Baptism

Godparents getting him dressed beforehand

Fr. Uncle Matt

The Sign of the Cross

"I Baptize you..."

Chrism

"Receive the light of Christ"

Father blessing

Michelle and Tim, George's godparents

Our family

Porgie Georgie

I may have said the nursery rhyme to the baby a couple of times and now Adelle has taken to calling him Porgie Georgie. I love her. And him. There is too much cuteness in this house.

I caught a smile

A snuggly outfit from Grammie and Grandpa and some knit booties from a friend. He is a spoiled boy.

A post four years in the making

In October 2007, I taught Issy to knit. She has slowly, every few months since then, worked on knitting a rectangle, which would eventually become this purse:

Last week I was going through my yarn basket and I found her knitting and she set to it and finally finished it. To say she was excited about finishing it would be an understatement. She was elated. It needed a few finishing touches though. We sewed up the sides.

Bought a pretty button,

Sewed in a liner and added a little clasp for the button,

And she has a purse that she knit herself!

A glimpse of our school year

We started school a couple of weeks ago. It hasn't been toooo bad. George actually isn't the big challenge. It is keeping Adelle occupied/not making a mess that requires some doing. Some days are better than others in this regard. Luckily, she has been taking pretty good naps lately so we have been doing most of the things that require one on one time during that time. It makes me think back to our early homeschooling days when Liam was her age. And then that kind of makes me feel like time goes by too quickly.

We are using Mater Amabilis curriculum as our base this year. My sister Michelle used it last year and spoke highly of it, so I thought I would give it a try. Isaac is pretty much Level 1B and Issy is 1A but we have adjusted some things so that Issy, Isaac and Liam can do them together.

Liam is doing Teach Your Child to Read and Issy and Isaac are doing Explode the Code Online for phonics. Issy and Isaac are also doing Primary Language Lessons for grammar this year.

The kids are all doing the Faith and Life series together. Issy is using the New Catholic Picture Bible for Bible History and Isaac and Liam are using it for New Testament. Issy is using the Life of Our Lord for Children for her New Testament.

We are using This Country of Ours for American History. Interesting book. Think I might need some more sources to have a balanced look at the beginning of our country, but so far, it seems like a good overview.

Continuing with Math-U-See this year. Issy told me she is liking math more than she did last year. And my boys are pretty darn enthusiastic about it. I wish I could guarantee that they would always have kind of enthusiasm for math.

Our literature collection. Tall Tales on Monday, Fables on Tuesday, Poetry on Wednesday, Myths on Thursday and a Classic (we are starting the Narnia series) on Friday.

Our new art book. I have several others, but I am excited about using this one for ideas. We are also doing picture study, singing and music.

For Science we are doing a lot of Nature Study this Fall. When it gets too cold for that, I am planning on using the weather lesson plans from MA.

A month later... some reflections

Sweet, sweet boy. I Love him so much. All those long days of waiting seem pretty far away now.

I am really glad he is here. I was reading back over my posts from this pregnancy. I feel very, very fortunate that our best case scenario seems to have played out. He had the milder of the two antigens, and this was my first pregnancy sensitized to that one. He looked great, anemia-wise, the whole pregnancy. The fluid thing seemed to have resolved itself. He came a wee bit early for me.

I was so pleased with my care this time. Other than my the whacked out billing issues with their office (which I am hoping to get resolved this week), both of my doctors were really great to work with. I was really surprised how much I ended up liking the perinatologist. He was very understanding of my desire to be cautious and yet to keep things low-key if possible. He was encouraging of my choice to vbac and understood that it was important to me to go into labor on my own as long as things kept looking well. I felt very much like an equal partner in my care. I don't recall once being talked down to. My previous experiences and knowledge of my body were given weight in making decisions.

My experience with birthing in the hospital was overwhelmingly positive, also. Even Grouchy Nurse and Pushy Resident didn't really bother me. I felt so surrounded by Joe's and my support team's good... um, energy? supportiveness? (I am not sure the right, non-hippieish word I am looking for) that any negativity just bounced off me. I felt protected but I also felt the strength to advocate for myself. This was really important to me and something I had been concerned about. I got there at just the right time- not so early that I was messed with excessively and not so late that pushing out the baby was a chaotic experience. I was so pleased that everyone was really respectful of that time immediately postpartum, which happens so rarely. It was like everyone in the room really got it.

Oh, I could go on with my reflections about the birth and likely will in another post. But for now, I hear a little boy squeaking himself awake and 4 other littles that need to be directed to get ready for the day.

Life with a babe...

This is my fifth baby- you would think that very little would surprise me at this point. And yet, new motherhood has always held something different for me. My babies have all had different personalities, the way the other kids interact with a new sibling is different, how I am able to respond to all of them has been different. I would like to say that this transition has been smooth, and I guess if I was comparing all of them, it definitely hasn't been the toughest.
George is not particularly easygoing. He really doesn't like to be put down when he sleeps, save a bit of a stretch in the afternoon when he will sleep for a while in the swing. He doesn't sleep very well at night- there is usually a stretch from 3 or 4 a.m. till about 6:30 when he doesn't really want to nurse, but he does want to suck. Just not on a pacifier. And he can't coordinate his fingers yet. So he just grunts and squeaks and latches on and off every 15 or 20 minutes. And when he is awake during the day, he kind of mostly just wants to nurse.

But he is really, really, cute. And the kids love him.

I have also been able to respond to his lack of easygoingnesss relatively well, at least this far. Aside from having to do it a somewhat overwhelming amount, nursing is going very well, which is always a good thing. And I also have the experience to know that, in the grand scheme of George's life, this time is short. I am trying to find that balance between wanting to get this really intense time over and done with and knowing how short the newborn days are and how I should savor them.