Nesting

There's nothing quite like an impending DUE date to encourage the obsession over things to DO. Things that must be done now or they will never get done. Things that will be impossible to do with a sixth child underfoot. Things that are super duper important in the grand scheme of things ;) What can I say? I know I'm not the only pregnant woman to see the absolute necessity in completing certain tasks before a new baby comes! In the last few weeks, I've done things like reorganize our laundry closet, clean out and paper the shelf for all of the cleaning supplies under the kitchen sink, buy new curtains for the living room (and beg Matt to hang them!), attempt to get this blog back up and running, purge things that absolutely cannot be in our house any longer, put laundry away while it's still toasty from the dryer...all extremely urgent tasks!  

The mothers in Megan's second grade class all threw me a little shower during this time, too. It was so thoughtful and generous of them, and I came away with lots of little blue things that needed to be organized and put away. Another item for the "to DO" list. Admittedly, I chipped away at this list in between things that truly did need to be done (feeding/looking after my kids!), but even slow nesting is satisfying. Also satisfying is having little helpers with these tasks. The girls had Columbus Day off from school, and I put them to work! I gave them each a Magic Eraser, taped off sections of dirty walls in our house, and they did an amazingly helpful job of cleaning (their own!) dirty fingerprints from every surface we could think of in our house. They were more than happy to help with this task. Genius...if I do say so myself!

Another super important item I needed to check off my list was the collection and organization of Box Tops for the girls' school in time for the fall deadline. In addition to my nesting activity, I'm guilty of a totally separate but equally ridiculous neurosis: volunteering for too many things as a school parent, especially considering my "delicate condition." One of these commitments is my official title of Box Top Coordinator. As it turns out, this job is indeed something I can do from home easily, but it is also tedious and a bit time-consuming. Once again, I'm thankful for some eager helpers who I trained in all parts of this job. Megan and Bridget could probably do it themselves from now on, which will come in handy since they want to keep this job "forever, even when we're in high school!" Cutting and trimming tiny little squares, checking dates, counting in sets, and packaging these box tops for mailing is right up their alley! Luckily, we got this job done, too, and moved on down our list :)

The final days of this pregnancy have reminded me to try to get a few pictures of myself for posterity's sake. I honestly love being pregnant, and am feeling nostalgic already about this little guy making his appearance. While he's still nestled inside, I've got him to myself and can enjoy his kicks and movements, and know that he's still itty bitty (although my OB has hinted that he'll be on the bigger side!). Once he's out, the growing begins :(.  As much as I want to meet him and see who he looks like, I want him to stay little even more!

This picture was taken the day after my due date, on October 27th. We decided to head to mass and the school's book fair. It made for a long morning with a lot of activity that I thought was sure to send me into labor. Instead, we made it home with five new books, five very happy girls, and no baby boy!

Later that afternoon, crazy nesting mommy reared her head again. I "suggested" that Matt get the lawns mown and trimmed, and do a couple odd jobs around the house. That left the girls to their own devices while I vacuumed, cleaned and shampooed the rugs in our van. The story behind the need for this would be an interesting blog post on its own. Suffice to say, the very last thing I needed in the final days before delivering this baby was another child (read: not my own child)...a seven-year-old at that...peeing on the floor of the van before Megan's soccer practice last week! If detailing a car, and then tidying up the garage didn't get labor started, I don't know what will! :)

While baby #6 is urging me to get things done, yesterday, baby #5 is intent to have me sit and relax. Mary's favorite thing to do cuddle up with me and talk to the baby. In fact, I think cuddling with me is just an avenue to what she really wants to do. To say she's infatuated with the baby is an understatement. She pulls up my shirt whenever she's given the chance, giggles hysterically and says "Hi Baby!" and doesn't quite understand that my bare belly should probably not be exposed all of the time, like in the middle of Target, for example! She says "Baby. In." and  then "Baby. Out!!" quite a bit, and loves to hug and kiss my belly. I'm grateful for the extra kisses and cuddles from her, and love that she forces me to take a break from crazy nesting! I hope she is just as loving with this baby once he's "Out!"

Five of a Kind, Working on a Full House

Remember when we just had five girls? I think that's a question we'll ask ourselves in the coming years, and we might even struggle to recall what it was like. Something tells me this little boy is going to make his mark, and make it difficult to remember life before he arrived! So far, all we know is: Barbies in the bath tub, baby dolls, dance parties, all pink, lots of drama, all girl hair -- no boy 'dos, a drawer full of bathing suits -- no trunks, a pink load of laundry every other day, playing "family," and did I mention drama? Soon enough, we'll become acquainted with the other side of the toy store, the art of dressing a boy, and we'll probably be peed on a few times before we master changing a baby boy. Soon enough, we'll be immersed in the language of trains and trucks, add to our skimpy ball collection, and better know all things Lego.

For now, though, life is just girly...to the 5th degree.

There won't be many more pictures like these! I'm cherishing our last few days with five little girls before we get a pop of blue around here. Today is my due date, and this little guy is taking his time to make an appearance. I'll use the extra time (hours? days?) to wax nostalgic about our girly family.

I've been thinking about my grandmother, "Ma," a lot lately. Our little family resembles hers quite a bit. Ma and Pa also had five girls in five and a half years (including my mom -- the blonde in these pictures), except they didn't have twins, which meant Ma was pregnant even more during those years than I was. Having five girls in five years is a pretty rare and special experience that most people won't understand, and I'm really wishing I could talk to Ma about this feminine phenomenon now!

She died when I was about five months pregnant with Tessa and Annie, and before we found out they were both girls, but I have no doubt that she knows that I'm continuing to walk her path, including having a boy for our sixth baby. While I'm a bit (okay, very)spoiled in comparison with all of our modern luxuries, I think our days with five little girls were probably very similar. I'd love to chat with her about that over a cup of tea!

More than that, I'd love to know how she felt when her first little boy came along. Obviously, she didn't find out about her boy via a fancy ultrasound, so I wonder if she was equally surprised at his delivery. Did his boyness throw her as much as it's throwing me off? It definitely threw her girls for a loop. They love talking about how they dressed up baby Joey as a girl and paraded him around the neighborhood for introductions. Our girls have had more time to get used to the idea of a boy, but I'm sure our little guy will be traumatized in other ways. Hopefully he'll come out as unscathed as my Uncle Joe!

Here's to the end of one era and the beginning of another!

BOY, oh BOY!

Boy, has this post been a long time in the works. I am officially the worst blog procrastinator of all time. I vow to catch up and fill in with an entire spring and summer's worth of news, but before I do, I need to make a minor announcement...

We're having a baby! And very soon!

9 week old Stecher  #6

This news comes as no surprise to anyone who knows us, and certainly anyone who's seen me lately, but I can't very well post brand new squishy baby pictures in a couple of weeks (God willing! This blog is not the only thing needing attention around here before the big day!) without some sort of preface. The baby's due date is October 26th, which used to seem a long, long way off. It seems oppressively close right about now, as the weeks have been flying by ;)

33 weeks

37 weeks

38 weeks

I know there won't be much shock at this announcement on here, but it was a real surprise for the girls when we told them right before Easter. Please ignore me and my voice, too! (We had to rescue this video, and it's in two pieces for your viewing pleasure)

Tessa (to my left) was sick, which explains her lack of enthusiasm. I promise she's very excited about the arrival of "Bucky." (That's a whole other post. Of course we should name our baby after Jake and the Neverland Pirates' ship!) I think it's obvious that Megan was the most excited. I love that she kept putting her hands on top of her head, so unbelieving. She was genuinely surprised, and kept asking us afterward if we were serious. After the iPad stopped rolling, she expressed what a lot of people probably thought when we told them. She said, "So, let me get this straight. We're going to have SIX kids?!"

Yes we are. Without further ado, I introduce our baby BOY!

Yes, I just typed the word BOY on this blog...in reference to my own child. Who would have thought?? I've had a few months to get used to this idea, and, to be honest, it is still sinking in. We're adding a boy to this little dollhouse we have here, and very few things have ever made me so nervous or sick to my stomach with the fear of the unknown. We decided to find out the sex of the baby at our anatomy scan, and I'm really glad we did. It's nice to adjust to this big change and not feel the same kind of unrest in the delivery room as I did at the scan. Is  that awful to admit? Maybe. I only know my own experience, and all I know is five girls. Having a boy just seemed so foreign and different. I worried immediately what kind of family dynamic this would create, what it would be like for our boy to grow up with five (overbearing? bossy? torturous?) sisters, and how we would arrange kids in bedrooms with a boy in the mix. I was sick to my stomach for a few days after learning how our lives were going to become a little more blue.

To make things even more complicated, everyone (and  I do mean everyone) was under the impression that we would be absolutely ecstatic with a boy this time. I can't tell you the number of people that literally want to high-five us upon hearing this baby is a boy. Maybe I'm being overly sensitive (9 months pregnant? Nah, not possible), but to suggest that we've been waiting and hoping for a boy with each of our pregnancies takes so much away from each of our sweet girls. Moreover, most people think that Matt must have been dying for a boy. He truly hasn't. He was as unsettled as I was at the ultrasound. We had planned on the tech writing the sex of the baby down for us and then opening up our news back at the house with all of the girls. However, the surprise was revealed to us pretty quickly during the ultrasound, and Matt and I immediately shared a look that said, "Did you just see what I saw? Whoa. This changes everything."

Obviously, a sane person -- perhaps someone who hasn't been immersed in the business of raising five little girly girls -- will read this and think that we were/are absolutely ridiculous for feeling this way about a boy. A rational person would go into that ultrasound and realize that there was a very good chance (50%, or so they say) that this baby would be a boy. But, well, we're not sane or rational (have I mentioned that we're about to have six kids under the age of eight?), and a sixth girl seemed like the only real possibility. I promise we both have degrees in biological sciences.

At any rate, we are indeed having a BOY!

Slowly, we've been retrieving all things newborn from storage, realizing how few gender neutral things we have, collecting cute blue clothes from family (three HUGE boxes were delivered to our doorstep all the way from Washington, D.C., thanks to Jen!) and carving out a piece of our bedroom for this little guy to call home for a while. The girls are becoming more and more excited as I've been organizing baby clothes and setting up the bassinet. Mary is infatuated with talking to the baby (with my belly exposed, which is not always happening, much to her dismay), and her favorite thing to say is, "Baby. Out!" She says "Hi Baby. Hi Baby" all day long, gives him kisses constantly, and promises that she's going to help me change diapers and feed him. We shall see :) As for the older girls, I'm excited about some genuine help and real awareness on their end. I've read that an eight-year-old girl is exactly what you want in your house when you bring a new baby home. I'm hoping a seven-and-a-half-year-old will suffice. As for a certain six-year-old, I think helping take care of her little baby brother will give her some purpose and keep her out of trouble :) She's already my helper extraordinaire in organizing his clothes and making up his bed. How lucky am I to have five other little mommies to help me out? Pretty lucky!

Boy, this was a long-winded way of saying we'll have six kids very soon! Stay tuned :)

Little Girls -- Party of Three