A very long awaited appointment finally came today! I got up the nerve recently to book a family appointment with Dr. Guselle, and while she couldn’t make it happen right away, it happened today! I want to tell you guys all about it, but its been a big day and I don’t have the gumption to go into all the details.

So, for a quick breakdown, I primarily discussed Rowan, Solly, and myself. Brady was tentatively on the list but his cold/sinus infection was FINALLY cleared up with antibiotics and steroids. We covered Rowans hearing, his lack of balance/coordination/tip toeing, and his possible lactose intolerance. We covered Solly’s constipation and a little bump on his face that I don’t think I’ve mentioned on here before. We covered my persistent crappy hearing in my left ear and that pesky unsightly mole under my nose. LOTS of topics, and LOTS of information. I feel great about it all, honestly. But its WAY too much to put in one post. Maybe one for each of us? Ya, I think thats smart.

Meanwhile, during our appointment, Miss Waverly sat in her bucket, totally happy, the entire time. She even slept for a chunk of it. But pre-sleep, I took a cute little photo progression…

And one horrifying comparison.

She was a cute little user-friendly addition to our group 🙂 It would’ve been nice to actually come as a whole crew, but this was fun, too 🙂 Maybe next time!

Yesssss!!

We’ve been itching to get our bus back! We had originally been told that it would be done for Friday, but that got pushed to a “hopefully this week” when we brought it in on Monday. We were clear that we needed it for Monday, not just because we’re not reasonable people, but we had promised it to our church to use Monday evening (tonight.) They understood and said they’d do their best, but we officially weren’t holding our breath, which was frustrating.

While I was away, Brady tried hard to get it back. He called and pressed them a little on Friday. They said there were over 600 hail dings on the roof, which was absurd, but apparently not enough to warrant a new roof. So they were still working on it. The guy told Brady that Speedy wasn’t open on Saturdays, but the body shop they took our van to was, and if he heard anything on Saturday, he’d personally call Brady, and come in to work to get us our van.

Buuuuut that didn’t happen.

So this morning, Brady called, and they said it should be ready around 11:00. He let me know right away, so I finished feeding Wavy, dressed the kids, and loaded up.

Let me just say. I’ve only got them buckled in on my own one time, but I’m SO glad we don’t have to do that on a regular basis! Make fun of our bus all you like, but we are SO fortunate to have such a nice, roomy vehicle!

We stopped at Costco to fuel up the rental van, grabbed some coffee at Tims, and waited for Brady at Speedy. Our van was nowhere to be seen :/

What a relief it was to see that garage door open! I guess they had received the van back and still had to switch the blow out mirrors for the new ones. But there it was! Our kids celebrated, as did I.

Brady arrived right at 11:00 and began switching car seats over. He really didn’t have the time in his schedule to lose, but such was life :/ I’m not able to get the car seats in place as tight as he can, nor as quickly, nor with everyone else in the van with me. So we made it work.

After about a half hour, everything was switched out and we drove home. It was SO good to have our bus back. Except the Sync system (aka the bluetooth system that plays music) hasn’t been working over the last little while. Whether something is glitching or updated or whatever else, we haven’t been able to fix it. At least bluetooth still works for answering phone calls. Can’t be too choked, I guess! They were also going to detail it for us, but we decided to forego it to make sure we had it back in time for this evening. No big loss there.

I’m so so thankful to have our bus back. It fits our family much more easily, and I feel so much safer in it!

I made it home! After an awesome weekend with friends, food, and crafting, I can honestly say that I am SO happy to be home! I loved being at camp, hanging out with my friends, making new friends, eating delicious food, getting some crocheting done, and staying up way too late. The weekend away was exactly as I pictured. I was still in touch with my friend and family, and received pictures of the kids and updates on what everyone was doing. Brady worked hard, as you probably read, at insulating the basement, taking the kids out a bit, and keeping everyone happy and alive.

Arriving home was the icing on the cake for me. Coming up the stairs from the entrance, I was greeted by each kid individually. I was given warm hugs and smooshy kisses. I’m rarely missed by my kids, thanks to my amazing life circumstance of staying home with them. So being missed is a real treat. That being said, they were still running around, happy, doing their own things.

Once I had said my hellos, we turned on some new music that was released while I was gone. While we were listening to it, Brady brought my stuff up to our room and discovered a wakeful baby. And as if my heart wasn’t happy enough to see her, she also missed me. And that was awesome.

Brady handed her to me, and she gave me a big smile! I hugged her, and she lay on my chest, unmoving, totally content, for a looooong time. It. Was. Awesome. She eventually shifted to a “cheek to cheek” snuggle, which was equally as delicious. Don’t get me wrong. I know they all missed me somewhat, but Wavy wanted to rest with me, which felt amazing and warm and welcoming.

It was a warmer reception than I was expecting. It feels great to be loved and missed. It was good to be away, but its good to be home.

I promise I’m not actually wifeless, just a quote that came to mind while I was trying to think of a title.

Quick, quick, name that movie!!

Also, today was day two of Hailey being away for the weekend and for the first time ever as a guest blogger, I don’t have a specific topic to write about today.

I was hoping to be able to write about how we got a miraculous call from our body shop saying the bus was ready to be picked up but, unfortunately, we did not. Apparently there was over 600 dents in the roof of our van! It was only outside for ninety seconds! At $10 per dent, our insurance company is footing a hefty bill. 😳 Luckily, we only have to pay a small deductible. I guess we’ll deal with that on Monday morning.

Also, today was not the smoothest day with the kids so I’m not gonna write about that either. I tried to make a special breakfast for them but they fought each other through its entirety. We tried to have a low key ‘It’s freezing outside!’ kind of morning but they fought each other through that as well. Similar results through lunch and nap time. Praise the Lord we had made plans to visit Hailey’s Mom for the late afternoon and dinner. They got some quality Grandma time, a delicious chicken strips and smile fries supper, and most importantly, they don’t fight half as much at Grandma’s. 🤗

Now they’re all five in bed and I’m planning to go downstairs and finish my weekend project which is insulating the basement walls. Don’t get me wrong, our house is properly insulated, but the lower half of our basement walls were still bare concrete and rather than building a half height wall and ending up with an awkward, dust covered ledge for our kids to jump off of, we built the wall to the ceiling. This gives us the opportunity to double insulate and have a very warm cosy basement. 

So I’m off. Here’s a couple pictures of the kids being sweet yesterday.

Sleep deep friends.

Guest Post!

While Hailey is away for the weekend she has asked me to fill in here on her blog for a couple days. So I’m going to do my best to remember the day Waverly was born from my perspective. Forgive me, it will not be even close to as detailed as Hailey’s original version was but maybe my male privileged version while be entertaining.

Here goes.

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I woke up to Hailey laughing at me and asking what I was laughing about. Still half asleep, I vaguely remembered having a dream about eating a Firecracker burger at Montana’s and asking the waitress to hold the spicy chicken and the spicy ranch. An odd dream and an odd way to wake up. Hailey figured I had been dreaming about something else. 😉 But I assured her, I was not. 😳

I got up and made us coffee and breakfast in bed as it was still quite early and not time to get the kids up yet. It was summer so the kids regularly stayed in bed til 830 or 9. We had a lovely, relaxed last morning together as parents of 4. However, that call from the hospital was just not coming.

We waited til 9 or so before finally losing most of our hope that we’d get the call that day went to get the kids up. From there it was a pretty normal summer morning. I had booked time off work so there was no worry there. No interruptions. Until Hailey’s doctor called. She said that Hailey was still on the list and that things were just running behind. Yay! It could still happen! But I figured that Dr Guselle would still have to go to bat for us with the other nurses and doctors in charge. And as great and powerful as she is, I still wasn’t confident. Merp.

So I tried to make the best of it and made a plan to take the kids outside to ride bikes. Dekker had learned to ride without training wheels just a few days earlier and I wasn’t sure if he’d get another chance to practice for a couple days. So out we went! Deks on his bike, Laela on hers with training wheels, Rowan on his balance bike, and Solly wandering around holding a kids snow shovel. lol I popped the back doors of the bus open and Hailey and I sat in the back, watching the kids and daydreaming about Wavy, subtly worrying that today might not be the day.

And then her phone rang and Hailey got a really nervously excited look on her face. I don’t remember what was all said on that call but I knew pretty quick that I should go finish packing the hospital bag. So off I went while Hailey kept an eye on the kids.

I don’t recall a whole lot between this point and when we got to the waiting room at the hospital. I don’t even remember which Tim Horton’s we stopped at for coffee. 😳 Which is normally a big deal for me. Anyways, I do remember sitting in the waiting room while Hailey filled out the admission forms and pretty quick Cher joined us. The three of us sit and waited nervously for only a few minutes when we were approached by a nurse who walked up looked at us like we weren’t allowed to be sitting where we were sitting…   And then she told us that she was our nurse and we should follow her to the delivery room. 😳 Slightly off putting but we blew past it and followed her.

Again, I don’t remember a lot of the details of the whole labour but you can go back and read Hailey’s version fo the day for the gory details. Lol I do remember doing a lot of laughing, a little bit of advocating for Hailey, and a LOT of telling people to expect an abnormally fast labour, as did Hailey and Dr Guselle.

And then it was not an abnormally fast labour like Laela. It wasn’t even a fast labour like Rowan or Solly. It was a totally normal labour somewhat similar to when Dekker was born. It didn’t take long and we were making jokes about how Wavy was taking to long, that she was late, or lazy. Haha. I remember thinking ‘Oh boy! She’s gonna be a big baby!’

After a lot of small talk and chatting with our nurses and Cher about previous deliveries, trying to prove that we did have reason to ask for the birth plan we were asking for, as well as some hiccups and causes for concern, all was still ok and the doctors weren’t too worried. So I went to find some supper and eventually a coffee. Clearly this was not going as we thought.

When I returned from my fruitless coffee run, Hailey had a big smile on her face and told me that she was fully dilated and probably quite close to being ready to push. ‘Yay!’ and also, ‘It’s about time, Wavy!’

Oh! Speak of the baby. She just woke up. I’ll be back.

Ok I’m back. Where was I?

Oh Ok.

Time to push!

Ok, so whenever we get to the point of pushing in a delivery I always feel the need to be the super encouraging, vocal husband like you see in the movies. But I am not that person. I’m not super vocal or someone who shouts encouragement to others. But I feel like if I was just silent it would be super weird and off putting, especially to Hailey. So, I make an effort of be out of my comfort zone and encourage her and offer her sips of water after every push and so on and so forth. I think it’s working because she’s never complained about me during delivery. Honestly, I think she barely notices whats going on around her. She’s so self involved in those moments. 🙄

Kidding Honey!

She has every right to not be concentrating on anything else. Focus on the delivery! It makes sense. lol

So I was being encouraging, and Hailey was doing whatever she was doing. 🙄 And then came the geyser. It was so much fluid that was released that it ricocheted off of Wavy’s head and came back at Hailey in this huge arch. Right onto her chest and towards her face. Luckily, our nurse from the old west was a quick draw with her towel and managed to catch it seemingly midair and dried Hailey off in a matter of seconds. Thank you Danna!

And Wavy was here.

Crying, wrinkly, cottage cheese covered, tiny, and with hair for days.

Gorgeous! She was so pretty right from the get go. I couldn’t stop looking at her. Right next to Hailey just staring while Hailey had her Mommy/Baby time. Father of five. Father of Waverly.

She was here.

Boy what a road that was. I have to say that we have not forgotten our Little Boys that we lost last year, I still think of them pretty regularly. I don’t think that will ever change. But having Waverly in our arms was an incredible moment.

So much healing.

So much joy.

And I think thats where I’m going to stop. I’m tearing up while writing this and I don’t want to have to field the kids questions about why I’m crying.

Wavy has been a wonderful addition to our family and I could not be more proud to have the wife and children I have.

I am perfectly blessed.

I’m off for the weekend, starting this evening, and this day is just about everything I could ask for it to be! It began by me sleeping in like CRAZY! Brady got up at my usual time and got the big kids off to school, and the others up and fed. I woke up a couple of times but dozed out again very quickly. When I did finally wake up and stay awake, it was 9:45!!! I never get to sleep that late! It was SUCH a treat!

We spent the rest of the morning enjoying coffee and turnovers together, as well as printing out crochet patterns for this weekend. I feel prepared and excited!

My mom had a morning out helping a friend, and dropped by with a gift for me to take along this weekend! SO thoughtful, and SO me! We managed to convince her to stay for lunch and even a movie! It was such a nice way to spend a chunk of the afternoon!

Still left on the agenda is a shower, and packing up the rest of my stuff. I have to charge my iPad, also, to have access to other patterns, and I need to see my kids a bit more!! I just KNOW Waverly is going to cut those two teeth when I’m gone 🙁 She’s barely eaten today, and has slept almost all day, which is usually a telltale sign that those suckers are about to come through! I was hoping she’d do it before I left! Ack!

So consider me officially signed off for a couple of days! Brady will take my place for tomorrow and the next day 🙂 Enjoy him!

I’ve had a couple of wonderful days, filled with dates with friends! Yesterday morning I spent with a girlfriend and her two kids, and yesterday evening was spent watching a movie with Jerilee. It was SUCH a nice day!

I spent the bulk of today with Cher, who lovingly walked her way over, in a raccoon onesie, no less! We had some minimal plans to do one or two productive things, but rather we chatted and drank hot coffee and wasted the day away. It was so nice and low key, which was nice, considering my kids weren’t having their best day.

Wavy, however, was a TOTAL peach!

Isn’t she sweet, all soft and chubby? Eek!

The plan is to close off the day by going for a walk with my mom while Dekker is at kids club. I haven’t seen her in so long, it seems, and I’m about to be gone for a few days myself, so this is our one chance to hang out! Hopefully the weather is nice to us!

As I said, I’m leaving for the weekend, which will be another fun opportunity to be with friends! I’m going to a craft retreat, which sounds fuddy duddy, but its a total riot! I went once a few years back and enjoyed myself so much! I’m excited to visit with awesome ladies all weekend, eat delicious food, and crochet my butt off! I may or may not make a stack of messy bun toques, just to have on hand to gift out, or to sell maybe. We shall see! Mostly I’m just excited to cozy up with other crafty people (ya, I said it) and breathe in some crisp camp air!

Who’s jealous of my weekend plans?!

✋✋✋✋✋

Ya, I know you are.

Sometimes I scramble for things to write about, if I’m being honest. Not right now! While I thoroughly enjoyed doing the mini series on the kids over the last five days, I actually had some important things to write about! So, today I’ll be catching you up in the form of a post about three things I am thankful for.

I am thankful for our tire shop! They never cease to amaze me! Our entire family had to come in for the appointment to get our winter tires on, as we had other errands to run that day, plus evening plans back into the city. Rather than driving in three times, we all went in for our tire appointment, saving ourselves one of those trips. We’re never made to feel a nuisance when we bring the kids, which is so so nice.

We sort of overtook the waiting room, ate some breakfast, and played for an hour or so. It was cute. The kids were pretty patient, which helped. It was pretty smooth!

(To fill in the gaps, for my own record, we also got Wavy her shots that day…

and we saw Footloose in the evening with this fun crew!) SUCH a loaded, memorable day!

I am thankful for our awesome church family! We led music at church on Sunday, and when Brady and I left our bench, Solly instantly broke down. Daddyyyyyyyy!!! We watched as a handful of people flocked our bench and consoled Solly. A loving friend opted to sit with us for the rest of the service, so Solly wouldn’t be nervous of a new person, which was so lovely. And it worked! He cried again the last time we went up, but quieted very quickly. There also was no shortage of arms reaching out to hold Waverly. I LOVE the support and love for our family! We love to lead worship, and we feel its where we’re supposed to be contributing to our church, but facing the facts, we cannot do it without help. Its SO special to know we have that willing help!

I am thankful for our rental van. *sigh* This one feels like more of an effort. I am SO thankful to have a vehicle while our bus is in for damage repairs but MY GOODNESS! A minivan is NOT ideal for a family my size! We have a brand new Dodge caravan currently. Its leather, has seat warmers, and automatic doors. ALL things we’d LOVE to have in our bus but don’t, and thats ok. But my goodness. That thing is not meant for five car seats, three of which are pushed SO close together, side by side, in the back. Also, good thing we bought diapers and wipes recently because we couldn’t do a full, big Costco shop with this thing anymore! Just this week, guys. Thats all we have to handle. But still, I’m SO thankful not to be just without a vehicle at all. What a relief!

That pretty much catches you up on our last few days. Nothing too crazy, but lots of good 🙂 And lots more to come! I have some company coming over the next day or two, and then I’m actually away this weekend! Brady agreed to do a couple of posts, so you can anticipate those! One of them for sure I’ve been bugging him to write for a while, so I’m pretty excited to read what he comes up with. But you’re still stuck with me for a while 🙂 As if you haven’t already been for so, so long, haha!

I was about to type something about it being the last day of the series, and the last kid, but I think we all know thats not the current plan, haha! She’s the most recent baby, but hopefully not the last! So we’ll wrap up this series with our littlest love, Miss Waverly.

(Hopefully this post doesn’t feel redundant with her monthly updates, but I can’t leave her out of this! At least read it for the pictures!)

Whats new with Waverly? Lots! This girl is ever changing! She is cold-free, up to date on her vaccines, and just beautifully healthy and sweet. Her hair is getting longer and longer, and there is lots of new growth around the edges and throughout. She is getting taller and thicker, but she still feels so dainty. The truth of the matter is that she’s probably up in size 6 months now, but I haven’t had the nerve to pull that stuff out yet. I’m not ready!! Lol! She’s very interactive and loves to be talked to and teased. I don’t have any big specific changes to share, I suppose, but everything she’s doing continues to progress and get better and better! Oh and she super loves to be naked, haha!

Whats the same with Waverly? Two specific things come to mind. One is that she still hates her bath. Hates her bath. But she’s totally fine 🙂 I think moving her to the big tub helped a little, but I’m suspicious that she’s going to be one who wants the bath hotter than I’m prepared to make it. So she’ll just have to hate it while I work up to figuring out her preferred temperature. The other things thats the same but I thought would’ve changed is her lack of teeth. She is teething HARD right now. I’ve never felt baby teeth SO close to the surface without them breaking through, but alas, they’re still tucked down there! So we wait. But she won’t be toothless for much longer!!

God has already used Wavy in obvious, exciting ways! I’m SO excited to see what He does with her next!

I have never anticipated a baby the same way that I anticipated Waverly, and she did not disappoint!

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Thats a wrap, folks! I hope everyone got a little taste of each of our children in this mini-series! These posts mean so much to me, because one day I’ll be able to look back at my blog books and see exactly where each kid was at the exact same time. These are such precious times.

Kid #4, who gave us a run for our money this morning at church, Solomon!

Whats new with Solly? All kinds of things, actually! He talks in good, clear sentences. He counts a little, and sings little bits of songs. (Thank you, Cher, for showing him baby shark, by the way…) The last time we were in the van, he bellowed “I LOVE THIS SONG” when “Gone Gone Gone” by Phillip Phillips came on. He also loves “This Little Light of Mine,” but just the version with the new part in it that he can SHOUT along to. With that being said, Solly is aging juuust enough that he has a bit more comprehension and can be reasoned with! Not all the time, but sometimes. He understands cause and effect. He’s also super helpful! He’s followed in his siblings footsteps, and he likes to be helpful, but its not always actually particularly helpful 😉 But nowadays, it is! He’ll put away diapers, through kleenexes or napkins away. He can tidy toys up and knows what goes where. He can unload just about all of the dishwasher, too! Another change that I actually mentioned on yesterdays post is that he loves to play with Rowan. SO much! If Rowan sits on a chair, Solly tries to squeeze in next to him. Its so fun to watch!

Whats the same with Solly? Really, not a lot. He’s done much more changing than maintaining recently. Sadly, his most significant constant is that he’s still awful at pooping :/ I won’t go back into it, but we had some work to do to get his system functioning properly, and he was on laxatives for about six months. We ever so slowly weened him off of his treatment and within a week, he had quit pooping again. Don’t worry, I have ideas, but we have an upcoming doctors appointment for him as soon as she is back from holidays. I’m scared he has an allergy, but I’m hoping he just needs a little more fibre than the rest of his siblings. Really, beyond that, whats the same about Solomon is his delicious little demeanour. He is SO friendly and chipper and smily. He will just hang his big ole mouth open and laugh loud and happy and its just so good to hear. He sometimes plays shy but warms up pretty quickly. It doesn’t take long to get him goofy again.

He looks SO much like baby Brady, it only makes sense that he turned out to be his namesake!

I hope Solly loves life this much forever! I’m loving doing life with him!