What a Wonderful World

In our age of doom and gloom and everyone prophesying the "end of the world," the recently deceased President Hinckley would often refer to the times in which we live as "marvelous" and he would speak about the wonderful technological advances of our day. When I would hear him talk like that I would sometimes roll my eyes and wonder if he really knew what life was like down in the trenches? However, I have recently been thinking about a subject near and dear to me -- childbirth -- and have been realizing what an amazing time we live in and how glad I am to be delivering children now as opposed to any other time in history.

Most of you know I now deliver my babies at home and I have had wonderful experiences with that. However, due to some outside circumstances, I may end up delivering at the hospital this time. When I explained this to my oldest daughter she started crying and said, "Who in their right mind would have a baby in the hospital?" It was then that I had my moment of perspective as I tried to explain complicated "grown up" things to a developing mind.

I told her how wonderful it is to live in a time with so many choices. I can have a baby at home, in the hospital, a birthing center, etc... I can have an epidural or not. I can have a c-section if needed instead of dying or having my baby die. The important thing is to have a healthy baby and a healthy Mom! It's wonderful that God has given us so many ways to go about this and has, for the most part, left it to us to decide the experience WE want to have.

My only "thing" is that I hope women take a few moments to realize just what their options are and to get educated about their childbirth experience. It wasn't until my third pregnancy that I even learned about how the uterus works and all the muscles involved with labor and delivery. Just understanding that helped me have a much better delivery.

Even though the world may be "ending", when it comes to childbirth, the 21st century is definitely the century in which to live.

The Perils of Living With Four Sisters

Recently B took J to a shooting range. After looking at all the guns, J exclaimed that he really wanted a gun. I'm sure B couldn't have been prouder. However, after looking all the guns over, J couldn't find one he liked because he wanted a PINK gun! My poor husband had a vision of his son, out on the deer hunt with the "men", pulling out his pink gun in order to make his kill.

I Love a Parade!

Going to the grocery store is quite an event for me and my family. We now have to use THREE carts just to manage the little bodies and have a place for the food! Paige sits in one cart, pushed by Addison. Jack sits in another cart, which has to hold the coats, purses, etc... because if we put food in his cart he opens anything he can get his little hands on (little piggy reference). He is pushed by me. Sydney sits in another cart, pushed by Avery because she still gets tired by the time we've walked every aisle in the store. We create a lot of roadblocks and traffic jams just trying to get through the store.

We usually get a lot of looks and occasionally a few comments. Here's a sampling of a few we've received recently:

While standing at the deli counter, out of the corner of my eye I notice a man taking the situation in. He says, "Man! You have A LOT of kids!" I reply that he is right and that I have another on the way. "Wow!" he says, "How come you're not totally crazy? I would be!" I ask him how he knows I'm NOT crazy? He just laughs at that and we go on our way.

We pass a man waiting to turn onto the aisle we're going down. He has to wait a long time for the three carts to go by. He says, quite loudly, but smiling, "Hey everybody, it's a parade!"

An elderly lady asks, "Are these all your children?" When I reply that they are she says, "How nice. You don't see big families anymore."

The last comment is the one we receive the most. It makes me feel good because I know that people have to be patient with us as we're passing by, but, hopefully, they'll take a few moments to sit back and watch the show -- it is truly comical. Maybe I should have the kids start throwing out candy!

This Little Piggy....

Well, I guess I had it coming. After writing about some of my adventures raising a boy, I guess it would be inevitable that I would find out I'm having A BOY! I'm really glad, for Jack's sake, that he will have a brother and it will be fun to have another little guy running around. However, then my silly mind began thinking about all the brother combos throughout history:

Cain and Abel (let's not repeat that)
Jacob and Esau (not the greatest relationship there)
Isaac and Ishamel (can you say 3000 year Mid-East conflict?)
Laman and Lemuel (don't need to say anymore about that)

But then I thought of some others:

Nephi and Sam
Nephi and Lehi -- in 3rd Nephi (powerful prophets)
Joseph and Hyrum (brothers through it all)
Jared and the Brother of (at least my little guy will have a name people can recognize)
The Kennedys (I'm not quite sure how to categorize them actually)

I guess we'll just have to wait and see. In the meantime, I'll be adjusting to swords, guns, and cars in the place of kitchens, dolls and polly pockets.

By the way, Bret is voting for the name "Hank". He thinks it sounds very masculine and like someone you would really like. He also thinks it goes well with Jack. What do you think?

Living With a Baby Pig

Cute, sweet-looking boy pictured above recently did the following -- in a HOUR:

Sprayed Pam cooking spray all over himself, dumped the rest of the orange juice onto the kitchen floor, and painted himself and my dresser with my eyeshadow and blush!

You might be wondering where his parents were during all this. We were cleaning up and trying to corral him! Bret said a two year-old boy could be compared to a baby pig. Baby pigs look for any opening in the fence and squeeze and squeeze until they can fit through. Little boys will look for and seize upon ANY opportunity which happens to present itself to explore something new. It goes something like this:

Hmmm, let's see what happens if I turn this container over? Interesting, the juice just falls out onto the floor! I really like that color! I think I'll stomp in it with my feet! Hmmm, now let's see what happens if I press this red button? I have no idea what this is, but my hands found it as I was randomly reaching up in order to see if there was anything neat to reach. Interesting, I am now covered with some strange, but fun, greasy stuff. Hmmm, if I climb up these drawers I can find Mom's powder stuff and use it for my latest creation. Interesting, Mom's face is turning red and she thinks I look so neat she is just staring at me without saying anything. I guess I have rendered her speechless. I should do this sort of thing more often!

All I can say is, it's a darn good thing he's cute! God certainly knew what He was doing when he made their little faces so adorable. Otherwise, my son would be living where he belongs -- in the pigpen!

Whaddya Know!

I had chest cold which eventually turned into an annoying cough I just couldn't get rid of! My Mom suggested I rub Vicks Vapor Rub on the soles of my feet and cover with socks just before I went to sleep. I was skeptical of it, but I love the smell of Vicks and, as I am pregnant and unable to take cold medication, I decided it was worth a try.

It WORKED!!!!!! It was AWESOME!! The first time I tried it, my cough improved 50% and I was able to sleep much better. The next night I applied it again and by the next day my cough was GONE!!!

I checked it out with Snopes and while it has been heard of, no one can describe the chemical reasons why it works. If anyone knows, please let me know. But for now, if any of you have a cough, I suggest rubbing some vicks on your feet and letting it go to work.

Review of The Golden Compass (book)

Although I received the same email every other Christian received about how just looking at the cover of The Golden Compass might burn your kids' eyeballs out of their sockets, I decided to walk a short way into Satan's lair and actually read the book in order to form my own opinion. The fact that I'm halfway through book two should either tell you how much I'm enjoying it or how much closer I now am to the Dark Side of the Force.

In my opinion the book explores ideas and thoughts in a very non-threatening way. While the author may claim to be atheist, after reading his book, I find that very difficult to believe. He may have decided he wants no part of organized religion and/or the religion he was taught, but the book is way too spiritual and philosophical for him not be spiritual himself. The book wonders, among other things, if there might be other worlds (ie The Spirit World) nearby with which we might sometimes have contact? Does anybody object to thinking about that?

The main character, Lyra, is a good young heroine for today. I like her much better than Harry Potter because she is brave and doesn't spend any time feeling sorry for herself or her circumstances. She accepts her destiny and moves forward with a purpose. She is humble enough to recognize when she makes mistakes and learns from them.

In book two the author negatively describes The Church and then states that ,"...all churches are the same way." Being an Oxford graduate I would like to know how carefully he chose his words? I could agree with his statement in that I think many "philosophies of men" have been "mingled with scripture" throughout even our church -- on the local level. We know of strange teachings sometimes being taught in Sunday School, primary classes, or even over the pulpit. In that regard sometimes "all churches" can be destructive to the developing spirit. On the other hand, I don't agree that all "religions" are destructive and that is where I would like more information from the author. The Gospel is good news and when a person has a clear understanding of who God is and what His plan is for the individual you can't help but want to follow Him.

All that being said, I don't have any objection to these books -- thus far. I'm really enjoying the quality of writing, the new and inventive ideas and the thoughts they are provoking. I would highly recommend reading them. I will post another review at the end of the third book to see how or if my opinion has changed.