I had a huge design deadline I absolutely had to make (and I did!) and then there is school stuff and various other kid stuff, and getting the baby weighed (he gained back to his birth weight and is Mr Average all round… how nice!) and taking a shower once in a while, not to mention food and sleep requirements. So yeah.. crazy crazy around the pickle farm.

And yet, I still seem to spend an awful lot of time sitting on my bum with a baby propped on my shoulder (and spewing down my back)… so I put that time to good use you know and spend it clicking around the interwebs.

So here’s a few good links from my baby spew moments…

I am totally in love and incredibly envious of the gorgeous lush green children’s garden over at A Handmade Childhood. I’m already making plans for spring seed buying and planting!

The Adult Privilege Check list at Shut Up Sit Down is a very thought provoking read in deed… not sure my brain is up for such deep thinking at present but I can’t stop pondering this.

I think these nifty paper garlands would make awesome christmas decorations.

And I want to make this hat for Quatro… actually one for each child would be good, if I could just get my hands on some wool jumpers….

Oh and one day I am going to make one of these awesome super sized marble paintings (as seen at Let The Children Play) to hang on our wall!

And if you happen to be a digi scrapper (or would like to be!) you should pop on over to pickleberrypop because it is our fourth birthday and there are lots of goodies to share! Almost the whole shop is 30% off and there are loads of lolly bags (grab bags) full of great stuff for only $3.50 US… but only until August 3rd!
This is my lolly bag…get it while you can!

And of course, it’s Friday! Time to flog ya blog with the lovely new hostess Lori from Random Ramblings of a Stay at Home Mum.

Happy Weekend everyone!

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Sometimes my words come out of my children’s mouths…. and it’s rather…. disconcerting.

Muski;
“For goodness sake!!”
“Holy Crap!!”
“Actually…”

Zoe;
“Seriously…. no I’m really serious…”
“Big buggery bollocks!”

Izzy;
“SHIT… I mean shoot.”

Thank goodness the little one doesn’t speak!

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Actually we did, it’s just that I was too busy to take any photos or blog about it.

But we played today.

We played and made Mr Potato Head plastic cup alien play dough monsters….

A day late, and a little short on details, but joining in Childhood101′s We Play link up… head on over for a visit to find see lots more great play ideas.

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Take the three names you all agree on. Allocate a number to each of those names and then use the Pony Trouble game (with the popamatic bubble) and see which number comes up. To be fair, make it a best of five game….

That is how you name your son.

According to my husband that is… lucky for him the right name won.

Noah William 'Quatro'

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When your dummy first belonged to your big brother and in times of dire emergency you are expected to give it back to him for a little while!

When your mother comes to check on you to make sure you are not dead because surely no one can sleep through the yelling and screaming that is happening only inches from your head.

When everyone spends hours trying to decide which of your siblings you most look like.

When your name is put to a family vote… or possibly a twitter poll.

When your mother calls ‘dunking you in the bath between your two sisters and your brother’ for half a minute a decent wash.

When you miss out on cuddles because everyone is arguing over who’s turn it is to hold you so your mother says in exasperation “fine… no one gets to hold the baby then!”

In other news….

It’s Flog ya Blog Friday and it has a new home this week! Head on over to Random Ramblings of a Stay At Home Mum for some great reads!

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In the early hours of a Saturday morning a boy was born, our fourth child. This is the story of his birth, but it can not be told in isolation. The story of his birth is intertwined with those of his brother and sisters. The strings that wrap around their stories, criss-cross each other so many times in so many ways that one story becomes part of the next and the next.

So I need to start at the beginning, almost seven years ago, with the birth of our twins.

I never for a moment thought that I would have twins. I had other ideas of how pregnancy and birth would be when we decided to try for a baby – a happy, healthy pregnancy and a peaceful, natural, birth centre birth. Instead it became a carefully monitored, high risk, scary pregnancy, ending with a c-section and two tiny prem babies who spent weeks in hospital. My world changed.

While it was not the birth I planned it was the birth I needed.

Without the monitoring and the specialist obstetric care, without the c-section at 29 weeks and the specialist neonatal care … without any one of those scary things our girls would not have survived. It was not easy, and we are not without our scars, but it was the birth we needed and while I wish it had happened differently, I do not regret it.

When I became pregnant with our third child, I knew it would be different.

Logically I knew that the reasons the girls were born early couldn’t happen, wouldn’t happen, to a single baby. Logically I knew that I had just as much chance of a long and healthy pregnancy and natural birth as anyone else. I thought things through, I weighed up some options and I choose the path that felt right to me. I would birth this baby naturally, normally.

His was an easy pregnancy, sure I threw up a lot, but physically and emotionally I felt wonderful… until around 41 weeks when I began to doubt myself. My body had never gone into labour without severe trauma, maybe it never would? At 42 weeks I hit rock bottom, I wanted another c-section. Two days later, a quiet, slow, long labour began.

After 24 hours of fairly painless labour and an hour or so of pushing my first boy baby was born into my arms and my world changed.

The adrenalin pumped through my veins for weeks after his birth. I was on top of the world. I felt powerful. I felt incredible. Despite people telling me that I had made the wrong choices, that I was crazy, that I would never get what I wanted, when even I had begun to doubt myself, I birthed my baby, into my arms.

My first two births couldn’t have been more different. Both amazing and miraculous in their own way, but poles apart. And this time? Our fourth child, my third birth… how would it be this time?

This pregnancy was physically harder than either of the others. I didn’t suffer any of the really nasty pregnancy symptoms or issues so I can’t really complain, but this time around I felt old, physically tired, and old. This baby burnt my ribs and made everything I ate taste terrible. He kicked and wiggled and hiccuped all day and night. In the last weeks as his head got lower and lower (something that never happened with M) my ankles swelled and I waddled like an uncomfortable duck.

It was the end of the school term, the middle of the year, and we were busy, really busy. School stuff, a third birthday and a ballet concert. I wished and wished this baby out a week before his due date but he wasn’t playing along… so I accepted that this would probably be another 42 week pregnancy and got on with life.

I wasn’t ready for labour when it kicked in late Friday night. I wasn’t ready, so I dismissed the regular, slightly painful crampiness as a result of eating too much Chinese food at the birthday dinner. I went to bed, but it didn’t go away, so I got up and got online… I needed a distraction.

I tweeted with the lovely Jayne for an hour or two in the middle of the night, before I finally decided that if this was labour and the contractions were around 3 minutes apart and hurt somewhat…. hang on… they hurt? They never hurt this early on with Muski…. hmm if they hurt and are three minutes apart, perhaps I should do something?

So I warned our babysitter and packed a bag as the Baldy Boy crammed in an hour or so sleep before I woke him. I’d decided that I really didn’t want to be stuck in the car if things got any more hurty than they already were… I was ready to go.

The fabulous Shae arrived and we left a little before 3am.

Round-abouts SUCK when you are in labour. They really, really suck.

We got to the hospital at about 3:40am (The Baldy Boy swears he didn’t speed, there was just no traffic at all, which is a good thing). It was dark and quiet and freezing cold.

We ‘settled in’ which means I huffed and puffed through a few more contractions while trying to answer questions and we monitored the baby and the contractions for a little while. It was like dejavou hearing the regular ‘doof doof’ sound of the baby’s heart beat…. I’d heard it so often with both the girl’s pregnancy and Muski’s. It was strong and regular and never wavered…

At 4 am I asked if the midwife would check to see what was going on…. she reported a big bulging bag of water and that she couldn’t feel my cervix at all. I’m not sure if that made me feel better or worse…. it all seemed so fast, too fast and it hurt, it didn’t hurt last time, it wasn’t supposed to hurt!

As if the ‘fully dilated’ report was a button things suddenly switched from regular hurty contractions to ‘holly crap hurt a lot, I’m never ever doing this ever again, bugger that I am pushing’ in a matter of seconds. Then there was a loud ‘pop-splat-gush’ and midwife, husband and even me, despite not having much time for breathing let alone talking, stopped for a split second to marvel at the force with which my waters broke, shot across the room and hit the wall. “Woah” was the resounding response from all of us.

It was all crazy pushing, yelling, crying, swearing and “I’m never ever EVER doing this ever again” from there on in. The lovely on call obstetrician arrived just as he was crowning and I was wondering, in a crazy moment of complete clarity, why I didn’t just sign up for that c-section – because you know I could have had a c-section, all I had to do was ask.

Muski’s birth was pretty much pain free. It was uncomfortable and hard work but it didn’t really hurt. I didn’t have that ‘ring of fire’ as he crowned…I just felt pressure and exhaustion. This was different, very different.

As this baby began to crown I began to cry… I couldn’t possibly do this. I pushed, his head slowly inched out, then stopped. I lost it. I started yelling at everyone.
“I can’t stay like this, someone do something” I pleaded.
Everyone tried to reassure me that I wouldn’t be stuck like that forever but I didn’t buy it. They told me to just push with the next contraction, but there wasn’t one. For what seemed like forever (but was probably only a minute or two) the contractions simply stopped. I’d been willing the darn things to slow down a bit in the previous hour and now, just when I wanted them to ramp up and get this thing out of me, they stopped…..

Finally another contraction hit and he crowned…. K quietly slipped the chord from around his neck and then he was born…. in a crazy mess of yelling and tears….

It was just after 5am. Six hours from the first twinge. Three hours from when regular contractions began and just over and hour after we arrived at the hospital. My life changed.

As long slow and relaxed as Muski’s labour and birth had been Quatro’s was fast and full-on and intense. It grounded me in a totally different way. This time I didn’t want to yell from the roof tops, this time I wanted nothing more than to stare at my baby in quiet amazement which is just what we did for the next couple of hours.

With each of my births the resounding response from me has been ‘Wow’.

Said with relief…”Wow! I have twins, and they are alive and doing ok”

Shouted from the roof tops….”Wow! I birthed my baby into my arms, I am awesome!”

and this time…

Whispered quietly with awe….”wow…. just wow.”

Giving birth changed me each time. ‘
Each time in different ways.
Each time in the same way.

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Our kids have a good combination of book loving genes from both sides of the family, but I suspect their solid love of reading also has a lot to do with the fact that they’ve been read to from a very young age.

The girls were given gifts of books from family and friends before they were even born and I have very fond memories of their Aunty Sarah holding one tiny teeny baby at a time while she read to them when they first came home from hospital. Muski was included in story time from a very early age and even the smallest picklebum has been read to almost every night since he was two days old… well he listens, sometimes eats and sometimes sleeps through the girls reading their school readers and then me reading to them before bed.

There was never any doubt that our kids would be book lovers, which is great, because I think reading and enjoying books is hugely important for everyone!

So I have to confess I was quite excited to be contacted about the Babies Love Books Young Readers Program.

Funded by the Victorian State Government, The Young Readers Program aims to promote the importance of reading to young children and support families and the community to improve literacy outcomes for children. A ‘rhyme time’ booklet and DVD is given to families at a baby’s four month maternal and child heath visit and two year olds receive an Australian picture book. Recently major libraries around Melbourne hosted special events focussing on fun ways for parents to introduce reading to their young children and you can find information on other events at the State Library’s ‘What’s On’ page

I was particularly excited to see Alison Lester named as one of the Babies Love Books ambassadors. The pickle kids and I are huge fans of her work. And, it gets better… the Big girls and I were able to send Alison a list of interview questions! Here are her fabulous replies!

Izzy – My favourite book that you wrote is Magic Beach. Which one is your favourite book?

Alison – I love magic beach too. Its hard to choose a favourite, its like having to say which one of your kids you like the best.

Izzy – Do any of your books have fairies in them? Or do you think you might write a book about fairies sometime?

Alison – I’m not much of a fairy person, though I like the idea of being able to be very small and get inside things.

Izzy – I like your books because they have beautiful illustrations and they have good stories. How long does it take you to write a book?

Alison – It takes ages because I don’t sit at my desk very often. If I worked every day I could do a book in about 2 months.

Zoe – My favourite book of yours is Imagine. My favourite part is the snow, which is your favourite part?

Alison – I like underwater the best.

Zoe - I am learning to read some of your books on my own. Do you like to read your stories out loud?

Alison – Yes, often when I’m planning a book I say it out loud when I am running or riding my horse and it helps work the story out.

Zoe – I really like the pictures in your books. How do you make them?

Alison – Usually I draw with a 2B pencil on any old paper, lots of quick drawings to work it out, then I trace the best one on to watercolour paper, and ink it and paint it with watercolours

A big thank you to Alison Lester for taking the time to answer the girl’s questions (I think Izzy is taking a printed version of this blog post for show and tell on Friday!). Now off you go and read to your kids, even if they are only little, it’s important and fun!

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When Muski asked to get out water play this afternoon, I thought for a moment about finding the plastic tub and setting up the little table with towels and various accessories…. I also thought about just saying no. It’s cold and it wasn’t long before we had to leave for school pick up… Then I stopped and thought about how we could make this work for everyone, how we could keep it simple and make it easy.

I filled the kitchen sink with a little bit of soapy water, dumped in some dirty plastic bowls and cups etc and passed him an apron. Muski spent the next thirty minutes, washing, re-washing, stacking, and drying this dishes.

He got to play with water, and I got the dishes washed! Simple. Easy.

We are playing along with Childhood101′s We Play Link up again this week… Loads of great play ideas to share so go take a look!

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Nancy from [A]musing Mother asked –
What do you do when your children tell you they are bored?

Thankfully the ‘I’m bored’s don’t happen too often in our house. I think it is one of the few positives to having twins – they always have someone to play with, so they don’t look to me for inspiration or motivation very often. And even though Muski is home on his one while the girls are at school he very rarely pulls out the ‘I’m bored’ line.

It does happen occasionally, and my stock standard reply is
“Well find something to do and then you won’t be bored.”
Sometimes, if I’m feeling generous, I’ll reel off a list of suggestions of things they could do – go outside, draw, get out a puzzle, etc etc etc. Usually they don’t like any of my suggestions and come up with something on their own anyway!

Nancy also asked –
What’s your best brain fart? Or placenta brain or whatever.

You mean I have to pick one? Just one, crazy, no brained moment when there are so many?? Here’s one of the best…

I burn myself when I’m pregnant. On the oven, on the fire place, on the iron. I simply forget that these things are hot and that the ouchy tingling hot sensation is my skin burning and I need to put that thing down or take my hand/arm/stomach away like now!

My lovely friend Nic asked –

What is your favourite Parenting book? and non parenting book?

Parenting books… I confess I don’t read all that many these days, to many good blogs to read!. Back in my beginning baby days I discovered Pinky McKay and I love her straight forward, practical, go with your instincts advice, and she is just as awesome in person. And if you want to stretch your brain and really be pushed to think read some Alfie Kohn he’s very interesting.

And non-parenting books…. I’m not very good at picking favourites. I’ve loved loads of books over the years but nothing that stands out as the one and only, best book ever.

Lately I’ve been enjoying reading ‘teen fiction’ by Isobelle Carmody, after reading her children’s book series Little Fur with my girls. I also enjoyed reading the entire Narnia Chronicles… I read the Lion and The Witch and the Wardrobe as a child but had never read any of the other books, which are all fabulous.

I also enjoy a nice, easy, girly, read from time to time…Marian Keyes has always served me well on that front.

My equally lovely friend Laura asked –
What if anything do you miss most about life before children? What in your life today wouldn’t you change for the world?

What do I miss??
Sleeping in.
Quiet.
Earning my own money.

What I wouldn’t change?
The two things that I really really REALLY never thought would end up the way they are and the two things that drive me the most insane are also the two things I would never ever change.
My family.
Where we live.

Leanne at Deep Fried Fruit shared her party trick and then asked me –
What’s your best party trick?

You know, I’ve been wracking my brains and I can’t come up with a single thing I can do that is worthy of the ‘party trick’ title…. Maybe I need to start working on building up my skills in this area!

Disclaimer – if this post is full of typos and weird spelling errors and makes no sense at all, I blame lack of sleep.

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Time for a few gratefuls….

This week I am thankful.

* I am thankful for blogging friends who knit gorgeous cardigans for my new boy! Thank you so much to the lovely Pixie who knitted the gorgeous cardigan Quatro is wearing in the above photo!

* I am thankful to be able to listen to my big girls read each night and watch them swell with pride as they master each new book.

* I am thankful for a baby who sleeps, even when he doesn’t.

* I am thankful for my Mum.

* I am thankful my children have an awesome father who can comfort his over tired, cranky, upset tummy baby for half an hour while I have a bath.

* I am thankful for all the lovely comments, congratulations and good wishes we’ve gotten from everyone at school this week as they’ve met our new boy.

* I am thankful for orange juice and wagon wheels.

* I am thankful for a Middle Boy who sits next to his baby brother and tells him about all the people who love him.

* I am thankful for my lovely OB who was on holidays when Quatro was born, but who rang me ‘just for a chat to see how you’re going’ the day he got back.

* I am thankful for our wood burning fire… it’s been brrrrr freezing around here this week!

* I’m thankful to be part of a great group of Aussie Mum Bloggers … and to be flogging my blog with Mummy Time on Flog Yo Blog Friday!

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