3 Months Ago...

Three days ago it was Michael's 3 month birthday! Yes, 3 months ago I was making a rapid postpartum recovery all the while marveling at the awful, yet wonderful labor and delivery and the little miracle that arrived promptly at 4:40am. (I think...:) I attribute everything going so well to everyone's faithful prayers and our Father's bountiful blessings He continues to bestow on us all through His grace. Thank you all for your concerns and dedicated prayers - I know it would have fared very differently had we neglected such an essential aspect to this whole past pregnancy and delivery. I truly felt covered in prayers!

Shaking this previous pregnancy's weight off hasn't been such a breeze, but then, I didn't expect it would. If I had trouble with the first, there is no doubt the third would be triple the difficulty, right? Well, I am happy to say after experimenting with various food ratios, caloric counting techniques and fun new exercise videos, I have fallen back on my old standby that has gotten me real results after the other two children. I simply stick to a very simple meal plan that has been tried and tested by me and exercise my *ahem* off! Yes, that Burn it Up DVD is a miracle - especially to my lower half! So, I am happy to announce that two weeks into my old routine has produced a 3 1/2 lb weight loss! Yeah! What is my secret you ask? Ha! Would it matter? Everyone's body responds differently to diets, so mine is just tailored to fit me - it might not help others, but if you're curious, I will indulge you if you insist.

We are continuing to make improvements to our home. Even though Seth has taken some more time off work, he is never idle! Right now we have removed to old entertainment center and large family table from the living room and have replaced it with a beautiful 120 gal. aquarium. I love the way the room feels so much more spacious and the aquarium adds a unique atmosphere. We will eventually have a flat screen mounted to the wall, but for now we are enjoying to novelty of a family room without a tv! :) Seth has also built another shelf for our pantry and plans to build at least three more in various rooms of our house to help with organization. I am so thrilled and blessed to be married to such a handy man!

Well, I need to get ready for bed. Okay, in all honestly, I need to exercise, shower off, put a load of clothes in the dryer and then crash! Wish me luck!

How It All Went Down

So, I don't plan on making my posts so frequently but I thought I should post how everything went for us the other day at the doctor's office.

I woke up bright and early and nursed Michael. After getting the girl's their breakfast and dressed and ready to go, I straightened up the house and put baby down for a nap. While he napped I exercised and then showered. I thought I was doing pretty good - quite on top of things I thought proudly. I even had called the doctor, confirmed our appointments, found the address, entered it into the GPS and placed it in the van ready to go. All this on four hours sleep the night before!

I hadn't eaten yet so I was trying to make a fruit milkshake for Seth and me before getting out the door. As I tried to pry the frozen strawberries apart with a sharp knife, my knife slipped and I literally stabbed my wrist! I was shock and I knew it was deeper than a small little kitchen mishap. I quickly plunged my hand under cold running water and applied pressure right behind the wound to prevent too much bleeding. Seth calmly took care of me (he could tell I was unnerved by the whole thing, but not panicky) and bandaged me up. I realized something like this would have been minor to him and he would still have put in a rigorous full day's worth of work had he been in my shoes. I decided to be stoic, but it hurt more than I had thought. I kept my hand above my heart and began trying to give the girls a basic lesson in first aid - never miss a teaching moment!

We got packed up in the car and began our little adventure. Usually when these kind of things happen (doctor's appointments, shots, confrontations, basically anything unpleasant) I'm pretty fine coping with it until reality hits in the day or hours before the actual even. Seth usually has a pretty good grip on reality from the get go. I usually am thinking, what's the big deal and then I start to think, oh this is kind-of scary. So, I began getting slightly apprehensive, but tried not to dwell on what is coming up too much. I was really tired and tried to take a nap in the car. I didn't want to snap at the girls even though I explained to them I am trying to sleep and they continued to ask me questions, tell on one another, and request services from me. Seth detected the irritation in my voice and told the girls to only address him for the remainder of the drive. (The appointment was in Raleigh - about 1hr 45min away.)

We arrived 25 minutes before the appointment and I went in with Michael while Seth helped the girls out of the car, etc. I had to go to the bathroom, so I first went there and then changed Michael's diaper. When I got into the office Seth was already there with the girls waiting. He thought I had checked in, but I hadn't. The waiting room had been empty when we arrived, but once I walked in there were several other people waiting. Basically, we might have been seen earlier had I not made the bathroom stop. As it turned out, we had to wait the extra 25 minutes as well as an additional 45 minutes at least. (So remind me, what are the purpose of appointments?) Oh yes, and we also discovered Katrina had come with no shoes! I had told the girls to put their shoes on after the little kitchen accident and they are usually so obedient when I give orders (especially Katrina) that I rarely have to check up on them - ok, plus I was a little preoccupied.

Once finally taken in to the mysterious maze of little rooms, Michael and I began our wait again after a nurse asked a few questions. She told me to get him undressed so she could weigh him. You all know how cold those medical buildings are! We waited for almost 10 minutes then the Dr. came in a began to get the procedure going. Since they weren't going to use an anesthetic I brought orajel to help. (hey - it couldn't hurt, right?) Michael hated the orajel and that got him so upset! Then, while he was wailing the nurse decided to weigh him and the doctor told me to bring Shiona in to see if she needed her's clipped too. Thankfully a quick examination revealed she was fine, so I quickly return her to Seth and Katrina in the waiting room and dashed back to hold my little crying baby. They were ready for the procedure and I helped hold him down and told him how much I love him and am so sorry he has to go through this. It was an incredibly simple thing - just a snip of the tissue with a pair of sharp scissors and then they applied gauze for a few minutes.

Michael was beside himself and when I removed the gauze and tried to nurse him he refused. There are only so many options left to soothe an upset baby when you can't nurse. I walked him around and sang to him. The doctor wanted me to stay and he would come back and check how things were healing in a few minutes. I kept trying to nurse, but he would try and then scream. I think it was more because he couldn't get the hang of the new sensation rather than the pain that was bothering him the most. After about 12 minutes he fell asleep. The doctor came in a few an eternity later and after a swift examination said it looked good and we were free to go! What relief! As I walked back to the front room to pay I could sense that it had fared no better for Seth in the waiting room with two very active girls! Ha! The story he had to tell me later. Poor man - and I had requested he accompany me because I thought it'd be too difficult to take all three by myself. Did I feel guilty! (Of course, you all know he would have insisted on helping anyways!)

It was almost four when we ate lunch at Subway. It was freezing, I could feel mastitice coming on, Seth was tired, I was achy, blah, blah, blah. We were so happy when we finally got back home. And I was so relieved when Michael finally was able to nurse a few hours later. He was a little fussier than normal, but not inconsolable.

At the end of the day, I was just so happy to have it behind me. I set my alarm every four hours so Michael would nurse all through the night and help me get over the infection quickly. It only lasted a few days and it was more mild that previous ones.

Thank the Lord for His grace - sometimes it is the only think that you can see got you through sometime. I know I probably sound like a spoiled child compainling about trivial things, but God is there for us in each circumstance and whether it is life and death or just general overwhelming circumstances, He is real and there for us.

Improvements

I thought this would be a good title considering everything that has been going on. Seth has been working like only a Robinson can to fix up a little outside of our house. He and his dad poured concrete along the side of our house earlier this week. Then they began building a little (or rather quite large for us!) pavilion adjacent our back deck so we can sit outside and still be sheltered. Just today Seth finished shingling the roof (with a bit of my assistance too, I might add!). He always does such a wonderful job. I'm so proud of his work. And of course we are ever grateful to his dad for being so kind and helpful. Seth said he couldn't have done it without his dad's assistance.

This has already yielded untold joy for our girls. They have loved being able to ride their bikes right outside and actually be able to do chalk. There are many other benefits to this for us as well. I won't have to park in the mud and unload groceries in the rain; I have the option of pulling right up to the side entrance (our kitchen) and unloading there if the weather is bad. Eventually we will probably enclose the pavilion on three sides and put a table, some chairs and a BBQ grill in there.

On other levels there have been improvements too. Thank you all for your prayers for Michael. I think his skin is slowly getting better. We are narrowing down what may be the culprit/s. His skin still feels rough and patchy but I've noticed it a little softer and less red.

I feel like I have been making some personal improvements as well. For one thing, I have been able to exercise every day this past week except once. This is so encouraging for me because I feel like schedules and goals are falling into place. I was able to school the girls and get exercising in on most days while Michael napped. I am sooo grateful God has graciously given us a very easy, content baby. He is a dream for us. Mind you he is not without his fussy times, but they are so manageable! I am very grateful God gave us a more challenging child first. It helped us not expect things to be too easy, so we are able to be more thankful when things are going so well instead of being all uptight and frustrated when they aren't.

Another thing is I've really been making an effort to not put things off - even for a few minutes (because I tend to forget after that anyway!). I am a terrible procrastinator, but I am slowly realizing how irresponsible that is of me and hard it is for my sweet husband. I don't ever want to be like the messenger in Proverbs who you can't rely on. I feel like because of my forgetfulness Seth doesn't feel like he can completely trust me to get things done without him having to remind and check up on me. I really want to be like the virtuous woman in Proverbs 31 where it talks about the "heart of her husband doth safely trust in her" - that is my hearts prayer. So, that being said, I am trying to be a doer! I am trying to do bookkeeping everyday, or at least when there are new receipts to account for. I've made numerous scheduled transactions so I won't forget a bill or an automatic payment and I am trying to keep on top of filing so it doesn't pile up and become a huge project every few months. (Yes, I know - that is terrible, but I've done that many times!) I am also realizing that I need to do at least two if not three loads of laundry a day, and am also realizing the benefits of doing dishes three times a day as opposed to once or twice. Some things do get overlooked and with each child I have to relax my standards of cleanliness a little bit, but I try to keep the house going and tidy for all of our sanity!

Tuesday Michael will be going to the doctors to have his tongue clipped. He was born with a webbed tongue, also known as being tongue-tied (Yes, that is a real term, not just a cliche.) Seth had one too when he was little and got it clipped. Fortunatly it hasn't interfered with him being able to nurse, but if we leave it alone it will interfere with his speech later on. Once we realized Michael was webbed, we checked the other girl's out and discovered Shiona is slightly tongue-ties as well! So, we made an appointment for her to be looked at and possibly have her's clipped too. Her's is not as severe as Michael's. Please pray that the procedure will go well, there will be no complications, little pain/discomfort and a speedy recovery. Thank you all so much!

And on that note I am going to sign off. I will post a few pictures of Seth getting the outside ready for concrete and them laying it.