I LOVED Easter this year. Absolutely LOVe-ED it! :-)
I wanted to post this yesterday...but too busy.
I'll post more about all of our fun later...but for now, I wanted to add the lyrics to one of the songs we sang in our ward choir yesterday. It was one of those songs that you never want to stop singing...so beautiful! I'll be sad that we're done...though it was wonderful to perform it and I think we did a bang-up job, if I don't say so myself. Hehe!
Behold The Wounds In Jesus' Hands
written by John V. Pearson and put to music by David R. Naylor
We gave Spring Break a good chance this year. I talked Brent into driving down to Southern California...for his first time ever. {I swore after being pregnant for two years and taking our last trip to not so sunny but very fun Alaska, that we would take a nice, warm vacation}. We drove 16 hours, straight to Anaheim the first day.
it was amazing how warm it was on the drive down! Ollie enjoyed the fresh air at a rest stop.
we snatched the kids out of bed early in the morning...so they were still in their jammies, watching movies
stretching our legs at a rest stop
{it was St. Patrick's Day, by the way...that's why I have a green flower in my hair}
The very NEXT morning we woke up bright and early to try to get to DISNEYLAND right as the gates opened. We were a little groggy, so we weren't there quite as early as we were hoping.
All ready to go, and SO excited!
It was ALL for these two little boys...
Pirates of the Carribean
on the way to Tom Sawyer Island {a childhood favorite of mine, I must admit}
on Tom Sawyers Island
would you look at that? real wildlife inside of Disneyland!
waiting for the boys to go on Space Mountain...so we could do the baby swap thingy.
{WHICH by the way, I'm sorry to say did not work very well}
watching the jedi training...THAT was neat
taking the chance to eat our snacks during our down time
Alice in Wonderland...also one of my childhood favorites
TOBY lost his other bottom front baby tooth while we were waiting in line for Alice in Wonderland...what a magical memory.
teacups
Joshua in front of the matterhorn...the only coaster we got onto :-(
blurry picture of us leaving the park as they close the gates...as tired as all get out.
Some things we learned about Disneyland in the next post...
I hope you don't think badly of me for writing about things that are hard. I know that probably most of you know me and some of you do not. I think of myself as a strong person. And I used to be more confident. I hope you aren't disappointed in me that I don't seem to be getting stronger from my experience of loosing Elsa. Sure at first it was pretty easy. I had such assurances that all was well. I had so many friends and family surrounding me with love. I felt my Savior as my constant companion. But lately, well...lately it's been hard. Again. And again.
Every time someone is going to have a baby {but especially a girl} I get so nervous. Especially if their situation is like mine was, as in they have two boys and are very exciting to finally be adding a girl to the mix. I worry and hope that everything will turn out the way they had planned. But then when they have that baby safe and sound and they are in baby bliss, I start to slip. This internal struggle begins. The struggle of being SO happy for that family, while at the same time being SO sad that our situation turned out differently. The worst is when I read stories about babies that *almost* didn't make it, but then they miraculously pulled through. Don't get me wrong...I am OVER the MOON elated that others aren't having to experience the ache and the pain that I have. But I wish that things had happened differently for us. Could I have been given any kind of sign that she was going to die so that I could rush into the hospital to have her delivered immediately? No. Is was not meant to be that way. She was not meant to be here.
I used to be so ok with that. I thought for sure that I would be blessed with another little daughter that I got to keep...right away. And that I would then be this noble, selfless mother who would carry on after giving Elsa a gift. I was sure that God would not put me though loosing my daughter if he wasn't going to make it a lot better right away? {I'm not going to write another paragraph about how much that feeling does not effect my love and joy for my baby boy Oliver, even though I could. Hopefully my adoration for him is shining through in other posts}.
But here is my question for you all...this is what I seem to be struggling with the VERY most:
How can I be happy for others without feeling so sad for myself
{or angry, or jealous, or...insert related synonym here}? My dear husband thinks that this just might be my big challenge from this experience.
I know that many of you have also lost a baby. The rest of you have gone through other struggles, whether seen or unseen. Have you ever lost something that you WANTED so VERY MUCH? Something that you had prepared for and planned for, for months or years? Something that can't or won't be replaced for a VERY long time? How do you deal? Am I just being a baby?
Here are a coupla things that I do know:
1) I have it good. I know other people have it worse than me. I am regularly humbled by the amount of good I have in my life, and the lack of others in the world. I'm not comparing with them though and I can't dismiss my pain even though others may have more pain.
2) God is good. And I know he has a plan for me and for my family and for my Elsa. And it will make us all the MOST happy in the end. I just don't always know what it is and it is hard to trust. I once thought I knew what a great deal of faith felt like...but now I'm just quivering and shivering like a little child.
So other than those two things, what do YOU do to deal?
...and for Elsa...
For Mary Lydia: From a Parent Left Behind
By Susan Chock Hartman
Child,
you were not born for sorrow.
I cannot even mourn for you: a few hours
beneath the stars, a name, a covenant,
a safe and shining flight across the sky.
I mourn, instead, for myself,
for my mortal fears, my pain,
for my world-weariness,
for my dark nights. But you, my child,
did not come for such grief.
Someday I shall teach you of this green earth:
of small warm animals,
of cornfields and clay,
of birds that can’t fly,
and of the fear of falling.
And though your new home is
grander, your new life
more splendid, your new world
much lighter, much warmer
than this,
I believe all will be
more beautiful
when I hold you again.
This is a clip from the television show Portlandia. We've never seen the show, but we laughed heartily when we saw this clip:
The day before we saw it, I was picking up probiotics at a store in the uber-hip Portlandia neighborhood of Sellwood after Oliver's doctor appointment...and EVERYBODY at the store {I kid you not} had a bird or an owl {that's still a bird though, huh?} or a tree or leaves on their bag. Haha! Wow...those people TOTALLY have my style {I named my daughter after a bird!}. I loved nature stuff before it became trendy...but I don't care. Everyone in Portland can love it along with me!!
Wowsas! Just when I thought I was caught up on the blog, I'm way behind again!
In March Oliver turned 7 months. The only big change he had was that he learned to sit up independently. He also went poop on the potty for the first time...I'll thought about posting a picture, but I'll spare you that little detail.
First, some recent sewing projects:
skirt:
My Katie Fox skirt. Love it.
Katie designed this pattern last year and she shared it with me.
I bought the fabric for it WAAAY last fall, and finally got around to making it.
swimsuit:
Next, a little clearance swimming suit purchase alteration.
I bought this suit from Athleta (the women's GAP athletic sub-store) on clearance for $15 each piece. Which is a bargain...but they were out of talls in the tops. And I want my tankini to cover my WHOLE belly. So I bought a little coordinating swimsuit fabric, folded it in half to make a belly band and sewed it to the top of the bottoms to make a yoga waist band. It required a lot of coaxing to get my old bernina to sew through the 8 layers of stretchy fabric...but after I bought a stretch needle and switched from a straight stitch to a zig-zag stitch, it came together perfectly.
I LOVE it! Genius!
I can't wait for summer to use my ADORABLE new swim suit!
baby pants:
Next I made a pair of cream knit baby pants from a brand new sweat shirt type shirt, which I bought on sale and then didn't end up liking. The fabric was so new and soft, it was just begging to be made into pants. And I had this cute little orange and cream kimono style shirt that needed cream pants to match it. I found another pair of stretchy pants that were the size and style I wanted, folded them in half and laid them on top of the sweat shirt. I cut out two double layered pieces with a 1 inch seam allowance on the sides and an extra two inches on the top. I used the sweatshirt hem as the bottom of the leg so I did not need to hem the pants. Then I sewed the side seams up and place the two legs together, one leg inside the other with right sides together and sewed the crotch. For the waistband I sewed a separate band of fabric around the elastic, and then attached the band to the top of the pants. SO easy! And SO perfect! Once again, I'm very happy with how it turned out.
This picture was taken on Oliver's actual 7 month birthday! YaY!
My baby buddy hanging out in the guest room/sewing room with me:
Some family fun:
taking some pictures with the self-time...the boys have caught on to one of my favorite games: self-timer photo shoot! YES!
I can't believe how old Ollie is looking...although, since we've taken these pictures, he's chubbed up a little more. Our babies tend to get to a very chubby peak RIGHT before they start becoming mobile. AHHHHHHH! He's growing up too fast!
Just a darling picture of Toby. I think I have some pretty cute boys.
And here are some pictures of Oliver feeling very accomplished after he achieved his first poop on the potty:
Since I'm sparing you the poop pictures...which are pretty very disgusting, I'll tell you about elimination communication instead. It's simple. When you see your baby pooping or peeing you tell them what is happening. Then when you notice their potty cues you try to get them on the potty before they go. Give them the word or sound you used when they were going before, and hopefully it all comes out in the potty! Yea! Not too challenging. I'm just hoping to catch it every once in a while and get him comfortable with releasing on the potty so that hopefully potty training will be a breeze!
playing with his brovy and his toys
Not a very good shot...but a BIG hug from his brother.
Mmm...I think that Oliver has to be on the top 10 of the most adored babies in the history of the world. His brovies love him SO much! I know this is because they had to wait SO long for a baby and they suffered a great loss when Elsa died. They are experiencing SO much joy and that makes me very glad. In fact, yesterday Toby told me that he thinks we should have 8 more babies in our family...WOAH! Hold on there brotha! THAT's TOO many.
