Christmas Day!

OK, here's a hodge-podge of pictures from this morning--it's been a quiet but hectic morning--Santa was so good to all of us, and it's hard to decide what to play with! The Barbie styling head is a hit, all of the transformer stuff is a hit, and Craig's favorite toys are the remote control cars. This afternoon we're going to make our bird feeder, and play with our rock tumbler. Enjoy the photos, and send some of your own!

Wishing you peace and love today and all days--

The Wheelers

Matthew James Wheeler

Matthew's birth

OK, seriously? Why in the world would ANYONE tell a woman she could

labor in the water but she'll have to get out of the tub in order to

deliver the baby? After having three kids now with no drugs,

I have to say Matthew's was definitely the easiest, least painful, the

fastest and most gentle birth I've had. I've always had a thing about

water with these blessingway beads and whatnot, instinctively I was

onto something. So, Craig and I spent Sunday morning making three gigantic batches of

pasta sauce (his idea, not mine, although we had a lot of fun). Then,

a babysitter came over and kept the kids while we saw the new James

Bond movie and then went to World Market and stocked our wine fridge

for the holidays--so much fun! We got home just in time to pick up

the kids and go to 5:00 mass (I had a REALLY painful "braxton-hicks" contraction in the car on the way, but didn't think anything of it since I've been having them for about a

month now.) By the way, the readings were about the ideal wife

(Proverbs 31, one of my favorites) and another one was about Him

coming suddenly and without warning, as do labor pains upon a pregnant

woman--I really should learn to be still and listen....LOLOLOL It's

just so hard when Michael is literally holding his own hot wheels

demolition derby in the middle of the floor at the back of the

church.....LOLOLOLOL

So, after mass we came home, had pasta for dinner and I decided I HAD

to go to Harris Teeter for a few things. An hour later, I was leaving

HT having purchased $225 worth of groceries for $125, the savings for

which the manager had to come and approve my purchase (score--never

won that big before at the grocery game). I came home, went in and

said goodnight to Meghan, then came downstairs to put away groceries

with Craig. My water broke then in the kitchen--so he helped me to

the bathroom and we called Christine, my doula. After talking with

her about what happened, she assured us this was it, and she'd be over in a

little bit. Then we called Stephanie, my midwife, and she was on

her way too. I sat on a yoga ball and stayed there for a little while once

Christine got there. Contractions started getting a little more intense, so Christine suggested I walk into my bedroom and let her do some counter pressure on my back. I was leaning on my

dresser, staring at my labor necklace from the blessingway, a picture

of Meghan and Michael and Matthew's ultrasound picture. Man, that's

one of my favorite moments of the whole night--the visual reminder of

my friends' prayers and well wishes, and the three beautiful human

beings in my life because of the whole labor process. Talk about

mental fortification! :) Once the contractions seemed to be coming pretty hard, Christine

suggested I get in the tub (worth every dollar). Craig ran the bath

for me, and once I was in the water, the contractions didn't slow

down, but it was like turning the volume button down on the pain.

Christine and Craig were making me laugh, the cats kept coming in to

check on me, and the whole time, Meghan and Michael were sleeping

blissfully upstairs. The whole thing was so peaceful!

Stephanie arrived at some point, but I can't recall at which point in

this story, since I was pretty well internally focused by then. I do

know I got out of the tub at one point and had a contraction or two

out of the water that would have sent me running back to the water if

I hadn't been doubled over in pain. Once I WAS back in the water, I

didn't have any pain that intense until Matthew was coming. Craig and

Christine both told me that he didn't think I was as far along as I

was compared to our other children's births--he said the first time I

had any difficulty breathing through a contraction was the one that

brought Stephanie in to catch the baby! I remember asking him to

start reading the labor letters from the blessingway to me, and

delivering Matthew pretty soon after that. It was beautiful--and everything I'd hoped for. Honestly, it was so stress-free that it was almost a "non-event--" nothing stressful,

nothing annoying, it just was. My bathroom, my bed, my food, my

things, my THING. And then, our son. And then, at 7 AM, our family.

The way it's supposed to be. Until school started and thankfully it

was just Craig and Matthew and me again until 1 pm. :)

Merry Christmas!!!

Hello, friends and family! Sorry I haven't updated this page in such a long time, but we've been kind of busy, with moving, getting settled and having a baby and all. LOLOLOLOL So, I'm going to post a bunch of pictures, and I won't write a long missive as I tend to do.....hopefully you'll get the gist of what we're up to from the pictures, cuz' I'll be off to nurse a baby pretty soon!

OH! We named him Matthew James Wheeler, born on 11/16/2008 at 11:47 PM in our new home.

This election....posted by Craig

Kelley and I were talking about the election last night and it looks like Kelley and I are on opposite sides of the fence for the first time ever on a national election. In about 2 minutes the conversation got a little heated when the hot topic de jour came up- Sarah Palin (of course!). Kelley finds Sarah to be someone she can identify with and they hold similar positions on life issues. Kelley made some really good points:

• Palin lived her convictions when the chips were down (pre-natal diagnosis of Downs Syndrome).
• As a candidate she is facing criticism that men in similar positions would not face.
• Palin has a real track record as a reformer.

I agree with Kelley on all three points. However, for me, the nomination of Sarah Palin was a negative for the McCain campaign. In my eyes Sarah Palin is a small town mayor and a governor of a sparsely populated state that is vastly different from the rest of the US. Alaska just doesn’t face the same issues as the rest of America:

• Alaska’s economy is based on Oil/Gas, tourism and the US military.
• Alaska has almost no urban areas to speak of.
• The population demographics are totally different from the remainder of the U.S.
• Alaska is largely a harsh, unforgiving wilderness. They have bounties for wolves there.
• Many people still hunt and fish for sustenance.

None of these facts are good or bad, but they do illustrate just how different Alaska is from the rest of the US. I do not feel that her experience is sufficient to warrant appointment to the second highest office in the land. The people of Alaska feel she’s been a good governor. She is a very successful person. However, there are questions that need to be answered: what experience or knowledge does Sarah Palin possess about immigration, global economic issues, financial markets, oil/gas from the DEMAND side, social security or health care? I fear that her appointment was simply based on winning the election and not on who would enhance the ability of the McCain administration to govern effectively. If we set aside her admirable position on life issues what remains? If we conducted an objective assessment of qualifications where would Sarah Palin rank? If we limit the pool to women would she rank ahead of Liddy Dole, Olympia Snow, Christine Todd Whitman or Meg Whitman? Are we being pandered to?
I’m pretty discouraged from what I have heard so far. Albert Einstein once said that things should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler. Is “drill baby drill!” a good assessment of our energy issues and the proper response? Sounds a bit like “4 legs good, 2 legs baaaad.” Abstinence only sex education sounds fantastic, but the results show it doesn’t work. Teaching evangelical Christian creationism in the classroom next to evolutionary theory is, in my opinion, totally inappropriate. Why don’t we teach the creation stories of all faiths? And don’t tell me evolution is only a “theory”- in scientific usage “theory” is a very strong term (Gravity is a theory as well). “War on Terror” sounds good- very catchy. FDR said the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. We’re at war with an emotion; a disembodied amorphous concept that can be bent and shaped to whatever someone wants it to be. We’re getting sound bites and fluff from the McCain-Palin campaign. Was anyone outraged over “lipstick on a pig” before we were told to be? Does anyone know the context of that remark? We get jingles and symbols; catch phrases that stick in the head but lack any real significance when issues are looked at in depth. How many dumb emails have we gotten about who is or isn’t wearing flag pins, the Pledge of Allegiance, and Obama=Muslim? I was hopeful that McCain, a guy who has always walked to the beat of his drummer) would being depth to this campaign but we’re only getting more of the same.
Over the past eight years I’ve soured on the Republican Party. Too many substantive issues have been ignored, minimized or swept under the rug. Too many appointments have smacked of nepotism. We’re embroiled in two overseas conflicts; one seems similar to the colonial expansions of yesteryear while the other, the fully justified war to overthrow a dangerous and oppressive Taliban regime, drags on and on without enough troops, support or focus to finish. Executive privilege has become a catch-all bucket designed to excuse the president from answering for his actions. Erosion of privacy continues unabated. We’ve imprisoned people without charge. We torture people – read up on water boarding and tell me it’s not torture. If that doesn’t work we’re happy to turn a prisoner over to even more unscrupulous regimes for nastier treatment. Habeas Corpus seems to have been suspended without us even realizing it in the name of keeping us safe. Oil prices have soared through the roof. Our credit markets are a mess. Are we in a recession? Who knows?!?- We keep changing the rules on how we calculate growth and inflation. The only people who seem to be benefiting from this administration’s economic policies are Bush/Cheney cronies. Look at Halliburton and Exxon Mobil against the DJI over the past 5 years- how convenient.

I’m an independent who has never failed to vote Republican in a national election. Things will change this time around unless McCain & Palin do a few things:
Prove they aren’t going to be the third iteration of Bush-Cheney
Start outlining some concrete plans that are rational, not emotional, responses to our issues.
Divorce themselves from the sound-bite politics of the lowest common denominator

I’m not saying Barack Obama is the better candidate yet, but I’m darn dissatisfied with what the Republicans are serving up.

OK--what are we up to?

Alright--after a Wheeler family vacation with Ann & Pete and all the grandkids (the parents were invited to come too) to DisneyWorld, Meghan started Kindergarten at St. Gabriel Catholic School. It was so cute to watch her put on the uniform and head off to "the big school"--my girl can take a thing or two seriously once in awhile! Luckily, some of her girls from preschool were also assigned to her class, and it's been smooth sailing! This week, Meghan got pulled out of class into the LEAP program for her reading lessons--good thing since she's already finished the Junie B. Jones series and is almost done with ALL of the Magic Tree House books! Kindergarten is now going at Meghan's pace, and to quote her, "Mommy, I never want to leave Kindergarten!"

Michael started in the Young 4s class this year at his preschool--and true to form, he's got all of the ladies eating out of his hands. Seriously--what is it about this kid that makes all women swoon? Even as he's turning over a chair and figuring out how a toy USED TO BE put together, the lady in charge will inevitably be gushing over how sweet and how cute he is.....

Baby #3 (We just cannot decide upon a name) is doing great and is keeping Momma up at night with his gymnastics--he's already claimed his place in the pecking order by kicking Meghan in the ear and knocking off Michael's book and letting them know HE'S HERE!!!! He's his most active right when I'm trying to sleep and also when he hears big bro and big sis acting rowdy and making noise. He's going to fit right in!

Speaking of baby #3, ok, it looks like we're going to be in our house before he makes his appearance after all. That's all I'm going to say right now, and hopefully everyone is knocking on wood after merely reading those words. :)

By the way, did I mention that Craig's finished his MBA?????

If I'd known how easy this was....

Thanks to my friend, Sandy, for encouraging me to start a blog. I've always dreamt of writing a book, but this seems a whole lot simpler and a lot more do-able! Here goes.....