Sunny

Sweet Baby5, lovingly dubbed "Sunny" as it is a play on his actual name. His name has a part of sunshine in it, though it has a completely different meaning. How is that for a riddle?

9 years ago, if you would have told me that I would have 5 kids I would have panicked. I really don't enjoy being pregnant. I feel so introverted the more pregnant I get, I just want to curl up into myself and be left with my thoughts. Like the more baby crowds me, the less I want anything to do with the world's noise. The first few months I really don't enjoy feeling like I am going to puke all the time, though with Ziggy and Sunny the "morning sickness" was only really awful in the evenings, and it was manageable if I got a chance to lay down for a few hours in the afternoon. Which wasn't manageable with Sunny, thanks to after school care and going to school pick up in the September heat. It was pretty miserable.

I really don't enjoy feeling exhausted and this time I have felt the pull of all the big kids needs a lot more than I remember feeling with previous pregnancies. I remember with Ziggyfeeling like I was giving some thing important to our family in adding this siblings, that the lessons learned from a new baby are valuable and the give and take was worth it. The kids are bigger this time, I can't skip school (I mean we do, but I feel guilty) because I am sick and exhausted. Joy1 was 7 when I got pregnant with Ziggy, in some cultures she wouldn't even be in school yet, it wasn't a big deal to turn on some audio books and let the rest slide. I can't skip the violin lessons, the orthodontist appointments, juggling vision and dental care and dietary needs is a lot more to think about than it was 3 years ago.
I feel like this baby is a gift, but I also feel like I can't let the exhaustion cause me to drop the ball, they need me. Which means I am exhausted.
And the still find me like this any chance I have to lay down. Ziggy curled up next to me, my ferocious and ardent cuddle bear.

It has made crowding out the world a lot more difficult. Though I have tried. We've stayed home all winter, after an insanely stressful fall I called Operation Hibernation and we've been staying home a lot. I feel a bit bad hunkering down to the extreme that we have, but we've mostly enjoyed it.

Crowded life has also made it difficult to connect with the little one keeping me awake at night with his antics.
I like to take time to get a feel for my babies. With Joy1 I remember she was jumpy and fidgety. I felt kind of unsettled with her, maybe even a bit anxious. I was so sick when I was pregnant with her as well, the entire pregnancy was miserable. I loved her ferociously, and would do every thing in the world to be sure I was making the best choices for her- but I have definitely always had a hard time "settling" with her, feeling comfortable. It felt like once she weaned she always settled down for HubbyJoy better than she would for me. 

Joy2 was a powerhouse. I just remember all her movements were strong and rough and striking. I struggled with a lot of really awful personal stress and exhaustion when I was pregnant with her. My diet was abysmal and I felt horrible the entire pregnancy. She came roaring into our world and she had this deep intensity about her from day 1. She smiled from birth. She loved people. She was happy and sad with all her might and has been since the day she was born.

Joy3 I felt this peaceful snuggle bug. I remember I was around 5 months pregnant with her and reflecting on the feelings I got from her and it was just "snuggle me close and I am good" and that has been true for her up through now. Hold her close, let her know how cherished she is, she's good. She was happy if she had my arms. I am still really the only person on earth that can calm her down and get through to her when she's upset and "locks up".

Ziggy. He was just a joyball. I just felt how happy he was to be with us, to be in there and joining our world. All the way through I just kept feeling this sweetness. And he came out this sweet sensitive thinker. He is happy when he is with the people he loves, particularly his Mama.

Sunny, what do I feel about Sunny? His movements make me think of Joy2 but they are even stronger. They aren't quite as reactive as hers were (she seemed downright annoyed to be honest), he takes the poking and body slamming (Thank you, Ziggy) in stride. He seems more chill than Joy2 was.  But he does get worked up! He hears a noise when it has been quiet and he starts kicking and flipping out about it. Some one talks to him and he wakes up and starts moving all around. But he will also go for LONG periods where he sleeps, he's an active sleeper but it's not the intense "Oh my gosh! Are you going to break out????" movements that he pulls some times. The movie Alien? Some nights he hears Ziggy fuss and that stomach bursting depiction doesn't seem that far fetched.  He seems like he's going to be really chilled out about some things and then have these  "Oh my goodness where did THAT comes from?" moments.

I also love thinking about what clothes feel like him, is that weird? Probably. With Ziggy it was foxes and bears,  reds, and blues, and stripes. He really is like a little fox, so cute and sweet and a little bit of a stinker. And he growled like a baby bear as a newborn, constant loud growly grunts when he was happy or sad.

With Sunny I just keep seeing bright colors and black stripes and patterns, dinosaurs and elephants (there's a combination!). I am sure the season has some thing to do with it too! Ziggy was born near the Autumn and I was craving Autumn colors and themes. With Sunny I want bright and fresh and striking colors.

It will be interesting to see if my intuition is right about him or if he will come out surprising me.

Seasons Shifting

I always feel this way when I am pregnant, but this time it's been hitting me especially hard.

Heading into the home stretch of this pregnancy and I think it is hitting me for real: this is it for me and babies. The end of an era. 11 years of baby building...13 or 14 probably by the time that Baby5 weans (if all goes well with nursing). I am tired. Not just physically from the pregnancy (though I after all these years my body has been growing babies from nothing into big happy toddlers, I am feeling depleted there too!) I am feeling tired trying to keep every thing running. Between homeschooling, keeping the house and laundry kind of decent, and a busy toddler: so much work!

It's funny and it's probably completely mental, but I feel like in choosing this fifth baby- in taking the leap into "look at that big family, they're crazy" territory. I mean we're not the Duggars by any leap. But when people notice my belly and ask me if Sunny is my first or second (usually I am out alone grocery shopping, or all of my children have blissfully abandoned me at the playground) and I say "Actually, he will be my 5th." I get these stunned looks. It's quite amusing! I am pretending it is because they thought I was 24 and look far too young to have so many children (almost a decade past that, and I look it too) and not because they are judging my birth control choices (he was specifically planned and tried for, thank you very much!).

I am probably putting too much pressure on my self, more than I ever did when I had a couple kids. Are their nails all clean? Did they brush their hair and teeth? Are they wearing ripped clothing? Are their glasses clean or do they have 3 weeks of gunk on them? Do they smell good? When was the last time every one showered? I really need to get a better schedule 2 of my kids hate bathing in the winter and will try to fly under the radar until it can't be missed...Usually when I am running through this mental checklist and it's too late to hose them down.
We chose a bigger-ish family but they are all loved, nurtured, cared for and generally clean- see? 

The fact of the matter is things have shifted in life the last year or two. HubbyJoy is super busy with work and I can't depend on him like I used to. I mean he tries and he is far from being uninvolved, but when he has a client waiting on stuff the Honey Do List waits for quite a bit longer than Nesting Mama can stomach sometimes. So I have been reorganizing a lot mentally this year. Handing off some basic household chore to the oldest two kids has helped keep things going fairly well.

Handing off more of their education to them has been freeing as well, actually it is amazing! I have daily requirements that they meet before they can do any thing with screens: big motivator. Most days they knock out the list before 9:30a.m. and we sit down for 30 minutes and I have them narrate what they are reading about and go over their math questions and science material with them. It definitely lightens my load.

There are definitely areas we could improve in educationally, but that isn't this season, we're getting it done and they are all learning and growing, this list is good enough for now.

Which brings me back to sweet Sunny Joy. He's due in May and I can't remember ever feeling like this about a pregnancy. 

Done, numb, apathetic, exhausted, giving myself pep talks, unable to wrap my head around the fact that I am doing this again. 

I wanted this baby. Last summer I had a dream about little boy, it wasn't Ziggy. That little guy in my dream had a name I had never considered for any of my kids before, he was a lot like Ziggy but completely different and the were playing together. I told God in the dream (and in many conversations afterwards) that I felt a little selfish asking for one more little boy in our family, but I wanted that one, his little arms around my neck were so real and his name was exactly right and fit so perfectly into our family convictions. HubbyJoy and I talked about it for weeks and kind of came to a point where we knew I was ovulating soon, we knew the window in which the spacing would be anywhere near what we wanted was closing. So we decided to go for it. 

If we had known how insane the next 4 months would be, there is no way we would have tried for baby! My wisdom teeth were impacted and causing severe pain, as soon as we realized there was no turning back on that move I kind of panicked about dealing with that through the first trimester. I scheduled surgery to have them removed immediately. That took 2 weeks out of my life by the time I was recovered.
I was getting back to normal and feeling good and took a job doing before and after school care for our neighbors again. That was going to be a tall order with homeschooling, I honestly didn't think we would get pregnant after the surgery stress and I was kind of second guessing our decision, it wasn't a good time for a pregnancy. 

Famous last words. The day before I started watching the kids, on Ziggy's second birthday actually, I got a positive pregnancy test. 

A few days after the neighbors started with Before and After school care, they announced they were moving in November, and would Mom like to buy their house (some thing we had talked about and planned to do the next year)? Which meant we were buying this house! It would be all ours well before the baby arrived. What an answer to prayer!! 

What a freaking headache. If you've ever bought a house and gone through mortgage paperwork,  you know what a completely thrilling experience it is. So many phone calls. So many emails. So many forms. So many phone calls. phone calls phone calls. Oh my goodness it sucks. 

Add into the mix that HubbyJoy was taking a Seminary course 1 weekend a month all Autumn in preparation for his Ordination (also scheduled for some time that Fall) and on top of the mortgage process, on top of a pregnant sick wife working part time, on top of working full-time himself. 

A test of our endurance. 

We closed on the house in November and moved Mom next door the next week. It has been wonderful having our own home, it was desperately needed and it was on the table for next summer but the fact that it worked out so soon was completely God and an answer to our over-crowded prayers. This house is the perfect size for all of us, even a little bit big. We are feeling little nudges that we might not be here forever (and that makes me sad because I love this house) but for the next several years this will be our home. 

All of that adjustment it is no wonder I am feeling a little bit of a hard time connecting with this little guy. 

I wanted him, I asked for him, but I am having a hard time wrapping my head around how soon he will be here. And that my Ziggy Joy won't be my "baby" anymore. Maybe it is all in my head. Maybe because he was my baby boy, but in some ways I am feeling like I did with my oldest when I was pregnant with my second, can I love another little boy this much? Ziggy was a breath of fresh air, a little joy ball, a baby I thoroughly just enjoyed.  He has been such a little sweet bear that just oozes love. I am so tired, what if Sunny is a fussy baby?  What if we don't connect as easily? What if I have used up all my baby love? 

And I know love grows, it surprises you, and it is different every time and that's okay. Still a lot to process. 

I didn't get around to what I wanted to reflect on in this post, which is that I am also feeling really ready. I see how big my older three are getting and I am ready to be done with babies and toddlers. I am ready to be able to go and do stuff as a family with out worrying about diaper blowouts, milk leaking and soaking my shirt, with out some one melting down because they are missing their nap, with out having to be hyper vigilant because toddlers are unpredictable. 

I think about the fact that I am about to be doing these scooter walks with my big kids with a toddler and a baby in tow. 

With Ziggy I felt all the pluses and no minuses for adding another baby to our family. I saw love grow in a way I had never witnessed and it has been an blessing to watch it blossom over the last two years. With Sunny I am again watching love grow. But instead of feeling that it is all gains for every member of the family, I am seeing that continuing this baby season of our life past Sunny, I will be limiting and changing some goals and ideals and I am not sure I am willing to do that. Pregnancy isn't easy for me. I am sick for about 4 months every time, I deal with hip and back pain, hormonal mood swings, and horrible insomnia which leaves me feeling tired and frustrated. My births are for 4/4 for being longer and dramatic. I am really not looking forward to the process again and I hope we can go out with a decent experience on that front as well. A post on that another time.

I am ready I think to move on and maybe there is a bit of denial and grief that Sunny is "it" and I wish I had more to give him and could slow time down and savor this. 

But mostly I just want to get him here, and know that we are complete and moving forward. I am so ready to know him. Also a post about him another time. 

A Beginning

Blogging seems kind of ...dead. I know there are a lot of blogs out there, popular blog, blogs with hundreds and thousands of readers a day. It seems though that so much of it is run by social media and that's just not really my thing. Don't get me wrong, I waste as much time as the next person scrolling through Facebook, laughing at stupid posts, sending hugs to friends having a rough day, making connections outside my home in private groups.

I haven't blogged much since Baby Four arrived 2.5 years ago. I used to use blogger to document snippets of family life for posterity but I mostly use Facebook for memory keeping now (and the options of downloading whole Timelines into Memory books, which I plan to do one of these days, really!).

The thing is, I do need the outlet, a space to think about stuff - regardless of who reads it. This is probably the worst time I could possibly take on a new blog, Baby Five is due in less than 2 months and there is so much to do between now and then!

Life is very full, just keeping every one fed and alive and the basics of life feels like a full time job. I have been thinking about relationships in my life, relationships with in my family, and being intentional about the choices I make in fostering relationships. Being intentional about what I take on and commit to. I have been thinking about the shift I feel as my bigger kids get older and we start quickly sliding towards middle school and puberty. I have been thinking about this shift to Baby Five and how hard it has been this time to find time to connect with him. How hard it has been to even wrap my head around the fact that in a blink I will have his sweet smelling head tucked against my cheek. I will be up nursing again at night. I will be doing the teething thing again. And all in the midst of that I am going to still be juggling the midst of "this". This life is big.

Add to it that there are so many "shoulds" pushing and pulling us, we should be getting involved here, or we should be doing more of that, especially when it comes to homeschooling. We're closing in on the end of our 5th year of homeschooling and I am starting to feel those "shoulds" and pressure more than ever, my oldest will be in 5th grade next year. How can I best prepare her? Am I giving her enough to stretch her wings and take on some personal responsibility and independence?  She's such an amazing individual, and I never know with her how hard I should be pushing her, or where I need to wait and let her work things out in her own time. I mostly lean towards waiting with her, she's a slow bloomer and that's okay. But am I doing her a disservice, is she too comfortable? I won't even touch the other side of the spectrum that is Child Two. That girl! She is the catalyst to so much that drives this family, and that's okay but a post of it's own!

I need a space, a corner of the internet to make some space for joy. To focus on my personal goals.

How can I do that? What are those goals? How do they align with my convictions for my family? What exactly are those convictions? I hope to kind of start chipping away at those in the next few posts.

Baby 4 (really, a great big toddler) is waking from his nap and I don't know how much more time I will have to write before he wakes up and wants to be the soul focus of my attention, he's good like that. He doesn't take distracted Mama when it comes to after nap snuggles.

More later...