Roslyn's Blessing Day

 Isn't it the truth that with the 4th, 5th child the less pictures you get of them? It's a sad but true fact of life. I have the hardest time remembering to bring our camera anywhere these days. It's like, if I can remember the kids and all the stuff needed for them before getting out the door to go somewhere, then I'm doing pretty good!

Well a while back we had Roslyn Blessed. It was a small but special event for us. She really is a sweet sweet baby and the perfect addition to our family.

Of course I forgot the camera as we hurried our family of six out the door to be early for 9am church, we were just lucky to get there on time! Luckily my Mom is getting better at remember her camera and brought hers so we could record this day with pictures.

A friend of mine at church came up to me after the meeting and handed me a small scrap of paper with crayon colorings on it and other scribbles along with the words spoken in Roslyn's Blessing by her Father telling me how she liked having the words of the blessings of her kids written down so she did the same for me. She apologized for the condition of the paper and that she had missed a few words while her toddler started coloring on the paper as she was writing words down. It was such a sweet gesture and so much appreciated by me! I love having good friends.

My Mom made the blessing dress she is wearing, for Eden when she was an infant (her first Grand daughter) and now all three of my girls have worn it. It has such special meaning in our home now.

 

We sure tried hard to get just ONE good picture of our little family and this is all we could come up with. I think it's a Harker genes to take bad pictures ;) 

 This one is my favorite even though Cory and I are looking down, it's the best we could get!

Days with my two year old

When I'm not holding Roslyn and taking care of her needs I get to spend time with my little Lahna girl. She is so entertaining that it makes rough days seem bearable. Seriously, two year old children can be pretty fun people to hang out with.

Here is what a typical day with Lahna entails....

Breakfast is not her favorite. She wakes up hungry but I have a hard time finding things she'll eat for breakfast. Half the time she wastes her cereal with milk, some times toast and eggs she'll eat, oatmeal if I'm lucky, she's just not a breakfast girl.

When Daddy goes to work she cries, asking if she can go too, it's sweet and sad at the same time.

When I drop off the older two at school she cries and asks if she can go too, it's also sad :(
Then on the car ride home she explains how she has a school and a teacher and that she gets to go there, even though we both know it's not true, we talk about it anyway. I think it makes her feel included.

Some times we head over to Grandmas if she is really sad so she can play with her cousin Dominic and by "play" I mean brawl. They were such good friends and loved each other so much......from a distance :) I think she treats him how she'd treat an annoying little brother (if she had one) and he treats her as if she were an annoying older sister, it's true love!

She loves to ask (a million times a day) "What are you doing momma?" even though I just answered that questions two minutes ago and even when the answer is the same she still says "Oh" as if it were news to her.

She loves to offer to hold the baby and when I finally let her it lasts about two minutes and then she is saying "Momma can you hold her, she's hurting me." ha ha poor Lahna, her new born sister is not so small these days.

One of her favorite things to do during the day is color, draw or paint.We have another artist on our hands. And I love that she loves to do those things because I can just sit her at the table with the art stuff and let her go to town, easy entertainment and it didn't involve turning on the TV, wohoo!

She is getting so good at entertaining her self with toys. Some of her favorite are her pony's and horsey's and her stuffed duck collection, all of which she has made into family groups including a Mommy, Daddy brother and "baby". I love to listen to her make them talk to each other, some of the things she makes them they say.....well at least I know she listens to me :)

I've been trying to help her give up her nap because when she does take one she doesn't go to bed at night very easily and we can't have that. But she still loves her nap time and I'm not kidding, she asks me if she can please go in her bed to go to sleep. What kid does that? She is like me when I was little, I'd take naps after Kindergarten.

Half the time she asks to skip lunch because she is so tired and just wants to go to bed. Seriously? What kids says no to food so they can go take a nap? She is a funny kid.

Her favorite part of the day is when we go to pick up the big kids from school. She gets so excited for them to be home with her.

Things she says or does:

*Which one you like momma?- said while she holds up two things whether or not they are similar items it does not matter, but I must pick one.

*When you ask her when she did something or when something happened, like "When did you say/do ____with Dominic?" or "when did you hurt your finger?" Her response is "On Tuesdays." We finally figured out she means "two days ago" one time she said "on threesdays" and that is how we figured it out what she meant by "Tuesdays"

*When I say to her "I love you Lahna" she replies with "I love you most" it melts my heart every time.

*She makes everything into families: A family of Grapes, a Family of Lotions, a Family of coins etc. It's so funny to me that both my girls did this but Jonah did not, it must be a girl thing.

*She pronounces mosquito "skamito"

* She pronounces spaghetti "skibetti"

*She called Halloween "Hallow-winga"

*She is fully potty trained but I need to supervise her still, so when I take her in there and make sure she actually makes it on the potty she then will say "Okay go away mom!" and then I have to leave her in privacy.

There is so much about this girl that I wish would never change! She is hilarious and totally entertaining. A lot of people say "terrible twos" but I think two year olds are the best! I mean yeah they have melt downs and throw fits and sometimes just drive you crazy with their craziness but there is so much fun that come out of them that it just out weighs the bad, in my opinion. Now three year olds......that's another story ;)

I love my days with my Lahna lulu!

Life with a new born

I know it's only been three weeks since Roslyn joined us and I know that it's only been two and a half years since I've had a new born in the house but MAN I forget how much work they are and how little you can achieve with a new born around.

I always feel bad when Cory gets home and the house is a mess, I'm a mess, the kids are a mess and I haven't planned dinner. I know he doesn't think this, and if he does he sure does not say it but I feel like he's thinking "Okaaay what did you do today?" Because that is how I feel...."What the heck did I get done today?!" Well....I fed the baby, changed the baby, held the baby, calmed the baby down, got her to sleep finally, set her in her bed got up to do something for two minutes before she needed me again. I know this phase doesn't last long but it's killing me. And right now I'm really trying to enjoy each phase as much as possible because this could very well be our last child and I want to soak up each moment of each phase, but I have a lot on my plate with 4 kids and I feel so frustrated these last few days since Roslyn has decided she LOVES to be held ALL.THE.TIME! I can't get anything done.

I'm not one of those Mom's that just can't handle it or can't listen to her new born cry, I'm okay with letting them cry while I get some things done. But she has learned to just keep crying until she gets what she wants and when I test how far she will go she starts to hold her breath and starts to turn purple and she gets hysterical ( I know because I've let it go that far) and eventually I have to pick her up. I can't let her cry all day long, that would probably not a be a good thing to do but I also can't hold her all day long either. I hate to admit it but we have a high-maintenance diva little girl on our hands. She wants what she wants and doesn't take "no" or "just a minute" for an answer, at.all!

I LOVE this sweet little lady of ours I do, she is so precious and is such a blessing but she is driving me crazy :) I wish I could be more patient with her and I feel guilty that I'm not more patient but I just can't not do anything but tend to her all day, I have a two year old that needs me too, I have a house that needs attention and plenty of other responsibilities on my plate.

((SIGH))

I know it's a phase. I know it wont last forever and that she'll learn to entertain herself in just a few months time but for now I just sit and hold her and look at my house getting more and more destroyed hoping she'll give me a minute or two to get some things done around here.

How am I blogging right now, you ask? Well she is with my Mom while I "clean" my house :) I am cleaning, well I'm making my older kids clean while I do laundry and blog, he he.

Anyway I'm done venting. I just thought I'd record some of my thoughts even if they aren't all sunshine and roses. I'll blog a happier post soon with pictures of how big she is getting, she's seriously the size of a two month old already!

I love my chunky Monkey!

Roslyn's Birthday

I'm back!

I promised myself (and some other people too) that I'd get back into blogging and with new little baby at home there is a lot to blog about. 

So I'm just going to start off with the here and now and "catch up" later as soon as I have more time (ha ha! more time! that's funny.) for now I've "saved" spots on the blog to do the catching up so hopefully that will motivate me to fill them in, for now though I'm just going to keep up with the present.

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Roslyn Elise Harker

Born: September 13th 2012

at 10:47am

Weight: 9lbs. 1oz. (HUGE!)

Length: 22 1/2 inches (LONG!)

cone head!

Can you tell she was 9lbs! look at that double chin, fresh out of the womb and she's already sporting cheeks and a 2nd chin.

Cory was amazing, he was a trooper through the whole labor process as usual (he actually delivered the baby's head as the Dr. didn't quite make it in time) and then he headed off to work later that afternoon. (with Cory only being part time we didn't want him to miss even one day of work, no work no $ right!)

My Mom came and got to be in the room during delivery. It was a different but nice experience. I'm not sure how she felt about it. I'm sure it was weird being on the other end for once. It was nice to have her there to help do Cory's job as he was the one helping to deliver the baby.

Can you tell Lahna was over joyed to hold baby sister?!

I have four kids! Can you believe it?

The only boy, but I think he's okay with his role as Brother.

My sister Kim is in town for a few months living with my Mom (while her hubby is away for a few weeks) so she got to come and see baby in the hospital too. It was nice to have family around right after having a baby for once :)

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I want to have the birth story recorded on here because I have a feeling with this being my 4th child I might forget a few details.

So you have been warned, this is a birth story although I will try and keep it readers-of-all-kinds-friendly but I feel I should warn some people who just don't like to read birth stories, this is not the post for you, just look at the pictures and call it good :)

First of all many of you know that my Son (child #2) was born five weeks early and child #3 was born three weeks early so it came as a bit of a surprise (and not a good surprise) that this little lady decided to wait until her actual due date to come. I had yet to go the whole 40 weeks with any of my previous pregnancies so this was torture to me. I was so ready for her to come because I was HUGE and very uncomfortable and just ready to meet my new baby, also I knew she was going to be my biggest baby, but I had no idea she'd hit the 9lb. mark!

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The story from my point of view: (sorry it's really long)

The night before I had Roslyn (which was the day before my due date) I was feeling totally depressed thinking "I'm going to go over my due date, I just know it and I'm going to have a melt down when I do!" I was totally depressed and just exhausted and sick of being pregnant. I had been to the Dr. twice that week and once in the hospital with false labor and got sent home, which made me so mad! I was "false laboring" all week and was already dilated to a 5 (that's half way to where you need to be to have a kid fyi) I had been having contractions all day, well really for the last few days, well, more like the last couple weeks but they never resulted in anything real which was SO frustrating. But this day they were just going on all day and so in the back of my head I was secretly hoping they would turn into real labor but on the outside I had ultimately given up hope and just resigned to the fact that I was going to be pregnant forever :)

I laid down that night still contracting and they were seeming to be more painful than earlier in the day but usually that happens and then I would lay down at night and they'd go away. I figured I'd just do the same thing, lay down and they'd eventually go away like they always do. I didn't get much sleep, the contractions seemed to have subsided but I had what felt like an awful back ache and really bad heart burn. I tossed and turned and at about 1am I went to roll over and my water broke, which totally took me by surprise. I leaped out of bed and waking Cory up I yelled "Oh crap! Crap my water broke!" I laugh about it now because the reason I was so upset was that I didn't want my water to break in our new bed, with the new mattress pad and new mattress cover on it, ha ha! I didn't want any of those things to get ruined so I leaped out of bed and luckily it was an easy clean up, we just had to wash the mattress cover. I just think it's funny that that was my first thought "Don't get all over my new bed!"

I was also really nervous about my water breaking at home because I was already dilated to a 5 and usually after my water breaks my labor picks up pretty fast and it isn't too long before I have a baby. When my water broke at home I was so nervous that we wouldn't make it to the hospital in time. We both jumped out of bed. I called my parents to come over and Cory went to make up their bed for the night and pack up the car. I was shaking pretty bad I think because I was so nervous about how this could end, ya know worst case scenarios began to pop into my head, like having a baby in the car on the side of the high way on the way to the hospital or making it to the hospital barely but no time to have an epidural (which I did not want to happen at all) ya know those thoughts. It seemed like an eternity before my parents got to our house and then when they did we jumped in the car and I told Cory, "This could happen fast, you need to drive fast, if we get pulled over just tell the cop unless he wants to deliver a baby he should let us go." So Cory went about 75-80 mph the whole way there (which if you know my hubby he's not much of a speeder) and we got there in about 12 mins (usually it takes about 25 min to get there in good traffic if you are going the speed limit).

When I got to the front desk in Labor and delivery it was pretty calm there and I began to sign in and sign all the papers they lay out for you. I then said to the nice lady at the check in desk and the nurse next to her "I just want you to know that as of yesterday I was dilated to a 5, my water broke about 25 mins ago and this is my 4th child." The nurse then said "Ooookaayy! lets get you checked in here fast and lets see if your water did break." she came around the desk and saw that I looked drenched and realized my water had in fact ruptured and then all of a sudden nurses were rushing me in to a labor and delivery room, no time to go through triage, and hooking me up to the IV and calling the Anesthesiologist and the Dr. and getting things ready! I guess I said the right things to have them take me seriously :) With in the hour I had the Anesthesiologist on her way into give me my desired epidural. This was the fastest I have ever been admitted to have a baby, it was kind of weird.

I wasn't in a whole lot of pain but I didn't want to miss the opportunity to get the epidural. I usually like to wait as long as I can before I get the drugs because they seem to slow down my labor a bit and I like to get as close to fully dilated as I can before the drugs slow things down a bit. When the Anesthesiologist came in I was dilated to a 7 (not bad) but my contractions were still pretty bearable (I think I must have a higher pain tolerance than I give my self credit for, but I still wanted the drugs) I requested my epidural to be "light" or what some people call a walking epidural, where you can feel things but you aren't in any pain. I described it as feeling slightly uncomfortable but with no pain. I feel like having it this way I stay calm because I'm not in any pian but can feel things which helps labor (pushing) go by faster.

With this being my 4th I feel like the whole hospital staff involved takes my requests more seriously and I just didn't feel "shy" or like I couldn't voice my opinion on what I wanted or didn't want, like I felt with my first two I was just going along with what they told me and I didn't like that at all. With # 3 it was more like they took me seriously and it was such a good experience and I wanted that again. So I was not shy in requesting things the way I wanted them. 

So I got my epidural and of course things slowed down. Every time they "checked" me they would say " the baby is still kind of high" which surprised me, but I could tell they were right, I could feel her in my ribs like she was just hanging on not wanting to come out yet. So hours went by before anything exciting happened. The staff was saying "you had us scared when you first came in, we thought you were going to have this baby fast, but she is just not wanting to come out yet." It was true we were all scared this would happen fast and then all of a sudden baby did not want to come out and hours went by before anything started to happen.

The Dr. came in and we decided it was time to push. I love that he let me make the call "If you feel the need to push just do it and if you want to wait a bit that's okay too" it was so nice to be in charge and let the staff follow me. I started pushing and every time I'd push I felt like she was going higher and higher into my ribs. I pushed for about 5 contractions and was exhausted and she just wasn't budging. The Dr. then said "If you want you can take a break for an hour and we'll adjust you to a position that will help lower baby and then we can try again later." Basically I was going to wear myself out if I kept going like this. Also we came to find that my contractions were just not as strong as they needed to be to help me get the baby out, they weren't doing their job, and letting me do all the work. So they put pitocin in my IV to help the contractions become strong enough to be useful to me. The Dr. had asked Cory "Do you want to help deliver the Baby?" and I think it took Cory by surprise but he agreed because he's not phased by that stuff (he is a medical professional ya know ;) so when I started pushing the first time both he and the Dr. were suited up ready to deliver the baby. 

We decided to take a break and let baby lower on her own a bit with the contractions so that I could rest and have a break. So I laid on my side with a ball between my knees for just under an hour (during which I had the anesthesiologist come back in to give me a bit of a boost in my drugs) before I realized baby was dropping and she was dropping fast. At this point Cory had taken off his "suit" and the Dr. had moved on to I'm sure another patient or maybe he was in the Cafeteria getting breakfast, who knows? But he was no where in sight. So I told the nurse I think I need to push. So she told me to go right a head and she was there to help. After just a couple of pushes she says to the other nurse who came in to check in on us "Call the Dr. baby is ready to come." At this point I can feel  that her head is going to come out in the next push and then I realize the Dr. is still not here. The nurse tells me, Okay just don't push for the next one. I hear the other nurse on the phone saying "Well, you need to run, baby is coming out now!" The nurse then turns to Cory and says okay Daddy get your gloves on you are going to deliver this baby. At this point I'm saying over and over "she's coming, I can feel she's coming, I'm not pushing but she is coming right now."  I was for some reason panicking. The nurse at one point was pushing with three fingers on baby's top of her head, basically holding her in hoping Dr. was almost there. Cory got his gloves on (no time for the suit) and basically delivered her head just as Dr. comes running into the room. He said "go a head Dad, I can't do anything with out gloves on." So Cory helped the head out and then Dr. gloved up and came in and helped the shoulders out and then Cory did the rest. 

It was all so crazy at the end. It was such a weird labor. At first we were all crazy frantic thinking baby was going to fall out. Then it slowed down for hours. Then my first round of pushing was useless and baby was gripping my ribs with her toes or something. Then she decided to let go and come out fast not caring if Dr. was there or not. Lucky for her Daddy was there to catch her! It was quite the roller coaster ride of labor and delivery. It makes for a good story for her one day "Daddy delivered you ya know!"

I'm not sure how Cory felt about delivering his own child but I think it was an over all good experience for us. When I'm there in labor it's so weird like I'm in a different state of mind, like I'm somewhere between real life and a dream-like state and then after all of it is over I kind of come-to and then realized what I just did, brought a baby into this world, and then it's just all kinds of emotions that hit me at once. It really is a unique experience and each one has been different but my feelings about giving birth remain the same....That it really is a miracle and to be apart of it to experience it all (even the not so good stuff) is so amazing and just a blessing. 

Well, there ya have it. Roslyn's Birthday story.
We love her so much already and are so glad she was sent to our family!

First day of school 2012-2013

 My two "big kids" on the first day of 3rd grade (for Eden) and 1st Grade for Jonah.
Jonah was so excited to go to the same school as Eden this year. Last year he attended Kindergarten at the Kindergarten center while Eden was in 2nds grade at Greenacres Elementary. This year they are both at Greenacres Elementary.

Eden's Teacher Mrs. Cossette taught there when I went to Greenacres and my little Sister Allison had her as a teacher so that was such a fun surprise to get Mrs. Cossette for one of my kids. Jonah's Teacher Mrs. Ball seems so nice and will be a good teacher to help Jonah get used to the demands of 1st grade. I was so ready to have them start school again. It gets to the point at the end of summer that they are just bored and ready for routine again and so was I.

Jonah turns 6!

 Jonah is lucky enough to have a summer birthday. I always wanted a summer birthday when I was younger so that I could do pool parties and have fun outside activities. Well as a kids it seems like it would be so fun to have a summer birthday, as a Mother....well not so much.

It was so hot the day we had his party and we don't have an actual full size pool in our back yard that I could fit in and lets remember I'm hugely pregnant due any time with in the next month, so it was miserable for me. BUT the kids had fun!

We did do a water themed party we had as slip 'n slide out and a couple of kiddie pools and some sprinklers going. The kids kept cool in all the water activities we had for them. I think the water balloons were a hit! Sadly it only lasted 3-5 minutes before they were all tossed and popped. The water slide was the next big hit. They would run across the yard down to the water slide and then all jump on it at the same time, it was pretty entertaining.

A huge thanks to My sister Whitney for coming and helping and also my good Friend Marty for kind of taking charge of entertaining and wrangling all the kids (there were a lot of them) I couldn't have don't it with out her. It was a huge success and Jonah couldn't have been happier with how his big birthday bash turned out.

Here are the little kids (Lahna and Kye) enjoying the water slide. I love this sequence of Lahna on the slide...

  

 

More water slide action 

First they race.....

 Then they push and shove to be the first on the slide....

 then they leap in the air.....check out that kids height!

 Jonah is so into baseball these days so his cake was a baseball, easy!

 He is serious about getting all his candles blown out.

My Jonah boy!

I cannot believe you are six years old. It does not seem like six years ago I was shocked to find out you'd be joining our family five weeks earlier than you were supposed to. That day was a great day but also a little scary when there were moments I wasn't sure if you were okay. You were a strong boy, and only stayed in the NICU for just over two weeks. Then we got to bring you home to meet your big sister. Your personality has grown and changed right along with you. You were such a calm mellow little guy and now you have more spunk and energy and a bit of stubbornness, like little boys should! It gets you into trouble some times but now you just got to learn to use those Characteristics for good. We love you buddy boy! You are the perfect only Boy for our little family and we are so glad you came to our family! I'm proud at how much you have learned and how smart you are you amaze me with your patience with your sisters, even though at times it may be hard to deal with them. You a so fun to be around and we wouldn't trade you for the world! Happy Birthday big boy!

Visiting Harker's

 Back in May we last minute decided to go up to Canada to see G-Ma and G-Pa Harker and my kids' only Harker cousins. The kids had a day or two off school for a holiday (Memorial day?) and Cory had work off so we headed up North. We knew that in a few months I would not feel like traveling later in my pregnancy so it was the perfect opportunity to get away to see family for a weekend.

The kids love their cousins! They enjoyed time with them........

Eating Ice cream

 Having BBQ's at a park

Lahna trying to be a big girl like cousin Danica

 Jonah loved helping Grampa George with Yard work, he felt so "Manly"

 The kids decided that the very unsafe old deck was a great place for a "fort" 

(the next trip up to Canada involved tearing that old deck down, the kids were a bit sad about losing their fort, but it was probably for the best)

 "fishing" at the local pond

The kids only caught a bunch of water bugs and a couple of tad poles but they were sure excited about their great catches.

I love this picture. Cory just chilling with cute Danica while she hopes to catch something.

It was a fun short week end I'm glad we got to go. It's the first time we've been up to his folks in years. While in Indiana it was just hard to make a trip up to Canada so we were more than excited to go back for a nice visit.
Cory took the two older kids back up to Canada the end of July, but I was not feeling like driving 8 hours so I stayed home with Lahna girl and we had a nice five days to ourselves. I don't have pictures from that, as Cory went with out a camera. He did take a few pictures on his phone that I may post on here later.