Christmas Pictures

Well, I've been really trying to get some fantastic pics of at least the little girls together under/by/near the tree. The other day I dressed them up in adorable matching Santa dresses and clicked away...........I believe the above pictue says it all, check out her expression, she had ABSOLUTELY had it with our photo session.

6 months with Melanie

Wow, last Thursday marked six months with Melanie, our little smooshie, happy lovey little bean, Melanie. She's happy, and squishy, and mellow. She loves her daddy and gets sooooo excited when he gets home. She thinks Maddi is HILARIOUS!! Her feet are yummy, to me and to her. She won't touch a bottle, not to drink from, but she doesn't quite love nummies as much as Sis did, they're for eating and mommy is for snuggling. Oh, does she love to snuggle with mommy and her lovey and her binker! She doesn't really want to crawl yet, she wants to WALK! She makes the funniest little face and goes "ooooohhh". Recently she's started to pucker up and have a little fit when she can't reach something, she might crawl, if daddy (or Meg or Missy or Kadie or Sis or even Logan) would stop giving her the toy when she makes that face....

I'm so loving every minute with this little girl.

Melanie Faith

Minutes Old

Melanie Faith

1 month

2 months

3 months

4 months

5 months

(photo by Lish)

6 months

Maybe something new

Nope, not a new baby this time. So, I have an appointment Wednesday, after Mel's six month check up...an appointment with admissions. Someone might be going back to school again, at almost 39. YIKES. She just might be an RN by the time she's 42. We will see...........

Thanksgiving etc

Thanksgiving was really nice, this was my 4th year fixing dinner myself and it's funny the changes in our family since then. We've added two little girls, a boyfriend and a girlfriend, or. Maddi, Mellie, Britney and Brandon. We love all of them. Four years ago the four kids we had were here all day, 4 years later 2 of the six kids were in and out and they didn't get to see each other the whole day.Still it was nice.
Michael came to babysit on Wednesday so Mike and I could go grocery shopping, Sis had a blast with him, Logan too.
Here are a few pics of the last couple weeks

Really, really mad

The Diva Princess has not been feeling well, low grade fever, runny nose, cough etc. She does however still feel well enough to listen and dance to Beautiful Girls about 3,999,999 times. That apparently makes her feel much better.

Yesterday she overheard me talking about how she was supposed to get her H1N1 booster today but I wasn't going to take her until Friday because of her fever symptoms etc. She informed me that she was not getting ANY ANY booster shots and that she was really, really mad at me! " Really really mad at you momma, not just a little mad, really mad!!!!!" I can only imagine how mad she's going to be after we actually go get the booster.

Princess Maddi and her brother the groom

This week Maddi is a princess, every day, period. She has to wear a "princess" dress from the time she gets up until I wrestle her into jammies at night. Her favorite is a beautiful off white dress from our friends the McCarters, it looks like a flower girl dress and she thinks it makes her a princess bride mommy. She marries her brother in it alot. She goes over in the corner and sways a lot and then comes out of the corner and tells me with much excitement "Momma, Bubby just married to me!!!" Last night I asked her if she thought Michel and Britt would get married someday, she said "yes to me!!".

Feeling a little gripey

My words are just a jumble today, if I finish this and post it today it will make no sense whatever but will definately really be stephanierambling. I'm a little moody today. Maybe the weather.

I'm frustrated a little today, frustrated with my oldest and only son, I think he needs to do some more growing up and work a little harder. I love him and I'm proud of him, always and the way he loves his sisters, family etc. He stays out of trouble, doesn't drink, smoke, party.... However, I think he seems a little comfortable where he's at and needs to be pushed a little (HARD), he gets in a slump so easily and then has to be pried out (HARD). Times are rough and the economy is rough, but jobs can be found, especially for a young man NOT supporting a whole family. However the trick is to GET OUT OF THE HOUSE AND GO FIND ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Meg has acid reflux and can't have caffeine or chocolate for 2 weeks, that's a Perrine woman with no vices, scary....... Is is just a little ornery of me to want to eat a Reeses Pbutter cup with my coffee right in front of her???

Missy has finally started to enjoy cheerleading now that they are actually having games not just practice. She's doing a pretty good job from what I saw on Saturday. Last night I spent an hour and a half in the cheer hospitality room "babysitting" visiting cheerleaders for our schools bball invitational. What did I learn? I would rather be in a small room with 30 toddlers then in a big one with 10 jr high kids. What do I want to know?? Why would jr high cheerleaders have spankies in such contrast to the rest of their uniform that they draw attention to the area they should be hiding?? Glad our girls spankies blend in with their uniform.

Kadie is doing great, she got her new glasses and we don't have to run back to ortho until right before Christmas.

Maddi is going through a new phase, we MUST MUST MUST dress like a princess every minute of every day, PERIOD!!

Mellie is 5 months old today and yummy, yummy, yummy, awwww, my sweet little baby girl, bittersweet that time is flying so with her.

Mike, is Mike, I love this man, roller coaster ride that he is, funny that I growled at him this am about seasonal affective disorder when todays gloomy sky has me, well a wee bit gloomy
(*&%chy!)

Easy supper tonight, sloppy joes, mac&cheese and peas.

Pictures!

Vaccinations, Check!

After researching, soul searching and months of praying for health (which thank God we are blessed with) my whole family ( with exception of Mel who's to young) has now been H1N1 vaccinated. I researched this upside down, left right and sideways and came to the conclusion this was the best choice for my family. Everyone has to do what is best for themselves and their family.

Mmmmmmm, Yummy

Woke up yesterday morning and the first thought in my mind was mmmmmmmmmm, not mmmmmm coffee , but mmmmmm, yummy. Yummy baby breath in my face, warm yummy toddler arm around my neck. I love those first thing in the morning snuggles with messy hair and sleepy eyes. I love when Mellies eyes crinkle so much because there is her mommy and when Sissy says "morning mommy" with her croaky morning voice and gives me a sleepy smooch.

Sometimes bedtime is hectic, sometimes alone time for Mike and I is impossible.....but time goes so fast and before I know it this time will be gone too and I will miss it, a lot..

It's crazy, it's crowded but it's just so yummy!!

Megs Senior Pics etc.

These are a few of my favorite of Meggies Sr. Pics. They're beautiful pictures of her because she's beautiful. In a vain sort of way I'm very proud of her outward beauty. I want people that don't know her to know what those of us who do know her know ( did that make sense?) Anyway, she is a beautiful person I mean a beautiful person on the inside. She's smart, she's considerate, she loves her family and her friends. She's honest and stands firm in her convictions. At times she is unbelieveably bull headed but she doesn't back down and I admire that about her. Yes, sometimes it makes me want to pull my hair out but I admire her. I enjoy watching her grow from a little girl into a young woman and I'm proud of who she is. Yes, she's definately pretty to look at, but she is also pretty amazing.

I'm working on a couple posts for later, one is about our little Mellie turning 4 months and another about the end of "drinka nummies" with Sis and several new interesting conversations with her.

Sr. Pics by my Sister Lish

Brought little Mel's birthday story over from my pregnancy blog.








Melanies birthday was a rainy gloomy day outside but such beautiful one for all of us there. I got out of bed at 4:30 to get ready to go. Of course being the girl I am I had to have decent hair and make up so Mellie wouldn't be terrified by her first glance at Mama. We kissed all the girls goodbye and took off for Quincy.




I'll admit that even 6 kids later I was very nervous, and of course excited. We got to the hospital and they rushed us right through admissions and straight upstairs to maternity. We were taken straight back to our room where we got to just hang out for awhile. Actually, we were in our room by about 6:45 and didn't have a nurse in our room until around 8 or so. Our first nurse was Amanda, she came in to start my iv to get me hydrated for the epidural. My fantastic Dr. D had already told me I could have my epidural right away, YAY!! It was pretty busy that morning and Amanda had to come and go a few times. About 9:00 she came in and hung my first bag of pitocin and then about 9:20 Dr. D came in and broke my water. The anesthesiologist came in and did my epidural between 9:30 and 10:00. Yay, no pain!



Of course once I got the epidural there was no more up and down for me, so Mike and I just kind of hung out and talked. He dozed off and on and I spent a lot of time texting friends etc. Labor and delivery has always made Mike very nervous so I think he was very happy when Lish got there and he was able to step out for awhile (go get something to eat). Lish got there about noon and ironically I got my new nurse about the same time. Now, this is one of the great parts of the story, my new nurse Fran was also with us when Michael was born. So, for me in my mushy sort of way it tied everything up for me having Frannie with us for our first baby, 20 years ago and then now for our last baby. I was also thrilled to have Lish there with me again.



If I could do it all over again I would have had Lish there for all of my births. As it is having her with me for these two babies made both experiences that much more special. I wish I could have that kind of quiet time with her on a more regular basis........Anyway. We continued to just talk and enjoy our time. Mike came back briefly but was still extremely nervous so I sent him to help with the kids in the waiting room.



I was getting a little discouraged at one point when I found out I was just dilated to 4 but then went very quickly on up to 6, I think in only about 15-20 minutes. After that it went very quickly. Fran came in and rolled me over on my side, Mellies hb was going down during contractions and we wanted to make her happier. Sometime between 1:30 and 2 I thought it felt like she was coming down so we called Fran back in, I was right! She let me push once to see how I would do and then told me to stop until Dr. D got there.


At this point it was time for Mike and Missy to come in, I can't remember if Lish went to get them or texted Meg to send them in. Either way they came in a few minutes before Dr. D. After that it was easy, a few little pushes and I was holding my baby,the little girl that really really is my baby, and she is soooo beautiful.


The shining moment for me was after they had me "presentable" when all the rest of the kids came in including B & B, Michael and Megs s/o. I can't describe the beauty of seeing my adult age children on down to Sis filing in to see their baby sister. I will say that it was a moment that absolutely made my heart swell, and still does everytime I think of it, probably forever.


We all visited for awhile so everyone could soak up these first moments with their baby sister and then our little Mel made it clear she was hungry. From the very first try she nursed like a champ. After awhile Mike and the kids came in to say goodbye, they were heading off to supper and home, Sis was extremely tired and a little emotional.


I had to spend a little extra time in recovery because of a little extra bleeding so Lish stayed with us and we just stayed together in awe of our new little girl, she really is an awesome Aunt.


The days in the hospital are a bit of a blur as always, especially since I'm now finishing this nearly four months later. From day one Melanie has been the sweetest little blessing, so mellow and happy and just sweet. Not to mention of course that she is as beautiful as her sisters.


Another little bit of trivia, besides having Fran there for our beginning and end as new parents, as well of course as Dr. D who has seen us all the way through. Anyway, Michael was born on January 22nd, my month, Mikes day and Miss Mellie was born on June 10th, Mikes month, my day, cool huh?


It's very bittersweet knowing that my days of pregnancy, childbirth and newborns are over, I have thoroughly enjoyed that part of my life. I will say however that I'm so looking forward to watching all of my children, the big ones, small ones and in between ones continue to grow into toddlers, teenagers and adults, and soon, parents themselves.


I try to thank God everyday for my life.

Mellie Bean

Miss Melanie Faith turned 3 months old last Thursday, I really can't believe it. Time is just flying with her. And she's my baby, she's really my baby, trying to savor every moment. It goes so quickly. Just a few pics, she is soooo pretty my little baby, just like her sisters.

Interesting

Well I've decided it's time to really get this blog rolling so here goes.....
First of all almost 21 years ago when I was nursing my first child I never thought that this many years later I would not only be nursing another newborn but her toddler sister as well. Interesting, even a year ago as much as I love breastfeeding my children I didn't really believe I'd still be nursing my almost 2 1/2 year old, yet here we are. Somedays honestly it drives me bananas. Sis is very high strung and wants to nurse when she wants to nurse, period and doesn't like waiting. Of course she is like that about everything anyway. However it's also very rewarding, like when she holds hands with Mel and they nurse together.

She calls it "drinka nummies mama" Cute.

Monday she walked through Walmart with her shirt up giving her baby the nummies because she was really hungry.

Recent comments:

"Please I drinka nummies mom, just for a tiny bit?"
"I done mama, I got the milk out for Mel" ( when nursing just until after let down)
"Melnie bean be so excited I gotta milk out for her!!!!!"

Me" No honey not right now, let me fix you some special milk" ( milk in her favorite cup)
Sis " But mama, nummie milk is special milk!"

She's very clear on the right nummy being hers and the left Mels and she very rarely tries to sneak over to the left.

Just a few thoughts, more to come.

Moving Day

Today I'm starting my new blog, I've really done a horrible job keeping up with the other 2, and not really done with it what I wanted so I'm starting fresh. Plus, to be honest I wasn't sure how to change everything from momtofive and don't want to leave Mellie out, so here we go, I will try and figure out how to move some of my old posts over, but we'll see.