No Words

My beautiful Noah Blake. Our family will never be the same. I post only because it must be recorded, but I cannot write anything more. My world has been shaken beyond all words.

February 25, 2003- November 16, 2013

 

August 16, 2013

This beautiful perfect baby joined our family. Theo Henry. We are all completely smitten.

I will write more about him sometime soon. He is an absolute angel and saving grace.

Baby, Name Thyself.

By now, most people that know me know there's a small human growing inside me who will make his or her appearance in August. We- no, let's be honest here- I decided to not find out the sex of this baby in advance of small human's birth. I have 4 boys and one girl, and while those stats make me lean heavily in favour of this being a boy, I want to meet this person all at once. No preconceived notions about who or what they'll be. We've mostly not waited in the past, but I've got to say, waiting kind of rocks.

With the last baby, even though we knew we were having a boy, I had some trouble with settling on a name. Like 5 weeks of trouble. There had been no difficulty or delay with the four kids before that, but last time, everything felt wrong. So I am sure there are those who are skeptical that this baby will have a name before he or she is old enough to pick out his or her own moniker. Rest assured, there will be none of this back and forth wishy-washiness come August. I think we've pretty much decided on boy, even though it will possibly raise a few eyebrows, and girl is probably 90% set as well, and I am certain some will hate it.

See, the problem was, I got too much input last time, both before and after baby's arrival. Mix that in with hormones, sleeplessness, and a name that just wasn't him, and you get a giant sprinkle-covered pile of crazy. I have mentioned that I have a penchant for baby names, baby name books, websites, discussion boards and lists, which is a fun, weird hobby for me, but not as fun when I am trying to name an actual person. There are too many opinions on any name you like: too short, too long, too nickname-y, too formal, too posh, too chavvy (look it up), a dozen people in someone's neighbourhood have a dog with that name, too popular, too weird, too feminine/masculine, too dated, too made-up, too young, too old lady/man, too much teasing potential, too cutesy... it's neverending. And I have those thoughts about names, I just don't like anyone having them about my names.

I think for a moment last time around, I thought I could actually choose a name that would be universally adored. But you can't. And the difference this time is, I just don't care. I've looked up our front-runners on some favourite name websites, and am finding the more negative remarks I read, the wider I smile. Our names only have to fit our kids, not yours. I put so much thought into naming my kids, there is meaning and significance in each of their names, and this time will be no different. So we're not open to suggestions or discussion. I will answer a limited number of questions about which names it's not, but that's about it. And just to get things started, we will not be using Katniss, Dasten, Truleean or Greighcyn. And yeah, somebody else did.

nameberry.com
http://names4real.wordpress.com/
http://announcements.telegraph.co.uk/births

Onward...

We're moving in about 3 and a half weeks. I had been searching for somewhere to move once our contract here ends in April, and was becoming worried since I just wasn't finding anything. Granted, it's difficult to find something big enough for us, where there is room for the husband to work (he works primarily from home) without the whole household being disrupted, at least a bit of a yard, a fence, in a good location, and for the right price. We're not an easy bunch to house. But even so, we're in a pretty large-family-friendly area, and I thought there would be more to choose from. Months of classifieds, craigslist, and driving around to look at houses yielded nothing that would work.

A few weeks ago, a good friend of mine mentioned that she thought there might be something in her neighbourhood. Several phone calls and a few days later, I went and looked at the house, later that day sent Jeremy to look at the house, and by the next day we had decided that was where we needed to be. It's further out than we were wanting to be, and there may be some minor space challenges, but with perks like lower rent, a neighbourhood pool, and dear and long-time friends living near-by, we would have been nuts not to grab it.

It should be an interesting stretch coming up- packing, cleaning, uninstalling a fence, moving, 3 days after moving, the husband flies to Italy for a shoot (yikes), my brother's family is (temporarily or maybe not) moving across the country to Utah mid-April (we're lucky if we've seen them once a year over the years, so this will be awesome- cousins!), plus everyone will still be in school not so near our house anymore, and then there's all the reassembly and unpacking that seems to take months to complete... I'm exhausted already. But feeling very peaceful and blessed at the same time. This new house was pretty much dropped into our laps, and it's such a major hurdle and stress to have behind me!

That is part of why I have been MIA for months. Sickness and family in town and Christmas in December, catch up and house hunting from January til now, ugly sickness in February (4 weeks of bronchitis, sinus infection and ear infection, and that was just me) for everybody, and now preparing to move. Hopefully things will start to return to normal in the not too distant future. Did you see how I made it sound like I know what 'normal' is, there?  :)