daddy love

I think we can all agree.. there is nothing like seeing a Daddy snuggling and loving their babies. I love watching my husband with all of our children. He's such a sweet Daddy. Part of the reason I'm so in love with him!

[Daddy and our littlest, Emris, snuggling this afternoon.]



And of course, playing is always fun too..
[I know he likes playing with them..
but I can't help but think he's doing
this to give me a heart attack!]

maple + lemons

I know what you're thinking. Maple syrup + lemons. What could you possibly do with that pair? Hollow out the lemon, fill it with maple syrup and have a maple-filled-lemon-fight? Dip the lemon IN maple syrup and show your kids your sticky juggling skills? Good guesses, but no..

Wait for it..

Wait a little longer...

Ok! MAPLE LEMONADE! I know, right? Genius! Not me, of course.. but that guy we bought homemade cheese from at the farmer's market. Yeah, him.. you know that guy, right? Anyway.. I wasn't going to pay $1 a cup for it, so I bought a honkin' bag of lemons to make my own.

So I started out juicing between 10-12 lemons (can't remember now). As long as you end up with 2 cups of lemon juice, you're good to go. I, on the other hand, was not good to go, I didn't have enough lemons to make 2 cups, so I scaled back on the water a bit.


So next, set your lemon juice aside. Now mix 1 cup of maple syrup with 2 cups of hot water. The hot water is to melt the syrup, which makes it easier to mix.

[Please no comments on my cheap, plastic Walmart pitcher. Hehe.
I really need to scour Goodwill to find a lovely glass one!]

Add 6 more cups of water, this time cold. [For a total of 8 cups of water]

Add your lemon juice, mix and voila! Maple Lemonade! (You can thank me later ;])

So you'll want to refrigerate this for about 2 hours (thanks to the hot water). If you want it sooner, you can cut down the water by a cup or two and add the equivalent in ice. I haven't tried the latter, since I have the patience of a saint and can wait the two hours. (Ha, who am I kidding?? If you know me, you'll be laughing at the patience part..)

Well, I better end here. I need to get some motivation to finish putting laundry away and play catch up uploading Emris' weekly pictures to facebook. I take a picture every Monday (he was born on a Monday) to document him growing.. but I haven't uploaded in 3 weeks. I am so naughty!!

So here is a preview of his 11 week picture!

blood part 2

So I'm back to finish up my story.. sorry it took a couple of days! Life is crazy here! Crazy good, of course!!

So I left off with a phone call from my sister.. 2:30am on August 28, 2011. I was thrilled to hear my sister say those words. But really, almost 2 weeks early? I could hardly believe it, especially since I've always gone "late" with all of my babies. 7 days, 4 days, 9 days, 5 days after my "due date" with my children.

Anyway, I ask my sister what she wants me to do. She tells me I can come over and hang out while she's in labor.. which was super exciting, since she wasn't sure if she would want me there during labor. She knew I'd be there for the birth, but she wasn't sure about labor. So I got up, brought Nouvelle back to her bed, and got myself ready. After I got myself ready, I threw a bunch of prefolds and wipes in a bag, and got Emris in his carseat, and off we went.

(on a sidenote, this was all during the threat of Hurricane Irene..which earlier in the week my hubby said, "wouldn't it be funny if Levon decided to come during the hurricane?" ..little did he know!)

While getting ready my mom called me (who I had called to come to my house to help out with my sister's dogs) and told me she had gotten into an accident on the way over.. She had hit a sewer cover that was raised because of all the water from the rainfall. So she would be a little while longer because her tire blew out and was waiting for the police and tow truck to get there.

So I plop myself and sweet Emris in the car and head over to my sister's house in the insane rain being poured down. I got there and Brit was having some contractions, nothing spectacular, but definitely there. None of us could go back to sleep.. I was so excited about the fact that my nephew was making his way into the world! My sister decided it was time for me to get her dogs over to my house, and so we loaded them up while the lightening was striking and the thunder roaring, which scared her poor doggies. I got the dogs to my house, just as my mom was getting there.. Got my big canning pot (to keep the birth tub warm) and bottle of Floradix (for Brit to take to keep her iron high after birth) and headed back over.

I want to post the rest of her birth story, but she's hasn't done it yet, so I don't want to take over her job. But needless to say, labor progressed, the midwives came, and we waited for Levon to arrive. Brit was amazing during labor. Just stopping, closing her eyes and breathing through her contractions. You wouldn't have even known she was contracting if someone peeked in on her. She was a SUPERSTAR. So at 1:30, she started pushing and at 3:30, my sweet little nephew was born. The most beautiful little guy ever, covered in vernix and screaming his sweet little head off. I was so happy that Brit was able to have her home birth, and that her and Patrick welcomed their sweet baby in the comfort of their own bed.

So here is where blood part 2 comes.. After Levon came, the blood wouldn't stop. I am so impressed with her midwives. It only took her midwife, Jenna, a mere minute to know it was too much and say, "We need pitocin now!".. but to no avail, no matter the pitocin, it just wasn't stopping.. and only a minute or two later I was told to call 9-1-1. I have to say that was the scariest moment of my life. Seeing my sister bleeding out and them not being able to stop it. So 9-1-1 was called an just 4 minutes later they arrived. Thank God, her midwives were so knowledgeable. Brit was rushed to the hospital for the post partum hemorrhage.. so Jenna and I got little Levon in his first cloth diaper (Kissaluv size 0, which he swam in!), got him dressed and packed him up to bring to his Momma. He didn't go in the ambulance because he would have had to be admitted as a patient, and I knew Brit and Patrick didn't want that.. glad I made the right decision, because they were so glad I hadn't had him go with them. :)

Anyway, we got there and the Dr. was trying to get Brit's placenta out. It wouldn't come out so they had to take her to the OR, put her under general and take it out manually.

That was also beyond scary because she was still losing blood. Her midwives, Patrick, who was snuggling Levon, and I were just sitting in her room waiting for her to come back. I was so scared and was thinking terrible things, like what if she didn't come back?? But about 30-45 minutes later, she was back and all was well. She had lost a lot of blood, but fine none-the-less.

So, basically, I have seen enough hospitals and blood for my lifetime. But, throughout it all, I have a healthy and happy sister and brother-in-law and a perfect, gorgeous, lip-shaking crier of a nephew, Levon.. so I guess all the blood was worth it :)

[Levon snuggling up with his Momma, looking so cozy]

[Everyone loves a great, gassy newborn grin!]

[And this is the face you see when you rub his lip when he's hungry.. Levon is so sweet. I honestly never thought it would be possible to be in love with someone else as deeply as I love my own kids.. but Levon definitely showed me it's possible!]

And did I mention.. my adorable Emris is 10 weeks and 13 lbs 6 oz?

I can't believe how quickly my littlest love is growing!

Wow!

Wow, my last post was in May 2010. That is crazy! So much has happened since then. We welcomed a new baby on June 27th, 2011! I still hadn't posted Milo's (our first home birth) birth story and here I am needing to post another!!

I hope to get back to the swing of blogging soon, since we're starting our school year and having lots of fun!

So I will leave you with a picture of some yummy peppers we bought at our local Farmer's Market. Who doesn't love a yummy colored pepper? I surely didn't know purple ones existed. But they do..and they're delicious!!


And how about a picture of our squishy 8 week old sweetheart, Emris?
And my sweet hubby surprised me with some beautiful flowers one night when he went out to get us dinner. :)

I'll be posting again soon!!