Just a fun little comparison picture. She looks a lot the same--thinner face and she is almost 3 inches taller than last year. Still my sweet precious Anna-Kate!

First day of kindergarten

First day of first grade

The report is that school is awesome! She came home and had snack yesterday and asked if she could go back to school. I consider that to be a positive statement! :) I told her she has to sleep first. She said, "Ok, I'll go take a nap and then go back!". So, so thankful for our wonderful school, her sweet friends and a teacher who loves her, has prayed for her and has made this re-entry to school so easy and smooth.

First day of first grade

{alternate title: Time Marches On}

We spent the last 5 days soaking up the last minutes of summer--as in, more fun stuff than we've done all summer! Thursday we went to Six Flags, Friday we went to the zoo with Nana, Saturday Anna-Kate and I had our breakfast date with Leigh-Ann and Adam followed by Anna-Kate's back to school party, then a lunch date with Jessica and Marin! Sunday we went to church, attended the promotion Sunday picnic/bounce house extravaganza and went to home group that night. Monday morning we had a playdate here with Marin, followed by a huge Chick-fil-a gathering (15 kids total counting siblings, but 6 going into first grade with Anna-Kate) and then brought Grace home for an afternoon playdate. That afternoon/evening was spent at school to meet her teacher, see the classroom and enjoy the back to school picnic! It began pouring so we ate first (Chris had BBQ, I had Mexican and the kids, shocker, had CFA). I decided to truly be a fun mom and said we could stay and do the bounce houses/carnival games in the rain. All of the kids were soaked (except for Mark who slept peacefully in the sling under my umbrella with me!) and had the.time.of.their.lives. Whew!

This morning Anna-Kate came in before I had even gone to wake her up, fully dressed and ready to go! Chris stayed home for a fun family breakfast (and so I could take her and walk her in with a bit less chaos than is bringing all of my munchkins anywhere).

Eggs and muffins...breakfast of champions!

Mark wanted in on the family table action.
Ryan wanted him to sit next to him. :) 

My big 1st grade girl! No more canvas bag--
her own backpack this year!

Silly kids. Jack would not be separated from his muffin,
andevidently wouldn't be joined with his pants. Hmm.

Growing up too fast!

With the Daddy

Sweet friend, Adam (got this same picture last year.)

wWth her teacher, Mrs. Farrar

Saying goodbye to my big girl!

Hard at work already!

First grade, here we come!

So, ya....

It might have been {just shy of} two months since I posted last. Oops. First there was nothing to report, then we had company, then the Olympics...

Well, Mark is 10 weeks old now. I know. He's a little peanut still, 11.5 lbs at his 2 month appointment. :)  The first 8 weeks were hard. Harder than I expected, to be completely honest. I got spoiled with Ryan and Jack as they were both such easy, go-with-the-flow, quick nursing babies. Mark was not. :) Mark is a "spitter"--and it is constant. He is small so just couldn't eat as much as I wanted him to, which meant he took longer to sleep longer stretches. BUT, we are in a good place now. He eats every 3 hours during the day, then 11:30 pm, and not again until 8 am, so I am happy to announce my re-entry to the land of the living. Unfortunate that the Olympics have kept me up so late as my sleep deficit has, as yet, not improved. :) 

A quick recap...I pretty much holed up for June with my mom's help (both coming here and taking the big kids to their house for a week) with the exception of VBS (or "PBS kids" according to Ryan). My mother in law came to visit for a week and we took our first major excursion out--to the Childrens Museum. My parents left for France for a month so we kinda holed up again. I did manage to make it to the pool a handful of times with the kids. Since I was stuck at home anyway I decided to jump in to potty training Jack. Praise the Lord, he took to it really well and was trained in a day or so with very few accidents. Very exciting and proud of him! My streak remains--I still have never had a baby love the carseat. Grr. Mark seems to be getting better. I keep having talks with him that his life is about to be lived in his carseat. We'll see. :) We did a good job of reading every day and spent plenty of time in the backyard in the sprinkler and slip and slide. I tried to work on Ryan's handwriting and Anna-Kate's math facts/flash cards. It didn't occur as much as I'd planned, but I figure ever little bit helps, right? :) I'm missing some pictures in the big iphone download, but here are a recent couple.

Anna-Kate is a super helper! Despite his intense scared look, Mark adores her. :) 

Our special breakfast date (at the ever so classy Waffle House, or "Wa-Ho" if you prefer)
to celebrate her heading to 1st grade!

We've been dropping Jack's nap to aid in easier bed times with the boys sharing a room (and school starting) and also so he is used to not getting one (more than a little car cat-nap) with so much carpool coming up. It's caught up to him. 

At the zoo!

The last few weeks I"ve made a concerted effort to do fun stuff with the kids before school starts back--especially since it's been a pretty laid back {or...boring...} summer. We went to the Disney Store and then had Chick-fil-A at the food court, we've been to the childrens museum, Six Flags a couple of times and went to the zoo. Thankful for friends and family who come to help--I'm still not quite a "one-[wo]man show" yet. :)

What's in a name?

If you are me, a lot. :)

So I previously hinted at some of the "rules" or parameters for naming Mark. It became quite a lengthy and extensive list by the end of the process. :) We had many friends pondering with us as we attempted to find the perfect name.

Family name.  Had a good meaning. Four letters long.  Contained an "A".  Did not begin with "A", "R", "J" or "H". Couldn't end the same way as our last name. Not short for anything (ie, "Will" was off the table because it is short for William).

***

So, for fun, I will include all of the kids' names and their meanings.

Anna-Grace, favor
Kate-Pure
Ruth-Faithful friend

Ryan-Little king
Elliot-My God is the Lord

Jack-God is gracious/His gracious gift
Henry-Ruler of the home

Mark-Strong warrior
Christopher-Bearer of Christ

I have loved watching my kids grow up and take on their names, and what their name meanings have brought us to pray for them. Just a little special thing for me.

To remember

I don't have a "birth story", per se, but there are some things I want to remember about Mark's birthday.

• I didn't shake or get sick from the pain meds/surgery for the first time. Such a relief!
• Our prayers were beyond answered that Mark didn't need to go to the NICU like his brothers did. 
• The doctor assisting my OB in my surgery said, "wow, you are really thin." I started laughing and said, "you probably say that to all the girls. I feel anything but thin right now!". Evidently I have a very small layer of fat. Who knew? Now, if I could get the muscle control back so it didn't appear fat to the naked eye...
• They wanted to slowly wean me off the epidural overnight so turned off the automatic drip. I awoke to a screaming baby at 3 who I couldn't hold because my stomach was burning. I think I know what it would feel like to be shot or cut open with no meds. Good gracious. Painful. Turned that guy back on and weaned off while I was awake to monitor my pain. 
• My OB recommended an abdomen wrap. I was unsure the proper way to put it on/how tight to do it, so laid down as my two nurses put it on for me. Without thinking, I said, "oh, I just feel like Scarlett O'hara...never mind me not having a 20 inch waist" and laughed it off. Chris was behind the nurses turning all colors of red for my foot in mouth moment. Oops. Can I blame that on the pain meds I was on?
• I was off percocet about a week after surgery, motrin 13 days. 
• 12 days post surgery my incision was completely closed...same day that Mark's umbilical stump fell off (which, PS, I always rejoice over as that is disgusting and then they can have a real bath...but I was a little saddened this time as I continued one of many "I'll never do X again...")

That's all I have for now. Off to bed. 

The nursery

Well, I struggled with a nursery vision this time. As my big boys {weird that Jack is now "big"} are now sharing a room, I still needed to use my nursery bedding for Jack (it actually coordinates with Ryans, which is great as the window treatment is still up in there). I chose fabric twice and by the time I went to purchase it was sold out until late May--which I took as a clear sign from the Lord to a) scale back what I was planning to sew (everything) and b) choose new fabric. :)

So, back to the drawing board I went, again. I had in my head I wanted to use predominately navy, which is surprisingly hard to find in cute fabrics/nursery stuff. Well, for some reason, as I searched Pottery Barn Kids for the umpteenth time I found a new bumper I'd not seen before. And, bonus, it was on sale--$54 shipped! Done. My mom gave me the cute navy and white polka dot sheets for my shower, and my vision was reborn.

I bought navy minky to make a diaper changing pad cover. Love the softness for his little body. :) The french board was a re-purpose job from Ryan's big boy room (see it HERE). The other two are being used for Jack and Ryan. I recovered the glider and ottoman with a navy fabric with white polka dots that looks identical to the PBK sheets my parents' gave us. 

Still standing in the doorway. I bought cheap white drapes from Target ($9.99 each!) and added a 4 inch border of the navy/white polka dot to the sides and bottom. Love it. 

Here is the bumper and sheet that sparked the whole thing. I made the box pleat bed skirt from a simple white pique and added the same 4 inch border of the polka dot. The letters I just painted navy and added white dots to. And yes, Chris hung them the day before Mark was born. :) Then I took them down and hid them until we came home from the hospital. I'm a sneaky one like that. Lol. 

All in all, I am very happy with the room. It is quite a soothing place to sit, rock and nurse (which is super as I spend an awful lot of time doing those things right now.). :)

Announcing...

{One week late...oops}

The birth of our fourth child...Mark Christopher. 

Hello world!

Our smallest baby weighing in at 7.1 lbs. 

Mark was my brothers name and means "mighty warrior". Christopher is obviously after Chris and means "bearer of Christ". Our prayer for our little Mark is that he will grow to be a mighty warrior for the Lord! If he is anything like his uncle or his Daddy, I will count it a blessing.

And baby makes six!

Smitten with her newest baby brother

Our first picture in the recovery room about 35 minutes after he was born. We were so thankful to an answer to prayer that he didn't need to go to the NICU--our first boy not to!

My last pregnant picture ever. Weird. Total weight gained: 23 lbs. Odd, since I tore through bags of cheetos, powdered donuts and gallons of icecream and ate veggies only as an example to my kids. Ha! 

Baking a BIRTHday cake the day before Mark was born! Yum, raw egg...

 

Not so smitten...in fact wanted nothing to do with him until I produced the Elmo book from Mark to Jack. :) 

Loving on baby

Have this picture, in this same sweatshirt, with all the babies. :) I keep the  room cold. Chris lucked out with our room this time. He had an extra alcove area that wasn't up against the window such that when they brought the baby at night/took my vitals he was often able to sleep through it as the light over him didn't turn on.  

 

Eating cake {cake is his happy place}

With my sweet friend and OB, Stacy.

Ready to go home daygown...not a dress. :)

After much waiting, finally heading home!

A big thank you to my parents who kept the kids while we were in the hospital! My big kids had such a good time and enjoyed their Nana and Poppy time so much. In fact, when I told Anna-Kate that she couldn't hold the baby until she washed her hands, (Chris, Anna-Kate and I all got horrible colds/sore throats during Mark's first week of life) she said, "but if Mark get sick, doesn't that mean Nana will have to come back to our house for more time here?" :) Sweet, but no dice!

Somehow not pictured are Ryan and my parents...there are pictures of them all holding the baby, just not on my phone. Those will come. :) They were there too.