Freddy's birthday!

Where do I even begin with Freddy? We recently read our old blog books during the time that I was expecting him and Chris was going through all that cancer stem cell transplant mess and I was reminded of how much I loved him before he was born.  He was my little buddy and quiet companion when I felt so lonely taking care of Chris. Things are similar but different 4 years later. He's not so quiet anymore but he's still my little buddy and HAS to be in the same 10 square foot radius as me during the day when the kids are at school.  We moved his bed over to Charlie's room in anticipation of our little Max. He loves sharing a space with Charlie and has a hard time going to bed by himself although he loves to take naps still and will fall asleep on my bed with me or on the couch during nap time. 

He RUNS everywhere and is so exuberant.  He's so cuddly and loving and immediately says, "I'm SO sorry" when he hurts anyone on accident. He cries anytime he gets in trouble and changes his behavior quite quickly. He loves to play with cars, dart guns, ride his balance bike, imaginative play, read books, and sing. He loves dressing up and wears a different costume in the car to pick up the kids from carpool almost every day. His favorite costumes are his batman cape and mask, the green ninja costume, captain america, a cowboy and a knight. Everybody loves Freddy.

Even though I had just had a baby 3 days before his birthday, I wanted to make it special for him and we luckily had leftover frozen waffles with which we could do his breakfast in bed. 

Gwen was 'diagnosed' with the flu and step the day before and with a low fever, Freddy looked like he was coming down with it too. He stayed home from church with me, Max and Gwen.

Freddy wanted a Marshal (from some TV show, Paw Patrol) cake with a house on fire.  Chris did the decorating honors and made a house out of graham crackers and made yellowy-red frosting for the fire.  Gwen had been quarantined in her room for the past few days (we're really hoping sweet newborn Max wouldn't get sick!!) and we gave her permission to come down for the singing and cake. 

Alec had been working on this batman cross-stitch for Freddy since General Conference in October. He finished it and we framed it for him for his birthday. Alec is so thoughtful and Frederick just loves it.

Even though Freddy had been talking about his birthday for a while, he didn't seem upset that we weren't able to give him a party with friends or anything. We blew up balloons and decorated the house a bit. I'm so glad Frederick is in our family. He's a wonderfully sweet, loving, happy, imaginative, innocent child of God.

Maxwell Henry

We are overjoyed to announce the safe arrival of Maxwell Henry Archibald.  He was 7 lbs 2 oz and joined us at 5:05 am on December 14th.   Brittney and Maxwell are both doing great and we are so excited to be all together.

Brittney had been having more Braxton-Hicks contractions than any of the other pregnancies over the past couple of weeks, with spells of consistent contractions spread out over days.   At the checkup on Wednesday, she was already at a 3, which was a new thing to be even that far along so early.  The doctor stripped her membranes and we went about the rest of the day like normal.  Brittney had mild contractions through most of the day, but they were light enough to be hard to notice if she was doing anything besides just sitting still.

As we were getting in bed around 11 pm she said that she had had several in the last 10 or 15 minutes, and I could tell by the look in her eyes that they were gradually causing her more and more distress.  We decided to start timing the contractions and see how often they were coming.  The hard thing was that we were both already tired at the end of a long day and ready for bed. A few times in the past week or so this had happened before and Brittney went straight to bed to try and get some sleep in case she went into serious labor during the night sometime. This time, Brittney laid there for a few minutes but said that the discomfort was too much to sleep through.  At least she had fallen asleep on the couch for maybe an hour earlier that evening watching a show while I was doing some work on my laptop.  The contractions were coming 3-4 minutes apart and lasting about a minute each.  And they gradually got more and more painful as time went on. We were worried about waking up our 'on-call helpers' for no reason if the contractions were to stop. Brittney kept saying, "ok, we'll call them after one more really serious one." She probably said that 10 times.   About 1:15 am we decided that this was probably really happening and that we should go in to the hospital.  Our first 'on-call helpers' weren't actually able to come over when we called for the 2nd time to say, "This is really for real, come on over" So we made another call to our dear friend, Sharon Leigh, to come over and be with the kids during the night.  Brittney took a shower and got ready and I gathered everything we thought we would need.  Sharon came over but also needed to be home to teach seminary in a few hours so we needed to make sure the kids could be ready to leave our house for school by 6:00. We packed backpacks, and got out their clothes and wrote notes to teachers for pick-up arrangements in case labor went all day.  By the time that we left Brittney was having to stop and focus on dealing with the pain of the contractions.  It was really happening.

We arrived at the hospital around 2:30 am after having run a few red lights on the empty streets after waiting for way too long for them to change.  Brittney was needing to moan slightly through contractions and was experiencing pain and shaking a lot. We entered the hospital through the emergency entrance. Brittney put her head down on her arms on the counter trying to get out, "I'm in labor."through another contraction. Fairly quickly she got put in a wheelchair and taken up to the labor and delivery ward.  She got changed and into the hospital bed around 2:45 am.  When the nurses first checked Brittney she was already at an 8!  This was definitely really happening and being so far along gave us hope that we had already gone through a lot and that we might have enough energy to make it to the end. The nurses for the most part left us to ourselves and dealt with the contractions for about the next hour and a half.  The nurse measured Brittney again and said that she was almost ready.  Brittney asked the nurses to get the doctor to break her water for her, knowing that in the past that has really helped get to the end game sooner. Nobody came (apparently there were 7 babies delivered that night). After a half hour Brittney's water broke on its own and we had the nurse check things again.  She said that things were good to go.  Brittney hadn't really gotten the urge to push yet, but it gradually came.  The nurse helped Brittney through the beginning pushes and pretty soon the moment for the final few pushes was there.  The doctor arrived just in time and at 5:05 am out came the baby!

His mouth was full of fluid and so it took about 30 seconds for the nurse to get it cleaned out. We've never had to wait very long before to hear that beautiful cry and those 30 seconds seemed REALLY LONG but once the fluid was all cleaned out we heard some good strong crying from him.  We put him on Brittney's chest straightaway and he calmed down after a little bit.  The afterbirth process seemed harder than any previous babies, and it was clear that Brittney was both at the end of her rope and in a lot of pain.  She held baby and they both just cried. It seemed to take forever before that was all through.

Brittney was able to keep Maxwell on her chest for almost an hour and a half, during which Brittney gave him his first experience with breast-feeding, and after a few false starts he did pretty well.  Brittney really wanted to change gowns and get Maxwell and her all cleaned up (he had peed on her fairly early on) and so asked the nurse to come clean, measure and wrap him and make sure all was in order. The nurse swooped him up and took him away to do all that stuff.  We were surprised how long this process took - a few hours!  In the meantime we switched rooms and got settled in. I frequently went down to watch how he was doing in the nursery and he seemed to be sleeping like a champ.

Brittney was really anxious to have him back and got all ready to go walk to the nursery herslef to see him but they brought him back before she got out the door.  The rest of the time at the hospital has been spent feeding him and trying to get some rest ourselves.  We were both so tired after a night without sleep.   Around 1 pm I went to get the kids out early from school and Freddy from the Leigh's so they could all meet their new brother.  They were all super excited and so well behaved.  Freddy was a little tentative and skittish around Maxwell but his words were filled with wonder and joy.  It was so fun to be all together.

After the kids visit I took them home to get clothes packed for one more night at friends' houses.  Freddy and Gwen slept at the Leigh's and Alec and Charlie at the Gines'.  Then I got some food and made my way back to the hospital.  After dinner we turned in. Brittney tried to sleep in snatches throughout the night, feeding Maxwell every 2 hours or so, but attended to all her and Max's needs by herself giving me get a decent night's rest (for a hospital) and we are both feeling a bit more rested today, although still significantly more tired than normal.

Everything has gone well today and we are checking out of the hospital around 1 pm.  Maxwell weighs 6 lbs 13 oz at discharge and has been doing so well with his eating today.  Yesterday he was so tired and we had to try really hard to wake him up enough to eat.  I always am so much less worried about things once the feeding seems to take hold.

We are so excited to head home and start our new life together as a family of 7.  Wow, that will take some getting used to!  We are so grateful for all of our friends and family for their support and love.

Last weeks before being a family of 7

With the bookshelf made and baby #5 close approaching we decided not to tackle any new projects and instead focus on cleaning up. Enter (quite belatedly) Nesting Mode. I had a list of big things on the horizen for a couple of months: Primary Program, Charlie's Birthday, Halloween, Faith In God special meeting, bookshelf, then Thanksgiving was the last one before I thought baby would be born. (Freddy's birthday was actually before the due date, but I really feel like this one would come early.) Chris worked hard and cleaned out the shop area of the garage and put up some shelves to organize tools. We had a big bon fire to burn a small portion of the LARGE scrap wood piles we've been hoarding.  I love this picture because its all my boys looking so handsome. Have I ever mentioned how much I love Chris' profile from behind? 

The weather has been nice - really November is like the perfect month (weather-wise) here. The kids have been playing outside alot. They found this run down shed in the back woods and explored it enough to find a bunch of random supplies like bricks, old window screens, metal poles, fencing material etc. They pulled a bunch of this stuff out and starting building a fort along the edge of the yard. They like to bring out nerf guns and 'snipe' bad guys/zombies. 

Chris' robot team had a demonstration for the end of their semester and I took the kids to see him/them after school one day. We've been taking Alec's friend, Twain home from school every day so far this year so he came too.  We're all excited to see how this robot team does in the NASA robotic mining competition in FL this next May.

With Thanksgiving behind us we can decorate and really celebrate Christmas! We bought a tree at a local all-profits-go-to-Charity tree lot. It was only $25! I let the kids help decorate the nice tree this year because I was too tired to fight them on it. They did awesome. I really love our tree and it helps everything feel like Christmas.  We ordered a new couch (with Thom and Brittany's family coming for Christmas and overlapping with my parents for a few days after we really wanted everyone to be comfortable). I can't wait for it to come.

Our Branch is trying something new this year for our Christmas Party - led mostly by my good friend Audra. We're doing a 'Night in Bethlehem.' Chris got asked to be the roman centurian that comes to every classroom and demands their attendance on an upcoming date to be taxed. He did pretty awesome. Chris has a solo at this party, and the primary kids sing a song, and my boys participate in a small group boys group, and I have a solo. Its 3 days before my due date. We'll see what happens. :)

On the second to last day of preschool, because some kids were sick and another kid's family decided that they couldn't make December work so they just won't come this month. (UGH!) we ended up with only 2 kids. It was a real blessing in disguise because Alec had a Christmas concert that I really wanted to go to but thought I couldn't because of preschool.  I arranged things last minute so I brought Freddy and our 1 preschool friend to Alec's concert. It was fun to surprise Alec and get a feel for his life at school.  His team sang Deck the Halls, Joy to the World and All Around the Wold at Christmas Time. They did great!

Thanksgiving and a Preschool Update

Time for a little preschool update. We've had some really fun preschool days learning about corn and harvest and thanksgiving. The other kid who was barely too young for the deadline, dropped out and let me know the morning of the first preschool day in November. :( I don't feel like I can advertise the spot much knowing that theres just two weeks before Thanksgiving break and then I'll be so close to my due date that preschool could be put on pause any minute.  I am really sad and kinda annoyed at people dropping out last minute. I wish there was something I could do to make every kid love it as much as most of the kids seem to. Oh well. The rest of the kids have definitely settled into the typical routine just LOVE coming. Their parents say things like, "She wishes she could live at Preschool" or "She asks me every day if its Preschool" or when the kids cry because their parents come to pick them up and they don't want to go.  I kinda like that. 

I had contemplated not really cooking a Thanksgiving dinner this year since being a few weeks away from my due date. Chris and I were both intrigued with the idea of just going out to eat for Thanksgiving dinner like my sister, Tiffany did 2 years ago when she had a baby due in December. If this baby came as early as Freddy did, he would be born a few days after Thanksgiving Day. But then two of our favorite families here suggested doing Thanksgiving all together and mentioned how our house was the biggest one.  I also liked the idea of using our nice new kitchen to its fullest capacity. A few extra people were added last minute and we ended up hosting dinner for 22 people.  We did the turkey, jello, rolls, drinks and blueberry cream cheese pie.  Everything was delicious and seeing so many favorite people is always super fun.  I also love the extra push to get the house looking really clean and nice; although it was all pretty exhausting. They were really helpful and had everything cleaned up before the bulk of them left including the extra tables put away and the floor swept! It was lovely.   We are so grateful for good food, family recipes, and great friends.

Building a Built-in Bookshelf

One of the built-ins that we had planned on doing was in the space created in the landing when it was converted from a bedroom to a landing during the first remodel. Here's the space from way back then:

Where the wall is pink in the photo above was a perfect space for a built-in bookshelf. We used an old bookcase to house most of the books in the meantime. The problem was, we needed way more space for our children's books.

So with Thanksgiving break around the corner and us not going anywhere since baby #5 was due pretty soon after, we thought it was a perfect time for a project! (correction - I thought it was a perfect time... then again, I think almost ANY time is a perfect time for a project - I love projects!)

We've accumulated enough tools and some exposure to skills over the course of the last year or so and Chris is super sweet to delve into uncomfortable new worlds for me. We took a few weeks to plan it out and more than 1/2 of the wood was scraps from our remodels.  So the project only cost maybe $80?

By far the trickiest thing was getting the crown molding on the top with the angled ceilings. UGH. Glad that's behind us.  It has sooo much more space for books and we even have plans to put a small TV and Wii there during the Christmas break so when we have Thom and Brittany's family over we can send the kids up to the landing for some screen time and enjoy some quiet down by the couch in the family room.

Freddy's cute, an electrical ditch and a Robot Field Trip

Freddy is so adorable. He loves to snuggle still and is so quiet at nap time... he just doesn't like to sleep in his own bed upstairs for naps because its too far away from me. Which, kinda stinks sometimes. I can usually get him to go if I bribe him with a handful of marshmallows or some other treat to munch on as he falls asleep.  I love how he loves to dress up and its fun to see him wearing costumes I've made years ago... I just wish he'd stay in one costume at least longer than it takes me to put it on him! 

The wooded lot next to ours sold earlier this year to a nice family with two kids just older than Alec. They cleared some land and are building a house! I love that the neighborhood is getting some new families.  Apparently, the easiest way to get electrical power is to access it from the powerline on our property.  The electricity guy has come to talk to me about it a few times during business hours without notice so Chris has never been home. I hate making decisions on my own, I can never remember everything they say just right and its hard answering Chris' questions. But with Chris hating to make phone calls, we usually just get stuck with whatever I can remember. Anyway, this is just a long way of saying we now have an electrical ditch going across the side of our front yard. Apparently they hit 2 water lines as they dug.  That's crazy because its SO out of the way from where I would imagine our water lines went. So weird.

Chris and the MSU robotics team got to be involved with a big PEAK field trip that the 2nd graders went on... so Freddy and I tagged along and watched Chris give a presentation to Gwen and her PEAK friends and teachers. One of the things I love about living here is the unity and comradery  between the public schools and the university. Also with the small town feel of seeing people you know in most large group situations.  Chris is great with kids, I love watching him do the stuff he's good at.