Halloween Fun

We had a lot of fun in October celebrating Fall and Halloween!

First we had a little party with a family in our neighborhood. We had spooky treats (the candy corn looking pizza triangles didn't work out great). We played some fun games like pumpkin balancing and make a mummy in a minute and pin the nose on the witch and Halloween bingo. Then we watched It's a Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown!

We got to go to a little Halloween play group party. It was late enough that Braden was out of kindergarten so he got to go too. 

My favorite is the Syracuse city Pumpkin Walk! There are hundreds of pumpkins and it is so fun and festive. 

Clark loves being "spooky."

Paul and I went to a face-painting-required Halloween party. He was Harry and I was Hedwig. It was a lot of fun. They played a few fun games and if you lost you have to drink awful concoctions. I was hoping to avoid it but I lost one of the games. Luckily I drew mint syrup mixed with prune juice so it wasn't too bad (fish sauce was one of the others which would have been awful!)

 We raked and played in lots of leaves. The leaves on our trees are almost all gone now!

We carved pumpkins of course! This year was Susie's first time carving on her own. She did so well! Braden painted his. Clark absolutely loves pumpkins (it must be because they are orange). He wants to go outside and look at them on our porch 5 times a day. 

We went to the Voyage Academy school parade on Halloween morning. The kids are SO CUTE! 

That night we made pizza for dinner and went trick or treating! Timothy was a sweet pea and I was a farmer. The pea costume is special because it was the same one that my little sister wore when she was a baby. Susie was a monarch butterfly, Braden was Spiderman, and Clark was the hulk. It was a cold Halloween night so we only lasted about an hour and a half but we ran into lots of friends in the neighborhood which is always so fun and saw lots of great costumes. The kids were excited to go home and glory over all their candy loot. 

Timothy's Baby Blessing

Timothy was blessed in church on October 14th. It was a happy day to be with family and celebrate our new baby. I love listening to the blessings and was able to record in Timothy's journal some of the things Paul said in his blessing. We sang Hope of Israel in sacrament meeting and looking down at little Timothy I was happy I can teach him about the gospel of Jesus Christ.  

Our Timothy Paul is Here

Olivia came to stay a  week before Timothy was born. It was so wonderful having her here. She helped so much with the kids and gave me a foot rub every night. She's an angel! She watched the kids while I went in for stress tests. 

So here's the birth story. I have been practicing relaxation for the past 5 months or so. I read the Hypnbabies book and listened to the CDs. I wanted to try unmedicated birth mostly because I wanted to see what it was like. I don't like having IVs and an epidural. I ended up needing pitocin so I had to have an IV anyway, oh well. 

I decided to be induced on Saturday 25th. I was 9 days over my due date, 80% effaced and about at a 4 as far as dilation goes. We went in a 7am and started pitocin at 8am. The contractions started right away, not bad at all. I would just relax my body and get through it. It took until 2pm until I was at 8cm. Up until then the contractions were very manageable, although they got more intense as time went on. As long as I kept my body limp during a contraction it was good! I felt empowered and excited. Because I was at an 8 my midwife thought that delivery was minutes away so she broke my water and turned off the pitocin. Unfortunately labor stalled after that. I was still having contractions but I wasn't making any progress. After two hours (now 4pm) of that I decided to have the pitocin back. That's when it turned a corner and got harder. There were a few contractions that I wasn't able to relax and those were tough. I learned that even though it required all of my focus and energy, if I could remain limp and breathe slowly it made the contractions much more bearable. If I tensed then they were far worse. Paul said it was hard to tell I was in pain because I was so still and silent. But that was the only way to bear it. I've heard women who do hypno-birthing say they are able to deliver pain free and that blows my mind because it sure was painful! My midwife had me move from one side to the other side to move things along, that was difficult. The most painful part was the 4 or 5 contractions before I wanted to push. Those seemed almost unbearable. Pushing was easy and quick. He was born at 4:42pm. I was so exhausted from labor that when they handed Timothy to me it took me a minute to come to. But I loved meeting my baby for the first time. I was very happy to have the delivery I was hoping for and so grateful for a beautiful and healthy baby boy. 

The kids came to meet him a few hours afterwards. It is so fun to see them meet their new brother. I love it! We had a few more visitors the next day before we were able to go home. It took us up until we left the hospital to finally pick a name. We went back and forth all day! But I love what we choice. Timothy Paul, we love you! 

We have been home for more than 2 weeks now. It's been great having Paul here. He takes care of everything from carpool pick up to cleaning the bathrooms. We are all taking this time to get to know our new baby and adjust to having a new little one.