a day, January 2017

Every so often I like to record what my days are like at this stage of life, so here goes. Including posting photos of myself with no makeup to the internet...look at those tired eyes!!!

1-2 AM: Matthew is wiggling around with lots of little whuffling noises--just enough to keep me tense and wondering whether he will wake up for good. We've really got to get him into another room but that long trek across the house in the dark multiple times a night isn't very appealing.

4:00 AM: wake up with Matthew. He's actually slept for about three hours straight which is AMAZING. I put him back in his crib around 5 am.



6:15 AM: Matthew wakes up again. I'm groggy enough that I fall asleep nursing him and don't wake up until almost 8. Neil, however, woke up when I did but stayed awake and got Abigail on the bus to middle school and has started breakfast for the younger kids. I check in with them, kiss them, and go back to feed Matthew again...and fall asleep again holding him (I've got the most ridiculous sleep deficit right now!). Finally drag myself out of bed, kiss Neil goodbye, and get on with the day. I eat a slice of homemade bread left over from dinner last night as I start some laundry and do a quick 15 minutes of grading/responding to students' emails, then a round of vacuuming.

9:30: Matthew goes down for a nap, and I head into my bathroom to clean up the gigantic mess I accidentally made when I tipped Nathan's tub of wheat (our indoor version of a sandbox for his beloved construction vehicles). It takes a ridiculously long amount of time to get all the wheat kernels and I deep-clean my bathroom while I'm at it.

10:30: Matthew wakes up and I feed him quickly before we head out to pick Luke up from school. I call my younger sister on the way and have a quick ten-minute chat with her during the drive.


11:20: Once we get home again, we head straight for the library couch and read stories. Luke and Nathan have REALLY been struggling lately with fighting right after school, so I've been experimenting with all sorts of different things to reduce the fighting. Feeding Luke right away seems to be key, so he ate a granola bar in the car and I give him a banana during the stories.

11:50: Matthew (on my lap) is getting fussy, so I put him down for a nap and then we read stories for another twenty minutes.

12:10: I ask the boys if they're hungry. Not surprisingly, they're full after the bananas and granola bars. They want to play with their play-doh and construction vehicles, so I decide this is a good time for some treadmill miles.

I manage to get 3.5 miles done before Matthew wakes up. I take a quick break, grab Matthew, get some drinks & more food for the boys, and then hop back on the treadmill to finish up while Matthew hangs out in his swing near the treadmill. All told, I get in 5.5 miles of 400-meter repeats at 5k pace. It's a hard workout and I feel both tired and exhilarated when I'm done. Bonus: this is the shortest run I'll do all week and it's a huge relief to have it done before bedtime, since the last two nights in a row I've run for hours once the kids were in bed.



1:15: Showered and dressed--time to feed Matthew again.

1:40: I Help the boys clean up the play-doh mess and give the kitchen a good going-over in the process, then I start organizing a bunch of Family Home Evening lesson materials my mom gave me while I help Luke with his math homework. I started sorting out the lesson stuff a couple of days ago and it kept getting interrupted, so it's a huge relief to finish it now!

2:10: Luke's finished with his math; we move on to having him read aloud while I keep folding. My mom calls as we're finishing up and I talk with her for a few minutes before Abigail gets home from school. Matthew's ready for another nap since he woke up quite awhile ago.


3:15: Everyone has had a snack now; Abigail starts practicing her clarinet while Luke and I work on handwriting skills, then I work with her on her solo and ensemble piece. The competition is this Saturday and I'm her accompanist; I will be excited to have an extra 20 minutes in my day every day when we're no longer practicing this song!

4:00: Juliet and Isaac are home; after they have a snack, Isaac starts his math homework and I quiz Juliet on her spelling words while I make dinner--one of the kids' favorites served with green smoothies. It's an easy-to-make dinner that I hope everyone will eat without too much fuss. Normally Neil moves heaven and earth to be home to eat dinner with us, but tonight he's teaching a late-afternoon lab and has to rush straight to the church to supervise the scouts' Pinewood Derby.

The kids all pack their lunches, fold and put away their laundry, and lay their clothes out for school tomorrow. Abigail practices piano, Matthew wakes up and I nurse him, and Juliet practices piano while Nathan sets the table--and snap a picture because my heart turns over with love at his little floppy puppy tail up there carefully inching around on top of the table as he lines up plates and cups and forks. (Tomorrow I'll remind him not to stand on the table, but today I just soaked up his little-boyness and eagerness to help.) As we're finishing dinner, Nathan takes a huge final bite and triggers his crazy gag reflex (thanks to all the issues he had as a baby) and throws up everywhere. Everyone takes this in stride and the girls are halfway to having it cleaned up before I've made a move.  We're rushing in hopes of making it to the library tonight!



6:00: victory! Luke and Abigail do the dishes while Juliet clears the table and Isaac practices piano. I sneak in some more quick grading while the kids are finishing up dinner jobs, then we start the dishwasher and head out to the library. Nathan eats a granola bar in the car, while I find myself immersed in one of those out-of-nowhere heavy conversations with Abigail--we cover the latest political news, including the implications of repealing the Affordable Care Act and the pro-choice and pro-life debate. We pull up to the library just as I finish explaining why meaningless sex is so problematic, and then as all the kids get out of the car and run into the library I reflect again on how those "big talks" are so important to have on a regular and normalized basis.

7:15: home again (car convo on the way home was role-playing phone etiquette with everyone...Nathan loved this!!) and we start the pajama process. Nathan, Juliet, and Isaac make themselves toast and everyone gets in about half an hour of reading. I give Matthew a bath and check out Juliet's latest Lego creations in the "Main Street" town that the girls are always building--my favorite new additions are the ski shop with all the tiny little details, including a scale to get an accurate weight on rental skis and the multiple 3-D layers of snow outside, and the balsamic vinegar shop in the town. We brush teeth and say prayers...by 8 pm I'm trying to nudge kids into bed while also bouncing a very cranky Matthew and Neil walks through the door! Hurray hurray, I didn't expect him until close to midnight, so this is a treat! He takes over with the older kids and I go off to feed Matthew.






Once the kids are in bed, it's more grading and then the best time of all--hanging out with Neil (and talking over all the crazy political stuff from the last few days). He's been working the last couple of nights while I've been running, so time together sounds amazing!! There's tons and tons of stuff I didn't get to today, but...that's how it goes. Tomorrow is another day!

Matthew Ajax: Our Gift from God

Normally it takes me a few days--or weeks--to write the birth stories of my children, but my heart is so full of joy and gratitude that this one cannot wait.



We have always wanted to have six children in our family--that was something we dreamed and planned about as an engaged couple talking about our family and our future. After Nathan's birth and the ensuing physical and emotional damage, it seemed for years that five children would be it for us. We gave away all of our baby things and moved on with plans for a family of five children under the assumption that my physical and mental health would not support the last child that we had dreamed and planned for so long. This was a period of intense mourning in so many ways, and I cried as each article of clothing or piece of baby furniture left our home.



What has become so clear to me over the past months and has been driven home with lightning-bolt force over the last 24 hours is that Matthew, our sixth child, is a very literal gift from God, sent to bring us joy that we could never have anticipated during the very dark years following Nathan's birth. I have been overwhelmed again and again by very clear impressions of God's love and tender care for our family. Last night as I was holding Matthew and praying I was literally in tears as I felt like the Savior was sitting there next to me in the dark of my hospital room, telling me that Matthew is the answer to so many prayers and so much wondering about whether we are doing the right thing with our lives, and a very clear confirmation that my choice to be a mother is the thing that God wants for me more than anything, and that this baby is a literal manifestation of God's love for us and His perfect plan for our happiness. I have felt so full of light and joy the past two days--all of my worries about adding a newborn at a very stressful stage in Neil's doctoral program and the potential for another bout with postpartum depression have literally been lifted from my mind and all that is left is peace, joy, and hope and an absolutely overwhelming knowledge of God's love that washes away all of the deepest doubts and worries I have been privately battling for several years--about our life choices, about our time in graduate school, and about my faith and relationship with God. I cannot even describe the enormous weight that has been lifted from my mind and my heart--I literally feel like I have been reborn with so much faith, courage, hope, and surety.



Matthew's name is derived directly from this knowledge--its Hebrew translation means "gift from God." As we were pondering what we should name him, none of the names we tried seemed to fit, but we kept coming back to Matthew as we listened to this John Denver song about a cherished son growing up in love and joy. Finally--after a lot of prayer and discussion--we reached out to some dear loved ones who had named their beloved son Matthew before his death in infancy. We shared with them that we felt that this name was one which would fit our son, but that we were hesitant to use it in memory of their son. They were so incredibly gracious and encouraged us to go ahead.

His middle name, Ajax, is derived from our love of skiing as our very favorite pastime as a couple and a family and our incredible time in Aspen skiing Ajax Mountain, which we have talked over and over and over about making a yearly family tradition as soon as we are able to do so.



My pregnancy with Matthew was so different from my past pregnancies. It has been--by far--the easiest of all of my pregnancies. I have been blessed with strength and resilience that does not match either my age, my medical history, or the reserves that one would expect from a woman going through pregnancy for the sixth time and who had been on periodic bedrest for my last 3 pregnancies. I was able to recover from a stress fracture just prior to his conception and continued running throughout the entire pregnancy--the first day I took off because I didn't feel up to working out was the day before his birth. The five miles I walked while I was in labor with him brought my total mileage to 931 miles for the pregnancy, including two half-marathons at 15 and 20 weeks. I kept my mileage at 30 miles per week right up to the very end--for comparison, with Luke and Nathan I was only running 12 mpw from about 14 weeks onwards!

My labor with Matthew is the first one where I felt fully in control, calm, and empowered throughout the entire process. There was never a time where I felt unsure or unable to process what was happening in that moment. This was an enormous blessing, especially after the trauma of Nathan's delivery, where things escalated very quickly to the point where I was literally voiceless due to a sudden blood pressure drop.

We chose to schedule an induction on my due date after a week of constant and unproductive contractions. (I have never gone into labor on my own, and after quite a bit of reading during the last week I think I may fall into the category of women who have prodromal labors, where an induction or C-section is the typical result after weeks of nonprogressive labor with consistent contractions.) Unlike my previous inductions where I really stressed and worried about whether we should continue to wait, I felt very assured and confident about the decision to go ahead with a scheduled induction.

In the past, I have tried lots of different methods of pain relief--epidurals, morphine, Lamaze, the Bradley method, hypnobirthing--and every single delivery has been marked by a lengthy and protracted labor, extreme pain, crying, and a feeling afterwards that if only I'd been more courageous, or more determined, I would have been better able to deal with the pain. I've felt ashamed of my physical and mental weakness, which really peaked during Nathan's birth when both the midwife and the nurse were very demeaning and ended with several months of treatment sessions with a birth trauma specialist.  

This time, I decided that I was going to get an epidural as soon as I started feeling uncomfortable. I wanted to be an active, calm, and reasoned participant in my final childbirth. My beloved OB, who delivered both Isaac and Luke, broke my water just before 8 am. Neil and I walked 4 miles up and down the halls (I wore my running shoes and my Garmin so that I would be able to time things effectively and wouldn't have the sore feet/ankles that have resulted from too much barefoot walking with other births!) and then spent about twenty minutes in the delivery room so that the nurse could get a better record of Matthew's heartbeat, since the wireless monitors were not working well. When we began walking again, my contractions increased dramatically in intensity. From my previous labors, I knew that the early stages of labor would go quite slowly and then very quickly once I passed 4 cm, so if I wanted to get an epidural, it needed to be very early on before most conventional wisdom would suggest its use. For a few minutes, I wondered whether I was making a mistake and would slow my labor down too much, but then I felt very clearly that I should trust my understanding of my body and my recollection of previous labors. During Nathan's labor there was a lot of conflict with the midwife, who did not believe my assessment of my labor's progression, and so it was so calming to me to feel much more in charge of this one, thanks to a wonderfully supportive OB who told me that I was in the lead and that she was working on my timeline and what I felt I needed at the time when I felt I needed it.

So--I asked for an epidural based on how I was feeling and my predicted estimation of how I would be feeling in an hour when the epidural was complete, and my OB approved the order without ever checking my dilation. This was the first epidural I had received early enough in labor to not be shaking and contracting miserably while it was installed, and it made all the difference in the world to be able to breathe quietly through contractions that were 3 minutes apart rather than shaking violently through contractions every 60 seconds! I was so grateful to feel like myself in terms of being able to remember the name of each of the medical staff who came in the room, talk clearly with them about my care, and thank them for their efforts--one of the things that has distressed me most about previous labors is feeling like I lose the ability to be patient, courteous, and grateful for what the medical staff are doing. In my daily life, I really value being able to talk with people, use their names, and thank them for their help, and it was SO important to me to preserve that during this labor.

Once the epidural was in just after 12:30 I was able to rest quietly for about twenty minutes before my doctor came in, checked dilation, and told me I was at a 4, which was exactly where I was hoping to be. Based on previous labors, I knew that getting to a 4 was the hardest and lengthiest part for me, and that getting the epidural before 4 cm was integral to managing the pain before things accelerated to the point where any pain relief efforts would never catch up before delivery. We agreed to start a Pitocin drip to regularize my contractions, which had slowed after all of the fluid administered just prior to the epidural. This was something that I had expected and anticipated, so it wasn't at all distressing. I asked the anesthesiologist to adjust the epidural dosage, as I began feeling quite a bit of pain again with the Pitocin, and he brought things to a point where I could feel each contraction, breathe quietly through it, and still feel like I was aware of and controlling the process without being overwhelmed by pain. When I began to feel shaky and cold after another hour, with increasing pain from the contractions, I knew that delivery was close. My nurse agreed, reminded me that all of the running I had done had resulted in a very strong pelvic floor that would minimize the pushing stage, and told me that I would be meeting my baby in a matter of moments. She called in my doctor, who came in quickly and within minutes everything was set up for Matthew's birth. The doctor told me that they were ready whenever I was ready, and that we were working on my timeline. I waited just a moment longer for a clearly-defined contraction before I began pushing, and Matthew was born before the contraction finished. Everything was peaceful, calm, and I felt totally in control of the process and utterly in harmony with my body and the messages it was giving me. I was so grateful for the quiet joy that was a constant presence throughout the labor and delivery in such marked contrast to all of my other deliveries.

And then they handed me my beautiful son and I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude and peace. I know I'm saying this over and over, but it was the most calm birth environment I could possibly have imagined or hoped for. Everyone was quiet, unhurried, and completely supportive of proceeding at my pace on my timeline. I held Matthew while Neil cut the cord--something which he's never done for any of the other babies, but I asked him to do it for this last one and he obliged.

After Matthew was born, there were some complications with the placenta, and it ended up taking about 45 minutes to complete the last stages of delivery. Even with this, I was still calm and trusting that everything would be fine--I somehow managed to carry on a conversation with the medical team for the next 45 minutes even while they were forcibly extracting the placenta (I was SO GLAD I had an epidural at that point). While I knew all of the things that could go wrong and all of the complications that could result, I was so at peace and able to just relax and trust that everything would be fine. If you know me at all, this is not characteristic of my personality! 

After the delivery concluded, we spent the next few hours very quietly in our room with Matthew--he weighed in at 8 lbs, 3 oz, measured 21.5 inches long, and was born at 3:37 PM on September 27.

It has been a beautiful, calm, wonderful recovery with him ever since. He is bright-eyed, alert, and such a happy and beautiful baby. We are so grateful for the light and joy that he has brought with him from heaven to our family. 

 

Last day of school & vacation planning

Last day of school pics--Luke finished preschool, Nathan wasn't going to be left out, Jules is done with 3rd grade, Isaac is finished with 1st (and on to the high-ability classes with his older sisters, yay! So proud of him for getting in, although I did not doubt it for a second!) and Abigail is headed to middle school--yikes!!

 It's hard to believe that we're already into our third week of summer break! We start school so early in the fall that we really get out crazy early in the spring (plus we only had a couple of snow days this year, instead of extending for another week like we did last year...). Since I'm teaching the summer term at Purdue, any extended trip had to happen before classes began on June 10, which left us a short window after the children were done with school and before I began!

Neil only wanted to take off 4 days since his research is at a critical point, and I wanted more time than that, so...I drove to Utah with the children the day after school let out and Neil flew out to join us a week later. Best of both worlds!!!

What made all of this super-interesting was the fact that we left on a Saturday and I didn't decide to leave until the Tuesday of that week--just a few days before. This was also the last week of school which--if you do not have school-aged children or you have magically forgotten the crazy that is the last week of school--well, it's an insane time to survive, LET ALONE prep for a cross-country trip with one adult and five children. But somehow we did it.

The girls had a piano recital Saturday morning. I got up early and went for my run, then came home and biked 4 miles with the kids & Neil, then we all got ready for the recital and went off to see the girls perform. Then we ate a quick lunch and hit the road!

Mt. Rushmore--24 weeks pregnant!

A couple of tips if you are thinking about doing this sort of thing yourself:

1) Be as organized as you can

Some things that really helped me:

 a) Each child had their own (labeled) bag hanging on the seat in front of them. This is where all of    their belongings went and it kept all the chaos off the floor/seats. At every stop, the kids had to put    their stuff back in their bag before exiting the car.

 b) Assign jobs! I had each of the three older kids acting as "row captains" for their row. They took this responsibility very seriously. Isaac, in the middle row, was also "trash police," which meant he was in charge of knowing where the trash bag was and making sure everyone handed him their fruit snack wrappers and whatnot. (Note: the popularity of this job really paled by the time we were 20 hours in and we eventually assigned the child who was being most obnoxious about yelling "trash police!" to be the new trash police...but it kept the car clean!) Abigail was an AMAZING helper and pretty much ran things while I drove--I just told her what I needed her to make happen and she did it. She was absolutely phenomenal and I couldn't have done it without her.

c) Pre-pack bulk snacks into smaller sizes. Normally I just bring a plastic bowl per kid because I hate all the waste that comes with individual bags, but...it was pretty darn nice to be able to just toss something back.

d) Pack each outfit in a labeled Ziploc gallon-sized bag. I've done this for years and it is such a lifesaver. No searching! I don't do this for adults, but I LOVE it for kids (I also specify on the label if it's a special outfit, like for church or a wedding or something). I save all the bags and just reuse them for each subsequent trip. This also makes it really easy to pack a "go bag" so you can just have one tiny bag with pajamas and outfits for the next day if you're stopping somewhere overnight.

e) I am a big fan of eating meals in the car (no time wasted in stopping + keeps kids busy in the car, and I just vacuum later), so I think carefully about what things my kids love enough that I won't have to cajole them into eating. This definitely works better for some children than others. :-) In addition to the standard sandwiches, we also do some items that are made in advance at home & then frozen until the trip--nice because you can do this a week or two ahead! (muffins, pizza pockets, oven-baked chimichangas, etc.). We always have lots of fruit & veggies on hand to round things out, and if I'm feeling daring we go for disposable yogurt cups. And thanks to leaving ALL of our food in Denver (along with my pricey ice packs!) I also have another tip: if you leave things in the 'fridge, put something else in there so you remember to get them out...like a sleeping bag stuff sack, because you're definitely not going to forget that. :-)

2) Plan creatively for in-car entertainment 

We watched 3 movies each way, which I think is pretty good for 23-25 hrs in the car (longer on the way back since we detoured a few times). We brought lots of audiobooks, picture books, and a few select small toys. I also ordered a few new items: this Cubebot was a HUGE hit and Luke probably spent at least 15 hours playing with it. I also bought a Water Wow book for each kid, added these bingo cards to our stash of printable/laminated ones, and we were totally fascinated with these atlases targeted for kids. I bought an atlas per kid who can read (3), but in hindsight, I wish I'd bought one atlas and 3 Cubebots. :-)

For past road trips, I made "road trip folders" that included all kinds of printables from Pinterest. Now I just check through these and update as need be depending on what's been used. Nathan isn't really into this sort of thing yet, but he LOVES cutting paper & putting stickers on everything, so I make sure his folder includes scissors and lots of construction paper, plus enough sticker sheets that he can occupy himself for hours by putting stickers on his eyes and things like that. I also have four or five different bingo cards (per kid) that I've laminated and keep with their folders...these are usually good for quite a few hours!

Our favorite audiobooks are the Classical Kids CDs (this 4-disc set has the best ones!) and the Chronicles of Narnia (this one is so so fabulous!!).  We also have this Peter and the Wolf/Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra that is always a huge hit (well, Nathan requested it 11 times so all the rest of us love it a little less now...). And Dick King-Smith's The Water Horse is dearly beloved. We always go to the library and check out a few extras to shake things up--always a Harry Potter or two. :-)

3) Plan stops & routes carefully 

The first day we drove only 6.5 hours and stopped for two nights with dear dear friends in Iowa. It was SUCH a treat to see them and it helped so much in breaking up the drive! Our next day of driving was 10 hours (to Denver) and it was a looong day but I saved all the entertainment goodies for that day, so we were fine. And on our third full day of driving we opted to drive an extra hour so we could take I-70 through the mountains...we were 5 hours into our drive that day before anyone even wanted to look at a book or do anything other than stare out the windows in awe.

Overall, we stopped about every 3 hours. The stops were actually more stressful to me than driving, since I was trying to herd everyone through the bathroom and the boys were kind of like ping-pong balls after being cooped up in the car! We stopped at rest stops rather than gas stations since it meant everyone could go to the bathroom simultaneously rather than waiting in line, AND we usually took 15 minutes or so to run around and get some of the wiggles out. When we stopped for gas, I let the kids each pick out some kind of exciting treat (we get about 500 miles per tank, so this was pretty spread out and extremely exciting!). I think this actually only happened twice since I filled up right before we left and then after we arrived in Utah.

4) Planning for carsickness

I have a few kids who struggle with carsickness--this is what has been a lifesaver for me.

a) Ziploc bag clothes packets--super easy to find a change of clothes + you have something to seal the soiled clothing in without it stinking up the rest of the car.
b) Keep gallon-sized Ziploc bags where you can easily reach them (for me, it's the side pocket in the passenger door). After the kid is done throwing up into them, you can seal them without any leakage until you get to a trash can.
c) Baby wipes! Lots and lots of baby wipes.
d) We have had limited success with Dramamine (works for some kids and not others), but this trip I tried passing out Altoids whenever someone said they were feeling carsick. I'm THRILLED to report that this is the first time I have EVER not had someone throw up, versus the 8 times Luke threw up on our way home from Florida last year (with Dramamine). And we were going through some pretty darn windy roads, so this is huge!


And I think that's enough for today. Lots of vacation posts to come!

End of Summer, part I

We've had so much fun packed into the last bits of summer that it was impossible to keep up with it blogging-wise, so I'll just do a couple of big posts (this one is iPad pictures, the next one will be camera pictures).

First of all, with the openhouse for the Indianapolis temple, we were lucky enough to see lots of dear friends who came to the openhouse! We spent a couple of delightful days seeing beloved buddies that we hadn't seen since Thanksgiving (thank goodness for technology that keeps us connected!). 

We were all planning to get together at the same time, but circumstances worked out so that the visits were separated by a day or two, which just drew out the fun even longer!

Our first set of friends to visit--Jason & Melanie's family--came to stay with us overnight and then headed out early the next morning. Undeterred by the quick timeline, Melanie and I decided to make the most of it and stayed up until 3:30 AM talking (they were getting up at 6 to leave), as you may be able to see in my tired-no-makeup-but-happy face here!

They brought a 5-lb bag of gummy worms and the kids ran around until dark getting sticky and jumping on the trampoline while the adults talked as fast as we could catching up--I think the kids finally were in bed around 11 and we all were so sad to see the evening end!

A few days later, we met Tyler & Andrea's family at the temple, then went to the Children's Museum together. We didn't get nearly enough time talking in between chasing down kiddos, so they came over for a bit the next day after church and we chatted some more, but it made me realize how much we HAVE to get together with these dear friends for a much longer time--soon!

We got quite a few photos in front of the temple but for some reason I can look at the files that Tyler sent but the zip files won't upload, so we will settle for this one (of just our family) that we took in the reception tent.

And fun at the Children's Museum--boy oh boy was it hard to leave when the day was over! Poor Abigail was quite tearful--she and Elise have been friends since they were babies and every time they see each other they just pick right up where they left off. Same for Eva and Juliet.

I can't remember exactly when, but one weekend we went to this fun community BBQ held by the church that sponsors the vacation Bible school that my kids love so much. It was such a great event--everything was free and there were bounce houses, cotton candy, watermelon, elephant ears, all the BBQ food, pony rides, balloons, etc. The kids were in heaven!

So fun to go and see so many friends from school--I always leave things like this realizing just how deeply we've sunk our roots here and how hard it really will be to go.

Best picture of the summer--Luke's exuberant trip down one of the bounce house slides! Hah!



Juliet turned 8...

...which meant that it was time for her wonderful baptism day!

We were so grateful for all of the people who made a real effort to be there for her baptism--my parents came from Michigan, along with my grandparents; my sister Mary Beth came from Chicago, and Neil's parents flew in from Utah. It was a wonderful day!

And of course we had some wonderful food. :-)

One of my favorite pictures from the weekend--all my kids mobbing Mary Beth for stories. I love how even the older kids, who can totally read by themselves, magically zoom in if there's a chance they can cuddle up for a story!

We also started back to school...we had a fun little feast (the kiddos picked the berries for the raspberry lemonade and were super excited about it!). I don't even remember what we had but I remember how fun it was to sit around talking about our goals for the year. Sometimes family dinners are crazy but sometimes they are just these wonderful shining moments of teaching and learning and sharing, and those are the ones that make me keep plugging away during the not-so-good ones!

First day of school photo for Juliet and Isaac. Abigail was gone on the bus before the photo...I was just getting ready to take her picture when somebody yelled that the bus was at the corner (ten minutes early!) and so I dropped the camera and we SPRINTED to the corner and I banged on the bus doors and got her on! Not the most auspicious start, but she is absolutely loving her new school and I am sooo grateful we decided to switch (I think I was much more nervous about it than she was!). She told me that she said so many prayers of gratitude the first couple of days for her wonderful new teacher and friends. I'm so excited that she won't have to repeat the misery of last year with the teacher she would have had if we had stayed at the same school (the high-ability classes are a two-year sequence). I'm so proud of how insanely hard she worked for that teacher last year--she finished the year with straight A's, but it came at such a high cost to her and I am just beyond grateful that this year she has a new teacher.

Just realized that I have no first-day-of-school photo for Abigail, but I do have one of the owl shirt I made for her to wear on her first day! Hah!

My book came in the mail one day, which was a super fun surprise! It sold out within two weeks and we are in the process of doing a second printing. :-) We have been getting really awesome reviews and I have loved hearing from so many people about how it has touched their minds and hearts. It's sparked some good discussions for Neil & me as well!

Luke & I celebrated the first day of school by going out to lunch with Neil and then taking a long luxurious nap together. It was awesome. :-)



Then he and Nathan ran around half-naked feeding grass to the chickens.



This is totally out of order, but on July 31st we had our third annual Harry Potter party! My kids look forward to this SO MUCH.



The girls took care of all the decorations while the boys helped me make the food. I love all the little touches in the vignettes they set up...this one (below) was my favorite, mostly because they made sure each owl was carrying something for the Owl Post.

This year we had actual Chocolate Frog molds (I bought one and then the kiddos' awesome teacher from school loaned us another), and I bought a ton of Bertie Bott's and the kids had a taste-testing festival that was the highlight of the party. I kept finding soap-flavored beans in couch cushions for weeks! (I also ate soap/vomit/dirt/earthworm flavored beans, which made my kids deliriously happy and almost--almost--made up for the wretched taste.) It was also the first year that Isaac was really immersed in Pottermania--he's currently reading Prisoner of Azkaban--so it was extra fun seeing his delight at all the little touches that he now actually "got."

Once they were in bed, I added my own decoration to their bathroom mirror (Moaning Myrtle), which scared the bejabbers out of them in the middle of the night when they got up to use the bathroom...but of course it ended up being their favorite thing about the party and we left it up for a couple of weeks until the next round of houseguests arrived!

And as always, once all our guests go home, we eat all the goodies while we watch one of the Harry Potter movies. Super fun. :-)

And to take us out, I really love this photo with Luke. Neil took it at the end of the day a few days ago...I wasn't wearing any makeup and the lack of sleep is evident, but I love the mother-joy that I can see in this photo. Luke had been feeling a little grumpy and a little lonely, and really wanted to be snuggled but I also needed to finish a few things, so I put him in the Moby Wrap and he just was so delighted! So many giggles, so much joy. I love that sunshiny little face and cherished the opportunity to keep pressing kisses onto his curly head while I finished up dishes and packing lunches and whatnot. One of those moments I don't want to forget.