Prioritized Parenting...

Have you seen or heard about that Times article and cover about Attachment Parenting?  Attachment Parenting is a parenting philosophy that basically says parents should be there and do everything for their children at all times: carrying them around in slings, sleeping in the same bed and nursing forever are a few of the main pillars of the philosophy.

I do not practice Attachment Parenting.

I think I practice Prioritized Parenting.  It works for me--shall I explain?

When I was pregnant with Clare I was pretty stressed out about how the quality of my parenting would change when I was the mother of three.  I was terrified of the bits of parenting that would fall through the cracks because I wouldn't be able to catch it all.

I cried about it.

Then, I got some of the best parenting advice I've ever heard (and since repeated about a thousand times).  A Mom-of-three who had two daughters in preschool with Lorien said: "You have to realize, you aren't going to be able to be the best parent to all of your children all of the time.  But you are going to be the best parent to the child who needs you the most."  Prioritized Parenting.

It made me feel so much better.  I had observed this in my parenting with Lorien and Wyatt without appreciating it.  I knew there were times where I had to give more attention to one or the other and--so far--they were turning out just fine.  Moreover, they have continued to be just fine as our family has grown.

Yesterday, I had to let Colter cry his little baby eyes out for about 7 minutes while I helped Clare and Adell set up a tea party.  Lemonaid needed to me made, ghram crackers found, plastic tea pots and cups washed--those things were more important than the baby.  Colter lied on a blanket on the living room floor and screamed while I set up a tea party for two very excited girls.  You should have heard their squeals of delight when I spread out the scrap of fabric for a table cloth.

Once the little girls were sipping "tea" with pinkies up, I settled into the difficult task of snuggling the baby.

And he was just fine.

I let the house work and dinner prep go that night.  Snuggling the baby was more important than a home cooked meal and vacuumed floor.

And all the kids who eat real food were just fine.

I still stress out about the quality of my parenting every-single-day some times but for the most part things are working out.

Bob Wehadababyitsaboy...

If you cannot remember the commercial this post title references, check it out here.

One month before Anderson Baby #5 was born, Wyatt and I were out filling a prescription for him at the drug store.  While we waited we talked about one thing or another.  Wyatt asked me: "Mom, what was your best day and your worst day?" 

"Humm, that's a tough one." I had to admit.  I told him a couple of stories from my childhood for worst days--embarrassing moments and the like.  Then I told him my best day was the day I married Will--because every best day that came after that was because I married the best guy ever.  

Wyatt was up next to reveal his worst and best day.  He did not hesitate for a second.  "Well, my worst day was when Daddy told me Adell was going to be a girl and not a boy.  And my best day was, the day I was born."

If you were standing near us in the pharmacy you would have heard the quiet tinkling of my heart freezing over with sorrow and then smashing into a million pieces.  

Not finding out the sex of Anderson Baby #5 only ever gave me pause for Wyatt's sake.  This trouper of a boy has three sisters and he is often odd-man-out--literally.  Sure, his sisters unintentionally do their best to make up for any missing brotherhood: Lorien is as rough and rowdy as any boy I've ever seen.  Clare is a happy participant in any made up game of Wyatt's devising.  And Adell would choose Legos over Barbies any day.  However, no matter how you slice it, they are sisters--not brothers.

On the night we left for the hospital Lorien and Wyatt were still awake as we walked down our yard path to the car.  They each made and displayed a few pictures for our departure.  

Wyatt drew two baby bodies, one with a football on it's chest and the other with a flower.  On his other poster he drew two baby heads, one with a bow and one without.  During our departure for the hospital I was too wrapped up in the contractions to notice these posters.  It was days later when I walked out to get some thing from the car that I noticed them.  

Poor Wyatt must have been on pins and needles wondering if we would bring home yet another sister or a brother?  

Truthfully, we all wanted Anderson Baby #5 to be a boy.  Lorien and Clare think Wyatt's baby pictures are the cutest and another boy would be just as cute.  Will always wants our children to be boys.  I wanted another son to put all these cute baby boy clothes on.  And Adell, well, Adell wanted the baby to be a girl--so I guess not all of us wanted the baby to a boy.  

The very next morning, Dave brought all the kids over to the hospital to meet the baby.  In trouped six anxious faces (our four and our two nephews).  They all crowded around the end of my hospital bed while I held Anderson Baby #5 swaddled in unidentifiable hospital blankets.  Lorien had her hand up to her mouth with a worried expression on her face.  She was prepared for the "it's a girl" news.  "Is it a boy or a girl?!?" one of them asked.  "It's a girl." Lorien answered.  I saw Wyatt's face fall but he kept silent.  "No, it's a boy!"  Our nephew, Evan, answered.  Wyatt's face lit up a very little bit.  "Is it a boy?"  After a seconds pause I said "Evan is right, it's a boy."  

A chorus of "It's a boy!" went round the room and the sparkle was back in Wyatt's eyes.  He doesn't over react to good news...he saves all of his dramatics for bad news.  Instead he just smiled and asked "It's a boy?"  We were all pretty excited.  

Soon, soon, Anderson Baby #5 will get to join this group of guys.  Wyatt and his cousin's, Evan and Andrew.  Anderson Baby #5 is one lucky kid.  

3 Weeks of New born Baby Bliss...

Our Colter is 3 weeks old today!

Three weeks!

I cannot believe it!

I have to try hard to not be sad about his growing up.

I have to try hard to not say things like "Ohhh, this is the last time I will ever get to..."

Instead, I am trying to remember that I am so stinkin' lucky to have had the opportunity to do this new-born-baby-thing 5--FIVE times!  That is amazing.  There are people who don't ever get to do this and who really, really, really want to.

So, here are a few things about our last three (wonderful) weeks.


My oldest sister, Jennifer, came out from Maine for a week.  It was so wonderful and deserves a whole post in and of itself.  But I am still working on posts for the kids reactions to Colter being a boy and heaven knows I wont get around to all the other posts I want to type.

We showed Jenn around the Stanford campus.  She is trying to decide where to attend graduate school and I am pushing Stanford as hard as I can.  My children were spazzes, as always (see the first two pictures).  And we got to check out the "Thinker" who has been away from the Stanford Cantor Arts Center for the last two years.  

Jenn kept my dishes and house cleaning up while I napped and rested.  She held the baby and entertained the big kids.  She even made the big kids help clean up--blasting her music so it was super fun.  (Clare is dancing while she sweeps up there.) 

We took loads of pictures so Jennifer could give my Mom and other sisters at home a virtual tour of my home here in California.  The picture above is a little bit of proof that my children do resemble my side of the family.  Jennifer and Wyatt both suffer from the same I-cannot-keep-my-eyes-open-when-a-flash-goes-off affliction.

Will decided Colt was old enough to participate in Daddy-kid rough housing.  

Colt was not amused.  

Adell is doing a great job at being a big sister.  Although, when ever she is around Colter her index finger is always poised to poke something...usually his face or eyes.

Adell says "Ohhh, he's so cute!" and asks "Is Colt awake?" every time I come around with Colter on my shoulder.  She does not like it when we call the baby "Colter" or "Cole" she always corrects us: "No, he's COLT!"

For the first couple of weeks Adell kept marveling at the much diminished size of my belly.  She would say things like: "Now Momma can run and jump and play because the doctor sneak-ed the baby out of her belly!"  In the second week Colter developed those chapped lips nursing babies get.  It bothered Adell a lot and she would ask me to "take off Colt's horns".

I try to get a nap in every day.  So far it has been working out pretty well--however--I end up with hair like this every time I wake up.  It is lovely--yes?

Colter has come out of the new born baby zombie phase--where he is only awake to eat brains.  Now he has long periods of alert time during the day (and night--darn it).  He likes to look for the faces of our family members when he is awake.  He pukes a lot.  He hates baths but seems to enjoy showers.  He weighed 9 pounds 3 ounces at his 2 week check up.  He has started growing a healthy crop of three-week-old-baby-acne.  I will not be posting close-ups of his face for a while.  

Three weeks, we are so lucky!

And so a baby was born...

Hello friendly readers and strangers who have stumbled upon this blog of mine, 


This is the birth story of my fifth child.  I love telling my birth stories.  I love hearing other Mother's birth stories--not everyone loves birth stories (telling or hearing).  If you do not appreciate hearing words like "cervix" and "birth canal" you might want to skip over this post.  Additionally, this is a record for my sake only.  In the writing, I was not overly concerned with poetic speech...I use a lot of interesting transitional words like: "then" and "after that".  If you do not appreciate a lame writing style--skip reading this post.


To the brave I say, read-on and let me know where I can read your birthing stories.  I love this stuff!


Ahh, where to begin?  Truly, I started having contractions at about 36 weeks.  I remember waking up one night with a spicy pain in my back and abdomen when there were still 3 weeks and 4 days left in my pregnancy.  I kept on having those pains all the next day and called Will at work to tell him not to be late coming home.  I wasn't in labor but I didn't want him to be any later than he had to be.  I also remember telling him "As long as I don't have these wimpy contractions every hour for the next four weeks I will be fine."

Famous last words?

And so it went.  For the next four weeks ever other night or so I would be woken from a sound sleep with an uncomfortable contraction.  Then I would stay awake thinking about all the stuff I needed to get done before the baby came:

Get the baby bed out of the garage.
Pack the hospital bag.
Figure out where to send the kids when we have to go to the hospital.
Sign Clare's field trip form.

I would spend the next day watching the clock and timing the scant handful of contractions that would come along.

Thus was my routine for the next four weeks.  Every weekend I hoped things would advance so I would have the baby when Will was home and I didn't have to stress out about him getting stuck in traffic.  Every weekend I was disappointed.  I tried all of the suggestions friends gave me for inducing labor.  I even got a fantastic foot and body massage from a friend who swore up and down I would go into labor 24 hours after the massage...nope.

My due date came and went.  Early Friday morning--at 1:30 in the morning--I woke up once again with a painful contraction.  The contractions kept coming every 45-60 minutes and I was having to breathe through them.  I thought, this has to be it!  At 5:00 am I woke Will up, we had a bowl of cereal and I had two more contractions.  We went back to bed to try and get a little rest after figuring out where we would send the kids after school--when I would surely be in the hospital.  We turned off our alarms because we knew we wouldn't be able to fall asleep for long.

Zonk, we were out for three hours.  We woke to the sounds of the children messing around the house--5 minutes before they were supposed to be at school.  And that was it.  I didn't have another contraction all morning.  Will and I walked around our neighborhood for about an hour to make sure...nothing.  I cried on Will's shoulder, swearing I would be pregnant for 11 months and the doctor would find claw marks on my womb where this baby refused to come out when they induced me.

I sent Will off to a meeting in San Francisco with a promised phone call if anything changed.

At 10:15 am I had a little contraction while cleaning out the bathtub so I could take a long soak.  I got a good bath and tried not to think I would be pregnant forever.  I picked Clare and her friend, Sydney, up from Kindergarten and had another little contraction in the car at 1:00 pm while we drove over to McDonald's for lunch.


I spent the afternoon tidying up the house and chatting with the big kids as they came home from school.  Will got home from his meetings at about 4:00 pm and offered to pick up Chipotle for dinner.  We ordered online and he and I headed over to pick up dinner at about 6:00 pm.  When we got to Chipotle I had a bigger contraction but that was the first one I had had since 1:00 pm.  The contraction was significant enough to make me bark at Will "Turn off the car!" because we were sitting in the parking lot and the movement of the idling car was annoying.  We brought dinner home and I kept on having painful contractions that made me snap at the children to be quite while I tried to breathe.  By 7:30 we were pretty sure we were going to the hospital that night and we would need coverage for the big kids.

Many generous friends had offered to take the kids any time I went into labor.  I was grateful for every single offer and made a list with names and phone numbers in the weeks leading up to my due date.  I organized the list into people who had kids in school, people who had car space for all my kids and people who offered to keep kids over night or take them in the middle of the night.  We ended up calling Will's brother, David, to come and stay with our kids here.

I finished packing the hospital bag while Will got the kids ready for bed and a possible sleep over with their cousins.  Dave got to our house around 8:30.  We gave the necessary instructions in between four or five contractions and called the hospital to say we were on the way.  Before we left the house Will and Dave gave me a blessing.  As we walked out the front door Wyatt and Lorien peered out their bedroom window at us.  Waving and cheering me on as we walked.  They had also posted welcoming signs for the baby on their windows--it was cute.

I think you can click on this picture to see it better.  Wyatt's signs say "Happy baby day" he has drawn one picture of 2 baby bodies (with out heads) one boy body and one girl body and another picture of baby heads (with out bodies).  Lorien wrote "Welcome to our humble home.  We hope you enjoy your stay." and "Have a happy time!"

And we were off.

Here is a little miracle about baby #5's labor.  I hate, hate, hate, HATE having contractions in the car.  The movement of the vehicle, the distraction of the world around, the uncomfortable seat, getting in and out of the car--all of it--makes me very uncomfortable.  When I am laboring things go best when I can focus on breathing during the contractions.  The more distractions--the harder it is to manage the pain.  So, being in the car is the worst.  Will timed things perfectly, he knew my contractions were coming a little more than 5 minutes apart.  He waited for me to have one contraction before we got in the car.  Then he drove to a gas station right before getting on the freeway and I had another contraction at the gas station (with the van off).  Then he zipped onto the freeway and made it to the hospital exit right as another contraction was winding up.  He was able to pull the car off the freeway exit and wait for my contraction to pass.  Then we made it to the hospital parking lot before I had another contraction.  Perfection!  We were both very relieved and happy I didn't have to have a contraction in the moving car.  It was a miracle.

Once we were at the hospital we were checked in quickly and put into a triage room.  There the much dreaded cervix check had to happen.  Since Adell's birth I have hated being "checked" to see how my body is progressing.  During my labor with Adell I had an unsympathetic nurse who was not careful when "checking" a laboring woman.  Also, for some reason unknown to me at the time, it was difficult for the nurse to get a good feel for what was happening.  The nurse insisted I needed to be checked every thirty minutes--every time she was not gentle.  By the third check I was in tears and ready to kick the nurse in the teeth.  Thankfully, my doctor arrived and said I didn't need to be checked again until the epidural was in.

Skipping back over to this labor...  The triage nurse I had was a dream.  She checked once and not being able to get a good check without causing me great discomfort she explained what was happening to my body.  Apparently, under normal conditions a woman's cervix is pointed back towards her spine.  As the time for delivery approaches the cervix tilts so it is pointing more down and forward...make sense?

Look it up in an anatomy dictionary if you need pictures.

For women in their early pregnancies the cervix starts pointing forward in the weeks leading up to delivery.  For one reason or another the more pregnancies a woman has the later her cervix points forward.  So, with my fourth and fifth pregnancy, my cervix was waiting until I was fully dilated to start migrating in a "birthing" direction.  Thus, checking to see how dilated I was during labor was a tricky and painful process.

Bless this triage nurses heart!  She gave me this explanation, said it was obvious I was in labor and would be admitted to the hospital.

Once we were in our delivery room I was headed into transition.  My body was shaking like crazy in between the contractions and this trembling was making it difficult to focus once the contraction started.  Will did a great job helping me relax.  As the trembling would begin he would tell me to relax and start naming muscle groups I could relax, my neck and shoulders, my arms, my back, my legs and feet.  It got to the point that I would feel the shakes start and think in my head "Help me relax, help me relax, help me relax!" and Will would start in with his calming routine.

He was perfect.  He also always does this super-hero-super-strength trick when I have contractions where he puts his hands on either side of my hips and squeezes them together.  He just holds this flex for the full contraction--be it 30 seconds or 2 minutes.  It doesn't sound like a big deal when I type it but try flexing your triceps, biceps and pectorals all at once and holding it for even 10 seconds.  It is hard!  When I have contractions it feels like my legs are going to split off my body at the hip joint.  This little super-hero-super-strength trick of Will's is a life saver.

By this time in my labor I was ready for some drugs.  I always hope to go pain-med free but have only managed to do it once (in my labor with Wyatt).  The IV had been in place, they gave me a dose of fentanyl and called in the anesthesiologist.  The fentanyl helped me calm down--significantly--and stopped my body from trembling so uncontrollably.  After that I was able to hold still for the epidural and that sucker worked a little too well.  I was so numb I couldn't move or feel my legs at all.  In fact, it felt like my legs had indeed split off of my body at the hip and some one had replaced my legs with a pair of pantie hose stuffed with play dough.

It was weird.

I was a little concerned since I like to feel some kind of connection to my lady parts during labor.  I don't want to feel the full pain of my laboring body but I like to know it is still down there.  "Feet?  Check.  Knees? Check.  Hips and thighs?  Check and check.  Vagina?  Check!"

The epidural was in at 12:00 am on Saturday morning.  Will and I chatted with the anesthesiologist saying this baby would definitely be born on May 19th.  Observing the date would be all prime numbers (5/19) we should name the baby "Optimums Prime".  After I got accustomed to my play dough lower body I took a little nap.

At 1:30 am I called the nurse in to check out what was happening on my lower half--since I had no idea at all.  They broke my water and came back at 2:00 am to see how things were going.

Voila, it was time to push!

My regular nurse had just stepped out on a break and the midwife quickly got things prepped for birth.  Will and I got very excited.  We were finally going to meet this baby!  We would finally know if it was a boy or a girl!  I would finally not be pregnant any more!!!

The midwife said I should do a practice push on the next contraction.  I did my best with out having any idea what was really happening down there.  And with that one "practice push" baby #5 was almost out!  I looked up at Will and asked him if he was excited.  Then I gave two more quarter-strength pushes and this baby was born.  3 pushes, 2 minutes, baby out.

Likety-split just like that.  The nurse didn't even have time to finish prepping the receiving table.  I was peeling the monitors off my belly on the second push so I could have the baby up with me when it was born.

Out came baby #5 all warm, wet and squirmy.  This is always an amazing sensation to me, those little wiggles and involuntary movements the baby makes while inside are all of a sudden happening on the outside.  Where seconds ago my belly was as taught and tight as a drum is now as soft and squishy as bread dough.  And there is a kid laying on my belly?

Indescribable.

Will checked to see if this baby was a boy or girl.  (The midwife said she would not announce the sex of the baby but let us see for ourselves.)  Then Will asked me if I wanted to check for myself or have him tell me.  "You better just tell me!" I said, a little impatiently.  "It's a BOY!" he cried, "A boy, a boy, a boy!"

Then we were all tears, smiles and giggles.  We gazed down at this squirming, dark eyed baby.  Checking out his face, his head full of hair, his arms and hands, cooing and sushhhhing over his cries and generally being overwhelmed with the miracle that had just happened.

A boy, we had a baby boy!

Will and I kissed and cried and congratulated each other on a job well done.  It was a wonderful birth.  I didn't tear and they let me keep the baby wrapped up with me for a full hour.  Will and I took turns holding this baby boy and wondering what we were going to name him!?

Our nurse and Will giving Baby Boy Anderson the once-over after our hour of cuddling.

I feel like this was my best birth.  Every thing went so well!  I had fabulous nurses and a wonderful midwife.  Will was a super-hero, as always.  I didn't tear and my blood pressure did not plummet to dangerously low levels.  I felt tired but not out of it.  I got to snuggle our brand-spankin'-new baby for an hour before they had to do all the post-birth-check-up stuff.  It was great!  And this great birth experience is just another reason this needs to be my last baby.  I needed to end on a positive note so I could be a good ambassador for birth to other women experiencing it for the first time.  It can be so discouraging as a first time pregnant lady, to have a seasoned vet tell you her birthing-horror-story.  The world of pregnant women need as many positive stories as they can get!  Call the UN, I am a peace ambassador!