Oh the Bliss!

I love this! I was looking for something to help with the Tiny One's bum rash and I found this spray. Everyone told me to stop using wipes immediately, which has made a huge difference, so now I spray some of this on a little cotton pad and voilà! Nice, clean buns. (It also can serve as a boo-boo cleanser. I love things with a double purpose!)

I know that people come from good places and the intentions behind their comments are never bad, and sometimes they're actually funny, but sometimes I just want to say, um, really? Is that the BEST thing you can think of to say? Here are some of my faves from last week... "I'm going to un-friend you on facebook because you do not look like you just had a baby a week ago." - sorry? "What's her name? ... Oh I know SO MANY Mia's. Like, SO many." - great. "Are you guys finished yet? Is there some literature out there I can get for you (to teach you about prevention)?" (This one is my favorite) - "I'm the oldest of three and I am SO glad my parent's didn't have a fourth." - um... okay. This is the one I hear from almost everyone, it's not necessarily a bad thing to say, I just get it A LOT, "Two boys and two girls? Oh, the perfect family." Does that mean before Mia we had an imperfect family? I also hear endle

~ the ability to take my daughter to the doctor pretty much whenever I want to, for whatever reason I want to. What a gift that is. ~ the forgiveness of my children, especially Ben, who forgives and doesn't think twice about my wrong doings... I learn so much from him. ~ meals from friends, and even ladies I don't know, even though physically I am able to cook, mentally I'm just not quite there yet. It means so much to me not to have to think about whats for dinner each night. ~ the movement I feel is coming, or maybe is even here, from the Holy Spirit. Like he's doing something really big in believers around me and I'm excited to see what's going on, and prayerfully be a part of it. ~ for the age of 12-24 months because this is truly the best age ever. This age is God's little gift between the challenging first year and the promise of a challenging third year. It's a beautiful, often hilarious, much needed intermission. ~ a husband who loves children. ~

Because I pushed out the last remaining quarter of brain I had left when I delivered Mia, I can't seem to put together enough words to make a cohesive thought to save my life. That being said... The first week home with my fourth child was much different than my first week home with my firstborn. Everything is louder. Messier. Spinnier. (That's "spinny-er" as in, "everything and everyone is moving so fast in circles around me, they are much spinnier than usual." Spinnier.) Mia has spent most of the week sleeping, much to the dismay of her doting brothers and sister who constantly ask me if they can hold her. Constantly. There was a couple of hours Monday evening when the older three were being, well, themselves x one million, and I retreated to a very dark bedroom and where I closed my eyes and prayed to open them and find myself back at the hospital. But quick, before this sounds like my week was awful, (which it wasn't, not in the least, in fact nothi

Saturday afternoon, 2pm, got home from Costco and thought I might be going into labor. Troy woke up from his nap at 3:30, sensed what was going on and was not too happy about it at all. Thinking it was pretty early, but not want wanting to take any chances, we left for the hospital a bit before 4 o'clock Yep, too early. Walked the halls for an hour which produced more of these... Which felt like this... And at 8:42pm they led to this... We are so thrilled to add a precious baby girl to our family We love you Mia Joy! (7lbs 2oz, 18.5" long)

My friend Jessica is awesome and wrote a blog in response to the questions I've been mulling over that I shared a few days ago. She said a lot of really great things, my favorite being, "I think a lot of times helping people is actually calling them on their bs and forcing them to make a choice." All of you are free to to call me on my bs anytime. Thanks Jess!