Babymoon (and some random pictures)

One of my favorite birth books is The Gift of Giving Life, written by a bunch of Mormon women and giving various Mormon opinions about birth.  I got it when I was pregnant with Colton and re-read it with this pregnancy, also.

So squinty and fat!

This time around, one essay in particular that stuck out to me was about having a "babymoon" after you had your baby.  The writer wasn't referring to a vacation you take before the baby comes (although I might count our quick jaunt to Virginia Beach as exactly that), but instead as taking that first month after you've had your baby to stay home, shut out the world as much as possible, and really just get to know your baby.  The author talked about having others do your grocery shopping for you (she said people were happy to do this, although I have my doubts about that), playing soft music in your home, and making everything as loving and wonderful as possible.

Ryder snuggles with a very much asleep Daddy

Camille's eyes are open!  And only slightly cross-eyed...

The way she described it sounded so nice that of course I wanted to try it.  But then I remembered that I have four other children, two of whom need to go to school and get picked up every day, and I resigned myself to the fact that this was really only something that could be done with your first baby.  (Besides, I really couldn't justify asking others to do my grocery shopping for me.  Having meals brought in is about as much help as I'm willing to ask for!)

So much for that idea! I thought to myself.

She looks very angry here and that kind of cracks me up

She makes sleeping look like such hard work...

And then I actually had Camille and tons of snow storms and cold weather hit Virginia. 

And I have barely left the house at all since she's been born!  School has been cancelled (or delayed) more times than not.  Craig and Tracy have done the grocery shopping for me.  And I find myself getting almost exactly that lovely babymoon time that the book talked about!  It's not quite as peaceful as she described-- how could it be with four other kids running around the house?  And we occasionally play music that isn't exactly calm and soothing (but I like our music, so I think that's just fine).

We were excited to catch a rare glimpse of her neck-- she actually has one!

I love the little "shoes" on this outfit!

But we're home.  A lot.  Camille has only left the house to see the doctor for her two-day check-up.  And that's just perfect because it is WAY too cold to take a baby out there!  And honestly, I can't fit into most of my clothes anyway, so why would I want to leave the safe warm cocoon of my home?  I'm a natural homebody anyway, so this time has been perfect for me.

Zonked.

Everyone should have a baby in the winter time!  It's cozy and perfect.

I'm loving my babymoon.

Godsend

My sister Tracy just became a doula, so we had planned on her being here for Camille's birth.  Unfortunately, Camille came so early and so fast that there wasn't really any chance of Tracy being here for it.  Which made us both sad.

But despite that little hiccup, Tracy still managed to get here the same day that Camille arrived!  Which was very fortunate indeed since my Mom was in Hawaii and wasn't planning on being in Virginia for two more weeks!

So we've had Tracy here to help us this whole time.  And it's been fabulous.  You should all wish for my sister Tracy to come and help you when you have a kid.  Tracy has been doing dishes, laundry, making meals (even ones that she doesn't eat!), playing with my older kids, and staying up nights holding Camille for me so I can sleep.  She makes the kids their lunches in the morning while I sleep in, she takes them to school and picks them up.  She goes to the store and takes Colton and Ryder with her...  She basically does everything I was doing before I had the baby, and then she helps out with the baby, too.  AND, she does it without yelling at my kids.  She's even better at dealing with Bentley's bad temper than I am (she invented a new technique that I plan to use called "shaking the anger out"-- it involved picking him up and gently shaking him upside-down until he couldn't help but laugh.  Brilliant!).  She's kind of like a Tasmanian devil whirling around my house, except everywhere she goes things get cleaner and more orderly.  Or maybe you could just say it's like having Mary Poppins here, but without the British accent?

I'm not really sure how I'm going to survive once she leaves, but I sure am grateful for all the help she's giving us right now.  It's been so wonderful to be able to shower and nap and just let my body heal, all while knowing that the house isn't falling to pieces around me.  Not many people are so lucky when they have their 5th kid!

Thank you, Tracy!  I can never repay you for all this!

For those of you who want to hire Tracy when you have your next kid-- just let me know and I'll give you her number!

For Comparison's Sake...

Here are two pictures of Kendra when she was first born:

And here are two pictures of Camille, roughly the same age:

I guess in the same way that Ryder and Colton look alike, we've also got our own "look" going for the daughters in our family!

Camille Patrice

She came!  And she even came pretty early (11 days), making her my favorite child ever!

And can I say-- I am REALLY enjoying not being pregnant.  I always say I do pregnancy pretty well, but these last few weeks were killing me.  Between this awful cold that left me feeling like I was suffocating all the time, and the fact that I was carrying all out front which was really uncomfortable (although from the front, if I wore black, looked pretty fabulous!)...  Yeah, I was feeling very done.

And that Sunday was a particularly long day.  Sunday, the 8th, Craig was speaking in a different ward, so I got to do church with four kids all by my very pregnant self, and then stand for an hour teaching Sunday school.  It was exhausting.  The only saving grace was that they had food in Relief Society, which was especially lucky since I'd only found time to drink a glass of orange juice before church that morning!

So that was a long morning.  As soon as we were all home, we fed the kids a quick lunch and drove to Culpeper to have an early birthday celebration for Kendra (more on that in some other post to come).  I actually fell asleep in the car I was so tired.  We arrived, Kendra opened presents, and I promptly took a nap.  It was a little embarrassing, because I ended up sleeping for nearly two hours!  I would have felt bad, except I felt so wonderfully refreshed, I couldn't even muster any guilt over something I clearly needed so much.  And, as it turned out, that was the last sleep I'd get for a while, so it was an even better thing than I knew at the time!

We got back that night, put the kids to bed, and began planning our week, which looked to be pretty busy.  Sure, I had a few contractions here and there throughout the entire day, but that had been happening for weeks.  It wasn't anything to get excited about.

As we were going to bed, around 11pm, Colton woke up, so I warmed up a bottle of milk for him and balanced him on my tummy while he drank it.  That might have been a mistake, because right as he was finishing up, something leaked.

I wasn't quite sure what to make of that and was left wondering, What just happened?  Craig went to bed, and I put a towel on the floor next to me just in case.  I read in bed to see if anything else happened.  Twenty minutes later, I coughed, and water gushed out again.  Oh, dear, I thought.  This was definitely not a bladder problem.

But here's the thing: I wasn't having ANY contractions.  So I didn't know what to do.  Or if there was anything to be done at all. 

So, true to form, I just kept reading.  Around midnight, Ryder woke up and I sent Craig to see what he needed.  Craig took care of him (I think he'd lost his blankie?) and climbed back into bed.  Then he looked around and asked me, "Why is the bathroom light on?"

"Oh, well, I think something's happening.  I think my water broke,"  I admitted.

"Wait-- WHAT???" was his response, "So what are you going to do?"

"I don't know..."

"Well, don't you think you should text Tierney?"

"Oh, yeah, that's probably a good idea..."  So I texted Tierney.  Her next two responses were great:  "Wow."  And then, "Ok."  There were a few minutes of waiting, then she wrote again, "Can you try and rest?"  I told her I would try, but to keep her ringer on (duh).  While we texted, Craig called in sick for school and called his parents to let them know what was going on in case we needed them.  With every baby we've had some sort of game plan for child care while I'm in labor, and our plans never seem to work out, so this time we hadn't bothered planning anything at all.  And that turned out to be just fine.  You really never know with labor!

We made up the bed (that's a home birth thing-- put on a fitted sheet, cover it with a shower curtain, and then put another set of sheets on top), and laid back down.  But of course, we couldn't sleep.  We just laid there getting excited to have a baby!  Eventually the contractions started.  They were ten minutes apart.  Then when they were five minutes apart at 1:15, we told Tierney to come on over. 
She arrived before 2, bringing an assistant with her who we hadn't met before.  (This was pretty confusing to poor Craig, who headed outside to help carry stuff in, only to discover that it wasn't Tierney sitting in the car!  He thought maybe it was the girl across the street, and worried he must look kind of creepy heading out to see her, so he just turned around and went back to the house.  Fortunately the assistant (Tabita? I think?) realized what had happened and hollered out to Craig that Tierney would be there in a moment, so then Craig invited her in.  Weird!)

Tierney got everything set up while I laid in bed contracting.  Once she'd listened to the baby's heart and declared everything satisfactory, I asked if I could get in the shower. 

In the past (with Kendra, Ryder, and Colton) getting in the shower was my golden ticket to a speedy delivery.  As soon as I was done showering, my water would break and I'd start pushing.  So I was anxious to move things along.

But each baby likes to come in its own way, and this time, the shower didn't do a thing for speeding up labor.  I had contractions, but nothing bigger or closer together.  And finally I realized my trick wasn't going to work and climbed out.

But the problem was then I didn't quite know what to do!  So I just tried whatever I could think of.  I sat on the toilet for a while (usually with some more gushes of water).  For a while I sat on the bed with Craig and we chatted with Tierney and Tabita, sitting on the floor at the foot of the bed.  Eventually, Craig asked if I wanted to try walking around, so I agreed to do that and we headed to the living room so I could pace.  Everyone got comfortable on the couch and I walked the circle that our kids usually enjoy running (Craig offered to chase me like he does with them, but at three in the morning it didn't feel as funny as it should have).  I climbed up and down the stairs, and that almost always produced a good strong contraction.  (According to my favorite birth book, stairs are great for opening up the pelvic floor, so that's a perfect labor exercise.)

And in between contractions, we just waited.  We talked about church history-- it turns out that Tierney is from the town next to Palmyra, so there was lots to discuss there.  At one point I asked Tierney to check me, and braced myself in case the news was bad.  She checked and said I was at a 7 or 8.  She swept her fingers around feeling the baby's head, but didn't say anything about that at the time.  Later she admitted that it felt like an awfully big head, but she figured there was no point in worrying me about it.  The baby would have to come out no matter what size her head was!

I went back to climbing up and down the stairs.  At one point I looked at Craig (he'd followed me upstairs and we were standing alone in our room) and said "I don't want to do this any more."  He asked me if I was okay with Tabita being there-- he was worried her presence was making me uncomfortable.  But I assured him she was fine.  I was just tired.  And sick of the contractions.  I wanted it over already.  A little later, at the foot of the stairs, one contraction hit really hard and I declared that that had been a 9.  I just knew I had to be getting close, but labor is such a guessing game with stuff like that.  Who really knows?  I tried to be all zen during the contractions and murmur to my baby, "Come and meet your mommy.  It's time to come now.  Open up..." but I'll admit that mostly I just felt grumpy, tired, and in pain.

I really don't enjoy being in pain.

The night wore on, and I wandered up the stairs and leaned against the bathroom counter for another contraction, but this time it switched to a pushing contraction.  Everyone else was still in the living room, so I said, "Tierney?  Craig?  I think I'm pushing..." and they all rushed up to me.  (Later on, Tierney would laugh about this.  She said most women when they're ready to push sound like a wounded moose.  She couldn't believe how calmly and quietly I asked for their help.)  Tierney walked me to the bed and asked which side was mine and where I wanted to be.  I ended up across the whole thing, as the next contraction came and I could push in earnest. 

One push, and Craig announced he could see her face.  "Does she have any hair?"  I asked.

Two more pushes and relief flooded over me.  "She's out," I sighed, "Can I see her?" and Tierney passed her under to me. 

And she was beautiful.  And FAT.  And perfect.

Very first picture

Look at those fat arms!!!

She'd been born with the caul still on her, which Craig said had made her face look really weird.  But that was gone by the time I got her.  Tierney said that with my water leaking, but the caul so intact, the break must have been high up, which would explain the very sporadic gushes of water.

Camille squawked once, and then proceeded to look around calmly, taking it all in while we stared back at her and tried to memorize everything.  I tried to nurse her pretty fast, but she wasn't interested (it was three or four hours before she finally decided she was ready to eat).  I had a very small tear, which Tierney stitched up, but mostly we just sat around enjoying looking at our new baby.  After an hour or so of monitoring me, Tierney got to work measuring the baby.  She weighed in at a hefty 9 lbs 10 oz, and measured 21.5 inches long.  Her head circumference was 14 or 15 inches, which makes no sense to me at all.  How did she fit?  But she did, so I guess that's the only important thing.  She had the arms of a wrestler, but legs that looked more like regular newborn legs.  And approximately five chins.  We think somewhere underneath them all she's got a neck, too, but that's mostly just a rumor at this point.  And I think she has more hair than any of my other newborns combined.

Weighing her with a fish scale: a quintessential home birth tool!

I got to cut her umbilical cord-- I'd  never done that before!

Measuring that huge head

By 6am, Tierney was finished and had cleaned everything (including me) up, so she and Tabita headed out.

This gave me time for a quick nap before the other kids woke up (yup, they'd slept through it all!).  Craig got up with them and got them breakfast before announcing that he had a surprise for them.  He videotaped their responses, and that was precious to see.  They all came into the room to meet their sister with a sense of awe.  Ryder excitedly told me we should name her Lucy, since this is a girls' name.  (Apparently he got the name from The Lego Movie.  Perfect!)  But we told him we'd decided to name her Camille Patrice.  Colton looked at her, and then laid his head down on my leg and just rested there thinking about it all.

Craig's parents arrived a little later and proceeded to play with the kids and pick up food for us all so I could stay in bed and rest.  I was so thankful for that long nap I'd taken at their house the day before!  And even more thankful for their willingness to drop everything and come help as soon as we needed it.

And mostly, I was thankful for my brand new little baby.  My perfect little Camille, and her perfect little birth.

More pictures to come!  So many more pictures to come...!

The Polarization of America

I've often thought that politics was a pretty polarizing topic in our country, but with the recent measles outbreak, it's really struck me how it's actually parenting that bring out the most rabid opinions in people...  Consider for a moment some of these choices that most parents face:

Home birth vs. Hospital birth

Natural birth vs. Epidurals and/or other interventions

Circumcision vs. Intactivists

Attachment parenting vs. Crying it out

Baby wearing vs. Using a stroller

Breastfeeding vs. Bottle feeding

Home school vs. Public school

Vaccinating vs. Anti-Vaccinating

Working parents vs. Staying home with the kids

Helicopter parenting vs. Free Range kids

And then there are all the various ways people choose to eat (assuming here that these are choices and not dictated by allergies or diseases such as Celiac's): vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free, non-GMO, local, organic, humanely raised, only seasonal...


I have strong opinions on some of these topics, and on some of them I don't particularly care what I or anyone else chooses to do.  But I'm astounded by how much OTHER PEOPLE seem to care about ALL of these things. 

Take home birth as an example.  I really liked my home births.  They were beautiful experiences that I wouldn't trade for anything.  I think there's a lot to recommend about having your baby at home.  But I absolute do NOT think it's the right choice for everyone, or probably even for most people.  I don't encourage people-- even close friends!-- in that direction because I realize it's just not what most people are interested in.  Live and let live, as far as I'm concerned.  But go to a website that deals with home birth (either for or against it) and watch the vitriol fly as people accuse others on both sides of the debate of not loving their child enough to do what's in their best interest.  They'll accuse mothers of caring more about getting "the birth they wanted" than the health of their child (as if any mother is more concerned with how the birth goes than whether or not her child is healthy???) or they'll accuse people of blindly believing anything doctors say, as though they didn't go to medical school for how many years and should be given due respect for that sacrifice.  Both arguments are insane.  Both arguments assume the worst in the person on the other side.  Both arguments do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING towards having an actual conversation about this topic.

When did we start believing that everyone's circumstances are the same and that the same thing is right for every single person having a baby?  Are we so unimaginative that we can't think of situations where different solutions might be called for?  Or even appropriate?  Or even-- gasp!-- better for that individual?

And here's the kicker-- even if I completely disagree with what someone else is doing, when did it become okay for me to be a complete jerk to them just because I disagree with their opinion?  As much as I think vaccinating kids is a wonderful scientific tool to keep them safe and healthy, I am astounded at how mean-spirited so many of the articles about the issue have been.  It made me want to whimper, "Can't we all just get along?"  I can't tell if this is just the anonymity of the internet making it easy to sling mud at everyone we disagree with, or if this is just our society sinking down into meanness, but whatever is going on, it really bothers me.  I want people to be nice.  I want them to try and understand both sides of an issue.  And if they can't agree, I want them to at least be civil about it.

That doesn't seem too much to ask for, to me.



It makes me think of a good friend of mine from high school.  We originally bonded over our love of Stan Freburg and our similar political views, but those were just the doors we walked through to friendship.  When we returned from college and I discovered that my friend had become a liberal, I will admit that I was a bit crushed.  I had so few conservative friends outside of BYU, it was hard to lose one of them.

But we still discussed politics on occasion, and I saw an astounding thing happen: we could talk about politics and sometimes still find common ground!  And even when we disagreed, we could be polite and hear each others' opinions and still respect one another and be friends!  And it was a beautiful thing.  Perhaps even more beautiful than when we simply agreed on everything.

I would like to see our country head back in that direction again.  We won't always agree on everything.  And it's possible that our disagreements might even be painful at times.  But that's no reason to leave respect and kindness at the door.  Ever.

Pinewood Derby, Year 3

Every year I am amazed at the amount of time Craig and Bentley can spend making his pinewood derby car.  My natural tendency is to get annoyed (because there are always about five hundred other things I can think of that I would like to make Craig do around the house), and I have to step back and notice what a fun father-son bonding thing this actually is.  So what if the automatic door on my van is sticking?

Anyway, this year the theme for the race was "Time Travel."  Bentley originally wanted to make a model of the Mayflower, which Craig and I both agreed was a brilliant idea.  Unfortunately, we also realized that this would make for a terribly slow car, and felt like in the interest of full disclosure we should probably point this flaw out to Bentley.  So he decided he wanted a locomotive engine, instead.  He and Craig fashioned a lovely one, and set to work painting it and trying to make the rather bulky car train as speedy as possible.

I love this picture.  It can be so hard to get a good shot of Bentley, and this one is perfect.

In the past, I've tended to get kind of up-tight about the day of the actual derby.  I have a hard time bringing little kids to places I'm not familiar with, especially when I know there won't be anything to keep them contained and/or occupied.  But this being our third time going, for once I was pretty relaxed about the whole thing and looked forward to cheering on Bentley's car.  As an added bonus, Bentley's den was in charge of this year's derby, so I figured Craig would have no problem saving us seats since he'd be there way earlier-- I could just show up with the little guys and enjoy!

That turned out to be completely wrong.  (I should have known better!)  Upon our arrival, the first thing I saw was Craig standing at the head of the race track, directing each scout on how to place their car on the track.  He was too busy to even notice us, let alone to have been saving seats for us that entire time.  And coming and helping me with the kids was certainly not going to be an option, either.

Craig is engrossed in making sure the track is perfect.

So I found some seats with pretty much no view of the race track and proceeded to try and keep Ryder and Colton happy for an hour and a half (fortunately for everyone, the snacks they were selling were at a good price, so I didn't feel too bad indulging the kids).  This was one of those things that, had I been prepared and had I not spent the entire morning vacuuming the whole house AND had I not been so pregnant, probably wouldn't have been a big deal at all.  But as it was, I sat there feeling kind of annoyed and hard-done-by.  (Scouts seems to have this effect on me, I'm afraid.)

So it wasn't my best time ever.

But, much more importantly, Bentley seemed to have a wonderful time, even though his car didn't race particularly well.  Craig and Kendra had a great time, too, for that matter.  Well, so did Ryder and Colton, for the hour and a half I managed to keep them there.  So, yeah, everyone had fun but me.  I was grumpy.  (I should just make Craig blog about this-- then you'd just get the happy version and not see what a whiner I am!)

I was too busy to get many (good) pictures, but I like that I got Craig helping Bentley out here

Anyway, I survived it, and everyone else had fun.  And I really did like Bentley's car.  I'm not quite sure how Craig is going to manage all this once all three boys are old enough to be doing this at the same time.  I guess that will be his problem, unless I start learning to use his power tools (doubtful).

But I think I'm glad this next baby is a girl!

Bentley thrilled (I think?) with his award-- "Most Industrious"