just stay this little

in case you all were wondering where this erratic blogger had run away to, the answer, is nowhere.
this past week, two weeks, i have been home.
but not idle.

you see, this past week, i've had my first taste of housekeeping. (funny, i accidentally spelled 'housekeeping' as 'horsekeeping'. ha. i wish).

you see, this past week, my parents have not been home. 

you see, this past week, i have been the oldest person in our home. 

you see, this past week, i have had to make sure baths were taken, meals were on time, piano lessons were attended, school was completed, sibling fights were soothed, and rooms were kept cleaned (that was the hard part). 

you see, this past week, my parents were in the hospital. 

wait, wait, lay aside all those horrid assumptions, no, ashley is not suddenly an orphan, her parents are healthy, her parents are quite alright.
in fact, they weren't even in the hospital for themselves.
they were in the hospital for this little critter.

indeed, ashley is now the older sister of 9 younger siblings. 

little Ezekiel Boaz gave us quite an interesting ride for the first week of his life outside the womb, he was born via csection (the first of us to achieve that record) and was the smallest baby at 5 pounds 11 ounces. which beats my birth weight of 6'5.  the little stinker. until him, i was the only baby born in the hospital, and i was the smallest. 

but i forgive him. 

i still achieved rank of first born.

aside from having to have his entry into the light rushed, he had a little bit of problems getting his body to work right, so he had to stay in the hospital a little longer than we thought.

and since his mummy and daddy weren't going to leave him there all alone (its a big world for such a little tyke), they stayed in the hospital, which means, guess who was left here to care for those other 8 siblings?

well, i imagine you guessed correctly, seeing how i pretty much already told you. 

it was a little rough, since we weren't able to see him, since he was in the nicu, and you are only allowed in there if you are 18+, which i'm not, much less his other siblings, so for a week, all we saw of him were pictures and videos mum and dad shared with us, and his home coming was a rather hige hooplah. 

 i laugh over the statistics that say that babies in big families don't get as much love and attention as single children. 

what utter bosh. 

little ozzy (or, oz the great and powerful...) gets more love than is probably healthy, and i have no idea how he is ever going to learn to play by himself since so many hands are willing to play with him. 

 and like every tahg baby, long feet and fingers.  

so that has been what has kept me busy, and let me say, after a week of taking care of a house hold, i am so not ready for my own house.  

but, it was totally worth it since it allowed mum and dad to stay with this cute little bundle of boy, and help him through his initial get up and go period. 

and, ozzy is totally fine now, and is so alert, and attentive. 

and i'm already marveling that a few weeks ago, i had never held him. 

seems like he has always been a part of our family.