What could have been....

The last couple of days have been a steady diet of  minor, in the grand scheme of things, but still significant  tragedies where various things have gone wrong for us.

Seeing this ornament on our tree today has only served to increase the pain and a cry 'of when will things go right for us again' in my heart.
Reading of others responses in miracles to prayer requests and the knowing of a dear friends imminent arrival of a precious baby is probably not the best way for me to end this particular  day.

Don't get me wrong, while I rejoice in these things and am truly joyful for these events in others lives it does not seem to lesson the longing in my own heart for - not only a precious baby of our own but a relieving of many burdens we have carried for a long time.

I knew this decoration on the tree would be a struggle for me, we only ever but it up when we are expecting  a baby, but the children wanted to put it on as the loss of our Cinnamon is still very close to their hearts and so I think it helps them have her near in this time of rejoicing.

 Every year as we decorate the tree the first decorations to put on after the lights the tinsel and the beads are the individual calico hearts with every one's name on them.

I have made them for each of our children for their first Christmas and we have  had a standard 'baby' one ready for the baby we are expecting the following year after Christmas.

It stands ready in the ornament box for that most blessed event and each time we put it up it is a real joy as we celebrate the birth of our Saviour at Christmas but it also reminds us of the anticipation of our own gift from God in a new life coming to join our family in the near future.

I know that for many the burdens we carry in our family may be small and trivial compared to others but I must admit to being worn down by the many and constant struggles we have been facing for quite some time now.

And so I find myself asking why it continues for us and when it will end?

Today has been a day of many struggles and yet we still have had much joy and I guess I need to focus on that and be thankful for those blessings, but I confess it is difficult and I do pray that the prayers and sacrifices we are making in this season of Advent, which is essentially a mini Lent in the Liturgical year will  for once truly be answered for us.

Having said all that I really do not want to be negative but I do want what I write her to be real, a journal of our family and our lives and so need to put this here as part of that memory making I do, even if it isn't as rosy as I like it to be.

 So as this day comes to an end I wish you all a goodnight, sweet dreams and many blessings and look forward to coming back tomorrow with much  brighter and happier thoughts,

God Bless,
 

Saying Goodbye!!

I have avoided this space for quite some days!
Partly because I am not exactly sure how to say what I need to here and partly because in my own mind this space here, my blog, is really an extension of my heart, my home and my life.

I wanted to write about what is happening in our life here, the funny things the children are doing and the everyday life that continues on but I can't ignore the fact that I was not sharing one of the most significant moments that has happened in our lives lately.

Sharing that event here makes it so much more real in my own mind and heart and I so very don't want it to be true, even though I have welcomed the support and love of those who have known both online in my other places and by texts and phone calls.

Even now I have found myself clicking away, avoiding the reality of the situation trying to not let it be said - all finished - with and therefore a record of the pain we have endured as a family these last few days.

I am sure some of you may have guessed by now and I know some already know but sadly, Oh, so very sadly, we have lost our precious little baby that we were so very excited and thrilled to announce not so long ago.

A baby we have longed for, a baby to hold and love, to be part of our day to day living a part of our very beings.
A baby that even though we have known for such a short time has become an intimate part of our lives, such that the loss has changed our family for ever.
So much so that this sorrow has taken hold of our lives, all our lives, the children too and rocked us terribly.

Not only is hard to bear my own pain at the loss of 'what might have been' and all the things I had planned to make and do for our precious baby but it has been hard, so very hard to see and be so helpless at the pain and suffering of our other precious children who had so welcomed this baby into their hearts too already.
Our children already saw this baby as an ongoing part of of their lives. They would say goodnight each night and  pray our goodnight blessing over my tummy.
Each morning I was greeted with a sea of smiling faces not only saying good morning to me but also  to the new baby.
They talked to the baby and prayed for the baby throughout the day.
Yes this baby was truly a part of our lives.

Saying goodbye has never been a strong suit for me, I get teary all the time.
Seeing each of the children say goodbye and grieve in their own personal way has also opened my eyes to the depth of their grief as well.
We (Stephen and I) have received little gifts of notes and pictures of the baby and mummy and Daddy, notes to say how sad they are about the baby dying and we have had many hugs and tears shared together.
Vellvin has shared here and here.
Eden wrote the most beautiful poem and shared it with me.
We have had much love, yes continued love from our dear children as they see me struggle with the loss of our baby.
I can not say how much this means to me the solidarity of love over a shared grief.

I find my self avoiding other people as I am so not ready to deal with the reality of this. I find myself avoiding 'life' by not fully engaging in the here and now- I admit to a fair bit of book reading in an effort to not think about the loss and devastation, that I know awaits me as I surface to real life.

I know there are others who have undergone this tragedy before and many women will again in the future.
In fact we lost another dear soul over 20 years ago!

I am not sure that I truly appreciated that little baby in the way I should have.
I am not sure that I grieved enough for that baby, as I know that I did not have the great support of other like minded and loving people.
I am absolutely sure that I was encouraged to just get on with life, to move on to the next thing and because that was the community I lived in - I did.

Now however through the support of other beautiful mamas I am encouraged to: yes be sad and upset over this event as it is indeed devastating.

I know I did not feel this tremendous tiredness and physical weakness last time that seems to consume me at the moment and I admit it has caught me totally unprepared.
And I know it has nothing to do with my age!
I do know it has to do with the knowledge of how precious and blessed each little baby is and the blessing that I have been given in each of these beautiful gifts from God.

I know it will take some time and I still find difficulty talking about it even with my husband and children.
I know that I love this baby as much as any of our other children and that every time I think of what will never be I start to burst into tears.
Just as well this writing isn't in pen and ink or it would be all smudged :)

Again as I have learned to accept the love and grief (for me and my family) of those around me I pray that I can over time be better at helping my own dear family to accept this part of our lives.

I am so eternally grateful to those dear friends who have taken the time to send me a short note, text or left a comment on those online pages I shared on already.
It is this community of friends that I draw and rely on, not only for this but in other aspects of my life that I have shared  previously.
I do believe these friendships are as real and important as the new IRL friends we have made over the past year as well as the very old and dear friends from previous parts of our lives.

I pray that we will continue to remember the wonderful gift of life we were given even for such a short time in our baby.
Our baby whom we have named Cinnamon Grace - now in heaven but who will live for ever in our hearts.
A treasured gift from God!

Friends shared this verse with me and while I acknowledge the beauty and wisdom of this verse, at the moment it does not ease the pain or sorrow - perhaps over time!

"My Lord, the baby is dead!
Why, my Lord—dare I ask why?
It will not hear the whisper of the wind or see the beauty of its parents’ face—it will not see the beauty of Your creation or the flame of a sunrise.

Why, my Lord? “Why, My child—do you ask ‘why’?
Well, I will tell you why.

You see, the child lives.
Instead of the wind he hears the sound of angels singing before My throne.
Instead of the beauty that passes he sees everlasting Beauty—he sees My face.
He was created and lived a short time so the image of his parents imprinted on his face may stand before Me as their personal intercessor.
He knows secrets of heaven unknown to men on earth. He laughs with a special joy that only the innocent possess.

My ways are not the ways of man.
I create for My Kingdom and each creature fills a place in that Kingdom that could not be filled by another.

He was created for My joy and his parents’ merits.
He has never seen pain or sin.
He has never felt hunger or pain.
I breathed a soul into a seed, made it grow and called it forth.”
I am humbled before you, my Lord, for questioning Your wisdom, goodness, and love.
I speak as a fool—forgive me.
I acknowledge Your sovereign rights over life and death.
I thank You for the life that began for so short a time to enjoy so long an Eternity"
. -- Mother M. Angelica

Blessings to you and your homes,
 

A New Life!!!

How to start this post? Why not straight out?

We are expecting a new precious little baby to be welcomed into our family around mid June next year.

While I have shared this news with some of my other on line community of friends I have delayed sharing it here.
I'm not really sure why that is really, as it really is the best and loveliest news we have had in a long while.

In fact I am told by some that they really did not expect to hear this sweet news again and so they are even more delighted to be able anticipating this new baby.

Truly we are once again so very thankful for the gift of a baby into our family.
We do view each and every child we are given as a gift from God.
We do believe that God alone is responsible for opening and closing the womb.
Even as we/you pray for or against a new child it is God who ultimately decides, and let me tell you it had been difficult to think that our prayers had not been answered as we constantly leave our selves open to the blessings of  new life and to not seem to have them answered.

Indeed perhaps that along with other reflections I have recently on our older children leaving home and the new dynamics that happen within a family as this happens that has helped me to reconnect with how quickly time passes  and how our lives change so very quickly.

It has made me in a way speechless in how I am unable to share how much this little baby means to us.
I really cannot convey the joy and peace we have about this precious little life (lives) with which we have been entrusted but I can tell you form the bottom of my heart how very very thankful and full of love I am for this privileged of once again becoming a mama.

Now just for your interest we still have children who are praying for twins (or more in the case of much smaller ones who have no idea of what they are ACTUALLY  asking)
We have never had twins before and as a single baby would result in an odd number of boys and girls (we have 6 of each) some of the children think a boy and girl twin would do just nicely thank you very much!

For my part I have always wanted twins (which is why my oldest daughter says I wont get any) but I also recognise the hard work involved in such a gift.
So until we actually have an ultrasound I think the general consensus is to still be praying for twins :)

Blessings to you and your homes,
 

Toddlers...........

I thought this so appropriate for our sweet Trahaearn!!

I am a toddler~

If it is on, I must turn it off.  

If it is off, I must turn it on.

If it is folded, I must unfold it.

If it is high, it must be reached.

If it is shelved, it must be unshelved.

If it has leaves, they must be picked.

If it is plugged, it must be unplugged.

If it is closed, it must be opened.

If it does not open, it must be screamed at.

If it is pointed, it must be run with at top speed.

If it has drawers, they must be rifled.

If it is full, it will be more interesting emptied.

If Mommy's hands are full, I must be carried.

If it is paper, it must be torn.

If it has buttons, they must be pressed.

If the volume is low, it must go high.

If it is toilet paper, it must be unrolled.

If it is a drawer, it must be pulled upon.

If it has a faucet, it must be turned on at full force.

If it is a phone, I must talk to it.

If it is a bug, it must be swallowed.

If it is food, it must be dropped on the floor.

If it is not food, it must be tasted.

If it is food, it must not be tasted.

If it's a Mommy, it must be hugged.  

~Author Unknown

From Trahaearn to my Big Brothers ♥

Dear big brothers Kynan and Braedon,
As you are unable to be here on a daily basis I thought you would like to see how grown up I am getting.
I thought you would enjoy seeing how I am learning to crawl now.
I hope you enjoy and I can't wait to see you both again soon.
By the way underneath Autumn's bed there is so much mess, I was quite distressed and just had to blow raspberries at her!

The big girls thought it amusing to get me to crawl by keep on moving the chalk in front of me. I don't know why they do this? I mean surely I am smart enough to crawl by myself!

The other day while Mummy was hanging out washing she put me on the grass beside her and let me go all over. The only problem with being outside is my clothes get really dirty.
Oh yeah, how do the non matching socks grab you.


Well that is all for now
Miss you heaps, as does everyone else
Love Trahaearn  ♥

'Baby Buns'l

 There is something irresistibly sweet about a little waddling baby bottom.  But then there is just something so irresistible about babies - full stop. All that beautiful trusting innocence looking into your eyes as he gives you an adoring smile that begs for a return favour, that is so easily granted.

We are entering a new phase with our little dumpling, who by the way is a VERY big dumpling. He is getting up on one knee and rocking back and forth as he reaches forward to get what he has seen out in front of him.

Trahaearn is a delightful little guy and he seems to be growing so very, very quickly. He spends a fair amount of time reaching from a sitting position and plopping down onto his tummy and then reaching for what he wants.

 See what our little sweety can do! His next stage is to get that little right leg around  so he can start to move forward.

Hmmn, looks like we will be entering the pick up all the little things of the floor again.

BTW does anyway else agree with me about those cute baby buns?

Blessings to you and your homes,
 

First Foods

After the fact that Trahaearn had some cookie tasting on St Nicholas Day I thought it would be time to add some 'real food' into his diet.
I admit that I have benn put off starting our sweet dumpling on solids as we ahve been pressured by Doctors from the time he was three months old to start him on solids, even while the Lactation Nurses advocate at least 6 months old as based on World Health Guidelines.
So taking the plunge I cooked him up some sweet potato and mashed it up with some EBM, which some of the kids found highly disturbing, lol.

So we just had to record this momentous occasion with some very sweet photos of him sampling the food. He really did not seem to like the food to start with but did have  a little taste.
Today when I gave it so him again he did seem to take to it better and finished the little spooonful I had prepared for him.

So enjoy these photos of our sweety trying a new sensation and look to the bottom to see who was very keen to eat his leftovers!!
In fact I had to stop her from trying to multitasking -- feed him herself and eat it while I was trying to spoon food into Trahaearn's mouth.

Blessings to you and your homes,
 

Baby Play Gym

As Trahaearn is growing and becoming more settled he is spending more time playing on the floor by himself. Well for as as long as he can see people nearby.
When our Kynan was a baby my Nana from England sent some money for her first great grandchild. We decided to buy a Sesame Street Play-gym (very old fashioned compared to the new ones).
Frankly it was not much use as a play area as the toys suspended form it were relatively boring and static not to mention basically the same 'platicy' type, but there was very little in the way of natural /wooden toys back then. However over time it eventually broke and we added other things to it.

The whole structure fell apart when Corbyn was a baby. You would think it would last longer than 10 babies now wouldn't you, lol.
For Arwen we re-made the support structure out of wooden broom handles and used the plastic corner pieces form the old plastic one. I would have loved to use a timber corner but couldn't work out one myself (Stephen was still away at the time) and these were perfectly adequate anyway. Not perfection but workable.
The advantage of this is we are easily able to  pull the support structure a part to pack away and the toys are simply tied on with wool or string etc.

WE made some home made toys for Arwen to enjoy and she played with these quite happily for a while as well.
So once again we added a few home made and other toys. The little ones Corbyn  and Arwen especially keep adding ones they think Trahaearn would have. Sometime it is a bit over whelming for him the amount of items to look and try and reach.

Perhaps you can see a felted ball, various wooden beads, a small gnome type doll and a wooden cutout of a rocking horse. Oh of course you could not miss Pooh Bear, now how did he get on there?

So once again I am enjoying the fact that we have managed to make something to our specifications rather than being told what we must like as consumers and therefore be subject to whatever is thrown at us by retailers.

Blessings to you and your homes,
 

A Little Sweetness to Brighten your Day........

And mine of course!!
What more can I say???

Blessings to you and your homes,

Stop That........You'll Spoil the Baby!

Stop That ...You'll spoil the Baby~

Have you ever had anyone say this to you?

I have on numerous occasions and only yesterday, Saturday, when Stephen and I were out shopping with Trahaearn.

Now the interesting thing about this was we had just gone into the local baby shop to have a look at some Baby Wearing apparel. I still am looking for the best option to buy to carry our dumpling around in. I thought rather than continue to look on line I would see what the local shop had and perhaps even get to try them on to assess what I liked. Yes, I am slow. I should have tried this before, but having tried to get things like this locally before I was not anticipating much success in getting what I needed.

However, into the shop we went with Stephen carrying little Trahaearn all snuggled up in his bunny rug. We had carried him for a quite some time (Stephen mostly) and he was asleep and most content. Trahaearn really is much more contented when being held rather than put down to sleep or left alone in his cradle or rocker?

Now we asked if we could see some of the baby carriers they had in stock. As we were just looking and chatting with the sales woman I said  that Trahaearn loved to be held and did not like to be put down but preferred to be carried and I wanted something I could carry him in and still be hands free.

She said that 'oh you have made a mistake and spoiled him'.....blah, blah blah 'that she had 8 years difference between her 2 children and the younger one now 4 was spoiled because they carried her as a baby.'
This being her response when we said we were not using the Snuggli we bought nearly 22 years ago for our son. Obviously she thought that Trahaearn was the only child after Kynan. We were slightly amused at this and then enlightened her to the fact that the baby we were carrying was in fact number 12.

We did try on the baby carriers and I was so glad I did as the one I had been  in favour of buying I found  was really not going to work for us. What it did confirm was that a wrap around carrier is what Trahaearn preferred himself as he stayed asleep and settled when I put him in the wrap. BUT when I put him in the traditional strap-on ones he immediately woke up and protested. I could actually feel his discomfort and pain from being placed into this restrictive space and not snuggled in to the wrap style.

So we will be ordering online as it is cheaper this  way, rahter than from the shop, this Australian wrap- Hug a Bub. Which to my eye looks the same as the Moby Wrap and Sleepy Wrap.

Enough of that now~
What I was distressed by during this conversation at the BABY shop was the fact that a baby should not be held and cuddled because this, wait for it---- spoils the baby.

How can this still be a thought in peoples minds?
A baby IS LOVE and dependence in it's purest form.
A baby gets all it's impressions through the eyes of those who care and tend for him.
A baby is a gift to love and cherish at all times.

When a baby cries he does so for a reason- hunger, needing a nappy change or comfort emotionally. We all need emotional comfort, so why wouldn't a baby?
So why would we not pick up a baby when it cries?

Of course this does not always fit in with my schedule and of course this is worse if you have a high needs baby, which I believe we have had more than our fair share of.
But once again a baby is a blessing ALWAYS and we put the baby first- SACRIFICIAL LOVE. Hence the desire for a baby carrier so I can give the baby the love and attention it needs as I tend to our other children and our home.

I think children are a great reminder of this in their immediate response to the cries of a baby. Each time a baby in our home has made the tiniest little cry the other children in the family want to tend to the baby. Never once has anyone said 'leave the baby, it will be ok'

Children often see what we as adults have forgotten to look for, the needs of those smaller and more helpless than we are. They see what we don't: that a baby who is wholly dependent upon us for all they have should not have to wait for our adult agenda to fit him in.

A baby can not be spoiled by too much love and attention!
Except for our Kynan (whom I cuddled to sleep) I have rocked all our babies to sleep in the rocking chair we bought just before Braedon was born.

Does this take more time? Sure it does! Is it worth it? You bet it is!

But what else should I have been doing if not caring and loving those sweet little blessings. And guess what they actually do grow up. I am not still rocking them to sleep, but the love and bonding that took place way back when they were babies I think was well worth the desire I had to pick them up and love them.

There is so much research I was going to share about the way babies can not be spoilt by carrying, and picking up when cried or cuddled a lot, but I won't. Perhaps at a later date!

What I will share is the loving testimony of a mother of 12 precious children who has had the privilege of caring for each baby by rocking, carrying and loving each special baby.
I can say quite honestly that I believe that not one of these children or young adults has been SPOILT by the lavishing of care and affection on them or of TOO MUCH LOVE!

I do believe that if we follow our 'mother hearts'  in the care of our children that  we will know the right and most caring way to respond to the blessings we have been given!

~ A mothers heart is a touch of God's love ~

Blessings to you and your homes,

Baby Dumpling

I realised I hadn't posted many photos of our precious little 'dumpling' I have put them on Facbook but forgot to put them here too.
So here are a few recent ones of Trahaearn for your pleasure.......cause I love looking at how sweet he is.

Corbyn loves to take care of his 'baby brother'

All wrapped up with Eden

Trahaearn is one of our 'sicky' babies one who is always throwing up, so once again we carry the cloth nappy around to wipe up the spills.

This one was just from taking the photo at the wrong time...poor little guy!

 Big eyes all the time

 Oldest and youngest

 I am so big say's Corbyn....I am ready to catch him in this photo

 Daddy love....

 Even though it is fuzzy this is an after milk look...so contented.

 Asleep in my arms...bliss

 Autumn and baby bunting

 Kynan with his two youngest siblings and they both adore him.

And last of all one of me and my precious blessing

Blessings to you and your homes,