Good But Challenging

   Life is good but challenging.

  Rose is, mostly, a very easy baby.  She is nursing well and she sleeps a lot.  She fills her diapers with encouraging regularity. I'm pretty obsessive about diapers in the early days, since "throughput" means that she's getting enough to eat.

  The biggest challenge is that she hasn't quite figured out the whole "days and nights" thing, so that she is often up very late.  This picture from last night was at around 12:30 p.m. and I didn't actually get her down 'til 2 a.m. That's...too late. But we're working on keeping her up during the day (more) and I hope she'll start sleeping better at night.  I don't mind getting up to feed her, that's no problem. I do mind it when she is awake and perky at 3 a.m.  My bed is calling at that point.

  The biggest challenge, though, is Daniel.  The kid is awesome and I adore him to the ends of the earth, but not surprisingly he is having a hard time with exhausted, weak Mommy. I can't pick him up.  I can't play with him a lot.  And as was true before Rose was born, he is INTO THINGS.  He just can't be left alone except in a safe room, because he climbs dangerously, dumps water on the floor, etc.

  I am grateful, again, for healthy, strong, big children who can play with Daniel, watch him, lift him, and change his diaper. 

 We'll get through this season. I was recounting to Kevin that 14 years ago, I told a friend that I didn't realize how much WORK an infant is.  This was, of course, when we had Naomi and I was stay at home mom to one small child.  This particular friend had 9 or 10 kids at the time (she finally had 12 total) and I wondered more than once if she thought I was a total wimp.

 Now that we have 9 children, I am guessing she didn't think I was wimpy.  The truth is, the first child is a challenge especially when Mom and Dad don't have much experience with babies. Neither Kevin nor I had spent much time with infants so everything with Naomi was stressful because it was all so new.  With Rose, I have tons of experience with infants.  While I am tired, I have confidence that in a few months things will be much easier -- she'll be sleeping much longer at night and I'll be recovered from the C-section. That makes it easier.  Plus of course at this point we DO have big children who can do a lot of work around here.'


  So all in all, we're doing well. But if you pray, we'd appreciate prayers for both Kevin and me, that we'd have stamina and wisdom and patience during this difficult season.  Kevin plans to return to work on Monday so he'll be working plus dealing with shortened nights.  I'll be taking the reins of the household back into my hands.  We'll manage, but it isn't exactly easy.

 But Rose, but all of them, are of course worth it 100 times over.