That one time.

So there was that one time, when I was giving Miri a bath in her infant tub.


And I thought nothing of the fact that my phone was near the edge of the large bathtub.

Nothing of it as I drained the water from the infant tub.

Nothing of it, when Ezra joined us in the bathroom.

Nothing of it, until I saw the glow of my phone from just under the infant tub where the water was draining.

I put my phone in a bag of rice in an attempt to save it, but this morning, as the apple symbol cycled through, but my phone would not turn on, it was very clear it had no. To add insult to injury, the modem was out on our wireless and with Tony's construction in the basement, I couldn't find it to reset! Due to this, I head out of the house with all three kids, to drop Isaac off at preschool and to bring Ezra to my Mom's, unexpectedly. I nursed Miri there, before going to the Apple store to set up an appointment at the Genius Bar later in the day. Which meant I then went and picked up Isaac, brought him to my Mom's as well, before returning to the mall for my appointment! $200 later and I once again had a phone.

You best bet I'll think twice about having my phone near an empty tub again.

Miriam: One Month

This life. This life is the one my heart has longed to live. Miriam, your arrival brought so much peace and an overwhelming feeling of contentedness.


You took hold of your mama, literally, from the very first seconds of your life.


We're not sure what our "complete" family looks like or what God has in store for us, but the majority of the time it looks like this, with your addition.


You shook off all of my anxiety about having a daughter . . . for about 1 hour and then it came back triple fold.


You have two of the most devoted big brothers. And while they may be more accustomed to your presence now, they are enamored still the same.




You've already changed so much from when you were first born!


Within the first 6 hours, you looked spitting image of Isaac, but in some images look so similar to Ezra.


There are definitely similarities between us though, my dear daughter. Especially through your eyes and mouth.


You haven't given us too many smiles, even when sleeping, but my oh, my, when you do!


And daughter of mine, that hair! You so surprised us with that one, although in looking back at my baby pictures I had just as much, just as dark.



I, not so secretly, hope that you also share my blue eyes, but am trying to down play it.


I think I've taken a million pictures of you, especially on my phone, but how can I not when this is my view?

Love you to the moon and back, sweet girl.


Newlyborn vs One Month

My Three

Dear First Born
I've always loved you best because you made me a mama. You made me recognize something inside myself that I denied existed. You were the genesis of motherhood and opened my capacity to love selflessly, more than marriage had initiated. You anchored us, as we embraced lean, meager months due to a recession, living past our means and resulting jobs changes and insecurity. You didn't complain about our $40 grocery budget and supplied the smiles when we wanted to. You are the original model for a mom and dad who are trying to work the bugs out. 

Dear Middle Born
I've always loved you the best because from your first breath you were familiar, yet new. You cried less, wore hand-me-downs and took a nuk. You were put in the swing a lot more than your brother, but in doing so helped us relax. From the very beginning, we could tell you were tender-hearted. Your spirit is sweet and you crave intimate moments. You validated us as parents, that we really could stretch our hearts to infinite limits. 

To My Baby
I've always loved you best because you undoubtedly prove that God's plan is better than our own. You scared me more than I was willing to admit, as I never desired to have a daughter. Your pages are laid before you completely blank and I can't wait to help you fill them.  

Naming Miriam Joy

While Tony and I decided to withhold our name choice, as well as options, most friends and family knew that our short list would be limited to names of Biblibal, Hebrew or Jewish nature. My brothers and I were named this way, and Tony and I decided to do the same when naming Isaac and Ezra. That being said, we really didn't anticipate anyone guessing our names.

The criteria for a name to be added to the list was: Biblical, not too popular, not too trendy, sounded well paired with the boys and a positive meaning. With both boys we went to the hospital with 1 1/2 girl names that we agreed on, just in case there had been a mistake. The 1/2 came from me liking a name that Tony wasn't too sold on.

To be honest, naming a daughter a strong Biblical name of our criteria proved to be quite difficult! After holding onto our "just in case" name for so long, it kind of went the way of Micah for me. While I still liked it, I just didn't care for it enough to name my child.

So, much like we did with the boys, I compiled a list. The only way a name could make it's way onto the list was to be okayed by Tony, which worked great previously. Except there aren't too many names that fit our criteria. Female Biblical names are all either entirely too familiar or extremely unique, so we found ourselves working with quite a short list.

And from that short list, we were only really working with 2-3 and the 3rd seemed to vary by the day. I grew pretty frustrated with our name options, as Tony vetoed quite a few and I had expected to do what we did with Ezra, by saying the name around the house with the boys and it didn't seem to be happening.

I just couldn't get Tony all the way on board for my name choice, which was Miriam, so I opted for some outside pressure and took a gamble. As I've mentioned more than a few times, Isaac is just a little opinionated. I went out on a limb and told him our three choices: Miriam [my favorite], Elise [Tony's] and Naomi [the 3rd choice of the day]. Happily, he decisively chose Miriam. Yay! Win for me! There were two huge problems as a result however. First, Isaac pronounces the name Mariam, shortened to Mary. Additionally, he wanted to tell everyone! Due to the desire to share, most of our family heard Mariam before she was born, but we deflected the excitement by ensuring them that while Isaac had decided, we had not.

A note about Elise. I wouldn't immediately think of it as Hebrew, and it is not Biblical, but when looking up the meaning Hebrew is listed. It's a bit of a stretch, but I think it's considered Hebrew due to it's association with Elisabeth. 

As we got closer and closer to her arrival, we knew she would not be named until she was born. Once we were certain in our uncertainty, I felt a lot of peace and gave myself a goal of having her named within 6 hours of her arrival.

I prayed that her name would be immediately clear to us, like it was when Ezra was born. With her arrival and her shocking amount of hair and resemblance to the boys, I think I was a little thrown off. She just looked like her! Unfortunately, I couldn't quite figure out who that was. She wasn't named for the first 5-10 minutes. In all honesty, I'm not sure if she was named before or after we remembered that we needed to confirm she was infact a she!

Tony is the one who first brought it up. He still favored Elise, but just asked me what my thoughts were. Completely honest, I didn't assume that just because Tony had just been subjected to my birthing her that I would obviously get my name choice. I wasn't convinced she was one or the other, but still preferred Miriam and so, she was Miriam Joy.

Miriam meaning "beloved."

Joy meaning JOY! With both boys we chose family middle names and we wanted to do the same with our daughter. Joy was our forerunner from the beginning, first because it is Tony's sister's middle name and secondly, it is my third middle name. Yup, third middle name, as my Dad always called me Leah Marie Princess Joy.

Unlike with the boys, we jumped right into using a nickname with Miriam, shortening it to Miri. It's pronounced Meeri, with a sound like mirror. We call her Miriam, Miri and Miri Joy as we often call the boys Isaac Levi and Ezra John, even when not in trouble. ;)

We absolutely adore how fitting her name is and can't wait to see God's plans for our little girl!

MishMash

I'm tired.

It's a good tired, but tired nonetheless.

Everyone always asks if Miri's a good baby. How she sleeps. How she eats.

Every time I'm asked, I forget these are the regular questions, because I rarely think about the answers. I've definitely taken for granted that she is a good baby, that she sleeps in fairly regular chunks of 3 hours at night and that she latched well from the beginning.

I have friends that spoke with extreme trepidation when I was pregnant with Miriam, about the logistics of three children and that absolute understanding that I would always be overwhelmed. It's probably for the best, but I didn't think about it that way when I was pregnant.

I'm tired, but at least 95% of the time, I'm also loving this.

There are periods of being overwhelmed, obviously, but they are short lived, thankfully.

At this point, with a preschooler, toddler and newborn, I think that the transition from 1-2 children was hardest. From 0-1 children was the biggest and 2-3 well, it's to be determined. I just remember 1-2 being the most difficult, when Tony and I were out and about a week after Ezra was born and Tony was so frustrated to have to constantly be "on." We were used to tag teaming Isaac and I was down for the count, being responsible for Ezra. There was no rest for Tony, no sharing time to socialize.

This time there have been situations where I asked Tony if he felt like the boys seemed to multiply when we are in public, because, seriously, they can just be all over the place! But really, we're loving this beginning to our family of five.

Somedays, I feel like supermom, when I take all three grocery shopping and leave the store without a scene! And others, like today when we went to the park and Isaac screamed at me, that I certainly don't.

I'm thoroughly enjoying this time at home though. I'm not caught up on editing personal photos and even got to shoot a newborn session already, but I'm essentially living life. After running a business, working full time and being a mother to first one son and then two, I barely knew how to handle myself in down moments. And then I remember, this is when the laundry gets done or the dishes, opposed to not having the time and daily tasks slip away into weekly or worse.