Welcome Home

Seth was very excited to get home.  He was not excited to ride in his car seat.  He also wasn't fond of getting dressed.  Lance said it was because I put dress clothes on him.  I guess newborns don't like collared shirts.  They just don't know how cute they are in them.

Mia and Chloe were thrilled to have him home so they could hold him as much as possible.

Even though he wasn't the little sister they were hoping for, they were still enamored with him.

I think I was most happy to be home.  I hate being in the hospital.  They bug you constantly.  The beds are uncomfortable and the food isn't that great.  You'd think for as much as it costs, they'd have figured out how to spoil us just a little.  My mom said when she had babies they would serve the new moms steak.  That would have been nice.  If I hadn't had a c-section with Chloe, I think I would have wanted to have a couple of babies at home.  Lance thinks I'm crazy, so it's probably for the best we never had to have that discussion.  

Two days later Seth was already more alert.  I can't get over how big he is yet he still looks tiny since my other kids are so big now. 

Having a new baby in the house seems to make everybody tired.  This was one of the very rare times when I had all three little boys asleep at the same time!  Of course, it was more important to take a picture than to try to sleep myself!  It didn't last long anyways.

My boys were very interested in my changing belly.  After a couple of weeks Tyler said to me, "Your belly is getting flat again."  Thank goodness somebody is noticing!  I'd have to say I was really quite concerned about the rate at which my belly returned to "normal" this time around.  After all, this was my sixth pregnancy, he was huge and I'm getting older.  Skin just isn't as elastic in your late thirties as it is in your mid twenties.  Much to my surprise, my belly did go back to "normal" much faster than I expected.  Of course my summer clothes seem to be a little more snug than my winter clothes, so I took advantage of my maternity shorts for a while.  

Isaac and Gabe are about 22 months apart so I didn't think 19 months would be too much different.  I guess I didn't take into account how much more mellow Isaac is.  He's always been so patient and calm.  Tyler is quite the opposite and was always into everything and very busy.  Gabe is definitely more like Tyler.  He's figured out how to use a chair to unlock the dead bolt to try to sneak outside.  He is climbing everything.  It doesn't help that he sees his older siblings using stools to get into the fridge and cupboards.  He just copies them and gets where ever he wants.  He opens the stove, then climbs up onto the stove.  He does the same with the dishwasher.  I got a lock for the stove and that stopped him from opening the stove to climb on it.  He was starting to play with the buttons when he was on the stove.  He can still use a stool to climb up on it, but since that makes more noise, I can get to him before he's into too much trouble.

Gabe loves to yell at Brady.  He yells, "Bady!" over and over and over.  It's hilarious the first 5 times.  He doesn't stop though.  Poor Seth hardly has a chance at staying asleep.  He's a very sensitive sleeper, which really isn't fair since he's the seventh.  I've kept him around the noise and the kids while he's sleeping, hoping he'll get used to it, but he just really prefers silence.  So he doesn't do too many long stretches of sleep unless someone is holding him and threatening anyone who makes a noise.  I'm perfectly happy to hold him as much as possible though.  I know how fast babies grow up, so I try to enjoy it as much as possible.  I only wish I didn't have so many other things to do!  All those other kids seem to want to be fed once in a while too.

This is Seth at four days old.  He looks like most one month olds!  He was also not happy that I put him down.

When Seth was a week old we took our first outing as whole family up to Lance's sister's place for a church thing.  Our nephew was being ordained to the office of Elder. (It's a position within the priesthood generally given before going on a mission or later if a mission isn't served.  I bet that clears up nothing if you're not familiar with the priesthood within the LDS church.  Feel free to look it up at lds.org.  It's just more than I want to write right now.)  Anyway, I got this cute white shirt onesie at Kid to Kid before Seth was born.  I think he wore it once before he outgrew it.  I'd like to pretend he was very content and happy like the second picture, but he was more like the first picture the entire time I was putting it on.  And when he screams, he screams.  Once he had it on, he was adorable though.

 He made up for some of that screaming when I caught him smiling in his sleep.  I just love him so much.  Being a mom is one of the most amazing things ever.  I feel so blessed to have my kids.