I Still Exist...

...only not so much in the 'blogging' world at the moment.

Really, I'm just tired. Somebody needs to get these two kids of mine in sync (Like the band! Ah! 90's music! Sleep deprived tangents!). Someone needs to tell Isla that sleep happens like, ALL night long, not just part of it. And someone else needs to tell Finn that I'm tired and I don't want to run around like a maniac with him all day. Actually, I do want to, so scratch that. Just tell Isla to sleep.

As you can see...tired.

We are, however, enjoying my mom's last week out in Utah for a while. Its been great having an extra set of hands around to help...I really don't know how I'm going to handle these two monsters without her. Finn needs so much physical attention while Isla is just a worry-wart who cries at me much of the day.

Sigh.

And its about to get a lot busier around here. No final details for y'all yet. Oh no. I'm gonna make you wait. But it involves possibly packing, possibly moving, and possibly a lot of paint swatches. Take your guesses!

As far as the kiddos themselves go, they are fantastico. Finn is talking like a maniac and can spot letters 'O', 'I', 'S', 'E', 'A' and sometimes 'T'. He can 'read' a few short words, but lets face it, he can't  actually read, we've just trained him like a monkey. Its great :) My mom did an evil thing and taught him how to say 'That's mine!' so now he feels he can take anything, say its his, and he's good to go.

It's actually kind of cute, so for now he's getting away with it.

He's also obsessed with this educational book on horses that I stole from my elementary school (no joke). He flips to the page with the paint horse and yells, 'Bubba!'...the name of my horse from way back when. He also points at the jousters and says, 'they crash!'. And for the finale he points at the pictures of hay and grass and says, 'they eat grass' and then proceeds to put his face on the book and pretend to eat it.


Precious.

He also loves trucks. Anything with four wheels is a 'truck'. And lawn mowers. On Mondays when the courtyard in our complex gets mowed he stares out the window for (what seems like) hours saying 'mower' over and over and over again. It gets repetitive, but I'll convince myself its cute for his sake.

And Isla? She's great too. Duh.

We're still getting into a groove but I've switched her to mostly formula and she's been a lot happier. But seriously, she's literally hungry or eating ALL. DAY. LONG. She'll drink 5oz of formula and be hungry 2 hours later at the most. Its ridiculous. She's still pretty tiny too.

Basically, I'm jealous. Tall, skinny and can eat whatever she wants. Sheesh.

Now, the only thing I need from her is some decent sleep at night. That hungry-two-hours-later thing doesn't end just because the sun goes down.

Tips anyone? Anyone?

*Crickets*

No? It was worth a try.

And on that note, I bid you all a sleepy adieu. 

Blog posts are so exciting! So is my playmat!

The Elegorilorse Is Back...With a Vengance

Remember the strangest case of sleep deprivation ever? No? Click here. Too lazy to click there? I'll explain. Finn was a sleep-grunter. He sounded like an Elegorilorse. It was great (minus the sleep deprivation).

Isla is following suit in a big way. While she isn't the best sleeper in the world (she's up for a snack every two hours. Ugh), when she does sleep she is loud about it. The elephant, gorilla, and horse noises just. don't. stop.

The Beatles got it right when they said they were so tired. And they wanted a drink and a cigarette. I feel ya, boys.

So far her only saving grace at nighttime is that I can read while she neighs in her bassinet and therefore feel tired and intellectual come morning.

Other than that she's a little dreamboat. Finn still loves/ignores her and I can only imagine that they'll be best of friends at some point in time in their lives. Maybe once he stops trying to sit on her? Yeah, that happens.

But he also likes to run into our room in the morning and peak at her sleeping in her bassinet (Did I mention she falls asleep around the time Finn wakes up? Oy). So thats cute.

She also has really, really long arms and toes and fingers. The nurses at her 2 week check up kept commenting on it. And she's a whole inch taller than Finn was at her age. We got a lanky one on our hands here. Another Rebarchik to put my height to shame, I'm afraid.

 

 An Elegorilorse? Me?!

Just Some Pictures...

Not much going on except being the mothership to these two kiddos. In lieu of that, all I have for the general public is two more pictures of this little cutie pie:

 She smiles in her sleep a lot :)

So far so good as far as being a mom of two goes. It helps that my very own madre is here to keep Finn as occupied as he needs to be (which is a lot) while I figure Isla out. It seems as though she needs to eat every hour and a half and let me tell you, Finn isn't going to hang around while I do that all day. Don't blame him. A bottle gets tempting most days.

The only problem I see is that my mom is going to have to leave some day and I'm going to be left to figure out how to do this solo. *Gulp*

Day 5...

Ain't she gorgeous? That's all....

How It All Went Down...

You want an awesome labor story? You got it!

(Why are these stories so obligatory for the blogging world? I don't know.)

So contractions. They started on Saturday morning and I was like, 'sweet! Lets get this party started!' even though they weren't so painful that I was convinced it was really 'go' time. We went to the hospital when they were about 8 minutes apart because everyone told me that with second kids labor goes by a lot faster and frankly, I didn't want to deliver a baby in the car.

Gross.

They sent us home an hour later because my gut instincts were correct...thundercats were not go.

We were back 3 hours later because the contractions were stronger and 3-5 minutes apart.

They sent us home an hour later...again. And told me to relax. Yeah. Sure thing. We ordered pizza and wings on the way home because I was all emotional about the fact that I was in some amount of pain and people were ordering me to chill out about it.

That's when the fun started!

We ate pizza and wings and started watching Sherlock (yes!) but I was like 'holy mother of batman, these contractions are KILLING me.' It was BAD.

I really didn't want to go back to the hospital only to be sent home again and have the nurses laugh at me behind my back (that happens, right?), but I was swearing like a sailor and could hardly walk so we went and it was probably good timing because...

...suspense...

...my water broke as I was getting out of the car. Super gross feeling but it meant we were good to go. Oh, and I was 7cm dialated. I'll do the math for you. In 3 hours I went from 2cm to 7. Unmedicated. Ouch.

Since I was in a lot of pain but wanted (past tense!) to go sans drugs, I compromised and got an epidural but wasn't hooked up to any medication. Which means I could still feel my legs...and all that...but it was just dulled down a bit.

Compromises are awesome.

2 hours later Isla was born!

36 uneventful hours after that we went home!

We've been home for a day and so far so good. My mom is here and Luke is taking a few days off work so basically I'm home free.  Now if only I could leave the house for more than a minute...

Finn is adjusting just as I thought he would. He still runs around throwing things only now he has to avoid hitting a baby. He likes to pet her legs and when she cries he runs over with her pacifier (we get lucky if he doesn't put it in his own mouth first, though) and he likes to give her his toys. He also enjoys sitting in her bouncy chair which, as you can imagine, is much too small and pink for him.

But yeah, mostly just ignores her. Fine by me. It seems safer.

As for Isla...she's a doll. A doll with a set of lungs and high expectations. Takes after her momma :)
But really, she just sleeps and eats and stares at you and cries and basically is a newborn baby. Sometimes she honks like a goose when she's upset. Or squeaks. It's great.

What more can you ask?!

sw

Isla Rebarchik

She's here!!

And since I'm sitting not-so-conveniently at the hospital at the moment with no fantastic photos of her on hand, here are some general details:

• Born 12:44am on Sunday May 20th (37 weeks 6 days)
• Weighed 6lbs 4oz (exactly the same as Finn)
• Labor was intense but we were all laughing by the end.
• Her name is pronounced 'eye-lah'... fyi.
• She looks unbelievably like her brother did at birth only with a head of near-black hair.
• Finn has come to visit twice and likes to pet her like a dog and point to her eyes (i.e. try and poke her eyes). But he also gave her a kiss of his ow volition :)

Love!

One Last Hoorah...

In anticipation of baby girl's possibly (hopefully!) imminent arrival this family took  one last, awesome trip as a family of just three.

Let's face it, every time we go somewhere its an awesome trip, but this one was extra special because we went to the zoo.

Given Finn's new talent at naming animals and their sounds I thought it would be epically exciting for him.

As it turns out Finn is WAY more interested in the water and rocks in the animals' enclosures than anything else. Really, this kid loves water and rocks. He can spot a water fountain from a mile away and we have a rock collection constantly growing outside our front door (and in the car).

But in any case Finn saw some animals and thought they were pretty cool, too.

 Furry doggy backpacks are the best...

 See that Bengal Tiger in the background? Whatever, look at those rocks in the water!

I just love his face in this picture :)