7 births in just over two weeks

Holy cow, I'm exhausted. The hardest one was the 36 hour labor with a transfer, then 24 hours later I had another birth and was up another 28 hours.

A friend asked me how my kids did after the 36 hour one. I left at 2:30 in the afternoon, kids were by themselves until Dad came home at 5:30 and Dad took them all to a church Christmas party (poor guy!). The next morning Grandma came and got them, dropped the boys off at school and the rest of the kids at the other Grandma's house. The boys walked to the first Grandma's house (they were working at the temple) after school and the second Grandma came and picked them up in the evening. She, of course, spoiled them by taking them to Wendy's for dinner. I got home about 9:00 that evening and was informed that they all wanted to sleep at Grandma's house. She decided to keep the baby too so I had no kids and could sleep as long as I wanted. Of course I naturally woke up at 8:00!

So this friend wanted to know how my kids handled it. She said her kids would have been basketcases after two hours of her being gone. It made me realize how blessed I am that my kids do fine without me. I guess they are used to having a not so normal family life all the time although I feel they definitely have a stable family life. I'm also blessed to have both a Mom and a Mil that adore my kids and are very willing to help out whenever they can.

So here is my question to you all. Last week, before the last two crazy births, I was really wanting to go off by myself or with some friends to get some "me" time. It didn't help that I read somewhere that apprentices need to make sure they are taking care of themselves. I went to a food tasting party on one night and felt guilty because it was more time away from my kids. So how do I find the balance of being gone lots with births, still take care of myself but also spend enough time with my kids. Then there is the cooking and the cleaning and the laundry and the shopping and everything else that comes with taking care of the family. Some days I feel like my relationship with my kids comes last and it should be first. Do I really have the "right" to be going off to be by myself or with friends when I already leave my kids so much already? OTOH, I'm not feeling that need to get away right now. I'm so worn out from all these births that I really want to just stay home!

Pic of my family

http://www.tammyjarman.typepad.com/

It's the 13th and 14th one down, the one with three girls, three boys, baby JZ sitting on my lap. My sil took all the pics. She does great work, huh! I haven't had a great pic taken of me for a long time so I was especially pleased with our couple pic. Sil is supposed to give me CD with the pics on it so as soon she does (hint, hint) I will put it right on my blog.

I also put a bunch of pics together from this year for my sis so she can make a calendar for my Mom for Christmas. I thought I'd put a few of those on here too. Just not today! LOL

My sil has a singing group

I think she has an awesome voice. Go listen to them at http://www.claritymusic.blogspot.com/

In the picture on the left, she is the second from the left, Karen.

Yay! High Speed Internet!

We took a huge leap of faith this month and got rid of our home phone. I already have a cell phone, dh has one through work and we got the kids a phone with my parents family share plan so it seemed a natural step to just get rid of the home phone. It's working ok although we've had a few glitches like when my phone got dropped in the toilet and I had to use the kids phone for a few days. It meant leaving the kids home by themselves without a phone. It might be a good reason to get a insurance plan on my phone.

Anyway, we used the money from getting rid of the home phone and put it towards internet. LOVE IT! I can finally start watching the fun videos from Utube that people love to pass on. I can also navigate much faster which means I can keep up on my blog better and keep up on others blogs too. The transition from no home to internet took us a few weeks plus the laptop, where all my links are, is dying so I haven't been able to update for awhile.

I've started going to births. I'm now up to grand total of 8 births attended. I know, not much, but it's a start. The hardest part is leaving my baby when he is sick. We've had croup and stomach issues going through the whole family. Not fun. So far, though, all the births have been either at night or on the days dh is home so it hasn't affected my family a whole lot.

Yay, lots of good news.

My Mom came home from the hospital last Thursday, the last day that I posted. They shocked her heart and it worked so they sent her home several hours later. She still isn't doing so great, though. Occasionally her heart goes into A-fib and she is tired all the time. I'm going up several times a day to help her with various things and take her places. I hope she starts improving soon.

JZ is 99% weaned! Friday night was the end of my rope. He woke up about 1:30 to nurse and suddenly I realized why I really do not enjoy nursing him. He has this annoying habit of latching on for a minute, nursing then pulling off for a minute. Latching on again, pulling off. On and off for 20 min straight. Usually I eventually put an end to it when I get fed up but Friday night at 1:30 in the morning I'd had all I could take. I was done. Dh took him for awhile and rocked him to sleep. We were up from 1:30 until 5:30. We would just get him to sleep and lay him down and he would wake up. I won't tell you what I eventually did because it isn't pc but he eventually got exhausted enough that he stayed asleep.

Since then he hasn't even asked to nurse at night. I can't say our nights are any better than when I was nursing him but at least dh can take him and he won't throw a fit. He asks sometimes during the day but I just sign all gone and get him a drink or food and he does fine. For the most part he really doesn't get upset when I won't let him nurse. Over all it went much easier than I thought it would. I did let him nurse on Sunday and then again this morning because I was full but I suspect it will be the last time.

So, overall I'm getting a bit more sleep. I was awake from 2:30-5:30 Tuesday morning but it wasn't his fault. I just couldn't sleep. I slept good last night.

So the last bit of good news is that my house work is all caught up. It's cluttered and my fridge desperately needs to be cleaned out but it's all stuff that would only take about a few hours and then it would be all clean. But my laundry is all caught up and all the organizing is done. My next big project is to get some curtains on all the windows. I think my kids would appreciate that! After that I want to clean all the carpets.

Still working on weaning

It will take forever, I think! LOL I seem to have gotten it down to just once or twice during the day. Night time is still insane. I hate to admit but the nights that we do the best are the nights I give him Motrin and Benedryl. He fell asleep before I gave it to him tonight. He woke up at 11:45, it's 1:45 and he is awake again. Yes, I've been awake since the first time he woke up. The night before when I gave him the meds he woke up once at 2:00 and then again at about 5:30. I could handle only twice a night.

My Mom is in the hospital. She went in on Sunday because she was dehydrated and bo explanation for it. She was also have wierd heart rate patterns. 4 days later she has had an angiogram and a stent put in. No idea when she will be home but she still had a funky heart rate so I'm not sure it will be today or even tomorrow. The insane lady started a daycare a few months ago so I've took it over for. I'm near exhausted with taking care of two households and way too many kids!

I'm also worried about a friend. I want to be there for her. I'm just not sure how.

The end of next week I will start attending lots of births. Hopefully things will return back to normal. Not by any means calm but at least normal. Baby, I need sleep!!!

Whats new in our lives?

Not much. I desperately need/want to wean JZ but he doesn't like it so much. Some days it's pretty easy to distract him, other days it doesn't work so well. He has been waking 5-7 times in a night. It's been suggested that if we wean he will quit waking at night. Maybe, it worked for A when she was a baby but I can't figure out a good time for me to miss at least three nights of any sleep at all to get up and walk him back to sleep a dozen times each night. Yes, dh would help but he has been crazy busy doing overtime at work. He needs sleep too. So either I get a little sleep nursing him 5-7 times each night for ever and ever or I get up and walk with him until he goes back to sleep. Biggest problem is that he is a super light sleeper. It's very hard to lay him down after we put him to sleep and have him stay asleep. So I get up, walk with him for 1/2+ hour until he is limp asleep, lay down with him, wait until he relaxes again, move him over to his spot and pray he doesn't wake up. If he wakes up we start all over again. Most of the time if he does wake up right away he wants nothing but nursing. I've never been one to let my babies cry themselves to sleep but I've been tempted a few times. It's sad because the biggest thing stopping me is that I don't have a crib to put him in and wouldn't have anyplace to put it even if I did.

I need sleep!