This Week at Our House #5: Post Partum Week 2

 

This week was easier than last week. We continued our break from school for the full week. Sam had a rough start to the week, but then we found ways to help him and he has been much easier and happier the last few days. Friday morning, he even hugged Gideon and said, "I love you." We did not expect that. 

Gideon is gaining weight and doing well. At just two weeks old, he is almost a pound over his birth weight. Gideon has an intense stare. He watches all of us very closely and seems to penetrate us with his eyes. I like to say that he is an old soul in a new born body. 

I kept the rest of the kids away from the

computer and computer games and they all had a much better week. Joseph, Joshua, Arwen, and Susan were all a lot better behaved. They were good enough, I don't really have anything funny to report about them. Arwen

colored a lot. She still loves her crayons and coloring books. It's her favorite hobby. Susan tried to get people to play chess with her, which was funny. Josh called foul saying Susan was cheating. Of course, she has no idea how to play the game or is even old enough to figure it out. She just likes the pieces. Joseph read a lot and spent a lot of time on puzzles. We're on our 5th 1000 piece puzzle since New Year's.  Josh managed to play things other than computer games too, though I think most of that was either games or pretending to blow things up. Josh and Joseph can often be heard making bomb-like noises. They are never very loud about it, but it always seems to be happening. 

 

Rachel and Anya read my blog a lot, so they still used the computer. Sometimes, I thought that was cheating. Rachel however, did a good bit of cooking this week. She made homemade pizza twice and 4 cheesecakes. John said her cheesecake was the best he has ever eaten. I really liked her chocolate cheesecake. Anya is probably my number one to go to hold Gideon. She is very capable with him and he often seems quite happy in her arms. Rachel likes to hold him and sing to him. I took some pictures of his stare while Rachel sang to him. 

Many of the kids spent a lot more time outdoors. The weather was dry and not too cold and quite sunny. We have had some lovely sunsets. Joseph, Joshua, Arwen, Susan, Sam, and Adam stayed out until dark most nights this week. 

Adam has written the beginning of a little piece of piano music. I really like what he has and want him to finish it. I

think it would go well with a sad part of a movie. I made a recording of it and sent it to Ruth. Adam plays the piano all of the time. He is not traditional about it and mostly plays by ear. I do think that he has finally learned his notes, though because sometimes he gets music out and plays that.

I eased things a bit by getting back to doing dishes. We still have way too many dishes. I wish we had a working dish washer. Our current one broke last May. Broken dishwashers seem to be my curse. There was once I said that my time was worth a lot and I didn't need to waste it washing dishes by hand, so if we had to use debt to get a dish washer we would just do that. That was back in late 2010. Not too long after I made that statement we had a dishwasher break down for the first time and have had several break down since then, and always when we cannot afford to get it fixed. It's very frustrating. I am yelling mercy internally and I hope I have learned my lesson. I know now that I am never so important that I have to take out debt for anything!!!

Johnny and Kate continue to do a lot of transcription. Kate is continuing to work on her animation and children's book and Johnny spends time learning to program computer games. Kate also spends a lot of time with John learning math. Neither Kate nor Johnny take vacation time. They like to be on top of all their projects. 

Monday we start school again, and the roofer will come to start fixing our roof. Life will get busy once more, so I am glad that we took these two weeks off to rest, heal, and get to know Gideon.

 

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