It's been a long month for me. I had prodermal labor for almost two weeks straight, but thankfully when God decided it was time, it went fast.
I'm still in new baby fog and so very grateful for the ladies at church who provided us with a week's worth of meals.
We were blessed with a little boy. Elijah came at 5:22 AM.. an answer to a few prayers we had. My husband's work had told him he would have to make up time or take some of the family caregiver leave if we had any more "close calls".. My prayer that the baby would just come already, also had an added "please let Dennis be home". We were both a little worried I'd be sending a text of a picture of baby to get Dennis home. He also came early enough that the kids were all sleeping and none were scared by mommy in labor like they were with Hannah. Eva crawled out of bed just as he was born, but was patient enough to wait a few minutes to come see what was happening. Grace came in a few minutes later while Dennis was downstairs helping pull out cereal and juice for breakfast until grandma could get there to help.. We had just called her 10 minutes before, I wanted to wait to call her to make sure it was really going to happen-though I was sure, it was early to wake grandma up..
Elijah is healthy. He was pretty much attached to me for the first three days-completely normal and just what my hormones needed. The constant (or at least mostly constant) skin to skin and holding baby are beneficial for both Elijah and I. It helped his body regulate the blood sugar, temperature and I'm sure other things. It helped my hormones regulate and bring my milk in, and I'm sure other things though I don't know exactly. He got a clean bill of health from the doctor and the umbilical cord fell off in a couple days. We waited to cut it until the cord stopped pulsing, making sure he received every last drop of his own blood from the placenta-about 1/3 of a newborn's blood remains in the placenta. No jaundice, very little vernix, so I'm putting some coconut oil on the dry skin that's showing up.
I'm doing well. Starting to fell "normal" and getting back on my feet after about a week. My feet did swell a bit for a few days but that's gone now. I'm getting used to cloth diapering a newborn and a boy. It's a whole new way to fold all those prefolds than I've had to use in 6 years now. Knowing the cost of diapers, I am grateful we have the cloth. But man can this kid go through diapers!
Dennis and his mom have been helping when needed. I'm back on my feet enough that I can do the cooking, though Dennis does help some when Elijah needs mommy sooner than food is done. He's mostly the "muscle man" for a bit so I don't lift anything heavy too soon.
The kids have been on hiatus from school this week... but we decided we're starting back next week because the no routine is driving US a bit crazy and they have hours of "I'm bbbooooorrrreeeedd"... (of course with football starting they are now "playing football" as the game is on.... :/ Dennis could also benefit from the few hours of quieter time during their school to work on his school.
So I wrote everything above a few weeks ago... Elijah is now 4 weeks old and starting to get some cute little fat rolls on himself...though barely noticeable.. He is finally fitting into most of the newborn clothes. We've been back at school for a few weeks, with added geography. The kids have been wanting to learn about the states for awhile, so I added that in.. Just basic stuff, but Andrew and Eva are having fun with it. Thanks to freebies from the (what seems like millions) of homeschool blogs I follow, the state geography unit was free.. Just had to print off what I wanted and bind it.
I have to get back to sewing already...sometime.. lol A friend gave me a pattern for culottes for the girls, Elijah needs winter jammas, my mending pile is ever growing.... the list is literally two notebook pages long and I'm looking at patterns for little boy suits-just cuz they are adorable...and I can lol.
I think that's all the updating I have.. Too much going on around here.. This post sat around in my drafts for 2 weeks before I got it finished and published, so bear with me. :p Things are a wee bit crazy right now.
Have a great week!
~Tabitha
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