Breaking the Silence

 It has been months since I touched this blog. In late August we found out we were expecting baby #4! I was surprised because it seemed unlikely, but the test was definitely positive. It made so much sense because suddenly my milk supply tanked, and I could not figure out why. The timing was not what I preferred, and I didn't feel immediate joy at seeing those two lines appear, as I had for my previous pregnancies. I also felt immense guilt at not feeling thrilled because of this gift God gave us. I did come around after a while and now I'm more excited than anything. Two of my friends are expecting their rainbow babies some weeks before I'm due and that brought me so much joy! We are waiting until the baby is born to find out the gender, which we have never done before.

Homeschool still continued and we are due to finish our schoolyear about a month before the baby is due to arrive. I wasn't sure if we would because up until about 18 weeks I had so much nausea and just felt generally sick, so school sat on the back burner, and we were in survival mode. (I might have scrubbed the toilet every week or so, but otherwise, our house was in shambles). Thankfully, I'm feeling much better, mostly just tired and finding myself needing to rest more frequently.

I was convicted that I needed to personally stay off of social media for a time. I deactivated Facebook and Instagram and noticed just how much time I had been spending on those sites. Instead, I've been trying to read more, pay more attention to the house as a whole, and also continue with memorizing Romans. I had memorized chapters 1-4 and now I'm working on chapter 5 and making good progress. 

The month of January is looking pretty busy for us. My family is coming to town to celebrate a late Christmas and the birthday of child #2. I can't believe he's turning 4! We've got doctor's appointments for the youngest 2 children, as well as one for me, the dreaded gestational diabetes test! We're reading Caddie Woodlawn as our January book of the month for the kids book club, and we're hosting the event later this month. At the end of the month my niece turns 1! We will surely be glad to celebrate her! Life is busy but very good.