What we did this (last) week with 4 kids and no Dad and a grandma half a week . .

I started this post last week and thought I should finish it, even though it is about last week.  Here is a picture of my mom and a shout out to her for all the hard labor and emotional trauma I put her through when she was here!  I love her so much and me and the kids had so much fun with her and were sad to see her go.  Because of the lateness of my baby arrival she actually got to see Chase born!  The day of his birth we spent the whole day together, walked ALOT and went to a yummy sandwich shop.  I really enjoyed spending the day with her, up until the time I was in hard labor (which in no way had anything to do with her :)).  Also because of the lateness of my baby, Greg had to go out of town and my mom had to leave, so I was by myself for three days with four kids!  Like I always say, there's no better way to get used to the fire than to throw yourself in the inferno, right? So here's what we did . . .

We held and kissed Chase alot.  Daniel and Chase's kiss looks a little too close? 

The kids and I spent alot of time in the office (getting alot of the business end of the year tax stuff done).  Scott does homework and colors and Stacey colors and does puzzles.  It's fun to have them in there with me until they start fighting over whose is better at coloring while I am on the phone, and then they get kicked out.  I also put a picture of them in the bath, because I think they are so cute in the bath and I love the positioning of the cup in the picture!  Maybe my standards have just gone way down, but I actually was super excited that everyone in the house was bathed and showered (me included).  Whenever I do something now, I think ,"Oh good, I have 4 kids now, and they are all clean." or "wow, I have four kids now, and I still can get the laundry done, have a clean kitchen once a day, etc."  I feel great just when I get "everyday" things done (or just wash my hair)  Actually the couple of days that Greg was gone, people from my church took my kids for at least 3 hours everyday, and on Saturday, someone took my kids in the morning and in the afternoon so they were gone from 8 am to 6 pm. So I had one of the YW in my ward, Wyatte come over and we took newborn pics of Chase.  It was so fun and I think she did a great job!

Here are some of my favorites . . . 

 

We all love Chase and are glad he is here and we're glad our Dad is home too!  It's great to all be together even though some of us aren't getting quite enough sleep some nights!