Song in my head

Thank you to Brent for showing me this song. Love it!

This is why I'm "crazy" about carseats and seatbelts

As many of you know, I'm a member on a carseat forum. Recently there was a car accident involving a woman who is a CPST (Child Passenger Safety Technician...one of the experts who checks carseat installation). So word spread quickly among the different carseat boards. The woman's name is Casey and she posted a quick version of her story from the hospital. She's since been released and has written up everything that she remembers about the crash. It's every parent's worst nightmare. But because her children were properly restrained, they all walked away from the accident with only minor bruises. Casey, her husband, and her brother all had a few injuries, but they will also "walk away" from the accident. The people in the other car weren't so lucky. There were 6 people in a vehicle not equipped to safely hold 6 people. Only 2 of them were wearing seatbelts (2 of the survivors). 3 of the occupants died-- 2 of them were kids (15 and 11). All 3 that died were brothers. (The video of the newscast I posted below doesn't have all the correct info....they said all but 1 person died. There were 3 survivors. The story of the mother of the 3 boys is here.)

Here is her quick version of the story:
"We took the family camping this weekend. We were towing the boat. Nobody was in front of us. About 15 minutes after we left the campground, we were coming up on some cars heading the opposite direction. When we almost passed the first vehicle, a 4 door Jeep Wrangler swerved into our lane and hit us head on. We were going about 50 mph, not sure how fast they were going.

The other vehicle went into a ditch. There were 6 people in the other vehicle. I think 3 of them died (although the news story I posted says all but 1 died...). Only one person in that vehicle was wearing a seat belt.

We stopped right at the edge of the ditch. We were all wearing our seat belts, and the girls were all properly restrained.

Dan broke his leg and had surgery to put a titanium rod in it. He also had a big gash on his other leg. He's ok, he's in my room with me. My brother is in another hospital, he broke his wrist and had surgery. I am OK... I was in immense pain, they did scans on me and there is a little bit of fluid (not blood) in my abdomen. I had a huge gash on my right hip from the seat belt buckle, it required about 15 stitches. I have some very serious seat belt burn. Its very painful. Im weak, and my neck/shoulders/back are still sore. I will most likely be discharged tomorrow, we'll just have to see how I'm doing.

The girls? Walked away from the crash, which IMO was pretty much a miracle. They were all properly restrained (Kelsey in the 3rd row in a high back turbo booster. Sarah in the 2nd row in a ff Marathon. Megan next to Sarah in a rf Marathon. I was sitting in the 2nd row. Kelsey has a little bit of belt burn on her shoulder, but she's not complaining. Sarah has it on her shoulders from her harness, she is not complaining. Megan doesn't have a single mark on her. We are all extremely lucky to be alive right now.

Here is a link to the video. We are the first story. We aren't sure what is going to happen now though."

And here is the link to her longer write-up of before, during, and after the accident. It's pretty incredible. As a warning to some, she goes into detail about the experience and what she saw, so there are some pretty sad parts.

People sometimes tease me because I'm so protective when it comes to car safety. But the reality is that car accidents are the #1 killer of children. (And they rank pretty high in adult fatalities too.) If there are measures I can take to prevent any of my children from dying in a car accident, I'm going to go above and beyond the minimum requirements so that my kids are as safe as possible. I was going to do another post on carseat safety soon -- specifically related to boosters. This just gave me more motivation. Look for that in a few days.

I'm glad that Casey was well-informed about carseat safety and because of that, her children's lives were saved. I wish more parents cared as much as Casey did.

2 Months Old

It's official. My baby is 2 months old. It's gone by so quickly and yet, she fits into our family so well, it seems like she's been with us forever.

"Important" stats:

- June weighs somewhere between 14 and 15 lbs. (According to my super-scientific weighing method: I weighed myself on our home scale and then weighed myself holding June.)

- I have no idea how tall she is...I should measure her today, shouldn't I?

Fun stats:

- She's gotten super-smiley and talkative. She's actually quite a noisy baby (I don't know why that surprises me, given the gene pool she swims in).

- She's an extremely pleasant, easy-going baby to be around.....unless she has gas, and then she lets you know.

- The other children all continue to adore her. As you can see in the pictures, if we're ever wondering where Lady is, we can usually count on her being right next to June. Heaven forbid this baby ever get a moment to herself. Luckily June loves her adoring fans and smiles quite readily when they come into view.

- She does fine in the car as long as it's moving. But come to a stoplight and she starts to complain about the lack of hypnotic movement.

- She's sleeps well at night. Usually a 5-6 hour stretch, which is heavenly. But after that she wants to eat every hour, which can be frustrating for an anti-morning-person-mama.

- She gains rolls by the minute. I think she's up to 5 or 6 on her thighs and she has at least 3 chins. She already has cottage cheese thighs (tell me again why this is cute on babies and not-so-cute on mommies). She has dimples in her elbows. And when I got her pictures taken professionally a week or so ago (and she was nakey for a few of them *gasp*), Brent was taken aback by the fact that she already has boobs. (He worries that the 3 month old boys in church will start to get some ideas in their heads. And since we don't let our babies date until they're at least 6 months old, this just won't do. I'm going to have to find some modest dresses for her, along with a sports bra to turn her chest into a uni-boob. ('cause that's always a turn-off, right?))

I love having a baby in the house again. June brings such a fun, peaceful spirit into our home. We feel very blessed to be her family.

I won't lie, it definitely helps that she's so cute and has completely chewable cheeks and thighs, but even if she were a skinny baby, we'd still love her. Probably. ;)

Proud of My Kids

Of course after doing a whole post about myself, I'm feeling selfish. So here's a picture post showing my pride for my children.

(And yes, my not-quite-2-month-old has love handles. My father-in-law says I have "high-octane milk.")

Proud of Myself

(This post will seem silly to most people, but I don't care. It was a momentous occasion that I want to be able to remember.)

Tonight for Family Home Evening we weeded the yard. (Fun, huh?) When Lady was little, I would've just tied her onto my chest w/the Moby. But I really didn't want to have June hanging off the front of me when I was weeding.....not the most comfortable position. (Especially since June is already over 12 lbs....can you believe it?) I've tried a number of times to wrap Lady onto my back without a whole lot of success. But tonight I decided to try it with June. It worked beautifully. I was so proud I made Brent take pictures after. June slept most of the time and was completely content. This was a big moment in my babywearing life! :)

Fun, Random Pics

Over the weekend that we had June's blessing we had some fun with cousins. Brent made a homemade slip-n-slide and the kids all had a blast! It was over 70 feet long! :)

I caught Tink reading to Lady one morning when I got up. I love sisters! :)

Daddy getting some baby-lovin'!

Babywearing Fun

Having a new baby in the house has made all the kids want to wear their babies too. Aren't they so cute? And just in case somebody's feeling sorry for Roo being in a house full of girls, I'll have you know HE wanted to put on the sling. BUT there isn't exactly a baby in there.....it's a stuffed Darth Vader. :)

This one was too cute to pass up sharing. Lady is getting her 2yo molars right now and constantly has her fingers in her mouth. 2 teeth to go and we're through with this child's teething! YAY!

AJ wanted to hold June the other day when she was being a bit fussy, so we got her all wrapped up and both girls had a great time. I love how helpful AJ is.