Happy Father's Day??

oh dear.
I did remember, I did. Well, I remembered about a week ago, when I put together the photo book Jeff asked for for Father's Day and told him that I did it but hadn't ordered in time and it wouldn't be here in time.

I remembered again on Wednesday when Jessi came home from Rainbow Club class at church with a Daddy card she had made.

And then I forgot.

Saturday I brought the mail in and noticed there was a letter for Jeff from my mom. Couldn't figure out why mom would send Jeff a letter when she was just here last weekend, but OK.

I handed it to him and absent-mindedly watched him open it. Simultaneously, as he revealed that it was a card and not a letter, it dawned on me why my mom would be mailing him something.

And that dawning brought a very deep and unplanned response.

"OH CRUD!!! It's FATHER'S DAY!

You will have to let your imagination provide the intonation I used. But let's just say it wasn't positive.

About 3 seconds later I realized...
and stammered...
"Uh,,, did I just say that out loud?"

The look of utter confusion and amazement on Jeff's face let me know that I had, indeed, said it not only out loud, but rather loudly!

Thank goodness the look of consternation on MY face amused him and we both broke into hysterical laughter.

All last night he would look at me and say "oh crud" and I would begin my embarassed laughter all over again.
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now a small confession is needed in order to make the rest of this story funny. I didn't necessarily say "crud". It might have been another word that starts with cr and ends with p.
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Jeff and I have one year old nursery for the month of June. The first two weeks we only had two babies each time. Now it was still a challenge because these were babies who don't like nursery, but at least it was just two.
Today... we had 7 or 8. I really thought I had counted 8, but then when I go back and name them to count them, I can only come up with 7. Either way, it was a lot of one year olds! Especially when about half of them were of the sort that don't want to be in there. We did have two moms who brought the babies in later go ahead and stay, which was good.

So at one point I had two dirty dipes at the same time. I was changing one and the mommy of the other one was changing hers.
Hers was little pooplets, of the rabbit pellet variety. Well, slightly bigger than rabbit pellets, but that type of poop. Mine was.... NOT pellets. At ALL. I heard her comment about the pellets and offered to trade babies right then, but she wouldn't take me up on it. Upon checking the dipes, I had asked Jeff to run across the hall for a trash bag since we were out of the diaper disposal bags. When he came back, I was about finished and threw away the dipe from my baby, as well as the clorox wipes I used on the changing table, and proceeded to begin thoroughly washing my hands. Jeff went over to the other mommy to get her dirty dipe and tie it into the same trash bag.
As I washed, I heard much laughter... and looked up to see that Jeff had been out of the room during the "rabbit pellet" comments and had just picked up the diaper (which the mommy hadn't completely fastened up yet) and the diaper had sort of fallen open and all the pellets had rolled out... you seriously have to just imagine all the little pooplets rolling and bouncing... it was hilarious.
The next few moments were a flurry of the four of us adults trying to keep babies away from the disater zone, hand wipes to Jeff and the mommy to pick up the escaping poo balls, and get a wad of clorox wipes to mop the floor with.

When all was well, and I could breath through my laughing, I said, "Happy Father's Day honey" to which Jeff looked at me and replied...
"don't you mean, 'oh cr*p, it's Father's Day?'"

pictures

My mom and sis came up for a super quick trip yesterday to see the kids in their end of year recital. While she was here, I had Julie take some pictures to use as senior pictures for Dean. Since he had prom last night, he still had his tux and we did pictures in that.

My sister Julie took the pictures and I photoshopped them.

Original:

touched up and cropped:

original: touched up and cropped:

original:
touched up and cropped: Two (too?) cool dudes.
Oh, I wish my kids were photogenic...

Joyana... what can I say? original:cropped

what a ham

honestly, we did take pictures of Jessica... but so far I'm not loving any of them even touched up. I plan to redo her recital pictures in the next few days and will post them then.

still around

quick update:

Jeff is doing great, he really is. the surgeon is very happy with how he is healing and he has been back at work doing part time days for about 1.5 weeks, should be back to full time by the end of this week. He was truly very sick and it has taken a while for his body to recover from how septic he was. God has been so good, I really can't thank him enough.

I've had Jeff home for the better part of a month and we have enjoyed it so much! To be really honest, I thought it would be hard... I hear women talk about wanting their husbands to get back to work when they are off for a while, but it truly has been special.

Jessi just had her 5th birthday, no pictures though because the usb port on the front of the computer where I plug my camera in to down load pics is broken and I can't crawl around to the back right now. She had a great day with our final homeschool group field trip, a birthday dinner date with dad and grandpa, home for cake and presents, then off to the pinewood derby to see Joey race. She got a scooter, a fishing pole, and two puzzles, and a great time was had by all.

I got my new serger. I'm in heaven, it's great. After two years, I finally decided and bought one. so far so good. Again, I'll post pics when i get the camera connected.

We did a lot of moving over the holiday weekend, Jeff and I are into our new bedroom, Joey is in our old one, and the girls are in the "kids'" room by themselves. They are getting lovely bunkbed but it's not due in for a few weeks.

Our family lost a wonderful friend last week. My "Uncle" Tom passed away after several years fighting congestive heart failure. I'll try to post his obituary later, and do a proper memorial post. For now I'll just say that this is so bittersweet... our hearts ache for our loss, but I know that he is out of pain and can finally breathe again. He was a big man, an ox of a man, and to be, for all intents and purposes, crippled these past few years has been so hard on him.

Today was our last MOPS meeting of the year, and to make it even more emotional, our two co-cordinators are both retiring this year. God has given us two amazing young ladies to rise up in leadership, but it is going to be hard to do without my other dear friends. I'm going to blame it on the pregnancy hormones, but yes, I did cry (a lot) this morning.

That's all for now, just touching base since it's been a few weeks. There will be pictures eventually.

mother'sdaystimuluschecklightsout

Yes you read that right.

Mother's Day. Is it permissible to admit that my Mother's Day started out a little cruddy and went downhill a bit before it went back uphill? Or should I pretend that I was feted with breakfast in bed, someone else got the whole family ready and polished for church, and I got the "most angelic mother" award at church?

How about I neither admit nor deny anything, but do say that my dear husband did successfully rescue my day and turn it into something truly special? He really is a great guy and I'm so blessed to have him for a husband and the father of my children.
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Economic stimulus check. Jeff is actually looking this gift horse in the mouth and wondering where the government gets the extra money to do this. He's such a republican. I on the other hand figure it's about time the GOP learns to share, and after all, all they have to do is shorten the Iraqi war for a day or so to pay for this.

Our plans for the money include:
new lawnmower
new weed eater
new serger
retaining stones for the other half of the house border garden
windshield for the motorcycle
seat backrest for the motorcycle
spinning wheel
hire someone to put down new floor in the kitchen
put aside some $$ for school supplies for next year, so I can have an account to go to as needed
carpet another bedroom

Now obviously, this is a dream list. But it's fun to dream, and if we can manage even four or five things on our list, that will be great.

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We've had some yucky weather around here, including uncharacteristic tornadoes. Let me tell you, I'm a tropical girl and I grew up with hurricanes. they really don't bother me so much. Tornadoes though, I do NOT like. I dealt with them for two years in Alabama and figured I was finished! I didn't sign on to do tornadoes here too. That aside, last night we had some good T-storms and wind and our electric went out. It blinked a few times then went out for good. We broke out the candles and a hand crank camping lantern to use to eat a simple supper, then all piled into mommy and daddy's bed for storytelling, spelling and math quizzes, and general fun until bedtime. I really think the kids liked it, and I know I appreciated having them go down without the usual plea for 2 more minutes of light, or please leave the hall light on.

random moanings

argh.
without going into gory details, I can now proclaim that I have FOR SURE surpassed all the cleaning up of bodily function messes in my career as wife and mom, than I did in all my years working in various arenas of patient care/health care.
If I never see any more poo tinkle or puke, I will be just fine with that.

and yet... I have a new baby on the way and even though I'm such a hippy that I do EC, I know I will indeed be dealing with a whole new round of the aforementioned messes. And I wouldn't trade it for anything.

But really, we are already 6.5 people with 1.5 bathrooms (and really the .5 bath doesn't count, it's upstairs in a closet by Dean's room, no one else uses it)... do I HAVE to add tummy aches to the mix?
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I'm 24 weeks. That's over halfway, but not really anywhere near the end. Last night heartburn set in with a vengance. This morning I am craving salt so badly that I just licked the salt (and threw away the soggy chip) off of half a bag of tortillas. I'm pretty sure when I go for my next checkup, the scale will NOT be my friend. Something about the large portion of chocolate fudge chunk icecream that followed my salt-licking frenzy.

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Joy skipped her nap yesterday. She has been trying to do this occasionally, but it usually doesn't work, or if she does make it too late in the day, I just make her stay up and then put her to bed super early. The little rascal didn't go down until after 9:30 last night!!! With no nap!!! That is simply not good. NOooooooooooo! She is my nappingest baby yet and I like that. I know that to some people, napping is sacrosanct, and any deviation from this is reprehensible... that just hasn't worked for me with the first two kids... but with Joy, I really am enjoying having the naps go past the 2 years old mark. Now it really looks like she is going to drop them too. wahhhhh. I know we can still have quiet time/rest time, but I'm gonna miss the naps.

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I'm supposed to have a MOPS steering team meeting on Friday. Jeff's follow up dr appt with the surgeon is on Friday. I want to go to the Dr appt with him obviously. Well the person I was going to ask to watch the kids will be at the meeting. That is probably still ok, since she lives down the block from me, she could just take my kids with her and they could go to nursery (just like they would if I were at the meeting) and then after the Dr appt I could come back and sit in the end of the meeting and get the kids. but if one upchucked today... I'm pretty sure the rest will follow, you know? I really can't take them to someone's house or plan to put them in nursery if they are pukey. Not sure what to do. Anyone want to watch three possibly pukish kids for me on Friday morning?

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My mom broke her elbow the end of January and had surgery on it in February. A few days later, she fell again and in trying to catch herself, sprained the wrist of the non-broken arm. That was a bummer because this made her not just one-handed, but no-handed for a few weeks. The sprain was severe, but healed. What has not healed is something that showed up about 3-4 weeks post-fall... that she ruptured a tendon in the sprained hand's thumb. Her thumb doesn't work. A thumb is underappreciated until you don't have it. I tease her and ask how often does she actually hitch-hike and NEED the thumb, but we do know that it needs to be fixed. Well, the fix is another surgery. This time with at 6 weeks in a splint with no movement (they "borrow" and extra tendon from the index finger, route it through the palm, and attach it on the thymb, both of the the fingers have to be extended and immobile during healing), and then at least 6 weeks physical therapy for the thumb and finger. She is dreading this. I am trying to figure out how I can go help her. All of our commitments end by the middle of June, but by that time I am getting pretty close to baby day. She doesn't want to be out of commission when the baby comes because she traditionally closes up shop there at home and comes to stay with me for a few weeks--- which we LOVE and appreciate so much. So she either needs to do the surgery now so she's better, or put it off until fall. I really don't know what to tell her. it's not a good scenario either way. In retrospect... perhaps I should have hauled Jeff down there and done both of the surgeries at once. Then I could have taken care of them both at once, and hey, she does have two bathrooms!

Important Information

Unless you have just started following my ramblings, you probably know that I'm just a little bit "crunchy" and follow some of the more natural parenting practices such as natural childbirth, cloth diapering, extended breastfeeding, babywearing, and co-sleeping. I'm perfectly fine with my friends who don't, and while I love this way doing things for me, I'm less interested in convincing people that I'm right than I am in simply presenting information so that other mothers can have more choices.
I had two very "medicalized" births and one (so far, this next one is on the same track as well) natural childbirth with midwifery care throughout. Hands down my health both physical and emotional, and my recovery were miles ahead in my last birth. I desired natural birth with my first two but due to lack of knowledge and lack of a supportive medical staff, things just didn't go that way.
This past fall I was able to attend a screening of a very important film called "The Business of Being Born" and while I thought I was becoming more informed about birth practices, the information presented was shocking to me.
I honestly feel that anyone who has given birth or will give birth here in the USA needs to have this information. Again, not to convince you that "we" are right and "they" are wrong, but simply so that you can understand the choices that you have, but are not given or informed about.
A disclaimer: this is a very real documentary, about birth. so yes, there is lots of skin--all in the context of labor and birthing, but skin nonetheless. It also contains some unedited remarks of women in labor, and not everyone giving birth necessarily watches their language.
Another thing, the movie is focusing on the "business" behind current birthing practices and protocols, and compares them to what childbirth can be like. This is presented in the context of homebirthing for the simple reason that the midwife they followed happens to be a homebirth midwife in NYC. Don't get the impression that they are advocating only homebirth, that is simply the dimension that gets the most time. It is possible to have a natural birthing experience in a hospital, however the film points out very clearly that the system is totally stacked against that happening.
A few of the more important points that the film addresses are:
-the snowball effect of medical interventions. A hospital is a business, patients in, patients out, that is where the money comes from. Thus patients are put on a timeline... well, birth doesn't aways follow a timeline. Thus begins the cycle of interventions. First a little pitocin to augment labor (usually needed because women are laboring on their backs, tied to too many monitors), then of course once the pitocin is started, the pain becomes unmanageable without medication, this relaxes you, but also slows labor again, so, more pitocin is needed. This cycle repeats. Finally, the baby is being squeezed by these unnaturally strong, unrelenting contractions and starts to have its blood supply compromised, its heart rate drops, and it goes into distress. Mom is then rushed into an emergency C-section due to fetal distress, and everyone is so happy that the baby was saved because of the section... many times, without the initial interventions to augment labor, this would never have happened. The incidence of unplanned c-sections following the introduction of labor augmenting drugs is undeniable, but this is not often disclosed to moms in labor.
-the importance of the chemical effects of the hormones released during labor and birth. Briefly, oxytocin and other brain hormones linked to feelings of love, nurturing and even addiction are released during labor and delivery. These hormones are lost when replaced by synthetic versions (for instance, pitocin instead of oxytocin). In nature the simple story is that if these hormones are missing during birth, the mother animal rejects the baby. For instance, if a monkey is given a c-section, it will ignore the baby and let it die. Now obviously no one is saying that a human mother can't overcome this and love and bond with their baby despite this! However, the medical history of birthing in the USA over the past 80 years is fraught with mistakes that we didn't find out until after the fact. Think of routine pevic exrays, thalidomide, and cytotec induced uterine rupture. Will the study of mother-child relationships in the next generations show that our messing with these natural hormones was a huge mistake?
- Doctors, hospitals, and insurance companies are all equally complicit in misleading both one another and the birthing women in the USA. We are the second leading developed nation when it comes to maternal mortality.... first if you count only the largest nations. One interesting note that I found out in the panel discussion that followed the screening I attended (it's not in the film) is that if all the numbers were out in the open, our numbers would be even higher. For example, in the UK, any mother who dies within a year of giving birth is automatically listed as a maternal mortality, pending investigation for the real cause. In contrast, here in the USA, an obvious maternal mortality may be listed as sepsis or hemorrhage instead, thus skewing the numbers.

Ok, before I simply post the entire film, let me again say that despite my disclaimers, I do think that the information in this film is vital for women who have or will give birth. The good news is that although this film was originally only released through private screenings, then for rent on netflix, it is now available in it's entirety online, for free.
http://quicksilverscreen.com/watch?video=45525

I urge you to find 1.5 hours to watch this important film.

God's Hugs in a Deviled Egg

So Jeff is home, I think I said that last time. He is actually doing well, hasn't used his pain meds at all for the past few days. Our main issue is the wound care. I think I said the surgical wounds were the size of my pinkie or ring finger. Nah. Let's move right on up to thumb. Super fun times and I'm so glad that I'm well past any stages of nausea etc. The important thing is that by all indication we have beat this infection. He is tired but starting to get bored (woe is me) and has had absolutely not even a hint of fever.
He does have ample time off, thank God for a salaried job, rather than hourly. If he gets too far in the hole for sick days they will put him on short term disability I think. One other possibility may be that they send him a laptop so he can work on a few key things from home. Apparently the Navy wants their new ship on time, no matter what has befallen my Jeff. Silly government.
I've shared how blessed I was with childcare during this time, and now am being blessed with meals. Except... I'm afraid I'm going to gain a bunch of weight and also get spoiled--my homegirls can COOK. You know though... there was this one dish... I am seriously wondering if she got it from Olive Garden or something and just repacked it in a casserole dish? Yeah, it was THAT good.
So deviled eggs from God. Well, yes. See, to you, deviled eggs are just a common summer side dish, often used for cookouts or potluck dinners. To me, a good deviled egg is manna; pure deliciousness in a three bite format. I have a few close friends who know this and endeavor to make sure that if we come over for an occasion there are a few deviled eggs. Yes, I have seriously gone to someones house and there was a private dish of deviled eggs just for me. It's that important. So, a lady who I know somewhat from church heard about what was going on and called to ask if she could bring a meal for me (not a member of MOPS, just heard about it) so I let the girl who's scheduling the meals know and they got together. Today was this lady's day. She had emailed me to let me know that my dinner would be in the fridge in the church and to just pick it up. So I did, found a nice casserole of beef and noodles and a bowl with a side dish, brought it home, thought that was it. A few minutes after I got home, my in laws call from the church saying that I hadn't picked up my meal, I told them yes I did, and we realized that apparently I had missed some. They brought it by on their way home... a HUGE bag of fresh organic produce (2 heads of lettuce, 4 lbs of tomatoes, 5 lbs of baby carrots, and a large batch of bananas), a bowl of potato salad, and (drum roll) a big egg dish thingy full of deviled eggs. Now remember, this lady doesn't know me, let alone know me well enough to understand my fetish with deviled eggs. And these are SO good! You'd think that if I liked them that well, I could just make them, right? Well, mine never taste as good as ones that people make for me, and these, oh these are simply divine.
God not only provides for our needs (childcare), but our convenience (all these meals), and sometimes, just an extra special luxury like these eggs to show that yes, he's the amazing creator, God of the universe, mighty healer (Praise Him!) but he's also my daddy and delights in hugging me with someone else's arms in the form of a dish of deviled eggs.