You know you must be tired when you’re a writer and you have exciting news and the only way that you can think of announcing it is to simply blurt it out…
We’re expecting baby #4!
Upon returning home from our trip to the Philippines with Compassion International (literally, the day after we got home), we were surprised and delighted to find out that God was blessing us with another precious little one.
According to the ultrasound tech, I am 12 weeks (our midwife requested a dating ultrasound because of my very sketchy remembrance of dates and my irregular cycle due to PCOS), but the more I piece it all together and consider how I am feeling compared to other pregnancies, I think he’s wrong and it’s more like 13 weeks. Mothers know these things, right? I’m going with my gut.
Either way, babies come in their own sweet and perfect time and sometime next February, God willing, I shall be holding another little one in my arms.
Thank you so much for your patience with me these past two months, as I have sought to maintain my blog, respond to comments, answer emails, etc. while in the midst of sickness and fatigue and somehow attempting to care for a household of a busy husband, 3 young children, and 2 homestay students.
It’s been a challenging adventure at times, our food has been less than ideal, the laundry remains in baskets (at least it’s clean!), and yet God is always faithful to carry us through and provide just what we need.
I am so excited that we are currently on a weeklong family vacation, staying in a house on the Oregon Coast. It will hopefully be a time of rest, rejuvenation and plenty of enjoyment with my family and the friends we will be staying with. There will still be regular posts all week, including the great summer giveaway that began yesterday, but I shall be avoiding my computer and playing at the beach instead.
My Buttered Life Ebook: 5 Summer Skin Recipes and a Giveaway!
Congratulations!
Congratulations! Such exciting news!
CONGRATS, Stephanie and family! This is such WONDERFUL news! All the best for a happy, healthy pregnancy. Be gentle with yourself, mama!
@[email protected], I’m trying to… thanks for the reminder, friend!
Congrat!!! What a wonderful gift!!!
Wow, you’ve had a whirlwind time, first with your big trip, then the big news, and then trying to keep up with everything! May God bless you and give you the strength you need in your busy life. I hope you will be able to rest and enjoy your downtime this week.
We’re just back from our first long (3 week) holiday in our 22 years of marriage. It was blissful.
Annie Kate
@Annie Kate, 3 weeks sounds truly blissful. That must have been so wonderful!
Congratulations!!!!!!!!!! Have fun with the family and rest!
Thrilled to hear your news! Congrats to you and your family~
How exciting! Congratulations!! And just fyi, I haven’t noticed your blog lacking or slowing down. I know it can seem like that when life is busy. But I haven’t noticed! 🙂
@Ashleigh, Oh, good. I’m glad it wasn’t really noticeable. I was doing my best to keep things up, but some days I didn’t even crack open my laptop!
Congratulations, Stephanie! What a blessing. 🙂
Congratulations! We are due at the same time! I am due with number 4 on Valentine’s Day! I know exactly what you mean about meals being less than ideal, laundry being clean but in baskets, etc. We are in survival mode and I have given myself permission to be so! Hope you start feeling better soon! Enjoy your vacation and rest up!
@Christina, Yes, very close. I think my official date is Feb 11 or 12th. Something like that. Congrats!
And I am certainly enjoying vacation right now! 🙂
Congratulations! That is wonderful news!!
Congratulations! You should check out “Fertility, Cycles and Nutrition” by Marilyn Shannon to check out ways that could help improve PCOS with nutrition! I HIGHLY recommend it!
@Erin, For some reason Amazon is no longer carrying the new edition of the book that just came out in the last few years, but you can get it here on half.com!
http://product.half.ebay.com/_W0QQprZ73193399
@Erin, I think that is one of the books that I already have. But what has really made the biggest difference for more nutritionally is simply going back to a more traditional diet, like in Nourishing Traditions and the Maker’s Diet. From that point on, my cycle improved so much!
Congratulations! We are also expecting number four. Very exciting
congratulations! Love midwives!
Stephanie!!!! Mazel tov! So beautiful of Him to add to your family!
xoxo lylah
@lylah ledner, And so beautiful to hear from you, sweet lady! 🙂
A big congratulations, to you! We had our fourth a year ago in April. Fun times! :0)
How wonderful! Congratulations. I am typing this while holding my precious 3 month old right now. What a blessing!
That is very exciting!!! Best wishes for you and your baby! I wanted to thank you for the links for the coupons that MSM posted from you. What a blessing that you get those together!
@Living So Abundantly, Oh, you’re welcome. I always enjoy doing the MSM deals and helping others to find ways to make natural foods and products more affordable!
Congratulations !!!!!! Enjoy your vacation and relax!
Congratulations! This is so reassuring to me. I always dreamed of a big family and was recently diagnosed with PCOS and have been trying to accept the fact that I may never have children. Hearing your PCOS story and knowing your are pregnant with your fourth is such an inspiration for me.
@Alexandra, Ultimately God is always in control of our fertility, but right from the start, I didn’t accept that my PCOS diagnosis was the end of the story. I have been so blessed to see how diet and lifestyle changes have made such a HUGE difference in my cycle and hormone balance, allowing us to have these precious babies!
Have you checked out the site NaturallyKnockedUp.com? My friend Donielle who runs it also has PCOS and her site focuses much more specifically on health for fertility, although she and I have made many of the very same types of changes.
Wonderful news! Congrats on this newest blessing.
Very exciting news! We are growing with the addition of baby #4 too!
We have begun the paperchase for bringing our little one home from Ethiopia. Hoping that this time next year, we will be traveling to bring him home.
Congratulations!
@Michelle, Oh, that’s awesome! We definitely want to add to our family through adoption at some point as well.
congratulations! so exciting! I had a feb due date this year and just loved the way the seasons fell with my pregnancy- I hope you have a similar enjoyment!
@Leslie, I’m very excited about a February baby. I’ve had babies in every other season- May, August, and November. So a winter baby will be a new, but welcome, experience! No summer heat while I’m really big, lots of good excuses to just stay home and snuggle with baby. 🙂
Congrats!!! We just announced today too – baby #3 for us!
Congrats!
Yay! Congratulations! I’m pregnant with #3, due in January. It’s my first home birth, actually, my first midwife-attended birth, and we’re so excited! I’m finally coming out of the 1st trimester haze. I’m cooking again!
@Melissa, So excited for you to have your first homebirth with a midwife! Praying it will be an amazing experience!
And I only just started real meals again a week ago. It takes time, but it feels so nice to come out of that haze!
Exciting! Congratulations! 🙂
WOOT WOOT! YAY! So thrilled for you with blessing number #4. Can’t wait to see your pregnant cute self in OCt. 🙂
@Jen (Balancing Beauty and Bedlam), Goodness, you should see my “cute pregnant self” now! I can’t believe how huge I already look with #4. At 3 months I already look as big as the gals at church who are 5-6 months pregnant with their 1st or 2nd! Did you find the same thing with each successive baby?
Congratulations. Sounds like there will be lots of babies on board for Relevant. 🙂
So blessed to hear your news! May Yahweh give you His shalom on your journey! I know so many who are pregnant right now. It seems to come in waves. I’m due in Oct. with my ninth.
@Julie Nitz, Yes, it really does seem to come in waves. Our church has about 2 baby waves each year. Every time I’ve had a baby, it’s been within days or weeks of lots of other babies!
And congrats on #9! How wonderful!
The BEST news, Stephanie!
Blessings!
Blessing and Congratulations. Children are a true treasure. Remember to take care of first things first (hubby, self, children). All other things will work themselves out in time. Breathe.
Congratulations, what a special gift!
So excited for you! Looking forward to lots of updates on Baby #4.
4th baby on the way? Check. Meals less than ideal? Check. Laundry still in baskets? Check!
Glad I’m not the only one. 😉
@Cutzi, Nope, you’re certainly not the only one!
Congrats! I’m about a month ahead of you with #3! Due in January here! 🙂
Congratulations, Stephanie!
Congratulations! Have fun at the beach!
Yay!!! What wonderful news! You are doing a great job balancing – don’t be anxious for anything!
Congratulations Stephanie! What a blessing. You’re now moving firmly into the “large family” camp, and I hope you find nothing but love and encouragement there! I have two kiddos thus far, but we are hoping for lots more. Thank-you for being a beautiful example of embracing many children as a blessing from the Lord.
Much love,
Beth
PS – My laundry all-too-often stays in baskets (clean) also, and I “only” have two kids and no third on the way yet. We often get dressed in the mornings by hunting through the baskets for something to match 🙂 So you’re doing pretty well, I’d say!
@[email protected], Well, we’ve reached the stage where people are beginning to say “surely this is the last one, right?” or “wow, I can’t imagine ever having that many children”, to which we just smile sweetly and say that we love having them and that each one is a blessing. We’ll have to get really good at a sweet response as we add more and more babies! 🙂
And pregnancy isn’t the only time we pull clean clothes out of baskets, either!
Congratulations! 4 is lots of fun!
Congrats!!!
I’m so incredibly happy for you and your family!
I agree -4 is fun!
Renee
How exciting! Congratulations. I felt a pang of jealousy when I read, because I know it’ll be a little while before we can have another baby, because we have to get our health a little more straightened out. Blogs like yours are helping me to accomplish that though and I am super grateful. 🙂 I have been having these pains in my chest randomly and after about 6 different episodes (over about a year) I finally realized that I was having an asthmatic reaction to the foods that I was eating (we had eaten poorly the last half of our vacation) and now I feel more adamantly than ever that eating healthily is the way to go. A lot of people have said to me that they don’t like to eat to healthily because their bodies react so horribly to when they eat badly and I say (because of my experience) THANK GOODNESS! I am so grateful to know what toxins are causing my horrible reactions and to have more clearly laid out to me what the bad things are. Thank you for your help in my journey towards health. Check out my blog to see how my family is coming along in our journey. http://www.FamilyHealthNaturally.blogspot.com
Congrats! I’m only half as far as you are, and this is only #2 but I can identify with the sickness and lack of wonderful meals and laundry is sitting in the basket right now……..God bless as you adjust to the new addition in your life!
Congratulations!! How exciting!! 😀
Congratulations Stephanie! Thanks for sharing your wonderful news! 🙂
Congratulations! Your household sounds a lot like my daughter’s, who is a mother of 6. Hang in there! 🙂 Eventually all will come to rights again.
Congrats! How exciting. I know how you feel. I am 10 weeks with #3! If you didn’t catch my last comment. I think my garden must think I forgot about it…LOL.
Our other news is that my husband also got a job, although it doesn’t look like its long term and we still might have to move eventually. This job means a 20% reduction in his income and bigger expenses for us for his commute (before that was minimal and now it will be a large amount) but we are thankful for what he has right now. We will just have to wait and see what God has next for us. I don’t want to jump ahead and think about moving next summer with a newborn or else I get panicked! So far God is helping me have peace. I am trying to pick as many free berries as I can this summer anticipating the need for the food this winter when things are tighter. Its tiring but I keep telling myself its worth it.
Don’t worry- your household sounds like mine. My floor is sticky, the laundry is piled into baskets, the garden needs attention (isn’t it amazing though how well it does despite help?) and our food is definately less than ideal. My husband has been doing a lot of cooking. I am having trouble keeping anything down let alone “balance” so I am doing the best I can.
Have a great vacation!!!! I hope that you are able to have a wonderful time!
@Nola, So exciting that you’re pregnant, too! Yay!
I’m glad that your husband got a job as well. Just try not to think about the uncertainty. God knows the timing of it all. 🙂
And yes, my garden is being mostly ignored, but oh well. It’s surviving anyways. Especially once you hit #3, when you already have two little ones to care for, but even just when you’re tired and sick in general, it’s so hard to keep up with everything (or anything). I’ve learned over the years and pregnancies to expect a LOT less of myself and just trust that once I feel better, it will all eventually get caught up.
Oh and I also wanted to mention I haven’t noticed your blog “lacking” in any way. No one minds when you repost something or anything like that. Its okay! Be kind to yourself!
Congratulations Stephanie
Congratulations! And good luck!
Congrats! Yay for babies!
I, too, just found out I’m pregnant. I’m 9-10 weeks pregnant with baby number 1 after a miscarriage in December. We are praying that this baby is our forever baby. 🙂
Congratulations! All of my three children are one step behind yours (each about a year younger). So what does that mean for me next summer 🙂
I hope you are doing well and finding rest. I will look forward to, hopefully, some good pregnancy posts. i would love to hear how you manage the older three on those days when you feel too tired to do much of anything.
Congrats again!
Congratulations to you! How exciting. I am expecting my first grandchild in the beginning of January! I am so excited about it too. Congrats again!
So happy for you! Your youngest was such a dear at Blissdom when we got to eat lunch together. You’re a great mom, I wish you all the best. 🙂
@Laryssa @Heaven In The Home, Thanks, Laryssa. Will I see you at Relevant this year?
Congratulations to you. I have two babies one Feb 3 and one March 4 … one year apart. I wish you the best of luck and will be sending up prayers for you. Keep us posted on things. 🙂
@Stephanie, We have also found that once you eat healthy, when you eat poorly for a little while, your bodies tells you to stop it. But I am also glad for those signs from my body, good reminders that those foods really are as bad as I think they are.
Congratulations!!! I am also expecting, due in February 2012. Also very happy to hear that I am not the only momma struggling to keep things rolling with morning sickness and exhaustion– my house has been in shambles the past few weeks, but things are starting to ease as I am heading into the 2nd trimester. Praise God! I always wondered how Mom’s with more than 1 child survived– slowly learning that you can only do what you can.
http://nestofkrohs.blogspot.com
Congratulations to your whole family! Children are such a blessing from the Lord!
🙂 Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Congratulations!
Oh, and since you asked about our summer especially new jobs, babies and homes I had a baby in May, Mark got a new job in early June, and we moved in late June.
@Debra Worth @ Sweet Kisses and Dirty Dishes, Thanks for sharing your summer news, Debra! 🙂
Awwww! Congrats!!! This is great, great news! I think 3 of my favorite bloggers are all pregnant at the same time! (You, [email protected], and [email protected]) Blessings to your family! Hope you get some energy back soon! Enjoy the rest of your vacation!
So funny! We are vacationing on the Oregon Coast this week too, Lincoln City. Congratulations on the newest addition to be joining your family. – Jess (at) OlyMomma
Yea!!! Congratulation!!! I am 13 weeks pregnant now with my 4th baby as well, due February 3rd!!!! I wish you the best!!
Congrats! I am sending waves of energy and nausea free days 🙂 I too am in the throws of beginning pregnancy. I am due sometime beginning of March (most likely end of Feb.)! This is also our 4th and with the news comes excitement and the “how am i going to have enough for 1 more!” Wishing you a healthy pregnancy
Congratulations Steph! I’m really excited for you guys.
Such happy news! Praying for all the best with the newest little one!
Congrats! So exciting!
We welcomed twin girls into our family 6 weeks ago. We have 5 kids under age 5!!! But I wouldn’t change a thing…. Children are such an amazing blessing 🙂
Enjoy your pregnancy!!!
Woo hoo! This is so exciting. What a blessing.
My exciting news is that my almost 2 year old is finally sleeping through the night (mostly). It’s been a loooong time coming!
Can’t wait to see you and your baby bump at Relevant!
@Stacy @ Delighting in the Days, Sleeping through the night is definitely big news. Yay!
Congratulations, Stephanie and family!!
I’m also do in February! Just Number 1, not 4! 🙂
@Claire @ Econ at Home,
due, not do.
Congratulations on your pregnancy, Stephanie! I think you’re doing a great job keeping the blog going while juggling so many other tasks. Your readers definitely appreciate it.
Yay! Congratulations!! 🙂
Congratulations!!! That is so exciting!! My husband and I just found out that we are expecting our second baby sometime next March! Our first baby boy was born this past November!!! I hope that you have a wonderful pregnancy!!!
Congratulations Stephanie (and family)!! Such an exciting time.
Yay for you Stephanie! CONGRATULATIONS!
So excited for you!
Wonderful news!
Congratulations! I am due with #2 in November and I enjoy checking out this blog for great ideas & encouragement. I did not feel great during my 1st trimester and ate not-so-great foods but now that my energy has improved I am recommitted to doing better! Mommypotamus.com has a great list of real food for busy moms on a budget – have you seen it before?!
Congratulations and God bless you.
Congrats Stephanie! My first babies (twins) were born just a little bit before Johanna, and now it seems like our next babies will be born at about the same time too!
I would love if you would consider a post on eating real food through the throes of morning sickness and exhaustion with caring for our other kids! Last time while I had it worse (due to the twin pregnancy I guess), I at least could take time to take care of myself. This time, it’s all about the girls and I’m too exhausted to eat properly and am getting sick as result. Would love some real food ideas!!
@S, I will try to do a post on morning sickness and eating well. Truthfully, I do struggle with it a fair bit myself, mostly because I find I completely lack the energy to cook and my husband has a very busy schedule and isn’t particularly good in the kitchen (by his own admission).
I did write a post when I was pregnant with Johanna, with some ideas for making meals while sick:
https://keeperofthehome.org/2009/01/healthy-natural-pregnancy-you-mean-my-family-still-expects-to-eat-while-i-have-morning-sickness.html
Hopefully I will be able to address the sickness/exhaustion issue and how to get in extra nutrition in another post. Hope that you feel better soon!
News?!
My Husbands Pastoral Internship went very well! Working with RHMA.
As for me, I got a new position at work where I will be (by God’s grace) supervising 25 men in the kitchen at bible school! I am looking forward to my DH finishing school in December and getting to breath good Godly character into the men I will be working with.
And CONGRATS STEPH!!!
I think we have the same due date. If you truely were 13 weeks last week. haha. This is my second baby. And I wish people were a little more positive about having two children! But I got a lot of pitying comments when I was pregnant with number one “It will be so hard” …haha, people are funny. It’ll be what it will be and praise God for the blessing of another child for you and me!
Congratulations, Stephanie! So excited for you! 🙂
Congratulations!!! I just had my 8th baby which makes 8 children (no multiples) under the age on nine for our family. It is a blessed life albeit somewhat busy and chaotic at times, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world!