Five Babies In

   When I had my first newborn I already had a just turned two year old who my husband and I were adopting. I had only had her in my home for about six months so we were still trying to really get to know each other's hearts. Having a brand newborn baby come into the mix was incredibly challenging. He also was a baby that had a lot of struggles to overcome, but none of them were really obvious, so I could not really glean help from the medical field. It set the tone of how parenting was going to feel for me for a very long time. I was overwhelmed, felt very insecure, and like I was failing no matter how hard I tried.

I have a two month old new baby right now. She is my fifth child. It is interesting how different I feel this time around because of what I have learned.

So let this be a very dear lesson I can share for all of you new moms to remember. There is no handbook for your specific child. Every single moment of pregnancy, and all that follows, is new to you for the rest of their lives as you have never walked that road. Try to give yourself grace. It is so easy to feel overwhelmed, stressed, and like you want to give up. Just remember you are not alone. Every new mom is in the same boat! If nursing is hard for you...well, its been hard for many a mother. There is so much support out there now for mothers who want to nurse their babies. Don't try to go it alone.

The list goes on with everything, and it is so important to remember 'this to shall pass' and it may seem to drag on, but in all reality it will go more quickly than you can imagine when you look back. Even if you can't enjoy the moments all that well just be IN the moment. Try to take deep breaths, stay hydrated and fill you mind with this truth: You are their perfect mom and you are enough!

I did not do any of this the first time around and the experience was actually traumatic for me. This fifth time around I feel a lot more peace most days. There are the hard days where I have nursed for hours due to her having a growth spurt and my anxiety is high, but mostly I feel okay with it all.

Having a new baby is not for the faint of heart. The responsibility is the greatest you will every have. I am two months in now and my baby is doing well. She is gaining weight like a champion, smiling and cooing and doing all she should be. It is such a blessing to me to see this. She is so loved and adored and she can rest in that.

Random things I have learned that have really helped this time around:

Check your baby for a tongue and lip tie...if there are any...getting them cut helps in so many areas, but when they are tiny...nursing them is very challenging, and sometimes impossible, if they have a tongue tie or lip ties.

Nursing fully on one side...making sure they fully empty the breast! I did not realize how important that was. I have a lot of milk and I don't know if I have every made sure to fully empty each side. However this really makes a difference in how babies digest their milk and can really cut down on how fussy and gassy they are.

I have given my baby probiotics since the day she was born and I know that has helped her feel more at peace.

I have slept her sitting up in a little chair. For my babies that really helps them sleep better.

I put corn starch on her during diaper changing to help keep diaper rash away and keep her dry and it makes a big difference in that area.

The first five days she was never out of someone's arms even at night. I was not always trying to put her down to get a break. I was content to just snuggle her. I think this helped her adjust to life outside the womb with less trauma. New babies just want to be snuggled up in someone's arms close to their heart every second of every day. It is normal and important and not something some people realize.

I got my placenta encapsulated to try to help my hormones be a little less intense during the first few months. It has helped me feel a lot more calm and in control of my emotions. I just take one pill a day. I am so grateful that I was told about this and made the effort to get it done. It makes a huge difference.

For the first two months I have eaten as much as I wanted when I wanted as breastfeeding makes you ravenous for food. Now that she is just over two months I have started to change what I am eating to try to lose some of the excess weight I am carrying on my body, but giving myself that two months to eat whatever I felt I needed to was really nice.

Getting enough sleep really affects the quality of my breast milk. When I don't get sleep my baby is very fussy and gassy. REST is so important and I have tried to make that a huge priority over cleaning my house and showering and doing any other good thing...it has been hard but worth it.

All that I have learned just goes on and on but I am so grateful for how pleasant this experience has been after some very hard experiences in the past. I hope as I grow older there will be woman who can glean from my knowledge as I will be happy to share them so that they do not go through some of the horrible things I had to go through!

One of My Favorite Months

 April is on of my favorite months of the year and that is mostly due to my location in the world. My world in April is full of new life all around me. The leaves are that new fresh green and the color never ceases to inspire.

There are Daffodils and Tulips and so many other beautiful fragrant blossoms everywhere. The colors and fragrances always remind me to dream again!

April is also the month I was born. Every year I wish to feel really celebrated and seen. I think every single person wishes that on their birthday. Sometimes it is easier to feel celebrated than others and this year there was no internal struggle. Some years my birthdays have been really really hard and I have cried buckets. This year I was happy with whatever happened and felt at peace. I was beautifully celebrated by my husband and my children (because, quite simply. they are old enough to do that now, and I have taught them how to celebrate well).

My oldest is an amazing cook and baker so she made my birthday meals and this amazing birthday trifle

My husband, brother and dad were so incredibly kind to me my heart was bursting. They bought and installed a new living room window for me. Since we bought this house the Summers have been very hard for me because my living room window did not open. I could not cool my very warm house down. So this Summer will be different! Yay!!! Getting this window out and a new one in was not easy and I so appreciate all the effort that went into it!

 My friends are always faithful and so loving in how they celebrate me and I so appreciate it.
This year my friend and I went on a little trip for my birthday back to some of my most favorite roots in my life and as usual it filled my soul full. We managed to go to my old home town, visit friends from childhood, and help another friend move into a new house all in two days!

                          My baby was a pretty wonderful traveler (during the day :)

                The creek I spent hours sitting beside and playing in when I was little.

                                    A beautiful park by the Ocean that was bursting with beauty.

                                               Stopping to remember my grandparents

                                                      New friends meeting for the first time

April has been filled with a lot of joy for me. I determined before it began that no matter what I was going to enjoy it to the full and I have. There is so much to be thankful for each moment of each day and I am glad to experience it and be truly in it!

I hope you are doing well
Love Tansy

Celebrate

  Our newest baby is my fifth. I have five children now. It seems surreal. I feel like the first time you have a baby if you have any friends or family in this culture I live in there should be something called a baby shower. It is a beautiful time of celebrating the new baby held by family and friends. There is food, gifts and fun. Sometimes only the first baby is really celebrated in this beautiful way and subsequent babies are passed over. However I believe each child deserves as much celebration as possible and so when a sweet friend offered to have a baby blessing shower for my sweet baby I was so thankful.

 The week leading up to this blessing shower was particularly exhausting as our house hold got hit with a particularly violent flue. I was up all hours of the night taking care of sick ones while nursing the baby in between vomiting sessions of others. It was intense. I felt like I was floating I was so tired. My feet just were not anchored on the ground, and yet my feet hurt so badly my body was like lead. It made no sense and it felt very unpleasant.

  Therefore on the day of the baby shower I was so ready to just be present and feel joy in amongst the tiredness. I was so beyond encouraged, strengthened and lifted up by my sweet friends and so thankful for them in my life. I felt like my precious baby was celebrated and loved on and it was a beautiful way to welcome her into her life. Thank you to all of you who put time aside in your day for me. Thank you for being my dear friends xo

My three girls ~ before I was expecting my girls and I got matching dresses. When I was pregnant I saw the matching dress in baby size to what we already had so I bought it hoping we would have a girl.

The love and care in the smallest details that went into this baby shower brought me so much joy. Thank you Cheryl!

            I love giving gifts and I love being given gifts  ~ generosity fills my soul.

                                Weeping willow branches and roses adorned the lights ~

                               This beautiful sign beckoning us inside was a labor of love.

                                   The beautiful details everywhere ~ my heart was full

  Life is lived better when there are kindred spirits to take part in it. I am thankful for those who have chosen me to call their friend. I am someone who feels every little thing so deeply and my love for these ones is deep. They hold me up, help me keep on, and remind me that I have value. I am so grateful.

My Cup Overflows

In amongst the fog of new born land are these moments of blinding glory that pierce your soul. I am so thankful for life right now. I am so thankful for all of this. It is miraculous and beautiful and how could I ask for more.


In families where there are fractured histories often celebrations are hard. The art of celebrating someone, and it being a happy experience, I have personally battled to an exhausting degree. This celebration was beautiful and I was so grateful for the moments of joy and being able to be in illumination rather than darkness.

Seeing her face for the first time, hearing her voice, after asking her every day while she was in my womb if she was still alive if she was okay. It was such a moment of relief after all the worry and the pain. My cup overflows.

The outpouring of gifts for our new baby and for our family ~ all the flowers, the cards, the meals, the giving of one's time ~ it filled me full. I needed the celebration to be big and it was. Thank you to all of you who gave.

A new baby ushers in wonder and overwhelming sweetness into a house hold. It is not something that can be imagines only experienced. In believing in a Creator, and taking part in this masterpiece from His heart to mine, I know how loved I truly am.

And this...blessing this baby with love and gifts and beauty from dear friends...I was uplifted and my soul was filled again.

May you be blessed this week in your normal every day life. May you find inspiration and hope even if the every day seems mundane, full of servant hood, and maybe drudgery. May you look up and see that the beauty in you can spill over into it all.

xo

And She Arrives

  It has just become the first day in April of 2019. Why am I not asleep? Well because I just got my baby to sleep and this is my first chance since she was born that I decided to take to blog.This is my birthday month and I am beyond excited to welcome it. April always makes me thankful as it is full of freshly sprouted green grass, blossoms of all hues and bright blue fresh skies that beckon you outside. This year I have a brand new baby in the house as well and she is the most precious treasure. We are all so in love.

  On February 26th at about 10pm I knew I was going into labor FINALLY. It had felt like a very long wait. I had thought I would have had that baby at least a week earlier and she just had not come. I had had so many contractions and so much pressure but she was coming when she was coming. When my midwife called me and told me if I went into labor that night I could not have a home birth because she was sick....and I also would be delivering with a midwife I had never met, I think deep down I knew it would probably happen that night. As the contractions started to get more gripping I decided to try to go to bed...wondering if maybe once again they would calm down like so many other times this pregnancy. At about 1:30am I gave up trying to sleep and got up. I tried a bath next because often if you are in false labor that will slow everything down. Clearly things were not slowing down for me. So I started to try to get ready to head to the hospital. Between contractions I was trying to think of everything I would need to be birthing in a hospital. It felt a little surreal. I didn't want to phone the midwife till the last minute so she could sleep as long as possible. As time moved on I started to feel that this labor was progressing and I needed to get somewhere I could deliver. The hospital was about twenty minutes away. I am quite calm during labor and often give a bit of a false impression of how I am feeling inside so I started to get frustrated at my husband who seemed to be taking his sweet time getting ready. We got into the van just after 4:30 in the morning and started the drive. It was a cold very windy night.

  On the drive I realized that my contractions were exactly five minutes apart and I just tried to really breath them away each time. When we got to the hospital I was pretty sure I didn't have a lot of time left and I just wanted to get up to the ward so I could focus! We couldn't figure out where to go into the hospital and when we finally walked in a door we were told to go to a different entrance. At that precise moment my water decided to break and I KNEW I could not find another entrance I needed to get somewhere I could deliver the baby! My husband needed to park the vehicle and I couldn't really stand up right any longer so a kind security gentleman rolled me in a wheel chair through corridors and up elevators as my water seemed to never stop and was all over hallways in the hospital. Once I got up to the ward it felt a bit chaotic until my midwife and husband arrived. I was soaked and feeling a bit overwhelmed but tried to keep calm and remember what I wanted to communicate to the midwife about my wishes for my delivery that seemed to be fast approaching. When she had time to check me I was fully dilated and ready to push. On the way to the hospital I had tried to call some friends I had hoped could attend the birth and wake them up.

  As everyone around me was busy preparing the room, filling out paperwork, checking the babies heart beat and I was meeting nurses, trying to just get in the zone of what lay before me I felt overwhelmed and hopeful that all would be okay. I started to push the baby taking a drink of water after every contraction and trying to remain calm and handle the pain. One friend arrived and kept trying to contact the other ones. I kept pushing. It seemed to take a long time. I was so tired and started to feel annoyed that I was not pushing the baby out faster. As the baby slowly made its way down another friend arrived just in time. The midwife guided me so kindly as did the nurse during the time the baby was actually coming out and I was able to be very controlled and follow instruction and it made it so I didn't really tear at all which was a first for me.

  I remember trying desperately to be calm and do what I needed to do and not scream but I did scream once at the end. Then I heard everyone saying, 'open your eyes' and I did and I saw my sweet baby girl coming up and into my arms. It was 6:28am February 27th. She gave a few little cries but really just snuggled into my arms. The feelings of relief are not really describable. Every single day of my pregnancy the worry that I might lose her was with me. It was hard to bear. Once she was in my arms I just felt such thankfulness. Once the baby is born there is still work to do ~ delivering the placenta, having your stomach massaged and massaged which is so painful, then latching the baby on for the first time and causing your uterus to contract...getting the one stitch I needed to get... I just wanted it over with so I could finally relax! I felt so much relief when it was all done :)

 My baby was a healthy seven pounds fourteen ounces and she was nineteen inches long. She had dark hair, a sweet little chin, the cutest lips and long feet and fingers! What a journey to arrive at that moment! It was fraught with so much sadness and worry and loss. I was just so relieved and yet felt like it was all a dream and I might wake up and find it wasn't real. It was hard to actually connect to the moment for a while. Slowly but surely it started to sink in and become real.

  She has been in our family for just over a month now and every day is filled with her. Our whole lives revolve around her right now and we are all so grateful. She is sweetness and snuggles and preciousness. We all just adore her. I spend a lot time nursing her and trying to coax burps out of her and then trying to decide what is most important to accomplish in the moments I am not nursing her. My recovery is going okay but I do have a few complications that are making some days challenging. The baby however is thriving in every way.

 I will be writing less as I have been for a while. I am focused in, thankful, just so thankful.

Happy Spring!
Love Tansy

Roof Leaks

   I don't know if you have heard the expression, 'when it rains it pours?' Well sometimes that seems to happen over here in my corner of the world. We have a new baby coming into our house any day now. At least it feels like it should be any day but I guess the real truth is that I could potentially have to wait until March 14 to be induced if I go over my due date as here they allow you two weeks over due. I can't imagine having to do that but if I must I must. Anyway! A new baby is coming and I have been trying to prepare for that. We don't have the space to give the baby its' own room so the baby will be in the master bedroom and there are little spaces created through the house for nursing and changing diapers etc. Having a baby in the house involves a lot of preparation and planning! So through out this, life doesn't just slow down or stop. There is still all the appointments to get to, the activities to drive to, the cooking, grocery shopping, laundry and cleaning to do and that seems like it all should be enough. Well let me tell you...it isn't.

   About a month ago I was sitting in my dining room and suddenly I could hear that there was something alive in my floor. It was rolling nuts along, or something that sounded like nuts, and it was not doing so quietly. It sounded like it was right beside me. There is no access to under my floor and I did not know how whatever rodent it was was getting in. It was not the best feeling. Night after night I could hear the animals storing up food for the winter in my floor. We have people renting in a suite in our basement and they have two cats, we have one cat upstairs in ours, so this house has a total of three cats in it. You'd think that might possibly exempt us from a rodent invasion. Apparently not! A week or so after I heard the scurrying in the floor I saw a mouse or rat in my living room in the middle of the day. It ran quickly, but it was there. I knew they were also in my kitchen as my cat was showing all the signs that there were visitors of the worst sort (in my mind). I have this phobia of mice and rats...That meant putting all the food in cupboards in a large tote that now sits on my floor, trying to keep all food off the floors and counters and begging my husband to call an exterminator. He did call one and the person that came proved to be completely helpless. I was left with about six traps in my living room and that was it. It did not help. My husband eventually put out poison in every safe spot he could in our kitchen, living room, dining room, and traps everywhere and we caught one mouse. Just one. Lately the inside of our house has seemed quieter and our cat has been less on the prowl. However the other night my daughter was coming home from a dance class around nine in the evening and the door was locked. She started screaming and I am heavily pregnant so getting to the door took me a hot minute. It turned out there was a mouse on the front porch with her. When I let her in and shut the door I realized it was no mouse but a large black rat. It boldly came to the glass floor length windows beside my front door and put its' nose to the glass seeming to actually asking to be let in from the cold. It had no fear!! My husband tried to go outside and catch it but it was fast. It, however, did not leave the vicinity of the front of our house and spent the evening running around our porch, driveway, and gardens. So the rodent issue is ongoing it seems. We shall see what becomes of it.

  There is also the issue of our roof. We bought a forty year old house with a forty year old roof. This past Autumn we payed a pretty penny to get the roof redone as it had been leaking in our bathroom for over a year. It was not easy to get the roof done as there just was not an availability of roofers in our area. We waited for months to find someone.  When they did come they did a wonderful job. We have a complicated roof with multiple skylights and fans and all sorts of things. However the other day we had some snow fall. This was the first snow fall of the year. I felt relief that our roof was re done and I didn't have to worry about the roof leaking all over the house in random places like it had last winter when the snow fell. Well! I was wrong. My daughter came to tell me the roof was leaking and it was no subtle leak. Water was aggressively entering my house through one of my skylights and the leak was spreading. I put out buckets and tried to not get too panicked but I did not take it well. My husband, bless his soul, risked his life to go out on the roof and assess the situation and somehow managed to temporarily slow the leak so it was not pouring in. However this weekend he will be up on the room trying to once again, fix a leak. I am sort of sick of trying to fix leaks.

   So these are two small stories and honestly they are not big deals at all really! It is just that sometimes when there are a lot of small things that are annoying or troublesome or overwhelming every little thing becomes big.

  The reality is....I have a cat who kept the rodents from going onto my counters and my cupboards. They stayed under the fridge stove or in my fire place.They did not enter bedrooms and that felt less invasive than it could have. The roof is not leaking in the bathroom anymore and we tried so many ways to fix that leak...at least IT is fixed :) We had a couple snow days that were magical. We have a slough near our home that also froze thickly which does not often happen. There were hours spent sliding, sledding and laughing in brisk cold air. This is so good for every part of the body. Happy memories were made. One of the best things as well is that every day I feel the baby moving inside of me. As it grows bigger and I feel little limbs poking out every day I am so thankful he or she is still alive. SO taking those things and trying to at least let them hover at least in the outskirts of my mind helps me stay a bit more sane than maybe I would be.

Thoughts After Counselling Today

   Each week since July my children and I have gone to counselling together. It has been a really lovely experience for us all. My four year old started out just loving playing with all the toys they had available but now he has decided he would like his own sessions. In a two hour period we all have at least a little session. Sometimes we have a session altogether but often we have separate sessions.It has been eye opening for my children's hearts and has garnered much more self awareness. It has opened wounds and helped them heal. We are so thankful to have had this opportunity.

  Lately in my sessions I have not been able to take much in as I have been so tired and my mind so hazy. I am just proud of myself for getting all four children there and keeping them happy while they all wait their turns. Having my own session is always a blessing but I always am wanting truth to sink in deeply, and in my current extremely pregnant state, and being out of it because of my iron deficiency issues, I often leave feeling like there was so much more I could have absorbed but it just floated around my head!

  Today though I was doing much better. That was amazing. So I wanted to capture here what I learned so that I can come back to it at another time and re soak it in.

  Something I have realized about myself is that negative emotions are extremely overwhelming for me. It can be my own or someone else's, but at any time those big negative emotions just flood me. I have ways I cope with them as everyone does...but those ways of coping are really me trying to stop the emotions.

  So today..the focus was...was that those negative emotions, in me, my husband, my children...are good emotions. Why are they good? Because they are the way your body has to tell you that something needs to change. They often protect you and are fighting for you. So instead of trying to immediately process them and then shove them away, or just shove them away, or shut them down, how can I see what they truly are representing and saying and help myself in the ways I need to? Also how do I see them in my children, help them name them, but then not try to make them calm down immediately or make them go away?

  This feels almost impossible for me to do as these emotions are automatically huge for me and automatically very overwhelming. By big negative emotions I mean anxiety, anger etc. I just want them gone. So in me doing this (wanting them gone) a cycle is created that actually makes these emotions bigger and worse and always there. If instead of shutting them down I could let myself or my children really feel them, own them, and take time to feel in my body where they are, why, and then sit with it all for a while...it could be very freeing and very powerful.

  We shall see how this goes. I have been stuck for a very  long time just trying to keep drama away and trying to maintain a peace and calm..haha...aka control..that is never really there. There is always an undercurrent and it is hard.

  We have big changes in our family coming...and in reality there are always big changes coming. Life is full of changes. Some people and families love change. I am not one of those individuals. Change is just another reason for me to feel overwhelmed. I want to do well, manage well, protect those around me, help others feel safe etc...and yet is that really my job? I have taken it on...but your emotions are simply that...yours.

  I hope this is something I can hold close and I can start to move past the step I have been stuck in that has created such a cycle that has been with me for life. I hope I can let the emotions do their work. I hope I can ask myself the questions, but be gentle and honest. I hope I can create space for myself to do that even if others wont. I hope that I can also create that space for my children.

 May your weekend be lovely
It is cold here and supposed to snow. We have had no real snow this winter at all!!! So I don't really believe it will snow. If it does I will have some VERY excited children.

 Blessings to you,

Love Tansy