Juniper Martha

As I just dusted off the ol' blog for the first time in six years.... Oh gosh. On the eve of our 4th baby's 3rd birthday I realized that I really did want to record her birth story. Three years later...

Care for an update?

It's been a minute. So take a seat.

We live in Florida now. We have 4 (precious) children. Graham is almost 11 and in 5th grade (gasp!). Jackson turns 9 on Sunday and is in 3rd grade. Savannah just turned 6 and started Kindergarten. And Juniper turns 3 tomorrow. I know.... we are a herd. I love our herd!

I'll back up a little bit. 

We moved to Gainesville, Florida in December of 2016 for Matt to be the Creative Director at Parisleaf. They are a small branding and design agency here in Gainesville and are such a great group of creative friends that truly feel like family. We have also found an amazing church family here and have been so blessed to jump into life with them. They definitely loved us hard and helped ease the early haze of homesickness!

Now - the real reason for this post. To document the birth story of our sweet baby Juniper.

As Savannah turned 2 in 2015 I decided to follow a long buried desire to work in a hospital setting taking care of patients. There was a lot of things going on in our work and personal lives at that time. Way too much to even try and summarize here. But me returning to work was for me and also for our family. In another life I would've gone to nursing school! I worked nights taking care of patients and supporting the real nurses in the Neuro unit at Mercy Hospital. It was everything I envisioned would be involved with nursing and extra patient care time. It was also crazy and insanely hard on our home schedule and my body as I was working 2-3 night shifts a week. 

So imagine our surprise when we found out about our baby Juniper! As we think back on those days we were confident in the Lord's timing and gift of that sweet babe and we FOR SURE can't even begin to imagine our family without her. But it was still a lot of a surprise! We were thrilled when we found out we were having a girl... and bonus points for my sister sharing her pregnancy news and we were able to be pregnant together and have a set of cousins only 3 weeks apart!

(38 weeks...)

Circumstances led Matt and me to pack our daily life materials and move in with my parents while he worked and pursued full time employment. We made the arrangements for the boys to start at a new school... we trusted the Lord with all the fibers of our beings... We packed ourselves up, moved into my parents home on Saturday, August 13th which was also my due date. 

While we were doing all the moving and walking all the stairs, and carrying all the things.... we joked about it sending me into labor. Ha! We had previously planned to send the kids to church with my parents and sleep in the next day. For sure my body would need it!

I had some serious labor signs during that night and a few more indications that things were happening on Sunday. I have pretty unremarkable pregnancies from outsider perspective. And although my belly doesn't get too big.... I have big, regular sized babies. They just take up every teeny inch of my insides. So I'm pretty uncomfortable for the last 3 months... And my labors were fast and furious for my boys and (I guess normal length?) for Savannah. All that to say by this point of hitting my due date, in August of a mid-west summer.... it was time.

(Juniper Martha, 8 lb 8 oz. 5:38 am)

I can safely say that Matt and I were equally thrilled when I jumped out of bed at 3 am Sunday night with a massive contraction. And immediately another. He knew what to do...

There were no smiles, it was immediately serious labor business. We arrived at the hospital around 4:30 I think. In all the heaviness of life decisions and changes I had completely ignored the reality of impending labor. Who knows how I thought this would go down. I've been able to deliver all my babies naturally and drug free... So I should've known what was coming... But it wasn't pretty. I whined and cried and probably stomped. I did not labor calmly or peacefully. The labor nurses and my favorite doctor were truly amazing and I could never thank them enough. There were several moments when I wanted to quit. But is there anything every truly worth living for that doesn't come with some pain? Matt was amazing as always. And maybe a little scared of me? Either way, he never left my side.

What felt like an eternity later but was likely only 5 minutes I had my precious Juniper on my chest. She was NOT happy about her change of scenery and cried oh so loudly. It was like a little preview of her almost 3 year old temperament! It was a whirlwind of emotions giving birth for the last time. Life and birth is truly a miracle and it is not lost on me what a gift I have been given in these 4 sweet babies. 

(There are just so many of us!)

We were immediately surrounded by loving and supportive family who jumped in to help out with the other 3 kiddos. We were blessed with so many friends who came to love on and pray over us. Matt took our big kids to their first day of a new school and came immediately to pick me up from the hospital for discharge. It was an insane week of big changes and hasn't seemed to slow down even a little since then.

(My matching blondies...)

(This big sister loves her baby SO much!!!)

(look at those smiles!)

Juniper was a very mild and serious baby from the beginning. She was almost constantly held thanks to all the eager big siblings and rarely cried. She was quite literally sweet as sugar! She had big, curious blue eyes just like our Jackson and her hair was definitely blond but with a little hint of red.

(S in preschool, G in second grade, J in Kindergarten)

Matt accepted the new job and moved to Florida at the end of September. I stayed in St. Louis to finish out the semester before we all made the long drive on December 30th. 

(Just before mom and dad left town.... I think we all wanted to act like Savannah!)

(The family all together on Christmas 2016 before we moved)

It was hard to leave the only home our little family has ever known for a new town full of only unknown! But the Lord has been so kind and gentle with us. He has provided endless support and provision and so much joy! We miss our out of town families and I can't imagine having to do this without modern technology... wow!

These last pictures were taken for Juniper's first birthday. Sooooo, we definitely need some new family pictures!

As Juniper has grown into her own little person over the last 3 years we just love her more and more. Until recently she was our most quiet child and we were almost convinced we were going to have at least one mild mannered child. Nope. As she has begun to talk over this last year we have been able to laugh at her stubbornness and persistency as she yells and stomps and does all the things you'd expect a 4th baby to do to make herself known in a big family.

Thank you to so many friends and family who have prayed and supported us to get us to this place. We know and appreciate you so very much. God is so good! 

Happy 3rd birthday to our sweet girl! We can not imagine our lives without our lovie loving, curly headed, snack loving baby girl. She is a master lounger and can get her big siblings to do her bidding way better than I'm able to. She owns us all and I'm thinking we're all ok with the arrangement!

Savannah Caroline

And then there were five!

Savannah Caroline

7 lbs 2 oz.

19 in.

August 1st at 3:06 pm

Can you believe we have so many children? Me neither.

Let me back up a little...

Being pregnant is a miracle, truly. It's wonderfully beautiful to grow and feel a little baby growing and moving inside your being. Their eyes form, their fingers and toes separate. They grow fingernails and even sometimes suck their thumbs. It's just amazing. God is in the details!

That being said. That I love growing babies and being pregnant and such... I was just so over pregnancy about a month before baby girl joined us. It might have been the whole moving/house situation. Could have been the heat (though we've had a mild summer.) I'm just going to go with that I was so darn excited to meet her and hold her on the outside!

We had just a few things going on the first half of August. Matt's brother got married on August 3rd, so his parents were going to be in town for 12 days and desperately wanted to meet this little girl! Because of the wedding, several of Matt's extended family were going to be in town as well and it's harder to get down to see them. Also going on was a trip for my dad, two of my brothers moving for college, and my mom starting school.

So this is the story of Jackson and this is the story of Graham. Both labors and deliveries were rather fast so I could only imagine little Savannah wouldn't be too different.

We really wanted to avoid an emergency situation this time. No ambulance. No pushing in the car. Just a little more peace. A regular drive to the hospital would be nice. Plus, we weren't able to use our favorite doula this time... and she kept us sane and safe with both of the boys' quick births!

Because we were trying to get to the hospital just a tad bit earlier, I think I was paying much more attention to my body looking for signs of labor. So Saturday night before she was born we actually took a little field trip up to L&D from 3-6 am. It was fun. It was unproductive. We came home without a baby. Turns out baby girl was just tuning up...

Fast forward a few days (with contractions during the night, every night). Since I was awakened by contractions in active labor with both boys I was very aware of my nightly uterus activity.

My dad got back in town from his trip on Monday. Matt's parents arrived in town on Wednesday. We had a lovely dinner with them Wednesday night. So everyone is here. Just hoping baby girl joins us before too long! I woke up Thursday morning around 6:30 with a contraction. Then another. They were anywhere from 4-10 minutes apart. I figured as soon as I got out of bed and got the day started they would go away. They didn't though. I told Matt that maybe this was the day. We both got really excited and then remembered that we should practice "labor denial" a little longer...

So Matt went to work and I went to Target. I do that often. Go to Target just to entertain the boys in the toy isle. I did secretly load my stuff in the car before we left though in case something crazy happened while we were there. We just did our thing rearranging the toys and eating snacks that we'd pay for at check-out. I talked to a few friends... One friend strongly encouraged me to go home and call Matt to come home. She was right. I somehow thought that I could just meet him at the hospital. What in the world was I thinking?

All along the contractions are about 3-7 minutes apart but I had no trouble talking and behaving normally through them. I'd been texting with my doctor so she knew what was going on and kept checking in with me. I think around 11:30 I decided to head home and called Matt and asked him to head home when he could.

I got home, fed the boys and tried to hide my contractions from my brother and the twins' babysitter. Matt got home around 12:30, had a little lunch and put Jackson down for a nap. Then we left (G with the sitter and brother - and my parents were headed home from an appointment). We called all the parents from the car. They were beyond thrilled.

We arrived at the hospital at about 1:30, sped through the labor evaluation where they determined I was already 7 cm dilated and were ushered up to L&D. My doctor met us at the door and got us settled in our room. I have to say that laboring at the hospital isn't so fun. Lots of nurses asking questions. Lots of walking around. And lots of time in between contractions where I felt like a watched kettle. I did appreciate that the residents and my doctor seemed to understand the need for quiet and to leave me alone. The nurses didn't get that memo. Their job required more from me than breathing.

I'm not sure of the time, but at some point I really started to get tired. I started whining. I was uncomfortable, my back hurt, and I was hungry. That's when Dr. suggested I get checked to see how labor was going. Once I lay down I felt much better, and the good news was that I was already 10 cm and ready to go. I got pretty emotional at that point with the excitement of getting to meet baby girl and with the anxiety of the end of labor (i.e. pushing).

After several "I can't do this" and "I just want her out" moments, a few yells (ok, screams), and many comforting words of affirmation from Matt and Dr. we met our sweet sweet Savannah at 3:06.

She was immediately put on my chest and the two of us were covered to rest and recover. It was such a miraculous moment. All cares in the world were lost. I shed a few tears of overwhelming joy and relief. We thanked our heavenly Father. And Matt and I just talked to and gazed at her. She immediately found her thumb and tried to look around. And in that instant, I couldn't imagine life without this precious little one.

With my favorite doctor!

We very quickly had a flood of visitors. Both of Matt's brothers followed by his mom, aunt, grandmother, and a close family friend. His dad had gone to pick up G and J. And not long after they all left, my whole family came to visit. I so wish I had gotten a picture of everyone together. G&J had already met and held her (the first picture) and when the twins got there they were just the cutest showing her off. T&C haven't seen a newborn before and still love checking her out and asking questions about her. I loved that everyone got to meet her on the day of her birth! This little girl is covered in family love!

The boys were very intrigued at her little check-up the next day. Taking notes, I'm sure, for when they get their doctor kits out of storage...  And check out their little watches! I found them each Lego watches (from Savannah) that they loved. Nothing says "mature big brother" like a watch right?

Daddy and his daughter. Love.

So protective of her already.

He is always asking to hold her. My heart swells...

About to head home.

(hospital pictures)

My new favorite picture.

All of my loves.

Welcome to our family precious little Savannah! We promise though we may be loud and crazy and you'll probably have to play pirates and knights one day - we can't imagine our family without you!

And a huge thank you to both families for the visits and for so much help watching and feeding the boys. We know they felt very loved through this transition!

July 2013

This was most definitely an interesting month...

Those that are in our lives on a regular basis will know this but I'll try and summarize for those just tuning in.

Remember we got a contract on our house. Remember we were slowly but surely packing ourselves out of living space. Well in all the excitement of the June post I didn't mention that we weren't sure where we were going to be moving. See, we're selling, but we're not buying again. And we had been talking to someone and were planning on renting their house in a great part of town. Closer to church, closer to family, and in a good school district. Plus, this house has two bathrooms!!! It's pretty important. The rental was being renovated they didn't want to finish it before we had sold our house. So once we sold they let us know that it would be 6-8 weeks until it was ready. Yikes! Thankfully my parents offered to let us stay with them.

I'll insert here that in no way is a family of 4 (going to be 5) an easy group to add to an already busy house hold. Oh, and my sister and her boys live there. Oh, and one of my college brothers and recent high school graduate brother were living under their roof at this time as well. And we have the cat. And I'll be having a baby while we live there. Hold onto your hats folks. Those 6-8 weeks were going to be a wild ride. So we started the planning process to move some of our most necessary items into their house and pack the rest for the POD to be seen at some future unknown date. It was fun.

We moved into my parents house on July 4th. Everyone (i.e. my parents and youngest brother) were so so gracious as to move out of their beds and rearrange their personal belongings to accommodate us. It has been something like 6 weeks now as I'm blogging this and we've settled into a new normal. We all have our routines. The two brothers have moved back to college. My mom and the twins have started school again. And it has been sweet (and at times very exhausting) how excited the 4 toddlers are to be living together. Every day it's just as exciting as if it was the first... they just love each other so much!

Sorry, I got ahead of myself...

Here's where the drama starts (as if 12 people under one roof isn't drama?). Our contract sort of fell through. Awesome. So since we had already moved out of our house and put our things in storage - we decided to stay put and see if things could work out with our buyer. (He still wants our house, but his own sale fell through. So we're hoping he can sell his place quickly.)

Now I'll share the month of pictures. Just wanted to give a little life update for those that might not know.

This was the week we moved out. I had to pack the boys' playroom when they weren't looking.

They definitely noticed when all they had to play with was one box of figures...

An afternoon trip to DQ for ice cream with M&Ms seemed to lift their spirits.

Despite a sort of emotional day of moving everything out of the house that we'd need for 2 months...

We still had to find some fire works!

Look at this handsome fella!

G was resistant, but was finally convinced that he had to wear nice clothes to Uncle B's wedding.

Doesn't he look so grown up?
We had to go out and actually buy these things as he's always refused to wear anything with a collar or khaki pants!

Oh, and he was determined to wear that hat to the ceremony...

36 weeks.

G went with me to my 36 week check-up. 

It is delightful spending time with him by himself. We stopped for ice cream on the way home.

Gosh I could eat him up!

 Two straight weeks of "Kingdom Rock" bible school (at two different churches) made for some knight obsessed little boys!

This might not seem like something worth documenting.

July 29th. The day two random strangers made my day.

The check-out man at Trader Joe's told me to pick out flowers on my way out, and the guy at the gas station gave me my drink.

Both had asked me how much longer I had to go with my pregnancy and were excited for me that baby girl was coming soon!

June 2013

This month things picked up for our family.

So the AC died in our caravan at the end of March. We stuck it out for a couple of months but were so so excited to upgrade to this beauty! Working AC, working stereo, and automatic doors. Total heaven!

We got it the night before a 2 day drive to the beach!!!

The boys and I joined my family and grandmother for a week on St. George Island.

Despite the longest drive in the world we had a blast!

Toddler headphones and travel DVD players saved our lives.

So did these books with tiny super hero figures.

The books were sort of the best idea ever, until...

we hit any bump in the road and those figures avalanched to the floor.

Then they were the most annoying things ever!

Poor Laura climbed through the car retrieving little toys like 500 billion times.

And this is a picture of the rest of the car...

Yes, you counted correctly.

4 toddler boys. 2 moms in the front seat.

We were probably a little crazy to attempt this, but they actually did really well! 

Sleeping toddlers are probably the best sight on a road trip!

We love the beach!

This boy played his heart out from breakfast till bath time.

Beach sleeping is just so refreshing...

It's been so long since all of us siblings spent so much time together. We had so much fun!

The sweetest brothers.

Andrew, Daniel, and Adam (L to R)

And the whole family! Matt wasn't able to get away from work on such short notice... 

He missed out and we missed him terribly!

Laura, Thomson and Caleb (C is holding the sucker)

I don't have a picture, but all 4 little boys were super heros all week long.

They were adorable.

My sweet G.

Silly J. 

So full of attitude.

30 weeks.

Can't wait to meet baby girl!

I love my parents! 

I love J, but sometimes he's a little intense. He loves to watch movies and will actually sit through them.

So once we discovered he would let us eat in peace by watching Hook on my mom's computer, we were set! He is a super picky eater and survived the week on cereal. 

He watched Hook like 12 times off in a corner of the living room. What a funny guy.

This boy loved the beach. And the waves. 

Then we made the long journey home. It was such a wonderful wonderful vacation. 

I really hope we're able to do it again next year so Matt can be a part of it!

G is still in a major love affair with policemen. The hat goes everywhere.

He found that watch at my mom's house.

Then he wanted me to take this picture of him. 

Looking like a fierce policeman.

Oh, and he never wears a shirt. Ever.
He wears one when we go somewhere but once we get to any friend's house or back home the first thing he does is lose his shirt...

J's hair.

It's sort of taking on it's own personality...

This is probably my favorite picture in a while.

I think it captures both of them so perfectly!

And I love that they're both wearing belts.

I love my boys. I love that they love to snuggle.

And I'm ready to have this baby!

Hair.

So big news on the house front.

We got a contract!

Just a week after we got back from the beach things finally started to move with the house. 

Such an answer to prayer!

It was bitter sweet to pack up the house. Our first home. 

The trees that we planted. The rooms we painted. 

The doors that welcomed our first 2 babies.

We had a lot of fun making memories and building our family in this house!