Out of the Mouths of Babes

Bedtime, like many houses I'm sure, can be quite the ordeal around here. We were having trouble putting our kids to bed and after an hour or two of struggles we thought we had won. About 2.5 hours later lil miss Summer came down the stairs much to our surprise. Needless to say she was not met with the sweetest of attitudes. We gave her a stern look and asked in our most frazzled voices "Why in the world are you still awake? What have you been doing up there all this time?". Her answer will never be forgotten. She sweetly replied, "I've been reading the Bible". At this point we looked at each other and started laughing nearly uncontrollably because we never expected an actual perfectly acceptable answer! Matthew had received a rather thick children's Bible from his Christian pre-school and Summer had sat down and read it cover to cover over the space of a couple of hours.

It can be tough handling all of our children, especially at the end of a long day when everyone is tired. It's moments like these that continue to make it all worth it!

Newborn pictures

I had newborn pictures taken of Simon this past week! Behold the cuteness!! I am so in love and thoroughly loving having a baby in the house again. So is the rest of the family.
A few stats about Simon so far:
1. He has pooped on me 3 times already in his short two weeks of being in our family! I made it through 4 kids without being pooped on. He is making up for the rest of them.
2. He had his 2 week check up on Friday. My little (not so little) sweetie is 10lbs!!! (birth weight was 8lbs 14oz.) He also grew an inch and a half in those short two weeks! Up to 21 and a half from 20 in. Busy baby boy!
3. He is a grunter. Grunts all of the time! In fact, he grunts to wake me up to feed at night instead of crying. I mean, he grunts to wake Jess up, and then Jess nudges me to get up and feed him!
4. I am 5 for 5 at creating pukers! I am very skilled at catching spit up! Any of you amateurs who hold him, beware!
5. Seriously so sweet! (of course)
And now on to the main event, naked baby cuteness!

Pre-school...finally!

Matthew started pre-school last week! He has been so excited about this. Technically, he is eligible for Kindergarten this year, as CA's cut off date for school is in December. I would be insane to consider this, mainly because number 1: he hasn't been to any type of preschool yet and, number 2: have you met Matthew?!! We were holding off for FL's free voluntary pre-K program, but since we've moved to Cali, we get to pay for pre-school instead! Joy! Matthew is so happy and I love hearing about what he is doing at school, so it is totally worth it. He is in Miss Hope's Afternoon class in the zebra room. His class is from 1:15- 3:45 on Monday's, Wednesday's and Fridays. I have him on a waiting list to get into a morning class, as that would make my life infinitely easier because elementary school is out at 2:50. We'll see, but for now, Matthew is loving his time in school. He has asked me a few times to go to a school that does learning. He doesn't seem to understand the learning through play concept. And really, if I'm being honest, the whole reason he is there is to help him with his listening skills and to practice staying with group activities.


I bought this shirt for him, along with another one that says "danger seeker." I'm not sure if I should encourage this, but they are so fitting because let's face it, he's totally a danger seeker and nothing seems to be too extreme for him. I guess I need to embrace it, and keep the ER number on speed dial. Oddly enough, I haven't used it yet!

Labor Day

Jess took the kids hiking at The Ridges for Labor day. Lexi is all ready to go.

It turned out to be a very hot, dusty hike that they shared with a few hundred of our closest friends here in CA! This hike will be reserved for spring, winter and non holidays in the future. Despite their faces, I still think they had fun. My Mom and I stayed home with baby Simon. I'm so sad I missed this one.

Seriously, so fun!!

About a week...

So I guess it's true, after so many kids, you kind of forget to keep track of certain things. I'm not sure how old Simon is in these pics, but it's around the one week mark. At least I took them, right?!

Sleepy boy.

Little Tootsies!

After his first sponge bath. He wasn't a fan, but really, who does like to be stripped down, wet and laid on a towel?!

Sibling love.

Simon Andrew

This photo was taken on Sunday after church. Can you believe the roundness that is my belly?! I still can't get over how round my belly was!

Simon Andrew arrived on August 26th at 4:32 a.m.! Simon decided that he was ready to be born, so he gave me one good kick (or punch) and my water broke. It was 5 days before my due date, so I hadn't packed a bag yet. I tried to think of what I would need, but the panic of what was to come kept getting in the way. We headed off to the hospital around 3 a.m. I was group B strep positive, so I had to get antibiotics through an IV. It was my first IV since Summer was born. I thought that was going to be the worst part of the process. I hate needles and getting poked! I was wrong. I have never felt pain like this delivery before! Matthew and Lexi were both born naturally, so I thought I knew what to expect. I was not prepared. About 20- 30 minutes before delivery, I had the IV drug, staydal. Boy was I glad I did, because Oh my goodness, I can't even imagine that delivery without it. The nurse said it wouldn't help much with delivery pain, but it had to have, right? It was kind of funny, because even after delivering 4 other children, I felt like I didn't know what to do. The delivery was so painful, it was all I could think about after Simon was born. I kept saying over and over, "I can't believe how much that hurt!" I'm sorry for any of you reading who are going to be delivering soon. All I'm talking about is the pain. You may be asking yourselves why I didn't just get an epidural. Well, I don't ever have enough time to get one, the one time (Summer) I tried, it didn't work until after I delivered. The Dr commented that I didn't have a potty mouth afterwards and when I asked her why, she said, you asked if he was out yet and when we said no, you said, 'Seriously?!!'" She thought that was pretty funny.

Get ready for a baby Simon photo fest!!

Here are his stats.

Proud siblings meeting their baby brother for the first time.

So happy to finally hold him. I haven't heard anymore talk about a baby girl since he was born, so I guess she has decided to keep him!

Dutiful big brother.

So many big brothers

Lexi was probably the most excited to meet him. He's "her baby boy."

The crew! You don't know how hard it was to get 5 kids in one area for a picture. We did not succeed in getting eye contact from them. We take what we can get these days!

First family photo.

Our celebration dinner. Since we didn't get a date night in before he arrived, we'll consider this our date night.

Grammy and her latest (and greatest) grand baby!

Taking turns is so hard to do!

Future Dr.

Sad that she can't wear Matthew's flippers. Such a cute sad face, she'll go far in life!

Matthew, being Matthew.

Little Mommy.

Ready to go home. We had to stay the full two days since I didn't get enough of the GBS antibiotic before he was born. We had some great bonding time and rest with our extra day, but we were ready to go home. My back was killing me after sleeping in that hospital bed. My heart goes out to anyone who has to do that for any amount of time.

Ready to go!

Our brood!

Family of seven! Wow!

Look how full the car is with all of my precious cargo!

Lexi could not be happier to be a big sister! The jury is still out on how Simon feels about being the little brother to all of these siblings, but I'm sure he will come to love it!

So, there you have it. We are complete now. Now comes the task of settling into life with a new baby, in a new town, in a new house...Wish us luck, we're gonna need it!!!!

First day of school!

The kids had their first day of school on Tuesday the 23 of August! They were so excited to meet their teachers and begin making new friends. We weren't sure until the day before, if there was going to be room for T Jay at our neighborhood school or not. Thankfully we got a call the day before that he was admitted! Yay! He was even going to be in the same class as our neighbor's grandson, whom he had already met and liked! Score! The morning of, T Jay was really nervous. He kept saying that he was too nervous to eat breakfast. So sweet. They had a great time and made a few friends. They both have really great teachers and we are excited about the school year.

At Mohr Elementary.