Ginny's living up to her nickname

Turns out Ginny really is quite a little piglet. At her two week doctor visit she had gained 19 ounces in 11 days. I took her in again today because of her reflux and she has gained two more pounds, double what she should have. That puts her at 11 pounds 13 ounces. She's quickly growing out of her newborn clothes. Concerns about early childhood obesity aside, she's a cute little chubby cherub. She's getting the baby rolls and creases, and when she smiles it makes her chubby cheeks just adorable. Her reflux isn't too bad. She occasionally erupts an entire meal and has a few fussy spells where you can tell her tummy hurts. For the most part, though, she's a pretty happy baby. The doctor said I must produce pure cream, and who wouldn't be happy about a diet like that.

Ethan and Jo are trying to out do each other as older siblings. Ginny usually sleeps on my bed for her naps and I'll come in to find situations like the above picture where Ethan has shared his precious blanky and snake Rebby with her. My sister Kerri gave Ginny a cute bear that Joanna insists needs to be by Ginny wherever she is. I have also found Joanna's blanky shared with a sleeping Ginny surprisingly enough.

Is there anything cuter than an illiterate toddler reading her baby sister a story? Joannas little white kitty was placed so that it could enjoy the story as well.

The cute scene soon turned to one of uncertainty for Ginny with Joanna deciding the bed had become a trampoline.

When told to stop bouncing, Joanna figured it was time to move on to other activities elsewhere in the house. Not wanting her sister to be bored, she left her with the book to peruse at her leisure.

Bedtime

Since Matt is gone all day he usually takes care of bedtime for the kids. He and Joanna have a pretty cute routine together. She crawls into Ethans bed and Matt reads her a bunch of "sories" while she drinks her milk and snuggles her blanky. Then we all do family prayer. She's started to mumble along with whoever is saying the prayer. Then she gets snuggled by daddy while they sing her favorite songs. She usually asks for "su-shine" (you are my sunshine) first, and then "B" (sunbeam). Once there was a snowman gets her lowered into bed on the "small, small, small" part, and sometimes there is a rousing head shoulders knees and toes thrown in. Joanna adores her daddy and I love that they get that special little bit of time together.
Good behavior earns Ethan the right to stay up later than Jo. He has a hard time going to bed at a decent hour anyway since it's light so late right now. He'll usually go for a bike ride or read calvin and hobbes. When he does finally go to bed, he's asleep in seconds.
Ginny's routine consists of a bath and a lot of snuggling and rocking. She's so sweet all the time, but I especially love her when she's squeaky clean and in fresh pjs and all relaxed from her bath. She seems most content then too.

It's amazing how quickly a nice relaxing Sunday can descend into chaos. The kids were so great today, and I got an amazing nap. We were settling in for the night when Ethan decided to go for a last bike ride. I'll shorten the story and just say the kids down the street, one of whom he plays with quite a lot and just adores, decided to ditch Ethan. So he came home in tears just as Ginny erupted the entire meal she had just eaten. Luckily my clothes took the brunt of it saving my bed. Joanna saw it happen and was kind of scared by it so she decided she needed her blanky for comfort. Unfortunately her blanky was in the washer. So crisis control kicked in. Ginny and I got a quick bath and a change of clothes, Ethan got a lot of hugs, and we got out of Dodge. Thank heavens friends up the street were out chatting. The kids got to play, Ginny got rocked by an expert rocker, and Matt and I got to sit and breathe and laugh for a while. A half hour chat with friends does so much good for the soul. I'd take it over therapy any day.
I worry about Ethan and playing with other kids. He just seems to get picked on a lot. The most common scenario seems to be that he'll play really well with a friend if it's just the two of them, but if another kid comes along all of the sudden the friend turns on Ethan. The really heartbreaking thing is he doesn't seem to really understand what's going on. All he knows is he wants to play with the other kids and it's not working out for him. I guess it comes with the independence he has now. He doesn't have mom constantly watching him now but there aren't any moms there to enforce nice play either.
I never realized that being a mom would involve feeling so much guilt. I feel like every problem or struggle they have is my fault, either indirectly because I haven't prepared them or taught them well enough, or just outright my fault. Like the other night I snuck Joanna's blanky out to wash while she was sleeping. I started the wash and planned on moving it to the dryer when Ginny woke up to eat in the night. Well, a little bit before Ginny got me up I could here Joanna in her bed saying "oh no" and kind of whimpering and searching her bed for her blanky. I lay there for what seemed like an eternity feeling so horrible as she searched and sounded so sad, knowing full well she wouldn't find it and that I couldn't give it to her sopping wet. And even Ginny's throwing up tonight was my fault because I encouraged her to overeat. There's a lot of weight to carry on your shoulders as a mom.

Ethan's been wanting to go fishing like the older boys in the neighborhood so last Friday Matt went and got some hooks and bait for his old rod and took him out back to the stream. Ethan came and went while Matt did most of the work but they ended up catching one. Ethan was really excited and Matt was kind of sad about killing it. He felt better about it though when he had it for breakfast the next morning.

Joanna has been really cute with Ginny. She brings her blankets and toys and decides if Ginny should lay on the bed or sit in her chair. She picks out her outfits and chooses which diaper she'll wear ( they all have different sesame street characters and usually the Elmo diapers win out). The cutest though is when she sings "You are my Sunshine" to her. It's mostly "ya la la su-shine, la ma da su-shine" but it's adorable.

Here we go

So I'm giving this blogging thing a try. I don't know if it's worth using up the few minutes I have when all three kids are either napping or otherwise engaged but I've failed miserably at all other forms of journaling so I might as well give it a whirl. I'm starting out at one of the craziest times of my life. My days seem wildly busy yet when I finally collapse in bed at night I have a hard time thinking of anything I accomplished besides having my kids survive another day. With Ethan and Jo competing to see who can make mom's ear drums burst first and a 3 week old in the corner out screaming the both of them, I think I need a place to record the good stuff more than ever so that I don't look back at these first days of having Ginny in our home and shiver. The blog name comes from the pet names we have for our kids: Ethan Bear, Joanna Bug, and Ginny Pig (although Ethan still insists she should be Ginny Frog). We'll see if I get anywhere beyond this first entry, but if nothing else I can record that Ginny gave me her first all out real smile this morning and it was beautiful.