In short... the month of December

Christmas was a slew of activities. I think we celebrated daily the entire month of December. I certainly felt like we were on the go for a good portion of the month anyway. We got quite the variety of activities in from family gatherings, to gift exchanges, to spiritual experiences. What a fun filled month!

We started the festivities with a tradition of Rocky Mtn Dermatology. Have I mentioned I have a really generous boss? He footed the bill for dinner and put us all up for a night in a hotel in Ogden. We had a 20’s/30’s themed night and were encouraged to dress up. “Prizes” for best costume were mentioned. So of course we ALL dressed up! It was so fun to go and see everyone and all the creativity. We had a lot of flappers walking the halls! And check out Charlie Chaplin! Haha. I spent almost 2 hours trying to figure this dumb hairstyle out. No self respecting woman would ever spend that much time on her hair! I think my hair is just getting too long for a 20’s style. The time was worth it though… cuz I won the grand prize! It was my first grand prize and will probably be my last.

Jaedyn had her first Concert for school. They were told to dress in a Christmas type costume celebrating their favorite letter… uh… just how is that done? So here’s our little present. Jaedyn loved it at least. 

She giggled as she told me that after she walked into the class where the group was meeting several of her classmates wanted to “open” her. But then, who could resist such a gift J It was funny to watch the kids up there. You could get a sense of little personalities blooming and you observed some kids singing their hearts out, some trying their hardest to pretend nothing was happening, some truly oblivious to anything happening, some snickering with their friends and smiling shyly. It was fun. Can you guess which of these Jaedyn was?

Tina flew in and was here for the concert. She came a few days before the Cronin get together in Salt Lake and was able to get some snuggles in with Ebony. It sure was fun and very helpful having her here! We love it when Grandma visits!

As I said the Cronin holiday get together was in Salt Lake. We rented a VRBO property and most of Chad’s siblings were able to make it. We didn’t do anything too adventurous, just took advantage of the time together to visit and let the cousins play. 

Well now I take that back. After sledding one day, we jumped in the hot tub to warm up. Aunt Summer has a bit of spirit and suggested we jump out and roll in the S*N*O*W. So we did. Why? I guess it sounded like a good idea at the time. Haha. And Jaedyn (what a sport) joined us! Brrrr. No pix. I’m 6 weeks post partum at this point if you get my drift.

Aunt Summer also played a role in saving our mornings. She and Grandma Tina came brimming with craft ideas and supplies and every morning when the kids woke early (cuz that’s what kids do) they took it upon themselves to babysit and craft with them while the rest of us slept in. My heroes! No seriously, BIG thank you!

The cousins had a great time for the most part. Jaedyn gets a little overwhelmed with big groups of people and I’m putting it mildly when I say she’s sensitive to stimulation. Poor kid. Hopefully there was no real harm done J

At this point I'll insert a word of advice. The house was fantastic, the hot tub was perfect, the company was phenomenal. But if you ever get together with a big group of people and lots of young children and the house has a pool table... hide the balls! We looked for hours for one missing ball. One. It never surfaced. They charged us $50 for a whole new set! Chad asked them if he could take the rest of the set then and they never responded. Boogers.

I don't even remember where it was, but one of the days we took the kids to an indoor ... uh play place? They rode the rides for hours and didn't have a lick of fun.

Ok just kidding. They were thrilled. It was fun watching them on the rides. There was one that had benches and spun around fast in a circle. So fast that the inertia would push you to the outside of the bench. I rode with Lilia and about squished her cuz I forgot about that small fact and she was on the outside! I really had to pull on the bar to keep from squashing her flat!

Did I mention it went fast? This is Lilia right before I squished her!

Oh how the kids adore Aunt Valerie!

A trip to Salt Lake isn't a trip without a visit to Temple Square. As we walked in there was a feeling of quiet and peace. People were whispering and soft music was playing around the model of Temple Square close to the entrance. Jaedyn was watching the videos that play around this for a few minutes and then she walked over to me and quietly whispered, "Mom, I feel love here" and gave me the sweetest hug. Amazing that this 5 year old can be rough and tough one moment and quietly touched by the Spirit the next. It was such a gentle scene after some struggles during the weekend that it brought tears to my eyes. What an intuitive young girl to feel those feelings and be able to recognize and identify what they were!

Christmas morning was spent in our own home. We wanted to have a quiet personal Christmas. It started out so great! We had Jaedyn hand out gifts and we all opened them one at a time. Jaedyn was so excited to hand out gifts and was so sweet in her enthusiasm to enjoy what each of us got. She was tricky to shop for this year, I think she’s kind of in between phases of little girl and wanting to be a bigger girl. We kind of missed the mark on our gifts. Luckily we had the girls each pick a gift out at the store that they thought their sister would enjoy. Lilia picked a glowworm. Yes, you know the infant toy that sings while its face glows? Jaedyn was ecstatic! Who’d a thunk?

Lilia was hard to get to open gifts because everything she opened she wanted to spend time playing with and we had to keep telling her to put stuff down so she could open a gift. Maybe next year she’ll just be content with a single gift?

See my stockings? At the Boyd holidays we drew siblings and exchanged gifts and my amazing sister-in-law cross stitched these for us! I could have cried when I opened them cuz I was so surprised and so grateful and excited! Plus I KNOW these take tiiiiiiiiiime! Thank you Kellie!

(And who agrees with me that these nutcrackers need to GO?! I'm totally outnumbered here, the kids love them as does Chad, which is how we came by the hideous things in the first place! Help!)

And thank you Wes and Rebecca for the amazingly gourmet fondue dinner! They served up a 3 course foundue, complete with your marinades for meat, cheese for bread, apples and veggies, and 5 different chocolates for dipping anything your heart desired. Mmm Mmm! A new tradition has been born J

My favorite picture ever! I love that these girls are FINALLY starting to appreciate each other!

And this will be Jaedyn all winter long. The kid has a broken thermostat I think.

Our Little Glow Worm

Though you can't push her belly and get her to sing music, nevertheless we've taken to calling Ebony our little glow worm. Wonder why?

We feel a little like yo-yo's. She's on again, off again, on again. And I really don't want to get the poor kid's heel poked one more time! Ebony was born with a tennis ball sized cephalohematoma which is just a fancy word for a great big blood clot on her head. Who knows what caused it... maybe the week long labor? But because of it we can't get the poor kids bilirubin levels in check! And though I love that I can sleep 7 hours through the night cuz she's the sleepiest newborn ever... I don't love how difficult it is to get her to wake up and eat! Poor kid, I literally have to strip her and rub her feet the whole time and even then we're hard pressed for a full feeding. Which is no bueno since it requires EATING to clear the bilirubin! Thus the lights. 

She actually has done really well with the lights but it's been hard anyway cuz we were all lined up to take turns holding her before she had to go on lights and now we all line up to look at her. Boo. Jaedyn, especially, is not a fan. She loves loving on her sister and we've had several talks the last few days about how what is needed is more important than what is wanted. ha. I guess it's been an educational experience at least :)

Novemberings

It's been an interesting month thus far! Starting with Ebony joining our family on the second, it's been one thing after another since!

The day I got released from the hospital, we had an appt to get Lilia's cast cut. Unfortunately they took a while discharging me and we were running about 15 minutes late! So we jumped in the car, just to drive to the other side of the hospital and hop out for her appt (there was way too much luggage, and casted children, and carseat, and baby to even attempt the walk!)

They graciously saw us even though we were late. Dr Lyons was great and this was his asst, Brian. Lilia did great til he got to the bottom and then she started crying. I felt so bad thinking she was just scared. Then, once the cast was off I realized she'd been cut on the inside of her ankle! The cast cutters aren't supposed to do that! So I'm not sure if it was the actual saw or what was shoved down her cast to "protect" her but I completely understood her shrieks after that. Poor kid. She got re-x-rayed and everything looks good to stay on track. We are excited to wash that foot!

The other night Chad went in to check on the girls and this is how he found them. That's Jaedyn's top bunk. Looking like a lot of sleep is happening, huh?

I am so pleased with TECS. Jaedyn has gone from practically never holding a crayon to sounding out short sentences we tell her in just 2 1/2 months. She's learning so fast! And these activities are self-initiated which makes me even more pleased about them!

First bath at home. The post of the month would be incomplete I think without something said about Ebony. What a sweet baby! She lets me sleep 7 hours at night and rather than cry, I've heard her let out single wails when she's unhappy about something, which is a rare occurrence. Here's to hoping the sweetness persists!

Who does she look like to you?

Third baby and I got a rocker recliner! Loving it! And the kids got a play house. Or was it a doghouse? I'm all sorts of confused.

Seriously, she doesn't get put down!

Lilia was giggling in the bathroom and this is how we found her... playing peek-a-boo with toilet paper. Silly girl. 

Introducing...

Ebony Pearl Cronin

Born Nov 2, 2013 at 7:58 am

Weighing 8 lbs, 7 oz.

21 in long

And now I'm going to launch into the story of her labor and delivery so this is probably the part where you scan through the pictures and exit cuz, blah blah blah...

Crazy labor! Tues night I went to bed after having worked on Halloween costumes for a few hours. I woke up at 1:30 am with hard contractions every 7 min. I thought, "sweet! I just missed my last couple days of work! This is finally over!" After an hour and a half the contractions started lightening up but got closer together. I then had contractions every 2-5 min for 8 hours but they weren't painful. Because they were so regular I finally called the doc's office and asked if I could come get checked. They urged me to go to L&D if the contractions were so frequent. I refused. They were painless and in my experience that is not conducive to real labor! ha. They agreed to see me and low and behold, I'd changed a whole whopping half a centimeter. I was furious! Oh and, then the contractions stopped. Urg. Getting my mind back in work mode was a difficult task.

Wed night I slept fabulously, thank goodness cuz I'd had very little sleep the night before and then spent the rest of the day finishing costumes! I went to work Thurs (Halloween) with only a few random contractions. Trick-or-treating that night brought on a few hard contractions. I finally headed home early cuz I was just uncomfortable. Chad urged me to keep walking saying maybe I could put myself in labor. Haha. I was of the mindset that that would just make me miserable so I went home. I was asleep by 8:30 that night. But alas, woke up at 10 with hard contractions every 7 min. What's the deal with the 7 minute marker?

The contractions were hard and lasted until 3 in the morning. Then they just suddenly stopped. Aggravating! I then had to get up Friday morning and go to work again with little sleep! I was so sleep deprived I was almost crying on my way in to work. All day walking the halls and seeing patients I had random hard contractions. I was so exhausted by the time I got home that I sunk into bed at 7:30. Chad started a movie and I didn't even make it through the previews. At 1:30 I was awakened by hard contractions and yes... they were every 7 minutes. They lasted an hour and a half and did not get any closer together. Why is it always at night?! All I want is some sleep! And then, during a particularly nasty contraction I felt a popping sensation in my belly that was not very comfortable. Thinking it was the baby kicking I climbed out of bed for some positional change comfort and realized that the popping sensation had been my water breaking! "Yes! It's over!" My exaltation was short lived however when immediately my contractions switched to every 3 minutes. That's not much recovery time!

And can I just mention that every night while this was going on, Chad slept like a baby? His ability to sleep through anything is so aggravating! But maybe that's just cuz I'm jealous.

I finally woke him up at 4 by telling him it was time to get up. You know what he said to me? "But it's Saturday". Baha. Baby don't care! She's coming! He got up pretty quick after that and very carefully drove me to the hospital cuz every bump on the road was killer during a contraction!

And big thank you to Helen who woke up to come spend the night at my house at 3:30 in the morning.

We checked into the hospital at 4:30 and I had my blessed epidural by 5:30. Baby was posterior... again. Pretty sure I can't position them any differently. But she was also asynclitic. Dr Blackett was on call and we told her about my long pushing history due to babies being positioned posteriorly. As a result she reached in and turned the baby on the first contraction and baby Ebony was born on the second, just a few minutes before 8. Best delivery ever!

But my poor posterior asynclitic baby has a huge bump on her noggin. Also known as a cephalohematoma. You can kind of appreciate it in this picture.

All parenting techniques have gone out the window. All we wanna do is hold this baby!

Halloween

Since it takes more than a 5 year-old's skill to wield a knife, we decided to forgo the carving of pumpkins this year... and instead  painted them! Right choice. The kids had a blast. Thank you Chad for seeing that the pumpkins got completed this year. I'm down in the basement finishing costumes this whole time!

Check out these masterpieces!

And please excuse my half naked kids. Chad decided that was easier than using the craft aprons...

After having contractions every 5 min for 8 hours on Wed I was pretty sure I wouldn't be going to work Thurs (Halloween). Um, then they just stopped. It was really hard to get my mind back in work mode! Here's my costume...

Oof. The 3D effect was a vital part of the costume... but the pic makes me grimace.

Huge thank you to my mom for her help with the costumes! Never woulda happened without you! It's been tradition to do homemade costumes, they're a lot more work but they're cuter and more durable and my kids wear them all year long. This year though, I felt I had a pretty good excuse to not do them seeing as how I would be 39 weeks pregnant on Halloween. But then I felt guilty taking that tradition from my kids without their consent, it's been such a fun tradition for us! So I decided to give them a choice.

Big mistake. What's that saying, "Never give your children a choice that you don't want them to choose"? Yep, that's the one. I knew Jaedyn wanted to be a witch and Lilia, a cat. So I got online and found pix of what I thought were cute costumes on Amazon for an incredible price. I then found a pic of a pattern of costumes and showed the pix to Jaedyn. I was sure I knew what she'd choose. I was so dead wrong! And so surprised when she preferred the pattern costumes! And thus we embarked on the ridiculous journey of prego me bending over on the floor, cutting out patterns! I was reminded of Don Knotts on The Shakiest Gun in the West when he exclaims, "Air! I need air!!"

Here kitty kitty! You're so cute! Note the black sock covering her cast. It was definitely stroller trick-or-treating this year :)

At this point I was glad to have gone to the trouble. Don't they look so cute?!

Happy Halloween!!

Beep Beep... Coming Through!

Oh thank heavens THIS is not a permanent condition! Oi. 38 weeks and counting... not fast enough! I seriously feel humongo this time like I need back up alarms. I keep misjudging door ways and corners (ha!), and leaning over a counter is a thing of the past. In fact, just watching someone do that, makes me flinch!

Pretty sure it's been longer than 9 months. I asked the Doc at my last appt if anyone had ever been 55 weeks pregnant. He told me, "only in the tabloids". Haha. Well it's not just me. Even my friends have repeatedly told me that this pregnancy of mine is longer than anyone else's. I'm not sure if that makes me feel validated or irritated!