Other Things

This little queen is one week old today, and is still the center of attention.

The novelty hasn't entirely worn off, but the kids' requests to hold her have slowed down a bit, which is good, cause she needs her rest.

I'm lucky that I'm the mom and the baby needs me, so I do take priority when she's hungry. I get to lock myself in the bedroom for a few moments and enjoy her loveliness. Sweet tiny hands - 

Katharine sleeping in her swing. 

So there's been mostly a lot of baby lovin' going on here, but here's a few pictures of some of the other things going on. I haven't run errands or anything with the baby, so it was a good time to get the van fixed. It just stopped working a week ago but we've just left it sitting in the garage cause we didn't need it. Yesterday we had it towed. 

I've taken it in to Burt Bros three times to get help before it quit, and they couldn't figure out what was wrong, so we had it towed to Stockton 12 to get serviced, hoping that since they are a Honda dealership, they will know better what is going on with our Odyssey. So that got towed yesterday, it was looked at today, to repair it there are 4 things they recommended, so it's either going to be $950 or $2000 to fix, depending on if we do all the things they recommended. Yikes. We're just trying to get a good warm up before the hospital bills start coming in.

Other things going on with the kids - Abi is in California for her ballroom trip. She gets back on Thursday. Lily left at 6:30 this morning for Young Women's camp. They are going to Lake Powell! Lily heading out the door with her gear and some avocado toast for breakfast.

Lily will be gone until Saturday! Just having one or two kids gone sure makes the house seem more quiet and calm, when it's just our family. The day is still noisy and busy with lots of friends over. Owen and Daniel had two friends over today, and they were kinda wrestling in the hall, and Daniel got pushed back and hit his head on the hinge of a closet door. He put his hand on the back of his head and saw lots of blood on his hand, which made him scared. 

I gave him a bath to wash off the blood and see what the damage was, and thankfully it was a very very small cut and I, Dr. Mom, fixed it with some super glue. Here's a pic of Peter that Joseph sent - P found his phone took some seflies - 

And a video! Pretty funny. 

We talked to Hyrum today. Mostly it was Joseph and I visiting with him. H was doing laundry, J was doing homework, and I was staring at K, so there wasn't much deep conversation going on as we were all a bit distracted. He's good with the name Katharine, so that's nice. 

(She's an angel!)

The Name

Well, we've decided on a name. Most of the kids aren't thrilled with it (listen to Ethan's voice message, it's funny) but Corey and I are comforting ourselves with the belief that we haven't messed up on any of the kids names yet, so hopefully we got this one right too. The name we have chosen for this little queen is...

~ Katharine Ann Wride ~

On Friday I called the hospital and Bonnie at medical records said we could have until Monday. She said to call her Monday morning. I had an alarm set for today at 9:15 to call, but then I snoozed it cause Corey hadn't had a chance to sit with the kid yet. Then Bonnie called me after 9:30. I asked for 10 more minutes. Corey needed more time than that. I called her in 10 minutes to ask for more time. We were working on it for the next hour. But then she didn't cooperate and was a little fussy wanting to eat. I knew that she'll sit still if she hears the rumble of the water in the tub, so I turned on the bath water and Corey sat with her there for a few minutes.

The name was mostly between Katharine and Vanessa. 

I called her at 11:10 with our final answer and left a message, that I'm assuming she got cause she didn't call me back. 

Corey had like 20 minutes to himself yesterday, locked safely in our bedroom, to look at this princess. And then I came in and accidentally let Wesley into our room for some reason and then time to ponder was over until this morning. Sorry Corey. 

We didn't talk yesterday about names, but we had eliminated a few over the weekend. Corey scratched all the B, F, G, and I names on my list. Most of the K and V names were scratched too, but Vanessa, Katharine, and Ruby were still in the running. 

Maybe it's not helpful for the kids to know the names that were not chosen... 

When we told the kids her name this morning, Wesley was like "Nooo! Isabel is so much better!" The little girls like Brianne. Mel isn't sure, but didn't protest. Abi is fine with it. Abi is gone in California for a Disneyland trip with her ballroom class, and she just said "Aww" to my text. Lily didn't care, she just wanted her to have a name, and any name was fine for her, she was just like "Pick a name already!" Ethan's voice message to us made me laugh - And when we talked to him today, he was like "It's ok... it's fine... I just won't ever speak to her..." ha. It'll grow on her. Hyrum likes it. It was one of his suggestions that he put in the comments on Joseph's facebook poll. I liked Vanessa more, but with Natalie I liked Kristina more, and I just secretly called her Kristy for like a week until Natalie grew on me. I'm sure this will be the same. This little girl just needs some sleep. The kids want to hold her so much, and then she'll wake up when they do, mostly cause they like to hold her without the blanket and also want to walk with her and they move her around so much. I'm finding myself locking my room behind me just so she can have a moment of peace and quiet and stillness.

It might be a little silly that it took us so long to decide on her name when it ended up being such a traditional one. So Katharine just because it fits. Kristy was my top contender before seeing her, but after seeing her I didn't think she looked like a Kristy. Ann is her middle name after my mom's middle name, since they share a birthday now, and also Ann after Ann's Trail where I went biking during this pregnancy. :) I'm trying to soak up every moment with this little one. 

Snuggling with my little warm baby head this morning. 

So yeah, Katharine it is. I'm not sure if we'll call her Kathy or Kate/Katie for short. We'll see what fits and what sticks as she grows.

Staring at the Baby

There have been three things going on here the past two days. 

Thing one is there's been a beautiful baby who is trying to sleep...

She's a little bundle of heaven!

(I painted her tiny finger nails!) 

Sweet little hand!

Thing two is there have been lots of helpers helping me, although sometimes they're not actually that helpful. But they're trying!

And the third thing is there's been a group of people getting absolutely nothing done because we found something more important to do: staring at the baby.

All the kids were in the room for these pictures, Mel was behind the camera.

I admit it, babies are almost hypnotic. You can stare at them for hours. I didn't read my books at all at the hospital. I just stared at this little one. Corey hasn't had much time to join in the staring contest, but he did get a few minutes on Friday.

Not enough for us to make any great strides on her name, but hopefully tomorrow we'll make some progress. 

Here's a little video of her with her eyes open - from this morning at 2:45 am.

Toasty warm after a nap - 

I love how she was holding her thumb here. She did that right after I painted her nails and rubbed it off her thumb. Cutie.

Sweet little baby.

Ok, I guess that's enough pictures for today. We love her!

At Home

We are home from the hospital. This morning she got the ok to be discharged at 8:30 and I got mine at 9:30. I got the baby dressed in a preemie onsie and put her in her carseat. She didn't like that.

Corey came and picked me up Sorry baby, you have to go in this - you have siblings waiting to see you! It's just a short ride home! Hang in there...

At home, Corey had one of his first turns with the baby. And it's important he have time with her so we can figure out her name. 

Moving the baby up into my room to feed her, and the kids all followed...

She's pretty popular.

Daniel got a turn holding her first, cause he had to go see the pediatrician and get his kindergarten shots. He had decided that he didn't want shots and was NOT going to go to kindergarten after all, and Corey pretended to call the kindergarten teacher to let her know. Then Corey asked Daniel to just come with him to get Abi's bike fixed, and they made a stop by the pediatric clinic on the way. Daniel was a coward until the moment came for the shots, and then he got some courage and didn't cry or even say ow. He did great with his covid shots and flu shots, so I don't know why he was being afraid. He's a brave kid.

Back at home with the baby, I'd nurse her, she'd fall asleep, kids would want to hold her, she'd wake up during the passing around, cry, and then I'd take her to nurse her again. At one moment I kicked all of them out of my room and fed her in my bed, and I fell asleep with her briefly, but it was long enough that I got a text from Corey, who had run a quick errand to check out the trails at Snowbird, and as he was coming home, he turned the corner to see Daniel and Peter walking down the street, almost at the busy street. Corey asked them what they were doing. They announced were going to the school, about to cross the busy street, while holding a dead mouse they found on their way... while their mother was home napping...

Daniel was leading Peter. Daniel has a friend who lives down the street and whenever he wants to go play at his house, he insists I walk him down. And today, for some reason, he walked to that house and past it, leading his little brother along, so I don't know what came over him. I was very grateful that Corey came back when he did to stop them in their plan. And this just proved that Corey is right, this might be a bit much for me to handle without help. I'm not sure where the big kids were or what they were doing. I guess I didn't leave anyone specifically in charge of watching the boys, but they'd never done this before though this whole past school year when it's just been me and these two boys at home. So yeah, too bad for me that they were feeling brave when my guard was down. So that's a great mothering moment on my first day back with the new baby. Another mother of the year award for me! I guess I need to keep the baby out and available to be a magnet to keep kids around. My nieces came by to see the baby and stayed and helped me clean the house a bit. One of them helped keep the baby safe from kids and the other helped me clean the kitchen, then they swapped positions.

This little girl is pretty adorable. 

We are all smitten.

Corey took kids with him to Costco after that, and I straightened up the house (trying to redeem myself a little in Corey's eyes) with my big kid helpers watching the baby. We're kinda working on a name... I have a list, but mostly I need Corey to be able to have time with her, look at her, and get a sense for what name he likes. It just has to be an initial we haven't used yet, so JMEHWALSNODP are all taken. When people ask about her name, Corey says "Well we just met her!" And that is true. All the kids and all their friends are giving their input. As we reviewed our past names for the kids, we agreed that we haven't messed up yet, so hopefully we'll keep our streak of getting the right name. 

Hospital Visitors

Hello. I have just been here at the hospital all day snuggling with this little person. 

The pediatrician that checked her out this morning recommended that I stay the night, cause I could technically leave after 8:30 pm (as the baby has to stay for 24 hours after birth...) but they have to do a few tests at 24 hours, so that'd push to not being discharged until probably 10pm, and she needs to be seen by the pediatrician again tomorrow anyway, so might as well just stick around rather than go home late and bring her to the doctor in the morning. That made sense to me. Plus if we did leave late tonight, that would mean kids would be excited and awake when I got home and they would all want to hold her and then we wouldn't get to bed until past midnight. So, yeah, we've just been here entertaining visitors. My little sister Jersh came by to see the baby before she went to work, Joseph came after that before he volunteered at a clinic.

Mel was nannying this morning, and then she biked down to see the baby.

She had to bike cause she didn't have a car - the van isn't working, Wes had the Feista at seminary signing yearbooks, and Corey took his car. I told Corey he could tell the kids to practice and do their summer chores and then the reward would be to come see the baby. But instead, he took them to Classic Skating. Life 360 showed that they arrived there around 11:30, and I was impressed when they were still there at 3:30. They came by the hospital on the way home to see the kid and pick up Mel and her bike. He confessed "I didn't go there from a position of strength..." He takes them out, cause he knows he won't get anything done if he stays home, so it's better to just not let himself be frustrated. If he's not going to get anything done, might as well give the kids an experience.

So they skated and had pizza for lunch and learned how to fight zombies with lazers and stuff like that. 

They washed and sanitized their hands when they came to see us, but I was slightly grossed out about how grimy they and their clothes must be after being there. I somewhat reluctantly let them hold the baby.

Setting a timer and taking turns. 

I'm sure we'll be doing lots of this at home. 

My sister Jerusha texted that she wanted to bring by dinner tonight, so they headed home, Mel went with them, and I asked M to give them all a bath. Wes and Abi came by next to love on the baby. Abi hogged her though, so Wes didn't hold her. 

My sister Beka and her husband Matt came by. It was really sweet seeing them hold her. The baby sneezed so many times, it was funny, we were laughing that she must be allergic to Matt!

Beka is my youngest sister. She got married in 2011 right after we got home from our adventure in Chile. They have struggled with infertility and haven't been able to have children yet. On my mission, I met a lady who struggled getting pregnant, and I just loved her and her family, and I remember when she was sharing her struggle with infertility with us, and I know that anyone could struggled with that and it's totally out of our control, so I told myself that if God chose to give me children, I would let him. Infertility isn't a trial we've had to face, but I am grateful for that experience that set us on this course for a large family. After Matt and Beka left, my parents came by - 

and then Corey came again with Abi and Lily for a short visit - 

And that's been our day!

I am ready for bed now and am looking forward to heading home tomorrow, but this has been a nice hospital stay and I'm feeling good and ready to get back to facing life, I think!