Macy, Macy

I was looking on my blog this last week and in the topics section I noticed that Davie's name is about twice the size of Macy's. At first, this made me feel bad because I know I have blogged so little since Macy was born and we finished school. After I thought about it for a while I realized that Davie has been around for two more years than Macy so it's probably not nearly as bad as I think. All the same I am more than willing to admit that I haven't documented her as well, at least on this blog. 

After this last week I feel it necessary to have a blog post about Little Miss Macy. Have I said she's a sass yet? Yeah she's a sass. This last week, Tuesday especially, Macy was literally trying to BREAK me. I can think of no better way to say it. Of course Tuesday was our anniversary so maybe she was just trying to wish us a happy anniversary in her own awful little way.

Macy has for quite some time been the most excellent little trouble maker around. From day one she had great motor skills, yes as a newborn. I literally just do not know how to describe her. I often find myself trying to decide why she is so difficult, but she truly knows how to get into everything, at any and every second, every turn all the time.

For example last September, she climbed out of her crib.... she was barely 18 months. All these toddler abilities for the most part are simply annoying and makes my daily little chores, like basic cleaning, difficult, but there are other times where it is a disaster.

She was running at Lowe's and wasn't looking forward, then she turned around and smacked into the edge of a long piece of gutter (like for the roof). This, injuries at Lowe's, has happened several times. Mostly falling because she was running too fast, but there have been several inattentive runs that have ended in her smashing her head/face into something. Ouch!

 Like drinks, she always seems to know where liquids are, she always seems to be thirsty AND about 90% of the time she spills said liquid everywhere. Sometimes on purpose. Regardless of whether everyone in the whole house is yelling "No Macy! Wait let us help you, you will spill!!" Just this morning in the time it took for me to pick Violet up (because she was crying) Macy had spill 80% of the contents of her cereal bowl. That was most likely on purpose.

It's frustrating because she's so adorable and I love her so much. All you moms know exactly I'm talking about SOOO much it almost hurts. Then she turns around and blatantly ignores everything I say. Repeatedly. I've definitely struggled with trying not to yell. I wish I could say I have it under control but between Davie and Macy someone's always in trouble. And no one listens when I talk in a normal voice. Mom life all the way.

Macy is probably the quintessential second child. A couple of weeks ago I remember looking outside while Davie and Macy were playing. Davie was messing with some sort of bug on the sidewalk and Macy came up behind him with a sand shovel in her hand. 

She tapped Davey on the head with the shovel and he didn't react then she did it again and again and again harder each time until Davie finally started crying. I really try my best to not get in the middle of every fight because I don't feel like that's realistic but also because there are so many of them at this age. I do genuinely feel bad for Davie because Macy is so rough and he really is a very good brother most of the time.

 He definitely instigates plenty, but Macy has bugging him down to an art. I can't remember which one of my parents said this but it's totally true Macy is a tormentor. I love her to death and she can be sweet as candy but she definitely struggles. What can I say?? Macy IS two.

Macy has been slow to talk not because she doesn't have the skills. She just straight up doesn't want to and for the longest time she had a very small vocabulary and most of it was commands like, go, stop, no, mine, shush, etc. A couple months ago she started adding animal noises as the animal names so instead of cat she would say meow instead of cow it's was moo. I think my favorite of all these sound titles is her little mermaid doll she sleeps with and all the little Ariel figurines she has. We've tried in vain to tell her it's Ariel or the little mermaid but she insist on calling it her ah-ahhh-ah (just like the little song Ariel sings when she gives her Voice away).

Macy and Ah-ah-ah

 Just a hot mess

Another thing she's been big on is frozen, not because we have encouraged it, she just decided she liked it one day. Macy always called Anna and Elsa- Anna. We couldn't get her to say Elsa, we knew she could but she would not until this last week she finally decided to say it! A couple of months ago I had bought her a pair of pajamas that had Elsa on it in hopes of bribing her into saying Elsa's name. Total no go. Then this last week I made a pudding cake and I got her to say Elsa without even fighting. It's funny because I had heard her kind of say it before I knew she could say "El" and I knew she could say "sah" but I could not get her to saw them together. It sounds a little more like El-tha but I'm just glad she is trying. She has since lived the last 4 days her new Elsa pajamas.

I definitely think the last week or so she's gained more confidence in her speech. David is the one who mentioned it first, and I agree, but I definitely think Macy gets self-conscious about not being able to say things correctly and then she won't try.

Now that we have a baby in the house she's always caring for her babies carting dolls or stuffed animals around, putting them down for nap and singing to them. I was a little worried she might be jealous just because she was more of a mommy's girl to start with but she's done really great since Violet arrived. I've been very impressed with both of my kids both times. They are great helpers.

She was always been our eater but has since traded that in for being a persnickety little two-year-old. Food staples like bananas, apples, strawberries, bread rice, chicken, tacos (you name it) are suddenly something she will no longer eat. Or she eats like a bird.

Macy loves books and hasn't really ruined any. She's gotten a lot better at snuggling, loves candy of all kinds, still working on potty training (not quite ready yet), has a funny OCD type way of cleaning occasionally (mainly wiping herself or other objects down with baby wipes).

She gets in these silly moods that put us all in stitches, usually its because she makes the funniest faces. She might be a stinker but she is ours and we love her to pieces!

A Violet by any other name...

David and I debated over this little girl's name for months. Weirdly enough David and I have picked out all of our kids names way in advance (before we were married), but for some reason none of those names seemed right to me this time. We found out she was a she way back in December and I immediately started questioning the name we had previously picked out, which was PollyAnna. Polly was a family name on both sides 4 generations back and Anna was all over the chart everywhere haha. After looking over both of our family charts we both concluded that our families, for the most part, had very little creativity. Even to the point of naming several children the same name in the same family. This was usually because a child passed away, but still! The variety I was hoping to find was already found in the names we had previously agreed on.

There were lots of reasons we started to change our minds. Polly had the same ending sound as Davie and Macy (while its cute I'm not into having all my kids have similar sounding names or first letters etc), David didn't want Polly to be her nickname, which it most likely would have been, and the addition of a sister in law named Anna since we had originally picked it. David wanted to just use the next girl name on our list, but I hadn't been planning on using that name yet so it didn't feel right to me or seem to fit.

Shortly after we found out we were having a girl, I fell in love with the name Violet. It's a name I had always liked, but had never really considered. I had a tough time committing to the name Violet at first because it didn't fit our usual naming ritual. I have always loved older simpler names. Easy to say, no guess work easy to spell etc and as I got older I wanted our children's names to have lots of meaning, so I fell in love with using family names. Growing up I got called Car- E alllll the time. It wasn't my parents fault that the early 90's introduced this new way to say Kari and they were definitely thinking about me when they spelt it. My maiden name was Christiansen, that's 12 letters! They wanted to pick the easiest and shortest spelling for my name that they could. 

The only problem is Kari isn't that common and I don't know if I've ever had someone spell it right on the first try. Because of this I wanted my kids to have an easier time, so we've picked older names. I also didn't want the names to be too popular, David being the only exception. David will probably always be a little popular but when your kid is David 5th you can't really argue with that!

Anyways, David's first reaction to my liking Violet was to tease "is this because your favorite color is purple?". I laughed because I hadn't even thought of (which surprised me I usually think of those kinds of details) but once I had I loved Violet even more! Purple, lavender, and/or Violet have been my favorite colors for almost 20 years. Also cousin Violet on Downton Abbey is awesome ;) I absolutely love her character and how she is actually OLD school. I have a friend in the ward who was due a day before me who liked the name, and I didn't want to pick a name that was too popular (especially in the same Ward). 

Then David basically refused to truly weigh in at that time and didn't until about 4 or 5 weeks before Violet was born! Big stinker. In the meantime I poured over more baby name websites then I knew existed and our family history chart like I never had before. And while I found lots and LOTS of names I liked, however none of them stuck out or fit. There were also tons of family names I liked that are already currently in use on both sides of our families.

Maybe this sounds bad but her name is also the first and only baby name I have ever prayed about. With Davie and Macy, I just KNEW it was right, the family connections were just wonderful. Their names were perfectly planned no endless searching or arguing. None. David and I had a list of about 4 Boy names and 4 girl names (in a seniority order) completely planned way before their conception and I never questioned it.

About 2 or 3 weeks before she was born, we decided to do something we had never done before, wait until she arrived before we truly decided! That was more cautionary than anything, I had been consistently calling her Violet since mid March, haha and my sister in law and mom had been since December (they let me know their votes early). Needless to say I was both glad and relieved when she finally arrived. Violet is perfect for her. In the end I liked our little naming journey, even though it completely threw me off guard and was a little stressful. Violet may be baby #3 but she definitely has her own little story. 

Violet truly is our delicate little flower. She beat Davie's smallest baby record by almost a whole pound! Her tiny little fingers and toes are just adorable. 

Violet also seems easier to calm and soothe so far, she doesn't full on cry most of the time and usually if I pick her up she stops. Even if I'm only picking her up to change her. Davie and Macy were definitely never better once I started to change them. In fact for Davie diaper changes (especially the first of the day) were his daily crying sessions for probably over a year. I would also say that Violet is a little more snuggly, it's nice to feel like she needs me. When Macy would cry only food would help, when Violet cries Davie and Macy can just talk to her and sometimes she will stop. It's those short little moments as a parent that make a mom so happy! Violet has even stopped a full on cry to listen to Macy sing her version of "Twinkle twinkle little star". Which is Macy singing the words "uppa, uppa high" over and over again. 

All these little things make me think that maybe, just MAYBE, she will be our Vanilla baby. Also to clarify, by Vanilla I mainly mean temperament. She can be as sassy as she likes as long as she is more laid back than Davie or Macy :) 

PG 4

This is me today. 38 weeks and counting.
I feel like every time I'm pregnant it gets that much harder to wrap my mind around what pregnancy it is. This is my 4th pregnancy, but I only have 2 kids and when she gets here I'll only have 3. Sometimes I tease and say this is baby 3/4ths. I guess in a lot of ways I keep thinking that it will get easier to... understand... accept... I don't know but it's it's still a little weird and frustrating (if I'm being honest). I don't know if I'm saying that right because it's not a clear feeling or feelings and they come and go but hopefully that makes some sense.

I can't act like I have difficult pregnancies however this time and last time the last 10 weeks or so I've struggled with pelvic bone pain. Both my doctors have said it's because I carry low so there's a lot of pressure.  It's embarrassing because it literally makes me feel like an old lady. Even though I've gained more weight this time and last time when I need help getting up its because my bones hurt. It's weird to roll over at night and suddenly be in tons of pain and have to roll over extra slow like I'm a cripple. My waddle also has very little to do with my size and everything to do with bone pain. It's pretty cute to have a pregnancy/cripple waddle before age 30, trust me :) That's when I get most frustrated about having had more pregnancies than babies. My first two pregnancies were bone pain free, I just wish that the non-pain would have lasted more than two times. I'm hoping it will go away as soon as I have the baby like it did with Macy, fingers crossed! 

Other than that I'm all fluffy (like my fingers, toes and feet) and my fatigue has come back, but really just pregnancy life as normal. This picture is proof and it weirds me out. I normally have boney ankles and feet (thank you mom) so to not be able to see my ankles is just super weird to me. Did I mention that I kind of also hate feet? They are just kind of gross so to see my own feet look all bloated is extra yucky.

Along with extra weight gain I have come to the conclusion that since I live in Florida and we have a pool in our neighborhood I am spending time in the sun. Not a lot almost literally the daily recommended amount (15-20 minutes). I figure if I can't tone it ("it" meaning my ginormous pregnant self) I'll tan it. I feel like it's been really nice to dedicate time as often as possible to be in the sun. It does a body good. I figure if I have to spend the rest of the hot summer all fluffy post baby the least I could do is not be pasty white haha.

This week I'm 38 weeks along and it was only two days ago I actually pull out the little baby girl clothes and start washing them so they could be ready. And JUST today I finally ordered a bassinet. True story. With Davie we used our pack'n'play (which was just too big to have on the side of my bed) and with Macy we were able to borrow a bassinet so we've never actually owned one.

I've managed to take both kids to my doctors appointments the last 3 to 4 weeks. While taking the whole crew is not my favorite thing to do I can honestly say that it's not been too bad so far. No breakdowns or crying or anything else that made me feel like we needed to leave immediately so that's always good. No other major progress to report on that front but I'm still hopeful since all my babies have been born within a couple of days of D-day.

Right now I'm desperately trying to clean up the last couple of messes in our bedroom the fourth bedroom and the office. I'd say it's nesting but I've been trying to clean them up for months now and I think it's more like desperation at this point. The reasons why these areas have been neglected so long is because they could be closed off from small children but also because those spaces are really hard to clean with small children present... at all.

The 4th bedroom

We had visitors that spent the night last night and I BARELY managed to get the 4th bedroom under control by the time they got here. But not without absolute heck from Davie and Macy. Seriously yesterday my kids were THE worst. I hate saying that but yesterday it was true. They were all kinds of naughty to each other and all about making cleaning impossible as much as possible. As well as just literally following along behind me and destroying what I had done. ALL DAY LONG. Sometimes I think David worries about having more kids when I have days like that, but all I have to say is I really believe the part that frustrates me so much about days like yesterday is the fact that I know my kids can be SO well-behaved when they want to be. But aren't we all that way? And even more so as adults??

As far as this little gal goes she is a MOVER. Not the constant swishy/re-situaing type movements like my other babies have done but huge and often internally painful movements. There have been many evenings where her constant large movements have given my a tummy ache. Other nights I can watch what has to be one of her limbs move around as if she is trying to escape through my side! The plus side is I've never had to question if she is alive in there. I'm super curious to see what her personality will be like since both of my kids are so independent and busy. After I had Davie my mother-in-law said she didn't want any vanilla grand babies. I tease that Macy is my strawberry flavored baby and Davie is chocolate so I feel like I can have a vanilla baby now haha. A mom can hope!

This is me at 36 weeks and some change watching her try to escape from my stomach. Its extremely strange to watch and feel your entire belly move like that.

Other than that my family comes next Saturday and will be here for my birthday! Yay! And somewhere in all that hopefully we will have another baby girl. So at the end of the day there really isn't much to complain about. Life is good.

Family of Four

He has always been such a pretty baby and now he is turning into such a handsome boy! David hates it when I call him pretty, but it is totally true. Plus I'm his mom so I can say whatever I want.

Family of four!

David doesn't like these, or any picture with him in it, but I love to see my little babies in his arms. It's super cute.

Usually I make sure all the pictures are in order. Not this time! I decided to splice and mix them all up. It's nice not to have 5 of our family and then 5 of just Macy. I might reorder them like this more often. 

One of my favorites

We had to bring Davie back into the room for this and I was a little worried he wouldn't pose/ behave but he did so great! He was all happy, smiley and downright adorable. 

David insisted on doing one where he held Macy with one arm/ hand. We tried to do a nice one like this with Davie, but it didn't really work out.

So sweet.

I LOVE this picture, it captures Davie so well. Basically he got away from David while our photographer was trying to take family pictures. Davie loves people so he was going to go talk to her, but also escape off the bed.

Macy has the longest skinniest little fingers.

Davie has started to give BIG hugs, or as we call them squeezy hugs.

This is the blanket my aunt made for me almost 5 years ago! Haha I knew I would have a girl eventually :)

These pictures were tough for Davie.

I love my little boy.

This blanket is from my other aunt, very pretty.

Best BUDS!

Blanket from Nana.

I love having pictures right after I have a baby so I can remember, but I seriously HATE my face. There I said it. I just really dislike how chubby and fluffy looking my face gets and there is no way around it. It stems from the fact that normally I have a round babyface that I kind of dislike so after a baby it's worse.

Baby toes

I love the colors in this one they are so soft and pretty. 

Both of my babies! Together!

I do like this picture a LOT though.

*tiny lips*

I was not sure if any of these pictures were going to work out. The look on Davie's face cracks me up. It's like "ok I laid down, I'm done now". 

I love how she looks like a doll, but it's also a little crazy because she almost doesn't look like a living breathing baby! She really just looks like a plastic baby doll.

BIG yawn.

Another good picture, that I don't love my face in.