trying to keep up

 

I meant in the title "trying to keep up" initially about keeping up with the posts, but it pretty much sums up how I feel about life right now. Wake up and clean house and do basic errands, kid stuff is draining right now. I usually lay down during the kids rest time so I can have enough energy to finish the second half of the day. My to -do list of projects is too much to handle. I try to focus on just getting the essentials done and dinner made that extra projects can literally bring me to tears thinking about it. What a baby I am this pregnancy! Rob was home last week for 5 days and caught me on an emotional day and wasn't quite sure what to do with me...I am not one to cry in front of anybody, even him so he babied me for the day. I told him that it is just something I do these days because I get so overwhelmed with everything and being so tired and sick and hurting....and feeling useless to do such simple things like put on my shoes or shave my legs, or just sleep at night...

 

 

 This is the 8 mth belly that is getting gigantic each day.Had to buy some new shirts this week so I look presentable when I am in public:)

 Carson really looks forward to checking the chickens with me at noon. He pets each one on the back and gets so excited to count the eggs as he put them in the basket. We have been getting usually 5 a day during the winter which is really great for winter laying and havin 6 chickens.

 I made this cake last week for one of my best friends gender reveal party. Yes, it seems dumb to have a project like this when I am complaining about being tired and stressed out BUT I knew I wouldn't have this opportunity again and wanted to be part of it. When I told her I wantd to do one of these cakes neither of us were pregnant. Plus, I am sore and tired every day I might as well have something to show for it:)

 Valentines day ...

 I love decorating the hall at night for them to wake up to. I already have st.patty's stuff ready to go. I am working on easter baskets but easter stuff just got in stores...baby could come anytime between those holidays so I am tryng to prepare now.

 Maddie had to have a  chicken vday box. I would like to say that it was all done by her, bcause I really didn't need more to work on, but it needed to be hot glued so I had to assemble the bulk of it. She decided to name it Frank, and I thought that was pretty random...it became frank peepster. it won most creative and tied for best in class,so she was pretty excited.

 dinner was pretty simple thanks to papa murphys heart pizza and the jello and heart cucs below

 I was able to go help with maddie and aj's vday parties at school since rob was home. Also fit in dates with each of the kids and Rob while he was off for 5 days. Nice to have someone chase down carson those days for me.

Kennedy

 

Remember the days I used to blog all of the time? Just got easier to not , and then seemed overwhelming to think of everything to blog. Like 1,000 pictures I could post:)

 

Well, we found out we are having a girl! I will be totally honest that I was really nervous about it:) I felt so strongly before I got pregnant that there was a baby girl up there, and I didn't want to have 3 boys to find her...It will be Kennedy, or Kennadee if I get my way:)

 

 

 

 

This is my 6 mth prego pic. I am taking my 8 mth pic tomorrow for my 32wk. I am a lot smaller with this one and the 4th, but at around 7 mths it was like I woke up and nothing fit me and my body ached all over. As of 31 weeks I have gained 37 lbs, so smaller belly doesn't not mean lighter lady:) It has been pretty much like that since. I need to buy a few more shirts just to finish out this pregnancy. This pregnancy would have to be my most uncomfortable, but maybe that is just because I forgot the others and am in this one? Or the complete exhaustion is because I am busy taking care of 4 other kids? Either way, I am totally exhausted from day one, in pain most days this trimester and feel like an emotional mess. I know I have told people in the past that I enjoy being pregnant, but I should clarify...no one enjoys being tired and uncomfortable and a mess for 9 mths. BUT I do feel so blessed to have this experience of having her grow in me and feel her move and hiccup and imagine her coming. I try to focus on that each day. I am also so grateful that my sister in law has been blessed to have a foster baby in her home and my good friend and other sister in law are pregnant as well with me!

 

Just to highlight the holidays I missed since I blogged.

 

 

Halloween....Cat in the Hat, Thing 1 (our dog is Thing 2:), super girl and superman, a Jedi, and a Geisha.

 

 

 

Family Christmas party:)

 

 

My latest Cakes:

 

The girls tea party

                                         AJ's pirate party



                                                    

                   Puppy cakes for a friends baby. My cake next week is a gender reveal cake for one of my best friends. I will get the gender straight from their apt and bake the cake before the party that night to reveal it to her family and friends. I know I am too tired for this but I really wanted to do one and especially for her. So I'll suck it up, do a bit at a time and make it cute:) Carson's bday is a week before baby comes so I am trying to think simple.

Our baby "Peanut"

A lot of new things have been happening at the the Sterzer house, but I think I will post the biggest news right off:) I am 13 weeks pregnant with baby #5! Crazy, crazy, and more crazy, right? It's been a unique process to get here I guess. When Carson turned 1 last year, I got rid of all of my maternity and baby stuff. It wasn't an immediate thing. I went back and forth on whether we were complete with 4. I was 80% sure I was done, although Rob said he was 110% sure to make up the difference. I still felt a longing to have th experience of pregnancy and a new baby again, but it is a special time of my life and I realized I can't do it forever and need to eventually move onto a new stage in our lives with raising these kids that we have. I thought, hey, maybe this body can be mine instead of a baby maker and milk machine every other year. So I started running and thinking about the possibilities of my new independence. No more losing baby weight, newborns up all night, potty training horrors of another child. We have 2 girls, 2 boys and it seemed locically perfect and complete.

Then...in April I had consistent nausea for a week,like only I get when I am pregnant. I was worried because on the IUD getting pregnant can cause a lot of probs. So I went on an emotional ride for awhile utnil I could get into the OB. I told ROb to get a grip on the fact that I may be pregnant again. I jekd about it but I couldn't iamgine another explanation. I wasn't sure how he would react. But I was just as excited with him when he was searching online for baby names that same hour:) So thre was this "click" in our heads as we discussed what this meant. All of the sudden we could be havng a fifth which seemed huge. Or we could have IUD complications and have a miscarriage or other complications. The IUD freaked us out a bit when we realized what it could do to our baby. All of the sudden we were attached to this baby , Kennedy, that we didn't even consider the week before. We realized at that moment that if I wasn't pregnant than we wanted to be. So the next week when the doctor told a shocked me that I wasn't pregnant I told him to take out the IUD so we could try for a fifth. In the next couple months that followed I got tests done to help figure out why I was sick with severe nausea, exhaustion, headaches all of the time. Doctors did tests on all of my female workings and foudn me in healthy condition. The only explanation being that stress was making me sick for the past few months. I didn't think I was that stressed until all of this happened to make it worse:) So I decided then that if I was letting myself get sick then I had the power to make it better as well. We didn't put off getting pregnant to find out what was wrong with me anymore and got pregnant in July. At least now I am sick for a reason:)

This pregnancy seems more complicated to me. I am the kind of person that if I say something stupid or unintentionally hurt someones feelings it makes me feel like crap and I dwell on it forever until I can figure out how to make it better or just tell my anxiety to let things go. In this case I feel like a constant bully to everyone in my life who is struggling to get pregnant. Which is about 4 of the closest women in my life. In April, when I thought I was pregnant despite birth control, I cried like a baby to Rob "how am I going to tell them all that I got pregnant on accident when they have been trying so hard to get a baby!" We felt that this was right for our family but we kept it to ourselves that we were trying and when I was pregnant I waited until 12 weeks. My belly is starting to pop and make hiding trickier.

I am excited for us and seeing my baby last week moving around and kicking those tiny little legs was just what I needed to reassure me that this is what I want...I just want everyone else to have their babies too so I don't have to be a 9 mth reminder to them of what they are struggling with.

In 1 mth we will find out the gender. Although Cheyenne draws pictures of her baby sister, I remind her that it could be a boy too and to prepare for that. It's hard because all we picture is a girl as well, and Rob worries that if this girl I am imagining isn't baby #5 then I will push for a #6:) Next post will be some super cute pics of my fabulous 4:)

Mammograms and Garage Doors

      Despite the title of this post, I am really encouraging mammograms:) I am educating on what to expect for all of you who know you need it done but have put it off. I am also going to tell you a funny story. One of those stories that are only funny AFTER it happens.
    
 I don't know if it is a day to consider memorable, but it was my first mammogram. I didn't really think about the procedure long enough to worry about it. It was the results of the mammogram that I am concerned about. I have had a lump, mass, fatty tissue...whatever you want to call it, for 4 years now. My theory is that if it hasn't killed me yet, then it isn't cancer. Don't get me wrong, I have had it it looked at and had 2 ultrasounds already to be cautious. The next step was a mammogram.

     I don't know what is a worse thought when you think of mammogram. The pain may come to mind, or perhaps the fact that you are naked from the top up in front of a stranger who is positioning you on a machine. Awkward. My secret is to not look at myself but to keep on talking to the nurse. I have to praise the nurse (not sure what their official title is) for keeping me completely distracted and also pretty comfortable in a pretty awkward situation. I look back and realize that she probably didn't care about what was going on with my kids sports events or my hobbies, but in the moment I needed that distraction. The whole staff at Jordan Valleys breast care center were impressive.
      
When I first walked in the room wearing my fancy cape shirt, she said that I may have heard the mammogram being compared to a garage door being slammed on you. I had never heard that until that moment actually, and I told her so. I am barely 30 and mammograms aren't really something we discuss in my circle:) But at that moment I started thinking about a garage door being slammed on my chest...
      
The nurse told me where to stand and told me what she was going to do and positioned it where it needed to be. One of the awkward things is that you have to be so close to the machine so your body and head are kind of pushed up against this machine and then the nurse is right next to you and you hope your breath is not too awful. Then she goes over to her computer and says "stop breathing", while she takes the picture. The "stop breathing" is the beginning of the "funny" part of the story.
       
I have to explain first that the mammogram is the 3rd doctor appointment I had had that week. I have been sick for about 12 weeks now and have been though a few doctors and tests in that time trying to figure out why. Constant nausea, lightheaded and dizziness are a few of the symptoms. Plus I have never been able to stand for long periods of time without getting sick. So it is time for the last picture and at this point I am barely making it through without needing to vomit and so I am taking deep breaths. As she positions me in I notice this one is a lot snugger than the others and actually pretty uncomfortable and I am barely getting small breaths in. My vision starts going funny and my knees get weak and I tell myself  'it only takes a few seconds and you will be done' . At that moment though she says "one minute, just waiting on the computer". It reminded me of a scene on Megamind and I would have laughed if I could breath. As she says "stop breathing" I held my breath and saw a lot of darkness take over my vision. I iamgined a garage door coming down...But in that instant the nurse released me and I was free to breath deep and spend the next 10 minutes with my head between my knees. It makes me laugh now to think how funny it would be to pass out and being held up completely by your boob:)
  
 I have to point out, so as not to discourage you from getting a mammo(as they call it), that I didn't pass out from the procedure but just being so dizzy and sick before. It was uncomfortable, but not really painful. And it is only about 10 seconds from clamp down to release. Plus, most people go in for a routine mammo that may not even do this particular angle. But I had to get a picture of the mass and that was the best angle.
    
The best part, after another ultrasound and 2 more people groping me and asking me questions, I was told that although they aren't completely sure why the fatty tissue is there, it appears to be just that, and not cancer. The best way to keep track of any growth is to get another mammogram in 6 mths to compare it with the first. Although it was an interesting day, I don't stress at all in going back, putting on my cool cape shirt, and going in for the squeeze:)

Our Latest family pics...not horrible, but not amazing:) It is a joke to get all 4 kids looking in the same direction. I actually did all of these pics in 3 different appts to avoid tired, cranky kids:)



I learned this year to wear a bucket load of makeup so it looks like I actually have eyes:)



We had to hold him and live with the bored look, to avoid the screaming mood he was in:)

A lot of goofy looks here, but grandma needed a picture that was horizontal:)

They are all smiling and looking in the same direction and we got Carson to stop running off!

My Boys

I had to keep pretending to sit on the crate to get Carson to think it was a game. This pic was pure luck.

                                                                   My Girls

Busy, Busy

May is a busy month that I prefer to be over. I want them all to develop new talents and have new experiences but I hate the running around for appt, lessons, and balancing it all. It is really "fun" considering Carson is in potty training mode during all of this.

The chickens are apparently still the cutest things ever. They arw getting big and hte kids take pretty good care of them

Aj is an IRON Pig in baseball and we have games 2 times a week until teh first week in June. We have to be creative with dinnertimes and bedtimes on those times


We had fun dressing up for cousin Elijahs costume party

His pirate costume he will be using for his pirate bday party and halloween. It's all about the pirates with him this year

Cinderella partied hard

I never did get any good pictures of our little construction worker. He was  covered in sticky within minutes


<><><><><><>

<>

<><><><><><>

They each got some funny glasses at the party. I have a picture of me but it isn't flattering:)



She got it into her mind to be Mary Poppins so we borrowed a couple things and altered some DI treasures and she was pretty cute

                                                        My actress

 She has been attending acting classes with "Up with Kids" preparing for Tangled production. Neither me or Rob are the acting type but her cousins have done it and loved it. I don't like the annoying play or the silly parts they have BUT I love that she can get up in front of all fo those people and not be afraid like I would have been.

I was annoyed that they had to return their dresses before I got good pictures:) She got a trophy and it made all of the hard work worth it:)

 The morning after... anyone who knows us well will know that me and Maddie are not morning people. I admit, we slept in our running clothes and woke exhausted at 6:20 am. We had to catch tracks at 7 and get downtown for the RACE FOR THE CURE. My dad has a good friend battling cancer and he asked us all to support her.

We got some cool scarves and hats, coupons, snacks...

Mom and dad, 2 of my sisters, BIL and nieces



Maddie has been growing her hair out to donate and today was the day! Fantastic Sams cuts it for free and sends the hair in to the company. When your hair is used for a wig for a cancer survivor or such they will send you a postcard.



Our little gymnast

 

She was so excited for gymnastics, but as soon as we got their she forze and wouldn't even sit with the class or do anything. Her second class she did great so I want to give her a few chances more to see if it is something to continue. It is the same tuition as acting, and since acting is over it isn't a financial difference. As soon as baseball ends we will start Maddie in soccer. We are trying to balance it out so we don't have everything at once:)

 It was a really crappy week before mothers day. I felt like I was rushing everwhere and wondering how I am going to pull it all off and make us a happy family and have time for each other in between it all. We just need to take it day by day. We aren't gone every day really but I miss the days of having no plans and just staying home and playing in the front yard eating popsicles. We have those days still but I keep jumping ahead and already missing the days they will end. It is silly because they are still young but I get carried away in my mind and worrying about things that I don't need to. It's a better week and I am grateful for each new day to be better:)

Beautiful

I took some pics of my little beauties over Easter, mostly at the family Easter picnic.

They were searching for butterflies together





Carson with my dad on Easter picnic

Releasing out butterflies...

Carson was too busy to sit still:)