The Big Arrival

Little Margaret Anne arrived October 15 at 1:49 in the morning.  8 lbs 13 oz and 22 inches long.

I'll be back with a birth story and more pictures once I wrap my mind around the fact that we now have four children and one of them is a girl :)  

Prayers Please

Unrelated but very sweet 9th anniversary flowers with bonus paper airplanes and top of one baby head.

Chris is going back in for another hernia surgery tomorrow morning at 8--why they didn't notice six months ago that he had hernias on both sides I don't know.  Chris says he is feeling pretty good because at least this time he knows what to expect, me on the other hand--I really dislike the idea of anyone cutting into my husband, or putting him completely under anesthesia, or the thought of another six weeks of non-child-lifting recovery......mostly the cutting though.

I would welcome your prayers for a successful surgery and quick recovery and maybe for me not to have a pregnancy induced panic attack brought on by all of my imaginings of the various things that could go wrong--as unlikely as they may be.  Pregnant worrying is so much worse than regular worrying :)  

On Finally Knowing

So after months and months of hardly knowing anything at all about what our next year will look like, we finally do know some things!

But I'm afraid you'll have to scroll through these completely unrelated pictures from our vacation to find out what those things are.....

 Fort Macon group photo fail.

 Only child who willingly has his picture taken refuses to make normal faces.

 That's right, he's already picking flowers for mom :)

Well during our trip we heard from Chris' detailer that we definitely have orders to go to the Pentagon in November--well as definite as orders can be until you actually have them printed off and are on your way to check out from your command, that is :)  

The detailer also said he could push the orders to December 1 to give us more than two weeks postpartum to do the big move so that was thoughtful.  Is it crazy to try to move to DC in December?  Less crazy than moving in say September--hugely pregnant by yourself with three kids?

Wherever we go, we definitely need a pile of dirt at our new place.  I have never seen children more engrossed in their play than when mine were busy on the dirt mountain/castle/fort/prison/"lego castle" (which is completely different than a regular castle in case you, like me, didn't know).

Also, a hose, we will definitely have a hose.

And a daughter, if all goes well, we will also be settling into our new place with a brand new baby girl :)

David is beyond excited and has requested a curly haired, red-headed sister but has said that a "plain regular sister" would be fine as well.  I guess I'll see what I can do.

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Broken

Well, I suppose it was bound to happen sooner or later.......

.....we have our first broken bone.  This cast seems a little overkill to me since the bone in question is just his ring finger, but then again I'm not an orthopedist so what do I know.  Chris took him in to the original Sunday morning ER visit and follow up casting since I'm currently useless in an x-ray room situation.  And yes, yes they did recognize him at the ER. Don't worry, Chris informed them that Henry's just really accident prone so we are probably one nursemaid's elbow away from receiving our first visit from Child Protective Services.

 The funny thing is, he wasn't even doing anything that should have been able to break a finger.  He was just crawling around on the floor by himself pretending to be some animal or other when his hand slipped out from under him.  Chris knew something was wrong right away by Henry's sudden ability to give a perfect Vulcan salute--and also all the crying.

Clearly he's fine now though and if you ask him, he will calmly tell you that his finger "got squished" but now he gets to wear "hand armor." The lucky duck.

It should really be fun keeping this thing clean and dry for the next two weeks since the children seem to be allergic to that general state of being.  Also, Chris is the meanest dad ever for not letting Henry pick his own dream cast color--which happened to be pink.

How Giving Up TV Can Be Hazardous For Your Child's Health

We usually try to give up TV and sweets for Lent and we've had varying degrees of success--i.e. last year's Lent with a newborn--not super successful.

Well, you know that level of crazy that kids sometimes reach when they're literally bouncing off the walls and you break down and yell over the ruckus "who wants a show?" and they all come running and magically sit quietly for thirty minutes or until Netflix stops and asks if you're still watching, depending on how your day is going?

Well we hit that level of crazy today.

But I didn't ask if anyone wanted a show.

This is post ER visit--he's trying semi-successfully to look repentant.

He didn't actually bounce off the wall.  He actually bounced off his brother's head.  And into the dresser.  Luckily grandpa Reintjes was here to look at it and assure me that it definitely needed stitches and also to watch the other two boys plus a neighbor child who I was babysitting while I ran him over to the ER.

He was unfazed.  Well, he was slightly fazed when the actual stapling occurred but that only lasted ten seconds and then he was fine again.

The corpsman helping us asked if he was going to be bouncing on the bed again any time soon and in true Reintjes style Henry looked up, said "yes" and began laughing maniacally.

These Reintjes men.

They never learn.  

We'll see how the rest of Lent goes with no television.  Hopefully we'll get through with all our bones intact.

On the Overratedness of Well-Timed Babies

*This is an announcement*

I got really creative and surprised Chris with the big news by inventing a reason to go shopping and then pulling into the 'expectant mothers' parking spot in front of the commissary, which is something he always encourages even if I'm not pregnant and I always refuse.  He nearly ruined the whole thing with his irritation over the fact that I was not parking in the closest possible spot to the door he wanted to go into nor was I taking the most direct route to get there.  He surely was surprised--mostly because I had already had our ubiquitous must have tested too early negative pregnancy test and thought I was on my way to another eighty-five day funfest of repeated pregnancy tests and confusing charts.

I guess I should be proud of myself for not almost getting to my second trimester before realizing I was pregnant this time.  I decided to double check and take a second pregnancy test after sitting down on the couch one afternoon and immediately falling asleep.  I jumped up with a start and thought to myself--"hmmmm....that's not normal tired......that's pregnant tired......."  Well actually, my first thought was, "oh no, where's the baby!" and then I thought "pregnant tired."  And for anyone concerned about my countdown clock (and I know you all are)--the baby is due in October--which is also the month when we may or may not be moving to somewhere in or perhaps not in the Continental United States.  As always, our timing is impeccable.

When in October is the baby due you ask?  I have no idea, but I'll be sure to fill you in once I get my first ultrasound--NFP for the win!  

And when will we know when and where we're moving?  Apparently sometime in May so......that should give us plenty of time to plan :)

It looks like I'm relegated to being that mom who perpetually arrives at her next duty station about to give birth or having just given birth and depending heavily on the kindness of strangers......I mean, friends I haven't met yet.  I guess the good Lord is just driving home the message that I don't need to be in control of everything, or I suppose more accurately, I don't need to spend my life thinking that I can be in control of everything and I should just try to relax and have faith in His timing.  

In the meantime I'll be sure to keep busy explaining to everyone who asks (and it's already a lot of everyone) that no, we aren't trying for a girl--I just really like that prime parking spot at the front at the commissary.

...

And on another note, I'd really appreciate everyone's prayers because being pregnant still makes me feel panicky.  I'd like to think that I'll feel calmer once I see a heartbeat but I probably won't be totally calm until I've actually got this little one in my arms.

On Funerals and Traveling with Children

Last week we lost my grandfather--a loving husband, father, grandfather and great-grandfather, a scientist, a WWII vet--just the best man I ever knew.  It wasn't unexpected--he was ninety and he had been suffering.

Of course we are glad that he is finally at peace, but that doesn't make us miss him any less.

We decided to drive out to Texas for the funeral and we learned several important lessons:

1. Our days of pushing through 16 plus hours of straight driving are over--from now on we'll be stopping at a hotel halfway through the trip like normal people.
2. Always go for the hotel suite.  I don't care how much more it costs, this trip was made infinitely better by the fact that Chris and I were not hunkering down for the evening in the bathroom while trying to get two children to sleep in the actual room with the baby in the closet.  
3. Children can withstand any too-long-of-a-car-trip-hardships with grace and dignity if the tantalizing promise of an indoor swimming pool hangs in the not too distant future.  
4. Always make sure the indoor pool is actually heated--the children won't care but you most definitely will.
5. You can always count on children to lighten the mood of a funeral. 

David:  Where's great grandpa?
Me:  He's up in heaven.
David:  But if he's in heaven, where's his skin?
Me:


Henry:  I want to go see what's inside that treasure box.
Me (trying to keep him away from the open coffin during the viewing):  Not right now sweetie.
Henry:  Mom, I want to see what's inside that treasure box with the human head sticking out of it.
Me:

...

This fresh loss drove me back into my stack of Peter Kreeft who always offers me words of comfort:

In summary, Jesus did three things to solve the problem of suffering.  First he came.  He suffered with us.  He wept. Second, in becoming man he transformed the meaning of our suffering:  it is now part of his work of redemption.  Our death pangs become birth pangs for heaven, not only for ourselves but also for those we love.  Third, he died and rose.  Dying, he paid the price for sin and opened heaven to us; rising, he transformed death from a hole into a door, from and end into a beginning.

That third thing, now--resurrection.  It makes more than all the difference in the world.  Many condolences begin by saying something like this:  "I know nothing can bring back your dear one again, but..."  No matter what words follow, no matter what comforting psychology follows that "but," Christianity says something to the bereaved that makes all the rest trivial, something the bereaved longs infinitely more to hear:  God can and will bring back your dear one again to life.  There is resurrection.

What difference does it make?  Simply the difference between infinite and eternal joy and infinite and eternal joylessness.

 ~Making Sense Out of Suffering

So for now we're still grieving but joyful.  Joyful in the innocence of our sweet children who always  manage to make us laugh and joyful in the hope of resurrection.    

Post Op

Well Chris' surgery went well and now he's convalescing quietly in our room.  And by convalescing I mean napping and watching movies by himself on his iphone that he isn't allowed to watch in our living room with me because they are of a disturbing and/or action/adventure nature.  

My biggest advice for taking your husband in for a hernia operation would have to be to not bring your baby along.  Trust me, he will not be amused.  

He may however really scare some ICU nurses when he plays his favorite game of try to run as fast as you can to get through the automatic doors before they close and then proceeds to scream, cry and bang on the doors when he doesn't make it......again (because he was just so sure that this time was going to be the time and he would finally make it to that unknown paradise that lay just beyond those irksome doors).  The nurses might come running to the door horrified, knowing that the only thing that would make a child screech at that particular decibel would be that his precious little hands had been completely crushed.  "No, no," they would need to be reassured through the glass, "he's just really angry........"

It was a rough morning filled with no naps and thwarted dreams of climbing into elevators and playing in biohazard containers.

Poor little dear.

Now we get to move on to Chris' recovery which includes not lifting anything over twenty pounds for the next six weeks--which happens to be the magic number that excludes him from lifting any of our current children.  And probably the trash can.

This should be fun.

A Bit of a Birth Story

We are happy to announce that little John Michael finally made his appearance in the world early Saturday morning!

Like 3:22 am early :)

I ended up not doing the epidural this go round and it really wasn't that bad at all...until I hit eight centimeters that is, at which point I wanted to die.  Luckily for me my body knew exactly how much pain I can actually tolerate--which apparently is not too terribly much--and it was only fifteen minutes and five contractions from wanting to die to holding my precious little bundle in my arms.  I informed the doctors that I needed to push, they told me to wait, I disregarded their wishes and calmly let them know that I would be delivering my baby right then regardless of whether or not they were ready....or I screamed at them to "get.him.out!".....it's hard to remember exactly.........

Really the whole delivery was perfect and everything went according to plan until I heard the words that no mom who has just delivered a baby without the benefits of an epidural in place wants to hear......"wow, these pieces of your placenta are really adhered to the top of your uterus...."  I'm not sure if I'll be brave enough to risk another delivery without an epidural just to ensure that I never have to experience the joys of another manual placental extraction ever, ever, ever again.

He was worth it though.

Everyone wants to know if he looks more like David or more like Henry.  This is clearly a trick question since they were pretty much indistinguishable from each other at birth aside from their hair.  I think little John is following in his big brothers' footsteps and joined their club of look-a-like babies.  

It's All My Fault.....

....or so Chris says, and really it's true.....

Now Chris is just hoping that David's not doubly blessed by me and that he will at least inherit the Reintjes' perfect teeth.  I say that he knew what he was getting into when he married me and should have just factored the cost of glasses and orthodontics for any future children into the deal......

If you're wondering about the fantastic neckwear David is rocking, it's because he wanted his pictures to be "fancy" and nothing says fancy like layering a bow tie and a necktie with a t-shirt.  When in doubt about your own fanciness level just add one more accessory....I'm pretty sure that's the rule.............

It's Official

Chris is now officially a JAG....albeit with the new training qualification program he's guinea pigging, a JAG that's not allowed to actually do lawyery things in a courtroom.......

The children pretty much ran amuck in the courtroom during the whole ceremony but no one seemed to mind as long as the boys remembered to sit on the "good guys" side......I guess that's the kind of advice you get when you're working for the prosecution :)

We are so very proud of our very own JAG :)