby.

He is so thankful that I gave him a brother. He is tired of girls although I will say he does understand them and all their weird moods really well for being a 6 year old boy. He gets it and knows when to stay far, far away...or aggravate to the highest degree. He just got a lecture on aggravating a very moody 4 year old girl. He likes to make her scream and I abhor to hear her scream. It really pushes my buttons more than any other noise around here. She screams really really loudly. She talks really really loudly. She ALWAYS wakes the sleeping baby. I can't make her talk/scream anymore quietly so poor Johnny gets the lecture on aggravating the screaming 4 year old. Did I tell you he is very grateful to me for giving him a brother?

A rare pretty good picture of the 4 monkeys

Man, I love my husband for having blue eyes and giving me blue eyed babies

Ahh, he wanted that football so bad he could taste it. Or actually wanted to taste it but couldn't figure out how to use his hands to pick up something that big. Johnny gave him the football so they could start practicing. My heart melts. Did I tell you yet he was grateful to me for that brother? Just kidding, it IS getting annoying.

Not a very proud moment to put in my mommy moment journal. At least they were using the recycle bin that we fill every week, actually we have 3 that we fill every week.

Yes, that is my 6 year old giving my 2 year old a tramp stamp on her back. And I can call it that because I have one too. No, I wasn't a tramp (IMO) but I did tend to follow the crowd and it was cool,

He is very attached to his tattoo gun. He sells his art. $0.50 for me and daddy, free if you are under 7. I currently have a lizard on my arm and an anchor on my wrist. Yeah, I'm still cool.