Kiersten’s Blog

Yesterday morning ended well.  I got a little extra sleep, which was definitely much needed.  This morning didn’t go so well.  Ashton decided at around 2 a.m. that it was time to eat.  I expected that.  We hadn’t gone to sleep until after midnight so 2 came all too soon.  But I’m used to it.  Usually I stay up until his late night feeding and go right to bed and sleep until his early morning feeding.  The problem this morning came when he woke up his big sister with his hunger cries.  As I was in the living room feeding the baby, she was calling me from her room to come and rub her back.  When I was done nursing (which, by the way, isn’t so pleasant on its own right now) I took the baby in her room and rubbed her back for a bit.  Finally I put Ashton back to bed, but had to return to the princess.  I juggled them, running back and forth for quite some time.  Once one was happy, the other wasn’t.  I would get one to calm down, and the other would wake up.  I was able to get a couple of winks in before the baby was officially up to eat again at 4:30 or 5.  Taylor decided to help me out around 4, and went into London’s room to help her go back to sleep.  I don’t think he got much sleep, lying in her bed with her, trying to convince her that it wasn’t time to be awake because the sun wasn’t up.  It was no use.  She never went back to sleep.  So she’s been up since 2:30 a.m.  Me too.  As for Ashton, well, he’s sleeping right now.  London’s watching her 3rd movie of the day.  I don’t have the energy to convince her to do anything else.

5:00 a.m.  I’m awoken by a screaming baby.  The assumption: he’s hungry.  I’m not so sure, though.  He had woken me up at 2 a.m. and I had assumed the same thing, but he fell asleep before he was done eating.  So at 5, I’m not sure if I really want to feed him.  I think I would rather go back to sleep.  I would always rather go back to sleep.  I head out to the living room to decide my fate.  Then I hear a 3 year old calling me.  “Doomed,” I think.  I go into the pre-schooler’s room where she says to me, “Just rub my back for a little while.”  I do for a second, but I still have a screaming baby.  I tell her I’ll be back when he’s done eating.  I go back to the living room where the baby falls asleep before even attempting a feeding.  Fine with me.  I go back to rub the girl’s back and then bring the baby back to bed with me.  “I just need to buy an hour,” I think.  The next thing I know, it’s 7:30 (TWO hours later) and I’m waking up on my own, sleeping baby still on my arm.  I go in to check on the princess and she’s out cold.  Oh blessed morning!  I get up and feed the baby.  The princess doesn’t climb out of bed until 8:15.  Oh how I love sleeping in!

For as long as I can remember, I have had a freckle on the right side of my face, just above my upper lip.

There it is

I’m sure it hasn’t been there my whole life.  I’m not sure when it showed up, or even really when it left.  But it’s gone.  Recently I noticed that it wasn’t there anymore and in its place is a small spot with no pigment.  Weird.  Looking back at pictures, I can see that it’s been gone for about two years.  I guess I don’t pay that close of attention.

There it isn't. If you look closely, you can even see the pigment free spot.

In another skin-related incident, I had a tiny mole on the left side of my neck that was bugging me to no end.  It would rub against the seatbelt or against my collar.  It just hurt all the time.  I don’t think it had been there long.  I don’t even know.  It was small and barely hanging on.  Katie told me I should surgically remove it myself.  I decided that’s what had to be done.  It would just be painful for a second.  Then I wouldn’t have to deal with all the pain it was causing me all the time anyway.  I woke up the day I planned on removing the mole and it was gone.  It had fallen off in the middle of the night.  Again, weird.

Just because he's so cute

Things have gotten a lot better around here.  It’s amazing what a sticker chart can accomplish.  London already has 18 stickers towards her 35 that she needs for her trip to Disneyland.  It looks like we’ll be going a lot sooner than I expected.  That’s fine with me.  In the past 3 days, I think she’s only gotten mad at Ashton maybe twice.  I’m in shock.  Yesterday I could hear Ashton crying when I was in the bathroom.  A minute later he was quiet.  It made me a little nervous because I didn’t know what London did to him.  I asked her why he wasn’t crying anymore and she said, “I put his pacifier in his mouth!”  She tries so hard to help him and now she thinks it’s her job to give him his pacifier when he cries.

Today when we took Ashton to the doctor, London also had to take her baby to the doctor.  She has a little car seat, which she put Minnie Mouse in.  Minnie came with us into the doctor’s office, carried in her car seat by her “mommy” and was checked out by the doctor.  Minnie’s mom got a sticker when we left.  Not me.  I think I’m okay with that.  And in case you’re wondering, Minnie and Ashton are both really healthy.

This one has been a long time coming.  It may be offensive to some, so if your dog is part of your family, more than just a pet, maybe you should stop reading now.  I think it’s ridiculous how many people have their dogs as a huge part of their family.  I can understand loving a pet.  I had a dog growing up.  Still, she was a dog.  She stayed outside.  She didn’t wear clothes.  I didn’t take her to the store.  She was bathed with the hose.  Sure, we took her camping and things, but that’s a far cry from sleeping in the same bed with me!  I have gone to the mall in the recent past and been in shock at how many stores there are that specifically cater to dogs.  There are stores for just dogs.  This is crazy to me!  Why does a dog need to wear clothes?  It really doesn’t make them cute.  I know we’ve all seen a person carrying a dog in a purse.  Come on!  Can’t your dog walk?  Or better yet, leave the thing at home!  I’ve even seen dogs being pushed in strollers.  Give me a break!  And what about family pictures?  Who needs kids when you have dogs?  I guess I just don’t get it.  I had an experience with a dog today that kind of bothered me.  We were at the park and a man came near us with his dogs.  One of the dogs was not on a leash and wandered over, close to my 3 year old.  This was not a small dog.  He was bigger than my daughter.  Of course the man wasn’t worried and said, “Oh, he’s friendly.”  So what?  I don’t care how friendly your dog is.  If he’s bigger than me, I would be scared of him!  Of course my child would freak out!  So I just asked him to please come and get his dog because my daughter is deathly scared of them.  Sure, I understand that he was friendly, but don’t expect my three year old to be okay with the dog, just by somebody telling her that he’s friendly.  I guess what I’m saying here is, treat your dogs like dogs.  And keep them on a leash.

I have always thought I wanted four kids.  I’m not sure I feel that way anymore.  I’m thinking two is more than enough.  I knew the transition from one to two would be difficult, I just didn’t know how difficult it would be.  I have been driven to tears more than once.  Sometimes I wonder how I’m going to make it.  My mom left on Wednesday and on Friday I went to Hemet, where I had help from my in-laws.  Now I’m alone.  Taylor goes to work and I’m left to care for two little ones.  It’s not bad when they’re both happy, but as soon as the baby starts crying, the princess can’t handle it and the screaming, hitting, and covering the mouth starts.  For some reason, she just can’t deal with any noise coming from anybody besides her.  I have never been an advocate of spanking, and I still haven’t done it, but I can definitely see myself getting to that point.  I’ve been praying really hard that I’ll be able to handle it.  I’m sure it will get easier.  Here’s what I’m doing to try to remedy the situation.  I think I mentioned before that when Lora came to visit, she had a couple of extra Disney park hoppers that her company had given to her.  She wasn’t going to use them so she gave them to me!  I told London I would take her to Disneyland.  She has to earn it.  I made a sticker chart and gave her 5 stickers to start.  Every time Ashton cries, she has a choice.  She can yell.  She can hit.  She cover his mouth.  If she does any of these things, she loses a sticker.  If she’s good, she gets a sticker.  Once she makes it to 30, we’ll go to Disneyland.  Hopefully by then, she’ll be more tolerant.  I’m going to keep praying, but it made a huge difference this afternoon once I introduced the sticker chart.  She tries really hard now to be nice when the little guy is crying.  And she’s doing well.  This afternoon when I came out of the bathroom, she was standing next to his crib, reading him a book.  I hope she keeps this up and they become great friends.  Maybe we’ll be okay.

I love holidays.  The thing I don’t like so much is the commercialism of them.  I try to teach my children about the real meaning of the holiday.  I think that I was unsuccessful this Easter.  I was in the hospital until Friday.  I almost forgot that it was Easter on Sunday.  Then I bought into the commercialism (how can I pass up Cadbury mini eggs?) and created Easter baskets for the kids.  London painted Easter eggs with my mom on Saturday.  We also had a fabulous Easter egg hunt hosted by Melissa for our little friends here in the complex.  They all had a great time.  I would do those commercialized things anyway, but I didn’t even go to church on Sunday.  I needed a week off to recover from the baby.  I tried to teach London about Christ’s resurrection, but she didn’t really get it.  We’ve been talking about death a lot lately because she’s always putting things around her neck, so when we talked about Jesus dying and coming back to life, she couldn’t get past the fact that Jesus died.  Maybe next year I’ll be better.  I’ll teach my kids about the real meaning of this most special holiday and let them know how grateful I am for Christ’s resurrection.

Ashton and London on Easter. I'm so happy with the way London's Easter dress turned out!

My mom and Ashton

My mom flew in last Saturday to help out when I had the baby.  She was here a couple of days early and then just over a week after I had him.  It was so nice to have her here before because I really wasn’t feeling like doing anything.  She was also here with the princess when I had to go to the hospital.  Then, of course, she helped immensely with the recovery process.  I got to be lazy, playing with my children and trying to heal, while she slaved away in the kitchen and cleaned my house.  Not only did she take care of my house, but she also helped me take care of my children.  She flew out today.  I will admit that it’s always nice to have my home back, but I’ll sure miss her.  I flew solo tonight while Taylor was in class.  It actually went better than I expected, but I can tell this is definitely going to be an adjustment.  What if the baby is hungry when I’m supposed to be reading books to the princess?  Oh yeah, that happened.  Good thing I have a mellow baby.  Hopefully he stays that way.

We finally decided on a name.  Ashton.  And he’s here!

7 lbs, 12 oz and 20 inches long

I gave birth early Tuesday morning.  I went to the doctor for a checkup on Monday.  She checked me and thought that she might have felt the cord under his head so she sent me directly to the hospital to have an ultrasound just to make sure.  By the time I got there and was checked a bunch of times, they decided to just keep me there.  I was having pretty regular contractions anyway.  Plus, I didn’t labor long the first time so they though this little guy might come faster.  They didn’t want to take any chances, especially if it was the cord.  After the checks and the ultrasound, it was still a mystery as to what that thing was below his head.  So, they admitted me and put me on pitocin.  It turned out to be nothing (thankfully, since if it was the cord, I would have had to have a c-section).  He made his debut at 2:29 a.m. right on his due date.  Now I’m 2 for 2.  I wonder what the odds are of that.

The proud big sister

He’s perfect.  We’re so happy to have him a part of our lives.  I never knew I could love another child the way I love London.  All Ashton does is poop and eat and sleep.  I have to do everything for him.  I love it.  We’re always taught that you love who you serve.  I see that with my children.  I take care of everything for them.  That’s probably why I love them so much.