That's the whole point of the game

Trying to explain the rules of Hide and Seek to a 2-year old can be a challenge. Superman often counts and then yells out "Where are you?" before looking for whomever is hiding. Hot Wheels has tried to explain to him that the point of the game is for him to find the hider without being told where he or she is hiding, we've tried to tell him the same thing. Sometimes he gets it, sometimes he doesn't. The hardest part about playing Hide and Seek in our small ranch house is trying to make it seem like we don't know where the kids are hidden for 45 minutes when they used up all the original hiding spots in the first three rounds. Their current favorite is to hide under the covers of their bed. It's usually pretty obvious since the bed is made before the game starts and then there's a large bump in the middle of it.

We've had a couple decent workouts recently. Last Saturday morning we went to a local boardwalk along the beach that's a very nice 2 mile round trip. Super Dad pushed the boys in the jogging stroller while they ate waffles and I took Cutie in the baby carrier, also known as the "sweat-producing-heat-trapping-baby-sleeping-contraption", I actually was making some pretty decent time over much of the two miles, it almost felt like really working out again, and that felt good. I've been doing some moving-box-heavy lifting, and with Hot Wheels riding his bike more, the walks around the neighborhood while pushing Superman and Cutie in the stroller have gotten faster, too. Real speed and endurance builders? No, but fun.

I thought about the treadmill today,

Does that count as a workout? Actually we went out for a walk today so Hot Wheels could ride his bike and I added some short jog intervals while pushing Superman and Cutie in the stroller. It's not a jogging stroller and I wasn't moving very fast but it reminded me that someday I'll be able to go a little faster and I'm looking forward to that. Next goal - the 5k distance. The first one is in April so I've got plenty of time. Tomorrow we're having a family picture taken for the pictorial church directory and we get a free portrait. Cutie will be a month old tomorrow, too, so that's nice. We're going out for a walk first thing in the morning and the picture's early afternoon, it will be interesting to see how it goes with the kids, if Cutie could just sleep through it that would be perfect.
Now, here are some recent pictures. Take care.

Not Heaven, but really close

In the time that I've taken a break from posting, I've also mostly taken a break from the computer in general. Taking more time to be unplugged has been a good thing for me, I was starting to spend too much time partially spectating while the kids were left on their own and I was doing something on-line. I look forward to catching up on everyone's blogs, but I think that for the remainder of my maternity leave I may still be around sporadically. Especially since until I get back to the schedule of work, and the gym, I've got nothing exercise, triathlon or even physically related to write about. Except that Hot Wheels has started riding his bikes on our family walks and he's gotten quite good at it. He's mentioned a couple times that now he could do a running race and a biking race and pretty soon he'll learn to swim and then he can do races "like mom". That's a kick of motivation to get back to it, I'm just waiting until November because I don't feel like trying to juggle regular workouts into our routine. If I can find some time to hit the treadmill in the basement, fine, but I'm not going to stress over it.

In general, my life right now is about as close to perfect as I think can be achieved. We've been having an amazing time together as a family. Whether I'm ever able to convince (bribe) SuperDad that we should have another one, it doesn't really matter. We're a great family of five. The boys are completely in love with their sister, who will now be known as Cutie. It loses something in writing it here, but if you could here Superman talk about his new sister, he loves to kiss her and then tell me "She a cutie", and it's pronounce k-YOU-U-U-U-tee, in the way only a two and a half year old can make a word sound even better. There hasn't been a single instance of jealousy from the boys, even when I've got to stop whatever I'm doing with them so I can feed or change Cutie. Unfortunately, their only negative issue has been an increase in the number of times they're up overnight. We're not sure how that could be related to Cutie's arrival, since she's clearly not the cause of all of these sudden nightmares and scary stuff in their room, but they've been horrible about sleeping. She, on the other hand, is a dream. She's a relatively content baby and she's already started doing a four and a half to five and a half hour stretch of sleep at night. With the boys I never got more than three hours until they were over a year old, so this is wonderful. If only she could teach her big brothers to sleep better, mom would be a little more rested, and maybe slightly happier.

The start of the school year went fine. Hot Wheels is happy to be back at preschool and Superman tried his first "I'm Two" playgroup at the local Park and Rec. He cried for about 15 minutes but then settled down for the rest of the hour and came out proclaiming "Mom, I had fun at school!" So, all is going well.

We've had some aggravations with the whole house buying and selling process, but I guess there always are. We're hoping the closing will be six weeks from now, although the seller of our new home just found a place to move to so if she can close sooner, everyone else can as well. We're enjoying the last gasps of summer since the days still get up into the 70s around here. We've found a beach where the dogs can swim, but it's a bit rocky for people, Hot Wheels went swimming with the dogs last weekend. There's a local boardwalk along the water and we've been walking a couple miles there a few times recently. We've been spending time with some friends and generally enjoying ourselves. The next nine weeks will undoubtedly fly by too fast, but since last time I had to go back after six weeks, it will still be great.

I look forward to catching up with everyone as race seasons come to a close. I'm also looking forward to hitting next season with everyone, I've just got a little more work to do in the off-season getting myself back in shape. The only real negative to this post-pregnancy body is the adjustment to nursing. Trying to run with these bad boys is painful, but it's worth it. I saw a t-shirt recently that read "I make milk, what's your Superpower?", I thought that was pretty funny. The sad part is that the best food I'll ever make is something none of the kids will even remember eating. Too bad I can't cook meals that good. I do have a hate-hate relationship with the breastpump, but again, it's for a good reason. The boys were both exclusively breastfed and then nursed or got bottles of breastmilk until they were a year old. Not that formula would hurt them, but I was proud to do that for them and I intend to do the same for Cutie. I've always heard it helps with weightloss but I've never really found that for myself. I am back in my non-maternity clothes, those that I didn't already pack up, so I guess I'm on the right track.

Coming down

I'm sure this feeling will be familiar to anyone reading this, similar to a race let-down period, I'm hitting a wall. The past month has been completely nuts with Baby Girl's arrival and all the house stuff. I think that I'm a pretty good person to have around in busy and stressful times. I do well with a bit of chaos and can keep my head and organization to the extent that people have often commented they have no idea how I'm doing it- it being whatever needs to be done. Well, she's here, the house inspection is done, and I've got, say, maybe a tad more hormones running around my body than usual, so I can feel a crash coming on. I haven't hit the random crying-for-no-reason post-partum point yet. For me that's been about 5 days after, so by the beginning of next week that's where I'll probably be at. I'm trying to just enjoy the absolute blessings I've got in my life but there's something about my personality that leads me to dwell on small trivialities to keep my brain occupied when there isn't enough external stress. So, I'll cry "because" this is our last baby, because we're leaving this house, even though I can't wait- because this is where Superman was born, because I don't really like pink and we've already gotten about a dozen pink outfits for her. I'll cry because I'm not quite sure what to do with a girl, and I don't think girl toys are nearly as cool as boy toys, but also because I'm a little scared about the whole mom-daughter relationship thing and how I know that there will likely be times when I'll push her away by trying to do what I think is the best thing for her. Or, I'll just cry, no reason.

I think I'll be taking a blogging break for a little while to get myself together again. Right now I don't have a lot of interest in, well, anything. I'll get through it, I've been here before, it's just not the fun part and I'm not sure I'll be up to sharing. Thanks again for all the well-wishes, I'm sure I'll be back soon and I'll be keeping tabs on everyone else until then.

Pictures and info

Thanks for all the congratulatory responses! Just to let you know, we do have a name in-real-life, but I don't have a blog name for her yet, to go with Hot Wheels and Superman. I realize that anyone could probably find out who we are relatively easily, but SuperDad prefers that we not use names, especially for the kids. You never know these days, it's sad but true.

She was 8lbs 4 oz and 20" long. I'm told that's long for a girl, but she still seems so tiny. She's asleep right now, the boys are looking forward to her waking up so they can "help" me give her a sponge bath. They've been so great with her, she may be the most-kissed two-day old ever since Superman kisses her just about every time he walks by her.

Here's a picture of all of us at the hospital, and her close-up. Thanks again for all the well-wishes.

"Race Report"

Well, we're home and Critter has arrived. Or, I guess I should say Critterette. Yes, it's a girl. She's not quite old enough for me to have figured out a suitable name for her, I guess we'll just go with Baby Girl for now.

The whole induction thing was much less invasive than I had expected. The dr. broke my water about 11am and she shot into the world a little after 2pm. You don't need all the details, things were steady from 11am until about 1:15pm. Then at 1:15pm the nurse said we could walk around the maternity ward if we'd like, I was going stir crazy in the room so I said yes. After three laps I was feeling really uncomfortable, we got back to the room and she was on her way. There were about 25 minutes of some intense pain and a little nervousness due to a compressed cord and the fact that they couldn't find her heartbeat. Finally they got the monitoring back and the dr. barely had his gloves and gown on before he reached up and caught her. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about being in labor for only four hours, but that last part was quite overwhelming.

She's doing well, her brothers are thrilled to meet her and they've both shown much more interest and concern for her well-being than I had anticipated. I'm pretty exhausted because we probably got a total of three hours of sleep at the hospital, I don't know who can rest at a hospital- it's impossible. Glad to be home, our family of five.

Thanks for the many well-wishes throughout this pregnancy. I'm looking forward to getting back into shape after the next couple weeks of recovery, another journey I'll be sharing.

The end of the tunnel

Tomorrow's induction day. I was really hoping I'd go into labor before then, and I still could, but at 10 days over I guess tomorrow's the day. I'm a bit nervous about the whole induction thing and I'd rather have it progress naturally, but this is the best option available. The doctors think it shouldn't actually take much to get things going, but then again they didn't think I'd even make it to my due date.

I'll be back Thursday or Friday with the update, depending on when this one arrives I might have to be there more than 24 hours. Thanks for all the well wishes.

Nothing.

Still here waiting. Up to six extra days of maternity leave now, but I'm ready to get things going.

Almost the happiest place on Earth

No, not Disneyworld, my favorite local spot is the used bookstore down the street where all paperbacks are $1 and most hardcovers at $4. The bookstore is a converted residence with a main house, a barn and four other small outbuildings all crammed full of books, the owners live in the residence next door. I now have 11 new books to last me the next few weeks, it's always good to have a book handy for those late night feedings or baby sessions when I'm up, but don't want to noise of the TV to distract the baby. I also stock up on kids books there. My kids have 1 full sized bookcase almost full and four 4-shelf bookcases full of books. I'm so glad that they enjoy reading almost as much as I do, and it's been so much fun rediscovering some favorite books of mine from when I was a kid. They're big into the Berenstain Bears, Franklin, Clifford and some other random story favorites.

I was up again from midnight until about 5am with annoyingly irregular yet stronger, contractions. Then a little after 5am I was able to get back to sleep until Superman woke up at 5:40am or so. Not the most rested feeling today. We went for an hour walk this morning, then I came home and vacuumed the house, cleaned the bathroom and helped SuperDad move more bins of clothing and packed items out to the POD sitting in the driveway. I keep hoping that Critter will get the subliminal, and verbal, eviction notices that have been given, but no luck so far. My sister arrived at my parents a little while ago, she's been planning this trip for months to come and meet her new niece or nephew, now there's no niece or nephew to meet yet. She's here until midday Monday so there's still a chance.

A happy anniversary. This weekend last year was my first triathlon at the Timberman Sprint, and 17 years ago today was my first date with SuperDad. Time just flies.

Pregnancy status: 6 days overdue, hoping for Critter's arrival soon.

One Down

Only seven days on the market and we got an offer on our house! It wasn't quite full price, but it's close enough that for the peace of knowing this whole thing will be done, and the fact that we won't have to worry about showings or open houses with a newborn, it's worth it. I'm just thrilled because now our offer on the new house becomes a done deal, we should close and move mid-October. Enough time for me to recover and be more helpful, and before I have to return to work. I guess that this was all meant to be, I can't believe how lucky we are.

All is quiet on the baby front. My sister will be here tomorrow to meet the baby which will most likely still be in utero. Oh well, we're ready whenever he or she decides to make an entrance. At least I've now got a full extra week of maternity leave- woohoo!