Sisters:
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Summering
Sisters:
Friday, August 9, 2013
What's in a Name
We have gotten a lot of questions, quite justifiably, about how we came up with Inessa's name. After all, hardly anyone has heard of it.
We started out with a set of criteria that we use for naming all of the kids.
1. interesting, preferably spiritually oriented meaning
2. alliterative first and middle names
3. classic or traditional but not particularly common; naming statistics over the last 100 years gets consulted frequently
4. fits in reasonably well with the other kids' names
5. contains a nature reference that may be somewhat obscure; Elanor is a flower from LOTR and Peter means rock
6. doesn't sound too weird with our last name; everyone else's last name sounds so much easier to match than one's own--but they feel exactly the same way.
7. Minimal unfortunate nicknames. This is impossible to avoid entirely of course--someone will always think of something.
Jonathan starts connecting with the baby by browsing through name lists pretty much as soon as we know that we are expecting. I prefer to wait until we know the gender to start narrowing things down. So around the beginning of January, we were both on the hunt. Irene had been on our short list of girls' names for Elanor because Jonathan liked the meaning (peace or peaceful) and I had liked it ever since reading George MacDonald's Princess and Curdie as a child. We went through some lists to find another name starting with I to match it, coming up with some real gems like Iphigenia, Ingeborg and the oh, so popular, Isabella. We were starting to wonder if either Irene wasn't a good choice or we would have to drop one of our criterion.
When I came across Inessa, I was initially hesitant because I had never heard it before--something that Jonathan has had trouble accepting in the past. However, the sound was lovely and the meaning was interesting--it is the Slavic variant of Agnes, which means pure or chaste. More people have heard of Inez or Ines which is the Spanish version. Jonathan liked it so we rolled Irene Inessa around in our mouths and ears for a few days. After a while, it occurred to us to switch the names and we both decided that we liked the sound of Inessa better as the first name.
In the final part of the evaluation process, we did a search for Inessa to check to make sure that there weren't any terribly unpleasant associations or people with that name. When first item that came up was a link for a butterfly entomology site, we discovered that Inessa is a genus of skipper butterflies--a perfect way to fit in that nature reference and one last confirmation that this was the right name for her.
We planned to call her Nessie but didn't think of Miss Loch Ness Monster until after she was born and the paperwork submitted but I don't think that we would have changed our minds at that point anyway.
And after all that, Ellie insists on calling her Nugget.
We started out with a set of criteria that we use for naming all of the kids.
1. interesting, preferably spiritually oriented meaning
2. alliterative first and middle names
3. classic or traditional but not particularly common; naming statistics over the last 100 years gets consulted frequently
4. fits in reasonably well with the other kids' names
5. contains a nature reference that may be somewhat obscure; Elanor is a flower from LOTR and Peter means rock
6. doesn't sound too weird with our last name; everyone else's last name sounds so much easier to match than one's own--but they feel exactly the same way.
7. Minimal unfortunate nicknames. This is impossible to avoid entirely of course--someone will always think of something.
Jonathan starts connecting with the baby by browsing through name lists pretty much as soon as we know that we are expecting. I prefer to wait until we know the gender to start narrowing things down. So around the beginning of January, we were both on the hunt. Irene had been on our short list of girls' names for Elanor because Jonathan liked the meaning (peace or peaceful) and I had liked it ever since reading George MacDonald's Princess and Curdie as a child. We went through some lists to find another name starting with I to match it, coming up with some real gems like Iphigenia, Ingeborg and the oh, so popular, Isabella. We were starting to wonder if either Irene wasn't a good choice or we would have to drop one of our criterion.
When I came across Inessa, I was initially hesitant because I had never heard it before--something that Jonathan has had trouble accepting in the past. However, the sound was lovely and the meaning was interesting--it is the Slavic variant of Agnes, which means pure or chaste. More people have heard of Inez or Ines which is the Spanish version. Jonathan liked it so we rolled Irene Inessa around in our mouths and ears for a few days. After a while, it occurred to us to switch the names and we both decided that we liked the sound of Inessa better as the first name.
In the final part of the evaluation process, we did a search for Inessa to check to make sure that there weren't any terribly unpleasant associations or people with that name. When first item that came up was a link for a butterfly entomology site, we discovered that Inessa is a genus of skipper butterflies--a perfect way to fit in that nature reference and one last confirmation that this was the right name for her.
We planned to call her Nessie but didn't think of Miss Loch Ness Monster until after she was born and the paperwork submitted but I don't think that we would have changed our minds at that point anyway.
And after all that, Ellie insists on calling her Nugget.
 |
| Peanut and Nugget |
Sunday, July 21, 2013
Welcoming Inessa Irene
Now that Inessa is two months old, it's time to introduce her.
Because everyone loves a detailed and personal birth story, right? For the record, I am now three for three with the water breaking prior to onset of labor (PROM, for the technically minded).
Just as with the beginning of labor with Peter, we had lain down for the night and were chatting before praying and turning out the light when, oh dear, that tell-tale little gush that signals that the night is not going to be as peaceful as we had thought. Mindful of the frantic cleanup and mad rush to pack the birth center bag from last time, we had agreed to pack ahead of time (mostly done!), put a towel in the bed (just in case!) and finish whatever prep before labor started (even if it meant a hour less sleep for everyone). So we paged the midwife, called Elsa to come on over and then waited for contractions to start. We woke up (!) the next morning, feeling a little sheepish that nothing had happened and we had hauled Elsa over here without needing her to watch the kids overnight. We spent a lovely, peaceful day going to our midwife's office for a NST (during which she was so active that she kept moving away from the monitor and, while it was clear that she was doing fine, we had a hard time getting a good trace) and a discussion of our options while the kids went to the zoo with auntie, having a last lunch out together at Cedars, emailing friends asking for prayers and afternoon naps all around. I was, of course, convinced that nothing would be happening for a couple more days and we would have to go through all manner of interventions to get labor going but for that day, we would just let things go however they were going to go. While out walking, we saw a beautiful Painted Lady butterfly and felt that this was one last confirmation that we had chosen the right name for our little daughter--more on this later.
Elsa surprised me by making dinner and I felt that I was ready for a little bit of alone time after an involved day so I went off into the office to watch the second half of Bend it Like Beckham which I had started a couple of nights previously during one of my bouts of late pregnancy insomnia. After realizing that I had counted five or six contractions over the course of those forty minutes, I came to the conclusion that I would, after all, be in the 86% of women who go into labor spontaneously withing 24 hours of PROM. By the time that I emerged from my movie to rejoin the family, I was having to breathe through the contractions, a sure sign of real labor for me. I was in no rush, thinking that it would be a few hours before we would even need to consider going to the birth center for active labor and delivery but as the kids finished dinner, Elsa whisked them off to my parents house, leaving us free to concentrate.
One of the things that I appreciated about this labor was being aware of the progression of each stage. I have a distractable phase, a breathing phase, a singing or humming phase, a rhythmic phase and then pushing--which has its own set of sounds. I know that by the time that I hit the humming phase, I am definitely in active labor and the rhythmic phase with very little break between contractions indicates transition. So we didn't really have to wonder about when to call the midwife and let her know that we'd like to go over to the birth center and we didn't feel nearly as rushed or anxious about how fast labor was progressing--it was fairly clear the time frame that we were on as things unfolded. No wild speeding on the freeway this time!
We checked in with our midwives a couple of times before agreeing that it was time for some supervision and that it would be better to be in the car at this stage rather than any later. With the midwives coming from Seattle, there was just that bit of extra traffic for them to work through and we needed them to be there to let us in and get things set up. We left for the birth center (30 minutes away) around 8:00 and pulled into the parking lot just as I switched phases into transition. Getting through the doors and into the warm water was wonderful! I didn't realize how much Jonathan was concentrating on driving and helping me get through the contractions until we got there and realized that he needed to take a short break so that he could be there when the baby was actually born. Fortunately, one of the midwives was able to lend a (literal) hand to keep me on track. Our baby girl was born after approximately 30 minutes of pushing and about an hour after we arrived. The first thing out of the water that she did was sneeze!
If everything is going normally, it is customary to go home from the birth center within several hours after delivery so we headed home around 2:00 am. It is a little strange to make a car trip so shortly after giving birth, with a new baby in the backseat no less, but so wonderful to be snuggled up all together in our own bed and able to relax. I don't know that it is wonderful enough to make me ever want to just have the baby at home, but I don't miss the hospital stay one bit.
The older kids (so strange to think of them that way!) spent two days playing and wearing out my parents before coming home on Saturday night. They were excited to meet their new baby sister but even more excited to see their own beds again.
 |
| Working on those smiles! |
Because everyone loves a detailed and personal birth story, right? For the record, I am now three for three with the water breaking prior to onset of labor (PROM, for the technically minded).
Just as with the beginning of labor with Peter, we had lain down for the night and were chatting before praying and turning out the light when, oh dear, that tell-tale little gush that signals that the night is not going to be as peaceful as we had thought. Mindful of the frantic cleanup and mad rush to pack the birth center bag from last time, we had agreed to pack ahead of time (mostly done!), put a towel in the bed (just in case!) and finish whatever prep before labor started (even if it meant a hour less sleep for everyone). So we paged the midwife, called Elsa to come on over and then waited for contractions to start. We woke up (!) the next morning, feeling a little sheepish that nothing had happened and we had hauled Elsa over here without needing her to watch the kids overnight. We spent a lovely, peaceful day going to our midwife's office for a NST (during which she was so active that she kept moving away from the monitor and, while it was clear that she was doing fine, we had a hard time getting a good trace) and a discussion of our options while the kids went to the zoo with auntie, having a last lunch out together at Cedars, emailing friends asking for prayers and afternoon naps all around. I was, of course, convinced that nothing would be happening for a couple more days and we would have to go through all manner of interventions to get labor going but for that day, we would just let things go however they were going to go. While out walking, we saw a beautiful Painted Lady butterfly and felt that this was one last confirmation that we had chosen the right name for our little daughter--more on this later.
Elsa surprised me by making dinner and I felt that I was ready for a little bit of alone time after an involved day so I went off into the office to watch the second half of Bend it Like Beckham which I had started a couple of nights previously during one of my bouts of late pregnancy insomnia. After realizing that I had counted five or six contractions over the course of those forty minutes, I came to the conclusion that I would, after all, be in the 86% of women who go into labor spontaneously withing 24 hours of PROM. By the time that I emerged from my movie to rejoin the family, I was having to breathe through the contractions, a sure sign of real labor for me. I was in no rush, thinking that it would be a few hours before we would even need to consider going to the birth center for active labor and delivery but as the kids finished dinner, Elsa whisked them off to my parents house, leaving us free to concentrate.
One of the things that I appreciated about this labor was being aware of the progression of each stage. I have a distractable phase, a breathing phase, a singing or humming phase, a rhythmic phase and then pushing--which has its own set of sounds. I know that by the time that I hit the humming phase, I am definitely in active labor and the rhythmic phase with very little break between contractions indicates transition. So we didn't really have to wonder about when to call the midwife and let her know that we'd like to go over to the birth center and we didn't feel nearly as rushed or anxious about how fast labor was progressing--it was fairly clear the time frame that we were on as things unfolded. No wild speeding on the freeway this time!
We checked in with our midwives a couple of times before agreeing that it was time for some supervision and that it would be better to be in the car at this stage rather than any later. With the midwives coming from Seattle, there was just that bit of extra traffic for them to work through and we needed them to be there to let us in and get things set up. We left for the birth center (30 minutes away) around 8:00 and pulled into the parking lot just as I switched phases into transition. Getting through the doors and into the warm water was wonderful! I didn't realize how much Jonathan was concentrating on driving and helping me get through the contractions until we got there and realized that he needed to take a short break so that he could be there when the baby was actually born. Fortunately, one of the midwives was able to lend a (literal) hand to keep me on track. Our baby girl was born after approximately 30 minutes of pushing and about an hour after we arrived. The first thing out of the water that she did was sneeze!
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| Freshly born |
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| Meeting Daddy |
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| Cozily dressed for the car ride home |
If everything is going normally, it is customary to go home from the birth center within several hours after delivery so we headed home around 2:00 am. It is a little strange to make a car trip so shortly after giving birth, with a new baby in the backseat no less, but so wonderful to be snuggled up all together in our own bed and able to relax. I don't know that it is wonderful enough to make me ever want to just have the baby at home, but I don't miss the hospital stay one bit.
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| First morning at home |
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| Our family of FIVE! |
Meeting Grandma and Grandpa
Jonathan's parents made a trip from Moses Lake to visit and meet their newest grandchild--number 10!
Ellie and Peter weren't a bit excited to take a trip to the park with Grandpa. Not a bit...
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| Love |
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| Let me show you how I can make the car make really LOUD noises by pushing this little red button right here... |
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Turning Three
Ellie's third birthday fell on Easter Sunday this year so we decided to celebrate on Saturday with family. Ever since I showed her bits of the Nutcracker and Swan Lake ballets, she has been calling herself a dancing bird or dancing flower so I chose a pink ballerina theme. She was pretty excited to get up and see these hanging in the dining room in the morning:
Sitting with cousin Amy waiting for everyone else to arrive:
The rest of the decorations:
The dancers (including the ones over the window that are hard to see in this picture) were turned into a mobile to go over Ellie's big girl bed in the room shared with Peter. The dried roses are the ones that Jonathan has given me over the last couple of years. I'm not the only one who doesn't want to just toss them, am I?
Pink flowers for me!
Peter with Auntie Dodo:
You're so pretty, Auntie!
Playing with the cousins (minus Judah):
Yummy birthday cupcake:
This was my first experiment with Japanese cheesecake, chosen because it was light, lower in sugar than some of the other options, and gluten free (for the cousin who would doubtless be horribly disappointed to miss out on dessert). It was quite a hit--there were no leftovers.
Sitting with cousin Amy waiting for everyone else to arrive:
The dancers (including the ones over the window that are hard to see in this picture) were turned into a mobile to go over Ellie's big girl bed in the room shared with Peter. The dried roses are the ones that Jonathan has given me over the last couple of years. I'm not the only one who doesn't want to just toss them, am I?
Pink flowers for me!
Peter with Auntie Dodo:
Yummy birthday cupcake:
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
The MOB walk of shame
I do know that there is another, less savory meaning for the phrase but it also seemed appropriate here. I mean that walk into a hair salon with your little boy whose home haircut has gone terribly, horribly wrong.
It was a perfectly legitimate idea in the beginning. I've cut Peter's hair a couple of times with scissors and had no trouble making it look just fine. For this latest round, I decided that it was time for it to be a little shorter, a little more toddler-like so it was time to bring out the trimmer for the back and around the ears. I had been asking Jonathan for a couple of weeks to show me how to use it but we hadn't gotten around to looking at it together. After a couple of online tutorials, one day I hit the point of fix-this-now-before-I-go-crazy and thought, "how hard can this be to figure out, really?"
It started out well. The trimmer was fully charged, the adjustable length guard was easy to find and install and Peter was intrigued by the sound but was reasonably cooperative with sitting on the table looking at books. The first part went just fine. But just as I pulled the trimmer away to check my work, the guard slipped a little and, woops, there was a patch that was a little shorter than the rest. No big deal, I thought, I'll just camouflage it when I do the rest and be more careful with the guard position on the trimmer. Turns out, like that first wobble of an unstable ladder that sensible people pay attention to so that they don't break their necks by continuing on, that was just the first warning from the trimmer that all might not proceed as planned. As I continued with the shearing, the guard slipped again and then again, this time leaving a bare patch that no amount of tweaking was going to minimize. In desperation, I switched to the scissors, cutting the top and sides in the previously acceptable fashion. That part wasn't too bad but I found it nearly impossible to blend with the uneven back. Finally, in tears, I had to lay down the tools and admit defeat. It wasn't just the funky-looking, yep, mom did it look, that I was willing to have as the price for the learning curve with the new technique. I didn't think that I could stand to take him out in public.
So we loaded up for the nearest salon (such a ridiculously fancy word for a simple place) and trooped off for the trim that hopefully would deal with the mess, bracing myself for the mockery of the stylists. They were nice enough about it, giving him as good a cut as they could with what I had left and waiting until after I left to laugh at me, per my request. I couldn't show the enthusiasm that I think they were hoping for but at least it did look better than before.
It really is awfully short but I have confidence that at least it will grow out evenly from this point. And we are going to be investing in a proper, fully functional, trimmer set for the future.
My sheared lamb:
.jpg)
It was a perfectly legitimate idea in the beginning. I've cut Peter's hair a couple of times with scissors and had no trouble making it look just fine. For this latest round, I decided that it was time for it to be a little shorter, a little more toddler-like so it was time to bring out the trimmer for the back and around the ears. I had been asking Jonathan for a couple of weeks to show me how to use it but we hadn't gotten around to looking at it together. After a couple of online tutorials, one day I hit the point of fix-this-now-before-I-go-crazy and thought, "how hard can this be to figure out, really?"
It started out well. The trimmer was fully charged, the adjustable length guard was easy to find and install and Peter was intrigued by the sound but was reasonably cooperative with sitting on the table looking at books. The first part went just fine. But just as I pulled the trimmer away to check my work, the guard slipped a little and, woops, there was a patch that was a little shorter than the rest. No big deal, I thought, I'll just camouflage it when I do the rest and be more careful with the guard position on the trimmer. Turns out, like that first wobble of an unstable ladder that sensible people pay attention to so that they don't break their necks by continuing on, that was just the first warning from the trimmer that all might not proceed as planned. As I continued with the shearing, the guard slipped again and then again, this time leaving a bare patch that no amount of tweaking was going to minimize. In desperation, I switched to the scissors, cutting the top and sides in the previously acceptable fashion. That part wasn't too bad but I found it nearly impossible to blend with the uneven back. Finally, in tears, I had to lay down the tools and admit defeat. It wasn't just the funky-looking, yep, mom did it look, that I was willing to have as the price for the learning curve with the new technique. I didn't think that I could stand to take him out in public.
So we loaded up for the nearest salon (such a ridiculously fancy word for a simple place) and trooped off for the trim that hopefully would deal with the mess, bracing myself for the mockery of the stylists. They were nice enough about it, giving him as good a cut as they could with what I had left and waiting until after I left to laugh at me, per my request. I couldn't show the enthusiasm that I think they were hoping for but at least it did look better than before.
It really is awfully short but I have confidence that at least it will grow out evenly from this point. And we are going to be investing in a proper, fully functional, trimmer set for the future.
My sheared lamb:
.jpg)
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