Christmas

The Christmas season is a marathon.  We all want to quit when we're nearing the finish line, and we're on the 4th night of going to bed at 2am, right?  There are the presents, the stockings, the food, the activities (combined with the normal activities) the baking, the parties, the teachers gifts, the programs.  And if you somehow manage to have your head on straight amid so much going on, you hopefully get to enjoy it along the way.  Otherwise…it can seem like a chore.  I tried really hard to do all of the above without getting overwhelmed.  Luckily, we don't know many people in Winchester, so the baking part was easy.  We made homemade gifts for the teachers.  The presents were wrapped early, and the food was planned out and executed as early as possible.  I even made my grandmother's couscous recipe for the first time.  

Christmas eve came, and we invited our friends over for our Christmas Eve Old Town Bethlehem night.  The kids went on a scripture scavenger hunt outside while my friend and I lit the candles, turned on the music and put the food out.  It was wonderful.  The kids slept great that night, and we were grateful ramona decided to sleep in the next morning.  The house was bright from all of the sunshine!  Such a great day, staying in comfy clothes and having nowhere to go.

 looking for Santa's glitter trail 

 Eliza set the table for Breakfast!

 

Moose Apple

The day before Thanksgiving, we woke up to beautiful snow.  Big chunky flakes were falling, and I knew that we needed to seize the day and grab our tree.  But first I had to get through the first part of the day.  Without having to explain a boring story, I'll cut it short.  The kids were out of school, two had doctors appointments, after the appointment I was driving to meet a friend, and I ran over a piece of debris from a car accident and literally heard my front right tire pop.  We got it figured out, and later made our way to the tree farm only to run out of gas (because of an appointment card I had set in front of the gas gauge.  All of this while it snowed and snowed.  

Finally we made it to the farm just 15 minutes up the road from Winchester.  It was beautiful, and dreamy, and the trees were covered in snow.  The kids played for so long, and never complained about the freezing weather.  Ramona's fingers were icicles by the time we got back in the car, but she could have cared less.  We found our perfect Frasier fir, grabbed some scotch pine garland, and a wreath, and headed home.  I literally had no part in decorating the tree this year besides putting the lights on.  The kids went to town on decorating, climbing the ladder, and making clumps of ornaments everywhere.  It was a great start to the Christmas season.

breakfast time!

happy birthday, sunshine!

Perhaps you've met her, and have experience it first hand, but Eliza makes everything better.  I probably sound like I love her more than my other children, but obviously you'd have to know this isn't the case.  I love certain things about her so much, it makes me so incredibly happy inside and outside.  I  write about these things often because I feel like, for the past 8 years, my head has been in the sand.  Medical school and residency was rough for all of us, but a lot of times I put myself on auto pilot and just went through the motions.  This girl, from the moment she could put sentences together, always said the most cheerful things.  She forgives the fastest in our family, compliments me on a daily basis through different observations ("mom, your eyes look so beautiful today!" "I LOVE that pretty scarf" "You are the best mom ever!"  You're the best cooker!  I like your toenail polish!  Have a great time at your party (i.e. girls night out)) she was the best snuggled as a baby, and has no fear.  The list goes on and on.  But what I love the most is her optimism.  Oh, her optimism!  I could write a book solely based on her outlook on life.  She'll say something that she's sad about, but quickly turn it into a positive experience.  "I'm really going to miss our old house, but at least I know there's a mama bird out there right now with its babies!"  I mean…seriously…SHE teaches ME to be more like this in my daily life, and for that, I'm so grateful.   We need more Elizas in the world! :)

If these pictures from her party look a lot like Ramona's, it's because it was basically the same idea.  More than half of the decorations came from years past, and it was a quick cake and ice-cream.  I do have to say one of the mistakes I made this year was putting her birthday party on the day after Halloween.  Next year I'll have to remember that.  We were so thankful she has these friends in her life!

We love you, Eliza.  Every bit of you.   Thank you for being the best daughter we could ever hope for!

Eliza is always the last one awake.  It goes in the Isaac-Ramona-Eliza order almost everyday unless someone has peed their bed, which thankfully hardly ever happens.  But for whatever reason, Eliza was up first on her birthday, and I was able to spend a whopping 5 minutes with her in the dark dining room showing her the decorations for her party.  It was such a fun moment for her and I before the rest of the kids woke up.   I love that she has puffy eyes in the morning.  And I especially love that she loves to sleep.  She knows how to throw it down!

Ramona turns 2!

Happy Birthday Ramona!  Her actual birthday is September 29th, but I am finally getting around to a few pictures from her (rather ordinary) day.  It's always hard to wrap my head around the 2nd birthday. She's neither an infant, or an independent child, but I want to keep calling her my baby.  She IS my baby.  Anyway, two just seems so much older than one, and I guess I'm just not willing to accept it. :)

Ramona came into our lives one week before her due date.  I had an incredible doctor who I was looking forward to seeing at the induction we had set up for the following day.  Two night prior, I went to bed with a stomach ache.  Not cramps, but just achey.  Being the third time, I recognized this for what it was.  I took a deep breath (as deep as could be at 39 weeks) waddled into bed, and wondered what the night would bring.  When I got up in the middle of the night to do the first of three bathroom breaks, my water broke.  I hopped in the shower, became my quiet self (this is my knee-jerk reaction to whenever I'm nervous) and mentally started thinking about the next few hours.  Somehow my mom managed to cut a normal one hour drive to my house, down to 45 minutes, and showed up in her pajamas and bag.  We took one last picture of my baby belly and hit the road.

She was born about 9 hours later at 12:19pm.  It was a very quiet labor.  Contractions were not nearly as big as with Isaac and Eliza, and I was kind of concerned that they weren't.  I mean, I was grateful, but still thinking "is this really it?"  Sean opted out of giving me my epidural, but one of his favorite attending came to do mine.  When it came time to push, I knew it would be only minutes before Ramona was out, but incredibly the epidural began to wear off, and in the end could feel the final labor entirely.  Fire.  That's all I felt.  Fire.

Oh how we loved her and kissed her and smelled her the minute she came out.  I think I saw a psych student (why?!) sway in the corner of the room, but I was too busy to really notice.  That overwhelming joy and love and confidence rocketed into 5th gear and I couldn't wait to nurse her and hold her.  I had loved the name Ramona for quite some time, and what really sealed the deal was when I told my mom. She said "Did you ever know that particular story about Nonna (grandma)?"  I had no clue what she was talking about.  "She always mentioned how much she loved the name Ramona, and that she had hoped someone would use it someday."  Boom.  Done.  Chills up and down my spine, it was meant to be.  What a great name to share with my grandma who, had she been here still, would have seen this happen.

Ramona came out with auburn hair.  Her eyes were already speckled blue, and her face reminded me of Isaac.  She was an incredible baby, who ate well, pooped like a champ, and slept through the night (10-6) at 8 weeks.  The greatest blessing is watching her older siblings dote on her.  We ALL dote on her, even tonight when she came up to Sean and I with a bag of mini marshmallows and turned on the charm like you wouldn't believe.   OK, you cutie pie….you can eat 5,000 marshmallows….your wish is our command….

We love you, Ramona Lina.  Our lives are complete with you here with us.  We can't wait to watch you reach each milestone, and explore this big world.

(Part of "letting go" with blogging is going to be organizing large groups of pictures….so here they are, in no particular order)