Impromptu Potty Training

Aaron is in the midst of potty training. He's two years and three weeks old. This is like six months before I would have even thought about potty training him, but it turns out kids sometimes have their own agenda.

Tickled pink to be in "big kid" underwear

He's been telling us he's poopy for at least a month. Most of the time he's not, he just wants his diaper changed. We've been coaching him to tell us he's just wet and he sometimes does that too. In the last couple weeks he's started actually taking his diaper off, which is shocking when you find him naked. It's only happened once when he was poopy, but it made me nervous.

Lately I've been telling Aaron that if he needs to poop or pee he should just go in the toilet. Every time he very firmly said, "no!"

So Bill and I decided two days ago to pull down the potty seat that fits on top of the normal toilet. Aaron has never seen it before and I figured why not, we used to put Genevieve on the toilet before we put her in the bath and that worked well when we actually potty trained. Well, Spencer and Genevieve got all kinds of excited and helped us show Aaron how it worked and what do you know, he peed in it right then and after that he refused to put a diaper back on. Since he's already taking them off, it's not like we could really keep it on him. Instead he said he wanted underwear. I happen to have a few pairs from when Spencer potty trained and they were too small, so these were new. We put them on Aaron and he was beyond tickled. He spent the rest of the day going pee about every ten minutes on his own. He was totally enthralled. There was not a single accident.

The evening rolled around and he utterly refused to put a diaper back on for bedtime. Good thing we've potty trained two kids already and have lots of bed pads and that whole routine is old hat. We took him to the bathroom, put a pair of underwear on, and left him, fully expecting to have a wet bed when he woke up the next morning. Except there wasn't one. He stayed dry all night! By comparison, neither of my older ones could do this until much after they day potty trained and one still isn't dry every night. So at this point I'm totally blown away.

So yesterday we had more of the same. The toilet wasn't as much a novelty anymore, but he still only had one accident and it was outside on the porch, so totally not a big deal. My house has all wood floors, so even when there are accidents inside, it's not even a big deal. And this morning he woke up dry again.

Today hasn't gone as well. We've been in and out doing all kinds of things and he's had a few accidents, but he also pooped in the toilet, which is amazing again because that took Spencer a few weeks to figure out back three years ago when we potty trained. He peed during his nap too, but again, fully prepared for that, so not a big deal, just another load of laundry with a pad and blanket.

So there you have it. We're potty training completely at the mercy of Aaron. He started it and it seems we're going to keep doing it. In my experience potty training usually looks like an initial few days where you have like 30 accidents before the kid figures out, generally through bribery, that the toilet is okay to pee in. Then there's months after where you remind them pretty regularly to use the bathroom and eventually they figure it out and go on their own, but it's quite a few months. I'm just tickled that it looks like we totally skipped that first phase. I've always found that part so taxing and it's pretty well the best news all week that I may not have to do it this go around. Aaron is definitely earning favorite child status for this week. Hahaha!

Chloe at one month

Chloe hit her one-month mark on Saturday. What do you say about a baby that tiny still? She's still cute. :) She lost all her hair on the top of her head last week, just like her brothers did. We still haven't decided if her hair is blonde or red. We'll have to wait for it to grow back in to see what how it looks.

She still sleeps through the night, which is amazing. She slept from 8:30 to 4:45 this morning. That makes such a huge difference for my recovery.

She's getting more interactive. We're seeing more smiles and she likes to look at everything. She lets us lay her down on the floor now and she'll just look around.

She has trouble actually going to sleep and will only sleep so far in her rocker/sleeper, not flat on her back anywhere. But that isn't a problem, just a bit of a future worry for switching her to her pack and play, but whatever, no use worrying about that now. My friend just gifted us their swing, and she is loving that tonight, which is wonderful.

She's growing like a weed. I don't know exactly how much she weighs, but based off of trying to weigh her while I held her the other day, she's already up to 10 pounds. So pretty much she's growing like a weed, which is great.

She still has her siblings completely enamored. She's tolerant of their overzealous love, thankfully. And that's it for now. She's calling me. :)

Aaron is two

Oh geez, this kid. I love him to pieces. It's hard to believe he's already two, but more so it's hard to believe he's only been earthside two years. He's packed a lot of impact in that two years and I can't remember at all what it was like before he made his debut into our family. So without further ado, here are a few great things about Aaron that I don't want to forget.

Aaron is a charmer. Those that know Bill know about the little twinkle in his eye that he gets when he's about to say something really funny to someone in a side conversation or have the perfect comedic comment. Well, Aaron totally inherited this trait. He has the best sense of humor. He gets that same twinkle in his eye and I always know whatever he does is going to be super funny. He loves to laugh and make other people laugh.

Aaron is always up for trying something new. He doesn't have a lot of the boundaries that the older two have developed. For instance, I usually keep a bag of homemade cookies in the freezer. We usually have one a day. The instant Aaron learned how to open the freezer, the barrier of my kids asking me if they could have a cookie evaporated. See, Aaron goes and opens the freezer and gets one for himself without asking. He always grabs one for the older two as well and sometimes one for me too. How can you be bothered at a kid for getting into something he maybe shouldn't when he shares with everyone around him?

Aaron is adventurous. Why not hop back in the pool after your bath and getting pajamas on? Seemed perfectly reasonable to him. I just laughed. I find that's a better reaction than getting bothered. Everyone is happier.

Aaron loves to be carried. Mostly he just wants his daddy to carry him everywhere, because he's more attached to Bill then I thought possible, especially after Genevieve going through this age phase, as she was super attached, but Aaron takes it to a whole new level. He LOVES his daddy. 

He's a food lover. He doesn't always want to eat what I give him, but he loves to eat. It's refreshing.

He loves hats. I have to say he looks pretty good in them too. 

He adores his baby sister. He was the first one to hold her the day she was born. He mostly calls her Baby, but he knows her name too and he'll use that. She's been crying a lot in the car the last couple days and he will say, "Mommy, rock the baby." So sweet. He has a gentle soul. He sees when people don't feel good and wants to make them feel better. He is so attached to his Goonie stuffed bear. We've bought one for each of the kids and when one of his siblings is crying he'll run and find theirs and bring it to them. It's like he thinks in his head that Goonie makes him feel better, so obviously it will make them as well. They don't have nearly the attachment to theirs, but not surprisingly, they have grown to love theirs a lot as well! This kid is influential.

Aaron is a problem solver. He comes upon an obstacle and rather than be deterred he figures out a tool that he can use to get past his problem. It's a marvel to behold. He climbed on chairs way earlier than any of my others. Honestly, he has had more bumps and bruises than the older two because he's always pushing limits to do more. I kind of love it because he's not easily frustrated and that makes a rather delightful child.

Speaking of delightful, he's just such a sunny personality. He has mastered the concept that saying please gets him a lot of things. He's currently exploring the screaming option as well, likely as a result of seeing his older siblings try it, but he's quick to stop when we tell him it won't get him anywhere. He's a thinker and it's fun to see the wheels turning in his head. 

Aaron knows what he wants. He's very willing to share his opinions. Again, it's super refreshing to ask him whether he wants to eat something or do something and get an honest, clear cut answer. I really appreciate that when life at my house is so chaotic. 

And so that's Aaron right now. I can't wait to see what the next year brings. This kid is such an integral part of our family and I'm so glad he's ours.

Naming a baby

I don't think I've ever told the story of how we chose Chloe's name, and now seems like a great time to do that. I'm convinced she's in on choosing her first name. Bill and I somewhat half heartedly had thrown names around the first few months of my pregnancy, but nothing was sounding right. We didn't have any names we both liked. I can't remember exactly when it happened, maybe sometime in January, but one day I woke up with the name Chloe bouncing around my head. It was kind of like a bell rang in my head and I just knew that was her name. It felt so certain to me that I hesitated to tell Bill in case he didn't feel the same way. We went out on a date for our anniversary a day or two later and I told him I had a name but I was hesitant to share it, lest he shoot it down. I really shouldn't have worried. Bill totally isn't like that, but whatever. Anyway, to my surprise not only did he not shoot down the name, but he loved it. We basically just looked at each other, marveling.

So we had her first name, but her middle name was another story. We spent the next probably four months throwing names around to no effect. In the past we've used family names for middle names, but this time that didn't work out as well. I love both my mom and mother-in-law, but neither of their names worked as a middle name very well, and I didn't want to use just one and not the other since she's our last baby. My other kids are middle named after Bill and I and then my dad.

I finally decided I wanted to find a name that had a meaning that was special to me. I started searching around and still didn't find a lot, but kept at it. We actually decided on the name Chloe before we knew for sure she was a girl. I had always thought we would have a boy, a girl, and two boys. That's a different story, but I felt like Chloe was a girl pretty much from the day I found out I was pregnant, which was both very surprising and very exciting for me. Another boy would have been great, but having a girl was unexpected and a lovely surprise. It balances our family out and just made me very happy. So my searches for names that had meaning centered around all sorts of positive words like happiness and joy and such. I actually found the name Anabel a few months ago and Bill didn't hate it, but didn't love it either. We threw out quite a few other names and nothing else clicked, so we decided basically that unless something else came to us, that would be it. And nothing else came, so there you go, Chloe Anabel, our sweet surprise of a girl. She's a wonderful addition to our family, completing it and bringing that special feeling into our house that comes from a new little one.

Chloe Anabel

I have a quiet moment right now while the kids are either asleep or outside with Bill, so I'm going to jump on it and write Chloe's birth story. I imagine it will be a while before I have another chance if I don't.

I have 19 nieces and nephews on my side of the family, plus another seven on Bill's side. We have quite a few chances to land on shared birthdays as a result. Back when Spencer was born, we were surprised and pleased that he was born on my birthday. When Genevieve came along she ended up sharing a birthday with her cousin Michael, 16 years her senior. Aaron came four days after my brother and nephew's birthday and he doesn't share with anyone, though he shares birthday month with his dad. So this go around I was due on June 25th, but my niece's birthday is the 22nd, my sister's is the 16th, my aunt's is the 26th, so there was a high likelihood I could have Chloe on another shared birthday.

Throughout my whole pregnancy with her I felt like she was going to come early. I grew very fast early on, so when I compared photos with my other pregnancies, I was much bigger at the beginning. I stopped doing that after the first trimester, so in the last few weeks of June when I happened to do the same thing again, I was surprised to see that things had changed. I was actually smaller with her than with any of my other three kids. I was a little shocked actually because I just expected to be bigger each pregnancy, as had been the case before. It threw me off just a bit on the whole idea that she would come early, as she still had room to grow, more than the others had.

Fast forward to June 10th. Bill is at a conference in Boston. I'm home with the three kids, surviving his five days away while 38 weeks pregnant. That night while I work I start having contractions. I recognized them as such and not Braxton-Hicks, but yet they weren't painful, which left me wondering a bit. They went on for close to five hours, long enough for me to text my midwife and let her know, just in case anything progressed. I went to bed that night wondering if I would be woken up to more intense ones, but nothing happened. Bill got home the next day, much to our shared relief, and over the next ten days probably every other night I had the same thing happen, hours of contractions that never escalated but were definitely the early labor type.

June 21st then 22nd roll around. I was really hoping the 22nd was it, but by the evening it was apparent nothing would happen that day. I was discouraged. It felt like I was going to be pregnant forever. That seems absurd to type, but the feeling is very real. It just feels interminable at the end. Chloe had descended so far in my pelvis that everything hurt. I couldn't sit, move, walk, do anything without just being uncomfortable or in pain, so time was moving very slow. I was finding it very hard to sleep as well, so the exhaustion was hitting hard. Bill gave me a blessing that night at about 11pm that was comforting but also left me feeling like I'd be pregnant at least another full day. He said I would get a better night's sleep and that she would come very soon and be healthy and well. We headed to bed and I fell asleep quickly.

Side note, despite feeling like I was going to be pregnant forever, and so ready to be done, I actually didn't feel particularly ready for labor. Previously my shortest labor was 12 hours with Aaron and it was intense. Genevieve was so big that the end of her labor was really crazy hard too. Comparatively speaking, my entire pregnancy with Chloe I felt way better than with the last one, but those last few days were so uncomfortable that I was having a really hard time feeling like I had more to give in labor, and I expected to need more. So I wanted to be done, but at the same time I was worried I wouldn't have what I needed to get through this last hurdle.

Okay, back to falling asleep on the 22nd. I don't remember if it was two or three times, but between 11pm when I fell asleep and 12:45am when I woke up for good, I got up two or three times to use the bathroom. Each time it felt like I had been asleep forever, and I had this band of pain in my abdomen that was really annoying. But each time I went back to sleep until 12:45am when I got up one more time and the thought suddenly hit me that maybe labor had started and it wasn't feeling like contractions because I hadn't realized that's what they were, so I wasn't relaxing. As soon as I tweaked my mental view of what I was feeling and relaxed, the band of pain transformed into contractions, and not just little ones, minute-long contractions coming every three minutes. I tried to lay down and sleep some more, but only made it through about three or four before I rolled over and woke Bill up and told him I didn't think I was going to be sleeping anymore tonight.

I almost felt silly calling my midwife at this point, but you can't argue with that kind of intensity and time in between contractions, so despite only having had five or six contractions, I went ahead and texted her to come. She's an hour from me, so that factored into my reason for texting so fast as well. It turned out to be a very good choice.

Bill and I immediately got to work prepping for the birth. He worked on blowing up the tub and getting it filled up, I started gathering supplies: the birthing kit, plus all the miscellaneous things like bowls and trays and towels from around the house. I was having steady contractions still, but for the first time I had no back labor, so when Bill tried to come and push on my back like he had every other one of our babies, I sent him off because it wasn't needed and didn't feel good. Instead I just leaned against doorways or tables and rocked my hips back and forth. That seemed to be the trick to work through each contraction. This went on for about an hour. The hose got all tangled up, so we had to fix that before we could fill the tub. Aside from that, the prep work went smoothly.

Somewhere around 2am one of the assistant midwives showed up. She immediately got to work setting up the stuff they would need during the actual delivery. At this point I was hanging out in the living room leaning against the desk, rocking through each contraction. They had upped in intensity some. I was having 30-second long less intense ones followed by maybe a ten-second break and then a full minute long hardcore one that I started to need to vocalize a bit to make it through. I had a hard time believing it, but I also started to feel her moving down I guess into the birthing canal. It had only been an hour!

This whole time everything was so surreal. I had such a hard time believing things could really be progressing as fast as they seemed to be and I didn't want to lose my mental edge if I had hours ahead of me. Now is probably the best time to mention what turned out to be the secret weapon. Way early on in my pregnancy my midwife told me about an herbal mix she recommended called Gentle Birth. I got it the same place I got my birthing kit. It involved taking a bit of a tincture three times a day for the last five weeks of my pregnancy. It tasted a bit like dirt, but nothing too onerous. I'm convinced this is what made such a difference for me this go around. I realize every birth is different, but this is my fourth and the other three had marked similarities that just didn't happen this go around. I've never dilated early the other times. While I didn't get checked at all, I'm convinced all those nights of early labor really were doing something and I was much further along Wednesday night. I've never had contractions hit so fast and so consistent. They weren't particularly intense, and that has never happened either. Basically everything was faster, less intense, and easier, and I couldn't recommend higher to any friend of mine that is pregnant or will be to try this stuff out. If it has any similar effect for you it will be worth it. It's not even expensive stuff!

Alright, back to 2am or so. I'm in what I realized after the fact was transition. I'm having super long contractions that I have to vocalize a bit to get through, but honestly, are still totally doable. I'm feeling her move down. I'm beginning to feel like I might want to push soon, which totally blows my mind. The pool is finally filled enough and I decide it's a good time to get in. I wasn't sure how it would feel, but turns out it felt amazing. The warm water was great. My actual midwife showed up about then, at like 2:20-2:25am. I have just a few minutes' break from contractions while I imagine my body adjusted to being in the warm water and how good that felt. Then I have one contraction and I kind of move around to figure out how to best work through it. The next one that comes I'm leaning against the pool side and it's the first one that feels like it gets ahead of me on the pain scale, but I have a feeling to push and I do a bit and that brings instant relief and I can handle it again. Again, I'm mind blown at this point. The next contraction comes, I feel again like pushing, so I do, but honestly, it was at like 60 percent of what I have ever pushed before with my other kids. I was worried about tearing and I didn't want to go too fast. And guess what? Out comes her head! What?!?! Unlike my first two, where I felt relief after their heads came out, I still was in pain at this point. I couldn't tell if I was still in the middle of a contraction, but since I was still hurting I figured I was, so I pushed again, also not at full strength by any means, and what do you know, out she comes! Ah! What relief! I tell you, that is possibly the best feeling in life, that moment after having a baby. Such relief. Such happiness. The midwife laid her on my chest and wrapped a towel around her and we just lay there, marveling and what had just happened. It was 2:41am, less than two hours after I had been woken to my first contraction, and I had my baby in my arms.

Chloe didn't want to nurse at that point. She was good to just chill in my arms and look around. She was super alert for probably three hours that morning. We stayed in the pool until I delivered the placenta, then I transferred to my couch, which was right next to it, and chilled some more. The midwives eventually checked Chloe out, weighed her, etc. She weighed 7 lbs 8 oz, was 20 inches long, and had blonde hair.

The midwives took care of literally everything else. Eventually Chloe did nurse and they set things up so we could go to sleep. They cleaned up the pool, all the supplies, washed any towels. It was incredible. I literally woke up later that morning to a spotless house and a new baby, as if nothing had happened. I can't say enough for how amazing that was. The whole reason I did a home birth in the first place was because we have so little access to midwives where I live that the drive felt too long to us. We opted to do it at home, and that turned out to be the best choice.

And that's about it. This was by far my best birth and best recovery. I'm still in that recovery period, but I didn't need stitches, so aside from generalized soreness and tiredness and all the exciting parts of getting used to nursing again and such, things are progressing as well as they possibly can. It's wonderful. She sleeps like a dream. Like the first few nights she slept eight hours. Holy cow, not being completely exhausted makes a huge difference! We're sticking pretty close to home, minus a few grocery store trips, and otherwise just getting used to being a family of six. The other kids absolutely adore her. So much love is flowing from them to her. She's taking it well. :)

And the best part of all of this? We're done. We have our four kids. That's what we always wanted and she definitely feels like our book end. So this is my last recovery, and I'm just enjoying everything about a new baby for this last time. It's a really delightful feeling and I'm kind of reveling in it.