March 22, 2013

  As I mentioned before, Ryan was born a month early.  We were very unprepared.  Erik was still in the crib, so we didn't have anywhere to put the baby.  I hadn't pulled out any of the baby clothes.  And we were literally in the middle of painting our basement (a horrible yellow color that we never liked.)  But boy were we blessed to have some really great people around us.  When my water broke, I knew from experience that we had to get to the hospital, fast.  We called our next-door neighbors and unexpectedly dumped our three kids on them.  While I was in the hospital, my neighbor, Amy, cleaned my house.  She also brought over a bassinet, bouncer, and other needed baby supplies.  Once we were home she brought us a huge dinner that lasted at least three meals.
  My sister Jill lived just a half hour south of us.  She came up to our house the evening Ryan was born, packed up my kids and took them back to her house.  She kept them there for the duration of my hospital stay.  My girls were in heaven playing with older cousin Jessica.  Erik's little world was rocked by all that was happening, but Jill acted as if everything was great.  She brought the kids to see me in the hospital.  She even dyed Easter eggs with them.  
  This was a crazy time.  I was worried about Ryan, who had to stay in the newborn ICU for a few days.  It was so nice to know that my other kids were well-taken care of, and well-loved.  I don't know what I would have done without Jill.

  The picture above is a pretty could representation of the week.  Easter sunday was right in the middle of all this craziness.  I was going back and forth from the hospital every three hours to feed Ryan, and Jeff was trying to keep the other kids happy. Erik was still weirded out and Sydney was suffering from a double earache. This picture is our best effort at an Easter shot of the kids in their Easter clothes.  I remember looking at Jeff after we took this picture and asking him why we were trying to force things to go as planned. It was okay if we didn't go to church this time.  And it was okay if the kids wore their Easter clothes the week after Easter.  After that, things seemed to calm down a bit.  Jill's family came over for Easter dinner and the kids had an Easter egg hunt in our front yard. The next day the doctor finally gave the okay for Ryan to come home and all was well.