Cinco-de-Kiddo

It is time again. Time for me to announce on the blog, for the sake of the history of our family, that I am pregnant. I have been dreading this announcement for many reasons. First of all, I've been so nauseated that I cannot sit in front of the computer without consequence. (I get up feeling even worse.) Second of all, I don't want the J train to turn from "cool quirky family with four kids" to "crazy people who home school and have lots of children." And thirdly, well...the first two reasons were enough for me putting this off.

Today when I broke it to my pediatrician and he said (after I asked) that his big families were mostly either "LDS" or "Religious home school families" I assured him that we were church people, but that we were "normal church people." What exactly that is, I'm not sure, but whatever. I mean, we all watched the Cosby's in the 80's and they had five kids. No one thought that was weird, right? It was totally doable. Even funny, with the constant jokes about no one ever leaving the house. I mean, if the Huxtables can survive so can we, right? I admit, they were living on a doctor AND a lawyer's salary, AND their house didn't have four walls, but I'd like to think they were real and they thrived, even with five kids. Can we just be creative starving artists who love kids? Because that's what we are.

We are excited and feel blessed to add another to the family. The kids are excited too. I was afraid of selfish reactions but they all wanted to name the baby right away and while it's tempting to give the baby a name thought of by the whole family I told them "If you want to name a baby you can grow up, get married, and have your own!" (A very Cliff Huxtable kind of thing to say, I thought.)

I am feeling all the normal physical issues of pregnancy and it is at this point that all us mothers wonder how in the world we can forget how sick, fat, and tired you feel under the weight of a tiny being. It's like I want to knit on a pillow "Pregnancy is hard" (that's the edited version) and display it on my couch in case I forget. When I'm not pregnant, it seems rosy and miraculous. When I am, it's hard work. But one advantage I have is that there are four miracles running around here that prove to me every day that it's worth it. Let's knit that one on a pillow. Because no matter what challenges this new one brings, it is life and it is precious. I am privileged to be a part of it all.