Some more of this and that

We had five very successful days of bootcamp! That was our retraining period. It went well, very well. It has been so peaceful around here. Our days went from constant, constant battles, sibling fighting, whining....etc. Seriously we had three starts of spats yesterday. But that is where the training comes in. For ME that is. I have to make sure to catch it immediately, and I mean IMMEDIATELY. Wow, what a difference that makes.

Jedidiah has been just blowing our minds lately. He started scarfing down food! I have been praying, and praying that his body would work like it should. He started eating two of his jars of food, AND ate mac and cheese yesterday, and this morning he was eating pancakes! He never eats breakfast! I weighed him yesterday and he is only two ounces away from catching up to his last highest weight. So today or tomorrow he should be caught up. And then he should be on the rise (number wise that is!)

The new baby is doing well. It is an active one. Not anymore active than the girls, but compared to Jedidiah's inutero activity level it very active. So this is good. The girls have loved feeling the baby kick. With Jedidiah by the time I got one or two kicks and got the kids over to feel he would be done moving!

Well I don't want to be on here for too long as I need to make sure I am on top of the kids. I can hear or see them all, but I need to act fast if anything comes up as we are still in training mode.

Here are some pictures:

Here is a picture of our newly sprouting garden plants. We have tomatoes, cucumbers, chives, watermelon, and beans in there. We have lettuce to plant directly in the garden beds.

Here our are sprouts three days later! My do they grow fast! They are supposed to stay in this set up for six weeks, which I don't see how that is going to be possible.

Here is our very own in house chef. She was cooking our yummy breakfast of homemade pancakes.

Here she is tending to the pancakes. I was quality control.

Here is Jedidiah inhaling his pancakes. He was trying to stuff them in his mouth. This is the same kid who would gag if you even touched his mouth about 8 weeks ago!

Jedidiah's compliments to the chef! He sat there for about 45 minutes eating. Granted he is new to this fork thingy. So it was taking a while. When he got too impatient, he would just pick them up with his fingers.

Besides being outside this would be one of Jedidiah's other favorite activities. He is making sure he has enough bubbles in there. He loves bubbles. Hey, what ever works. This is also the same kiddo who used to scream bloody murder if he even touched water. He has come a long way.

It doesn't get any better than this! One happy boy.

Not only is our oldest a chef, but a seamstress as well. Here is her doll that she and I made together. Her name is Annabelle. I made up a pattern, she sewed, stuffed and put on the hair, not to mention she clothed her as well. I have three other dolls waiting to be sewn. Maybe I can get her to do those as well. There have been so many things coming up lately. I have to put the dolls on my to do list.

I hope you all have a great day!

PS, make sure to check out the girls' blogs. Isabella has been writing up a storm, and sharing pictures. Moira will be writing a new post today. So check them out and make sure to leave just a quick comment. :-)

This and That...

or in other words, some ramblings.

There are a lot of little and not so little things I wanted to get written down. You know, before the fall into the deep recesses of my brain, where there is no way out. (That is supposed to be a joke) Ok, where to begin. Please excuse me if I am repeating myself from past posts. My memory seems to be the size of a gnat, so bear with me.

In Jedidiah news, he's lost some weight. The story of his life. His medicine, that he supposedly doesn't need, ran overdue. And I suppose it wasn't being effective. Needless to say there was a lot more throwing up than normal. We just got a new batch made up the other day, so hopefully he will be back in full weight gaining swing soon. He is doing well besides the tummy issues.

I do believe I wrote about my guess on the gender of this baby. I also think I wrote about all the old wives tales and our name thing that "tells" us what we are having. So far, it's all pointing to this baby being a boy. I had an appointment with my midwife this past week and I am measuring on target. Which is a bit scary as I usually start to measure one to two centimeters behind. The only baby to measure on target was Flannery, and she was our biggest baby. The ironic thing was that for most of her pregnancy I was vegetarian. That didn't last as I got these intense cravings for chicken! Hey, I figured that if my body is craving something then it must need it. I never craved any weird food. With Isabella it was cheese, Moira it was potatoes, Flannery it was the chicken, Saoirse it was popcorn with olive oil and salt, with Jedidiah......I was just hungry, hungry, hungry all the time (and ate accordingly, which I am sure had something to do with gaining 50 pounds with him), and with this baby it is avocados. Yeah, weird! I don't even like the taste of avocados! I just like their texture, and with some salad dressing on them, you can't taste their true selves. Ok, back to this baby being a boy. So there is an old wives tale that if the baby's heart rate is high (160's) then it's a girl, if it is low (150) it's a boy. So far with all five kiddos this has proven to be true. So this past weekend we got a heart rate of 148 (which is where Jed's rate was all pregnancy long). So there you have it, in black and white this baby is a boy. Ha, ha! Then there is our name thing. Too long to have to rehash, but suffice it to say that what ever name I feel I have to have, or just sounds right, has been the baby's name...thus gender. Right now the name we have is for a boy. So if this baby comes out and it's a girl, well call me a false prophet :-) I will truly be shocked if it is a girl, the same feeling I had with Jedidiah.

Ok, on to other things. We are taking a week off of school. The kiddos have been....how shall I say....disobedient? Obviously I do not expect perfection. But things were getting bad around here, all my little directions were either ignored or out right defied. That makes for one crazy house! So we are doing some retraining. That and some spring cleaning. Two birds with one stone.

Part of the reason things have been out of control is due to me. At least in the spiritual realm. Someone made this great illustration. When she was younger her father used to take her and her siblings to the ocean to swim while he surfed. He would set up his backpack on the sand and tell them to stay in line with the backpack. She said it never failed they would at some point look up and be far far away from being in line with the backpack. She said that is how it is sometimes when we take our eyes off Jesus. How true!!! That is what has happened to me. I'm just plugging along, things are going downhill, even when there have been other major improvements in the household, and before I know it it's chaos around here. I look up and I'm far from Jesus. Of course it's effortless to get away from Him, just like in the ocean, the current effortlessly carries you away. But to get back...well now you have to paddle against the current. It's a lot harder getting back to where you were. So for the past couple of weeks I've been trying to make my way back. I think this week of refocusing and prioritizing is helping me in that effort.

Ok, I've got Jedidiah in my lap, so typing time will have to be over for now. Hopefully I'll write again soon. I will be busy all day though with the kiddos, so it may take me a while. Right now they are (horror of horrors, watching a movie.....hey this retraining is totally wearing, and an hour of them chilled out, and out of trouble helps me keep my sanity).

WOW, some great car seat info!

I wanted everyone to check out my friend Isabelle's great information on car seats that she posted for me in my comments in my last post. Thank you! At this rate Jedidiah may be rear facing until he is three! I will copy and paste it here later. Right now I need to get everyone ready for the Easter party we are going to today. Then later I have an appointment with my midwife. I've got breakfast, shower, clothe all children, make a picnic lunch, pack the van and whatnot to do in the next one hour and 20 minutes. Yeah, it's crunch time!

Giving praise where praise was not due

As some of you know I have been singing the praises of Pediasure. We had added that to Jedidiah's formula some 5 or 6 weeks ago. At the same time I also started using two supplements, Ambrotose and Jaro-dophilus (good bacteria). I just assumed his quick weight gain was due to the addition of the Pediasure as it has more calories per ounce than his formula. At the same time of these additions we had to cut back on the volume he was receiving ( a long story, but it has to do with his pump). So the other day I decided to figure out exactly how many more calories he was getting.......drum roll please.......the calories have been the SAME! Yes, the same, due to the cut back in volume. So here he has been gaining all this great weight, and it has nothing to do with additional calories. He is getting more calories, but not because we are giving him more. I believe that the good bacteria and Ambrotose are making his body work like it should and he is finally absorbing the food as he should, thus getting more calories. He is filling out great! It has been amazing to see. He was up to 19lb, 5.5oz the other day! Around here we celebrate gains in ounces :-) In just a couple of weeks he may be heavy enough to turn his car seat to the forward position! I have a feeling that our child who is such a creature of habit will have a hard time that it won't happen that way. Time will tell.

I am in the process of brewing a batch of homemade chicken broth. I have heard great things about real chicken broth, and at this point we are trying whatever natural means to help Jedidiah's body to function properly. My next venture will be to acquire some keifer grains to start making our own keifer. Keifer is likened to a drinkable yogurt. Yogurt has some 6 or 7 good bacterias in it, keifer has 30. I'm still trying to find a source though. You can buy it through the internet, but I prefer to get some from someone I "know". "Know" as in someone from one of the two message boards I frequent.

Gotta run, Jedidiah is in some serious need of copping some zzz's

A wonderful day outside

To the girls dismay, we didn't actually spend the day outside, just about a half hour. We have been spending about two hours outside for the past few days. I am sure it will be more of the same, at least until Saturday when they are prediciting rain. Here are a couple of cute pictures while we were out. Jedidiah was obsessed with throwing large sticks and pinecones. Even with the temptation of playing with the ferret he chose to throw sticks, and splash his hands in some really yucky water. Notice his lovely homemade haircut, er, buzz cut, or butchery, pick your phrase.....I did all my self! I am sure no one can tell ;-)

A boy and his stick. He spent the whole half hour throwing that stick, and that pinecone in front of him!

Caught in action. You can see that the pinecone has not landed yet. We were trying to get a picture of him in mid throw. We didn't get one. Oh well.

Here he is about to throw that stick. Watch out world!

Here's a real cutie! Looks like she needs a haircut as well. Don't worry, no buzzers will be involved! ( rainbow writing, compliments of Saoirse)

I spoke too soon!!

OK, thankfully I do not believe in being jinxed. That being said.....I spoke too soon. Yesterday afternoon after I posted about Jedidiah, that maybe he will actually hit the growth chart soon, blah, blah, blah...Well he woke from his nap cranky. Which is VERY unusual. The whole evening he just wasn't himself. Then after his evening feeding.....he threw it ALL up, on him and me (I'm the lucky winner, as Jerry had just passed him to me). Then he was sick to his tummy all morning. UGH! He seems to be doing better now. But what a blow. We were on cloud nine and then he gets sick. Anyways we celebrated with some homemade cupcakes. Here are two picks. You can't see his cupcake, but he was using the spoon to eat the frosting. And in the next picture is Jed and his dog. His security dog. Some kids have a security blanket, he has a dog. Oh, well. Its a new experience as none of our kids had a security item.

NINETEEN POUNDS!!!!

AND 1 and a 1/2 ounces!!!! That is how much Jedidiah weighed in at this morning. This is HUGE, this is glorious, this is something to be excited about! I just checked when I last mentioned he hit 18 pounds and it was two weeks and one day ago. He gained a pound in two weeks!!!! Can you tell I am a little excited? He had spent some 4 plus months holding in the 17 pound range. So the fact that he gained a whole pound in two weeks is very exciting. It has been about three or four weeks that we have been adding the Pediasure to his formula. It took him a good week to adjust to it. And during this time he got a tummy bug and had a yucky cough. So it is amazing he gained so much weight. At this rate he may hit the growth curve in a month or two! I am almost scared to "say that out loud" as the last time the doctor and I discussed him hitting the curve we had 8 weeks of being sick, sick, sick. Yuck. So please pray that we will all stay healthy, so that this growth rate may continue.

Here is our 19 pound wonder boy! I took this picture this morning. Oh wait, that would be our 19 lb. 1 1/2 oz boy to be exact :-)

And here is the wonder boy with his loving sister. She wanted to get a picture with him.

Have a great day!