Baby Rowan

I was bigger this pregnancy than with any of my others, so when baby Rowan arrived and was big,  I was not too surprised.  And he was a week early!

Baby Rowan arrived at 8:12 a.m. on Feb. 23, 2015.  8 lb. 12 oz.  21.5 inches.  He was very chubby and everyone in the operating room kept remarking on how big he was. This was the kids' first glimpse of their new brother.

Rowan is now 6 days old and has still hardly opened his eyes.  They seem kind of swollen and glued shut, plus I think having chubby cheeks makes them harder to open.  It is weird for me to have a chubby baby, I am interested to see if it lasts.

Full Name: John Rowan Bailey.   He was almost "Theo" (John Theodore Bailey), but in the end I had my way and we went with Rowan.

I don't think there is even a picture of me with Rowan yet, I have just felt too awful.  The recovery from the C-section has been considerably harder than my other deliveries, but I feel a little better each day.  The entire experience was quite scary anyway, I really didn't like the idea of being paralyzed and then cut into like that while i was still awake. The experience did turn out to be quite freaky because pain sensation and pressure sensation are completely separate, so the spinal anesthesia blocked all the pain but I could still feel the pressure, so I could feel the doctor slicing into me 4 times, then I could feel them pressing on the baby and pulling him out.  The scariest was probably feeling the doctor stitching me up and pulling hard on the threads to tighten the stitches.

a rare moment with his eyes open.

There was a little bit of a snowstorm the day we were discharged.

Evolution of Charlotte's People Drawings

The Evolution of Charlotte's People Drawings a.k.a. "guys"

Here is the first recognizable thing she ever drew (approx. age 2.5)
 

"Wodots"

 

Here are drawings done as Charlotte comes closer to age 3.  While I don't think the following are an aesthetic improvement, they are probably stylistically more complex, we see the addition of hair.

 A person and a sun

The guys' limbs become more 3-dimensional.  The top one is a family important including the new baby.  The big one is John.

Again, we see the 3-dimensional quality emerging.

 Charlotte did this a few months ago, and said it was a bird.  I'm really quite amazed.

January

  
We don't do a lot, especially now that we are just kind of trying to get as many appointments as possible over with and get ready for the baby, but here are some simple things that have occupied the kids so far in 2015.

Cute outfit of Arabelle's that she wouldn't wear last year, but now is more than happy to show off.

She thinks she always needs to pose now.

Family picture Charlotte drew, includingt he new baby.  The big one is daddy.  You can also kind of see the black eye she gave herself on her new bed.

The craft table has been an integral part of these girls' lives for the past year.  They spend sometimes hours a day at it.  I leave stacks of scrap paper on it (usually the backs of Jeffrey's papers he gets from school since he brings home like 15 a day), and the girls are just drawn to it.

I had a bag of expired rice so I decided to make this mini sensory table, and it has been a huge hit.  Charlotte has spilled her share of rice, but it has been worth it for the hours she has spent playing with this.

Once again, the black eye.

She was really proud that it was her turn to have Elsie sit by her (the girls fight over Elsie)

 This is one of the scenes that Arabelle set up while playing.  It is funny because she doesn't seem to care about relative size or having the toys be from the same "set".  I heard her say the transformer was the dad.  She kind of reminds me of the little girl on Toy Story 3, in fact.  I find it very creative because when I was her age, this would have driven me nuts.  I had to have complete sets of coordinating toys in order to be able to play.

Jeffrey had to make a "reading rock" for school.  He could decorate it however he wanted, I guess he was supposed to read to it in the reading center.  The girls of course wanted to make their own, see if you can guess which rock goes with which kid.

Arabelle's version of the "awkward smile" phase.  She thinks she is supposed to pose cutely somehow, but she's not exactly sure what to do.

My fashion star.

Charlotte made this for John out of play dough and then brought it to him and sang her version of Happy Birthday.

Jeffrey wanted me to take a picture of his reading rock on this chair.  He did tell me that he wanted it to look like Papa, and he named it Ted.

Of course Charlotte also wanted a picture of her reading rock on the chair.

Jeffrey has become a real reader in the last couple months.  I had been sitting by him and having him read about 15 minutes a day, and I would help him with the hard words.  A couple months ago, I noticed he really didn't need me sitting there anymore, he knew the vast majority of the words in the simple books, and was very good at figuring out most of the rest.  I have been putting the girls to bed at 7, but Jeffrey can "stay up late" if he wants to read.  He  will usually read for a good thirty minutes before I tell him to turn out the light.  I just got him a set of 12 box car children books, and in the past week he has finished the first 2 in the series.  He seemed to really understand and enjoy them and the stories were quite nostalgic to me.  Although I remember even as a first grader being annoyed by the repetitive nature of the Box Car Children books as well as some of the plots and descriptions.

This is what happens when Uncle Phil sits down.

Arabelle's 5th Birthday

Arabelle was so involved with planning everything to do with her birthday this year that it was exhausting.  We had a little family party and ate spaghetti and she wanted blueberry muffins for the dessert. 

Grandma and Grandpa came and brought her horses in a barn for a gift, and she got this nail polish, which was her only gift from John and me since we were paying for a big friends party.

Memaw got Arabelle this vet costume/kit and it has already seen a lot of use.

  Arabelle started planning her birthday in full force 6 months ago.  Since then she has made countless lists and rounds of homemade invitations.  She went through tons of ideas:  costume party, games party, angry birds party.  She finally settled on "exercise party", which I convince her could be done at the place where Jeffrey has gymnastics.

Here are just a few of the lists that she made.  Keep  in mind that I had to dictate every letter to her.

She made her own invitations, which I never would have allowed with her meticulously planned and themed ballet party of last year, but as I said, this year Arabelle needed to be head party planner.

Those are 2 that Arabelle made on the top row, and the 2 on the bottom row are ones that Charlotte made in imitation.   The squiggles are her "ABCD's".  We glued a printed insert inside with all the necessary details, and then Arabelle decorated the fronts.

That's Arabelle on the far left.  She was really excited to wear her fancy rainbow glitter gymnastics leotard.  Of course, one of her first guests asked her "why she was wearing her pajamas", but she didn't seem to mind.

 It was a super fun party.  There were 2 instructors there that did the parachute with the kids and also a fun obstacle course, and then they had time for free play.  My only complaint is that we had to be super strict with time.  We got exactly one hour in the gym area, and a half hour in the room with tables for cake and ice cream/presents.  It all felt a bit rushed, and a few kids were quite late, so they got almost no time in the gym, which made me feel bad.  I will go ahead and mention that it was $100 to rent out the facility, but I have spent close to that on home birthday parties buying lots of games/crafts/party favors to entertain the kids for an hour.  Of course, not having to get my house perfectly clean (while under stress of also planning a party) was priceless.  And as I mentioned, she only got one very small gift from us, and I really don't think she would have minded had she gotten nothing, she just wanted that party!

Arabelle had lots of guests, but mostly she played with Emery.

Emery, Arabelle, and one of Arabelle's admirers, Braxton.

Scotlyn and Valin, to whom Arabelle is apparently engaged to be married.

More guests:  Sara and Xander from church, and Jeffrey of course.

Charlotte was very pleased with the cake and ice cream.   I wasn't sure how many guests would show up, so I had 2 cakes.  The first one was planned by Arabelle:  chocolate with chocolate icing, blue sprinkles, and green frosting letters.  She wanted the letters to say, "I love to exercise!", but I did encourage her to change it to "Happy 5th Birthday!"  We also had a round vanilla cake with strawberry frosting and 2 kinds of ice cream.  We did eat over half of each cake, so I was glad I had planned extra.

The gymnastics staff had Arabelle sit on this block and she got to call up friends one at a time to sit by her while she opened their present.   Halfway through I realized it was horrible because she was calling up her "favorite" friends first and then leaving the other kids until last.  So then I just had the last 3 kids all come up at the same time, and it was wild so I wasn't able to write down what give gave what for thank you notes, which quite bothers me, but oh well.  So if we were to do a party here again, definitely would do presents differently.

I was a little worried that no party could live up to Arabelle's extensive planning and expectations, but she seemed fully satisfied with the experience. Almost all of her guests game, and she actually got some really great gifts including a card making set, a set of 8 "Frozen" puzzles, and lots of Princess Sophia items including jewelry, 2 ceramic princesses to paint, and a doll.  She has been playing with all of them.