Timothy John

Timothy - coming from Greek meaning to Honor God

John - coming from Hebrew meaning God is gracious 

I have always liked the name Timothy. In fact, that was my choice of name for Micah. Yet, David really wanted the name Micah, and that was fine with me.  So when we found out baby #7 was a boy, Timothy again was my name of choice. (Actually, before we even found out baby #7 was a boy, I found myself calling him baby Timmy. I guess I just kind of knew this was our baby Timothy. :D) At first, David was not too sure. But then one night before going to bed, he said that he wanted our baby to be named Timothy.  :)  

We chose John as his middle name, as we wanted him to be named after his Opa Johann (David's father), who celebrated his 62nd birthday four days after Timothy was born. The name John is also special in my family, as my grandfather was also John. So, we thought that would be the perfect middle name. And I love the meaning of the name, God is gracious. We are so in awe of the Lord that He would be so gracious in giving us another child, another son. He truly is so gracious!

The Monday (Jan. 7th) before our little Timothy was born, I bent over to help Madelynn with something, when I experienced incredible back pain. I could hardly get back up, and then to walk, sit, lay down... anything!... was extremely painful. It was obvious that I could not take care of the kiddos, so David's parents graciously came and helped out. They were wonderful!  I went to bed early Monday night trying hard not to be discouraged. I mean, I was only 6 days away from my due date, and I couldn't even move! I also knew that back pain can take a long time to recover from. I just prayed for a miracle, and reminded myself of the verse from Psalms 42:5 "Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God."

Thankfully, after spending 18 hours lying in bed on a heating pad, my back felt so much better!  Of course, it still hurt and I had to change positions and move slowly, but I was no longer in extreme pain, and I could get around and take care of my family. I was so thankful! I did my best to take it easy, and by Friday, I forgot that my back had even hurt. What a blessing! During those many hours in bed on Monday and Tuesday, I was able to rest and think a lot about our baby's upcoming birth and spend time praying. It was a blessing... in hindsight anyway. :)

Friday morning (January 11th), I had a doctor's appointment, just to make sure little baby was doing well. While they were monitoring the baby's heart beat (via CTG), they noticed that one time while I was having a contraction, the baby's heart rate dropped. This made my doctor extremely nervous, as it showed that the baby was in stress. (Personally, I believed that this was a false reading, but...)  My doctor then wanted me to go to the hospital later that evening in order to have another CTG done, checking the baby's heart, to make sure that he was o..k. 

So, Friday evening, David and I left the kiddos with Oma and Opa, and we went to the hospital together.  After several tests, everything showed that the baby was doing just fine, for which we were very thankful. The midwife also checked to see if I was at all dilated, and I wasn't. She said that it could be several days yet before I would go into labor. Great. 

Yet, after arriving home from the hospital, I began to realize that I was having contractions about every 10 minutes or so. They weren't at all painful, but I was definitely aware of them.  After putting the kids all to bed, the contractions continued to come. So, David and I decided to eat a light supper and go to bed early, just in case we would need to get up in the night. :)

Around midnight, Madelynn woke-up, and after tending to her, I went back to bed disappointed that my contractions had stopped. Yet, around 1:30am, I woke-up, realizing that I was having contractions again. At this point, they were getting a bit too intense to sleep through. So, I decided that instead of just laying in bed, I would get up and 'move around' for the next hour. If it wasn't the 'real thing', I figured that the contractions would stop. And if it was the 'real thing', then maybe it would help to get things moving a bit. 

I went downstairs and put a load of laundry in, cleaned out the fridge a bit, took out the trash, emptied the dishwasher, tidied up around the house, and ironed some clothes. During this time, I noticed that the contractions were getting closer and more painful. Finally at 3am, I decided it was time to wake-up David and get to the hospital. He quickly called his parents while I finished (or rather started... oops!) packing my hospital bag.  David's parents arrived around 3:30am, and we were out the door and on our way to the hospital. All during this time, the contractions kept coming, about 3-4 minutes apart and were getting more painful and intense. 

The big clock in the entrance of the hospital said 4am when we walked in the front doors. When we finally made our way to Labor and Delivery (I was walking quite slowly at this point and stopping often during contractions), a very friendly midwife greeted us.  Instead of doing all the checks that they normally do, she said that she first wanted to see how dilated I was. As I had already had several children, she was guessing that things would go quickly. I was surprised when she said I was already 6 cm, and she could feel the bag of waters! Yeah! 

She quickly took me to the last available room (there were lots of babies born that night!) where David and I continued to labor together. After a while, I felt the urge to push. The midwife checked me and said I was completely dilated and the baby's head was right there. So exciting!!! With the next contraction, she broke my water, and several minutes later, our baby was in my arms! It was wonderful! Our little Timothy John was born at 5:09am... just little over an hour after entering the hospital. Out of all our kiddos, his birth was definitely the easiest one for me. Perhaps it was because he was quite a bit smaller than our other babies? 

For the next several hours, I just kept saying, "oh, I'm just so happy"!  And I truly, truly am. Whenever I look at our little Timmy, I can't help but smile and feel so happy, thankful and content. I am so in love with our newest little one... we all are!  

So far, Timothy has proven to be a good baby. He is a wonderful nurser. He eats like crazy! He loves to suck, and sucks on anything! He was only 5 hours old, when he popped his little thumb into his mouth! He also takes the pacifier, which is good. He tends to get a bit fussy in the evenings, but that's pretty normal. He sleeps 4 hour stretches at night, so I am not complaining!

Oh, and he has David and Micah's adorable dimples!!!  :)

And for those of you who may be wondering, little Timmy's hips were checked, and so far they are totally fine! :)  Just to be safe though, we are wide diapering him for the next several weeks as his hips continue to grow and mature. We are so very thankful!!!

Our other kiddos seem to be doing o.k. adjusting to a baby in the house. They all love to hold him... even though taking turns can be quite difficult at times. Goodness. Little Madelynn is a bit jealous of Timmy though, especially when her beloved Papa holds him. She is definitely a daddy's girl, and doesn't like it when he holds anyone but her! 

We've just been taking this last week slow as we've been adjusting to having little Timmy here with us. David is quite busy though with studying for his upcoming exams. Yet, he helps me whenever he can, which I am thankful for. We just feel so blessed... seven precious little ones to love, nurture, and cherish. It's definitely not easy, but oh, so worth it!

Here's a little video clip which I took of Timothy while in the hospital when he was just one day old. (We tried to post this earlier, but for some reason, it wouldn't work.) Thought Grandma and Grandpa would enjoy.  :)