Some Little News

Things around here are just about as perfect as you can expect with four little girls taking over our house.  We have a pretty solid routine that has all four girls on the same nap schedule, all girls eating the same foods, enjoying the same activities, and sleeping through the night.  We're frighteningly close to potty training Tessa and Annie, which means just overnight diapers in our very near future.  Matt and I can go out at night (with the help of a babysitter) and not worry about a baby waking or needing to nurse/pump etc. We have two girls happily in each kids' bedroom, a van that hold us all perfectly, and the glimpse of a "normal" life on the horizon.  With two kids in preschool already, we're on the verge of moving into the full-fledged "kid" phase of our life.

Perfect, right?  Right.  Except for one detail...

I'm pregnant.

(I couldn't resist this intro, a la "16 and Pregnant," my guilty pleasure reality show, even though I'm far from 16, and this baby was definitely not an "accident." Please, someone, reassure me that I'm not the only watching this show!)

So, we'll have a newborn in the house again at the end of July!  Exciting and terrifying at the same time.  This is the longest we've gone between kiddos, so having over two years between kids freaks me out a bit.  Tessa and Annie should be 28 months by then, and I'm used to much smaller gaps.  I'm hoping that this larger gap will work in my favor!  As it is, we'll have a couple months to adjust to life with five kids before the school year starts, and the baby's birth will coincide almost perfectly with the end of summer school for Matt which means he'll be home for a few weeks before his school year begins again, too.  After that, the baby schlepping begins, back and forth between drop-offs and pick-ups at two different schools.  Let's hope for an easy-going baby!

We're aiming to be surprised with the gender of the baby.  Having experienced not knowing with both Megan and Bridget, I would love to experience that again.   (We found out with the twins, more for logistical reasons than anything else, although their birth was just as exciting!)  So, we'll be waiting to find out if we'll add another girl to the little sorority here, or if it'll be a boy --- and God help him if it is!!  Having a girl would be much easier on us, in many ways, but we would both welcome the change in having a baby boy!  It's weird even typing those words!

Names are a hot topic of discussion around here.  If it were up to Megan and Bridget, we'd have these contenders so far:  Mary Helson (Megan made Helson up, and she's proud of it!), Greta Star (Bridget's contribution -- I have to admit I love Greta but I don't think it's going to happen), and Twinkle Rainbow.  Hmmm...obviously, they've given us a lot to think about ;)  It's fun having kids that understand the concept of a baby coming, and remember it on their own.  We haven't had that before!

So, without further ado, I present...Stecher Baby #5. 

His/her most recent accomplishments include allaying any paranoia of Mommy's at the first trimester ultrasound. The baby checks out perfectly and passed genetic blood work tests with flying colors. Now I can move on to worrying about something else, I'm sure.  Like...the possibility of a boy in this house!! Something (okay, four things) tell me we have a slightly higher chance of another girl. Maybe that's just the estrogen wafting around here clouding my thinking, though.