I'm finally reading again

For months I haven't read anything, I don't know what it was about my third trimester, but I just couldn't get into any books.  
During Christmas my husband started reading Ender's Game to my 7 year old.  My kid could have read it to himself, but as my husband wrote, " I am making him listen to me read them rather than turning him loose for selfish reasons. Basically I can make sure he understands so he likes them more. Too good of literature for him to give up before he gets to the good parts like he tried to do. He wanted to stop reading after a couple of chapters and I pushed him on." I enjoyed listening to my husband enough I told him maybe he should read me Ender's Shadow.  He had been asking me for months to read it, and I just wasn't getting around to reading.  Then he went on a business trip half way through the book.  So I finished the book myself. 

Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

In some ways I enjoyed this book more than its companion book, Ender's Game. Ender, the main character of Ender's Game has a lot of love and compassion. Something I personally don't relate to too well especially since he is a small kid. While Bean, the main character in Ender's Shadow is unfeeling and calculated, it personally makes it a more enjoyable book for me. But parts of the book seemed really forced to me to make the plot coexist with the companion book.  Other parts seemed forced in order to keep the shadow series moving.  But like I said I for the most part enjoyed the book.

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I reread this book in January of 2014.  My 7 year old kept meaning to read it, but never got around to it.  So I challenged him to a reading race to see who could read it faster.  I was only aloud to read it while he was at school or playing on the computer.  I just barely lost.  Anyway, I think I enjoyed the book more this time, maybe because I was reading it with my kid.
Written in August 2010
This book was fairly good, but I struggled to want to read it.  Even though it wasn't my favorite book, it had some good qualities.  I really liked that one of the central plot themes was it was ok to be dyslexic and have ADHD.  I also liked that one of the characters was described as a bookworm and had dyslexia.

Curtsies & Conspiracies by Gail Carriger

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The first book in this series slightly annoyed me, so I'm not sure why I reserved this book from the library.  I was surprised I found this one quite enjoyable.  Maybe because there was more teen romance, it was nice and clean, but what boy does she like more? What boy will she accidentally encourage more?  Will either boy make a move?  These are fairly small plot details but oh this book did not disappoint.  In this book the school goes to London.  The vampires, werewolves, and robots seemed less annoying in this book.  More just random characters thrown in, instead of forced in like the first book.  I'll wait for the third. Also I enjoy that the girls are both girly, and powerful females that can be in control. Yea! girl power.  (I know that sounded so late 90s) 

The Call of the Wild by Jack London

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read this book with my son to help him fulfill a goal he had set in school.  (To find and read books on a 7th grade reading level.) I didn't read it with my son, we read it individually at the same time.  He had already read the abridged version and enjoyed it, so he was totally into the book.  I found the book so boring, but indeed more challenging to read than most of the fiction that is popular right now.  The book was no double spaced, it wasn't on small pages with small margins.  I'm not much of a lover of classic animal literature.  The book seemed to get more and more depressing, which I mentioned to my son.  He told me it gets better, so I forged through, missing Francois and Perrault, needless to say I was thrilled when John Thornton entered the picture. Still it took me an embarrassingly long time to read this book.  Plus I didn't even read all the short stories in the end which my kid did.  I'm lame. 

The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Book 2, this time I didn't even keep up with my 7 year old reading it. (I was bogged down in Call of the Wild.) He loved it, the weirder it got the more he loved it.  I quickly read it in fear he would return it to his school library before I finished. I think I probably enjoyed this one more than the first too.  In my opinion these books are more interesting when I look up the Greek Mythology on wikipedia.  

King of Shadows by Susan Cooper
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was another 7th grade reading level book to read at the same time my son was reading it.  It was a fine example of a book, that technically he could read, but emotionally did not get, because of his young age.  During the first 50 pages, I wondered why we were reading this, but then once Nat went back in time to Shakespeare's time, the book got a lot more interesting. The last third me and my son both very much enjoyed.  In fact I was enjoying it enough, that I took the book with me to the hospital so I could finish it before my fourth baby was born.  The minute I finished it, I ordered my epidural.


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One Week

In a week I'll have another baby.  A little odd to think about.  I'm not sure I'm ready for this one.  In preparation, here is day old pictures of my other three. 

 And blogger is super awesome, and doesn't allow to rotate pictures after upload.  Get with the picture blogger.

 This was my fat baby, coming in almost 2 lbs heavier than the others. His hat wouldn't stay on, because he was too big.

I really don't feel ready for this next baby.
How will I take two under two grocery shopping?  How will I make sure all four bathe on a regular basis?  Until #3 was big enough to bath with #2, he routinely bathed only once a week.  Yes, I'm that terrible of a mom, I just couldn't remember to get it in my schedule.
I'm ignoring the horrors of school pick up with two under two, and a 5 year old that likes to cry at any trigger.  Its already an awful daily event, that takes 45 minutes, so you know we'll just add to the madness. This doesn't actually stress me out, I'm either in denial, or pass caring. I'm sure it will get worse, but I'm not sure how it possibly could, so I've made peace.

By the way, I'm not ready, having a baby in the middle of the school year with two children in attendance is super stressful! Like beyond stressful.  But I'm so excited, for #4 to be in our family.  I've wanted my last two close together, this just makes my family seem perfect.  For years, I wondered what the future of my family would be, when I would finally feel like it was the the right time to have another. (I know three years does not seem like a long time for most, and some have to endure much longer, but it was still plenty challenging.)  I regularly got a peaceful feeling of right now your family is perfect... So even though society deems one son and one daughter perfect, I knew in time there would be more.  So now I'm thrilled to have two close together, because that has just never been our path before, but the first couple of months will be crazy!

Almost 8

My oldest turns 8 in four and half weeks.  In our church 8 is a huge deal! He gets baptized in 6 weeks.  I told my husband I wanted to pay a friend to take pictures of him, my husband said why don't I take pictures of him.  Good point.  So you know, these might be only semi-professional, but good enough for the girl my husband dates.

 He finished reading the whole Book of Mormon before Christmas, we are very proud of him, he is working on memorizing the 13th Article of Faith, he has finished the other 12.

 He is so old and helpful these days, it seems like so long ago he was just a little guy. He is an awesome big brother to all his siblings and so patient with them, much more patient then his mom. He is truly his little brother and little sister's best friend, he is so nice to them.

 We are late bloomers, and he didn't get his baby teeth until he was 14 months old, so he hasn't lost any baby teeth yet. At least is grown up teeth will be real healthy, according to the dentist.

Lastly, here is a picture of him on the day he was blessed. The 8 years have past so quick and so slow all at the same time.

37 Weeks

Last sunday, January 12th 2014, I was 37 weeks.  I wanted a picture of me 9 months pregnant with my toddler.  He has spent so much of his life trying to cuddle with his mom around her belly, it needed to be documented.  

18 month olds are my favorite age, I'm actually worried, I won't care about my infant, because I'll be too infatuated with my young toddler. Infants are not really my favorite age.

 Then of course my 5 year old wanted to join the photo action. Our outfits match, I'm not sure if she does it on purpose or not, but we spend about half our life in matching outfits.

I'm pretty small this pregnancy, I'm small all my pregnancies, but this one smaller.  Nat's and this one I was by far the smallest.  My first pregnancy I got all bloated the last few weeks, and then Mr. A, he was just a huge baby.  But I've still gained 40 lbs with all my boys, so who knows why I look small this pregnancy.  (I only gained 30 with my daughter, it was a hard pregnancy so I don't think it was as healthy actually which is why I didn't gain as much.)

Young

Oh my husband and I use to be so young!  We still are young, but not as young, now I feel like society deems us old enough to be respectable young parents.  When our oldest was a toddler, not so much.  

I use to worry that we were much too young to be parents, mostly because everyone told us we were too young. I worried when our kids moved out we would be too young to be empty nesters.  Now like I said we are at much more respectable ages, 29 and 31 are much more respectable ages to have printed on a birth certificate.  Society still deems us as young parents. But the worry is gone, I love it now, I look back at the pictures and we were so young. I love it.  We've grown up together, I can't even fathom any dreams or plans I would have in life without my husband. We go on adventures with our children, instead of putting off children for adventures.  Hopefully we are fun parents, we'll be young grandparents, we'll be like my grandparents and be great grandparents. We never became spoiled adults, because we always had to pay for tuition, food and baby clothes.  Last pregnancy I was sad that I would never have a fancy baby nursery, now I kind of take it as a badge of honor.  Babies don't really need all that stuff anyway.  We are no longer poor, but we spent years broke in school, so our perspective and wants are different, like I said we grew up together.

Less than 2 weeks

Monday morning I woke up panicked.  I told my husband I was not ready for this baby to come out.  In a retelling of the story to a friend, she wanted clarification, I am totally ready to have this fourth/sixth human being in my house and family, I am not ready to do everything that must be done once I check in the hospital.  Ahh!  birthing babies!  Horror upon Horror.  At about this moment I would rather potty train. (Come 8 months from now, I might sing a different tune.)
Anyway, monday monring I panicked. So when I saw my doctor later on, and he asked if I wanted to be checked I said no.  I didn't know what would be worse, to hear I hadn't made any progress or that I had.  (I made no progress until 39 weeks with my first two.) I decided I would rather not know.  My babysitter while I'm in the hospital is leaving town for a week.  Until today, I thought sure this baby COULD come early, but now it is not allowed, he is going to have to wait until the 29th.  I guess anytime after the 27th.  (yes, I have backups, but life would just be easier with the plan.)
Overall I still feel panicked, but not as bad.  Other than packed bags we are getting close to ready.  The toddler is in with the 5 year, so he doesn't associate the infant with not being with the 7 year old.  The first morning I could tell he missed his brother, he had to go check on him.  But since then its been a party in big sister's room.  Yes, I have a boy and a girl sharing a room.  I'm totally ok with this.  When I was real small I shared with my sister, but then for a few years I shared with my little brother, I think until I was almost 9.  Its been good for my daughter over the past few days, learning to share her room.  She is really learning how to be "the big sister", she is earning the title instead of just breathing.
I should mention, I'm loving her at 5.  Every few days she decides to impress us on how big she is, and do a chore or task without crying.  Its amazing to have her try to go all day without crying.  Its been a long 5 years.  I'm actually quite surprised, my oldest exasperated me until he was 6.  So when she turned 5, I thought only one more year until she starts acting like a human. I'm just loving this new big kid.  She has really struggled during this pregnancy of mine, in ways she never did during my third.  We've had some regressions, and other trials, so I'm excited that she is now trying so hard at being big. She even told her dad she was going to give him her thumb sucking blanket.  She has since backed down, but she is making progress, and it might be gone soon!

A date

My baby is coming in 24 days or less. I'm really uncomfortable. Like, I can barely bend over, and have constant braxton hicks. The baby feels like he is dropping all day and night  It takes a lot for my body to go into labor, so I'm assuming it's going to be a long 24 days. I still have a few crafts I want to finish so I guess I can wait.