Hampster Leash

This morning I was reminded (by one of my girls) that I once made a leash for my hampster Amazon. She was named this because she used to hang on the bars of her cage and she them like crazy.....much like an Amazon. So creative, I know. Anyhow, I was clever and made a harness leash for my hampster and would take her for a walk to the corner and back. I made a harness so that I would not choke her and so that I could gently lift her off the ground if she was not keeping up with me. It wasnt hilarious to me back then, but it totally is now. A leash for a hampster....seriously?! Her little legs would scurry, scurry, scurry. I cant imagine what her little hapster brain was thinking. C did not refer to it as a leash when he heard the story..... but rather a noose. I am a genius


In other news, the baby is doing fabulous! She has been waking once in the night and going back to bed until about 8. Loving. What I do not love is when another girl wakes up with a bad dream, wakes the baby and then my whole schedule is off. I wake up in a bad mood and refuse to get out of bed. C refers to me as his , " ray of sunshine" mockingly and that is just funny stuff. So I get out, ready my ladies for school, get them to the bus, and commence the home learnin'. Yeehaw. Dani is doing great! She is usually done by lunchtime and I have no doubt that she is going to be way ahead of her peers. Bright girl!

Horray Chirps Charlee!

Praise the Lord for 7 hours between feedings. This presents another problem for the nursing mother, but I will take it for that many hours of sleep. I can hardly believe that my little muffin is 6 weeks old today. Has it really been that long? On one hand it seems like she has always been with us and I couldnt remember life without her. On the other hand she is so new and little, how has 6 weeks passed? I think this is God's was of helping us forget about the sleep deprived nights (honestly she has been amazing about this, so we are really blessed on this topic), the engorged tata's, and the projectile poo. Girl has some skillz, that's all Im sayin.

The title for this blog comes about from a book that we used to read to Leilani. On each page it would say, " Horray chirps Charlie when he's out, I really love to get about." I think of it each time I applaud her. So cute. I even love getting up with her in the night because her little face says, " thank you" in the wee hours. Love love!

We went to the fair the other day as a family. Holy hotness batman! We lasted for about 3 hours as a family and then I had to get out of the heat. Charlee kept cool as we kept fanning her and getting her hair wet with cold water. She was just chillin along for the ride, not really caring what was happening. The big girls took their own money and paid to get in these big bubble things that float on water. They saw them at the fair last year and wanted to get in there this year. They loved and it looked like a human hampster ball, hilarious! Fair food was good, not great. The highlight for me was the elephant ear. We could not finish one as a family, it was ginormous. Oh, the piggly wiggly fries get an honorable mention too.

Lou Louisms

This is the biggest gap we have had between children....5 years. Leilani was the baby for all that time and she loved. When Charlee came into the picture Lou wanted to make sure that she could still be "mama's baby". It broke her heart when I got big with Charlee and I could no longer pick her up and hold her. I recently was able to pick her up again and she was in 7th heaven. Here is a conversation that happened in the car the other day: Leilani (L), C (C):

L: Dad, if you had to choose for me or Charlee to die, who would you choose?

C: I would never choose that honey. I serve a big God that would never make me choose that.

L: Yah Dad, but if you HAD to choose, who would you pick?

C: I wouldnt pick babe, I would tell them to take my life, not my girls life.

L: (frustrated) Ok

This short and disturbing conversation was very revealing. She wanted to know where she stood in the pecking order of things. Broke my heart to hear her ask this question. C does such a great job of fielding these questions. When she first asked it, I said, "what?" because I was sure that I heard her wrong. Nope, I heard right. I hope and pray that we make Lou feel valued and secure.

On another side note, homeschooling will start next week. Nervous and excited for this to be happening. Please pray for us that we will not mess this up and that our daughter will come out of 8th grade well rounded and more secure in our relationship after having 3 years together.

Above are a couple pictures of Charlee getting rid of hiccupps. My dad puts a piece of newspaper on their forehead. This was her first time but we subjected all the other girls to this. C thought it was some Hawaiian voodoo thing until he realized that it is just put there to take the baby's mind off hiccupps and put their attention on something sticking to their forehead. Love. I wish the pic of Charlee smiling would have come out better but she moved.

Busy Summer Days

Yesterday was a fabulous day. We enjoyed the farmers market in the morning, hit up Costco, went to the Splash Down Cove, got to see my mom while C took the bigs for a bike ride, and ended the evening going on a date provided by the TCCC. Love! We went to The Country Gentlemen and had dinner with a co-worker of C's. Of course Charlee was with us, she needs me ya know.

I have been enjoying reading, thinking about the "Titus 2 Woman". C and I watched a youtube video on Mark and Grace Driscoll answering questions live via text. I never get sick of watching those two. These questions are off the cuff and bibilcally answered. One question was about "stay at home dads." **sidebar. The thing I love about pastor Mark and Mars HIll is that he preaches it and it may be offensive, but it is the word of God, so deal" They referenced 2 Timothy to answer the question. It was fabulous. His answer to questions a lot of the time is, "there are exceptions to the rule, you are not it." Basically, if you are having to ask the question b/c you think you might be in the wrong, you probably are. Love. check it out if you get a chance.

Crossview bought the 509 fitness building and will hopefully start having services in it soon. I got to see it last night and was really impressed. Overwhelmed, but impressed. Gobs of work to be done. The vision and dreams for the building are exciting.

Self-Soothe

This is a tough one for me. Beings that I had five years between babies I am struggling to let little Charlee "cry it out". She just started crying as I started typing so we will see just how long I last. Very soon here I will need her to get to the point where she can get herself to sleep....not a binky.....not someone holding her.

It was a fabulous night last night for us. She slept from 10:30-2. Then from 2-6ish. C picked her up and brought her to me around 6:30am. It was a great night of sleep for me. Broken sleep, but sleep. ****ok, I have gone to her three times. She has been quiet now for 7 minutes (fingers crossed) this is good!

My big girls have been reading and journaling all summer. We set goals for them to reach if they get all their minutes each day, then we will reward them at the end of the month with a prize. Last month they went to Yoplicity and had fro yo with anything they wanted on it. They were in heaven. This month we are considering surprising them with a trip to Silverwood (2/3 of them have already earned passes) and a night at the raptor reef. Fun times. They will love.

I often refer to myself as a cow, for many reasons. The most obvious being the fact that I am a creamery for Charlee. My motto in nursing has always been "suck it off me, put it onto you." I am truly relishing the time I have with her. She is so stinkin cute! I will say that this baby goes through more diapers than any other baby i Have ever had. Probably 15/day. That is a bit excessive. I started wondering if I was changing her too soon but the fact is that I am not sure a single diaper could hold much more. ***We are at 10 minutes, yeah!***

I made it.....barely

I had my first outing with the 4 today. Probably wont be doing that again for a while. It wasnt all that bad, just took me forever to get out of here (like 45 miutes) and of course Walmart did not have enough check stands open. I was the person going thru the express check out with the max number of items. I didnt care. My 20 items were spread out over two carts too becuase I had "help". Such is life. I keep meaning to purchase school supplies when we go out but by the time I get everything that is on my list, I just want to get out of there

So this is our most expensive baby. I think we will pay about $1000 out of pocket. Before her the most expensive baby was Leilani at a whopping $125. In the military, one baby was free and the other cost me $40. Civilian medical coverage is a shocker. Oh well, praise God for the healthy baby and the means by which to "pay " for her.

I am contemplating getting a massage soon. How do I do that with a newborn? I suppose I will take her and just let her sleep in her carrier while I get my medical Rx, lol. I am so looking forward to laying flat on my back for the massage. I have had to be propped up during the pregnancy.

Sleep is not great. I got about 6 hours last night with two breaks in there to feed. UGH! The thing that keeps me going is the cutie pie face that greets me each night and the fact that I know this will be over soon and I will miss it. So I am even enjoying the sleep deprivation for now. Check in with me in a week and I iwll tell you whether or not I am still enjoying.

On my own again....

Today is C's first day back at work. We had a glorious 23 days together. In years past I would have told you that the boy needed to get back to work after about a week. That was the max for the both of us on "together" time. This sabbatical was a different story. The first week was a little difficult but the last two were glorious. God is really doing a work on my husbands heart and I am loving. I wouldnt have told you that he could love me better, more fully, more sacrifically but he has. Never in our marriage have I felt more valued and respected. He did dishes, laundry, yard work and was constantly asking if there was anything he could do to make my day better, it was fabulous.

Yesterday we started implementing "ferberizing" Charlee. We have had her on the 3 hour feeding schedule but yesterday we started letting her self-soothe. That was difficult. We went and calmed her after 10 minutes and eventually rescued her after 30. I looked at it as a loss but C looked at it as a win b/c she did have to cry for a while. Fast forward to 10pm last night and I layed her down and made her "self soothe" and she was out in about 5 minutes. Praise God becuase I probably didnt have much more will power in me. I love her so!

I have been reading a daily devotion dealing with the Titus 2 woman and loving . Todays verse is 1 Corinthians 14:33

For God is not a God of disorder but of peace. As in all the congregations of the saints,

Enjoy!