introducing: Abryhn Joseph "AJ" Sisk!

proud parents with the newest boy

nurse chrissy helped us through labor and delivery

siblings eagerly wait their turn

"i've never had a baby before"

"mine new baby"

the aunts came to see the new nephew

mee-maw-again

friends jeff and marilyn copeland came bearing food for mom and dad

Pray Specifically

Apparently, God has a sense of humor...and enjoys messing with our family.  This morning, Chris woke me up with "the alarm didn't go off!" So, in the end we still get to make a mad dash to the hospital even though we're scheduled for an induction.

I'm reminded of the incident a few years ago when Chris was going deer hunting. The boys and I prayed that "daddy would get a deer."  Not that I'm that thrilled with venison, but I knew Chris would really enjoy the conquest.  He came home from hunting trip, not having fired a shot, but with a deer in his possession.  Someone else had killed it, but gave him the meat to process.  Technically, daddy did "get a deer", just not like we had meant it.  So, the next season, the boys and I prayed more specifically...that "daddy would shoot a deer"! The lesson should have carried over.

In the same way, I mentioned to God that I would enjoy getting to "mad dash" to the hospital.  I should have qualified it by continuing to say "...because I'm in labor on my own".  Because, He provided the exciting mad dash to the hospital...due to oversleeping! We didn't miss our appointment though, so He's just kinda messing with us! Good thing the contractions aren't too bad yet...I might not have a sense of humor later =D

this too shall pass...

 Over the last few weeks we've been preparing for AJ (boy or girl initials), and among other thoughts, I've been wondering..."how shall we break the blog-silence?" Maybe we should wait for a birth announcement- afterall, the new baby IS the main reason for the lack of posts.

Then today happened.

As I was dealing with the situation, my thoughts hovered around....I need sympathy, I need sympathy, I need sympathy. Not wanting to steal any one person's time by ranting over the phone, I thought "I'll appeal to the online social community! SURELY someone will read my sufferings and think, 'poor Stacey'."

Then I thought about the well-meaning phrase I hear most often from empty-nest-moms and probably would hear again today..."This too shall pass". Of course they're referring to how quickly time flies and all of a sudden the babies are grown and gone. In this afternoon's case however, the phrase sounds rather ironically unencouraging. Here goes my sob story:

Each afternoon, I shut Violet in her room to either take a nap or play- she won't always sleep anymore. Then the boys get to watch a couple hours of PBS while I recover from the morning and psych myself up for the evening by taking my own "time out".  It sounded like today was going to be another no-nap day for Violet, so I tuned out her playing noises and read a "babytalk" magazine to refresh myself about newborns...less than 4 weeks til D-day!

As I finished skimming the magazine, I heard a distress cry from Violet..."Momma! Momma! Momma!" All it took was opening the door for me to SMELL what was wrong with her. yeah. Problem was, she didn't call me right away. She had already removed the offensive diaper, freed contents onto the carpeted floor, done some sort of smooshing activity , climbed on one brothers bed, sat on his headboard, climbed the ladder (with a quick squish against the wall) to the other brothers bed, sat on both the sheet and comforter, and was on her way back down again when she called me. I'm sure she had a great time.

She was relatively easy to clean, but the floor...wow. Really, I didn't need to review what dinner had been last night! I had put her back on her bed so she didn't get to play with toys or watch TV with her brothers. She kept saying "I watch you mommy?" As if I was the afternoon's entertainment. I had flash backs to the stage where baby throws something just to watch it fall, parent picks it up, baby throws it again (just to see if gravity still works), parent picks it up again, baby throws it again (because now its a fun game with Mommy/Daddy...rather like playing fetch with a dog). Then she sang me her "poop song". I only know what it was because when she was finished she told me that's what she was singing. Then she wanted to sing "Deep and Wide". nice transition. I didn't see the connection, but didn't need to...by then I was stripping the boys' beds on my way out of the room. It smelled as nice as Resolve stain remover could make it, and my containment mission was complete: stop the mess before it spread further.

It might have been more worth while for me to not have taken my time out, rather than to expend the energy to clean up such a mess. I'm not sure I netted any energy-gain. Although, I'm tempted to dwell on the lack of glamour involved with being a caregiver of young children, something rings in my ears..."This too shall pass!"