Meg is a mess

My daughter is a stinker. I just wanted to throw that out there right away. She gets into all sorts of trouble. I look at her and see a 2.0 version of Jack. Jack was a very mischievous toddler, and I feel Meg will follow in his footsteps.

she was unsupervised for maybe 3 minutes

angry that her brother only gave her a bite of his cheese she decided to get her own food. It is a yogurt container from the garbage. She licked out whatever was left. Gross.

Decided to climb into dresser and throw out the clothes

always growling. not sure she will ever use actual words.

my chair not Robert's.

picture granny took- sums her up pretty well

not sure how she even got back there. absolutely no idea.

she climbs on the chairs all the time. She wants to hang out like her brothers and watch tv

This is just a small look inside life with Meg. She is always getting food out of the pantry, trying to open the refrigerator, we have a photo album and she found markers and colored on every single picture before we even noticed what she was doing, she take clothes out of everyone's dressers, no lower cabinet is safe, she screams when she is mad, and she cries these pitiful sobs the second you tell her no. She is a handful; way more than Luke and Thomas were. Life will never be dull with Meg.

Too many kids and I don't know what to do

So 5 is it-- the number of kids that is too many for me to handle. I am not able to just stay in bed and cuddle my sweet Robert. No, he is often left alone upstairs in bed while I deal with/parent/keep alive the other children. If not alone in bed then he is very often in the car because we have so many places to be. After I had Meg I basically stayed in bed with her for like 3 weeks. Not the case now.

Thursday I took Jack to school only to find out upon arrival that school was delayed for two hours due to fog. :(  Tigran had a vet appt. that morning as well because he keeps peeing in the house!!!  At first we thought it was because he was getting old but in the last 7 days he has peed in the house 3 times!!!! Pete dropped Tigran off at the vet because I am not able to control dog dog at the vet, and then he came home so I could take Jack back to school. Then we had a couple hours of not being in the car before the vet said I could pick up Tigran- whether or not he has a bladder infection is still unclear at this point, but they did give us antibiotics to use until we get the results of his urine culture. As soon as I got back with Tigran I had to turn around and take Luke to his doctor appointment. One hour back at home, and then time to pick Jack up from school. Plus, that evening Jack had Tae Kwon Do. Now he is in the higher belt rank class so he meets later, and the time is pretty inconvenient since I have other children I have to put in bed. Pete has been catching up on sleep this week so he is here, but not very helpful. I was able to leave the kids here with him while I dropped Jack off, but I had to drive back home to put them in bed before driving back to pick up Jack. Hopefully, when Pete is more able to help it won't be so crazy, and he can just take Jack. I was so tired that my big plans for watching tv in bed were not to be. After about 20 minutes I was asleep. Of course, this was the night little Robert decided that from 2:30-4:30 he would be awake and unable to fall back asleep.

Friday was also a lot of car. No delayed school today, and I did check my email before even getting out of bed. I was a little slow in getting up and this combined with Jack always being slow when getting ready for school =he was late. Sadly, he is late more often than I care to admit, but today is Friday and that means Mass as soon as they get to school, and this Friday his class was in charge of Mass which means they are supposed to be the first ones in the church. Oh, and to top it off I remembered half way to the school that I was supposed to pack his lunch but totally didn't. This meant a couple different things for me. I had to go to the store. We were out of basically everything. I had been waiting for the infant insert I ordered for my Ergo to arrive because I can't even imagine going grocery shopping with a baby and my not wearing that baby. I don't even know how I would do it; especially with Meg. Now I really had no choice if Jack was going to eat lunch. I decided Robert would have to go in the Ergo without the insert, and I would just have to constantly check on him to make sure he was ok. So that is what we did. Then home, unload groceries, pack lunch, drive it to the school, get back in time to make lunch for Luke, make sure he is ready for pre-school, take him to school, clean up a little so that I don't trip or so Meg stops tripping every time she walks anywhere, a small amount of down time, and then time to pick up Luke and Jack. Did you notice that no where in there did I mention sit in bed and snuggle a baby? Poor kid.

Today I decided that I needed a beer, but sadly I didn't even get to sit down to enjoy it. I had to drink my Stella while standing up and doing about a hundred things for all the kids. If I waited to drink it once the kids were in bed then it would be late and I would be in bed myself, so I had to squeeze it in. So 5 kids is too many. I don't get to just sit down, I get so tired that by the end of the day I just want to go to bed, I don't shower everyday and for me this is a big deal, I have always showered every day as part of my calming down time, even if I had to put a kid in there with me. I get done what I need to get done, eventually, and not much else. It is going to take some getting used to.

Ok pictures:

Meg growls, she growls all the time, now she even makes the growl face all the time. I had to share.

Jack is now a purple belt, which means he is in the higher level class.

It was nice enough to go outside the other day so Thomas asked that I take a picture of him running.

Guess I need some photos of Luke all by himself.

Group shot of the 4 youngest. See Meg even growled for this picture.

Sweet baby asleep. Pete said that Robert has already rolled front to back. I noticed this too but thought surely not. Now I am going to have to actually set up the pack and play for nap time.

Jack's birthday interview

Jack saw that I interviewed Luke for his birthday so he really wanted me to interview him for his birthday. Since I was a little busy on his birthday we had cake today and I interviewed him.

Who is your favorite person in the whole world? Daddy

What is your favorite color? red

What is your favorite TV show? Avengers Assemble

What is your favorite outfit? my mine craft shirt

What sport do you like best? basketball

What song do you love? Diary of a Mad Man

What is your favorite cereal? Apple Jacks or Fruit Loops

Who is your best friend? Jack K.

What do you want to be when you grow up? A scientist/herpetologist

What is your favorite book? Percy Jackson books

What are you really good at? TaeKwonDo

Where do you wish you could go on vacation? beach

What is your best memory? Yesterday when daddy and I were at the first communion retreat

What would you buy if you had $1000? An Xbox and a bunch of games

What vegetable do you hate the most? zucchini

If you had one wish what would it be? to do anything I want, like not brush my teeth but still have clean teeth or not have to eat veggies.

What is your favorite flavor ice cream? I really liked those Magnum Bars in Germany. They aren't the same as the ones here.

What do you hope to do before your next birthday? Earn my brown belt

I made one promise and I ignored it

So Jack had one rule, one promise I was supposed to keep---- DO NOT have the baby on his birthday.  I even scheduled my induction for the day after so there was no way I was having that baby on his birthday. Turns out I was wrong. Poor guy. He handled it quite well.

I never thought I would have the baby on his birthday. I had not been having contractions at all. I was grumpy, tired, and all that end of pregnancy stuff but no Braxton Hicks and no random contractions here or there. I woke up around 4am, which wasn't unusual, checked my email when boom contraction. Hmm. 5 minutes later boom. Coincidence? It kept happening- 5 minutes apart and 1 minute long. They hurt, I was uncomfortable, 35 minutes later they were still happening. I got up told Pete, brushed my teeth, and they began hurting so much I had to just stop and squat. I began shaking, I felt like I was going to vomit. Contractions in the past never really bothered me. They were uncomfortable, not pleasant, but nothing like this. I knew this was it, I was going to have the baby on Jack's birthday. I paged the doctor, Jack woke up from all my noise, so I first apologized, told him to get dressed, and then make sure dad was awake!!

I was in so much pain that I said just take me to the hospital now with all the kids and we will figure it all out later. The contractions were already moving into the 3 minutes apart range and lasting longer than one minute. So we get out to the car and you'll never guess-- it had snowed like 6 or 7 inches overnight. This baby had the worst timing. The roads were horrible, we had to go so slow, Pete could barely see, all the kids were in the car asking questions, and I was just in constant pain.

We pull up to the ER, Pete gets me a wheelchair, leaves the kids in the car, and takes me inside. I really thought the baby was just going to fall out of me right then. They kept asking me questions and I just wanted to yell- SHUT UP!!!!!! They came to take me upstairs and Pete went home with the kids. I figured just see where things stand and if we need to call someone we can. Pete's parents were on their way in from Kentucky. When I got upstairs it was 7am. She checked me and I was 7 centimeters. It was obvious my contractions were every couple minutes so they did what they could to quickly get me prepped for my epidural. In the past the epidural has always made me nervous, scared, and was the most painful part of the whole contractions part of labor. This time I wanted to be one of those crazy screaming ladies that cusses and demands the epidural now. I truly couldn't get it fast enough and was not at all concerned about the pain from the numbing shot or any ill effects that could be caused by it. I was just sad that it didn't work immediately.

Once I was numb enough to actual say words instead of grunts and glares my nurse and the doctor checked things out and it was around 8:45 or 9am. I was basically ready to go so he popped my water and told me I could start pushing anytime. The nurse stayed with me and after a couple pushes said she thought I still had one centimeter to go before pushing and didn't want me to push for another 30 minutes. This way I didn't irritate my cervix and cause swelling. Pete and I talked at that point and he wanted to hang out with Jack on his birthday and make it special for him and not have him feel like we were brushing him aside for a new kid. Plus, he couldn't make it to the hospital in 30 minutes anyway. So at 9:30 the nurse comes back she tells me to push, I push half of a push and she tells me to stop because the baby is right there and she needs the doctor. He comes in, and I push just through two contractions and baby is born. He weighed 8 lbs. 10 oz. 21 inches long.

Since I was having a tubal ligation in a couple hours we just hung out in the delivery room. I still wasn't sure of his name because we liked a few different names and had decided not to settle on one until we saw him. Pete wasn't there, and I had no strong feelings, so he was just baby for the first couple hours of life. I learned right away he likes to suck or nurse just because. He didn't seem overly interested in eating but he kept nursing to fall asleep.

They took him to the nursery while I had my surgery. For my surgery they upped the epidural dosage, gave me some sedatives that didn't completely knock me out but had me falling in and out of sleep, and they put up a big sheet so I have no idea what happened. It took about 20-30 minutes then I was done. Never to have children again. It is sad and weird to think that part of my life is over when it is basically all I have been doing for the last 9 years- almost the whole time I have been married to Pete. I feel very confident in my decision but the finality of it, the inability to do what a woman's body is meant to do, is a loss. I mourn that part of womanhood being gone.

He has been a very good baby so far. He really likes to nurse in order to put himself to sleep, to help soothe himself, and to eat so I know already he will be very attached to me. Not a bad thing, but something that will make certain parts of my life harder, especially with a Moo Baby around.

I called Pete after my surgery and they had been celebrating Jack's birthday all day with gifts, doughnuts, movies, and naming the baby. They had seen the pictures I sent and all agreed to name him Robert Franklin. At Christmas Luke decided the baby's name would be Franklin Santa Baby Weigel. So we had been joking that was his name for awhile now. Then Joe and Matt got a dog and named him Franklin, and while Luke thought that was cool he still wanted our baby to be Franklin Santa Baby. Robert had been a name Pete picked out and liked a little while ago. He liked that it was German and I have people named Robert in my family so I agreed to it as a top pick, but still wanted to wait. So as soon as they saw the picture they agreed he was a Robert Franklin. Luke wants to call him Bobby. Pete wants to call him Robo Cop Baby. I think we may have to wait a bit longer to see what actually sticks. He may end up a Robert, after all Thomas is Thomas and refuses to go by anything else.

Everyone made it to the hospital that afternoon to see Robo Cop Baby.

He seemed like a big hit. Meg was a little overwhelmed so she just hung out with Daddy mostly. She is very mad at me and the last two times I have seen her she has turned her head away from me and won't look at me. Then she snuggles up to Pete. I have deeply offended her by having this baby. I guess it is lucky she has Pete.

Here are a couple pictures of what Robbie/Bobby likes best- being snuggled up right next to me sleeping.