Alicia had asked about pelvic floor preparation to avoide getting an episiotomy. Firstly, I will tell you what I think of episiotomys in general (you couldn't imagine that was coming, could you?) For the most part, I find them to be completely useless. The point is supposedly to facilitate getting the baby out with a "clean" cut instead of a messy tear. This is all well and good...except that from what I've found, it seems that most doctors tend to use it for their own convenience. Very often, the baby really can fit. Also, the episiotomy can tear down further as the baby comes out. I'm not going to continue in this line of thought, because it's just too painful to consider, but you get the idea.
There are two ways that I know of to prepare the pelvic floor for giving birth. The first is the most commonly known: perineal massage. It has to be done for the last 6 weeks of pregnancy, and tends to help quite a bit. However, nothing has been proven to be quite as effective as using the Epi-no device. Unfortunately, almost no doctors or midwives in the US have heard of it at all. You can read all about it by clicking here. I highly recommend it if you can at all afford it. You can get more ordering information by emailing here: info-usa@epino.com
On to the fun stuff.
My mom, Rachel and Joel got here last week, and on the first day, we did some of this:
Did you know that you can knit with only your fingers and some yarn? Neither did they, but it's kept them occupied on more than one occasion since getting here.Essentially, you use your fingers as a loom. It goes very quickly; Rachel was able to complete a 3-foot scarf in about 45 minutes (!) In case you want to try it, click here for the how-to.
Two days after arriving, we celebrated Rachel's birthday (which had been on March 31st). Hannah made a delicious (although very "special" looking) cake -- yellow cake base (from scratch, of course), sour cream hazelnut custard filling, topped with a hard dark chocolate glaze.
On Saturday, we went to the indoor playground, and everyone especially enjoyed the set of trampolines.
I was unable to capture it, but Joel and Greg were actually doing flips. Joel wants to make sure Christopher knows that.
Elijah is absolutely fearless. He runs from trampoline to trampoline, and is getting pretty good at not falling until he wants to. (His version of a jump is more like a dramatic drop to the ground.)
Hannah was having such a great time...
That she actually split her pants, all the way up. Thankfully she had a sweatshirt to cover things up a bit.Surprisingly enough, it was Mommy who saw it, even with here eyesight being the way it is.
This is Mommy, "hiding" from Joel. According to Joel, she was in such an obvious place that he thought she wasn't playing hide-n-seek anymore. According to Mommy, he "didn't even see her".
Daddy, Caleb, Jom, Grace, Joy, Christopher -- we miss you all!
Tomorrow, I'll post about our trip to the castle.
