gifts and love!

i've had some lovely surprises arrive at my house since baby alexander came home from the hospital... i have some amazing friends and family. this gorgeous bunch of flowers was delivered from my friend kelly the day we got home,

these were on my kitchen table thanks to my lovely mum (at my dads insistence ♥) i love rosemary and they smell gorgeous!

and this! this! this arrived a few days after we got home... from my friend hayley - gourmet snack hamper from mrs. p's pantry, a new dessert business made locally here in ellenbrook. she said it was the perfect gift for the person and baby who have everything.

and it totally is. midnight breastfeeding snacks here we go... licorice allsort slice, caramel slice, fudge, rocky road... yum!

and last but not least these gorgeous flowers from my girls keryn and elena... i loooove yellow flowers and was absolutely chuffed when these arrived with the girls when they came over to give baby alex some cuddles.

how blessed am i? ♥

zoe sage mama goods

my beautiful friend bianca gave me this "mama cover" as a baby gift for alex (along with some other goodies!) and wow is it perfect, for pretty much everything. she started her business earlier this year and is doing really well and it's no surprise considering what they are good for

-a feeding cover (this is what i have mostly used mine for so far. perfect for people like me who don't really want anyone seeing too much of me while i feed baby alex, it offers 360 degree cover, so my still out of shape mum tum is hidden as well as my boobs!)
-an infinity scarf
- a high chair cover
-a trolley seat cover
and



-a capsule cover.
joseph and i had our first outing with baby last week, i was still keen on keeping him rugged up seeing as he'd been unwell, so we covered his capsule which i had locked onto the pram and he was nice and safe inside

the covers come in multiple colours and styles and are so handy! definitely an awesome gift for someone who is expecting.

b, you are truly the best. very blessed to have friends like you. baby alex and i are super grateful!
check her shop out - https://zoesage.com.au/ - that's her on the home page with little miss zoe sage.
♥

general conference oct 2018

quote from elder jeffrey r. holland's talk "the ministry of reconciliation" ♥

with baby arriving and all the whirlwind surrounding it, it took me a while to watch the october general conference. being in australia, we have plenty of spoilers before we watch it a week later and wow was there a lot to take in! at this stage (blame it on the new addition to the family) i have only watched the sunday morning session, but my favourite talk was definitely the "role of the book of mormon in conversion" by elder shayne m. bowen telling the most wonderful story of conversion. it is well worth the read (or listen if you please) but here's a part of it below...

As a young missionary going to Chile, I learned a life-changing lesson about the conversion power of the Book of Mormon. Mr. Gonzalez served in a respected position in his church for many years. He had extensive religious training, including a degree in theology. He was quite proud of his biblical expertise. It was obvious to us that he was a religious scholar.

He was well aware of the missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as they went about their work in his home city of Lima, Peru. He always wanted to meet with them so that he could school them in the Bible.

One day, almost as a gift from heaven, so he thought, two missionaries stopped him in the street and asked if they could come to his home and share the scriptures with him. This was his dream come true! His prayers had been answered. Finally, he could set these misguided young boys straight. He told them that he would be delighted to have them come to his house and discuss the scriptures.

He could hardly wait for his appointment. He was ready to use the Bible to disprove their beliefs. He was confident that the Bible would clearly and articulately point out the error of their ways. The appointed night came, and the missionaries knocked on the door. He was giddy. His moment had finally arrived.

He opened the door and invited the missionaries into his home. One of the missionaries handed him a blue book and bore a sincere testimony that he knew the book contained the word of God. The second missionary added his powerful testimony of the book, testifying that it had been translated by a modern prophet of God named Joseph Smith and that it taught of Christ. The missionaries excused themselves and left his home.

Mr. Gonzalez was so disappointed. But he opened the book, and he started to leaf through its pages. He read the first page. He read page after page after page and didn’t stop until late into the afternoon of the next day. He read the whole book and knew that it was true. He knew what he had to do. He called the missionaries, received the lessons, and gave up the life he had known to become a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

part of the conference was the huge announcment, that our 3 hour church block will now be reduced to 2 hours as of january 1st next year. wowsers. that blew all of us away... even though there's been rumours galore about it happening for the last year or so, none of us thought it would actually happen! funny thing is, my parents branch has been running on a 2 hour program for the last few years anyway, as their branch is so small that they just didn't have the numbers to run the full thing. so... we are kind of used to it anyway - and now of course dad is making jokes about how much more righteous they are and how the rest of the world is following suit. ;)

i loved this quote from president dallin h. oaks which i think is something we would do well to remember in these times. the lord will not lead us astray and has sent good men to lead his church and guide us home.

i was especially excited to see the announcments of so many new temples, including salvador, my favourite city ever - and auckland new zealand!!

and as usual the memes were flowing fast and strong... this was the best! i was cracking up when i saw it.

general conference? simply the best!

taylor swift!

friday night was one of the most amazing nights of this seven year olds life. maddie is living a completely charmed life and it got even better due to life getting in the way for her daddy and i. dom, our friend luisa and i bought tickets to taylor swift late last year and due to me deciding to have a baby in there, who was just 8 days old at the time... doug was going to go in my place. only life reared its ugly head and he was needed elsewhere by his mum who had an important hospital appointment... so when the time ticked closer and he still hadn't made it home, madeline got to take his place. 

oh. my. word. i have never seen a more excited child in my life. she was bouncing off the walls and waiting by the front door counting the minutes until aunty dom arrived to pick her up. 

her report was that "it was amazing! i loved it all. taylor swift is the best! i did fall asleep for a few minutes, but then i was happy again afterwards." lol

i am honestly glad she had a cool experience but i'm just amazed over here that she got to! i don't think i went to my first concert until i was out of high school!! what a lucky girl. i am just super grateful for my amazing friends who took her and didn't mind one bit. 

just for laughs, here she is the following morning, on our way to ballet, looking super cool and rocking out to taylor swift in the car. ♥

thank you cookies

if you didn't already know (and seriously, if you've ever checked out my blog and haven't noticed then you must be living under a rock...) my best friend is extremely clever with pretty much everything she does. i've not had to bake a birthday cake yet for either of my kids (and just for the record, it's not because i am incapable, it's because she is much more capable than me and offers to do them!) and after specialising in cupcakes for a while, she's now making custom cookies... which are amazing! totally shameless plug, she's baked on benrua on facebook and instagram, go check her out!

i really wanted to send something to the amazing midwives and doctors that looked after us at the hospital so i made an order through her for some cookies. aren't they gorgeous?! we dropped them at the hospital this morning along with some thank you cards, my first unaccompanied expedition with joseph and baby while madeline was at school and i survived! go me! hopefully they are appreciated, cause i already know they are going to be delicious!

jen macqueen, you've done it again. ♥

**just for the record, i may have survived, but it wasn't without a call to doug and massive hysteria and almost crying... i very carefully put the parking ticket in my pocket, paid for my parking on the way out and somehow lost my ticket between the machine and the car. i spent the next 5 minutes looking for it to no avail, and in the end had to call the hospital and ask what to do! a call to the hospital security via the help! button on the carpark exit, with a very teary voice saw me out of there within seconds as they opened the boom gate remotely for me. oh my word. so much drama.**

**and a little but more, a week passed and we finally found the ticket, under my seat, it must have flown off when i shut the door on the other side to go around. ugh. what a first outing that was. thankfully i am still alive...**

first smile and first bath!

i know all the medical explanations, i know that babies "can't" smile before about the 6 week mark, i know it's supposedly wind. but look at this super cute face. he looked right at me this morning and smiled. so stuff you medicine, i am taking this, my baby smiled at me, and actually did it for so long that i managed to get a photo of it. so there. he's obviously just so happy to be home!

we also had our first bath today, now that there are no needles and tubes hanging out of his hands anymore... and he loved it!! he was so happy to be in the water and just chilled there, looking around with wide eyes while we sloshed the water around him. i have a feeling that he's going to love water as much as the other two do. he is such a little cutie. how lucky am i?

home time!

they finally let us go home today! baby alex's infection marker has continued to drop and the doctors were happy for us to continue treating it with antibiotics at home. hooray! after a stop off to the hospital pharmacy to get them we were on our way. we made it as far as mcdonalds (about 500m away) before he screamed so much that we had to stop and fill up his tummy, but eventually we made it home where nanna was waiting with a very excited joseph and madeline followed not much later from school. i am just so happy to be home!

i am generally a quite anxious person and some times are worse than others... but even though i was stuck in the hospital for the last 6 days with a newborn, who spent a lot of that time in the nursery, i was surprisingly okay. i had asked doug to give me a blessing prior to going in to be induced and although it was lovely, i didn't recall thinking at the time that much of it was for me personally, but it was. i never felt stressed, other than a brief 10 minute period the first night when alex was taken into the nursery and i didn't understand what was wrong or what was happening... and i was able to rest, have time to be alone and just spend time with my new baby, because we asked people not to visit while he was unwell. it was surprisingly a beautiful time even though i should have been beside myself and i am so grateful for the power of the priesthood, which can offer us so many blessings, big and small, for people big and small. ♥

slow and steady

at 4am this morning, baby alex's drip port was removed as it too (like the first one) was starting to fail and leak. not to worry, all his antibiotics can be administered orally from now on.

hearing test today... he passed. hooray. we are one step closer to going home. fingers crossed it happens tomorrow. i am starting to go a little stir crazy being stuck here for so long. never mind, slow and steady wins the race. this baby is well worth the waiting. 

out to the ward ♥

sunday has brought a wonderful blessing, baby alex was considered well enough to leave the nursery and come out onto the ward and share my room with me! hooray!

madeline and joseph had come for a visit with daddy and his parents, so when i was called into the nursery to feed baby, it was a wonderful surprise for us to be able to take him with us when we went back to the room. there were squeals and complete joy from madeline and big smiles from joseph as we brought him in to meet his siblings for the first time. 

it was absolutely love at first sight and these two are so pleased to have baby to cuddle and love to their hearts content. madeline is dying to play mum and i am sure she will be an amazing help to me.

big sister having her first cuddles ♥

alex my love, you are doing amazingly. i am sure we will be home before too long ♥

getting better...

still on the drip, but out of the oxygen crib!

baby woke up at 2:30am this morning and started sucking at nothing, obviously realising that food is missing... (when the drip in his hand stopped taking fluid and they had to do one into his other hand, he were without food for a little while, which explains why he got hungry)

the night nurse came and found me and asked if they could give him formula. i said of course if you really need to. however when i walked in there a few minutes later and she had been attending to one of the other babes, she said, let’s try him on the breast and he sucked happily for 40 mins, and didn’t seem too distressed afterwards. 

back into the crib he went. he had another feed at 530... and your breathing was finally down to 55 (normal range is 40-60). a blood test showed he has an infection of some description, with the infection marker at 46, which shouldn’t be above 3. thankfully as a precaution, when his breathing was accelerated they had already started him on antibiotics which they will now continue. 

maddie and joseph came to see baby through the nursery door and m was so happy she bounced up and down, then cried the whole way home because she couldn’t hold him. after feeding well throughout the day and this evening they took away his crib and put you in a regular cot! hooray!

baby was given this adorable mini quilt (pictured above), which all babies in the midland hospital special nursery receive, made by a wonderful group of volunteers. it is adorable and has been placed above the crib to block out the lights and is now keeping him warm in his cot. he's already doing so well and i am feeling very positive. it's hard not too when the nurses are so lovely and keep me so well updated on his progress. if i have to be still in the hospital, it's a very nice place to be. ♥

special care nursery

for a bit more of an explanation, baby alexander ended up in special care because he was "breathing up." a baby should be taking anywhere between 45-60 breaths per minute... alex was doing 93!! obviously this was a strain on him and he was sent to the nursery to be monitored until they could get it under control. it's likely to have happened because of the speed of his delivery, which may have left fluid in his lungs. the nurses say this is the most likely reason.

they are feeding him with a sucrose drip installed in one hand (which was swapped to the other after a few hours as the vein in his hand was collapsing, he's now got a giant bruise where it was), as his breathing sped up following him breastfeeding yesterday, so he'll get his feeds that way for now until his breathing slows a bit. they are also treating him as though he has an infection, as it's likely he has one, also from the fluid. blood tests (my poor baby now has multiple heel pricks in both heels) will show further.

but here is my sweet boy in his closed in crib. he was lying on his stomach for most of his first 24 hours, to ease the effort required to take breaths. he's very alert and looks around a lot while he is awake. i've been in to see him a lot, but the heat (a constant temperature of 27 degrees) is making me so sleepy and i can't stay in there for too long at a time.

above all else, he is doing really well. i know things will be fine, it's just a matter of time until he'll be out and in our arms. ♥

baby alexander james kendall

well, he is here! baby alexander james kendall arrived in a rush this afternoon, at 1:47pm, weighing 3550g (7lb, 8oz). he is the sweetest little babe and i am obsessed already! he has dark blue eyes and a little tuft of red hair at the back of his head... another redhead to add to our little clan! he looks very similar to madeline as a baby - and is basically a carbon copy of his daddy!

i was induced yet again, when i reached 41weeks+3days (the longest they allow you to go overdue here in wa) at midland hospital. the midwife broke my water at 12 noon and we waited. an hour passed and towards the end i was having small contractions (which i could feel), but nothing really huge enough to show well on the machine that measures them, so the midwife said she assumed the dr would ask them to start the drip which triggers them. thankfully when she arrived at the end of the hour to check in, she said she'd asked her superior and i was given permission to go another hour and see where i was at once that was over.

well... that was when the action began. i started to feel really unwell and went into the bathroom, cried for a bit to doug and then came back to the bed. then boom, it all happened at once. huge contractions began... i was fully dilated and had to start pushing. i know now, my full labour period was a very brief 17 minutes, which left all the midwives in complete shock... and my baby in the special care nursery! :(

my poor student midwife ash couldn't do anything more than watch as midwives ran about... no one expected it to happen so quickly, so much so in fact that the midwife (sam) who was looking after me had gone to have her lunch break while nothing was happening, left me with another midwife (georgia) and walked in just in time to catch the baby. my entire labour and delivery happened within that half hour period. nuts!

baby had a brief feed a while after he was born, then doug had a very short hold but his breathing began to speed up and he was taken off to the nursery to be assessed. i was feeling positive, but eventually hours later had a little cry when it was all apparent that i would not only not be taking him home the following day, but that i wouldn't even be taking him to my room. it's looking to be a long few days ahead.

this pic we snapped prior to being moved to special care is so dear to me, baby alex looks exactly like his daddy as a baby. so so cute!

being assessed in special care by the lovely midwives. they were all so amazing and reassuring. i'm so grateful we were in a good place to be cared for so well.

still pregnant...

yes, i am still pregnant. i just hit 41 weeks and it seems baby k is more than happy to stay put. i keep praying i'll go into natural labour, as i do not want to be induced again, but nothing seems to be happening. i've had my feet and ankles massaged by a very talented friend that swears i'll go into labour within three days (twice!), but still no movement from bub.

we had our appointment at the hospital yesterday and i was booked in for induction this thursday... i think i may just have to resign myself to the fact that i'll never go into labour on my own and that all of my babies are going to be removed at the convenience of the hospital. sigh. i still have 2 days during which this could happen, but as negative as it sounds, i don't like my chances... i mean it's not the end of the word, as long as he arrives safe, that's all that matters!

i must admit though, i am starting to get uncomfortable... it's starting to ache, it's hard to get up and i feel like i've doubled in size in the last week (absolutely not true as you can see from the pics) but i am still okay. being pregnant this time around has been the easiest, i haven't been sick, i haven't been too tired and the best bit, i've been able to tolerate gluten and dairy with no issues...

i guess it's all a matter of time, let's wait and see what happens, but no matter what, i guess he'll be here on thursday sometime!  can't wait to meet this little one ♥

national opshop week

for those of you that aren't in the know (as in, all you losers who haven't yet caught on to the fact that opshopping is the greatest move you'll ever make...) this week is national opshop week!! i saw this adorable little cartoon online this week and decided that would be my acknowledgement to it.

i have grown up being taught well in the school of opshopping run by my mother barbara. she is the queen of opshops and finds all the best bargains... you name it, we've found it, or can find it and we are well known for it. i think i could say quite safely that 90% of my clothes are opped - mum and i have often joked that the only things we buy new are food and underwear!

opshopping is often about the thrill of the hunt, but it is also so much more. it has enabled me to be able to afford things i may never have purchased, have a huge variety of clothes and have some awesome "opshop days" with my mum and friends. best thing is, my husband totally supports my addiction - seriously, how could he not when he's seen the amazing things i've bought home for me, the kids and even him! i love coming home and giving him a "concert" (best explanation ever, that i stole from my friend lauren, who used to say it about showing off her garage sale finds to her husband) when i've gotten some awesome stuff.

if you don't opshop, you should start... there is no time like the present to get more bang for your buck!

happy national opshop week! ♥

monopoly

with a big thanks (or should i say no thanks) to aunty emily and uncle theron, my kids suddenly have an obsession with monopoly. cue the eye rolls here... as most of you should know by now, i grew up in a house as the only girl with three older brothers, who loved to play endless games of monopoly, and cheat, which always ended with someone throwing the board. so i am an old hat at this.

today however, i have been thoroughly amused by participating in this game. normally the kids drag out the box and play it forever, buying and selling without any exchange of money (i mean seriously, what the heck?!) picking up cards, and somehow always rolling exactly the number they need (i have witnessed first hand the old "rolling" of the dice, but really placing them on the board to get the number you need)... this time they've made it a real game. mummy and daddy are supervising and playing, everyone has money and we are playing the correct rules including: all tax goes into the middle of the board for the lucky person who lands on free parking!

joseph is schooling us all, he trusted me to handle his finances and already has a stack of houses on his properties, but he's made some equally bad financial decisions, such as trading park lane to daddy, who just "happens" to own mayfair, for some basketball trading cards, which are obviously unrelated to the game. what a cheater! let's see how this ends. i'm just hoping it doesn't end with the board somewhere across the room.