Christopher And Tia

I spent the weekend on the couch.

No, really. I spent the entire weekend, on the couch.

My recovery has been less than fantastic. Just a tear shy of torture, I'd say. A lot of it is my own fault though, as much as I hate to admit it. For some reason, I was under the impression that coming home from the hospital meant- things going back to normal. I thought that my release was kind of like a free pass, to get back into the kitchen, back into my chores, and back into my full go-go-go mentality.

Well I pushed myself too hard. I opened up my incision in 4 different places, started to develop and infection, and found myself stuck on the couch, unable to do anything other than eat, drink, and feed the baby. Christopher wouldn't let me so much as sit up to grab a glass of water. And while I found it extremely annoying, after the first 10 minutes of being treated like an injured queen, I gave in, cozied up with my pillows, and let myself heal.

Most of the pictures that I took over the weekend were from my little corner on the couch. Not the most exciting, but- ...

On Saturday morning, the kids watched cartoons. Its not very often that we spend a morning in front of the tv (sometimes we go days without even turning it on), but with my not being able to get up and move around- why not?

Being stranded twelve inches above the ground, gave me a lot of perspective. I watched Eleanore curl her feet behind her knees, as animated characters danced across the big screen in front of her. I observed Charlie's infatuation with passing cars and trucks, as his head turned towards the outside every time there was a movement on the street. I noticed that we have a lot of little bitty spiders, that on an average day, go completely unnoticed, as they crawl up and down the walls, and scurry across the window sill. Things that I would have never seen, had my husband not sent me to my beneficial sofa-jail.

Charlie's transition from little brother to big brother, hasn't been as smooth as we had hoped it would be.

Jealousy, confusion, anger.

After I came home from the hospital, Charlie wanted nothing to do with bedtime. As soon as we'd put him in his bed, he'd scream. It was so bad, the first night, come 3am, that I was sure something was wrong with him. "He has to have internal bleeding, if he doesn't stop soon we have to take him to the ER!!", I begged Christopher- who was completely matter of fact about the whole thing, "oh hes been screaming at the top of his lungs for an hour, so what".

When we finally went to soothe him (because I just couldn't take it anymore), he snubbed us! He turned his face away from Mommy and Daddy, waved his hands up in the air for us to leave him alone, but when we did what he asked and backed away- he screamed for us to come closer.

Oh. I see.

Hes angry with us

Charlie simply didn't want to be left alone. And not only did we put him into his isolated crib by himself, but we had shut the door, walked away, and then completely ignored his pleas for attention.

It was a long night, that one.

So the next day, in an attempt to make Charlie more excited about bed time, rather than feeling abandoned- we bought in (from the garage) his big boy bed.

We had been saving his toddler bed for his birthday, 4 months from now, but... you do what you gotta do, ya know?

Bad idea.

Charlie hated his toddler bed. Now not only did he feel completely alone in his bedroom, while Mom and Dad were snuggling and loving a new baby sister in their room, off and on, allllll night long, but- he didn't have the comfort of his crib.

We should have known better. Parenting fail.

...so we removed the toddler bed, and the next night, put him back into his crib, and all was well.
Or, as well as it can be, when your world has been shaken up and taken over by all things teeny tiny and pink.

Sometime Sunday morning, Christopher captured this moment, while I was washing my face and brushing my teeth (my "me" time).

Eleanore holding her little sister, Evelyn.

Don't let Evelyn's look of complete panic fool you into thinking that shes unhappy (we all know shes not). She always look like that, being so brand new and all.

Hey, random question...
Have you ever seen our living room?

This morning, while no longer on complete bed rest (y'all would not believe what a couple days on your butt will do for a sore spot on the belly!), I decided to let the kids watch cartoons again.

I'm not going to lie. My corner on the couch has gotten pretty comfortable. And now that I'm not hurting every time I move, I'm not as opposed to sitting here (yes, I'm there right now) for hours on end.

Christopher goes back to work next week though, and I'm sure by then, the couch will go back to being just a plain ol' couch again. No longer my own personal recovery room.

But until then, hee hee.

Eleanore, all warm and snuggly with her Hello Kitty blanket, forced to watch Curious George from the floor, since our couch isn't big enough for the 5 of us (she doesn't look too miserable though, does she?).

The boys, and the angry pets-deprived cat, having a total stare-off.

Who do you think won?

And Evelyn, laying quietly in ...wait- wheres Miss Evelyn at?

Oh. Good. She is in there!

I failed to document the rest of our days adventures (having left the camera by my nest on the couch), but be assured that we did many exciting things today. Having baby's blood drawn, trying to get the broken dryer to work, not getting stung by the swarming bees at the base hospital ...all very exciting things that I'm sure you wished I would have taken pictures of. Maybe I'll do a better job next week?